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Saturday Jan. 20 was the UR Watershed annual Salmon Fish Flop. reference Dec.19 UR Watershed news. Great day if you joined us toss fish carcasses (hatchery fish) back into natures streams as the new generation of fish depend on the old generation for nutrients.
We met at the Elk Creek School at 10:00 AM, read below for details.
It's a tough? (fun?) job but somebody had to do it,
Well, it was a dreary January Saturday morning in Southern Oregon. I could go in the computer room and start getting my tax stuff in order. Yikes. Maybe go down to the Mall and buy some Dockers? Grey ones would go with the weather. Or, I could cruise up into the Upper Rogue Watershed on the western flanks of Crater Lake and throw 9-pound frozen fish around the countryside with other people who actually volunteer to do this. Option number 3 it is.
I add a dollop of foo-foo creamer in my Breakfast Blend, grab some boots and my favorite grubby coat, point the Blazer towards the most pristine watershed in Oregon. I wave through the fog at the Mall as I drive by. I'll get my Dockers next week.
Cool, the sun is burning through the fog as I hit Shady Cove. I finish my coffee as I'm passing a couple of cinderblock barns and the severely vacant Rogue Elk Cafe, wondering who will be showing up in the middle of January. I turn up Elk Creek Road, and look for the rendezvous spot.
Listen, when you see a crowd of 20 along the side of the road, and one guy has a pink and green fabric fish sticking out of the front of his hat, and people are putting waders on to put salmon carcasses back INTO the stream instead of taking them OUT , you know your in for an interesting time. So I turn off Sheryl Crow, put on my grubby coat, and plop my boots down into the snow.
Everybody's listening intently (even the guy with the fish running through his cranium) to Jay, the Fish and Wildlife dude. Why are we standing along side three pickup loads of frozen, gooey, headless fish? Jay explains: the salmon that migrate up from the oceans and actually make it back up to the small creeks and tributaries do more than simply start their life cycle over again by laying eggs in the cle an gravels to hatch next season. Once the fish die off after their incredible journey, the nutrients left in their bodies really help the local ecosystem as they decompose. But what happens when most fish don\rquote t make it all the way up anymore because of dams, hatcheries, and fishing? I guess that's why these people are standing here, getting fidgety; they want to " re-seed " the headwater areas with spent hatchery fish. Welcome to the Fish Flop. We have a thousand salmon to sling.
After more coffee from a well-used thermos on a truck hood (thanks somebody), I hear that we\rquote re splitting into three groups and heading out. Vince (one of the Fish and Wildlife guys) is loading one truck with a trailer holding a bright red Polaris quad. We will need the quad to transport the fish up into the hinterland of Sugarpine Creek. Cool! I call shotgun, and ride up with Vince, followed by two other rigs full of slingers, and away we go.
As soon as we made it to the first slinging area and started unloading fish from the quad, it was obvious that this was the Macho team. I mean, Leroy and Phil tell me that we need to spread more fish upstream. So I ask, " Do I have to carry two bags, or can I just take one?" Vince politely says, "Oh no, just take one". But aha, Leroy (and he is an OLD guy!) pipes up,
" Well, me and Phil carried two each, but it's tiring, so you should take one" . I attempt to shoulder three bags of slimy, slippery, half-frozen Chinook and Coho carcasses, settle on two, and conveniently empty one on the way.
I'm feeling good. The sun has come out, our salmon have been sowed, 10-year old Silas has just been allowed to drive (his first time) the Polaris quad down the snowy trail back to the meeting spot. (Don't worry Vince, I won't tell anyone.) And I'm thinking this is really manly stuff. But then I get hit in the back of the head by a snowball and see Ruth (who CLAIMS it was intended for her husband), and she shows me a photo of three wome n posing menacingly with hatchets. Seems their job at another site was to hack up the frozen bags of fish so they could be properly hurled around the countryside by other slingers. They eagerly shared digitals of their grizzly hacking techniques (I mean these ladies were getting into serious touch with their primordial side of something or other up there)!
So, I know why I\rquote m here, but I'm wondering why others are. Ruth, Sara, and Terri (the " hatchet ladies " ) do you often consider the myriad processes that must take place to get phosphorous and calcium in seawater of f the Alaskan coast into the belly of a black bear living on the flanks of Crater Lake? I think not. Pete, Paula, and Bob, have your tears ever fallen into the aquatic arteries that propagate life on this planet? Maybe. Steve, Peter, and Phil (fly-fisherman volunteers), are you fascinated by the mind-boggling change that occurs inside a salmon when, all her life in the sea, she is built to keep saltwater out of her body, and in the course of about three days must do a 180 and fight to retain her salts during her heroic journey? I doubt it. Do ANY of you stay awake nights thinking about at least one Ph.D.'s observation that it really is too late for us to bring back the salmon populations? Decidedly, no.
So, why do these people do what they do? What's the common thread? Don, who's gabbing to some guys about where they can go later on in the spring to yank old tires out of some other creek, pauses, looks around in the stillness , and reflects,
" well because we are just trying to improve things in our watershed" they said it would help and it's something we can do ". "Now, that's what I'm talking" about. See you next year.
Robert Coffan Hydrologist and Humbled Salmon Slinger
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What We Can Do:
Over the past years we have talked about what the URWA does in projects over the course of a year. By now you have seen many of our events illustrated and written about and with our new Assessment you will see even more in the coming years.
There is one area we have to emphasize to our members and guests. That is that we are not a politically inclined organization. We have no political enforcement capabilities and do not put ourselves in that position. As individuals we do have opinions but may not do so as an organization. If you have a problem with a local project we will direct you, if we can, to the appropriate governmental agencies.
Feel free to come to our meetings to partake, but do not expect us to show any organizational stances on political issues.
By Dee Hawkins
Agriculture