One Very Lost Sockeye Salmon

This extremely off-course sockeye salmon turned up in Northern California’s Trinity this fall…only about 500 miles off course…

Curtis Wilson of Arcata, CA hooked the lonely red in the Hoopa Valley area of the lower river — where it stuck out like…well…um…like a lost and very crimson salmon in gin clear water.

Home to Chinook and silver salmon, it’s not every day a sockeye shows up on the Trinity. In fact, the Lake Washington/Cedar River drainage in Seattle is about the southern end of the sockeye’s range these days (though the Columbia River on the Oregon/Washington border used to play host to millions of them back in Lewis & Clark’s day) and they’re really still only thriving in British Columbia and Alaska.

Though extremely rare, it’s not the first time an exotic species turned up in Northern California. In 2002, a handful of pink salmon were taken in the Trinity and Klamath rivers and a couple dozen sockeye also turned up at the Feather River Fish Hatchery in Oroville. A few seasons back, a pair of bright red sockeye was also spotted off the Blue Lake Bride on Nor Cal’s Mad River.

Tagged as: alaska, Northern California, red salmon, sockeye salmon, trinity river