An Illinois native, I just moved to Marin County, California for an 11 month AmeriCorps internship with SPAWN, a watershed protection non-profit. I've lived my whole life in Illinois and am absolutely a midwesterner, so this is a new phase of my life and a huge adventure for me. Read on!
Federal officials have indicated that they are likely to close the Pacific salmon fishery from northern Oregon to the Mexican border because of the collapse of crucial stocks in California’s major watershed.
That would be the most extensive closing on the West Coast since the federal government started regulating fisheries.
“By far the biggest,” said Dave Bitts, a commercial fisherman from Eureka, Calif., who is at a weeklong meeting of the Pacific Coast Fisheries Management Council in Sacramento.
“The Central Valley fall Chinook salmon are in the worst condition since records began to be kept,” Robert Lohn, regional administrator for the National Marine Fisheries Service in Portland, Ore., said Wednesday in an interview. “This is the largest collapse of salmon stocks in 40 years.”
Although the Washington and Alaska fisheries are not affected, the California and Oregon ones produce “some of the most valuable fish, ones that are prized from West Coast seaports all the way to East Coast restaurants,” Mr. Lohn said.
The effect on salmon prices is not clear. Mr. Bitts said the effects on commercial and sport fishermen and their communities could run to millions of dollars.
On Wednesday the council closed several minor short-term fishing seasons off California and Oregon in connection with the salmon shortfall.
Counts of young salmon, whose numbers have dwindled sharply for two years, were the first major indication of the problem. The number of fish that survive more than a year in the ocean, or jacks, is a marker for the abundance of full-grown salmon the next year. The 2007 count of the fall Chinook jacks from the Sacramento River was less than 6 percent of the long-term average, Mr. Lohn said.
The Central Valley salmon runs are concentrated in the Sacramento River, the focus of a water struggle between farmers and irrigation districts on one hand and environmental groups and fishermen on the other.
Three years ago, some conservation groups challenged in federal court an advisory opinion by federal fisheries managers that let federal and state officials increase the water drawn from the Sacramento River Delta for farmers in the San Joaquin Valley and cities in Southern California.
The opinion by the National Marine Fisheries Service said the increase would not harm the three salmon species protected under the Endangered Species Act. The fall Chinook salmon were not under the act.
John McManus, a spokesman for Earthjustice, the group handling the suit, said lawyers in the case had been told that the judge would rule by the end of March.
Federal scientists reported this month that abnormal ocean conditions might be affecting the food chain of young salmon.
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It's pretty exciting. We're going to Sacramento tomorrow; I couldn't go Tuesday because we had to teach in a second grade classroom.
In other news, I moved from the Mission District to SOMA (about 15 blocks, into a 'hood that doesn't really have a neighborhood feel. Like, I don't think it's appropriate to call it a "neighborhood". I live in an "area"). The day after I moved my car was broken into, again, right by my old place. Same window. One block away. "Thanks for leaving our neighborhood, bitch" I think is what it was saying...
I've been very, very bad at updating this blog. I like to blame some of the problem on a lack of (home) internet during 3 weeks of July, and my computer's wifi capability (or card?) breaking down, thus requiring me to plug directly into the line when I'm at home which isn't terribly convenient. The other, more realistic reason is lack of motivation.
But enough with excuses, on with adventures!
So what's happened to me since late June? Well, a lot of stuff. In July, this 25-foot steel and fiberglass salmon visited SPAWN on it's journey around the West, garnering support for removal of the four lower dams on the Snake River, one of Save Our Wild Salmon's campaigns. This is a video stolen from the blog of the trip, condensing the trip into about a minute. I'm actually in the movie - the shot of the "It Takes a Valley to Raise a Salmon" is from our float at the 4th of July parade in Woodacre, and I'm the one in the big sunglasses escaping the camera (and handing candy to kids) right before the video moves on.
The thing was hollow and the interior was painted with the life cycle and some other cool stuff, but honestly I didn't explore the interior because a) it was really hot on the 4th and I didn't want to be in an oven very long; b) on the 3rd I was wearing a skirt and wasn't about to climb up; and c) I don't like those kinds of confined spaces.
Fin is the salmon's name
Paola, Heidi, me.
Heidi inside
The hottest day I've felt here thus far - in the 90's (yet still not as muggy as the Midwest)
It was exciting to connect with salmon folks working on a larger scale issue - SPAWN is focused on a small watershed in West Marin, really, the San Geronimo Sub-Watershed of the Lagunitas Watershed. While our salmon population is crucial and the creeks hold the largest wild run of wild coho, the amount of people directly benefiting financially from them is small. The fish in the Snake are, yes, still endangered and thus not fished, but by removing the dams and restoring the fishery, jobs will be created - both in restoration and monitoring, but also in commercial and recreational fishing. I've never worked on an environmental project that made sense even when you ignore environmental impacts.
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Heidi and I held our Independent Service Project in July as well; pictures will be on Flickr, eventually. I promise I'll post those soon and then post here to let you know. Though, honestly, I doubt the pictures are exciting. We recruited volunteers to removed invasive Himalayan blackberry and English Ivy at a property on National Park Services Land, along Lagunitas Creek - a property where SPAWN's office will be moving to at the end of this month.
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Immediately after the Independent Service Project, Heidi and I trekked up north again for AmeriCorps WSP summer training. We all camped for a week near the mouth of the Klamath River, where Dick Cheney may have been responsible for a major salmon kill a few years ago. As much as these trainings wear on my quickly (by Wednesday I can usually be heard whispering to Heidi or Kristin (AmeriCorps WSP at IFR, see below) "it's Wednesday! Almost done!"), this one had some fairly kick ass moments (there is no way to more eloquently say that).
The Klamath meets the Pacific.
There were elk, bald eagles, osprey, comorants, AND GREY WHALES. I have never before seen a whale and it was awesome. I also saw an osprey catch a fish, but a) it paled in comparison to WHALES ROLLING IN THE OCEAN; and b) I told my dad and he's like "oh yeah, don't you remember seeing that when you were kids on such-and-such trip?" (I remember seeing ospreys nesting but no fish).
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So my future. I guess that's the next topic I need to discuss, since putting it off in order to write about how I'm starting to like cats (even ones that you cat-sit and that wake you up at 6 am by sitting on you) is kind of lame.
My WSP internship ends at the end of the mouth. Technically, it ends after I complete about 30 more hours, but that's 3+ days of work and there are 3 more weeks left till the end of the month. I'm planning on taking it easy, yet still working until the end.
I'm also definitely applying for another term in AmeriCorps WSP, even though it won't begin until January. My mind is still the same and I'm applying for a position at the Institute for Fisheries Resources (IFR), whose office is in the Presidio. I'm not really worried about the application (though, honestly, at this moment in time my essay question answers -- and I use the term essay loosely -- are not really up to par) or the interview. For a while I was worried about this four month period in between where I would be unemployed, but I think I've got a handle on things now. I'm working part time as a caterer on the weekends and I've been applying for other part time jobs. Since I can take lots of time off, I plan on using it to apply to restaurants and retail places in person. If I work at IFR and life in San Francisco, my rent will be significantly higher than what it is now, so I'll need a second job anyway. What's better than finding that and settling prior to starting stressful, awesome work? I don't know.
As for living situation, I'm attempting to move out of Mitch & Julie's house as soon as possible. The past 11 months here have been awesome; I really cannot say enough good things about living with them, their family, the pets, their house, the location, and on and on. However, I'm still not *really* supporting myself here. I'm also in an area with very few 20-somethings and it's getting kind of tiring. I'm ready to move on.
As I'm writing this, I got my first twang of "wait... I don't really want to leave Mitch & Julie's because I'll miss them!" For a while I knew I'd miss Lily (kitten who stalks me in the mornings and evenings and is currently curled up in the chair next to me), and maybe the sentimentalism has taken hold because I haven't been living in the house much the past 3 weeks (Klamath + cat-sitting) and thus haven't been living with 5 kids (since they are all away this week the house is quiet and empty - talk about an advantage of second marriages with ex-spouses still maintaining joint custody) (not to say I don't love the kids too - but 5 for a full week when there is no school for them is a lot).
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Today I spent the day in the San Joaquin and Central Valleys of CA touring Tuolumne River restoration sites as part of Kristin's independent service project with IFR, thus spending a large portion of the day with my potential future bosses. Like I said, I'm not too worried, though I never ever count on things like that (you never know who else might apply) and I would never not take something seriously because of it. Hilariously, Zeke (exec director) and Pietro (president) both have worked with Jean Flemma (Prairie Rivers Network!). It is truly a small world.
So that's what's been going on. As of now, I've been awake for over 20 hours today and I think it's time to go to bed. Maybe I will roll into work a little late tomorrow... hopefully literally as I want to pump some air into my borrowed bike (!also news though only exciting to me!) and take it instead of the car.
On Thursday I went to a fish hatchery to participate in Steelhead spawning.
When steelhead trout and salmon are born, they are imprinted with the smell of their home stream. So when they're out in the ocean deciding to come back to the freshwater streams to spawn, it's the smell of that stream that guides them and results in them spawning in the exact stream they are born.
So the Warm Springs Hatchery is at the head of Dry Creek (or at least, right before it's dammed off to create a lake or reservoir) and all these trout, imprinted with the smell, are just waiting to get inside, not realizing that they will herded into pools and then spawned by CA Dept of fish and game employees.
It all went down like this:
We all put on waders, rain jackets, and gloves even though we're working inside. About 150 fish are waiting in this channel, and a button is pressed and a gate starts moving from one end of the channel to our end, herding the fish into a much much smaller space, maybe 8x8? Basically, about 30 fish at a time are herded into a basket filled with water and CO2, which makes them slower. Relatively.
After about 25 or so fish have fallen into the basket, the elevator drops and the gate moves back - the fish can swim the whole channel again. Meanwhile, the trapped fish are slowly being doped, becoming more passive by the second (relatively more passive). After 4 or 5 minutes, the basket raises and dumps the fish into a counter top, where I (and two DFG employees) sort them into male and female. 3 ready females go into one bin, with more CO2'd water, and then about 7 males into the one next to it (also with spiked with CO2). The rest of the fish go down a hatch into a pool (not the channel).
Doped up or not, the fish are thrashing around wildly, and pretty big at that - 18 to 36 inches, I would guess. Big and thrashing while you're trying to sex them and grab them... Mostly I stood there trying to keep them from jumping off the table or from smacking me. My face was soaked, quickly. So were my sleeves under the raincoat. Thank god for waders and a heavy rain coat (mostly).
Anyway, so, now we have 3 females, getting more doped (again, relatively) and 7ish males. First we deal with the gals. Grab one, hold in this weird way, while another person sticks a needle in her belly, depressing it and releasing air into the belly so the orange eggs spew into a cloth-lined colander. Then the female goes into another bin where the water isn't spiked so they can recover.
I tried to hold a female like this, so that someone could get eggs out. She trashed. Too much. I dropped her. Visitors (parents with kids on spring break) were standing on a balcony above, watching, much to my embarrassment. Awesome. 36 inch female steelhead trout flapping and flipping and flopping all over the floor.
On to the males (this I could do successfully, probably because they were drugged much longer). I grabbed the guy, fin in right hand, resting his head on my left hip, running my left hand along his belly so the milt (sperm) spew out onto the washed eggs.
Then the males went down the hatch, into the pool, where the other, unused fish, went.
Back to the females. So the females' bellies are full of air and they're swimming upside down while they're recovering. They need to be grabbed, held upside down and rubbed on the belly so the air comes out, then carried over to the hatch and down they go.
But, of course, they're recovering from being drugged.
Yeah, I dropped one of these too. Embarrassing, again.
We repeated the whole thing until all 150 fish had been gone through and were back in the pool.
Once all the fish are out of the channel, thrown down the hatch, and into the holding pool, we moved them back into the channel, drug them, and then the head lady counts males and females and we move them into a truck with a water tank on the back. One of the DFG guys and I drove to the Russian River, well upstream of the Dry Creek mouth so they wouldn't get respawned that year to release them. We backed the truck up to the side of the river (we're about 20 feet above the water), attached a big metal tube to the back, then opened it up - fish went flying into the river - really - just this stream of water and fish shooting into the river.
Pretty awesome.
I have no pictures, get over it.
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The weekend before was Easter weekend, Heidi and I went to the Bring Your Own Big Wheel race down Lombard St.
A really far away picture of Lombard St. The race was down the really curvy part.
My friend Zack was racing, if you can call it that. It was a lot of people crashing into each other, into walls, it was hilarious and awesome.
This video was stolen from Tony Chang (Zack's roommate - was in grad school at UIUC while I was there, we met on the bus to the March for Women's Lives).
This week was a big mix of coho salmon related fantastic-ness. It was also super busy.
The storm Saturday night brought the flows high enough for the coho salmon to jump up the pools at the Inkwells, which I think I already wrote about.
So anyway, to continue, I suppose, the salmon run is really hot. Heidi and I have been going out a lot this past week to both look at fish and just check out the area and also do some surveying. Tuesday we took a video camera to Roy's Pools (a series of pools built so that spawners could migrate upstream, though it's a migration barrier to smolts migrating back to the ocean) to watch them jumping up the pools.
Unfortunately, by the time we got there in the afternoon they were no longer jumping every minute, but more like every 10-15 minutes. I tried to get a picture with my camera phone, but everytime they'd jump it'd be a surprise and by the time I got over the "HOLY CRAP LOOK AT THAT!!!" moment, the jump would be done. But we did catch at least one fantastic, perfect leap on the video camera.
Marjorie, the law intern, had her last day on Friday. It was sad - so on Tuesday (or possibly Mon or Wed, can't really remember) Heidi and I took her around to see the salmon, and indeed we saw lots. Marjorie works on the Sea Turtle Restoration Project/GotMercury.org project, so she doesn't have these requisite "hey we're gonna check out Lagunitas Creek today" excursions. It's so exciting - these huge fish in these streams! Their behavior is so clear - it's really easy to humanize them and get excited about what they're doing and what their objectives are while you watch them.
We went out later in the week with one of our volunteers (and because we were possibly going to do a CBS interview - didn't happen) and saw a salmon missing it's nose. It had gotten stuck while jumping through the Inkwells (a series of pools at the confluence of Lagunitas and San Geronimo Creeks) and ended up not making it - and staying in the larger creek. And he lost his nose in the process!
So, other office-y news:
Megan, our lead naturalist (who occasionally brings us delicious homemade food ever since she discovered that we were on food stamps) called into a show on NPR and mentioned our creekwalks on Tuesday, so every since then the phone's been ringing off the hooks. Heidi and I come back from outdoor excursions and we have billions of messages. I ended up hooking up with one of the creekwalks today, after our habitat restoration in the morning, because I signed up a friend of mine (yes, I have A friend in San Francisco) and his roommates. It was so packed! And we saw coho and possibly a chum salmon, so it was quite a success.
Monday Heidi and I took Marjorie (the law intern who is leaving to go back to Wisconsin and her parents while she awaits the bar exam) to an area to see them - we watched males fighting, females building redds (nests), amazing.
Yesterday Heidi and I watched them leap through Roy's Pools (a series of pools that allow the salmon migrate through in high flows and, in lower flows, act as a dam. The dam that was there before was too high for the salmon to get over)!!!
Today Paola took Heidi and I on a spawner survey - so we got decked out in our chest waders and went in the stream, walking upstream (out of the stream as much as possible) in a tiny tiny creek (literally 2-10 ft wide) for 2.5 hours looking for salmon building redds and males hanging around waiting for their gals or fighting with other males.
