A "typical redd"

SK60 · Senior Member

A "typical redd"

Ty · Senior Member

I miss that sight.

hobbs · Senior Member

Great pic! That is some prime gravel. I must say that I have seen that sight quite a few times this year....always cool to see.

Xnjb707X · Senior Member

I was out at the creek today checking on redds and here is an example of an empty redd. I saw quite a few redds around 3 upto the bridge, all empty though. They are very scattered about and not big at all, some are even getting covered by weed growth. I found a few in deeper water as well. Numbers seem to be the same as last year, low.. Hope trend turns around for the better.

- Nic

-- Edited by Xnjb707X on Wednesday 5th of January 2011 06:52:55 PM

-- Edited by Xnjb707X on Wednesday 5th of January 2011 06:54:00 PM

LilWhippersnapper · Senior Member

That's that not a redd... That's from when my fat a$$ fell in the water. Lol, just kidding. I'm kinda confused though. I'm hearing 2 different stories. One says that there are spawners all over the place, and the other story is it's the same as last year. I'm kinda leaning toward the latter. Or was it an early spawn and fish are already done?

mx19 · Senior Member

If you get up to the creek at last light or with a strong flash light when the sun has set you will see quite a few fish on redds...They have been getting the hell out during the day. I would suspect they slide back down in the deeper water...Which is why we should not fish the runs behind the redds. Sk60 you seen this yet.

Oh ya..there was couple doing there own spawning in the parking lot .Need a good flash light for that to do...

Otter · Senior Member

Hey SK 60 that is my photo at Access 2 circa 2006. What you see is flows around 70-90cfs. I have some photos a few weeks later when the flows dropped to around 45-50 cfs. The fish were gone. There are several factors for the spawning fish. These days MX-19 is right the fish are spawning at night or during the rain storms. They are really spooked! It is fun just to go out and watch what is in this creek.

LilWhippersnapper · Senior Member

mx19 wrote:

Oh ya..there was couple doing there own spawning in the parking lot .Need a good flash light for that to do...

That was just Shawn "teaching his new girl how to fly fish."

hobbs · Senior Member

Hopefully the fish will spawn just the right amount from now on since its zero kill. Putah being such a short section and trapped in between two lakes I hope the "fish bowl effect" doesnt occur over time.

For example, when a lake gets overpopulated with stunted fish because they are too successful at spawning and mortality/predation is so low. Conversely, a lake with just enough suitable spawning area to allow the perfect amount of spawning and/or just the right amount of mortality/predation produces a healthy number of larger fish. Its difficult to find that balance.

Just a thought...anyone have a take on this?

-- Edited by hobbs on Wednesday 5th of January 2011 10:37:55 PM

SK60 · Senior Member

Measuring spawning rates/success is difficult. Best indicator may be the number of fry seen in March-April hanging out in protected sites. The mouth of Cold Creek is a good spot to look. 2008 there were a couple of hundred in the first 50 feet of the creek; last two years the mouth has had little water and very few fry were seen. If El Nina keeps the rain up, this will be a good year to do a "count" and possibly rescue trapped ones when CC starts to dry up. Since no studies have been done the past two years, its hard to know whether this is a good or bad year for the spawn.

ONEWEIGHT · Senior Member

I think Shawn was demonstrating how to dig a redd to his new "friend"

Bob