As early as June 16th, summer water leasing began this extreme drought year. Six leases were implemented by July 1st, followed soon by 3 more, in order to help sustain rearing habitat for juvenile coho and steelhead. The amounts leased ranged from 0.25 cfs to 1.3 cfs. At many sites, these instream additions of leased irrigation diversions doubled the existing flow. Most of the transactions occurred on French Creek and its tributary, Miners Creek, with another on Sugar Creek –

With extreme drought and a record coho salmon run, members of the Farmers Ditch Company agreed to release most of their irrigation water rights to help with juvenile fish migrations this spring.On April 30th, 19 cfs was added to the mainstem Scott River at river mile 54, a challenging reach for sustaining flows within the disturbed dredger tailings. The purpose was to extend the period of time that salmonids could move through several miles of the upper river to access needed

An amazing number of coho salmon spawners returned to the Scott River during the 2013-14 season. Despite a drought-induced low flow of only 50 cfs during most of the fall and winter, a total of 2,731 coho adults came through the CDFW fish counting facility at river mile 18. Fresh adults were seen even into late February, weeks after the weir was removed on Feb. 7th, and more may also have spawned below the weir. The Scott’s large run appears to represent about half of Califor