Sockeye Season, Fish Compost, Bees and ZigZag

24 Jul Sockeye Season, Fish Compost, Bees and ZigZag

Starting last with zigzag, our five year old cockapoo dog who above almost all else loves the tennis ball, salmon dinner has got to be the most exciting event in his doggy life. I’m sure the cats are likewise enthralled, but they don’t demonstrate the level of excitement the dog does, or of even that of the bees. The bees are at a zigzag level of psyched when its a salmon dinner night on the back deck. Over the years the kids have learned to coexist with the wasps and yellow jackets that hover over our plates and make flight with chunks of red fish flesh the size of their thoraxes. (Ok, maybe it’s not bees that have these). The wee thieves do as they please. Zigzag gets the scraps, the cats patrol the general area for the scraps the bees had to drop, those fish morsels too hefty for bee cargo.

Nancy got a call from a customer who we built a raingarden for this spring when it still rained in Seattle. They wondered about the multitude of mushrooms growing in the “trial” compost we used in a part of their yard. “Well, don’t ‘cha know that mushrooms are a sign of fertile soil?” She said. This was a batch of fish compost a Belfair, Washington soils farm makes. They use post-consumer salmon, the type grocery stores and restaurants don’t sell to blend into their municipal yard waste greenery. So, a quick review of the non-people in our lives who love salmon: zigzag, the bees, the cats and mushrooms.

The sockeye are running through the locks now. We took our summer exchange student to the locks to see the spectacle of wild fish, some almost the size of the boys torso swim against the current to get to the spawning grounds. They fight the torrent of water racing past them after having successfully dodged the sea lion feeding grounds, they flop thru less-than-pristine urban rivers then streams and spawn and then die. That’s not the end of them. Every bird seeks out the succulent majesty of the salmon carcass. Every insect adores the protein and potency of the salmon remains. Every microbe does what a microbe will do, every last atom of the awesome fish gives its admirer a reason to feel special. Thank you pacific sockeye salmon, forever may you swim.