Good things lead to better things
 

Folks,



Did part of my annual redd walk where I pick a section of Stauffer Creek and walk it during early November to determine the number of redds and therefore the possibility of increased brown trout populations.

I divide the stream into four sections and today I walked the section from the Lazy M upstream to the bridge.

I am pleased to report that someone removed the beaver dams along this section thereby allowing browns to utilize the traditional spawning habitat. From a low two years ago of only 12 redds, the beaver dam removal resulted in an increase to 36 redds in this section. Only nine below the removed dam shown bellow and the rest above it. There were some sections where the redds are so close together that counting was difficult. In this case, I error on the low side. No point in being too optimistic.

This redd located along where the dam was located humored me. A fishery screw you.



Regards,



Don

Great news indeed, sir.

Excellent news, thanks for the report.

Great news!!!
Sounds like my bitching to the ACA earlier this year about dam removal may have actually helped. At that time, they claimed it was not their responsibility...that it was TU central chapter?
I hope they removed the "builder" of those dams too....

Don...did they take out the one just u/s of the bridge too?

Great news!!! Thanks for the updates

You can rest assured if the ACA says they are not doing something, they don’t.
I have no idea who removed the dams.
I don’t know of fbs status of other dams or beaver control.

Don

Don...the one I was thinking of was the one no more than 50 yards upstream of the bridge...It had been there since last fall (2017)

Great to hear. Those beaverdams really do a number on the stream flow and trout travel. Not sure what the answer is in regards to the beavers. Seem to be difficult to remove the dams, beavers rebuild them quickly.

Any trappers around? Their time is probably worth more than beaver pelts I guess

Sorry what is a REDD?

A red is a spawning bed that a Trout makes by cleaning the gravel, you can easily recognize it by lighter areas on the stream bottom in pea gravel areas. Don't Tread on Redds.

Thanks the picture makes way more sense now.

An update

Took another walk today looking for redds in the Buck for Wildlife area. Starting <> 600 yards east of the parking lot I wandered upstream checking out the usual spots. Well, it took a while to find the first one. From year to year, the browns will often use the same locations. Such wasn’t the case for the first several hundred yards. Then I found a possible. Occasionally, browns will try a spot and find it not to their liking. These trials redds often do not contain the large rocks at the upstream end indicating a rejected location.
Then I found a real one and within a short distance another. In one stretch of 50 years there was four.
The walk ended with eight redds found which is far better than the two I found two years ago and certainly down from sixteeen found about ten years ago. Whether this indicates normal is unclear.
I never check upstream of the Buck for Wildlife parking lot to the Lazy M any longer as there has never all been more than two redds in this location. Upstream of the Lazy M is a far more important spawning area.
I then checked two short previously used spawning areas.
Just below the culverts on the west property line of Stainbrookes site yielded four redds which is typical. Further upstream, downstream of the culvert on the Leavitt site often has redds but there were none.
So ended today’s redd check.