December 16th

Fish are progressing nicely - first batch is eating well, and the "survival of the fittest" has started.  We had one fish that died this week and was promptly picked at by the other fish in the tank.  The fish in the basket are doing well, with most of them swimming up and trying to eat.  Looks like we are going to let them out on Monday to fend for themselves.

December 12th

Just wanted to add a pic from our tank that was taken today.  Our fry are doing pretty well - we lost two over the weekend, but they are eating well for the most part and hanging near the top.  The second batch has become much more active lately, and they might start eating here later this week.  Water quality has been excellent, with no issues to date.  We have placed a double guard on our filter intake this year to try and keep weaker fish from getting sucked in.

December 4th

Sorry for no posts for a while, busy time of year as you all know.  Both sets of fry are in the room tank currently, with the first set of fry doing very well.  In fact, we started to feed them this past week - November 29th - after returning from Thanksgiving break.  About half of the fry are now actively feeding, with a few still staying on the bottom, including our two cojoined twins.  The second batch of eggs is not fairing as well, as we are losing between 5 and 10 fry a day.  The fry have hatched, but just don't seem to be doing very well at.  I am concerned that this set is not going to last much longer - we are already down to around 100 fry in that batch.

November 21

We received our second batch of eggs last Wednesday, November 16th.  This batch was not sorted with the picker, so there was a much higher mortality rate on delivery.  After sorting, we placed 232 live eggs in the basket and disposed of 224 dead eggs.  Both batches of eggs are currently in the same tank, as we are in the process of replacing our defect tank with a new one.  We also thought it was a good idea to save a little money here in the beginning by only needing one chiller running at the start instead of two.  The original set is progressing nicely, with some losses but the with the sac fry quickly abosbing the leftover nutrients and attempting to swim.  Looks like the first batch will be swimming well when we get back from Thanksgiving.

November 9

Most of the eggs have hatched with slight mortality.  They look pretty good so far with just a few "spinners" evident as of now.  Looking forward to the second set of eggs coming this week - expecting most of them to be fry already.

November 3rd

Eggs arrived yesterday during 5th period, separated during 6th period.  300 viable eggs placed in the tank, with 68 dead eggs in the bag.  The eggs were placed in a brood basket until they reach the swim-up stage to help with removal of dead eggs/fry.  Several fry have already hatched out as well.

November 2, 2011

So we have the tank up and running in the room with a very good week-long test with some fathead minnows.  Chiller seems to be working well and all levels are good.  Brookies are to be delivered today or tomorrow, so we are anxiously awaiting them.

October 12

Well, we have the room tank up and running.  Chiller has been tested and appears to be working properly.  Will plug in and set temperature next week.  Trout eggs to arrive November 2 or 3.

May 27

So today was fish release day.  After another disastrous week  (we had a the room aquarium shatter on Tuesday morning), we went to Thorn Creek to release our remaining fish.  After loading and counting, we were able to release 94 brookies into the stream.  After releasing the fish, we had Tim Wilson of the PFBC perform an electroshocking demonstration for us where we were able to observe 16 different species of fish.  Ryan Harr then did a demonstration of macroinvertebrate sampling, and we ended the day by planting 200 trees at the Thorn Creek Habitat Improvement Project.  Overall, a great day, and the rain held off until the very end!!

May 2011

Sorry for the long delay between posts - been working through some technical issues.  Our fish our doing very well, even though our numbers are way down from previous years.  Fish are healthy and feeding constantly.  Interesting thing has happened this year - despite all experimental expectations - the lab tank fish are much bigger than the room tank fish.  On May 5 and 6, classes completed a mass sample of the two tanks using a random sample of ten trout.  The room tank came out with an average of 5.92 grams, while the lab tank came out to an average of 10.35 grams.  We are working through possible rationales, and will try and set the tanks up differently to compare results.

Release day is scheduled for May 27, and students will be taking part in numerous activities.  We will have an electrofishing demonstration, a macroinvertebrate sampling, tree planting and the trout release.  Look for more information later.

Into March

Our tanks have been doing well lately with no fish losses.  The new hang-on filters seem to be holding there own in the lab tank.  Fish are getting nice colors and eating every chance they get.  One good thing this year with less fish - a lot less water changes have been needed so far!!

Struggle Last Week

We had a struggle last week with the lab tank.  After the filter rupture, I didn't think it could get much worse.  Well, we had an automatic feeder malfunction over the Valentine's weekend, and dumped the entire canister of food.  After coming back to sky-high nitrates and ammonia levels, we did a major tank sweep and clean, and by Wednesday we had the water back to acceptable levels.  We did lose 2 fish out of that tank, but it appears they actually got stuck to the new filter intakes.  We still are considering moving all fish to the room tank and doing a complete water change, but don't think it's necessary at this time.

Plus and Minus

On the plus side of things, the fish that we have left are growing great.  The food this year seems to treat them well, as growth rates are excellent and the colors are fantastic.

On the minus side, our fluval filter for the tank in the lab ruptured on February 10 during a routine cleaning.  We quickly went to plan B with 2 hang-on filters and so far there seems to be no issues.  With so many less fish this year, I am hoping this will be ok until the end of the year.

Good Weeks

We have had a couple good weeks recently with few casualties to speak of.  We have switched the brookies over to the size 1 food, and they have responded well.  The remaining fish are eating well and growing at a nice rate. 

January 13th

So at least the die-offs have slowed down.  We seem to be losing a lot less fish, some days none. Both tanks have water testing extremely well.  Tests that are performed daily include pH and temperature, and every other day we perform nitrates, dissolved oxygen, and total conductivity.  Still puzzled as to the cause of the die-offs, but it does not seem like we are alone.  Between the two tanks, I would guess we would have about 100 fry left.  The ones we do have seem to be responding well, and seem to like the new food.

Major Die-offs

Our major die-off continues, primarily in the lab tank.  We have been removing about 10 fry per day - not good.  We have changed water numerous times, checked multiple parameters, and have done lots of cleanings.  The dead fish seem to be getting "moldy" very quickly after death.  We have recently added salt to the tank in hopes of destroying any fungal buildup.  The next thing will be to transfer all fish to the room tank and do a complete cleaning and start-over in the lab tank.  Not good!