Post by Robert Berry on Oct 25, 2009 8:55:01 GMT -5
Andrew saw his first King Salmon (after three other dives in the river this year and nothing spotted). It swam right under him. We surfaced and he was excited and said "Look Dad, did you see it?" Yep, I saw it. We saw what looked like a female salmon after that; but, may have been a large steelhead trout. That fish swam by us fairly fast.
Usually this time of the year there are around 500 or so salmon still in the river. There were no salmon anywhere in the fish ladder. There was a tour bus there and I told one guy to go to www.myspace.com/scubadiverbob and look on the blogs and pictures and he could see what it was like three years ago. At least when Andrew gets older and his kids ask what the salmon looked like he will have pictures to show them.
The Fall Salmon Run goes until about the middle of November. I really miss the salmon. Now that they are almost extinct it sort of messes up one of my favorite dive sites. The Feather River salmon are almost extinct; the next two years will tell if they are extinct. It's in there genes to go up the river their ancestors spawned in. Biologist have also found iron in some of their brain cells, that act appearently like magnets, that guide them all the way around the Pacific Ocean and back to their ancestral spawning grounds. It's like interesting to study about.
Well, since there weren't many salmon for Andrew to see, I worked a little on using a compass with him, the Fish Barrier Dam is due North from where we enter the water and when you head back it is South. If your under water and go East or West you'll end up on one of the river banks.
Then I took him up and under the Fish Barrier Dam and he got to experience how to use the Dam to push him downstream to the entry point; he thought that was fun!. I told him just inflate his BC on the surface and he told all the people watching us "Now I get a free ride back".
I'll add pictures when I get them developed (the only disadvantage to using a Nikonos over digital).
Usually this time of the year there are around 500 or so salmon still in the river. There were no salmon anywhere in the fish ladder. There was a tour bus there and I told one guy to go to www.myspace.com/scubadiverbob and look on the blogs and pictures and he could see what it was like three years ago. At least when Andrew gets older and his kids ask what the salmon looked like he will have pictures to show them.
The Fall Salmon Run goes until about the middle of November. I really miss the salmon. Now that they are almost extinct it sort of messes up one of my favorite dive sites. The Feather River salmon are almost extinct; the next two years will tell if they are extinct. It's in there genes to go up the river their ancestors spawned in. Biologist have also found iron in some of their brain cells, that act appearently like magnets, that guide them all the way around the Pacific Ocean and back to their ancestral spawning grounds. It's like interesting to study about.
Well, since there weren't many salmon for Andrew to see, I worked a little on using a compass with him, the Fish Barrier Dam is due North from where we enter the water and when you head back it is South. If your under water and go East or West you'll end up on one of the river banks.
Then I took him up and under the Fish Barrier Dam and he got to experience how to use the Dam to push him downstream to the entry point; he thought that was fun!. I told him just inflate his BC on the surface and he told all the people watching us "Now I get a free ride back".
I'll add pictures when I get them developed (the only disadvantage to using a Nikonos over digital).