INTERNATIONAL RUSSIAN-USA PROJECT “KAMCHATKAN STEELHEAD. THE STUDY AND CONSERVATION OF THE RED DATA BOOK SPECIES,” YEAR 2022, Mission XXIII
The Interim Report on the results of the joint Russian American combined anti poaching and scientific expedition, Year 2022, fall season
By
Principal Investigator: Moscow State University Professor Kirill V. Kuzishchin
Main responsible research personnel: Moscow State University Senior research scientist Marina A. Gruzdeva
Moscow Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky Seattle -Washington - 2022
Principal Investigator: Moscow State University Professor Kirill V. Kuzishchin
Main responsible research personnel: Moscow State University Senior research scientist Marina A. Gruzdeva
Enforcement personnel: Affiliated official Fish Inspectors Dmitry S. Navrotskiy Pavel A. Kozlov
1. Introduction, Principal Goal and Particular Tasks of the 2022 Season.
Our KSP project from the beginning in 1994 came through several tight and hard periods. Last three seasons appeared to be again a period of hard time for all of us and for Kamchatkan steelhead. In the given circumstances we faced, to stay on our way and sustain our activity and realize the goals of the project was enough. As it was in the previous years, there was no clear vision of the plan how to execute the field activity. The saddest event was the absence of the US partners in the expedition because of flight limitations. That is why all of us had to be flexible in preliminary activity and elaboration of the plans for field activity. Up to the beginning of September there were a list of issues to be solved. One of the most positive events that happened was the arrival of the Justin Miller to the field. It was a great trip that showed the possibility of the US partners to get to Kamchatka, a test for all parts of the chain, from application for Russian visa to the flight plan how to get to Russia by the new pathway. The successful round trip of Justin Miller to and from Kamchatka shows that in general, we can organize trips of US anglers in the future even under strict limitations. To fill the gap in sponsors in the 2022 season there was a move for more active involvement of the Russian anglers. There is no novelty in it, as we had Russians in the previous years, but year of 2022 was the first when Russians became a main basis of the field operations. But even with Russian sponsors there were difficulties. In the end, we had eight sponsors divided into two groups that came to Kamchatka and took part in the expedition. This number was one of the smallest between years, and why it was decided to concentrate all of them on one river Utkholok. It was quite good to cover anti poaching and scientific tasks on one river, but it caused a tension regarding two other rivers Kvachina and Snatolvayam. The only way how we can cover the urgent need to keep under control Kvachina and Snatolvayam is to settle a small sentinel group in the Kvachina Camp. In 2020 we already arranged such a group, basing on the experience we put two our people Pavel Kozlov and Valeriy Kozlov in the Kvachina Camp. This small team had all needed equipment (communication devices, boat, fuel etc.) to do scouting rides for all period of the expedition.
We always keep in the mind the highest priority of the KSP is to monitor and protect unique steelhead stocks in three rivers of North West Kamchatka. The last two years showed that even limited presence on the river provide adequate shelter for the steelhead stocks and gives a good opportunity to fulfill the scientific/monitoring objectives. So, the main goals of expedition
in 2022 did not deviate from what we elaborated: 1) to provide the presence of expedition with the enforcement support to wash away poaching and 2) to provide data collection for estimating of the modern status of the stocks.
One of the effective efforts to provide stock protection is to have the functioning expedition camp on the river and our people that making boat/ATV rides by the river. During last year, we had the evidence that our people on the river was a strong factor for poachers not to come to the rivers. Fish police officer in the camp improves the total value of the expedition. The only shortage of our expedition was early timing of the camp closing, that usually takes place in mid October. For years we discuss a special anti poaching efforts when a part of the team remains in the field after sponsors go out. Thus in 2022 there was a decision to do in such a way to prevent poaching for steelhead before rivers freeze. Between the members of our team, we had two affiliated inspectors with the special temporal mandate Dmitry Navrotskiy and Pavel Kozlov.
At the same time, the anti poaching efforts have the same value as the scientific tasks. As far as we are working with Red Data Book species, we have to provide the actual estimation of the stock status for the Regional and Federal Ministry of Natural Resources. To date we know that most of the stock attributes in three North West Kamchatkan rivers vary dramatically between years. It means that all the stocks are unstable, and go through so called “bottlenecks” thereafter and could be a transformation of the intrapopulation structure. It means that we need a strong set of scientific data to understand the future of the wild stocks and reveal the linkages between stock health and environment. Thus, it is crucial to put a serious efforts in scientific research, moreover, we have a clear understanding that some tasks need to be done more intensively, like study of the linkages between genetic structure and life history strategy diversity. The science team, as in the previous years, was of two authorized MGU scientists Kirill Kuzishchin and Marina Gruzdeva.
Basing on the objectives, the main goal of the 2022-Expedition was to provide a robust protection of steelhead in three rivers and collect standard set of samples that will allow evaluating the modern status of the named steelhead populations.
The particular tasks of the project in 2022 include the following major issues:
1. To obtain data on the run timing and make expert estimation of the relative abundance in three rivers, within river distribution and to evaluate the risks for fish in the fall time in a given conditions and gather the data for the forecast how the fish could overcome the winter season;
2. Collect size weight data, scales, define the sex of fish to look after life history variations within the population;
3. Provide precise patrolling of the rivers in the aim to detect and stop poaching of steelhead in the most sensitive period of the life span within the rivers;
4. To put the enforcement efforts to the poachers in case of the poaching event including arresting procedure.
In the other words, the goal and tasks of 2022 season were the same as we put in our routine practice, and the most important thing to stress is that we did not have plans for limitation of the field activity under difficulties and limitations of the moment. Of course, we understand very clearly that execution of the plans will require additional efforts, but we had optimistic perspectives We would like to see the goal and tasks to be the same for years in the future, may be increase the number of the task but not to decrease them. On the basis of the obtained data every year we are publishing the scientific papers in the leading international scientific magazines. We see the interest to the scientific results on Kamchatkan steelhead rainbow from the side of scientists, conservationists, managers, and officials. Thus, the KSP will remain an outstanding serious scientific and conservation project and showcase for other species
and regions and we need to do our best to support the KSP Project and make it functional in any conditions.
2. Preliminary activity
In 2022 the preliminary activity began much earlier than in was last years. Our KSP project once again was under careful investigation from the Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) MGU team had a series of meetings with officials at the Federal level. The questions were mainly for the scientific and conservation outcomes, as well as there was interest for the recommendations for better conservation efforts. There was also interest for our activity in how we are realizing the monitoring/scientific study of the Red Data Book. We were ready for the detailed cooperation with officials and provided them with thorough information about our work. Our answers include the overview of the data set, the procedure of archiving and catalogs of the samples, the procedure of access to the samples and data. Also, we proved the serious approach to the KSP showing a number of papers in the peer reviewed magazines. All together during last 5 years (2018 2022) we published eight papers in Russian magazines, as well as 1 paper in the North American Journal. Officials considered this a good result, and there was a recommendation not to diminish scientific activity and publish at least 1 2 papers every year. Such investigation was rather unusual in the perspective of two decades beginning from the year 2000. The reason is that MNR is making a broad supervision of all scientific projects dealing with Red Data Book species. In mid summer the investigation was over, our project passed through it, and the were no more questions to MGU as a leading scientific organization that is executing science work with one of the Red Data Book species. The aspects dealing with protection and conservation was not of high priority for the Federal MNR, as they explained, this is the field of responsibility of the local MNR branch. Thus, on the way to the field Kirill Kuzishchin made a visit to the local agency (as we are doing routinely) had a fruitful talk with the Deputy of the Head regarding KSP. The local people demonstrated their support for KSP and they had no questions or any investigations about us. So, at the preliminary stage the MGU team did all needed actions about our Project and gained a support for it. But at the same time once again people from MNR demonstrated strong interest in the science program and a continued need for robust scientific studies of steelhead with resulting efforts to publish more papers in the scientific magazines. All this story urges us to keep in the mind scientific side of the KSP and pay attention for data collection same serious as for the conservation efforts.
Previous two years allowed us to elaborate and test the standard procedures for our activity before moving to the field. Even in 2020 we recognized the effectiveness of the publicity of the expedition to prevent poaching. So, the “mass media campaign” that our team launched in August early September between local people in the villages of Tigil Region provided a spread of information about expedition. In the previous year of 2021, the rumors about expedition appeared even earlier, than we began public announcement. Same happened this year, but with some specifics. By the inside information, local poachers and potential poachers were sure, that in 2022 we would not be able to organize field expedition. Political and global problems was the reasoning that we will have no chance to come to the rivers. As far as we know, rather many poacher teams began preparations for the rides to steelhead rivers. And it was a big surprise for poacher’s society to know that we are consistent in our plans and serious in the efforts to protect steelhead. It was important in the “rumor campaign” to mention that this year we WILL stay on the rivers for a long to wait until rivers will freeze. It was not a real novelty, because at the early stage of the project, in 1995 1996 we keep our camps up to November. But during last decades we did not practice long stay to the late October. It was a new reality for poachers that caused a big problem for poaching. Thing is that at the end of October beginning of November very good time for netting of steelhead, when the fish are under very severe threat. But at the same time this period is one of the worst for ATV drive through swamps as usual ATV trucks sink
down in the mud piles with serious damage of the machines. Poachers do not like this period and seem to prefer making rides for steelhead in a more or less dry weather. So, this year we declared, that steelhead will be under our protection during most dramatic time.
As we did in the previous years, we arranged our departure from Esso/Anavgay to rivers as publicly as possible, showing for the people that we have enough for big scale and long expedition. The ATV that was leased for our transportation was packed to the gills by camp equipment (fig. 1). Also, there were couple of small, but important issues. First, we showed how we load quite a lot of wooded board and panels it means that we are planning camp improvement, what means a strong evidence that we will stay for a long; second everybody can see many barrels of fuel on the ATV roof. Those two small details said much for poachers.
Near to the time of departure we received some information about logistic plans in the area of Utkholok Kvachina Snatolvayam. It is well known that there is an ATV road between village of Ust’ Khairyzovo and village of Sedanka, that cross all three rivers. And we know that in the fall time as a rule there is a traffic between villages. During such cargo trips the people making stops at the rivers to do a quick netting or beach sein to get some steelhead. It is not a real threat for fish but thing is that results of this fishing immediately goes to poachers and provides them current information about presence of fish, about our presence and other important information. As we were informed, in September October 2022 there were no big plans between locals to make cargo trips between villages, probably 1 2. That was good news, because usually locals drive much more often. Before, in some previous years, there were a small team of poachers that focused on coho salmon somewhere at the mouth of the Utkholok and Kvachina/Snatolvayam rivers, but we had no information about them in 2022.
The start of the expedition was on September, 19 all the team and camp equipment were ready, along with the PR actions, aimed at local villages Esso, Sedanka, Tigil and Ust Khairuzovo.
3. Transportation, Logistics and Overview of the General Situation on Arrival.
Because of limited scale of operation there was need to set up only one base camp at the Utkholok river and organize a modest spike camp at the Kvachina River. On the Kvachina River there was no need in additional tents, two of our staff planned to use the cabin for living and every day activity. All of those came out with a need in one ATV instead of two as we used for full scale expedition program. This year there were a lot of people that traveled to the field by ATV. Actually, six our people were on board: Kirill Kuzishchin (MGU), Marina Gruzdeva (MGU), Dmitry Navrotsky (Camp Director), Viktoria Schelchkova (cook), Artyom Arafailov (camp staff) and Pavel Kozlov (Kvachina camp Leader & ATV driver). It cased some difficulties with sleeping places but it was not critical. The main difference in 2022 to other years was that the ATV will stay with us all the time, with Pavel Kozlov to be authorized driver and keeper of the machine. The idea was to use ATV for anti poaching actions in the river watersheds and for possible maneuver for fishing between Utkholok and Kvachina if it will be needed.
Usually, we did the transportation to the field or, at least to village of Sedanka in a company of 2 3 other ATV to increase safety and for help if needed. This year all together 4 ATV went as a team (fig. 2). As a rule, the way from Esso/Anavgay to the field takes 2 3 days, including 1 or 2 nights to sleep and rest. Not this year. The start was as usual, but at the end of the first day, when we covered about 95 km, went through mountains, a tremendous rainstorm fell down on the area. For many years there was not so much water from the sky. All the numerous streams and creeks blow up. All the tundra patches and swamps suck rainwater as a sponge. That created a big problem for driving. Our ATVs began to sink down in the mud, along with big trouble with crossing of the rivers on the way. In usual conditions the stage in the creeks is about 20 30 cm at the cross places, but we were faced with the level at 1.1 1.3 m. Sometimes
our ATV was in a big trouble and we had to do a rescue of it from the swamp for hours (fig. 3). In the end, the way to the Utkholok Camp took 5 days and 5 nights. It became an all time record for our time with KSP, never in the past we spent so much time on the way in. The only positive events on the way, especially nearby Kvachina and Utkholok rivers was watching numerous grouse, ducks, foxes, and rabbits. This year there was a lot of wildlife in the tundra area, as if there were no hunting here
Figure 2. The first day of our trip we had a nice weather and moved rather quickly. There were not any breaks of the machine. Bad news that it was only one day of comfortable trip.
Figure 3. Our ATV with entire load sank down in a swamp between alder tree forests Alder tree is an indicator of very wet places on the top of the hills. It is hard to find safe way to go through the place, because under the layer of soil at every spot could be a lens of water. Hours needed to get the machine out of the trap.
Being on the way to the camps we realized that there will be difficulties in “our” area. Reason was from the endless rains, which lasted all the days while we were on the way. It means that even Kvachina River which we have to cross could be at a high flood. Same could be with the Utkholok River. At the arrival to the Kvachina ATV cross site we found out that the river stage is about +1 meter to the baseflow. We were lucky to cross Kvachina without a trouble but the ATV begin floating for several meters in a middle of crossing. That was a bad sign, and when after couple hours we reached the Utkholok River bank, it became obvious that the ATV will float for sure in attempt to cross the river. We decided to stay of the river bar for a night and wait to the next morning in a hope that river stage will go down. The reason was because there was no rain. And next morning we saw a good progress as the water fell down for about 30 cm (fig. 4).
Meanwhile we were afraid to cross the river and set up a boat to try the depth of the river and velocity and the crossing site. Only after thorough tests there was an attempt to cross the River, which was successful, but for a while the ATV floated in the middle of the river (fig. 5).
So, in 2022 the trip was with a big number of adventures and a lot of efforts from the staff. Bad news from this experience was the shortage of time to prepare the camp for a visit of the Russian sponsors that was planned for September, 27. It meant that in the nearest days, a tremendous efforts should be applied to make all the equipment functioning.
Figure 5. We were lucky to cross the Utkholok River at the Lower Crossing Site
In general, I would say that this year we had a hard preliminary set up period because of cumulative effect of weather and use of the basic camp infrastructure. Good news for us was at the arrival at the camp area that in last 1 2 months nobody visited, as the tall grass everywhere was the evidence. We found some harm for the infrastructure, first of all no steps to the water from the high bank, but no walkways missing. This year at our arrival we see that some items needed repair and that even our 2022 season might not be smooth. That is why all the team was involved in a reconstruction, which was finished right in time before first group came. At the same time, it is obvious that next year we must improve the lodge and other camp facilities All that was done in 2022 before groups came was only temporal support for camp items at the end of their functional lifetime.
5. General River and Fish Migration Conditions During Expedition.
Some data on the river’s shape. At the arrival to the rivers, we figured out that we were at the medium stage flood when the water goes down on both rivers Kvachina and Utkholok. And there were a number of remarkable and important differences between rivers. 1) at the same moment the river stage in the Kvachina is less than in the Utkholok: most of the gravel bars on Kvachina were out from the water or had a thin layer of water upon them; absolute majority of the gravel bars on the Utkholok were submerged dramatically having 40 60 cm water layer upon them; 2) while river stage on the Kvachina was not so high as on the Utkholok, water clarity on the Kvachina was much less no more than 30 cm, with lots of minor clay or mica particles. We stated that major tributary of Kvachina the Pukhl River brought very dirty water. While on the Utkholok water transparency was 60 70 cm at least. So, fishing conditions was much better on
the Utkholok because of clear water and good fly visibility in the water. The data we get is a piece of experience for us for future. We know that during the period of rains there is no good sense to make a trip from UT to KV for fishing. We did one such a trip with the first group of two people on September, 30, spent the whole day on the Kvachina River and had only one gentle take of steelhead. At this trip we had quite good velocity/depth conditions and it was a pleasure to make a correct fly presentation, but dirty water did not allow us to catch a fish.
Most important issue for the expedition were the river conditions. As we mentioned above, at the time of arrival river was at a high stage. Basing on the experience of the previous period, such conditions could be defined as “non fishable” or, in the best case “fishing is possible with low likelihood of catching ” Usually at such stage we had a day off for fishing or lazy attempts to get something for those sponsors who did not like to stay at the camp. Utkholok River had a stage that 60 70 cm above the normal for fishing. Kirill Kuzishchin made several attempts to get a steelhead on traditional beats but failed. The velocity in the river was at least twice more than we defined as “normal.” All the steelhead spots were under the deep water. Also, there was one more bad circumstance. Usually at the even years it is a “rich generation” of the pink salmon on the West of Kamchatka; but not in 2022. Nobody expected so poor run of pinks to main commercial rivers of Western Kamchatka. We have no accurate data on the Utkholok River, but according to the local rumors there were few pinks in the North West Kamchatka this year. Meanwhile pinks die in early middle September, before main steelhead run, the pink abundance play important role for steelhead within river migrations and disposition. In a poor pink year, its redds place in a restricted zone nearby riffles; in a rich pink year, its redds spread more widely to the tail outs of laminar runs and in the runs with high gradient (like Pride or Pete’s Run). In any case there are many holding places for steelhead, and those places are easy to recognize. But this year played a trick with us. At the very beginning Kirill made several studies to find pink/chum redds in the riverbed. It was a big surprise, but there was not one redd at the riffles with the depth less that 1.2 m. Locals told us that there was no rain in August, when the main spawning period of pinks and chums takes place. Thus, it is possible that at a low level salmon may spawn in the deep most parts of the river, on the thalweg of the riffles. But in September those patches were very deep, as well as velocity was extremely high. Absence of the salmon redds created new difficulties for fishing operations. All the preliminary data showed that we have to elaborate new system of fishing beats in a given conditions.
In fact, the expedition got into even more hard conditions than there were at the arrival of ATV. All the periods of rainy weather kept up and we did not have even one sunny day. For the first time in the history of the Project, there was a period of high water with two big peaks of stage. The first took place beginning from October, 2 till October, 6, the second began at October, 11 going uphill to October, 13 and after. At those periods river stage was about +2 m and was about the edge of the meadow bank (fig. 6). Lots of wood and riparian trees floated by the River along banks of the camp. And water became very dirty, with transparency about 5 cm. Not any chance to fish as it was too dangerous to stay in the river the level was so high that all the willow alder bushes on the banks were submerged. So, all told, we had five fishing days with the 1st group and 4 fishing days with the 2nd group. It is important to stress, that because of bad weather conditions there was delay with flight out in on first rotation. It was planned to arrange a flight that will take away first group and bringing in second group on October, 05. But cyclone caused a delay of rotation for October, 08. Three extra days for 1st group were lost to sampling because of unsuitable fishing conditions. Because of very bad weather forecast we have to arrange flight out for the 2nd group one day earlier, than it planned October, 13 instead of October, 14. So it was total number of 9 fishing days for two groups instead of 16 as was planned Further, those nine fishing days were under unsuitable fishing conditions. We have not experienced such a poor fishing conditions to date the 2022 season was the worst for the whole history of the KSP project.
Figure 6. Utkholok River at high water stage, October, 7, 2022. Water is about +2 m up to the baseflow. Flood water goes towards the camp facilities.
Same or even worst conditions were at Kvachina River. This river has different geomorphology comparing with Utkholok. In the lower reaches of Kvachina, where our operations takes places, the River has narrow floodplain and steep clay riverbanks The endless rains in September October 2022 created such a high stage that the water during the entire expedition was at the first or above the first river terrace. It means that in the Kvachina Base camp area, all the water was at the bottom of the hill near bottom of the steps. Not any chance for fishing and thus we missed the whole fishing season on Kvachina River after all.
After 2nd group, MGU team and some of the staff (cook Viktoria Schelchkova and Artyom Arafailov) left the camp at October, 13, the other part of the team stayed in the camps, with the aim for patrolling and preventing poaching on the rivers. On the Utkholok River it was Dmitry Navrotskiy, on the Kvachina River Pavel Kozlov and Valeriy Kozlov. On both locations our people stay with one jetboat on each river, enough fuel, food, propane, and firewood. On the Kvachina Camp was ATV that planned to stay up to the very end of the expedition. The plan was to be on the rivers to the beginning of November to cover the most sensitive period for steelhead conservation. But because of weather and river conditions the timeline was modified. After October, 13 there was a severe change in the weather, when moderate rains switched to hard rain/snowstorms, and there was no gap in them up to the October, 22. All the rivers blew up. Several rides by Utkholok, Kvachina and Snatolvayam rivers showed a huge flood of the whole floodplain. Tons of dirty water flows poured down the rivers. And the weather forecast was for snow for the nearest weeks in November. Taking this in account, it was a decision to accomplish our activity at October, 24.
One of the sensitive issues for the operations in the problem of heating in the Dinning Cabin and living facilities. Woodstoves are good enough but it is a tension between our needs and providing of firewood. There are no thick forests around and it is a shortage of potential patches of birch for cutting. Every year we had a problems with firewood. This year the operation was modified. The heating of the living rooms made from electric heaters, feeding from 220V generator. It was quite enough heat for comfortable living, but we have to keep in the mind, that the autumn of 2022 was much warmer that previous two. And one more issue needs to be covered. Electric heaters are not good enough to dry waders/raincoats during the night. On the Kvachina camp we have a special drying section with the woodstove. No such on the Utkholok camp. In a future, in case of frost electric heaters could not provide enough heat for comfortable living. Other issue dealing with electric heaters is the need for generators to work all the night. The noise is not a good thing for quiet sleep for many people. So, the problem of heating still on the table to find out the best option for it.
At the first glance, the season of 2022 failed. Partly it is true, but this vision is from the point of fishing operations and we had a poor set of samples for scientific goals. But we have to do more broad vision of the whole situation. No doubt about good news of the season. The flood during steelhead run from the sea created the shelter for fish, that we can dream about. Because of high water there were several positive events that can protect stocks. 1) At a high water steelhead rapidly goes upstream for a big distance. We know it for sure from the years of study, so we can be sure that on the Kvachina River steelhead could be in the upper reaches at a distance of 60 80 km from the mouth. On the Utkholok River steelhead for sure reached the upper parts of the river under the Bear Ridge (approximate distance 80 90 km). There are many quite deep pools in the Middle and Upper parts of both rivers to provide successful overwintering of steelhead. Therefore, a remarkable part of the stock did not fix in the lower reaches, where fish is under the threat of poaching in the lower and tidal pools. 2) High and very high level in the rivers making almost impossible seining and netting anywhere. Any attempt to set up a gill net failing because of a strong velocity. Lots of wood that floating in the rivers very quickly damaging any kind of nets. 3) flooding rivers mean that steelhead could easily take unusual routs for upstream migration, including floodplain forest. We know it for sure from the data of radio tagging that we did in 1997. We found out that steelhead easily go through alder/willow trunks in the floodplain forest rather far from the riverbed. 4) lots of water and wet show turned tundra into the wide swamps that became very hard for ATV move. Thus, few people were ready to risk searching for a steelhead. During our stay there was only one ATV that made a ride from Sedanka to Ust Khairuzovo and no back trip. There was a problem to cross the Utkholok River even when the river stage was about +1 m above the baseflow.
All those factors are very positive to decrease the possibility of steelhead extraction from the rivers. Of course, natural factors could not avoid at all the poaching, but we could be sure that most of the 2022 run will escape from poachers and will spawn next spring. At the same time our presence provided protection for steelhead at the mouth of the rivers. So, we have enough data to be sure, that the protection issue of the 2022 year was fulfilled.
It became a routine to do observation over other species and wildlife in the fall time during the time of expedition. The end of September is a time of late coho run along with the last specimens of the summer run coho. Having coho in the river is a good point to arrange additional premium food for the anglers. But this year we saw only one summer run male coho in a spawning color, bad to eat. Absence of coho is one more evidence for rapid migration of all fish upstream typical behavior for Kamchatkan salmon and steelhead. Also, there were rather few charrs in the Utkholok River, while in the common years of low level there are many of them. In October Dolly Varden, White Spotted charr and their hybrids begin to appear in the
runs, but in a few numbers. Bears did not make trouble for us, perhaps because there was no food for them on the riverbanks. Couple of them we saw in the country, but at a big distance.
6. Main attributes of fish run, within-river distribution, and fishing operations
First attempt of steelhead fishing took place by Kirill at September, 25, in high water conditions and failed. Fishing in the next days also did not give any result. Because of high water it was impossible to see any moving fish or any sign of the fish. One day it was a catch of one rainbow in a typical steelhead spot, but no steelhead until 1st group arrived. So, it was the first year when we had no preliminary data to provide immediate effective angling for sponsors. We have to begin from the very beginning in a new conditions.
By the proposal of Justin Miller, who came with the first group on September, 28 the best possible beats should be upstream from camp, perhaps most upstream pools and runs. Because rapid assessment that we did downstream from the camp showed no possibility even to stay in the water. We decided to cancel downstream pools and concentrated on the upstream area. Finally, we found out that there were 3 4 more or less perspective runs, where anglers could provide adequate fly presentation with likelihood to get a steelhead. Two runs provided us most of the catch. It is Pete’s Run above the upper crossing of the River and Pride Run far upstream. Few steelhead bites were in the Last Call Run, Rush Hour Run and Late Bloomer Run. This year there was not one steelhead bite in the run above Kolkavayam Tributary mouth, while this run was one of the best at the normal river stage. The reason Pete’s Run gave us a fish was a run structure at the high river stage. As usual we were getting fish closer to the bottom of the run, but in 2022 it was to fast. But above typical places, the flooding river covered a big gravel bar up to the willow forest. And on this submerged gravel bar appeared a steelhead migrating rout. Steelhead moved in quite shallow water, less that 1 m, in fact it was rather close to the willow forest no more than 15 20 m off the forest into the river. The section length was about 100 m, and fish moved through it with a frequency 2-3 fish/hour. It was the only place on the whole river, where we can monitor steelhead migration. It is interesting fact that such migration intensity was more or less stable during stage deviation up and down. Good place for 1 or 2 anglers to follow one by one and rotate. One day two anglers stay here the whole day and hooked three steelhead. The low number was a result of bad water conditions. The other productive place the Pride Run was a holding area for steelhead. Going through it two anglers routinely hooked 1 or 2 fish. But after those hook ups no fish showed itself for several hours or even to the end of the day. So, it looks that there was no upstream migration through the Pride Run in the shoreline area, where we can reach it with our tackle. It is important to stress that in both “best” runs anglers were able to cover restricted area not far from the bank. Big depth and strong current did not allow us to reach places close to the riverbed. In any case, the within river distribution of steelhead stays unclear all the season.
This year anglers have to use very heavy tackle to bring their flies to the lower layers of water. Heavy lines, tippets and heavy flies were the only way to get a fish. For some anglers, who were not an expert in casting resulted in a poor catch.
There was not any big difference in angling tactics during the 1st and 2nd groups, while the water temperature went down from 9 C on September, 24 to 4.5 C on October, 3 and 2 C on October, 8 and later to the end of the session. We did not see any clear tendency in steelhead activity during the season. Fish demonstrated gentle takes at the beginning, the same was at the end. There were 3 4 fish total that showed hard attacks on a fly. Almost all steelhead were hooked by the edge of the upper, rarely by the lower jaw, couple of fish hooked in the “scissors.” We were lucky that not one fish swallowed the fly deep into the throat, and there was no bleeding fish during the whole season.
In total, we obtained samples and tagged 28 fish from the Utkholok River, zero fish from the Kvachina River and 0 fish from the Snatolvayam River. Please note that there was one fishing day only on the Kvachina River with anglers (September, 30), and no anglers on the Snatolvayam at all. Main fishing efforts on Kvachina and all on the Snatolvayam River were done by Pavel Kozlov and Valery Kozlov.
Because we can define (or state) that there was no fishing on Kvachina and Snatolvayam rivers, all the data we can provide for the Utkholok River only. As we mentioned that fishing was poor, yet at the same time there was a quite unexpected result for the First Group. The data shows that CPUE during the first session was 2.1 fish/rod/day for hook ups and 1.7 for landed fish (table 1). It was because two rods were involved into the angling process. This result was comparable with what we had last year at the first session (in 2021 we had 2.8/2.0 respectively the figures are close). While the results for 2nd group was much poorer. At least all 6 anglers had at least 1 fish landed and 1 2 hooked. 3 people had 2 fish landed, 1 angler had 3 fish landed. The reason 2nd group had much less success was that the 1st Session was hard fishing conditions, but the heavy rains for the 2nd Session made fishing nearly impossible. At the period of 1st group the river stage was higher than normal 60 cm for 3 days and 70 cm for the remaining two days, while for the second group, the level was higher than at least 80 cm above normal, and water became dirty.
Table 1. General information about fishing efforts in season 2022. River Fishing effort Total hooked/landed CPUE*
Utkholok, 1st session 2 rods, 5 days 21/17 2.1/1.7 Utkholok, 2nd session 6 rods, 4 days 14/11 0.58/0.45
Kvachina, all the time 2 rods, 4 days 0/0 0/0 Snatolvayam, All the time 2 rods, 3 days 0/0 0/0
Note: * CPUE is estimated in number of fish/rod/day; first figure for hooked fish, second for those which were landed.
The table show objective data, but we have to keep in the mind, that it is a difference between statistical data and impressions from angling. Subjective viewpoint was negative. After returning from the river, both anglers from 1st group were not pleased, not having hooked and landed steelhead. The reason for it was low aesthetics of fishing, when angler have to fight with running water, there was not real landing because all the steelhead were taken by the landing nets in deep water, the takes were in unusual places etc. So not what we love about steelhead fishing on Kamchatka.
By almost any measure, in this case we had the worst fishing year during the whole project from the very beginning in 1994, and certainly the worst in 21 century (table 2). It is easy to see the correlation between fishing success and river shape as in the “wet” years when river is flooding we had poor fishing, when the weather was more or less dry it is opposite fishing was great. At the same time, we should keep in a mind that low river stage is also not good for fishing, especially on the Kvachina and Snatolvayam Rivers.
Table 2. The comparison of angling effectiveness (CPUE) over years (data for the whole period).
Year General river River conditions
Utkholok Kvachina Snatolvayam
2016 Hard rains, river flooding, early close of the season 1.01 / 0.81 1.08 / 0.82 0.95 / 0.79
2017 Few rains, rivers are in a great shape 4.45 / 2.15* 3.06 / 1.51 2.79 / 1.54
2018 Not much rain, ~3 missing days, good fishing conditions 3.19 / 1.55 2.55 / 1.30 2.54 / 1.27
2019 Bad weather, ~5 missing days, ½ of a period bad fishing conditions 1.55 / 0.73 0.93 / 0.41 1.61 / 0.72
2021 Few rains, rivers are in a great shape 5.20 / 2.98 2.45 / 1.53 2.53 / 1.43
2022 Almost all period river is flooding 0.97 / 0.78 0 / 0 0 / 0
Note: * the first figure is for hooked fish, the second landed fish. The years 2010, 2011 and 2015 did not included because there were no Utkholok operations.
Last year we began to use landing nets to keep steelhead nearshore and decrease the number of escaped fish on a short line. It was very effective last year, at the normal river conditions, but it became extremely valuable in 2022 at the flooding river. We can state that without landing nets most likely all the hooked steelhead will be gone and no data obtained. We had more evidence that landing net have to in every boat for every guide as a mandatory piece of equipment having received the strong recommendations from Ministry of Natural resources to maintain robust scientific research, the process of data collection should be improved so that the KSP’s angling and fish protection program continues to increase the number of samples collected during the KSP and landing nets improve greatly the process of sample collection.
In 2022 because of high water for a number of days we saw harbor seals in the camp area and downstream of the camp pools. It is quite usual event, though seals often follow salmon and steelhead in a rivers even in shallow places. While flooding, the river is suitable for seals moving back and forth. At the same time, we did not see even one steelhead with fresh seal wounds or marks. We have a hope that this year was a minor threat from marine mammals for steelhead fish had enough room to escape from predators. We noticed one steelhead with an old net mark across the body nearby the beginning of the dorsal fin. Perhaps this mark appeared many months ago, when fish was smaller in size as far as we know commercial fishers do not use ocean drifting nets with big mesh size.
6. Anti poaching activity
Anti poaching operations in 2022 were a little easier to do because we already had a good experience and protocols, elaborated during 2020 2021. In fact, in addition to the preliminary actions in local villages we did regular patrol rides on the rivers to look after any human activity on the banks. As it was in previous years, we had with us 2 drones which can cover rather expanded area to watch for any machines in the watersheds, netting cases etc. Similar kinds of operations were done after main group left the Utkholok Camp on October, 13. Kozlovs at Kvachina Snatol and Dima at Utkholok executed the standard procedure of river supervising up to the end of October. This means that all the lower reaches of all three rivers were under precise protection. There was not one attempt for poaching, moreover, there was not one stranger in the watersheds, not even hunters in the area at the lower Utkholok. After the patrol group came back
in early November, we investigated possible poaching incidents on our rivers. As far as we know there was no attempt to make a ride for steelhead netting. There were rumors that somewhere some people were captured by fish police with a number of steelhead, but there was no clear information, or even confirm what river was the source. It is possible that it could be somewhere to the south such as on the Brumka or other. We feel that we can confidently conclude that in 2022, the protection goal was reached, most likely the stocks escaped their main threat.
7. Main Scientific Results of 2022 Expedition
The length weight characteristics of anadromous steelhead in 2022 we have for the Utkholok population only table 3. Because of the small sample size those data could not be completely definitive, but at the same time we can see in the sample small fish of 550 mm FL and a rather big one of 910 FL. Most of the fish had fork length in a range of 735 780 mm (=28 30 inches). It is more or less similar to what we have for all the years before (fig. 7, table 4) The analysis shows that for years the average size of steelhead varies, but in rather narrow corridor within the range of 700 900 mm (>60% of observed data) or 750 850 mm (>75%). It is interesting but in the years with a small sample size (2022, 2016) there was a little increase of relatively smaller fish, most possible that this is the outcome from a small number of sampled fish.
Table 3. Size and weight of steelhead in the 2021 samples.
River Fork length, mm Total weight, g Snatolvayam, n=0 Kvachina, n=0 Utkholok, n=28 752.7 (550 910) 4737 (1917 8005)
80
Number of observation
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
2022 2021 2019 2018 2017 2016 450 500 550 600 650 700 750 800 850 900 950 1000 1050 0
Figure 7. Length distribution in steelhead for years of observations. Notice that majority of fish (75% and more) do not deviate much within the range 700-850 mm FL.
Table 4. Size weight variations in steelhead over years.
Year Utkholok Kvachina Snatolvayam
2017
783 (540 965) 5506 (1650 10173)
772 (550 910) 5104 (1449 8605) 812 (700 980) 6077 (4279 9064)
2018 766 (620 930) 5057 (2475 9856) 755 (560 927) 4892 (2452 9327) 771 (640 930) 5183 (2231 9518)
2019 792 (510 900) 5767 (1559 8331) 787 (640 914) 5548 (2913 9196) 778 (670 930) 5545 (4053 10573)
2020 791 (725 920) 5803 (1559 9122) 783 (572 900) 5721 (2833 8859)
2021 782 (660 960) 5536 (2922 9532) 771 (630 870) 5237 (2553 8479) 778 (650 910) 5255 (2595 8518)
2022 753 (550 910) 4737 (1917 8005)
Between years rapid analysis show more or less constant basic parameters of the intrapopulation structure of the stocks. More detailed information we can get from the scale analysis. To date we can tell, that in last 3 years (2019 2021) we did not find remarkable change in the age structure in typically anadromous steelhead. At the same time, we found out that in the sample from 2021 there were two groupings of fish with different ocean growth rate. One group have relatively slow ocean growth, especially at the first ocean year (18 22 circulli in a year zone), fish from the other grouping have much higher ocean growth rate, having 28 35 circulli in a year zone. In the past there was little difference in the data on the growth most of fish had 20 28 circulli in the annual zones at the ocean period. Split in the scale structure have no solid explanation to date. It is possible that a substantial change in climate of Northern Pacific (e.g., increase of the average surface water temperature for 2C in two decades) could have influence on the marine period of life of Kamchatkan steelhead. It is possible that a part of Kamchatkan steelhead could stay somewhere in the southern part of Sea of Okhotsk, in the coastal waters of Southern Kuril Islands while other components of the fish enter into the Pacific Ocean and stay far offshore in the high seas. But this hypothesis is in need of stronger evidence, to date we have a differentiation and we’ll find out what we do have to do in the sample of 2022.
All steelhead that we saw in 2022 had a bright ocean color, not any sign of red or pink color on cheeks or sides, neither in females nor in males. Moreover, all the steelhead that were landed had ocean sea lice near the basis of anal fin and parasitic crustations on the gills. Usually, sea lice fall down from the fish body in a period of 3 4 days, rarely do they remain up to 7 days but no more. Gill parasites stay on the gill up to 12-14 days in the freshwater after entering river from the sea. The catch of steelhead with the ocean type parasites means that there was very fast movement of fish upstream. Usually, steelhead stay for a while in the lower tidal pools of the rivers in a sections with frog water. This year the flood caused rapid migration upstream. It is not excluded that low biting activity of steelhead was a result of lower adaptation to the freshwater after entrance from the sea. We noticed that steelhead in 2022 were not so strong in fight against angler (less fun from reeling). As a rule, anadromous fish need in 2 7 days to adapt in the freshwater after getting in the river. Such was in the previous years and we observed schools of steelhead stay in the tidal pools of Kvachina and Snatolvayam rivers.
Little unusual fact about steelhead in our 2022 sample is predominance of females 18FF : 10MM. It is not something unusual for steelhead, but as a rule, in the past, the sex ratio was close to 1: 1 with a slight prevalence of males or females in some years. Maybe such a strange ratio in 2022 was the outcome from the small sample size, but in 2016 and 2020 there were also small sample, but the ratio in those years was about 1: 1.
It was likely presumptuous to expect recaptures of tags having so few fish landed. Meanwhile, there was one resident rainbow that was tagged. This rainbow was tagged in 2021 by Justin Miller from a location situated a distance of 3 km upstream from the place of recapture in 2022. However, it was the only recapture of the season.
Steelhead was not the only object of scientific interest on the rivers. Again, the charrs are in the focus of special interest because we still have a unique case of mass between species hybridization in the pristine environment (fig. 8) Also, we are interested in the fish population dynamics over years. In the 21st century we see decrease in the abundance of Dolly Varden charr in the North West Rivers of Kamchatka, all while White Spotted charr in all three rivers demonstrate more or less stable abundance. Regarding hybrids we can state that its abundance increased from the year 2000 (when it was observed for the first time). The real linkages in the ecosystem and interactions between char species are still unclear and there are many gaps in the information about it. We did not expect fruitful data collection regarding charrs having such a high river stage, but in fact, good samples of all three forms were obtained.
We noticed, that in 2022 more Dolly Varden appeared in the river, at least more than in the previous years. We discovered a complicated stock structure in the White Spotted charr. While there were many fish of different size, from 250 mm FL to 650 mm FL, it was not a uniform sample. Some fish, both small size and large size were immature it is very strange that White Spotted charr of 550 mm FL and of age 7 or 8 years is still immature. At the same time there was a group of White Spotted charr, both males and females that missed their spawning season, and the rest of charrs were after spawners.
Figure 8. The hybrid Dolly x Kundzha; the Dolly Varden and White Spotted charr from the Utkholok River, the fall of 2022.
Such strange situation never been seen before. So, the data we are getting from steelhead and charrs show that nowadays we can see very strong fluctuations in the nature and that there are more and less sensitive species. At a first glance charrs are more sensitive and reply to the dramatic climate change with the rebuilding of its intrapopulation structure, reproductive cycles
and destroy of the barriers between species: the high abundance of hybrids is the evidence for the theory. At the same time steelhead demonstrate more stable stock structure and the only change with the period of initial study (1970 1971) is appearance of the semi anadromous rainbows at the end of 20th century, and the presence of such a fish during the whole modern period.
8. Looking Ahead
The 2022 KSP Expedition could not be recognized as a particularly successful year. Fishing was poor, weather was bad, there were a number of infrastructure challenges, travel difficulties on our way to the Camps, problems with flights (in and out, again because of the weather) all resulted in more negative than positive impressions. At the beginning of the KSP, in 1994 1996, we found out that autumn floods can cause a big trouble for the field operations and the Project as a whole. But years of experience showed that anglers can understand this natural circumstances and overcome them. Thus, we created the formula that “we could not control fish and weather but we have to keep control over camp operation and logistics.”
I would insist we have six anglers on the Utkholok and 6 anglers on the Kvachina in the future. In 2022 we had six rods in the second group and restricted area for fishing (upstream from the camp, few perspective runs) and even in this situation the Utkholok provided fishing in a very hard conditions. While six rods on Kvachina River is too much having in the mind hard weather conditions. Moreover, in the past we started from about September, 18 20 namely on the Kvachina/Snatol but then we had no groups on the Utkholok. There were no good reasons for it, and during this period it was very hard from the fishing perspective very low water, very few fish in the river on the Kvachina If there would be a choice for the First group during the early period, we should run Utkholok River. In the Utkholok there would be enough water and easier to find a fish. Let’s try to arrange sponsors in such a way. Of course, the condition of the facilities on the Utkholok will be improved so there will be adequate living conditions. If so, six sponsors on each river would be the best option for the fishing operations and data collection.
Finally, this year we realized our plans to stay in the field till the end of the season. It was well done and we should do in the same way in the future.