We grow 'em BIG at Caroline

Hello fellow trout enthusiasts! It's Miss Bong here at Caroline finally making an appearance on this blog! We have been enjoying watching our trout eggs hatch and grow from alevin into young fry. We must have nutrient-rich water up on this hill because we have had very few fatalities. Our survival rate is about 75%! The tank is becoming crowded at these fry range in length from the smallest estimated at 2cm to the largest measuring in at roughly 6cm! They are voracious eaters and love to surf the current. Our class also wrote some "Trout Tales" to share with readers in the future. Stay tuned!

Bug Show at Enfield

Today, our wonderful Trout Unlimited mentor, Rich, came out to Enfield to share his expertise on aquatic insects. He specifically spoke about trout, their eating habits, and types of insects. Rich brought out the bug collection from Trout Unlimited. These insects are permanent samples they collected from Enfield creek. The same location our trout will eventually call home.

Plant Propagation

The Groton Middle School Environmental Action Club is currently trying to "green up" the hallways by introducing some houseplants on each floor.  We've decided to try using the trout water to root some spider plants.  As you can see they're doing quite well and the trout love the extra foliage!

TROUT FEEDING DEMO FROM SOUTH HILL!

Here it is, our first student-produced instructional video. Great job Noel and Julianna!

At Belle Sherman our 3rd grade class has been having a blast with our trout! We started with about 300 alevin-- we actually counted them. Lately we have had a huge die-off, though the water chemistry looks fine so we aren't sure why. We are at about 150 now.

The children designed an experiment earlier on to determine if the fish were ready for food. We put several fish into containers, fed them and observed their response to the food. The results were inconclusive, but it was very exciting anyway.

Our class has been formally observing the fish about once a week. Each observation has a focusing question or questions. Last week's questions were, What markings do the fish have? Why do you think they have those markings? Children record their observations in the form of drawings and written notes.

Matt Herman (our mentor and co-teacher in our class) and I took the class down to Six Mile Creek near Water St. for an up close and personal look at trout habitat.


We checked water temperature (39.1 F) and pH (7.8, just like in our tank) and threw lots of rocks in the water. When we returned to the classroom, children painted pictures of trout habitat, from the trout's point of view, which we will attach to the tank to help the fish feel more at home.

Children feed the fish and check pH daily. We are working up to the more complicated water tests.

In Groton, we're learning about diffusion and osmosis in class.  We used the opportunity to talk about dissolved oxygen in our tank and related the concept to our Brown Trout gills.  If you've never used Brainpop, they have a great video on fish gills and countercurrent exchange:  http://www.brainpop.com/science/diversityoflife/gills/  Give the free trial a shot.  On another note, all of the trout seem healthy and active.  We've only lost about 8 fish since the beginning.

Here are some images from Chad DeVoe's 7th grade life science classes at Groton Middle School.
BEAUTIFUL. Thanks, Guys!




First up- the "eyed" egg. Notice the visible eye and head. Its just about ready to hatch...





And here is a new-born "alevin", or "sack-fry". The attached yolk-sack will provide nutrition for the first 3-4 weeks in our aquarium setting.





We will be able to observe capillary formation, as the alevins utilize their food source. The yolk sacks will gradually be incorporated into the growing digestive tract. The alevins will also be growing gills, fins and a mroe complete body-structure in teh coming weeks. All viewable in class!

Eggs begin Hatching!

During my visit with 3rd graders at Belle Sherman this morning, we witnessed the first of our brown trout eggs hatching. The newly hatched alevins will spend a good deal of time building strength before they are ready to swim out of their nursery basket, but they were pretty active already this morning. Newfield reports that they have eggs hatching today also- we anticipate that everyone's eggs will hatch within the next couple of days.

Send in your pictures & make your survival predictions (See Student Data page for charts of survival expectations from each school!)

TROUT EGGS ARE HERE!

On Thursday, October 21, we visited DEC's Bath Hatchery and collected roughly 1000 brown trout eggs, which were distributed to classes at nine schools over the course of the day. Students are awaiting hatch day at the following schools, so watch for reports from participating classes!

Belle Sherman Elementary
Cayuga Heights Elementary
Northeast Elementary
South Hill Elementary
Enfield Elementary
Caroline Elementary
Newfield Middle School
Groton Middle School
Boynton Middle School

Special thanks, also, to the folks at DEC, and to Michael Lenetsky, Owen Lenetsky, Josh Filter and Colleen Kearns for all their help!
- Bill Foster, Project Mgr.

Groton is ready!

Today we spent some time today getting the trout tank ready for tomorrow's egg delivery.  We are very excited!  Mercedes prepped the tank by testing water pH, ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels.  A special thanks to all of our sponsors and volunteers for making this happen.