Quick bug stop on the Dosewallips River
By
Troutnut on July 6th, 2020
This long day trip from home to the Olympic Peninsula was primarily an attempt to dig a geoduck, a Pacific Northwest delicacy and the largest species of burrowing clam. I built a special tool to help dig them up from 3 feet under the sediment in the tidal flat off the Dosewallips River estuary, where the big clams are exposed only during the lowest tides of the summer. They're apparently located among the eelgrass at this beach by locating where they spurt jets of water 5-10 feet into the air as the tide recedes or rises. Unfortunately, I didn't see a single jet of water nor any other sign of a geoduck, even with the tide dropping to -2.8 feet.
My consolation prizes were some delicious steamer clams (manila clams), an easy find higher in the tidal zone, and some bugs to photograph from a short sampling stop upriver.
Date AddedJul 12, 2020
CameraiPhone XS
Brachycentrus americanus (American Grannom) Caddisfly Larva
View 13 PicturesBoth the genus ID (Merritt & Cummins) and species ID (Flint 1984) are pretty confident for this larva, a nice example of a common western caddisfly. It was by far the most abundant insect in my kicknet sample on this trip, and many of the rocks in the fast riffle where I sampled had dozens of these larvae clinging on.
Most recent comments on this post (latest on top)
Troutnut | July 16th, 2020, 9:44 pm | |
Administrator Bellevue, WA
Posts: 2737 | I had brought fly fishing gear, but we had to get back. This part of the Olympic Peninsula doesn't have much resident trout fishing, as far as I know. It's almost completely a sea-run fishery and the run wasn't in yet. |
| Jason Neuswanger, Ph.D.
Troutnut and salmonid ecologist |
|
Wbranch | July 16th, 2020, 5:38 am | |
York & Starlight PA
Posts: 2733 | Wow, what a great looking pool! You should of fished there awhile. |
| Catskill fly fisher for fifty-five years. |
|
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