Salmon Released by the Public at Hoy Creek Hatchery

A girl releases a Coho smolt into Hoy Creek at Salmon Leave Home at Hoy Creek Hatchery. (HSWS Photo)

Hoy/Scott Watershed Society (HSWS) held its annual Salmon Leave Home event on May 14, and was pleased to return to a public release of the approximately 18-month-old Coho smolts that have been living in the outdoor rearing pond since last May. This was the first time since 2019 that the public was able to assist with the salmon release, due to the pandemic.

The Society moved the event time to the afternoon to give families time to celebrate Mom (it was Mother’s Day). Weather conditions were hot with a high of 32C, but despite that, a steady stream of people came through the Hoy Creek Hatchery area. To the delight of many, wild Coho fry were visible from the footbridge.

The community had the opportunity to carry a bucket of Coho smolts to Hoy Creek for release; take a peek at the six-month-old Coho fry in the hatchery’s Capilano trough room; meet the volunteers and learn about the Society; make a Mother's Day greeting card using leaves; play the Plinko game and get salmon past predators to saltwater safety; sign a Farewell to the Coho Grads of 2023 card; sign a pledge to protect the salmon; and explore Hoy Creek Linear Park.

After a Land Acknowledgement by HSWS president, Kyle Uno, the MLA for Coquitlam-Burke Mountain, Fin Donnelly provided a few words before Kyle presented Keith Kozak, the Society’s first president, with a certificate of appreciation and a gift. Keith spoke about the early years of getting the Society up and running.

The event was supported by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, with Isaac Nelson overseeing the fish release.

The Society would like to thank all its volunteers for the time spent supporting the event, and the community who came out to help. A special thank you to the event sponsor, the Fish & Wildlife Compensation Program!

Salmon Leave Home 2023 'unofficial' photo: Thanks to our HSWS volunteers who were manning our areas of the event so that some of us could gather for a group photo with our special guests.

Back row, left to right: Tyler Storgaard, Isaac Nelson (DFO), Hannah Tonsaker; Matthew Watts; Henrietta Hamming (wife of the late Chris Hamming, HSWS founder); Robbin Whachell; Keith Kozak (founding member/HSWS first president); and Rodney Lee.

Front row, Fin Donnelly, MLA; and Kyle Uno, current HSWS president.



Society attends Coquitlam Earth Day event

Alex, Tyler, Matt and Thomas of Hoy/Scott Watershed Society

Hoy/Scott Watershed Society took part in a City of Coquitlam Earth Day event on April 22 at Town Centre Park, adjacent to the Inspiration Garden.

A big part of what we do is public education and bringing awareness to the local environment and to the fact that we have salmon-bearing streams in the midst of an urban setting.

The event provided an opportune occasion to highlight the challenges the Society faces, most often caused by man. Things like trash along the trails and in the streams, pollutants being dumped down storm drains, as well as natural challenges like invasive species.

Five-month-old coho fry were also on display providing a glimpse of how precious and fragile this species can be.

The Society would like to thank all of our volunteers who took part and answered questions from the public.

Left to right: Fin Donnelly, MLA, Coquitlam-Burke Mountain; Tyler Storgaard, Hatchery Manager; Matt Djonlic, Coquitlam Councillor; Maya Uno, HSWS volunteer; and Thomas, HSWS volunteer.



Juvenile Trapping Exercise Conducted in Hoy Creek

Hannah and Aiden set the traps in Hoy Creek.

Juvenile trapping involves baiting gee minnow traps and having them soak overnight in various locations in the creek to survey what’s present in those locations. A trapping activity can provide an understanding of:

  • What types of fish are present in the creek?

  • How big are the fish?

  • Are they hatchery-raised fish or wild fish?

  • Where do hatchery released Coho end up?

  • Where are these fish located?

  • What areas of the creek do they use?

  • How healthy do the fish appear?

Outside of some limited gee trapping to remove fish from the lower pond prior to sediment removal, this may have been the first series of juvenile trapping conducted by the Society.

The process started back in February with the application to the Department of Fisheries & Oceans (DFO) for a scientific license to trap for fish. The Society was issued a permit in March however the unstable weather conditions through much of March and April prevented us from getting out and trapping earlier.

The time of year that trapping is conducted is important as different times of year have different life stages for fish. For example, when trapping in April, we wouldn’t expect to see Chum fry present but would expect to see Coho fry as well as Coho parr/pre-smolts. As we get to the summer months, June through August, we might start to see trout fry (Cutthroat, Rainbow). Trout parr could be observed throughout the year.

The last weekend in April finally presented suitable weather conditions for us to trap. At the suggestion of Connie Boulos, Maple Creek Streamkeepers, we used salmon-flavoured wet cat food for our bait balls (tied up with cheesecloth). The Maple Creek Streamkeepers have conducted many years of juvenile trapping to understand what’s present in Maple Creek.

Hoy/Scott Watershed Society members, Rodney, Hannah and Aiden set traps on Friday night. Locations were selected that were deep enough to fully submerge the trap as well as have slow water to prevent fish from getting trapped, exhausted and die because of water that is too fast and fish being held too long.

Then, Hannah and Rodney retrieved the traps on Saturday night and gathered data on what was captured including species identification, length, and, in the case of Coho, hatchery or wild.

Overall observations: A few beautiful cutthroat trout parr were encountered in the fish trap pool behind the fire hall. At all other trapping locations, we encountered wild Coho parr/pre-smolts that appeared good and healthy.

When trapping is conducted year over year, it can be used to get a profile of the fish present – year-over-year, helping us observe changes in the # of fish encountered, the health of fish, and trends in the size of fish encountered. This data will become part of the data record for Hoy and Scott Creeks and could be used in the future to understand the trends in fish population ranges, sizes and health.

This was only the first trapping session in the season. Added sessions are planned:

  1. to trap the upper reaches of Hoy and Scott creeks prior to any hatchery fry releases as well as prior to smolt out-migration to see if any of the previously released hatchery fry were still present as pre-smolts in the release locations;

  2. re-trap the existing areas to see what new species are encountered as the season progresses.

  3. and also, to understand the prevalence of any wild fish present in those locations.

Spawner Survey Report for 2022

Coho counted in annual spawner survey (HSWS photo)

Hoy/Scott Watershed Society director, Rodney Lee led our spawner survey for 2022. Assisting him this year were Matthew Watts, Krista Englund and Travis Smith.

Spawner surveys are a basic form of stock assessment where the data can be used to gauge the health of salmon returns. In short, we walk the creek and count live and dead salmon (by species) to get a sense of the number of returning fish. Data is submitted to the Streamkeeper’s database as well as to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO).

Participants walk in chest waders in and around the stream including stepping over fallen trees, walking on in-stream rocks and muddy banks, and crouching under overhanging tree branches to identify salmon species targeting chum and coho but occasionally other species (chinook, pink) may have been seen.

The weekly survey area was the stretch of Hoy Creek from the Johnson St. pool (between Glen and Guildford) to Hoy Creek Hatchery in Coquitlam and statistics were taken from Oct. 24 to Dec. 17.

Here are the survey details which provide totals of carcasses for chum and coho, as well as peak live counts. We have compared them to our 2021 results in the chart below.

NOTE: Should you see salmon in the creek that have been cut in half, or have the tail or head cut off, from October through December that could mean those salmon have been marked for the annual Salmon Spawner Survey. We count live and dead fish weekly in a designated stretch of the stream. The dead salmon are cut as to not double count the dead fish the next week. This helps get an absolute count of salmon that have spawned in a particular area of a stream.

Paint Spill Reported in Hoy Creek off Walton Ave.

Photo courtesy of the City of Coquitlam

Thanks to the local resident who reported a spill in Hoy Creek on March 13 before 5 p.m. A white substance was spotted in the inflow culvert off Walton Avenue.

The City’s environmental and public works team conducted an investigation but were not able to find the source of the spill. They placed two additional booms at the outfall.

The City advised it is keeping an eye out for painting works in the area.

Anyone with information can contact the City of Coquitlam at 604-927-3500.


The Hoy/Scott Watershed Society would like to remind Coquitlam residents that storm drains lead directly to our waterways, and everyone should exercise caution when disposing of pollutants, which include chemicals used for cleaning hot tubs and pools, etc. Nothing but rainwater should go down storm drains.

See something – say something. If you have information related to this spill, or to report a spill in the creek click here.

CLICK HERE TO READ HOME TIPS FOR HEALTHY STREAMS

Photo courtesy of the City of Coquitlam

Photo courtesy of the City of Coquitlam

Society Attends Annual Streamkeepers Roundtable

Tyler Storgaard (seated left) speaks about the Society’s membership

Streamkeepers in and around Vancouver’s Lower Mainland met in Burnaby on March 6 to share information.

The roundtable was hosted by the Stoney Creek Environment Committee and those participating were asked to present the following from the past year:

  • Highlights

  • Challenges

The evening served as a time to share thoughts and to discuss collaboration so as to improve behaviours and practices in and around the watersheds we all represent.

Hoy Creek Hatchery manager, Tyler Storgaard provided a presentation on behalf of the Hoy/Scott Watershed Society (HSWS). Supporting him were the HSWS president and directors.

The Society would like to thank the Stoney Creek Environment Committee for ensuring worthwhile meetings like this take place.

Over 12 streamkeeper groups were present.

Oil Spilled into Hoy Creek

Look closely to see the colours of oil on the surface of the water.

On February 6, at approximately 2:45 p.m., a hatchery volunteer noticed oil on the surface of the water by Hoy Creek Hatchery.

The oil was reported to the City of Coquitlam by Hoy/Scott Watershed Society.

The City went out to investigate and reported back to the Society that the source was found by Douglas College staff and drainage crews were deployed.

The City later provided further details:

“Our sewer/drainage crew was working with facility staff from Douglas College yesterday afternoon/evening and reported that multiple private side catch basins (CB) were affected and had fuel/oil leaking into it. Apparently, it was caused by a leak from a dump truck. Absorbent pads were placed at these CBs to control the spill, and a vactor truck was called in to remove the oil from the system. It sounds like they found some oil left in some of the private CBs as well as one public CB. The vactor truck was at Douglas College the day of the spill vactoring out whatever was left in the City-side CB.

The Society was advised that City staff will also check some of the private side CBs to see if there is a need to have those vactored.”

The public is urged to be mindful of storm drains, which are meant for rainwater only, and are not for refuse disposal.  Individuals observing a dumping or a fish kill in our streams, or the presence of any other possible pollutants are encouraged to immediately report the event to the authorities. Contact numbers are provided on our website’s contact page.

CLICK HERE TO READ HOME TIPS FOR HEALTHY STREAMS

Society Presents to Coquitlam City Council

Hoy / Scott Watershed Society presented to the City of Coquitlam Council on January 16, 2023. Speaking on our behalf was HSWS president, Kyle Uno and vice-president and hatchery manager, Tyler Storgaard.

Kyle Uno also introduced other members from the society who were in attendance: Anne Woosnam, Robbin Whachell and Maya Uno.

The purpose of presenting was to introduce ourselves to the council, talk about the partnership we have with the City, and then provide some of our future vision for the Society and how we can work with the City to achieve that vision.

The hatchery rearing pond was originally constructed by the Brewer family to raise trout. In 1995, with help from the City and the Optimist Club, the pond was enclosed and converted to raise salmon and the hatchery building was constructed in 1997.

In 2002 our Society was officially formed. We have currently about 65 members from high school students to seniors and are run by a 9-member Board of Directors. All of our members are volunteers. We operate with a small grant from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, as well as any donations we receive and specific grants we apply for, including the Spirit Grant.

In partnership with the DFO and the City we operate a salmon enhancement program and raise both Chum and Coho salmon. We currently are incubating about 35,000 Chum salmon eggs and about 16,800 Coho. We do a broodstock collection of Chum and Coho salmon from the creek every Fall and do an egg take/fertilization process at the hatchery. The Chum will be released at the fry stage in a couple of months while we will keep up to 5,000 of the Coho salmon in our rearing pond until they are about 18 months old when they will be released at our Salmon Leave Home Festival.

We also operate a number of programs to support our creeks and to keep them healthy for our salmon. One of those programs is storm drain markings on nearby streets that drain into Hoy Creek. These serve as a reminder to people that anything put down our drains empty directly into Hoy Creek and many fish-bearing streams. Tyler will talk about some of the challenges we face in our creeks when residents pour illegal substances down our storm drains and the impact that can have on our salmon, both wild salmon in the creek and our hatchery salmon.

With the City’s assistance, for the last year, we have had a real-time instream water quality monitoring program that measures the temperature, conductivity, turbidity and pH of Hoy creek at our hatchery site. The system will provide us with alerts if any of the measurements exceed a certain level. So we often see the alerts if there is a spill in the creek or during periods of heavy rain in the winter time due to the road salt runoff. We also monitor the water quality in two other areas of the creek with help of DFO data loggers. This data will assist us in determining the overall health of our creek and the effect it has on our salmon population. We were also just recently successful in our Spirit Grant application to buy additional data loggers for our rearing pond. This will give us real-time data on the health of our rearing pond.

Throughout the year we maintain the trail along Hoy creek by cleaning up any garbage but every summer when it’s safe for young fish to wade through the creek we will do an extensive cleanup of garbage in or on the creek banks. For the last two summers, we have concentrated on Scott Creek on Runnel Drive across from Value Village as well as along Aberdeen Ave near Rona. There tends to be a lot of garbage in these areas most likely due to some homeless camps that we have found near the creek.

Another program we manage in the riparian areas of the creek is invasive species removal. We tend to focus on removing Himalayan blackberry along the creek banks as it can impede native plants from growing along the banks providing shade for the creek and lower water temperatures. The city assists us through its Bad Seed program and with providing native plants for re-planting these areas. We are also active committee members of the City’s Invasive Species Advisory Committee.

Partnership with the City and Future Vision

A big part of what we do is in public education and awareness of our local environment and the fact we have salmon-bearing streams in our urban environment. We co-host with the City the popular Salmon Come Home Festival every October and in May, the Salmon Leave Home Festival. These festivals were paused during the pandemic but we were pleased to have the Salmon Come Home event return to normal this past year. We also host a number of tours for school groups, Scouts, and other community organizations, like the Douglas College Ecology program.

HSWS had identified three capital projects in 2020 that will be needed to support the Society, watershed and community for years to come.

As the Coquitlam City Centre area continues to grow around Hoy/Scott Creeks, our ask is to be included in the Official Community Plan (OCP) with a new education centre.

Recognizing a new education centre is a larger long-term goal from the identification to the implementation stage, we would like to ask for support from the City to construct a chainlink enclosure onto the existing chain link lean-to.

This extension would allow for the placement of an already procured circular 6’ tub for the hatchery to support multiple species. Currently, we are not able to hold broodstock (adult spawners) or fry of both coho and chum salmon.

As the climate and environment around us continue to change, the salmon returns are more challenged. This past fall, we witnessed both chum and coho returning within the same period over several weeks and that complicates spawning of the different species.

Hoy Creek Linear Park has existing structures from the previous landowner, and one area adjacent to the hatchery is failing. The lower pond is fed from the coho rearing pond is leaking from the CIP dam and the CIP outlet channel has degraded significantly.

HSWS has taken the first step with DFO for planning/engineering and has applied for federal funding for the construction costs of the circular tub and to remove the existing failing structures to naturalize the pond and its outlet to provide fish rearing habitat for generations.

If the value of our identification stage estimate is not funded by our initial application, we will be seeking other sources from both Federal and Provincial programs. HSWS, with DFO, has targeted a construction schedule for this summer (June-August 2023) for our initial phase.

In response to the presentation, several councillors asked questions. The Society was asked to connect and meet with respective City staff to see how they can assist with this process.

Egg Take Complete for 2022 Broodstock Season

Children are given a look at just-fertilized salmon eggs from the incubation room door at Hoy Creek Hatchery.

Here is our hatchery manager’s update on our 2022 Broodstock:

  • Chum

    • We have spawned 12 pairs (m/f) with a total green egg estimate of just over 35,000

    • Chum collection is done for the year

  • Coho

    • We have spawned 7 pairs(8m/7f) with a total green egg estimate just over 16,800

    • Coho collection is done for the year

Thanks to all the volunteers who supported these activities, and to our daily volunteers who monitor and maintain our equipment.

Thomas picks dead eggs from the Chum salmon incubation stack at Hoy Creek Hatchery as Adela looks on.

Hoy Creek Hatchery named Grand Champion

A photo with the Communities in Bloom ‘Grand Champion’ certificate. Left to right: Robbin Whachell, HSWS Director of Communications; Kyle Uno, HSWS President; and Anne Woosnam, HSWS Secretary / Asst. Hatchery Manager.

The City of Coquitlam - Municipality hosted an evening to celebrate their Communities in Bloom - Collectivités en fleurs accolades on Nov. 10, 2022 at the Vancouver Golf & Country Club. Hoy/Scott Watershed Society was acknowledged as 'Grand Champions' for the Hoy Creek Hatchery with the Coquitlam receiving the prestigious 5 Bloom Gold status.

A big thanks to assistant hatchery manager, Anne Woosnam, who led our Coquitlam in Bloom judges' tour when they came through town in July 2022.

Following their evaluation, volunteer CiB judges Berta Briggs and Larry Hall wrote, "The City of Coquitlam provides support to groups to implement some amazing programmes and projects. The Hoy Creek Hatchery is a project of the Hoy/Scott Creek Watershed Society. The Hatchery is located in a public park for all to learn about and witness the raising of salmon through many stages until they are ready for release. All work is done by volunteers under the guidance of the Watershed Society and the City. Water monitoring is constant to assure water quality is ongoing. As important as the Hatchery is to maintain fish populations, just as important are the learning opportunities and the human relationships that are fostered. The waterways are such an important part of natural heritage and their health is vital to environmental protection. One of Coquitlam's slogans is "Fun is in our Nature" and the Hoy Creek Hatchery provides fun for many while they work to preserve and protect nature."

"Communities in Bloom is about greening through environmental, natural heritage conservation and horticultural actions that involve citizens, businesses, institutions, and municipalities. The program is focused on environmental stewardship through the enhancement of green spaces.

A Tri-City News article stated, "Coquitlam took the prestigious '5 Blooms - gold' accolade in the Grand Champions category, with a special shout-out for the Hoy Creek Hatchery that it runs with the Hoy/Scott Creek Watershed Society."