Can You Say Cottonwood Tree Bloom.

The same thing happened last year.

If they raise the flow it will be gone.

Cottonwood gets my vote. Was down a couple of weeks ago. When I cleaned the boat last week there was some dried up on the gunnels.
It was very fiberous, just like cotton wood.

based on my examinations (and I am NO expert but, I see the snow storms of cotton wood seed in may), i am voting cotton wood until we get test data that shows its the algae stuff...

I was there this AM and just looked at it real close. Cottonwood 100%

For those of you who think it is Cottonwood, answer the following questions:

1) Why has this not been a problem every year?

2) Why was this substance still flowing down the river last fall & winter, long after the cottonwoods quit blooming?

3) How much Cottonwood fiber would it take to load the river up with the volume of gunk coming down it?

Remember how low the level of the lakes got over the past couple of years? Warm water mixed with a possible higher load of nutrients and you have algae bloom. The stuff is GROWING in the river. Was there over the holiday weekend and the volume of algae coming down the river was way more than all the cottonwood trees in Lewis County could produce and this stuff is coming down 24/7. I am sold on algae. Anybody with scientific proof?

I have to go with the natural groth of the scum from up river. I was at Mayfiel lake last week and watched this nasty stuff bubble up from the shallows in small sheets then float float off with the current. I talk to the people on the smart side of town WDF??? and they explained that as the water warms uo the algea ferments on the bottom and floats to the top. Still keeps getting worse every year and that can be atributed to the greater amount of fertalizers finding there way to the rivers.

There may be two subsatnces in the river.

The stuff on my line had small seeds in it and was clearly waterlogged cottonwood. White and dark grey no green whatsovever.

Those of you who think there is no sewer outfall on the Cowlitz River need to think again. The Cowlitz salmon and trout hatcheries represent the second largest fish hatchery in the world, last I heard. The fish waste and feed waste coming from the hatcheries probably equal the nutrient load coming from the sewage treatment plant of a small town. This type of algae doesn't need really warm water; high 40s and low 50s is plenty warm enough.

Sincerely,

Salmo g.

From what I've heard the problem does not exist above the trout hatchery. Trout hatchery outfall maybe the problem?

Cottonwood!

Cottonwood!

I fished it on Sat and it definately was NOT cottonwood.

I was fIshing there again this wed and thurs.
As a bassfishermen I have had every known type of algae on my line. From the green goo, to Elodea densi.

The whitish brownish crap getting stuck on everybodys line is Cottonwood that has been in the river long enough for Algae to grow on it!

BTW, its really slow at Bluecreek right now I only hooked 9 fish yesterday and 7 the day before, hardly worth the trip.

Micro...
Now that's a common sense answer that cant lose
Is everyone happy now, you're ALL right!

RL

I'm also joining the Cottomwood bandwagon.

The main reason for less above BC, is up river there are more fir and less Cottonwood trees.

Go look below I-5, it's even worse ....ton's of cottonwood trees.

Exotic Species??
If this is cottonwood it's growing and replicating itself underwater and creating a dense blanket all over the bottom of the river.
Maybe its an exotic macrophyte species that will come to be known as aquatic cottonwood. Make sure to clean your boats off so it doesn't get spread to another water body. It would be a real bummer if all our rivers became filled with wads of grey toilet paper snot.

It's definitely cottonwood seed. I live a mile from the Cowlitz between Toledo and CR. The river is lined with huge cottonwoods. It looks like a blizzard from about mid May until early July. The crap stays in the river into August. I hooked and caught a 15lb summer run last year just above Toledo I was fighting 15lbs of fish and about the same weight in cotton seed. It sucked but well worth the effort. This stuff may look like algae as many have stated, it does have algae that sticks to it as it rolls along and bounces off rocks. You can tear it apart and see the tiny black seeds in the middle of those doughy balls. I see they've upped the flow out of Mayfield to over 5000 cfs today. It should help root that junk out and flush up some more steelies.