With support from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to continue this important work, Cook Inletkeeper contracted with Watershed Sciences, Inc. to map cold water habitat and provide airborne thermal infrared (TIR) imagery for 66 miles of the Anchor River and 12 miles of the Ninilchik River. The focus for this work are the springs and upwellings that provide salmon with the cold-water stepping stones needed to make their way up and down otherwise warming streams, and also the warmer, ice-free nooks for overwintering juvenile salmon. The identification of these refugia as a key component to strategic conservation planning provides the best hope to embrace realistic climate adaptation strategies for salmon protection.
Watershed Sciences flew the South Fork Anchor River on June 30th, 2010 and the North Fork Anchor River and Ninilchik River on July 10, 2012. They flew at an altitude of 2,000 feet and the TIR sensors collected images every second which resulted in a 2-foot image resolution. And even in the cool summer of 2010, the location and thermal influence of 18 tributaries, 23 seeps and springs, 11 sloughs, and 9 small side channels and drains is apparent in the South Fork Anchor River imagery.
