News and Events

The brood stock coho from Clayburn Creek have been held for a week in a big tank.

The fish are removed one by one using hand nets. All three females and one of the two males had no adipose fin, marking them as having been raised in the hatchery from a previous egg take. 

Rob removes supplementary brood stock that have been brought from the Chilliwack hatchery. 

Tysan checks to see if the eggs are ripe.

He bonks the female, killing it.

The females are hung to bleed out because any blood would contaminate the eggs.

A special cutting tool is needed.

Tristan cuts the belly open with the tool.

With John's help, he strips the eggs out of their sacs.

The skein, the organ which produces the eggs, is also stripped. 

Milt from the males is mixed with the eggs.

Water is added, allowing fertilization.

The fertilized eggs have a distinctive glow.

The eggs are thoroughly rinsed.

First, the number of eggs in 30 g is found, then the total weight of all the eggs is measured.

By using arithmetic, the total number of eggs can be calculated. In this case, it was about 6,300.

The fertilized eggs are doused with disinfectant to prevent possible fungal infection.

All the eggs are placed in one incubator tray and will remain untouched there until the "Egg Shock" operation in January.

Rob parked his truck near where Straiton Road joins Clayburn Road. This was the second survey of the season at Clayburn Creek.

 Just downstream from the surveyed area, the creek goes under the Clayburn Road bridge,

Rob spotted just 3 chum, 2 live and 1 dead. Sufficient water levels due to rain came too late for the chum run this year, but just right for the coho.

The coho tally was much larger: 53 live and 1 dead. Most were seen between the Clayburn and Straiton Road bridges.

Photos by Dale Taylor 

Doug and Alexandra started at the pond near Bridge 1. They surveyed the lower section of the creek, from there up to Bridge 5.

Alexandra is holding a jack coho, a small male that has returned to the creek a year earlier than normal.

Doug uses a stick to retrieve a dead fish. The survey records the numbers of both live and dead fish, male and female, and whether the females are still holding eggs. 

After the details are recorded, its head will be removed so it will not be counted a second time in the next survey. The remains will be returned to the water as food for the small critters that will nourish the next generation of salmon fry.

ZoAnn, from Pacific Streamkeepers, chooses a location where vegetation overhangs the water.

Hatchery volunteers, John and Quirien, remove large pebbles and place the D-net in position. 

Quirien distributes the trays in which the invertebrates will be isolated for counting.

John, Quirien, Bruce and Dave find invertebrates in the tubs and transfer them into the trays.

Caddisfly larvae have attached themselves to the underside of a pebble.

Stonefly naiads are large and easy to find in a distribution tub.

Just before Stoney Creek flows through a culvert under Bateman Road and out of the Park, it widens into a large pond. This is the location where the one-year-old Coho smolts from the Hatchery are released every May. During the high water events caused by winter rains, the Pond fills with sediment. 

Subsequently, every August some of the gravel and sand are removed by the City. This year, about 25 truck loads were taken, deepening about half the Pond area and creating a stretch of quiet water for the benefit of last winter's generation of wild coho fry as well as resident crayfish, trout and other critters.

This is what goes on at a clipping station. The previously anesthetized fry are processed with special scissors (notice the collection of tiny fins), then placed in the water moving down that narrow trough. The water flushes them to the bottom end of the table.

Arlene is stationed at the bottom end of the table, clicking the hand counter each time a clipped fish goes by on its way into that white pipe which will carry it back to the Cap trough.

The operation begins with Paul lugging the seine net down to the rearing pond in the ravine below the hatchery.

Tristan, Bruce, Chris and Jasmyn spread the net out. As you can see, the cold water is almost waist deep.

John is removing vegetation trapped in the net when it is dragged along the bottom of the pond.

Jasmyn has to pull hard to move the 15-metre-long, 1.5-metre-wide net.

Paul, as community representative of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, supervised the operation. 

The smolts, which have been living in the pond for a year, are gradually rounded up for transfer to the tank truck.

Tysan and Jasmyn with Rob, who is holding a dip net load of smolts.

One of several netloads is relayed quickly to the nearby tank truck.

John holds the pipe as the smolts shoot down from the tank truck into Clayburn Creek.

These smolts were born in the hatchery in the winter of 2023/24, confined for a year in the ravine pond, and now free to head for the open ocean. What a remarkable life change!