Page 22 - Sonoma County Gazette Janaury 2019

Salmon Returning to the Russian River
Make it a Point to See a
Great Blue Heron this Year
By Lisa Hug
Happy New Year! May your year be full of wonderful bird sightings!
community on how to have the lowest impact possible.
It starts by taking the time to learn how to distinguish between different
Great Blue Herons stand around four feet tall. But, even though they are nearly as tall as an adult person, they only weigh between five and six pounds (the weight of a small newborn baby). Of course, Great Blue Herons are very slender and mostly made
of legs and neck. But these
birds also have “hollow”
bones with many narrow
cross-struts all throughout,
providing the bones with
structural integrity. In
contrast, human bones are
filled with marrow that
produces our blood cells.
By Zac Reinstein, California Sea Grant Russian River Monitoring Program
It’s that time of the year again, where our native salmon and steelhead are returning to complete their reproductive cycle in the tributaries of the Russian River. With some rain in the forecast, the river will likely open this weekend for recreational fishing. We would like to take some time to help inform the local
I think that spotting a Great Blue Heron would be a nice way to start off the New Year. It is such a gorgeous, graceful bird, with soft gray-blue feathering and long legs and an unbelievably long and slender neck. Its bill looks formidably long and sharp.
species of salmonids, and continues on the water by following local regulations and properly handling fish.
With full grown adult salmon beginning to move back up their natal rivers and juvenile steelhead making their journey out to the ocean, you are bound to have some excitement on the water. During periods when crucial spawning tributaries are disconnected from the mainstem, these fish are incredibly vulnerable to changes in water temperature, predation, and human influences while they are trapped in the mainstem.
Refresh your fish ID skills
Great Blue Herons are very patient
It is the responsibility of the angler to accurately identify the fish they are fighting and release all salmon and wild steelhead. Besides the regulatory consequences, illegally keeping or harming these protected fish will mean that fewer fish return in the future. Studies have shown that an increase in stress often decreases the likelihood of successful spawning.
Hatchery Steelhead
hunters. They will wait in perfect stillness until their prey eventually approaches. They have very large eyes, and are as comfortable hunting
Watch where you walk
These large herons nest in colonies called heronries. A heronry is usually found in a large tree. It may be just a single nest or contain several dozen nests. An easily observable heronry is located at Bodega Bay, in the Eucalyptus Trees behind the Spud Point Crab Company Restaurant.
Equally important is to be cautious of where you walk in the river. Salmonids—which include salmon as well as trout—dig redds, or egg nests, in the gravel when they spawn. This protects the eggs and hatchlings from predators and fast-moving water. Redds contain two main features: a pot,
or depression in the gravel (usually related to the size of the female), and a tailspill (mound of gravel downstream of the pot where the eggs are buried). Mature fish release the eggs and milt (salmonid sperm) simultaneously and then quickly cover them with gravel. They will stay in the tailspill for up to 70 days as they mature into juvenile fish.
The birds start to arrive in this heronry around mid February. Both males and females contribute to constructing their large stick nests. The males will bring sticks in to the females. She inspects the sticks, then carefully places these sticks into the nest structure. Males and females take turns incubating the eggs; occasionally rolling them over to distribute the heat evenly. The chicks start to appear in the nests around mid to late April. By May, these chicks can be quite large and noisy. It is fun to watch the parents come in with food for the young. By late July, most young will have left the nests.
Although these eggs harden over time, they are very vulnerable to human disturbance, such as a person walking through the creek. Ideal spawning locations often coincide with easy places for people to walk. During the early season redds will be more obvious due to the lack of algae on the fresh digging.
Here is another odd fact about Great Blue Herons. They have specialized chest feathers called powder down feathers. These feathers grow continuously but disintegrate at the tips into a powder -like talc. The heron distributes this powder throughout its plumage to help with waterproofing and to remove oils from fish and other sources.
We have compiled salmon identification guides for anglers and anyone else who is interested to increase their knowledge and confidence. Please visit the links below! Explore our ID guide and resources to make sure you can identify Russian River salmonids.
Perhaps the strangest thing to witness here in Northern California is a Great Blue Heron seemingly standing on water in the ocean. Often these herons will stand on floating sea kelp and patiently hunt for fish and invertebrates that may emerge from beneath the kelp.
• ID Guide: Identifying Russian River Adult Salmonids
• Do you #knowyourcoho? Check us out on social media! • Instagram: RussianRiverSalmon
• Twitter: SeaGrantSalmon
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Great Blue Herons can be found in any wetland. Good places to look for these majestic birds are at Ellis Creek Water Recycling Facility in Petaluma, Bodega Bay, or in The Laguna de Santa Rosa Wetlands.
at night as they are in the daytime.
Herons spend most of their time in marshes. They hunt for fish, crayfish, frogs, toads, snakes and even small mammals. They can occasionally be seen in meadows and farm fields hunting gophers.
They swallow their food whole, which is hard to believe, given the size of some of their prey. I once watched a Great Blue Heron eat a garter snake. It picked it up, wrapped it into a ball, and then somehow swallowed it whole. I could see a large, round bulge slowly travel down the heron’s neck as it swallowed the snake.
These birds will always have a special place in our hearts here is Sonoma County. They are the official bird mascot of the Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation where the Laguna de Santa Rosa is the heart of Sonoma County.