Hatchery manager, Rodney Lee looks over the channel where the fish were released in a non-traditional manner this year due to COVID-19. No festival took place.
On May 16, a few Hoy/Scott Watershed Society members came out to the Hoy Creek Hatchery to witness the release of the coho smolts.
What has become known as a favourite community affair where children and adults help with releasing the fish with buckets, was kept hushed this year due to COVID-19. A few residents who happened to be out for a walk stood by to observe as hatchery manager Rodney Lee, and assistant hatchery manager, Tyler Storgaard released the boards to open the waterway between the rearing pond and Hoy Creek.
Society volunteers see this particular coho brood of approximately 2700 as special because they were the resilient survivors of a major fish kill in May 2019 where thousands of fish in the hatchery and in the creek died of an unknown chemical substance.
Assistant hatchery manager, Tyler Storgaard mans the channel where coho salmon smolts were released to the lower pond, where local residents can be seen peering into.
The weather was wet, which did not help visibility for the onlookers, but our team was able to use a Go-pro for some underwater shots, and once the fish made their way through the back pond and down the metal weir to Hoy Creek, it helped us capture this video for our Youtube page. (see videos below)
Now that our rearing pond has been emptied, it will be cleaned and then refilled to prepare for the transfer of our coho fry (broodstock from winter 2019/20). The fry will first undergo an adipose fin clip to identify them as hatchery fish.
Once in the rearing pond, they will remain there until their release at Salmon Leave Home in May 2021.
“We’d like to thank our dedicated and small group of volunteers,” said Society president, Robbin Whachell. “From our daily feeders to those that helped out during Saturday work sessions to monitor the health of our fish and help maintain the riparian area. We also want to thank our neighours, the public, and the residents who keep a watchful eye over the watershed and alert us and the authorities of anything suspicious or negligent.”
It should be noted that since mid-March and due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Hoy/Scott Watershed Society has cancelled all Saturday work sessions, all in-person meetings and hatchery tours or open houses until further notice.
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Hoy - Scott Watershed Society, (HSWS) is a not-for-profit, volunteer-run environmental stewardship group, that conducts a salmon enhancement program in partnership with the City of Coquitlam, and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada. We are actively involved in watershed restoration, public awareness, education, and preservation.