State of Work

Work has been incredibly slow the last few weeks. The majority of the juvenile salmon outmigration is over, and it shows. In the last three days of observation I have not seen a single attack. I could probably count the number of gulls I've seen on one hand. It has not been terribly exciting, but I am getting a lot of exercise walking from zone to zone over and over again.

At the height of the season, when the yearling juveniles were migrating downstream, there were constantly fifty or more gulls feeding. My highest count was over a hundred. This highest count happened on one of the days that the lamprey were also outmigrating (it only takes them a couple of days).

Things slowly petered out after that, and aside from a small spike when the second wave of lamprey migrated past, there has been little action since. Right now the only fish moving downstream are the year zero chinook. They are very small and the spill is very high, so they make hard prey for the gulls it seems.

It is unlikely to pick up for the remainder of the season. According to previous research, the majority of the fish should be done. The only remaining species are sockeye, and they migrate out much later and in much smaller numbers. Particularly when compared to the smolt-storm that is the simultaneous outmigration of all the other species.

That's alright, though. More exercise and more time to listen to my podcasts, right?

Also more time to take pretty pictures of sunrises, even if they all have a dam in them.