10/7/15

The wait is over; the trout eggs came today!  We have started our journey to raise Rainbow Trout at Bear Tavern with the hopes of releasing them into the wild at the Forest Resource Education Center in Jackson, NJ in early June.  The preparation has been a total team effort that included help from Mr. Kirwan in setting up the tank and fixing any leaks as well as a tremendous amount of support from our PTO!  We even had a man named Paul drive over from Howell to lend us a chiller to make the water cold enough until ours came in the mail yesterday.  The water is a chilly 53 degrees and the chemicals look good!  We hope to use this blog to share our school-wide trout experience with you.  For the first three days, Mr. Kirwan and I will be taking care of the daily maintenance, but will turn it over to our fourth grade students next week.  It is exciting for the whole school.  ~Mr. Turnbull

What we need to do:

• Each day, students will remove 'bad eggs.'  These are the ones that turn solid white and the ones in which you can no longer see the trout's eyes.  That is why at this stage they are called "eyed eggs," because you can actually see the eyes through the egg.
• Fill out a data sheet each day that includes temperature, water clarity, chemical tests, water level and egg count.
• We test for pH and ammonia twice a week each and record the results.

Even though fourth grade will be spearheading the project, the whole school will get to watch the trout grow, making observations and connections to what they are learning in class.  Plus, it's just really fun to watch eggs hatch and fish grow!