January

Egg maintenance continues. Once the eggs reach the “eyed” stage (the eggs will have a distinct black dot, and the egg is at its least delicate stage), we remove them from the incubators and are “shocked”.

Hatching begins in the earliest of our egg takes. Starting with the Pinks and Chums, the eggs hatch into alevin. In nature, the alevin will remain in the gravel in the river, so, to simulate that, our alevin remain in the incubators. Over time the alevin will develop into fry. Once the fry “button up” (absorb their yolk sacks into their bodies and the abdominal opening will seal), they would (in the wild) emerge from the gravel, so the fry are moved from the incubators and placed into the Capilano Troughs (typically in early March). At that point, the fry weigh around 0.5g.