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Nov. 3rd, 2024 11:55 amI'm out watching the salmon in a local creek. It's that time of year. The air smells like rotting fish and my hands are cold.
It's interesting, the way they go. Nature documentaries show hero footage of salmon flinging themselves up waterfalls and sprinting along creekbeds. It's not that.
I can see maybe a dozen in this little stretch of creek, and they move so, so slowly. Little gains of a few inches, and then rest. I've seen two or three make longer sprints up a high-current areas, but mostly? Mostly they're still, resting, still swimming against the current just enough to stay stationary, gathering strength for the next bit of incremental progress.
There's one that keeps coming up to another one, the same pair every time, and one bites the other on its side. The bit fish flails, throws the biter off -- they're both briefly grabbed by the headcurrent and they both lose ground. I don't know why on earth the one keeps biting the other, but they keep doing it, over and over. It's the most commotion any of the salmon I can see are making. They both keep getting pushed further back down the creek, none of the others noticing or caring, living in their own bubbles of slow, careful, tired prerogative.
It's been a rough couple of days, like, really rough. I kind of feel like I'm swimming upstream for reasons I don't understand, too. I hope there's something kind at the end.
It's interesting, the way they go. Nature documentaries show hero footage of salmon flinging themselves up waterfalls and sprinting along creekbeds. It's not that.
I can see maybe a dozen in this little stretch of creek, and they move so, so slowly. Little gains of a few inches, and then rest. I've seen two or three make longer sprints up a high-current areas, but mostly? Mostly they're still, resting, still swimming against the current just enough to stay stationary, gathering strength for the next bit of incremental progress.
There's one that keeps coming up to another one, the same pair every time, and one bites the other on its side. The bit fish flails, throws the biter off -- they're both briefly grabbed by the headcurrent and they both lose ground. I don't know why on earth the one keeps biting the other, but they keep doing it, over and over. It's the most commotion any of the salmon I can see are making. They both keep getting pushed further back down the creek, none of the others noticing or caring, living in their own bubbles of slow, careful, tired prerogative.
It's been a rough couple of days, like, really rough. I kind of feel like I'm swimming upstream for reasons I don't understand, too. I hope there's something kind at the end.
