Everyone had fond memories of going up to Strawberry Reservoir to see the salmon spawning last year, so I promised the kids we'd try to find a time to do it again. Then we had a bunch of rain (which we love! but it's not conducive to picnics) so we weren't sure if we'd get a clear day to go, but we finally saw a "partly cloudy" morning forecast and decided to take our chances.
The aspens were turning pretty yellows, and so were even the grasses and willows!
Last year we got up here at nearly the very end of the salmon run, so there were only a few (though quite a few) of the beautiful red Kokanee salmon in the river. But this year the run was in full swing and there were a bunch of workers at the egg-collecting facility. It was SO interesting and funny to watch! Funny because they were just throwing the fish through the air when they were done with them! I've never seen such a thing in my life!
When the fish gathered in this little trap area, a worker would scoop some of them up in his net and hand them through a little window. Then the people inside would…well…hmmm…do you want to know this? It occurs to me that you may not want to. Well, skip down a few pictures if you wish, but I think it's so interesting!
From the males, they squeeze out the milt (fluid that contains the sperm) so they can use it for fertilizing the eggs. And then they take the females and slit them open. It's a little sad I guess. But the females have come upstream to die anyway. They haven't eaten in weeks, and their internal organs are totally shriveled, and inside they are just completely packed with eggs. It is amazing! Just thick and full of ONLY EGGS. So the workers slit them open and squirt all the eggs out, like squirting ketchup out of a bottle or something (sorry) and collect all these thousands of eggs to take to the fish hatchery. See all the pretty orange eggs in the dishes above?
If the salmon eggs are left to grow on their own they will nearly all be eaten by other fish and animals before they grow up. But by collecting the eggs, the fish and wildlife people are able to save a great number of the salmon and restock them in the lakes and reservoirs. I read that they collect two million Kokanee salmon eggs to use for the salmon stocking!
The females are put in buckets and just die, I suppose. But the males are tossed carelessly back out of the window and into the water, leading to scenes like these where there's suddenly just…a fish in the air.
So funny!
After we watched the salmon for a while, we drove up a road that forks off by the river to see if we could find the beautiful spot we found last year. We found it! It was beautiful as the clouds started rolling back in. We love how the aspens here are orange!
I especially like seeing the different colors of aspens next to each other.
Goldie left her cute straw hat here last year. She was hoping maybe we'd find it this year. But we didn't. (I like to think a deer ate it!)
We don't usually get to have Daisy with us on field trips anymore. So sad!! 😭 This paltry six kids is all we've got.
It did rain a little, and Zig heroically ran to the car and got the umbrella for us. "I'm the emergency rescue worker!" he said. We were grateful to be rescued.
Never happier than when whacking something with sticks
Not sure what this is
We loved this beautiful spot! We're so lucky to have so many amazing places around here to visit.
We saw some pretty leaves on the way home, too!
It was a great way to spend a beautiful cloudy day in September!
No comments