Description
Steelhead Trout: Oncorhynchus mykiss
This fish represents a stream’s night story. Steelhead spawn in fresh water in both winter and spring and this is where they spend the first year or two of their lives. Unlike other species, they don’t always die after spawning. Instead, Steelhead will return to the ocean repeating this process a few times. Ranging from Alaska to California, they eat a wide range of insects (including the pictured butterfly, a Pale tiger swallowtail: Pterourus eurymedon) as well as herring and other small fishes. The eye of this fish is the head of a Long-eared Owl (Asio atus), so quiet in the daylight that up to a dozen could be roosted above you and you’d never know. A black bear (Ursus americanis) climbs a tree. A wolf (Canis lupis) pauses as a raccoon fishes in the moonlight. Daylight is a:
Cutthroat Trout: Salmo clarki
These trout are both a salt water and freshwater fish. Very popular as a sport fish, small ones caught in saltwater are nicknamed “sea-trout”. Cutthroat trout range along the Pacific coast from Southern Alaska to northern California and inland from southern British Columbia and Alberta, south to New Mexico along eastern California into central Colorado. Spawning in fresh water, the young go to sea in their second and third year. In the tail the salmon swim against the current. Fishing in the wetlands we see a river otter (Lutra canadensis), a common loon (Gavia immer) and a great blue heron (Ardea herodias) while a Bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) watches for fish from his old- growth perch.
