- Posted By: Trina Wood
- Written by: Carson Jeffres, fish ecologist, UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences
Published on: July 1, 2011
A very wet spring brought a good deal of water to the floodplains this year—good news for juvenile salmon that thrive in this habitat. Floodplains — such as the Yolo and Sutter Bypass areas and the Cosumnes River floodplains — provide a link for juvenile salmon between the gravel bedded rivers where they hatched and the ocean where they will spend the next one to five years.
Although salmon may only use the floodplain for a month or two, this could mean the difference between success and failure in their long journey to the ocean and back again. When juvenile salmon spend time on the floodplain, they grow faster than those that use only the river channel during their migration to the ocean (Sommer et al. 2001, Jeffres et al....
Tags: floodplains (1), UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences (4)
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