Got Milt?

On August 28, Walt, Ella, Mr. Bringhurst and Mr. Gooden went net fishing at the Crooked Slough to catch a male and female chum salmon for the school salmon project.  Ella and Walt described the process: 

“When we went to curvy Crooked Slough, there were tons of reds hovering against the current. When the boat went over them, they zipped away.  At first, Mr. Bringhurst got out of the boat onto the waterlogged grassy bank and walked along the side holding the end of the net with the buoy.  We floated along until the net stretched out and it started tugging and jerking. The floats bobbed up and down rapidly.  Then we got on the bank and started pulling in the net.

There were three chum, two males and one female. They were all ripe. One of the chum had massive teeth, a tattered fin and enormous head.  We put them in a tote of water.  Once we got home, we cut open the female and squirted out the eggs into a bucket.  Then Mr. Gooden ran his hand along the male’s tummy and the milky milt came out in a stream over the eggs. We added river water, let it sit for a minute, and then the eggs were fertilized.  Then we rinsed the eggs off.  After letting them sit another hour, we drove home with the bucket and put the eggs in the tank.  While we were fertilizing the eggs, Tess and Alicia floated by on rafts.  They said it was cold.

We are now checking the water temperature every day as one of our morning math jobs. When the accumulated temperature units reach 300, then we’ll see black eyes through the egg sack and know how many of the eggs were actually fertilized.”