It’s not every day you get to custom build salmon spawning habitat!

Back in 2007, I was blessed with having the world’s greatest job…I was hired as a consultant to a spawning bed restoration project on the Stanislaus River in California.

My responsibilities: Direct two front loaders on where to dump gravel and boulders. Not only was the pay outstanding, but taking a thrashed river and making it pristine for Chinook and trout was awfully good for the soul! And, let’s be honest here, driving those big tractors around was pretty fun too!

We started the project carefully sifting and washing 200 tons of perfect spawning cobble and then added a couple hundred boulders in 1- to 7-ton range…

Then we went to work…

Here’s a look at what a lot of the river looked like before we started…

And, from a slightly different angle, when we were done…

Check out how dismal this side channel looked before…

Here’s how she looked after the work…

Before…

After…

Again, much of this stretch of river was sluggish and silted in before the work began…not exactly pristine habitat…

What a world of difference, eh?

When it was all said & done, we added 33 new riffles to a short 2-mile stretch of river…

On the last day, Dennis Hood of KDH Environmental and I toured the site & admired our handiwork…

Apparently, the salmon like their new home…