Several days ago, Adele Freeland and I went out in the rain looking for salmon coming up West Hylebos Creek to spawn. We didn't see any fish in the lower creek and Adele didn't see any fish in the fish ladder behind the blueberry farm. I was standing at the top of the fish ladder, directly opposite the viewing platform at Brooklake, staring into the pool formed between the first and second levels, when I heard an enormous amount of flopping and flapping coming from my right. I turned just in time to see a huge salmon lose his battle with the current and get swept backwards into the pool I had been busy staring into. I watched him rest for a few seconds, then he appeared to make an attempt to line himself up for another assault on the top of the fish ladder, when he was inadvertently swept over the falls between the top pool and next pool down. That poor salmon was so worn out that he was actually being swept away with the current and all of his hard-fought efforts were for nothing. Sometimes we feel so sorry for these beautiful fish. They battle their way over, under, around, and through incredible obstacles in their attempt to reach their spawning grounds. Adele and I searched each and every pool and were unable to spot this valiant warrior again. He probably found himself a nice, deep, quiet pool to rest up in for a while. You can rest assured that he'll make another attempt.
Yesterday, while I was walking West Hylebos Park gathering information for my latest blogs. Adele Freeland was on the opposite side of Brooklake looking for salmon again. The first thing I saw when I opened my email was a message from Adele saying, "THEY'RE BACK!!!!!' Oh, my gosh, I was so excited that it was all I could do to sit still. Adele said the salmon were very active and the fact that I couldn't get out to look for them was just about killing me.
Mary Longhurst and I made a trip to Brooklake this afternoon to take our turn at finding salmon.
The temperature got up to 63 degs F. It was so warm out that we didn't even need to wear jackets! The sky was bright blue and the water in Brooklake was just like a mirror. It was an absolutely glorious day to be out looking for fish!
There were a lot of ducks on Brooklake today, including mallards...
and gadwalls.
I took this photo from my favorite viewing location. Right now you have to climb down the hill, slough through calf-deep muck, and try to avoid knee-deep, water filled holes, in order to get close enough to the edge of West Hylebos Creek to see this. Several years ago, an unknown person sawed down this beautiful all tree which fell across the creek. Intially, we worried about whether this tree would block salmon access to the fish ladder leading into Brooklake, but a storm came along and shifted the tree to one side of the creek. Salmon love this spot. They like to hang out just under the edge of the tree and will usually spent quite a long time there before moving on.
Here's another salmon hanging out very close to the same spot. I saw five different salmon in this area today. Once the salmon leave this area, they continue up the creek to a nice deep pool that's at the bottom of the fish ladder.
Once they leave that pool they have to start swimming uphill. The water at this end of the fish ladder can be very shallow and that scares the fish. They don't like it when more than half of their bodies are exposed. Sometimes, I can stand there and watch them try and fail to conquer this spot over and over and over again. From my vantage point, I can see both the pool they're leaving and the pool they're trying to reach, but the fish cannot. When about half of their bodies are exposed, they often panic, turn back, and swim back into the lower pool, where they mill around for a while, trying to work up enough courage for another attempt. Often, they're just inches from reaching the next pool when they give up and turn around. Adele and I have found ourselves rooting for the salmon as hard as you'd root for your favorite team at a football game. Our groans when the fish turn around are just as loud and heartfelt as your groans when the ball misses the goal.
Once they start up the fish ladder, they have to leap over a series of waterfalls. Each waterfall has a pool at it's foot in which the fish rest between each attempt. It can take a very long time and a great many attempts to move from one pool to the next and often the fish will find themselves being swept backwards into a previous pool while they're trying to line themselves up for an attempt on the next pool.
This is the last waterfall at the top of the fish ladder, the exact same waterfall I'd watched the salmon be swept back over several days ago. If you're standing on the viewing platform at Brooklake and looking over the railing on the right-hand side, facing the lake, you'll be looking directly into the water at the top of the fish ladder. Once the fish make it over this last waterfall, they have to decide whether to follow the water to the left, which leads further into the park and dwindles away, or follow the water to the right, which narrows down into a very slender, shallow notch leading into Brooklake. The salmon really don't like the idea of swimming through that notch. It's very small and they have to expose too much of their bodies in order to get through it. As a result, the fish mill around in the water at the top of the fish ladder, checking things out in one direction, then the next, repeatedly. After each search, they tend to swim back to the very rim of the waterfall and hover there, back to the falls, as if they're smelling or tasting the water in order to find the right direction. Once they decide to make a run for the notch, a whole lot of splashing will occur as the fish try to wriggle their bodies over the shallow patch and through the notch, back into open water. We saw two salmon milling around in this area today and Mary watched one of them finally make a successful trip through the notch. It's not rare to see the salmon jump clear up out of the lake, as if in joy at the fact that they're finally home.
On that happy note, I'm going to leave you with one final salmon photo. Yes, once more, the salmon are swimming up West Hylebos Creek to spawn in our park and return to Brooklake, leaving their redds behind in the gravel to give birth to the next generation of West Hylebos salmon. The rubies are dancing in the creek again! It's a time for celebration!
Teri Lenfest