Hatchery Update

Good morning, everyone!

It's been about a month since I last sent out the news. In my last update, I was asking for volunteers for the 2nd half of our pink and chum spawning program. Well, we had a good day on September 6th!! Lots of folks showed up for the event, and we were able to easily take enough pink and chum eggs to make our goal. There were volunteers of all ages, I can tell you that!!

Quite a few Blatchley Junior High students were there helping, as were Chohla's Mt. Edgecumbe High School students. Thanks go out to Abigail and Samantha, both Blatchley Jr. High students, who have been there for the program all summer!! There was at least one student from Sitka High School as well. Sagan and her brother Liam did a fantastic job, helping me collect adults. Everyone had a good time.

What was particularly impressive was the way these students wanted to get geared up in neoprene waders, and help collect adults. There was lots of splashing water, and excitement galore, and by the end of the day, everyone was tired, and soaking wet, but we all got the job done!! You can see in the photos attached that lots of young people helped make it happen. I want to thank each and every one who made it that Saturday, even tho I don't know all your names. Keith and Jolene showed up just in time to help me by cooking the lunch that Lila had bought and prepared. Thanks also to Cheryl Westover, who came by in the early morning, and brought lots of goodies for everyone, but then had to work for the day. Everyone contributed in their own special way, and once again the volunteer effort at taking eggs worked. This is now the second year that the hatchery is surviving, due to volunteer help.

And now, please allow me to introduce Jack. Jack was coming in to volunteer last February and March, when we were coded-wire tagging cohos and kings. He became very familiar with the program, since he was also here to assist with the releases of coho and chinook smolts in May, and has been a tremendous asset to me and the rest of the volunteers!! Jack Lorrigan has been hired by the Sitka Sound Science Center as a Fish Culturist / Assistant Manager in Training. Jack has been on the job now for a month, and is a great help to me. I am finally beginning to take time off on the weekends, and Jack has been getting totally tuned into the idiosyncrasies of the SJ Hatchery. I am teaching him everything I can about this program, showing him all the details of fish culture and management. I must say that after 5 years of working here, I have become very intimately aware of all the strange complications that can pop up. I want to try to get Jack "up to speed" on the details as soon as possible. And I hope that Jack can become a full-time employee soon.

During this month of September, another tourist season wound down to a close. There were thousands of visitors this summer who stopped in to see us. The guest book in the Wetlab was filled to overflowing!! And, of course, we are extremely grateful for all the donations!! We shared our knowledge of Sitka and the salmon ranching industry to people from all over the world. It was a good summer.

For about one week, beginning on September 8th, Sitka Sound Seafoods purchased extra salmon from our adult raceways, fish that were surplus to our broodstock needs. Over 80,000 pounds of pinks, chums and coho were brailled out of the raceways and packed into iced totes. This cost recover effort was possible due to Sitka Sound Seafoods providing the totes, ice, a forklift, and a flatdeck truck, as well as 3 laborers!! Revenue generated from this will make it that much easier for the SSSC to operate the hatchery this winter. Thanks, Jon, for working with the SSSC to make this possible.

On September 12th and 13th, the coho fry rearing in Ponds 13 and 14 were split into 4 ponds, #1, #2, #5, and #6, to reduce their densities by half. Thanks go out to Chohla and her Science class from Mt. Edgecumbe HS, for helping dipnet fish, and carry buckets on Friday, as well as to Jodie and her daughter, Karimae, for helping that Saturday. We used the new electronic scale for this procedure and it worked flawlessly! The coho are all spread out now, and looking good!

There has been a good return of coho adults this month, too. In May, 2007, we released 120,000 coho smolts (these were from Broodyear 2005) and these fish have done well. We have been collecting adult cohos this month for our own broodstock needs. The adults are captured (one at a time) in the concrete raceways, and moved into empty circular ponds, where they will ripen for a month or so. Our goal is to hold to maturity 75 to 80 pairs of adults, so that we can be guaranteed to get our 150,000 fertilized eggs for this year. There has been some fungus in the water, but all in all the adults are doing well.

About two weeks ago, Jack and I turned on a small amount of saltwater to each of the coho and chinook rearing ponds, to help combat the Saprolegnia water fungus that is common in our Indian River water supply this time of year. Using the YSI salinity meter, we can make small adjustments and fine tune the salinities to whatever we wish. The coho have been getting around 4 to 5 parts per thousand, and the chinook have been at 5 to 7 ppt. This addition of saltwater is something that I have done here at the SJ Hatchery every fall, as fungus in our watershed is common following the upstream migration of thousands of salmon, reaching portions of Indian River way upstream of our gravity water intake.

In addition, we have been doing formalin treatments to the 2.1 million eggs that are in incubators. We treat the chinook eggs with a 1667 parts per million concentration for 15 minutes, 3 days a week, and we treat the chum and pink eggs with a 250 parts per million concentration for one hour, 3 days a week. We are seeing very high survivals in our eggs, and this makes it easier to sleep at night!! Soon, the August 30th eggtakes of pinks and chums will be eyed up, and we can shock and pick these eggs. Last year, Pacific High School and Mt. Edgecumbe High School students were very involved with the picking and processing of our eggs, and they all had a good experience!! I would once again like to invite the Sitka School District to participate in fish culture activities here at the SJ Hatchery. I'm pretty sure that Jack and I could no doubt do this alone, but this is too good an opportunity to pass up. Chohla already told me she and her class would like to participate in the "next step" in egg processing!! I encourage the Science teachers at Pacific HS and Sitka HS to let their students know that the educational opportunity is here, and waiting for them as well. I am always happy to schedule tours for school groups wanting to see what's going on.

What about the Aquarium?, you might ask. Lynn and Henry continue to come in to volunteer on a daily basis, doing maintenance, and feeding the remaining animals in the tanks. There has not been an effort to collect new animals. We are all awaiting a decision by the Board of the SSSC as to whether or not the Aquarium will remain active this winter.

The number of visitors has dropped dramatically, since the last cruise ship departed. We are beginning to think about winterizing, and putting all the equipment away for the year. The signs, and the colored flags that had been out front all summer, are now stored in the Sawmill. The air temperature has droppped, and the leaves are falling from the alders. Another winter is almost upon us. We will continue to have the gates to the hatchery grounds open 7 days a week. The front doors to the Sage Building may not always be open, tho. If you would like to look inside the Wetlab, you can always make an appointment with us.

Thanks again to everyone who donated their time and personal resources to the Hatchery and Aquarium this past year. I truly hope the program can continue to survive far into the future.

--
Daniel F. Goodness, Manager
Sheldon Jackson Hatchery
834 Lincoln Street
Sitka, Alaska 99835

Work Phone:
Home Phone: 907-747-3824
Email: daniel.goodness@gmail.com
Website: www.sjhatchery.org