A few of the fry were released recently into the Guadalupe River. To make the trip more memorable, they leave you the following goodbye.

The larger portion of the eggs that the Guadalupe River Trout Unlimited receive are put into Whitlock-Vibert boxes and placed into the Guadalupe River on stretches of the river deemed as private. This allows the best chance for their survival without tourists and curious passers-by destroying their habitats.  The video below is the process that the volunteers go through to place these eggs. The entire process is about three hours, so the video shows you the major parts of it without the repetition for each box being placed.

 

 

GRTU Rainbow Trout Egg Project – Guadalupe River from White Oak ISD on Vimeo.

Jimbo Roberts leads the charge for the Guadalupe RIver Trout Unlimited Chapter when it comes to planting rainbow trout eggs in the upper reaches of the Guadalupe River. This video shows a small portion of the work that is involved in this project.

A big milestone happened recently in the middle school trout tank. All of the fry had grown large enough to handle the current in the tank, and they were becoming very claustrophobic. So, they are now on the loose in the tank. Judging by the water tests being done, while the pH is running a little higher than we would like, the ammonia is holding steady where we need it. Glad to see the changes we made in filtering this year had such a dramatic improvement over last year. Keep up the great work, kids!

Christian Floyd, a fifth grade White Oak student, spent all of last year taking care of the trout egg project when it was at the intermediate campus. He even spent a weekend sharing his knowledge of the project with fly fishermen, state politicians, Texas Parks and Wildlife biologists, and many others while working the Trout in the Classroom booth at the Guadalupe River Trout Unlimited Trout Fest.  This year he parlayed that knowledge into a winning essay titled, “My Best Day on the River.” The contest, sponsored by the GRTU and Temple Fork Outfitters fly rods, grouped 5th though 8th graders into one category. Christian came out on top winning a fly rod, reel, and case combo worth about $250. He was unable to attend the awards ceremony, but a picture of his father Skyping him in to virtually receive his award is below. Congratulations, Christian. Nice way to extend your learning from the project last year.

Photo Credit: Scott FloydWe just received word that the 200 trout eggs will be available for pickup on Thursday, February 23rd. That means they will begin their life in the tank over the weekend after being warmed up to the temperature of the aquarium water (50º F). The eggs will then be placed into their hatching net for their approximately two weeks left of life as an egg. Generally, it takes about 50 days at 50º to hatch after egg fertilization. The eggs we receive will be at the end of those 50 days due to packaging and shipping times taking up the previous time period.

1600 trout eggs (brothers and sisters to these) will be headed to the Guadalupe River to begin a new life in the wild. They will have a homes in a Whitlock-Vibert boxes for the rest of their egg and fry life spans. We hope to video record this process once the eggs arrive so students can see it. We will discuss the different survival statistics between the hatchery style setting like we have and the natural “wild” setting most eggs end up in. You will be surprised how much of an affect we can have on the life of the trout and other river species through projects like ours.

Keep an eye on this blog and the webcams listed in the Links and Pages section to monitor along with us. We will be posting our daily findings of water quality in the Aquarium Data Observations spreadsheet linked to the right of this blog as well.

Feel free to leave us questions in the comment section for us to answer for you. Comments require approval by the teachers in charge before they show up on the blog, but we will get to them as soon as we can. Thanks so much for being a part of this project with us.

Photo Credit: Christian FloydThe details have been worked out once again and we are excited to announce the continuation of our Trout in the Classroom project. This year, the middle school students will get the benefit of observing the process.

Thanks to the Guadalupe River Trout Unlimited folks, we will be receiving 200 rainbow trout eggs for hatching in our middle school science lab! We will be able to watch those eggs go through the stages all the way to fingerlings large enough to release back into the river. We have webcams hooked up and ready to go on our new aquarium (pictured above). The links are in the menu at the top of the blog.

This project is based around the Trout in the Classroom program in place mostly in northern states. While we have a few year round natural trout fisheries not too far away from east TX, we do not have any in the immediate area. Studying this ecosystem is impossible without great, hands on projects like these.

Trout in the Classroom (TIC) is an environmental education program in which students in grades k-12 . . .

• raise trout from eggs to fry.
• monitor tank water quality.
• engage in stream habitat study.
• learn to appreciate water resources.
• begin to foster a conservation ethic.
• grow to understand ecosystems.
• release into the Guadalupe River

Be on the lookout for for more details as we get an arrival date for the eggs. They are being readied for shipping, so we hope it will be soon. We hope you will join in and share your expertise with this project. We also hope you will ask us questions in the comment sections to challenge us in our learning.