July 31, 2002

To those interested in the populations of Wild Summer Steelhead holding in Big Bend Pool, Hello. Sis and I hope this finds you all well in body and spirit.

The steelhead came into upper Steamboat Creek early this year. On the 14th of June, there were five fish in the pool in the morning and 27 fish by the end of the day with more than 100 fish by the end of the month, including three spring Chinook. The average over the last few years has been 0-16 fish by the end of June. This year is something different. As of yesterday, there are approximately 235 steelhead in the pool (and four Chinook). The high count for the end of July, which was in 1999, is 107 steelhead.

The larger numbers of steelhead in the pool may represent change in the way steelhead hold in this part of Steamboat Creek. Surveys of the holes between Steamboat Falls and Big Bend Pool show that early season fish are not holding in them in as large numbers as usual. This was true in 1999 too.

While the snow pack was reputedly much closer to normal this last winter, the creek is behaving about like it did last year - THE GREAT DROUGHT YEAR!!!! Does the upper end of the Steamboat Creek Basin not have enough elevation to keep snow on a near-normal year? Is our concept of what a drought is a relative thing (of course)? Is it based on what we hear the TV, the radio, and newspaper whipping up a furor about? In the late afternoon about two weeks ago, Steamboat Creek arrived at 80°. This is one day later than it did last year. The temperature has fluctuated since that time, often becoming hotter than 75°, the incipient lethal temperature of steelhead. As of yesterday, the creek was within half an inch of what it was last year at the end of July.

The condition of the fish, however, is quite different this year. For all that it was the great drought year last year, the steelhead were in good to excellent condition - to the eye anyway. This year a higher proportion of the fish are notably scraped up. The reason for this is unknown, but may have to do with the extremely heavy sport fishery for hatchery spring chinook below the fly water? Fortunately, residence in Big Bend Pool seems to stand a good chance of healing fungussed and otherwise damaged fish.

Is the great drought year yet to come? Of course.

FIRES

During a series of very hot days a couple weeks ago, there was an afternoon and evening of dry lightning which started more than 100 fires in the Umpqua Basin (main Umpqua, North and South Umpqua, and Cow Creek). One of these fires was on Johnson Butte, about two miles as the heron flies north of the pool. This was a low priority fire and it was several days before a crew was assigned to it ... which was as it should be.

From the first day following the start of the fire, the steelhead in the pool began to jump in earnest. Prior to this, on a day with a lot of jumps, there would be maybe 100 to 150 leaps. Since the start of the fire, there have been 300 to 500 leaps a day. The jumps are not continuous, but occur in flurries.

Jumping of this type - generally quite high with a pause at the top and a belly or a tail-flop landing--seems to be what the fish do when they are looking around at the lay of the world above the pool. Jumps like this are perhaps the lowest intensity of the stress responses and, normally, are likely to happen if people come down into the viewing area or a deer is crossing up creek or sometimes if mergansers are approaching the pool. What were the steelhead responding too? The fire was approaching the South Fork of Cedar Creek, a tributary of a tributary that enters Steamboat Creek about three miles upstream from the pool. The fire was certainly raining ash into Cedar Creek and, indeed, even at the pool, ash, though uncommon, was falling from the air and there was some smoke in the air throughout the upper basin. Given that these fish follow traces of elements entering the ocean to more than 150 miles upstream to arrive at this pool, it seems quite possible that the Johnson Butte fire was leaving its trace element signature on the water flowing into the pool.

A thing to bear in mind while thinking about fires and fish is that Steamboat Creek must have burned to the water line in places or even throughout the basin hundreds of time during the thousands of generations that summer steelhead populations have been holding in Big Bend Pool. Fires are a regular part of the natural world and, like otters, probably make the fish stronger, that is, since fire is one of the many cycles of nature that have marked the balance of the time summer steelhead have been holding in upper Steamboat Creek, it is probably one of the environmental changes which have left their mark on the resilient adaptive gene pools of the wild local fish.

POACHING

Since the beginning of July, I have found fishing line and lots of boot prints, including either hobnailed boots or studded wading shoe prints, at the hole that is poached the most along the creek up here. Don F., the senior OSP patrolman for the North Umpqua, when he stopped in early in the month, told me that he had observed two campers with rigged fishing poles in detached campgrounds in the upper basin. I have seen another. Over the weekend of the fourth, two different visitors to the pool told me that they had seen people fishing in this upper portion Steamboat Creek. Unfortunately, the fishing observed was on days previous to when I was told about it

LOCAL BREEDING POPULATIONS

Finally, within the last few days it has quite belatedly occurred to me that the fish holding in Big Bend Pool for the spring, summer, and fall do not comprise a single deme, or local breeding population. There are undoubtedly separated demes for each of the tributaries of Steamboat Creek and for Steamboat Creek itself. There are demes of wild summer steelhead minimally from Big Bend Creek, Cedar Creek, Little Rock Creek, City Creek, Horse Heaven Creek, Steamboat Creek itself, the East Fork of Steamboat Creek, all of which local breeding populations probably have representatives in Big Bend Pool during the low water and warm water time of the year.

One of the consequences of this is that, should a serious poaching event occur at the pool, even with fish left in the pool, one of these local breeding populations may be dealt a quite serious setback. Likewise, if five or six hatchery fish end up in one tributary, then there may be a serious loss of adaptive resilience in that deme. Previous to this, I have characterized hatchery fish as ticking sticks of slow dynamite.