Smolt trapping on Snow Creek

This morning the crew got to help WDFW with counting out migrating smolts.

Cheri Scalf (WDFW) who is very much loved by our crew, let the crew come help for a morning of monitoring.  She and Fred Bailey (Super volunteer) are nice enough to teach the crew each year how this process works and let us take part for a day.  It is always a crew favorite.  Plus we get Cheri's cookies.

1st Dylan and Robbie seined the pond in front of the fish weir. 

The smolts in this ponded area of the creek were seined into a box like trap that is part of the weir.

Then we sent Elijah and Dylan into the trap and handed down the nets.

Then their job was to net the smolts and pass them up to us.

Kori, Rick and Robbie were waiting up top to transfer the smolts to a holding tank.

As we got fish into the tank then they need identified and sized.

The crew would net them and shout numbers and size out.

The smolts would then be transferred to a 5 gallon bucket then returned to the creek.

Cheri would then send the fish down a big pipe back into the creek downstream of the trap.  It is a very fun event for us each year.  If you'd like to try it some time, comment and this post and we'll link you up with Cheri.

Near Shore Clean up at Discovery Bay

We spent yesterday and today working on WDFW land in Discovery Bay.  This land is referred to by the salmon coaltion as the Maynard property.  Maynard was a former landowner.  Many restoration projects have occurred in this area in the last 15 years.  Salmon Creek and Snow Creek both empty into the bay here.  We are here taking care of small loose ends as part of the next large project. The next large project is the removal of several portions of the old railroad grade which constricts the tidal prism.  This creates habitat that is less than ideal for endangered summer chum because it takes away the shallows.  These shallow areas are shelter and forage locations for juvenile salmonids. You can read more details about this project here Discovery Bay railroad grade removal details

The crew's job was to salvage sheet metal roofing from an old mill building as well as remove scotch broom and Ivy from several different key locations.

 

 

These roof panels will later be repurposed for interpretive sign kiosks.

The crew pulled and piled a very large amount of ivy and scotch broom as well.  The crew hand pulled these plantrs in areas that the machines will not be accessing during the construction phase of the railroad grade removal.

Here is Kori standing next one of the crew's piles of ivy that we pulled behind the mill building.

No that is not a stick.  That is one of the mature ivy vines thast Robbie pulled.

We found some vandalism at a nearby older site while we were in the area.  Someone had pulled several mature willow trees out.  Fortunately, willow are quite hardy.  We replanted them and pulled all the scotch broom in this area as well.

Above you see rick standing in a field of scotch broom.

Here you can see there is significantly less scotch broom.  We enjoyed the list of odd jobs we got on this 2 day stint.  We'll check in again soon.

Oh, we also may have a new record for ivy diameter.  We're talkin old growth here.