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Streamkeepers work for chum return

Gravel bed installation aids survival of salmon eggs

Squamish Streamkeepers made preparations to welcome an influx of spawning chum salmon by kindly making their gravel beds in Brackendale Creek's head pond on Saturday (Oct. 31).

The head pond, which doesn't have much flow and gets most of its water from the ground, has become increasingly muddy over the years. Mud doesn't provide a suitable bed to lay eggs but the salmon habitually return to the head pond, which means they would be forced to take their chances with the suffocating muck, said Streamkeeper co-ordinator Jack Cooley.

"Now the fish have something to lay their eggs on rather than mud because if they start to lay their eggs in mud the oxygen can't get at the eggs and the eggs would die," he said.

Nearly a dozen Streamkeepers, clad in trademark galoshes and hip waders, hauled wheel barrows filled with gravel donated by Coast Aggregate and covered an area of approximately 180-sq-ft. L&A Equipment Ltd. donated a truck to help with the project.

Depending on the strength of the return, the head pond is expected to be home to between 20 to 50 large chum starting in mid-November. The gravel bed was created just in time as the head pond welcomed its first two early chum salmon on Tuesday (Nov. 3), said Cooley.

The chum salmon are already appearing in other locations in Squamish like the Brennan spawning channels. Streamkeepers counted 130 chum in the channels last weekend, with about two arriving every minute.

The chum, which are an important food source for animals like eagles and bears, arrived early this year. And numbers are looking good, said Cooley.

"It looks like the chum run is going to be okay."

As for the coho salmon, they are expected to start arriving in the Mamquam Reunion channels for the first time this season, as coho fry were introduced to the channels about three years ago.

The Streamkeepers will monitor the coho return, as obstacles like beaver dams sometimes block the fish from returning to spawn. There's a particularly troublesome beaver dam deep within the wetlands in Loggers Lane Creek that Steamkeepers have notched, or created holes, to encourage fish flow.

"We made a big notch in that dam but when I went back the next day it was almost completely repaired," said Cooley. "Those buggers can really work."

Although the beavers' handwork creates more labour for the Streamkeepers, the district's recent culling initiative, which killed 12 beavers before it was suspended, was not an appropriate solution, said Cooley. Rather, installing wooden boxes around the culverts, called baffles, prevents beavers from obstructing the fish without harming them.

"The beavers can't block it and salmon can get in."

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