Lesson 4: The Backyard Team
In this last bundle of species, we will learn about:
Coho Salmon
Steelhead Trout
Cutthroat Trout
They are all from the genus oncorhynchus – even the trout – and are the species people often find in streams near their homes. So, they are the ‘Backyard Team’.
The Backyard Team likes to take their time before they head out to the ocean: Coho can spend 1 or 2 full years in freshwater, while sea-run Cutthroat trout will stick around for up to 3 years.
Some trout never go to the ocean at all.
Because these species spend more than half their lifecycle in stream habitats, they are particularly susceptible to the impacts caused by human infrastructure and development.
Lesson 4 will take 2 hours to complete and be graded by a multiple-choice quiz.
This lesson will cover:
•common traits shared among the species on the Backyard Team
•instream habitat restoration techniques (water quality, riparian, bank stabilization, instream cover, improvements to fish migration past structures)
•the value and development of off-channel habitats
•summary of the opportunities and challenges facing these species
The Backyard Team includes the most common type of coho salmon, which spawns from September to December in small streams and large.
They can exist in virtually any stream in S’ohl Te’m:e’xw.
The two other Oncorhynchus species, Steelhead and Cutthroat trout, are also included in this team – they are not quite salmon but should be. Some Steelhead and also called Rainbow trout.
All of these species live in streams for months or years after they emerge as fry from their gravel beds in the spring. For this reason, they are critically reliant on the quality and quantity of the stream and riparian habitats.
These species have placed bigger life cycle bets on healthy streams than the other salmon species have and therefore what happens in those streams matters more to the Backyard Team than their more ocean-focused cousins.
These three species have built quite a following of salmon advocates over the years, as all of them are highly desired sports fish in the angler community.
Many of these anglers were the founders of Streamkeepers and other habitat protection groups.
Children in B.C. also learned about these salmon and were taught to protect their habitats through the provincial curriculum.
There are many benefits to being amongst the most visible species of salmon, but because these species tend to live in the smaller lowland streams around highly populated areas, they really have taken the brunt of some of our worst human impacts.
A simple idea with big impact
All good salmon habitat relies on sources of clean water but many of our urban streams have suffered over the years from preventable pollution.
In 1975, Joe Kambeitz – a member of Kwikwetlem First Nation who worked in DFO’s Salmon Enhancement program – came up with an idea to prevent people from pouring noxious materials down storm drains, unknowingly poisoning fish in local waterways. A simple and easy-to-replicate idea of marking storm drains with a bright yellow fish became the Storm Drain Marking Program and it caught on in municipalities all around the world – saving many salmon lives along the way.
Optional reading:
The full story of how Joe’s idea turned into DFO’s storm drain program
Plant a tree, save a salmon.
Streams where the Backyard Team of species reside can be very vulnerable to low flow periods in the summer months. Little salmon fry and are often left surviving in shallow pools until the flow increases – and if these pools get too caught the results can be catastrophic.
Planting trees along the banks of these streams help to keep the water temperatures down. It’s another simple idea that anyone with a shovel and an interest in salmon can execute.
Case study: Restoring fish access
It would take a really motivated salmon to jump into the culvert pictured here and make it to spawning grounds upstream.
Unfortunately, there are hundreds of these in S’ólh Téméxw:
A first for salmon habitat restoration
During the urban development of S’ólh Téméxw, various barriers were placed in small streams in order to build roads and bridges. These barriers also blocked the way of many upstream migrating salmon.
The old weir, pictured left, was placed in the Brunette River in the early twentieth century and was a problem for many salmon trying to swim upstream. In the late 1970’s, local salmon advocates (working with their Salmon Enhancement Program Community Advisor) hand-built a little concrete fishway to help salmon get over the old weir. This was the very first salmon habitat project done on the Brunette River and began a remarkable story of 40+ years of salmon recovery in this watershed.
There are many different ways to get salmon up past difficult culverts or barriers.
Boulder fishway at Caribou Dam
Alaskan steep pass
Baffles or gravel in culverts (3 photos)
Gravel riffle at Spanish Bank
Optional Reading
A handy guide on fish passage through culverts from the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure
Rehabilitating Streambanks
Eroding streambanks are part of the natural process of river migration and create healthy salmon habitat, like the slowly eroding banks of the Upper Chilliwack River pictured here.
Riverbanks that have been denuded of their natural forest cover, however, are soft and vulnerable to fast erosion, releasing large amounts of sediments into the streams occupied by Backyard Team species.
In these cases, it is necessary to try and re-plant those banks to reduce the speed of erosion. This involves reinforcing the banks and planting vegetation as shown in this picture of a clay slide at the Coquitlam River.
Land use decisions over the last 100 years have changed the shape of streams in S’ohl Te’m:ewx
Streams are much simpler than they used to be, with fewer large log jams, shallower pools and a lot of shallow open water. Little salmon don’t particularly like these features for rearing in.
Putting large stuff – rocks and logs – in streams make for bigger pools and more hiding places for Backyard Team species in both high water and low water.
The challenge of putting stuff in our streams here in S’ohl Te’m:ewx, is that dreaded rain on snow event. Habitat restoration has to be designed to withstand floodwaters, otherwise, what was the point?
Optional reading
Winter habitat preferences for the Backyard Team from our American colleagues in Washington State.
Log jams form critical summer and winter rearing habitat for our Backyard Team
Pictured here is an example of a large natural logjam in the Upper Chilliwack River. The size of these logs means that they will likely not move even during a high water event. Their huge and complex root structures also make them a perfect refuge for small fish to hide in during a winter flood.
The challenge to recreating these natural log jams is that large this large do not exist anymore in S’ohl Te’m:e’xw; they have all been logged.
Simpler logjams in small streams can provide the scouring energy around them during floods to make good summer rearing pools for all the species of the Backyard Team.
However, only complex logjams can give critical winter cover to the smaller members of the Team, during the winter flood season.
In this example of a logjam constructed in the Chilliwack River, both provide good cover for rearing salmon during the summer months.
Neither of these simple jams would be a wise choice for a young salmon to hunker down for the winter flood season.
Pictured here is a complex logjam that has formed in the Upper Chilliwack River.
This large jam replenishes itself at each high water, as more small debris are captured and form the critical winter habitat that coho salmon juveniles need to survive the winter season.
Complex log jams need to be located on the outside bend of a stream to catch wood debris as they follow the flow path during floods. They also have to be stable enough and the right shape to capture that floating wood debris.
Optional reading
Information on Streamside Large Woody Debris Catchers
Constructed log jams in Coquitlam River
Pictured here is a series of six log jams placed on an outside bend of the Coquitlam River. Built in the late 1990’s, that are still functioning today.
These logjams were designed and installed by experts and are tied together with steel cable and anchored to boulders under and around the logjams. They are stable during floods and will probably provide habitat for another 25 years.
Boulders are another way to roughen up simplified streams
Notice how small pools and patches of spawning gravel have formed around these rock spurs, making for good salmon habitat.
Coho fry can’t spend the winter here, however. There’s not enough room to hide.
Trout species, on the other hand, love to spend winters jammed under large boulders just like this.
That’s why adding habitat diversity to simplified streams is really important for healthy and varied salmon populations.
Optional Reading
One of the more extensive efforts to help the Backyard Team in S’ohl Te’m:e’xw has been the focus on creating safe refuges from winter floods.
This is where off-channel habitat comes in. Off-channel habitats are side channels or sloughs (or ponds, if the beavers move in!) that particularly Coho salmon absolutely thrive in.
Optional reading
Chapters 13: Low-level nutrient replacement
Off-channel habitat is critical habitat for Coho salmon.
Beavers are also absolutely obsessed with this type of habitat, which can cause some problems for our Backyard Team.
Cutthroat Trout can also be seen enjoying an off-channel beaver pond, but most prefer to live in smaller, rockier streams that feed into bigger streams.
Steelhead Trout (or Rainbow Trout) also can be quite happy in off-channel areas but also prefer rockier, boulder-studded streams with log jams. They tend to use the bigger rivers and leave the little streams for the Cutthroat to enjoy. Both these species deal with winter floods by hiding at the bottom of the stream with their noses jammed under a large boulder.
Pictured here is a beautiful, natural off-channel habitat that is found on the floodplain of the Upper Chilliwack River.
This once was part of the main river, which has since moved away.
It is now kept wet by groundwater flows only.
It is a haven for young coho salmon in the winter and for spawning adult Coho salmon if they can find a patch of old river gravel with some groundwater upwelling through it.
Look carefully and you’ll see a series of beaver dams that present a problem for little Coho fry.
After a good rain, Coho salmon are actually able to get over a beaver dam like this one. The problem comes when they are found on a groundwater channel, where there will be no floods to help the salmon jump over the dam.
A groundwater-fed off-channel of the Chilliwack River.
Coho fry have a high chance of survival in a slough habitat like this: up to 70%
Off-channel provides stable and safe places for juvenile Coho salmon, Cutthroat and Rainbow trout to rear and spawn, particularly during the winter flood months.
This is very important in S’ohl Te’m:e’xw!
Juvenile coho salmon
Two adult coho salmon preparing a nest.
This is a really good place to be a juvenile salmon.
...until the fall rains arrive. By early November, there can also be quite a bit of snow on the surrounding mountains.
If a warm Pacific airflow moves through at this time of year, as it sometimes does, we get the dreaded “rain-on-snow” type flood event.
Nearby Lovely Pond offers a much nicer place to be after 4 days of rain.
Optional Reading
Fall movement of coho salmon juveniles into off-channel habitats.
How Coho use off-channel habitat:
Spawning
Rearing
Winter rearing (critical habitat during this period of time)
Science has told us that a coho juvenile that spends the winter in off-channel habitat has a 70% chance of surviving until they smolt the next spring.
For coho juveniles that take their chances in the main river during the winter, the survival rate drops to 15%.
This is why the creation of “Off-Channel Habitat” is one of our most effective restoration tools for the Backyard Team, and we have used it in many streams in S’ohl Te’m:e’xw.
Case study: Doubling the Coho in the Coquitlam River
The Coquitlam River had an estimated 250,000 square meters of habitat that young juvenile coho could access and use to rear.
Over 30,000 square meters of critical off-channel habitat for coho salmon has been constructed since 1993.
This represents an increase of slightly more than 10% of the total habitat available to Coho juveniles in this watershed.
Interestingly, assessment studies showed that these newly constructed off-channel ponds are responsible for around 50% of the Coho salmon smolts produced from this watershed.
This has led to a more than doubling of the number of wild Coho salmon produced by the Coquitlam River over the past decade.
Optional Reading
A similar study was done on the Chilliwack River to look at the benefits of off-channel creation for coho salmon.
The Backyard Team truly lives in many of the same places we do.
Optional Reading
Our American colleagues have their own toolbox. Take a deeper dive here.
Pacific salmon are wonderfully adaptive species that will change their habitats and behaviors as the world changes around them, if given half a chance.
This is what habitat restoration work does – it gives them half a chance. By providing access to clear water, abundant spawning gravels and deep river pools to hold and rear in we are helping them adapt to a changing climate.
It’s the least we can do, since they supported our families for generations.
The “Big Bar Landslide” could have meant the end of a 5,000-year salmon presence in the Upper Fraser River.
Using the kind of thinking we have covered in this course, a habitat restoration team worked (and is still working) quickly to prevent that from happening.
It’s the largest salmon habitat restoration effort in B.C. history – and a positive note to end on.
You’ve reached the end of the last lesson. Well done!
Take a few minutes to review your notes and – if you’re eligible for the honorarium – click below to take the last quiz.
(FYI: This quiz will only cover material in Lesson 4, not the whole course.)
A big thank you to Matt Foy, your generous and skillful instructor. He knows thiiiiiiiis much about fish!