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The Daily Bucket: Friday Sequence; Salmon spawning in a creek at Carkeek Park in Seattle [1]

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Date: 2022-12-16

Salmon need to overcome obstacles in the creek or stream they choose to spawn. Some obstacles are tougher than others. (18 seconds)

Here is another video showing a salmon that doesn’t have the strength to make it up on this try. (21 seconds)

enlarge Piper’s Creek is not used as a fish hatchery. It is just a spot where salmon spawn and the Park Department set up a program for the public to view the process.

All up the creek, there are signs giving facts about salmon and about their spawning.

enlarge A sign showing what happens at different times of the year at this creek.

Salmon start returning to the stream they have imprinted in their memory about 3-4 years after swimming out to sea after hatching. They use unique chemicals in the stream where they hatch to develop this memory.

Because the salmon that spawn in Piper’s Creek are not used in a hatchery, there is little information about how many fish return from natural spawning. To guarantee there are some salmon returning, a program was set up to acquire eggs from the Suquamish Tribe at a fish hatchery they run. 70,000 to 100,000 fertilized eggs or fry (small just-hatched salmon) are donated to the program. The eggs and fry are imprinted at Piper’s Creek (shown later in this Bucket). More than 20 local schools get 200-250 eggs each and get a chilled 55 gallon aquarium to raise them for 3 months until they get mature enough to imprint and release at a special area on the creek. This provides many educational opportunities in science, math and cultural studies.

This shows the life cycle of a salmon from egg to trip down river to salt water, growing in maturity in the ocean and then returning to spawn at the same stream it was hatched (or imprinted).

enlarge The life cycle of salmon, another sign along the creek.

I tried to clean the sign but it was pretty gross. I have summarized it below.

Spawning fish stop eating and live off of accumulated fat. They begin to absorb their scales, get scars from their travel up the creek and have skin disease.

Like growth rings in a tree, salmon scales show annual growth. One can tell how hard or easy it was for the salmon to find food and grow.

Both Chum and Coho spawn in Piper’s Creek. This sign gives hints at IDing each type and differences in the two.

Here are some photos of fish in the stream. It turns out hard to get good photos unless you have a polarizing filter.

See the dark line on the female chum salmon?

Notice the reddish large fish in the middle. I think it’s a Coho.

enlarge Salmon spawning upstream. I tried to get the nose, with little luck.

The mature salmon have a long way to go before they reach ‘their’ creek.



The Olympic Mountains to the west and Puget Sound in the foreground. After coming from the the Pacific through the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the fish head down Puget Sound to the opening of Piper’s Creek.

Puget Sound in the background. The foreground is Piper’s Creek. The fish need to wait until high tide to get into the river to head upstream

The stream goes through a tunnel under the railroad tracks. This is the first hurdle after the tunnel.

There are many opportunities to help out during the year for programs relating to the salmon.

Two bonus videos.

A salmon splashing its way up the river as it spawns. (7 second video)

One more video showing three salmon splashing and jockeying for position as they spawn. (15 second video)

I became interested in salmon at an early age. My mom worked for the State Fisheries in the 1950s. We got to know the Superintendent of the hatchery on the Dungeness River in the Olympics. Here are two photos of me and others helping with catching salmon by hand and stripping eggs from females and adding sperm from males to fertilize them. The eggs were then taken to tanks at the hatchery. We saw the whole process.



Me in front. You had to catch the slippery fish by the tail where there was a notch to hold on. My aunt and dad are in the background.

My older brother, far right, with little cousins “helping” me hold the big salmon. I was holding it by one of the gills which is OK if they aren’t thrashing around. Notice the truck in the background. It had a big water tank with hoses to release the salmon fry into the stream.

I hope you were able to skim the material. I didn’t start out with the intent on making a thesis. I had to cut out so much, but I felt this gave the gist of the salmon spawning at Carkeek Park.

Now it’s your turn to comment on salmon or anything in Nature. All comments and photos are welcome.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/12/16/2135336/-The-Daily-Bucket-Friday-Sequence-Salmon-spawning-in-a-creek-at-Carkeek-Park-in-Seattle

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