Hundreds Every Day!

Since we resumed the count last week, we have logged more than 300 fish making the jump each day!  Saturday had the highest daily log of this year's run, with nearly 500 fish logged as the daily entry.  We have now broken every year's total run (since 2006) except the 2008 banner year of >5000 fish!

2008 logged 5000+ fish in 37 days of counting.  We have logged more than 2000 fish in less than six days of counting, and they're still coming!

Please see the updated year to year comparison here.

For those who have not made it to see the Middle Pond flume this year, you are missing an incredible sight - hundreds of fish for as far as you can see!  The following is a video clip showing both the above and below water views of the flume on Friday, 4/13.  The flume has continued with hundreds of fish throughout the weekend and into today.  We would encourage you to take a look in person sometime soon!

Triple Digit Back to Back Runs!

The data is still trickling in from the first two days of a renewed count, but we had 378 fish observed in seven 10 minute counts on Thursday, and we've exceeded 300 as well today!  It started slow each day, but as the day moved on, the fish kept coming!  We've had more fish observed per day (with partial data only!) in the last three days than we had in any single day in the last two years!  We've exceeded the totals for both 2010 and 2011!  The single day counts for the last two days are larger than any single day counts we've had since the counting was formalized, other than the banner year of 2008! 

The year to year comparison is shown here.  (Click on graph to get a full size view)
The area shaded in green is the period when the count was suspended.  We did get some occasional reports from some observers when the temperatures briefly supported the migration.   Partial incomplete data is shown in red.
The values currently shown are actual values.  The statistical analysis will need to adjust a couple of the daily totals to reflect the state model.

On our first full day of the resumed count, the largest two counts of the day were done by one of our rookie counters.  After standing in the cold last week for a couple of zero counts, please see her email re yesterday's count:

"Very wild afternoon at the herring run.  Fish were going over the gate and under the gate, multiple fish were falling back down and then going over again.  Children were leaping and laughing, adults were interested and trying to talk to me. Blackbacked gulls and osprey were gorging.  I really tried hard to get 2 accurate counts (and enlist 2 future counters for the next generation).  Anyhow here's what I got:
151 for the 3pm
124 for the 4pm
58 degrees F
Here's a little shout out to Valentina & Richard, 2 wonderful youngsters that helped me count out loud as the fish went shooting by.  It was an excellent adventure for all of us. "

Believe it or not, her peak count was exceeded this afternoon by a new count from another counter for one 10 minute interval!

We would highly recommend all interested parties take a look at the flume entering Middle Pond this weekend.  Today it was full of fish, as far as you could see!  Stay tuned for a video from that view later this weekend!

Now we've got a run!

After a quiet week off, the herring have really started the run in earnest today!  Too bad we didn't start the official count a day earlier!
96 Herring were observed making the final jump in two 10 minute intervals this afternoon and early evening!  This number exceeds our 2011 total observation of 53 total fish over a 20 day period!

Hurray!  I'll show a quick summary of all the observations to date this year in tomorrow's blog post, but wanted to get the word out to all the counters that the fish are running now!  Please make sure to check the open slots and let us know if you can help us meet the 9 counts/day. 

Let's try again!!

So, we're gonna try again!!  We've been noticing that we have sporadically had fish coming through, so we may as well take those into consideration.  So, beginning on Thursday, April 12th, we will start the count up again.  For those of you already on the schedule, we are assuming you will pick up where we left off.  If you can't make any of the scheduled counts, please let us know!  For everyone else, we are in need of counters over the weekend.  We need:

We have split the day into 3 equal 4 hour sections:
7:00-10:00am is the morning section
11:00-2:00 is the afternoon section
3:00-6:00 is the evening section

On Thursday, April 12th - we need one counter in the evening section
On Friday, April 13th - we need 1 in the afternoon section and 2 in the evening section
On Saturday, April 14th - we need 3 in the afternoon and 2 in the evening
On Sunday, April 15th - we need 1 in the morning, 2 in the afternoon and 2 in the evening
On Monday, April 16th - we need one in the afternoon and 1 in the evening

For the rest of the schedule, we are wide open so please look and try to cover as many counts as you can please!  We realize that we may still have a lot of zero counts for the beginning of the run, but hopefully the water will warm up soon!!

HAPPY COUNTING!!!!

Still Waiting....

Well, it's been over a week since we officially suspended the count, and we probably should have suspended it even earlier.  We continue to monitor the seawater temps in an effort to estimate the most probable restart of the herring run.  Seawater temps in Cotuit Bay are essentially identical to what they were for this date in 2011, and the 2011 run started on April 17th.  We have received reports of herring on April 5 from two different observers, and we also had an observation of some herring late today.  We have posted the latest temperature plots here - it is very interesting to note that the herring made the trek at the same time the water temps at Cotuit Bay just touched 51F on April 5 and April 9.  With the cloudy weather forecast for the next few days, we will likely continue to watch and wait before restarting the count in earnest.

There has been one herring gull parked at the top of the Mill Pond ladder at some times over the holiday weekend, and today we received a report of an osprey looking around, so hopefully they are good indicators of a restart of the run. 

We appreciate those counters who check in occasionally with reports, to help us better assess the local situation, even when no fish are observed.

Counting to be suspended...for awhile!

Well, it's been over a week and no herring have been spotted.  We kept hoping that they would miraculously show up and we'd have a great year!  But, no such luck.  So, we are going to suspend the counting, for now.  But, be prepared for them to come back!  We think that they are just offshore waiting for the water temps to go back up.  The temperature in Cotuit Bay has been very cold!!! 

We will keep the schedule as is, and when they do come back, we'll just pick up where we left off.  In the meantime, if anyone is curious, please feel free to stop by the run and have a look.  Even take the temperature of the water and let us know!

We'll be in touch and let you know what is going on...

Saltwater Temps

Still no herring today - bummer.

We've added another new page with the plots of both Cotuit Bay and Eel Pond (Waquoit Bay, Falmouth) for us to further analyze to see if we can better assess when the temperatures may be conducive to the return of the herring.  While the weather seems to finally be improving somewhat, Eel Pond is now a bit cooler than it was at the same time in 2010.  Cotuit is now as cold as it was almost 3 weeks ago. 

For a view of the plots, please go to the new Page called "Saltwater Temps".  We'll be updating this page periodically throughout this period.