Native Steelhead spawning comes to a close

After fertilizing hundreds of thousands of native Elwha steelhead we are done for this year. This has been a very fun and interesting project to be on. It is far from over because the Lower Elwha Kallam hatchery has many eggs to incubate and lots of fry to feed and move around as they grow. We have hundreds of fry outside in the raceways and many eggs in the incubation room. Before the end of summer, (I think) we will be weighing, measuring, taking a fin clips, and PIT tagging the fish who are big enough. We will basically start the process over again of genetics and family so in 4-5 years we can spawn these guys.

Another thing we will be out doing soon is pumping redds for more recruitment in our native steelhead recovery program. Redd pumping is one of my favorite things to do. It is like opening a present we are wondering how many little steelies we will get and what stage of development.