PUTAH CREEK TROUT

brian clemens · Senior Member

PUTAH CREEK TROUT

101fish · Senior Member

It is my understanding that there are separate strains of 'bows in the creek, though given the inevitable interbreeding the genetic distinctions are probably blurred and what is present is probably a mutt species. That being said, after the completion of the dams, there were native (endemic) trout in the stream. This native stock has been diluted to some extent by stocking efforts by the DFG. However, the average lifespan of a stocked trout is about a week and few of the stocked trout will survive to reproduce. I imagine that barring a genetic analysis of the trout, telling the difference between a wild trout of stocked ancestry and a wild trout of native ancestry cant be done with 100% certainty.

brian clemens · Senior Member

hey thanks 101fish,

hey one more thing that i have been lookin into is the salmon, i have read that salmon were seen Willow Slough in November of 1997, spotted spawning salmon in December and January near Stevenson's Bridge Road west of Davis and this was verified by Professor Peter Moyle of UC Davis, a wildlife and fisheries biologist, who was very pleased with the re-appearance of salmon in Putah Creek. Moyle identified the 32-inch, 20-pound fish as a Chinook salmon, a threatened species in California.

The spawning, said Moyle, demonstrates that salmon can make it up the creek. It's the result of high creek flows in the fall, which bring the fish. Salmon come up from the Delta to the Sacramento River, make a left to Cache Slough and go up and right into the toe drain of the Yolo Bypass and then left into Putah Creek, at that point basically a ditch where it crosses the bypass.

"Now that we have salmon coming up and spawning this year, it's quite likely there are more that we didn't see," said Moyle. Indeed, his students in March were able to sample many more juvenile salmon. On March 31 1998 , students netted 37 juvenile salmon at the Mace Boulevard location.

"So there's a potential for fish to establish a population but it will take a number of years to colonize," said Moyle. "Putah Creek is tricky. It has good years and bad. It was only a marginal salmon stream before the dam was built but now you could argue that it's a regulated stream and (with enough water) you could make it more attractive to salmon."

this all was written by Elisabeth Sherwin in spring of 98

so my other question is, is something being done about this as well, or have we given up on having salmon reenter putah creek. i can tell you this, having salmon, steelhead and putah trout all in the same location is a good thing and a bad thing, good due to a better variety of species to catch, bad well its gonna bring more people to putah ofcourse and that just means a crap more issues to deal with.

shon42073 · Senior Member

I don't need to read an article to know there are salmon that run up to the diversion dam below solano lake, I personnally witnessed approx. 6 of them last winter. There are also what appears to be man made spawning areas in the lower creek, But the flows are sometimes so low that they are useless. I think (but could be wrong) the only law for putah creek stream flows is that the lower creek must flow at a min. of 10 cfs, yes only 10 !!!!!!! As for the native and wild trout thing, This is a topic of some debate. My personal opinion is this, A native trout is a trout that lives in water that has always naturally had them there, Basically a watershed that has supported them for literally millions of years. I also think that they look different then putah trout, Some i have caught in some rather remote areas almost look like they have some golden trout in them. To me a wild trout is simply a trout that has never seen the inside of a fish hatchery. I do agree putah creek trout are muts of sort, But thats fine with me because some mighty fine muts they are. These are just my opinions and am not posting this to start a debate.

Emerger · Senior Member

Otter and I saw a big fish in the now not-so-dry creek on Sunday afternoon which we thought could have been a salmon. Otter: did you ever get a better look at that fish? Can you ID it?

Otter · Senior Member

I am not going to start some wild fish story, so I am saying it was just another big wild rainbow. Salmon have been known to "jump the gate" when they are working on the diversion dam.

As for the fish in Putah they are wild fish not natives. The creek has been poisoned twice over the years with Rotenone. I guess to rid it of suckers, carp and squawfish. The fish are descendents of planters. Some fish appear to be cutbows orange slashes and all. I was reading on Kienes board about how a UC Davis student did a study where fish scales were collected by fishermen on Putah and sent in. If anyone has access to that study I would like to read it. JT do you know anything about the study?

mx19 · Senior Member

wild trout jump out of the water...
native trout like to tail dance across the top...

everyone knows that....

JT · Senior Member

Otter,

I just looked for the paper on the Putah study and couldn't find anything.� I'll check at school tomorrow.� I can access a lot more from a school computer.

bono · Master Fly Fishing Guide

Talking to fisheries biologists off and on over the last handfull of years about the strain of trout in Putah my general feeling is that "possibly " a few steelhead "may" have been trapped between the dams when they were built.And I've heard a story from a biologist from UC davis years ago of a hybrid cutbow strain of fish that I used to catch as a kid that eventually flows into Putah between the dams.I too believe that the majority of the fish in the creek are descendents of trout that have been introduced by planting and successfull spawning over the years.On another note Putah creek council and a few other organizations have been working on lower Putah creek developing new and improving old salmon spawning habitat I was fortunate enough to be involved in suveying some of these sites.Most of these sites are now very sucessfull thanks to the hard work of the agencies and the volunteers involved.

shon42073 · Senior Member

I don't think the lower creek gets the love it deserves, maybe because of the fact that nowadays theres alot of pvt. property around that area. One problem with salmon and trout on the lower creek is this....BASS, the largemouth and smallmouth i bet would just hammer any small salmon or trout in there, So i'm sure the survival rate would be low for fry. Think about it, How many small to medium rivers or creeks can you think of that have both healthy populations of bass and salomoids. None come to my mind at this time.

Leicafish · Veteran Member

thecaptain wrote:

I don't think the lower creek gets the love it deserves, maybe because of the fact that nowadays theres alot of pvt. property around that area. One problem with salmon and trout on the lower creek is this....BASS, the largemouth and smallmouth i bet would just hammer any small salmon or trout in there, So i'm sure the survival rate would be low for fry. Think about it, How many small to medium rivers or creeks can you think of that have both healthy populations of bass and salomoids. None come to my mind at this time.

John Day and Umpqua both have robust small mouth populations and pretty decent steelhead runs. Maybe to Russian at one time too.

Psyfisher · Veteran Member

The Root River in my home state of Minnesota has a good population of both Brown Trout, and Small Mouth Bass. You can catch them alongside each other, and sometimes on the same flies, and its a medium size river.

dtp916 · Senior Member

Dude, the Truckee River in our home state has 'bows, browns, whitefish, and smallmouth bass. Whitefish have always lived alongside trout, but smallies are there as well. Check it out if you didn't know:

http://flyline.com/tips_trivia/truckee_smallmouth/

Feather River has smallies and stripers, and salmon, steelhead, + many more.

The Lower Yuba near Marysville has smallies and salmon/steelhead/resident bows

The Lower American has tons of stripers. Several Forks of the upper American River drainage have smallies and rainbows side by side.

It is very possible.

And the Truckee is ranked as a blue ribbon trout stream, the Yuba has its days since the before the heavy runoff, the Feather is one of the best steelhead rivers in the valley, and the Lower American gets a massive salmon migration (steelhead, not as much).

shon42073 · Senior Member

thats good to know that they can live along side one another. I didnt know the truckee has smalmouth, All the other rivers dtp listed are much larger then putah, thats why i stated, Small waters.

-- Edited by thecaptain at 02:16, 2008-01-11

dtp916 · Senior Member

NF American is pretty small, dude. There's actually a lot of small places that hold them both. Smallies like colder water, and stripers like even colder water.

You can catch bows, browns, and smallies on nymphs and dries during the Hex hatch on Lake Almanor.