Last week Thursday, my girlfriend, her two sons, and I decided to take the 45 minute drive out to the Shuswap to view the Salmon Run. There’s been a lot of hype about the run this year, and I didn’t want to miss out. The last time I went, my kids were all school age. It’s been a while!
The sockeye salmon run happens over a 4 year cycle, fish returning every year to the place they had started out as fertilized eggs. The peak year is generally estimated to be about 3-4 million fish. This year, for unknown reasons, and very unexpectedly, estimates rose to 10-15 million! Not sure if that’s an overly generous prediction or not. Regardless, the walk along the Adams River was not disappointing.
Many once blue-gray but now crimson females were completing the final stages of their journey – laying eggs. They had been undaunted, escaping predators, traveling 30 km per day – against the currents, finally arriving at their destination. The males were pairing up with females, fighting off competitors (lots of splashing about in the shallow waters), ready to fertilize the newly laid eggs.
We viewed hundreds of fish only a few feet from where we were standing. Swimming, splashing, laying, dying, dead, rotting. Smelly.
If you get the chance to see this, take it. Truly amazing, the life cycle of a Sockeye Salmon.
More info: http://www.bcadventure.com/murphys/adamsriver/salute.htm
We went awhile ago...before there were very many dead rotting fish.
ReplyDeleteIt is too bad you can't insert "scratch and sniff" buttons on posts so your readers who haven't been out could get a sense of the understatement in your description of it being "smelly." :-)
ReplyDeletewell, those dead fish photos and the description of the smell don't exactly make me want to drive over there to see it, but I'll take your word for it!
ReplyDelete