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martin_b
09-13-2010, 03:29 PM
About eighty percent of the entire country of Denmark is cultivated and farmed, resulting in a massive need to drain the land. In the fifties most of our streams and rivers were converted from meandering and highly productive trout and salmon streams into straight, deep channels in order to quickly lead the water from the farming fields away and out to sea.

This obviously pretty much killed the foundation for our then healthy wild populations of fish, due to the fact that the gravel needed for trout and salmon to spawn their eggs in was dug up as well as sand/dirt covering what was left of spawning beds in the streams due to way too fast flowing water, now that the streams were straight channels.

Now, to make a long story short, nowadays the government has realized their mistake in the fifties and is now pumping lots of money into restoring the streams to what they used to be. So far things are going in the right direction and the fishing is pretty good in many places. There is still a need to stock a lot of streams, since they still can't produce the amount of wild fish that they're supposed to naturally. But the official policy is to end the stocking of our streams completely by bringing back the streams to their former glory.

The local fishing clubs help with this restoration. I spent the weekend learning how to do this properly. I had an awesome weekend learning how to lay out gravel spawning beds for trout, sponsored by the national sport fishing association which holds these courses to educate us anglers how to restore streams locally. The stream you can see in the video below is one of the only streams where NO stocking is taking place. We're laying out a spawning bed to help the brown trout population in a dammed section of the stream. This stream needed a lot of stocking up until five years ago, so this laying out spawning beds is really paying off. The world class sea trout fishing we have nowadays is a direct result of stream restoration by private clubs and individuals. I'm restoring a small trib of my home stream this fall hoping for similar results :)

Martin
[youtube:mjw310et]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqZsRMZJwkE[/youtube:mjw310et]

Danny S
09-13-2010, 04:57 PM
Kudos to you and all those taking on this venture. I do have a question. Do the restored streams still drain farmland or has another method come about to drain them?

greyfox
09-13-2010, 05:42 PM
With the lost of so much natural habitat, it's always nice to see something being done, good luck and thanks for posting :thumbup: .

martin_b
09-14-2010, 02:07 AM
Danny, yes, the streams still drain farmland to some extent, but putting back gravel and rocks and undoing the straightening in some streams is possible now because we found out that the farmland would become "too drained". Therefore everybody will do better with slower drainage. If you understand what I mean.

The farming industry IS a huge problem for nature, not just for our streams, but there's only so much you can do when farming is such a big part of our economy.

Ernest
09-14-2010, 08:43 AM
Excellent work, and I'm betting, well worth the investment.

In parts of the American Upper Midwest we went from very fine natural trout streams to waterways degraded by towns, industry, homes and agriculture. People didn't think about what they were doing to the streams, and the degradation was a result of "progress." Now we are moving back toward more productive streams with wild trout.

No doubt the geology, gradient, and history of our streams are different from yours in Denmark. There's also no doubt that a wild trout is preferable to a stocked one. Once the stream resotration is done, the wild fish take care of themselves, and the huge annual expense of raising the hatchery trout is over.

Here, rather than resoration, we call it habitat improvement, or HI. In many streams the HI goes beyond restoration, improving the stream to a point beyond what Mother Nature had provided. In many of our streams the fishing has never been better.

I expect you'll have the same result, and I'm hoping that you do.

martin_b
09-14-2010, 10:10 AM
The way we are "taught" to do the restoration is to bring back the streams to the state that nature intended them to be. That means that some streams can never be more than "so good" - ie. if nature for some reason ended up creating a stream that can hold, say, 100 trout per 200 meters, we will not try to restore it to any other state. That way we can get government funding for it, since the policy is to bring back the streams to a "natural state". I guess that's the way of politics.

During the course of the weekend we went to look at a stream that was restored in 1991. The small stream (or beck/brook) was back in 1991 led away from a huge dammed lake and a new course for it was dug and gravel and rocks were put in. We electro fished it in the weekend and the stream now holds 76 trout per 8 metres all these years after. Before the restoration it held 2 trout per 50 metres. That's some improvement I'll say!
Here's a picture of that little stream which is a major provider of trout to a larger stream with only wild (sea)trout:
http://www.fiskepleje.dk/upload/dfu/fiskepleje.dk/nyheder/nyheder%202010/nyheder_juni_2010/slynget-kvak-moellebaek.jpg

Brooktrout
09-14-2010, 12:42 PM
nice work. do the projects include bringing back native atlantic salmon spawning?

martin_b
09-14-2010, 01:46 PM
Indeed they do, Brooktrout. It is in fact a high priority to bring back the native atlantic salmon in the streams where it is naturally present. So far is has been revived and is spawning in all the streams that historically have been home for it. It is present in all the streams where it should be, but it is being kept alive with stocking since many of the streams are dammed and therefore the salmon doesn't have access to all its spawning areas. There is currently much debate about shutting down a big water powered electricity plant that only produce electricity equivalent of a couple of wind mills, but also is the foundation for jobs for an entire city...

rossa
09-14-2010, 04:16 PM
Good work, it's great to hear about things like this instead of ecological disasters.

soupmix
09-17-2010, 09:32 PM
That's a feel good vid. Kudos!

ags
09-20-2010, 08:54 PM
Wow, real progress with your restoration work - also completely comprehensive as it starts at the local level and goes on to the top.

Here in the eastern USA, they want to restore the brook trout fisheries. To date, from what I can determine and see, they have held lots of meetings. There has been academic/theoretical work undertaken and it may be completed. To me and by all accounts I have heard from others, it is great work. But, as far as I can determine, we have not taken this great academic/theoretical work out of the class room on to our brook trout streams and its surrounding habitat.

From reading your post, have concluded that in Denmark you are far, far ahead of the USA in restoring streams. Also, you have a great deal of enthusiasm.

martin_b
09-21-2010, 05:14 AM
It IS pretty easy to go from thought to action here. Mainly because we're a small country I think. We enthusiasts talk to the relatively few researchers that do research in this stuff all the time, and the government people are also not too far away. They're under pressure from the farming industry and such, but it's managable. A lot of my "restoration work" is to talk to the farmers and work out ways to restore streams so that everybody can be happy. Very often it is possible to work out ways to drain the fields that don't have a negative impact on the streams.

Ags: wouldn't it be possible to apply a similar approach in your area regarding restoration work? Ie. get som gravel and rocks and let the government know and approve what you're doing? I mean, putting gravel and rocks in a stram (in my opinion that's all that's needed to have e healthy trout population) is not rocket science :)

Ernest
09-21-2010, 12:54 PM
ags, good luck with stream restoration for brook trout in the East. I have read online some of the studies and the possibilities.

Martin, that looks like great work.

Habitat restoration or improvement is alive in the Midwest.

Wisconsin, just one of the Midwestern states, has (and I’ve stolen these numbers from the Wisconsin DNR) over 2,900 trout streams, and over 10,000 trout stream miles. There are a few large trout streams, but most are mid to small sized streams. Settlement, farming, logging, roads and towns have had an adverse impact on many streams. The DNR says that 30 percent of the water could use some habitat help to bring it to its potential.

Habitat improvement (HI) is performed on many stream miles every year. Often the work is to deepen and narrow the streams, to cool the water and produce a faster flow to sweep silt away from the gravel bottoms. The work is done on public land, or where the landowner has sold a public easement so fishers will be able to use the stream. The DNR directs the work, but many clubs and organizations provide volunteer labor to help in the effort. Trout Unlimited is not the only such organization, but their local chapters’ websites show many of the recent projects. For example, http://www.kiaptuwish.org/eau-galle-project - for the Eau Galle, and http://www.kiaptuwish.org/tiffany-creek-project - for Tiffany Creek. Re Tiffany, the chapter reports:

"What a Difference!!
"It's hard to believe it's even the same creek! John Sours has done his magic again. The creek has been narrowed 75%, the depth increased from an average of a couple inches to a foot or more. The banks have been graded back and rip-rap and lunker structures have been installed. The result? A substantial increase in spawning habitat, cover for the fish (protecting them from Herons and Kingfishers) and habitat for insects for the fish to eat.
"This section of the river had a population of brook trout of less than 200 fish per mile, we will see the results in as little as 3 years...but here's a hint. Cady creek...just 20 miles south went from 200 fish per mile to nearly 5000!"

I do have a friend who owns a share in a hunting property where public access is not available to the small stream running through the land. The club did its own HI work, with technical advice from the DNR. The fishing has been greatly improved on the property, and the stream produces many fish that drop downstream into a public fishery.

Some projects are targeted for native brook trout. Some of the streams won’t carry brook trout well, and they are managed for the introduced browns. Some streams in the Great Lakes watershed are managed for fish that come up the streams to spawn, including brooks, browns, steelhead, and salmon.

I recall a report years ago of carrying spawning gravel to the Brule River. The Brule is a great stream, but the thinking was that more spawning areas would help the big spawners from Lake Superior. The reporter went back a few weeks later, as I recall, and saw a number of large fish on the newly built beds.

I am not familiar with conditions in the mountains or the Pacific watersheds with regard to habitat work. In the Midwest, it is an important and successful strategy.

ags
09-22-2010, 10:52 AM
Martin_B,

Yes, that is our plan. Do only a few streams at a time. Gravel - many of these streams already have gravel. In the eastern US, Brook Trout streams generally flow through woodlands or forests. When/where these steams flow through farmland or a developed area, they either become brown/rainbow fisheries or warm water fisheries. The trees help keep the water temperature below 70 degrees F. which is a necessary condition for brook trout to survive. Most of the streams are small. but if there are significant treeless areas, the stream becomes marginal for brook trout. Under these conditions, the brown trout or rainbows take over those sections of a stream.

I'll keep you posted on our progress or lack of it.

martin_b
09-22-2010, 02:15 PM
Good to know ags, I hope you progress with it and good luck!

Where the streams flow through farmland/developed country, are there done anything with the natural meandering of those streams like here? I mean, are they straightened and things like that?

Also, regarding digging the streams deeper, that's a big problem when it's done here. Brown trout need about an foot of gravel covered by a maximum of 6-10 inches of fast flowing water in order to spawn successfully, so we actually widen the streams in some places due to that. But as I understand it, you're digging streams deeper to help the brook trout. Is that for living/growing habitat, or do brook trout have different spawning requirements than brown trout?

ags
09-23-2010, 11:35 AM
martin_b,

Straightening - which I think they call channelization here in the states. Yes and no. If I am interpreting your description correctly, in Denmark you channelized all the streams or almost all of them to accommodate agricultural. Here in the US when we have some big floods, and people panic then the highway/road people channelize parts or sections of a stream. Of course, all this does is move the flooding down stream.

We have an organization called Trout Unlimited in the US. It has Chapters all over the US where we have trout streams and lakes. They generally opposed channelization and have been successful in un straightening some sections of trout streams. Also, highway plans/ construction now go through more stringent reviews before they build the highway.

While it may have occurred here and there, I am not aware of any policy in any state where streams or rivers were channelized on a large scale in order to accommodate farming.

Digging - Not aware of any digging. Certainly not on a large scale. As far as I know, brook trout have the same or very similar spawning requirements as the brown trout. Both spawn in the fall with the brook trout spawing a little later than the brown.

When the habitat is ideal for brook trout, they will out breed other trout to dominate in that stream. But, with all the human interference, few streams are left with ideal brook trout habitat and the browns have taken over - and thank heavens for that! The theoreticians theorize that if the habitat were restored, the brook trout would return! But, until that happens, I'll fly fish for whatever is in the stream - that I'm fishing!

Gravel - years ago a gentleman named Charles Fox - The Wonderful World of Trout and other books - placed gravel in the limestone stream - the Letort - that ran through his property. I think there were some successful spawns of brown trout as a result. It was open land at one time - two wet to farm except upstream they had watercress farms which used weed killing and other chemicals which many believed degraded the fishery. Now most of the land surrounding this scared water is developed - mostly residential housing.

Because of erosion and the huge amount silt in some of our streams, gravel is placed in streams to facilitate spawning but to what extent I do not know.

martin_b
09-23-2010, 05:10 PM
Regarding "digging" I was refering to Ernest's comment "Often the work is to deepen and narrow the streams", but thanks for clearing that up.

And yes, channelization is what I mean with straightening ;) Because we're such a small country, in order to accomodate agricultural needs, the land has to be drained for the heavy harvesting machines to be able to drive on the dirt. They have to drain the land and get the water away fast. You're very fortunate that you seemingly can just let the land that can't be cultivated be and thus don't have to take these drastic measures! You interpret me correctly; it's not just parts of streams that were channelized back in the 50's, it was entire streams. Most of them have been restored and are not channels now though. What a waste of money!

erics beetle
09-24-2010, 03:22 AM
This last sunday I attended a work party on one of the Becks I fish. The beck has excellent water quality but suffers as the tree canopy is so dense little light reaches the waterway. Consequently weedgrowth and insect life is ltd.

I was discussing the work we were doing with a couple of guys on the work party, The conclusion was that the works we were doing probably wouldnt really bear fruit for another 5 to 10 yrs , but no one was in doubt that the works were worth it. Our country is very crowded and quality streams are under immense pressure so we have to do everything we can to preserve them for future generations..

My undergraduate son recently surprised me with his eloquence when I was taking him back to University and we were discussing the enviroment he announced " Remember Dad your generation didnt inherit the earth you are just borrowing it from your children" It definately made me think...

Ernest
09-24-2010, 06:03 AM
This last sunday I attended a work party on one of the Becks I fish. The beck has excellent water quality but suffers as the tree canopy is so dense little light reaches the waterway. Consequently weedgrowth and insect life is ltd.

A good reminder that habitat work has to be tailored for the specific stream or stretch of a stream. Some of our creeks are almost too warm for trout, and they benefit from summer shade. Others are naturally cold, but the trees restrict stream weed growth, and in these places we'll remove the trees so the sun can reach the water. Aquatic weed growth increases, the insects that live in the weeds expand their range and numbers, and the trout are more numerous and grow faster.

erics beetle
09-27-2010, 06:14 AM
This last sunday I attended a work party on one of the Becks I fish. The beck has excellent water quality but suffers as the tree canopy is so dense little light reaches the waterway. Consequently weedgrowth and insect life is ltd.

A good reminder that habitat work has to be tailored for the specific stream or stretch of a stream. Some of our creeks are almost too warm for trout, and they benefit from summer shade. Others are naturally cold, but the trees restrict stream weed growth, and in these places we'll remove the trees so the sun can reach the water. Aquatic weed growth increases, the insects that live in the weeds expand their range and numbers, and the trout are more numerous and grow faster.

Indeed on another stream I fish I would love a few more trees to gove some shade in the high summer , Although it has to be said where I live high summer usually only lasts a couple of weeks . Incidentally the beck I was referring to is the on my blog ( waving at trains) , You will see the problem...