WatershedEvents

WELCOME TO THE MACRO ZONE

MACRO photography and my fumbling and stumbling efforts to relearn some of its basics are the subject of today’s post. What a difficult and frustrating journey it’s turning out to be! Some of the issues are hardware based but most have to do with my current physical abilities and my ageing brain. Sometimes the task seems so difficult I seriously consider calling it quits. But I absolutely love shooting Macro, when it works, and I am determined to get back to something at least close to my previous skill level at the craft.

What is “Macro” as applied to photography? A Technical answer from some expert sources say it is when the subject being photographed is the same size (1:1) or larger on the recording device (a digital sensor or piece of film) as it is in life. That’s a pretty simple and accurate definition from a strictly physical point of view, but it really falls short of the mark. "Close-up photography" comes closer when it comes to gaining some sense of what it means to step into the Macro Zone. Most of the shots displayed in this post are examples of close-up photography; but I was definitely working in the Macro Zone when I shot them. 

From the viewing standpoint it’s more about size relationships than ratios; and from a shooting standpoint it is as much about a level of concentration and care as anything else. When I speak of entering the Macro Zone, I have a much more subjective point of view in mind. I think of it as a very unique kind of experience, one that usually involves stepping into another world. All sorts of weird and wonderful things happen when you enter that world, and if you push into it any distance at all, you may begin to experience almost as many strange things happening with the medium itself as with the subject matter at hand.

Digital approaches to Macro Photography vary in important ways from those involving traditional equipment and materials, naturally enough; but what it takes to get up close and very personal with small slices of existence is pretty much the same, regardless of gear, so far as the Macro Zone is concerned. Don't get me wrong, the gear issue is real in either case – It helps tremendously to have the kinds of specialized shooting equipment that is readily available on the market today. But gear isn’t really the determinate factor, so far as the essence of the experience is concerned. 

I got my first taste of the Macro Zone in 1967, while still in the Marines. I was stationed at camp Lejune, NC, cooling my heels in Casual Company while I was awaiting my discharge. I had time on my hands, a well-used Petri Penta camera at my disposal, and a wonderful pine woods within a few yards from my barracks. On one of my excursions into those woods I played with shooting through the 50mm lens reversed and held onto the camera body, a technique I had read about in one of my photo magazines. Much of the film was useless when I picked it up from the PX, but a few of the shots were awesome, at least in my eyes, and I was hooked.

Since then I have used all kinds of optical devices ranging from pricey lenses to the sides of beer bottles to photograph the small things around me, and all with various amounts of success. What I’ve learned is what many experienced pros will tell you: the gear is important, sure enough; but the real key to photography, any kind, is simply shooting as much and as often as you can. As a great old photo instructor once told me, “You have to get the first 10,000 bad pictures out of the way before you can call yourself a real shooter.”

So, I am hard at work on my second batch. Who knows how all this will go? But working in the Macro Zone will definitely be part of it. 

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Note: Summer and warmer days are fast approaching, and I am less and less inclined to spend much time on the computer. There are all sorts of projects I want to get after, and they are all "out there." Accordingly I am going to fiddle with the frequency of my posts. Right now I am putting up two a week (Wednesday and Sunday), but in the future I will follow a much less regimented schedule. My data suggest I don't have that many regular followers; but if you are one, stay tuned. I will do my best not to let you down. 

PREPING FOR NOVEMBER

Beatty Creek overgrown, but some access.

I’ve never been a big fan of hiking in spite of the many miles I’ve traveled afoot. I truly am more interested in the journey than the speed, and have no problem with short distances covered in hours instead of minutes. I’m more of the meandering type, and I’ve noticed that is also the approach I’m using when I go out on my own with the wheelchair. With that in mind, I went on my first solo “meander” down to Beatty Creek yesterday.

Neighbors are intent on protecting the resident population of pond turtles and their young.

I was reminded on the way what a great neighbor hood this is, and how fortunate we are to be living here. Especially from the environmental aspect. There is always a few volunteers taking care of the common areas, and the vegetation is a great blend of wild and domestic plants.

Our house is just a half mile from the creek, door-to-door, but it took me better than an hour because I poked. The light was only fair –  an overcast sky and pretty thick clouds, no “key” and very low contrast – so I took only a few photos. But it was a very gratifying outing nonetheless. I had a definite goal in mind, and achieved it. I wanted to examine from wheelchair the layout of the place in preparation for the Chum Run on Beatty Creek in November.

The only place on the creek where I can hope to gain any access is the bridge that crosses it a short distance above its confluence with Mclane Creek. There’s a good sized culvert there, and a couple good spots for redds in the area. In the past I’ve managed to get some decent shots of the spawning that happens here, and I hope to do so again. I looked around for some sort of additional access and found little of any real promise; but if the spring vegetation dies off this fall, I should be able to creep up closer to the edge of the bridge.

What will be fundamentally different this time, however, is the degree of intimacy I’ll be able to enjoy with the wonderful creatures. No longer will I be able to sit quietly on the bank, only a few feet away, and watch them rest in the shadows for awhile, before fighting for a good position near a gravid female, or continuing upstream to a final resting place.

Many times I’ve been close enough to touch one; but I’ve always resisted the temptation. The critters need every last ounce of their energy, and the last thing they need is to waste it on avoiding me. Besides, it would seem almost profane. If you move slowly and don’t crowd them, they will soon enough get used to your presence and let you settle in real close,

Being able to observe a run up close is a wonderful thing, and becomes a sacred event if you’ve learned even a little about their ways. It is especially so if you can sit alone on the bank with them and breath first hand the perfume of their being. I’ll miss some of that from the wheelchair, but at least I’ll be a distant witness.

I’ve been able to experience the beauty and majesty of this event most years since we moved here in 2014. I missed the run in 2021 because November’s rains came way too late (December in fact) and missed the runs of 2022 and 2023 due to health issues. I’m determined to make this one, and just hope the weather and my old carcass cooperate.

BEATTY / MCLANE CREEK CONFLUENCE

A long overdue and much needed visit to Mclane Creek Natural Area, and the Mclane/Beatty Creek confluence this afternoon. There wasn't much moving at the beaver pond - if you are familiar with Kitty's landscape paintings you'll recognize the big snag right away. It was fairly quiet along the boardwalks covering sensitive areas (below) as well.

The fall colors this year seem particularly strong to me, given the terrible heat and limited amounts of rain we had in early to mid summer. I'm thrilled with it all, and feel tremendously lucky to be living in such a wonderful area.

The confluence lies on dry ground just outside the extreme southwest boundary of the nature trail itself. A short walk through the woods puts you at the base of a very large, multi-trunk, western red cedar - the confluence lies directly below the group.

In the photo above, Beatty Creek comes in from the lower left and merges (about dead center of the shot) with Mclane, which flows left-to-right through the top half of the photo. There is not much in the way of running water in Mclane Creek right now, and only soggy gravel and soggier leaves in Beatty.

Salmon won't begin plowing upstream until the rain gives both creeks a good first flush. The coho will be first, probably sometime in the first or second week of November. In all likelihood the chum won't be able to venture into Beatty Creek's main channel until sometime just before Thanksgiving, when there will be (hopefully) an inch or two of water passing over the log jam currently blocking most of the channel. Chum can't go airborne like coho, so rapids without side channels create total blockades. Last year's strongest flows though the natural notch shown below were deep enough to allow large numbers of the great beasts to fight their way into the deeper water on the other side. (The viewpoint shown here is roughly 180 from the one above, and looks straight upstream from the confluence itself)

Several solid and potentially productive pulses of Pacific moisture are headed this way in the next few days, and we've had a fair amount of rain already this month. I'm hopeful it will be a good year for the runs in both creeks - a couple years ago Beatty was bone dry until mid-December, well after the chum run had come and gone. Not a single fish made it into the creek in time to spawn. 

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PS - HOW LUCKY AM I?

A hard left turn at the base of this towering mass of second-growth, big-leaf maple takes you back to the pond at the heart of the reserve; but a hard-right puts you on the trail back to my house, about a half-mile away as the crow flies. I am truly blessed, thanks to the foresight and ongoing efforts of a large number of people who, for many years have put their give-a-damn where their mouths are. Thank you, one and all.

THE FLUSH ON BEATTY CREEK

Above, a before and after photo of the impact of a good rain on Beatty Creek.

In the brief interval since my last post about Beatty Creek, a substantial amount of rain has fallen - enough to cause flooding in many of the low-lying areas around Olympia, and more than enough to turn the creek into a torrent. Wednesday-Thursday, in fact we set a record for rainfall for the period - almost four inches in a 48 hour period.

The watershed for Beatty Creek is not very flashy, meaning it doesn't operate like an on-off water valve the way badly degraded watersheds often do; but it rained a fair amount a day or two running up to Thursday's downpour, so the sponge was saturated well before the peak event. It is still raining from time to time today, but the great flush has passed and the water level is beginning to fall. In a day or two, any chum still waiting for a shot at its upstream breeding grounds should be able to make a run for it. However, IF any are still out there in Eld Inlet, I'll be surprised. 

HARD TIMES ON BEATTY CREEK

The two photographs below require a bit of explanation: The first was taken at the confluence of Beatty and McLane Creeks. I was standing at water's edge of McLane, and the view is directly into the mouth of Beatty Creek. For the second shot, I stepped over all that debris and pointed the camera directly upstream. What's important here is what's NOT to be seen, specifically the dark, sinuous motion of several large chum salmon fighting their way up Beatty Creek to their natural spawning grounds. 

It is nearly mid-December. In a typical year I would not be able to stand on dry land at this spot along McLane Creek, even if I might want to - the stream would be so deep and the current so strong it might knock me down. Only a few salmon would be entering Beatty Creek, only a handful sweeping away at their redds further upstream. The peak of the run would have passed. The scene along the way would be mostly one of carnage, the stream and its lower banks littered with rotting carcasses - the bleak aftermath of a successful spawn. Instead, today only a paste of rotting leaves remains on the damp gravel. The heavy and steady rains of November have yet to arrive, and purge the creek. Furthermore, the forecast for the rest of December suggests they may not arrive until 2020, well paste the time for spawning.   

This is not the first time late or otherwise insufficient rain has wrecked an annual run on Beatty Creek. It is an ephemeral stream to begin with, and even in a good year its bottom is dry as a bone by June. In the fall that bottom will be covered in a thick mix of leaves and other detritus offered up by the surrounding deciduous trees and shrubs.

Then, usually in the first week or two of November, a series of wet warm fronts will blow into the area from the Pacific coast, one right after another. They usually come through only a day or so behind each other, creating a kind of wet pulse which soon translates itself into surging crests of stream flow in the creeks.

Then comes the surge - the full force removes virtually anything in its pathway. It’s wonderful to watch the cleaning process; even more wonderful to see what happens when the cycle settles long enough for the chum to run up stream and lay their eggs.

Sitting (or sometimes lying) quietly along the banks of Beatty Creek, just a few feet away from the chum, can be a deeply moving experience. I will miss it this year, it appears. But that won’t diminish my love for Beatty Creek, nor will it keep me from studying and recording its ways. I will not, however, write a book about the experience – been there and done that with Up Fanno Creek. Instead I’ll simply journal my efforts on this blog from time to time. I may also pull a weed or two, and pick up the occasional bits of litter I happen across. If you are a wetlands lover, as I am, stay tuned.

WAITING FOR THE CHUM....

 

 

I'm always amazed by how rapidly time seems to fly these days. I haven't been on this site for months...been keeping my whining mostly to myself. I'm still writing about Bretz, and just recently made what I hope will be the breakthrough that will let me get this publication monkey off myback. More about all that as it develops - in the meantime, if you are interested, check out this LINK. It will take you to a podcast by Nick Zentner of Nick on the Rocks.

One of the issues I deal with continually is the surprising fact that I simply don't have time to get to everything I've loaded onto my plate. What makes this so surprising is I am fully retired, and am the master of at least 95% of my time. There are so many possibilities, some of which are purely pleasurable, but others more focused on "paying it forward."

The work on the Bretz material falls somewhat into both categories, although the pleasurable component has been somewhat strained for the last few months. Many very busy people gave me so much of their valuable time during the early stages of research, and I feel so indebted to them that I absolutely must deliver a final result. I also feel  miserable about the poor progress I've been making since I finished my first rough draft. 

Another activity, one which is more "community contribution" focused involves a nearby salmon stream. Beatty Creek it's called, and I'm going to try to put together a Friends-of group to work for its welfare. It is so small and so relatively remote that it isn't even on most maps of the area. It is also intermittent - a status which generally puts it more at risk than its cousins, the so-called perrenials. But every late November-early December it litterally teems with chum salmon, many of them over three feet in length. Up until now, I've tried to leave the advocacy work behind me - I had pretty much shot my bolt with the publication of Up Fanno Creek...or so I thought. 

At any rate, the rains have begun, and the chum will not be long behind. They are already in the lower reaches of Mclane Creek, the major stream into which Beatty Creek flows. It is only a matter of a few more inches of rainfall before they will be able to ascend the 200 verticle feet they must travel before they appear in our neck of the woods. Meanwhile, we wait...

 

 

WHEEL GOES 'ROUND

The chum run in Beatty Creek struggles. November’s rains came too late, and in quantities too small to provide much traction for fish intent on spawning in the mid-to-upper reaches of the creek’s three-mile channel. We are well into December now, and it's been over a week since the last meaningful rainfall. Water levels in the stream have been dropping steadily, to the point that the future of late arrivals is seriously in doubt.

Here – at an elevation of 160 feet above sea level – long stretches of the stream are so shallow that the tops of the gravel beds are nearly dry. These mid-elevation shallows are potential deathtraps for fish attempting to swim further upstream. Those making a run for it risk being stranded high and dry.

Between these dangerous shallows lie pools of deeper water, each of them crowded with dead and dying salmon, as well as with those still attempting to spawn. As the water levels drop, the desperate plight of the fish in these pool intensifies - the overcrowding, combined with shrinking surface areas and the processes of decay, will soon rob the pools of what little oxygen remains. Only a good rain can forestall the inevitable long enough for these stranded populations to make it up stream to fulfil their destinies. The next rain is still several days away. Nature can be so hard...

It is a terrible time on Beatty Creek, but better days are ahead. The Solstice fast approaches…the Wheel goes ‘round…the Buddha smiles...

Chum Salmon and the Weathering Process

Chum salmon contending for position over a spawning female (obscured by wave action photo left)

As I've written several times previously, each November chum salmon spawn in a small ephemeral stream not more than a quarter mile from our front door. Beatty Creek it's called, and I have loved it since the first time I laid eyes on it. This creek differs in almost every respect from Fanno Creek, particularly with regard to its bottom. The waters of Beatty Creek flow over deep beds of well sorted gravel; those of Fanno Creek flow over a bottom that is almost entirely composed of an exceedingly fine mud. 

Ironically, these creeks share a common ancestor: the Fraser Glaciation that invaded Washington State during the last glacial maximum. Fanno Creek's geological history is tied to the Purcell Lobe of that glaciation and its relationship to the great Missoula Floods that took place 16-12,000 years ago. The creek lies in the Tualatin Basin, a deep bowl of land in northwest Oregon. The Missoula Floods visited this basin at least once, leaving behind vast quantities of debris, including millions of tons of loess. The muddy bottom of Fanno Creek is directly attributable to that great abundance of that material. 

Beatty Creek, on the other hand, owes its salmon-friendly, gravely bottom to the Puget Lobe of the same glaciation. As that monstrous body of ice plowed through the Puget Sound, it carried with it enormous quantities of mineral-rich rocks it had literally ripped out of the mountains of British Columbia and Washington. When the glacier retreated, around 12,500 years ago, it left behind great piles of rocky debris, which in turn were washed and worn by glacial meltwater and all the other agents of the weathering process. The deep glacial drift that covers the lowlands of the Puget Sound are one of the artifacts of that weathering process. 

Great things happen when the rains of October and November flow through the ancient gravels of the Beatty Creek watershed. 

 

The Chum Cycle

A view of Beatty Creek in early fall of 2015. This bent tree caught my attention when I first visited Beatty Creek in the spring of 2014. The creek was full at the time, and  I was blissfully unaware of how intermittent the flow in this reach could be. I've visited this spot a dozen times since. The embankment from where I took this shot was flat and relatively free from salmon berries. I would sometimes sit or squat there for a half hour or more - just listening to the water and admiring the epiphytes and other vegetation. 

Taken a few days later, after a particularly heavy rain. The water was running strong, but not yet at full flood.

I returned once more,two weeks later. The rains had increased steadily from a few hundredths at a time to inches. The stream was running a a nearly full boil and was fully engaged in restructuring its bed. In just a few days the creek had carried my favorite perching place away. But I found a new one just to the left of where the old bench had been, a place where I could once again sit and marvel at the miracle of water. I'm weeks overdue for another visit. 

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POSTSCRIPT: I went back yesterday morning and was a little surprised how close to drying up the stream has become in just a few short days. This is late April, which seems very early in the year. However, the soils around here drain very quickly, and rainfall here in the Olympia/Tumwater area is more than an inch less than "normal" for the month. 

I checked a couple of pools and they both contained small fish, probably similar to the one's Jake and I discovered last summer (see previous post). I never got a positive ID on them, but the best guess is they were coho that made a wrong turn when they came to the Beatty - Mclane Creek confluence. The spot shown here is at roughly 40 feet higher in elevation than that confluence. The reaches upstream from here are are probably close to bone dry already. There's still a great deal of moisture in the stream bed, so fresh water will be entering the pools through seepage for at least a few more days. But if the next round of rain isn't better heavier than its been in some time, the little fish in these isolated pools won't be flushed out and taken further down stream. I'll keep an eye out on the process, and maybe try later to set up a "taxi" service for a few of them.

Well Enough, Left Alone

Grandson Jake and I ventured down the block to Beatty Creek the other day. He had never seen the stream before, and I was curious to see how it might be holding up during this extended drought. What a shock! The creek was dry as a bone.

We decided to head down stream to see if could find a puddle or two. Sure enough, just a few dozen yards closer to where the stream makes its confluence with Mclane Creek, we found a couple small pools crowded with small fish. The idea that these little critters were likely going to end up dying of suffocation didn't set well with either of us, particularly after we discovered there was a much large pool just another fifty feet downstream. I promised Jake I would return the next day with a bucket and a net, and move them to the larger pool.

Next day, net and bucket in hand, I went down to the creek bed and began scooping out the juveniles in the first pool.

I stopped at one point and examined one to see if I could identify it. As near as I could tell they were chum salmon, which was consistent with the only sightings of mature salmon I've made in the last two years.

I was about half way through the process when I realized that the knee I had placed next to the pool was soaking wet. I started pulling back gravel in several places, each one further from the puddle. The sand below was filled with water, and wherever the hole I'd dug was deep enough, it began to fill with ice cold water. It then dawned on me that, although the puddles were quite small, the water was very cold and crystal clear. I let all that sink in for a few minutes. Then, as gently as I could, I put the little critters back in their puddle. Nature ALWAYS knows best, and almost always needs less help from us than we need from it...even today.