San Juan Islands Marine Monitoring Network

• Community Salmon Teams
• Fisherman Bay Marine Health Observatory
• Friday Harbor Marine Health Observatory
• Indian Island Marine Health Observatory
• Deep Reef Marine Health Observatory
• Iceberg Point and the Seabird Coast
• Focus on Food Webs

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Community Salmon Teams

Lopez Community Salmon Team and Waldron Citizen Science monitor large salmon nurseries at Watmough Bight, a protected beach on Lopez Island's largely undeveloped south shore, and Cowlitz Bay, where sandy and cobble beaches meet the rocky slopes of Mount Disney.  Every two weeks from late May to October, volunteers use special 120-foot seines to sample aggregations of fish in the bay.  Juvenile Chinook and Coho salmon are measured, their caudal fins are clipped for genotyping to determine their streams of origin, and non-lethal gut lavage recovers specimens of what they have been eating. 

All visible injuries are recorded, and parasites such as "sea lice" and isopod gill parasites are documented and removed.  Sandlance and herring, the main fish prey of juvenile salmon, are also measured and fin-clipped for genotyping to monitor year to year changes in their spawning times and areas.  Juvenile rockfish (Sebastes spp), frequently encountered at Cowlitz Bay, are measured and lavaged because their early life histories and are poorly understood.  Results are reported to the community at SalmonAtion, an annual January celebration with locally produced food and wine, music, and art (see our Calendar).

See also: citizenscience.weebly.com/

Research Paper: Neritic Diet of Juvenile Chinook