Fish & Water - Sounds Wild
Delta Clearwater Coho

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Delta Clearwater Coho

On a beautiful fall day in Interior Alaska, an angler is casting for coho salmon on the Delta Clearwater River. She's had pretty good luck. The Delta Clearwater

The Delta Clearwater River is a tributary of the Tanana River, near the community of Delta Junction. It's aptly named, for unlike many of the silty, glacially fed Interior Alaska rivers, the Delta Clearwater River is spring fed and runs clear. It sports the largest known coho run in the Yukon Drainage. These fish have travelled more than 1,000 miles from the mouth of the Yukon to their native spawning stream. Delta Clearwater River coho are in full spawning coloration, maroon red with dark colored heads and hook jaws with sharp teeth. Because they are in freshwater and spawning, they do not feed, but they will still strike at a lure now and then. Most anglers practice catch and release on the Delta Clearwater River because the flesh of these coho is a bit on the soft side.

Biologists with Fish and Game have conducted fall surveys of coho in the river, and in 2005, more than 100,000 coho were counted in a 17-mile stretch of river. Because the river is spring fed, it flows into the winter and the coho salmon can spawn well into December. The young salmon will stay in the river for up to three years before migrating to the ocean and then returning.