Crocker Creek Video

Me and my co-worker Justin went to a restoration site on Crocker Creek the other day to check on things and look for fish.  Crocker Creek was blocked by a huge homemade dam that was used for swimming for almost a 100 years.  Fun for swimming, but it eliminated about 6 or seven miles of nice steelhead habitat.

The dam collapsed under the pressure of the 97/98 El Nino and made a HUGE mess. The failed dam was still a barrier.  Even worse it released a 100 years of stored sediment and tore down two hillsides over night.  I applied for grants and permits and a few years later we tore it down. 

Amazingly, the creek was colonized by stray hatchery fish the very first year access was restored.  Obviously there wereno native fish to return after being locked out for 100 years.  Even more impressive is that I have seen hatchery fish there every year since.  I have always wanted to get some documentation of redds etc, so I went armed with video gear.  I found a battered spawner under one of the habitat structures that was built above the dam.

I got some cool topside video, but decided to try and get some UW footage using my helmet cam.  We straddled the log and duct taped the helemt cam to a willow branch.  The hokey setup produced some pretty cool video.  Not only did it show the battered spawner, but juveniles produced above the old dam site from last year.  Very exciting to see that spawning has been successful.

Inspired by the footage, I decided to put the Mac Papa Bill loaned me to work...much better than the PC!  I ended up with a short documentary of the whole story.  Thanks to Bill for the Mac loan and to Zeelander for the compression tips.

Hope you enjoy it...

Cool what are those little fish?

1 year old steelhead

Interesting read and great footage! Where is Crocker Creek? Thanks for sharing, scwafish.

Janice aka "Big J"

Crocker is a trib to the Russian near Cloverdale.  The dam was at the KOA campround.

Great footage to some great work and effort put a huge smile on my face!

Awesome work SCWA!!! The video and editing are great! Those underwater shots look totally professional. BRAVO!!!
Z

That was kick butt! I loved seeing that the steelhead was a hatchery fish and i loved seeing the juveniles. Good work Sean! 

Gotta love it when a plan comes together, especially when your the mastermind behind it. Kudos to you Sean.

That's some pretty awesome stuff Sean.  And nice work on the video editing... looks very professional.

EK

Thanks guys.

Great stuff! Glad to hear the mac is working out for you, welcome to the team! 

iMovie is about a zillion times sweeter than what I was using...thanks.  Gotta find a way to host bigger video files.  Maybe I'll get a zoomy account at youtube.