Tuesday 6 June 2009

Today was a slow day at the fish box with only 8 Wild Coho and one Trout in the box. ( see picture)Due to hot weather and the Beaver building the top of the dam higher the fish seem to have stopped moving. Even though we see fish jumping above the fence they are not too eager to move downstream. We need some rain to get them moving or else they will probably decide to stay. The food in the pond is so abundant they may decide to stay and spawn in the upper reaches next fall. Also in the box were 28 Lethocerus beetles and one dead Trout of around 120 mm, sucked dry by the Beetles. We next went to the pond and I took Thomas his dad Brian and Errol for a row in the boat to check the dam top for work by the Beaver. Lots of fresh mud along the top and the big raft of grass and sticks we had left in the pond were all gone used by the Beaver to plug holes and raise the level of the top. After we went as far up the pond as we could row before the channel was too narrow to navigate up. Possibly saw a snake swimming across the pond as we were quite a long way off all we could see were a pair of eyes moving along the surface. With all the work on the dam we are getting more surface area flooded which will bode well for all the Wild Coho we will salvage over the next few months. More water will mean more food and a cooler pond over what may be a very hot summer coming up.