Nature Club Brook Trout Released

The first release, on May 2, of Brook Trout reared in Northern Virginia schools was a 100 percent success with all 19 fry surviving the two hour trip to the property of Mr. and Mrs. Phil Daley on Little Stony Creek near Woodstock, VA. Thanks to the Terraset Nature Club's careful nurturing of the eggs delivered from Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries hatcheries in October, the Brookies have a new home.

The biggest winners, however, are the students themselves who learned about a range of topics related to biology, chemistry, and habitat. Mrs. Cury and Nature Club volunteer teacher, Dianne Rose, have already declared they will do it again next year.

See a video of the release!

All About Fish

The fish are huge and they have lumps at their stomachs, Margo observed. Zoe says they have stripes. Haley and Zak both think there are still 18. Jack K. says they have many spots. Margo noticed that lots of the fish swim at the top and not the bottom. Hannah A. pointed out that the fish are not spotted, they are striped. Jack K. corrected her and they agreed that they have both spots and stripes.

"I noticed that the fish still have their food pouches (egg sacks)." said Hannah W.

Margo said, "The eyes are getting big."

"The fish are simming around in the left corner." commented Zak.

Jack K. reported that the tank is the right temperature.

Mrs. Rose noticed that the children in Nature Club have not been outside in a VERY LONG TIME and they need to RUN! Recess needs to be restored. NO MORE SNOW! NO MORE INDOOR RECESS!

Hannah W. noticed that the fish are swimming faster.

The New Year and the Trout

Since November, lots of fish have died. James and Haley and Margo and Zoe and Hannah A. counted 18 fish today. We've had 18 since the beginning of January - Zak and James checked the chart to make sure. Zoe said the fish are defintely bigger since we got that big snowstorm. Margo said there's lots of gunk under the rocks and we probably need to vacuum. Hannah A. thought that any fish caught in the filter might be blind.

We're still looking for a place to release the trout this spring. There is one stream in Fairfax County that might be OK, but we're afraid the water will be too warm in the summer due to pavement runoff. The club members are in agreement that we'd prefer a mountain stream. We want the trout to have the best chance of survival they can.

They Look Like Fish At Last!

I saw the fish yesterday! They were all swimming around the top of the water! They look like fish at last!

Progress

Now that all of the fish have hatched, they're a little harder to find. Some should be reaching the end of the alevin stage, so their bodies are growing and the egg sac is shrinking. So far, they are doing very little swimming, but a few are starting to move around. We gave them a little food, but only one seemed to notice, so we don't think they're quite ready to eat yet.

All of the levels in our tank (temperature, pH, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate) seem to be holding steady so far. Our nitrite level has been 1.0 consistently since we set up the tank, which had us worried at first. Nitrite measures some pollution in the water and isn't good for the fish, so we'd like it to be at 0, however, we can't find the cause of the raised level, so we haven't been able to bring it down. Water changes don't seem to have any impact. One of our advisors suggested that maybe there's some limestone in the pea gravel we used and that could be the cause. In any event, it doesn't seem to be effecting the alevin so far, so we're just keeping an eye on it.

All of the kids in the school are tracking what's happening in the tank. It has been really exciting to watch! We're trying to get pictures of the fish to publish, but it's very hard to capture those little guys.

Report by Nature Club - We Rock!

Nature Club making fish faces for the camera.

Today, Gabby saw little brown squiggly things in the rocks. She realized that the brown squiggly things were actually fish. Ellie used a flashlight to count the fish in the tank. She found 1, Hannah W found 5, Margo found 27, Hannah A found 7. The counting group agreed that there were 28, but later revised the number to 33. Zoe says the fish are getting bigger. Margo thinks that some of them won't make it because they're still in the hatching basket. Ellie, Zoe and Hannah A said there are twins - two fish attached to one egg sac. Margo found 3 in a row exactly next to each other.

Nature Club Meeting Comments

Oliver noticed that the egg sacks are huge. Margo spotted big rocks in the tank - lava rocks that provide a home for bacteria. Oliver pointed out that lava rock is also known as igneous rock. Hannah W. noticed that ALL of the fish have hatched. Hannah A. noticed that when they were just hatching, some of the egg pouches were hanging out of the bottom of the hatching basket. Emma noticed little squiggly things on the bottom of the tank which were the fish, but she thought they were worms. Hannah W noted that a few days ago the sacs were wiggling. Hannah A noticed that there were fish marks on the back of the tank in the silver stuff. Margo reminded us DO NOT TOUCH THE TANK! It's getting blurry. Oliver noted that a week ago all of the eggs were rolling around like they were alive. Remington suggested we put up a sign that says DO NOT TOUCH THE TROUT TANK. Julia noticed that the trout's eyes are getting bigger and cuter every day.