Hatchery

List of 3 news stories.

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  From the Hatchery to Nature

  6/6/2025
  After raising them from eggs, Shawnigan students headed to the creeks that cross our campus last week to release tiny coho salmon fry into the wild.

   

  While it marks the beginning of a journey for the little fish, it also marks the end of several months of care the Shawnigan students in Science 9 and Environmental Science 11 and 12 have put into raising them in the Mark Hobson Hatchery.

   

  That began last fall, when salmon from Hartl Creek were used as broodstock: eggs were harvested from the females and fertilized with semen from the males. Those eggs hatched into alevin, then grew into fry in March, at which point they were transferred into larger tanks of water and cared for until they were ready for release into Hartl and Shawnigan creeks.

   
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  Lake Omar Remediation Project

  9/6/2024
  A major project got underway in August to begin the remediation of Lake Omar, the natural centrepiece of the Shawnigan campus.

   

  Located in the heart of the school grounds, Lake Omar – one of two catchment ponds on campus – overflows into Hartl Creek, which then flows into Shawnigan Creek and eventually the Pacific Ocean. Lake Omar is the heart of a thriving ecosystem with a plethora of water and riparian plants, invertebrates, insects, birds and mammals. It supplies water to the Mark Hobson Hatchery on a seasonal basis, and in past years, it has also been stocked with trout and has been a favourite spot for students to flyfish. Unfortunately, Lake Omar is only a shallow pond and thus cannot sustain the life of fish year around as during the summer months the water becomes too hot to sustain fish life.

   

  In 2013-14, a group of like-minded people with backgrounds in biology, fisheries, and water quality got together with some Shawnigan science teachers to discuss how to improve the year-round health of this water body and how to ensure it could sustain the year-round life of fish. On Founder’s Day 2023, Kevin Tutty ’14 (Lake’s) and his father Brian, a retired fisheries and oceans biologist, brought up those discussions from a decade earlier with Head of School Mr. Larry Lamont, who put a plan in motion.

   
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  Annual Coho Release

  6/14/2024
  Nearly 10,000 salmon fry were released into the wild this month by students who raised them in the Mark Hobson Hatchery – a facility unique to Shawnigan among schools in British Columbia.

   

  The students in Science 9 and Environmental Science 11 and 12 have been nurturing the fish since November, when they caught fish in Shawnigan Creek to use as broodstock, then harvested eggs from the females and fertilized them with milt (semen) from the males. The eggs hatched into alevin – a phase where they are still carrying yolk – then grew into fry in March. Transferred into larger tanks at that point, they were fed and cared for over the following months until they were ready for release into Hartl and Shawnigan creeks.

   

  According to Hatchery Lead and Experiential Learning Instructor Mr. Louis Chancellor, the number of fish released this year was nearly double the amount released last year, thanks in part to some changes and improvements made to the system. He says it should be even better next year.

   
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