The Herring Spawn (Annual, Spring)
- Geoff Johnson
- Jun 5
- 1 min read
The herring spawn is one of a few "Attenborourgh" level annual events that take place around here. It doesn't run on a hard schedule and can start in spurts around late February, peaking in mid-March with possibility of late spawns into April. The gathering of millions of herring, releasing tons of their reproductive material not only creates a feeding frenzy for wildlife of all sort but discolours the water in creamy and pastel hues. Despite it's scale and importance it's not always visible from the shore in Ucluelet or Tofino, often it is isolated to more remote coves and bays elsewhere in the region.
In recent years we've been able to see some significant spawns right from shore; Specifically around Terrace Beach and Spring Cove. In 2024 the spawn around Little Beach and Terrace Beach was so obvious Apple decided to update the Apple maps images of Ucluelet to use satellite images from that time
I captured some drone footage from that year you may have seen on the news;
The following year we also had a herring spawn near town, this time in Spring Cove;
Comments