Mattole Salmon Group

Mattole Salmon Group
April 28, 2004


For the first time in several years, the wild salmon of the Mattole had a near ideal spawning season. The rains came a little late, and early arriving chinook salmon had to hole up in pools in the lower river for a few weeks. But when the rain began falling, it was in just the right amounts and at the right time to allow the chinook and then the Coho to reach their preferred headwaters spawning reaches. Spawner surveys through the late fall and early winter indicated a substantial run of both chinook and Coho salmon. It is difficult to determine the specific number of returning fish, but our best guess is that this was one of the better runs in recent years. Rainfall and river levels continued at fish-friendly levels through February of this year, with no extreme flows threatening the eggs or alevins in their redds. Our hope is that this will translate into a large population of salmon fry successfully migrating to the ocean or over-summering in the Mattole headwaters. Beginning in early April, the Mattole Salmon Group (MSG) will be installing fish traps near Ettersburg and our Petrolia headquarters to help estimate the number of down-migrating juvenile salmonids. This should help us confirm the degree of success of this past season's run.

Rob Yosha and Tabi Bolton of the Salmon Group and Dept. of Fish and Game staff performing water quality tests on disconnected pools in the Mattole riverbed in October 2002. Photo: Mattole Salmon Group Archive

The first of March, however, ushered in a whole new weather pattern and a new set of concerns. As long-time residents will confirm, it has been unusually dry throughout March, and now into the beginning of April. Mattole River levels are where we might expect them to be in late, rather than early, spring. Although this does not present a threat to chinook fry moving downstream and migrating to the estuary and the ocean, it raises serious concerns about rearing habitat for Coho and steelhead juveniles during the dry months of summer and fall.

If there is insufficient rainfall during the remainder of the spring, MSG will initiate a program we have long hoped would be unnecessary. In three recent years the Mattole headwaters have become so dry during the late summer and early fall that long reaches and many pools in the river have dried up completely. After discovering in 2002 that thousands of Coho and steelhead were being stranded and dying during these dry years, MSG and the Mattole community decided that something had to be done to save these fish. In cooperation and consultation with the California Department of Fish and Game, the Federal Bureau of Land Management, and NOAA Fisheries (formerly the National Marine Fisheries Service), MSG plans to rescue juvenile salmonids from pools at risk of drying up. We will move these fish downriver to suitable habitat where the flow remains continuous, or hold them until the fall rains in our Solitude fish rearing facility on South Fork Bear Creek.

A contract with the State Coastal Conservancy (CSCC) through the Mattole River and Range Partnership (see Watershed Plan, front page) is supplying supplemental funding for nearly every aspect of MSG's fieldwork. Thanks to the CSCC, we have been able to expand our spawning surveys, our dive surveys, and our water quality monitoring. This year, CSCC supplemental funds will also allow MSG to improve salmon habitat in the Mattole estuary by placing an additional rock and wood structure in the river channel. We hope that this structure will cause the river to scour a deep pool providing cool water for over-summering juvenile fish.
One of the most crucial elements of the support MRRP is receiving from the Coastal Conservancy is funding for the development of a Watershed Plan for the entire Mattole. This plan is giving MSG the opportunity to examine all phases of its work with an eye toward spotting our deficiencies, improving our methods and identifying specific restoration needs throughout the Mattole. With this plan in place, MSG will be in a position to increase both its impact and its efficiency, and focus on what can and should be accomplished in the next 30 years.


This article can be found online at www.treesfoundation.org/publications/article-138

Forest & River News is produced by Trees Foundation. For more information contact:
Mattole Salmon Group
PO Box 188
Petrolia, CA 95558
Email: evenson@igc.org
Phone: (707) 629-3670