Thursday June 26, Jenner CA.
The fog moved in as I arrived
I decided I was going to kayak Jenner today, windy or no wind. When I arrived at Jenner today, the fog was just moving in, but the wind was down to mostly breezy today and I was hoping it would stay that way and it did.
I put my boat in the water and paddled out a bit to see what was going on and I saw Ray’s truck pull into the parking lot, so I waited for him to unload and put his boats in the water. That’s him and his son putting their kayaks in the water on the ramp in the fog.
The fog was getting thicker as I waited for them. When they joined me, we decided to go down to see what was going on at the river’s mouth.
Biologists, that’s what
Yes, lots of biologists on the estuary today. This group is using a net to catch fish to check out and tag some for the tracking biologists to track. They put little electronic devices in some of the steelhead to track. The batteries last from ten to fifteen days, before going dead.
The guys in the boats are pulling the net they use into the boat, while the guys on the shore identify species and measure and weigh and do what biologists do. They just finished catching stuff in the net and are resetting it for the next catch.
Here they are gathered around to see what they caught. A bit foggy, but not too bad.
Foggy river’s mouth
They were hard at it, so I left them alone and we continued on down to the river’s mouth in the fog.
This is what the open river’s mouth looked like in the fog. Not too good for taking pictures of things.
We stayed at the mouth area for a bit watching what was going on as best we could in the fog.
Headed up the back channel
After a bit, we headed on up the back channel of Penny Island and put ashore on the east end of it for a little walk and maybe eat a few black berries too.
This is where we put ashore for our walk.
There weren’t many black berries left to eat, but I did find a few.
Headed up the river
From there we went up the river a bit, headed for eagle’s landing.
This was our view as we paddled along up the river.
We passed some female mallard ducks resting on a log, going back to sleep as we passed.
We paddled up to eagle’s landing were we sat for a bit, before Ray and his son Joey headed on in for the day. I continued on up the river. I was feeling a bit tired, so I sat in my boat in several places napping along the way.
This is one of my napping spots along the shoreline.
Crossed over to the north shore
Eventually, I crossed over to the north side of the river to see what bird life was on that side as there sometimes are a lot of birds taking it easy on that side.
Here are some of the merganser ducks I passed.
And not too far from the ducks, these geese were taking it easy too. As I approach, they start to walk back away from the shoreline, as they are doing in this picture.
The town of Jenner was still in the fog as I paddled down the north shoreline.
There go Bill And Eric
As I was paddling back in for the day, I spied these tracker biologists going up the river tracking.
Bill and Eric were going by, so I paddled on over to say hi. They were tracking up the river at a fairly good pace, so I grabbed ahold of the side of their boat for a bit. They showed me one of their tracking devices they put in the fish. They had just attached four more devices on four more fish, just a bit earlier, as they were with the guys with the nets.
Here is Bill and Eric tracking fish to see where they swim to in the estuary. They will be doing this for another month yet, everyday.
Tagging along with those guys was taking me back upstream, so I said good bye and headed on back to the launch ramp for the day and went on home for a good nap.