An epic run

Smith’s Chinook numbers are the highest in decades

One of the numerous salmon returning to the Smith River this week makes a direct hit on a concrete block near Rowdy Creek Fish Hatchery. Observers say the number of returning fish is the highest in decades. See coverage on Page B1 and still more images at triplicate.com/photos. (The Daily Triplicate/Bryant Anderson)

The basin’s rivers and creeks are so full that in some spots it seems like a dexterous person could walk across the backs of fish from one side to the other.

The spectacle was at its best at the Rowdy Creek Fish Hatchery early Tuesday evening.

As the sun set, huge salmon sporting the dark skin and white patches indicative of the end of their life cycle were hurling themselves out of the water trying to make it over a 6-foot concrete apron that dams the creek in front of the hatchery.

All three of the bottom photos depict salmon trying to clear an obstacle at the hatchery with varying degrees of success. (The Daily Triplicate/Bryant Anderson)

The resounding smack of their bodies hitting the concrete at the top of the apron left little doubt as to why running upstream to spawn ends up being the last major effort of their long traveling lives.

“I think this is the best year since the hatchery’s been open,” said Fish Technician Steve McCown. “We’ve been breaking records right and left.”

And McCown would know.

Each year the hatchery counts nearly 95 percent of the fish that forge their way up the Smith River’s Rowdy Creek tributary, and this year’s numbers are astronomically higher than any year in decades.

(The Daily Triplicate/Bryant Anderson)

According to the hatchery’s running totals, the difference between last year’s numbers and this year’s is staggering, said hatchery director Andy Van Scoyk.

“Last year we had 52 adult males, 44 adult females and 154 jacks (2-year olds),” Van Scoyk said. “This year we’ve counted 879 males, 902 females and 545 jacks.”

Rowdy Creek isn’t the only Smith River tributary to see unusually high returns.

Rod McCleod, a fisheries biologist who currently monitors Mill Creek, said that the returns this year are the highest Mill Creek has seen since record-keeping began nearly 17 years ago.

“We are 40 percent higher right now than we’ve ever seen for a whole season,” McCleod said. “And the season isn’t over, we’re going to be getting a lot more fish.”

The reason more fish are on the way is due to nearly two weeks of dry and extremely cold weather early in the month, that dropped river flow rates to the point where it stranded large amounts of spawning salmon in lower holes of both the Smith and its tributaries.

“Despite the dry spell, there was enough rain early in the run that a good number of fish were able to make it into the tributaries to spawn,” McCleod said. “There’s so many that there’s more than enough to seed the system.”

McCleod said that it’s hard to know what caused the sudden jump in numbers, due to all the variables involved, but he felt that a major contributing factor was favorable ocean conditions.

“Fishery management is definitely helping,” McCleod said. “But mostly it has to do with favorable ocean conditions. You can assume that because there are just so many fish.”

Normally salmon run in cycles, a number of bad years followed by years of higher returns.

The difference this year is that the numbers are so much higher, which leads McCleod to believe that this isn’t just a cyclically based jump in numbers.

According to Van Scoyk, local fishermen have been taking advantage of the larger numbers and prolonged season.

“Some guys are pulling nearly 10 or 15 fish a day out of some of those holes,” Van Scoyk said. “Most of them aren’t a good color though, so they aren’t good for eating.”

The Smith River Basin’s success story did not extend to the Klamath this year, according to local guide Jim Burn.

“The Klamath was pretty good this  year but nothing like the Smith,” Burn said. “There was some good fishing, but we are pulling a ton more fish each day on the Smith than we did on the Klamath.”

(The Daily Triplicate/Bryant Anderson)