sockeye spawn cycle from silver to red

[Okanagan]

Got some photos of sockeye spawning in the Adams River of BC over a week ago and thought I'd post a sequence of the changes in these fish as they move from salt water to spawning grounds.

The first photo is a female I think, fresh out of saltwater and mostly silver.



The next photo, below, is a male and female just starting to change shape and colour.  The male's nose is starting to hook, his back is humping a little (though not nearly as much as humpie or pink salmon do) and the first hint of colour change is starting:  green on his head and red on his body.


The next pic, below, is a male and female paired up to spawn.  While they swam up the river from salt water they have changed colour from silver all over to a red body and green head.   She will turn sideways and thrash her tail up and down to wash out a depression or nest in the gravel bottom, then squirt her eggs into the gravel nest while the male beside her fertilizes the area.  It is amazingly inefficient, half the eggs rolling downstream in the current, trout gobbling them, and the milt from this male more likely fertilizing the eggs of the next pair downstream than the female in the current beside him.  

[Okanagan]

More pics from the Adams River spawning area.

Main river below.



Side channel.



Spawned out dead male starting to fade in colour.  Sex REALLY takes it out of them!

[coyote101]

Fascinating, thanks for posting.

Pat

[Hawks Feather]

Great pictures.  Do they bite much when heading to spawning sites or not? 

Jerry

[Okanagan]

Great pictures.  Do they bite much when heading to spawning sites or not? 

Jerry

Most of the time sockeye do not bite on their way to spawning, though there are exceptions.  I caught a bunch on a green and red fly one morning when they were biting, but never have had it happen since.  In Lake Washington, they catch sockeye on their way to spawn by trolling with tiny pink plastic worms I've heard.  But 99% or so of sockeye caught once they enter fresh water to spawn are hooked by "flossing" or "strafing" or other polite names for snagging them in the mouth. 

Sinker, leader and hook are arranged to get the leader drifting downstream across the current.  The leader goes into the mouth of a fish swimming upstream when he opens his mouth slightly to pass water through his gills as he "breathes."  The leader slides through his mouth till it gets to the hook at the end.  Most such sockeye are hooked on the outside lip on the opposite side from the fisherman, easy enough to tell because the fish are heading upstream.  It takes quite a few fish in the water to make this effective.  In Alaska, people do it with a short line and leader they sweep downstream within a rod length.  In BC  they use a long leader of 9-15 feet and cast way out in the river for a long sweep downstream.

[FinsnFur]

That is SOOOOO cool.
The color changes those guys go through is just amazing. I  dont think I've ever seen a whole school of them like that. Very cool.

[KySongDog]

Really nice pics, Okanagan.  And very interesting narrative. 

[golfertrout]

nice pics those would be a blast to catch

[Okanagan]

nice pics those would be a blast to catch

Thank you all for the compliments.  Golfertrout, yes, they are fun.  They fight hard and taste superb, most people say the best tasting salmon of all.  You can see why the Alaskans call them reds instead of sockeye.  Wish I could fish for rainbow trout where these are spawning.  I've watched 2 to 5 lb. rainbows snarfing up sockeye eggs right in the middle of spawning salmon.

 Here are a few more pics.  The first one is looking across the river at some biologists tagging salmon, and if the reflection was gone from the water, it would be solid salmon most of the way across.  These fish are I'd guess 250-300 miles of river swimming upstream from where the silver ones were caught about 50 miles upstream from salt water, same run of fish.



The guy in the red sleeves on the left is releasing a tagged male sockeye.  Green jacket in the middle is picking one up out of the water where they have enclosed a bunch inside the net.



Tagged fish below.



Bears love this fish feast, and apparently so do bobcats, judging by tracks one time in an early snow.

[pitw]

Thanks .  Why tag 'em if they are just about to die .  That is a whack of fish for a fact.  Wonder why they morph to a red color .

[Okanagan]

Thanks .  Why tag 'em if they are just about to die .  

Great minds come up with the same questions, Barry.  I wonder the same thing.  If the taggers had been on my side of the river I'd have asked them.  I think they walk the stream banks later in the year and look for tags on dead fish to see where they wound up.  A lot of these fish look like they will spawn within a mile, but maybe some go father up the river, through another lake and into the river above.   Hmmm... if the tags send out radio signals, and a  bear ate one...  that could get interesting.

They tag them at various places up the river, starting out in salt water. The fish that enter the mouth of the Fraser go into something like 350 tributaries upstream, anywhere from a few miles upriver to many hundreds of miles.  When a particular tributary has low numbers of fish returning, I.e. the Stuart River way up by Ft. St. James, the tagging and tracking helps them know when Stuart run fish enter the lower river and they will shut down the season for a few days to let those fish pass.  Don't know if my words here make sense or not.  (And I have no idea if the fish gurus have any idea what they are doing but that's what they tell us.)

[vvarmitr]

Once they turn red are they fit to eat?

[Okanagan]

Once they turn red are they fit to eat?

Wal, like many such things, the answer depends on who you talk to.    I like them chrome bright close to salt water and have never eaten one past half way to full red, and only one or two that far along.  I think they are good as long as the fish is firm and healthy and has no fungal growths on it that start to form on some (and they look gross).  These fish live off of their fat mostly from the time they leave salt water till they die.  So each mile upstream and each day that passes, they get leaner and skinnier as they also turn red.  I prefer fat chrome coastals.  Indian people at each section of river will tell you that the sockeye are too fat to taste good downstream from their traditional fishing area and too lean above.   The folks way upriver eat red ones.   Nobody (that I know) likes spawned out salmon.  Maybe somebody from Alaska can comment:  Tikkanni?

Just remembered that I have eaten firm kokanee caught at the mouth of creeks when they are full red with green head, and they were good.  Kokanee are sockeye that are landlocked in a lake, never go to salt water and run up creeks  etc. to spawn.