Spawning Salmon

We took a ride out to Beluga Point on Turnagain Arm hoping to catch sight of some beluga whales during high tide. It was windy windy windy. Major white caps. No clue if any beluga's were in the Arm. If they were, we couldn't distinguish between them and the white caps. Soooo, a little disappointed, we meandered our way through the tourists back to the truck. We stopped at Potter's Marsh on the way back into town. Whew, no tourists. I hadn't been there before, but knew it was a good place to at least see ducks. Matthew and Emma like ducks. What I didn't know, was the abundance of bird species and other animals who frequented the Marsh. There was a sign posted listing everything spotted within the past 24 hours. Bull moose, eagles, trumpet swans, dozens of species of birds, and spawning salmon. Salmon? I didn't know that a nearby creek ran into the marsh, and being that it is located on the edge of Turnagain Arm....duh, what else would you expect? I wasn't thinking. So we are watching this little patch of water with deep ripples going back and forth. It was obvious something big was swimming in the water. I thought it was a beaver, and dang, he sure could stay under for a long time! We sat watching and waiting for him to pop his head up. Gave up and moved on. Then Cal says, "Hey, there's fish." Huh? Where? "That dark spot. It's a school of salmon." So much for the beaver theory. Oh wait, beaver was not on the list of spottings. Call me a nerd, but I could've sat and watched this dark shadow all day. I don't know exactly what the lure is. Maybe because it was so peacful out there....once you filtered Emma and Matthew's chatter. You could see, hear, and touch nature to the point that you felt a part of it. Not that I want to be a part of spawning fish. But, it was just plain cool to watch them. They don't show up as well here as full screen on the computer, but you can still see they are fish....and not beavers.
I was zoomed in on them and all of a sudden they scattered. Thomas said a bird swooped down on them. Wish I had gotten the bird.