(Amaya, Morgan, and Sam got to see how much the fish they released into Fauntleroy Creek last spring had grown. The large fish in the bucket is a coho smolt, on its way to saltwater, and the small fish are fry the Little Pilgrim School students released this year.)
By Judy Pickens
Special to West Seattle Blog

May was an especially busy salmon-release season on Fauntleroy Creek. A record 641 students – most from West Seattle – came to Fauntleroy Park as part of 17 field trips,and released just shy of 2,000 coho fry into the creek.

Just over 80 percent of the youngsters, preschool – fifth-grade, had reared their fish from eggs as part of the Salmon in the Schools program. The other 20 percent released fry reared by watershed volunteers for students to have a “salmon-lite” experience.

As those fish were getting used to running water, coho smolts were heading for nearshore habitat in Fauntleroy Cove after a year in the creek. For the first time, volunteers documented smolts in a soft trap as they left the park and as they passed through the fish ladder downstream near the beach.

A surprising 147 smolts left the park between late March and the end of May, showing that tributaries in the park provided healthy habitat for more than 7 percent of the fish released there. (Survival in the wild is estimated at 1 – 2 percent.)

Only 36 of those smolts, however, reached the lower trap. That number is typical since trapping in the lower creek began in 2003. The watershed council is working with state and city partner agencies to pinpoint the cause of such high attrition.