09.06.18
Edward Kikumoto
ANECDOTAL & HEARSAY RECOLLECTIONS
Poaching and unlawful activity at the Big Bend Pool.
None in my presence or reported to me. Fish counts.
The ODFW (Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife) diver was in the pool on August 2. There were 170 steelhead reported in the pool in late July. The water temperature at the top of the pool was 58ºF. There were roughly 100 steelhead in Steamboat Creek between the North Umpqua River and the pool, and moving up. The diver observed one hatchery fish in the mix coming upstream and thought it would be in the pool soon. He also said that the pool is only about 10-feet deep (low-water conditions), and that there are deeper pools in Steamboat Creek, which means that the critical factor that makes fish hold here is the consistently cooler water temperatures.
ODFW’s July report will reflect that the fish counts for both steelhead and Spring Chinook will be low this year. The low fish counts, low flows and high daytime temperatures, in aggregate, are of great concern to ODFW.
Within a week ODFW put a 2PM to one-hour before sunrise emergency closure on the fly only water from August 6 thru September 30.
On August 29 the ODFW diver returned to the pool. He counted 225 steelhead, and reported that there are only a small number of fish downstream. He thinks that the summer migration has peaked, which means that we probably won’t see many more fish coming to the pool until the Fall rains come, which will put the fish count for this summer at about 250. It appears to me that many of the fish that moved into the pool in August are “half-pounders,” fish in the 3 to 6 pound range.
Stream flows.
The stream flow continues to drop. On August 6 the Canton Creek gauge measured 37.5 cfs (cubic feet per second), with the historical median being 57.0 cfs. On August 30 the gauge measured 30.3 cfs, with the median being 47.0 cfs. There has been no precipitation at all at the Pool even on the couple of overcast days late in the month, and no rain in the long term forecast.
Water temperatures.
August has been generally much cooler than July beginning mid-month, with daytime temperatures in the 80s and evening temperatures in the low 50s. This has made the water temperatures much cooler with pool temperatures in the mid-50s and Steamboat Creek above Big Bend Creek in the low 60s. Fire smoke haze from as far away as the Rogue River on many days has helped keep the temperatures down.
On August 11 around 7PM Big Bend Creek was 58ºF, and the bottom of Big Bend Pool was 64ºF.
On August 15 around 4PM Big Bend Creek was 58ºF, and Steamboat Creek above it was 72ºF, and a quarter-mile downstream at the Little Bend Pool the water temperature was 64ºF.
On August 15 around 4PM Big Bend Creek was 58ºF, and Steamboat Creek above it was 72ºF, and a quarter-mile downstream at the Little Bend Pool the water temperature was 64ºF.
On August 25 the water temperature at the Little Bend Pool was 56ºF at 3PM; at 5PM Big Bend Creek was 53ºF, Steamboat Creek above Big Bend Creek was 66ºF, and the bottom of the Big Bend Pool was 56ºF.
With the cooler water temperatures and less extreme temperature variations in the pool itself I have seen the fish spread out more during the day and hold much higher up in the water column.
Visitors to the Pool.
The number of visitors to the pool is down a little from July (estimated at 350). Saturday is averaging 20 visitors, Sunday’s average is 12, and the weekdays about 8, for an estimated total of 312 visitors for the month.
On August 15 the new FishWatch kiosk was installed in front of the trail to the pool’s viewing area. Visitors like it, and I think people who see it, even in passing, have a greater appreciation of the special nature of the Pool and its steelhead.
Observations.
Early in the month a mother otter and her two pups stayed in the pool for a couple of days. They didn’t bother the steelhead much as she was concentrating on having her pups hunt crawdads in the shallows at the bottom of the pool.
The latter part of the month saw a couple of beavers in the pool that appeared to cause the holding pattern of the lower fish to change a little from being a loose pod when resting to being much tighter. The beavers would cruise down from the upper riffle to the bottom of the pool and appear to wander around in the pool and along its far edges looking for something, possibly food and/or nesting material. By the end of the month they were gone.
A blue heron has been to the pool in the early morning and evening on a few occasions but is easily scared away.
On August 20 a Chinook appeared in the pool. It was about the size of the largest steelhead in the pool at about 30-inches. It never stopped moving as it constantly circled the pool at about two to three feet below the surface. It was still here on the next day but was gone on August 22. What was most interesting about its sojourn in the pool was its rise to the surface once or twice during a circuit, and regularly every second to fourth circuit. It rose very methodically to the surface into a slow roll and appeared to open its mouth and “gulp” air just before it descended. As it neared its preferred cruising depth it expelled air bubbles from its anal vent. It never rose to the surface for any other reason. I have witnessed this action repeatedly over the two days and have taken many short videos of it occurring.
I have also observed this taking and expelling air behavior from a resident cutthroat in the pool. On August 8 at about 7PM I watched a big cutt hanging with the steelhead pod rise on three occasions to the surface – just breaking the surface – with its mouth open and turning back quickly. The first two times there was a single bubble that appeared as the fish swam down, but the third time, after it acquired some depth, two strings of small bubbles rose to the surface. Its movement throughout was even paced and not quick. I wasn’t watching closely enough to tell you definitively where the bubbles were coming from. So far I have not observed any other cutthroat or the steelhead take and expel air.
Late report.
On September 6 ODFW lifted the emergency restrictions on the fly water of the North Umpqua River because the extreme warm water temperatures that were anticipated after the July heat wave did not continue and are not likely to occur again this season, and a more positive forecast on the wild steelhead count expected for the North Umpqua River system.
DOCUMENTATION
• Kiosk photos
• Chinook “blowing bubbles” videos
