Greetings PACFISH team Newport,
This is just a quick note and a few photos to share with you from the weight and measurement this past Thursday. Bob and Brandon had just finished maintenance on the pens early in the morning so we had pristine waters to work with the fish.
I met Rex Shettlesworth (Ass’t Coordinator @ Hubbs hatchery) at BAC in the morning. Rex brought us 5 bags of food, along with his equipment to catch, weigh and measure a sampling of juveniles from each pen.
The process:
1. A large basket is tied to an end grate, submerged in the water.
2. A tub is filled with 20 liters of sea water from the pen.
3. The helper, (me), chase the fish from one end of the pen to the other, where Rex catches a big scoop in his net.
4. Rex puts that scoop into the submerged basket and we repeat the process until he has approximate 150 WSB contained in the basket.
5. Rex mixes a powder into the bucket of water that puts the fish into a sleep state.
6. Rex takes approximately 20 fish from the basket and places them into the “sleepy bucket”
7. In about 2 minutes they are ready for weight, measurement and are checked for tag retention.
8. Each fish is taken out one by one and placed on a board that is marked in millimeters; then placed on a scale that is weighed in grams; then scanned with a wand that “beeps” when passed over the head to indicate the metal tag is present. No metal tag, no beep.
9. My job is to scribe all the data that is collected on a pre printed form that is retained by Rex and Victor @ HUBBS.
50 fish are weighed, measured and checked for tag retention from each pen. Then 100 additional fish are only checked for tag retention.
If the fish is healthy, they are tossed back into their pen. If they have an obvious injury or malformation, they are euthanized. The majority of the fish that we handled were healthy and returned to their pens. However, we did have several fish with eye injuries or conditions that required euthanasia as well as a few fish with jaw trauma. A fish with white, missing or discolored eyes will go blind and cannot feed. A fish with jaw trauma or malformation will not be able to feed.
I’m attaching photos that show some of the eye and jaw conditions that required euthanasia. The whole process takes about 2 hours.
I’m waiting on the official results from the data collected. I estimate that the average length of the fish is 8”. They ranged from about 179mm to 234mm or 7”-9”.
Thank you all for keeping our WSB juveniles healthy, well fed and swimming in clean water!
We may be looking at an early release date. We will know more when we hear back from Rex and Victor.
Enjoy this amazing weather!
Kim
