"The 450-million-year-old fish is crucial for the Yakama Nation’s health and culture — and the region’s ecology"
"WOODLAND — Biologist Dave’y Lumley paced the shallow water at the mouth of the Lewis River on an overcast morning late last month. With each step, she carefully scanned the water in front of her, holding two hockey sticklike probes just under the surface.
“My mind goes blank on everything else and what I’m looking for is any slight movement,” Lumley said.
She and a colleague from the Yakama Nation’s Pacific Lamprey Project, Noah Sampson, were looking for larval lamprey — a difficult task because the fish can be less than an inch long at this stage of development.
The probes connect to a beeping, gauge-covered backpack, known as an electrofisher. Together, the rig works by gently shocking the water about three times a second to tease out young lamprey from the riverbed so they can be caught, counted and studied before being released."
Advertisement 
