Mt. Adams Institute Mt. Adams Institute
  • About Us
    • Programs
      • VetsWork
      • VetsWork Fire
      • Land Stewards
      • Education Programs
    • About
      • Our Mission
      • Our Impact
      • Our Staff
      • The Board
      • DEI Commitment
      • Lodging
      • Program Partners
    • Our Interns
      • VetsWork Interns
      • Fire Interns
      • Land Stewards Interns
    • Contact Us
      • Reach HQ
      • Live & Social
      • Employment
  • Internships
    • VetsWork
    • VetsWork Fire
    • Land Stewards
    • HIRED!
  • Summer Camps
  • Sense of Place
    • Season 13
    • Sense of Place Sponsorship
    • Sense of Place Archive
    • Hear in the Gorge
    • Donate to Sense of Place
  • Support
    • Donate
    • Gift A Scholarship
    • Sense of Place Lecture Series Sponsorship
    • Capital Campaign
    • Volunteer
  • Blog
Close
  • About Us
    • Programs
      • VetsWork
      • VetsWork Fire
      • Land Stewards
      • Education Programs
    • About
      • Our Mission
      • Our Impact
      • Our Staff
      • The Board
      • DEI Commitment
      • Lodging
      • Program Partners
    • Our Interns
      • VetsWork Interns
      • Fire Interns
      • Land Stewards Interns
    • Contact Us
      • Reach HQ
      • Live & Social
      • Employment
  • Internships
    • VetsWork
    • VetsWork Fire
    • Land Stewards
    • HIRED!
  • Summer Camps
  • Sense of Place
    • Season 13
    • Sense of Place Sponsorship
    • Sense of Place Archive
    • Hear in the Gorge
    • Donate to Sense of Place
  • Support
    • Donate
    • Gift A Scholarship
    • Sense of Place Lecture Series Sponsorship
    • Capital Campaign
    • Volunteer
  • Blog

Since getting hired by the Mt. Adams Institute through the VetsWork AmeriCorps program in March, it has been an extremely busy time learning how fish hatcheries operate. I began my first day of work at the Carson National Fish Hatchery in Washington on March 25th, 2019. Since then, I’ve been exposed to how much work is involved at a hatchery verses what I thought previously. Hatchery work is physically taxing most of the year; there are busier times of the year than others, depending on what kinds of fish are being raised. For Carson, we release 1.42 million fish a year, and have double that amount for a majority of that time. From what I’ve been told so far, the winter and spring seasons are the absolute busiest.

Within two weeks of working at the hatchery, I learned how to set up a massive pump that safely takes the fish out of their raceways, and pumps them up vertically to the top of water tanker trucks for transporting the fish to another location. In that case, approximately 250,000 fish were transported to Walla Walla. Once the fish arrive via hoses up to the tanker trucks, they are put into brackish water, which helps keep the fish calm. One of the biggest killers of fish is stress. After about 5 hours of crowding the fish down the raceways towards the pump, we successfully loaded up two tanker trucks.

Also, we recently released our smolts, fish that have been raised about 18 months at the hatchery, to the Wind River. We released a total close to 1.17 million. We’ll be lucky if only 1-2 percent return. That was a full day of pulling boards, monitoring water levels, and ensuring safe passage for those fish.

Just recently, we have had a marking crew on site to clip fins and insert a small wore tag into the nose of our remaining 1.42 million salmon. It’s been a great experience meeting the crew and learning the importance of the whole process.

I’m incredibly thankful for the opportunity the Mt. Adams Institute has provided via the VetsWork AmeriCorps umbrella, and I hope this story inspires others to look into giving back to our natural world.

Share

FacebookTwitterGoogle +Pinterest

Join Our Mailing List

Be sure to add your name to the roster, so we can send you latest news, jobs, events and resources.

Make a Donation

Make a Donation

Recent Posts

  • Field Notes: Devin Newman
  • Field Notes: Alexander Golman
  • Field Notes: Jacob Boak
  • Field Notes: Caelan Vielbig
  • Field Notes: Omeed Pourboghrat

Categories

  • Bulletin
  • Fun & Miscellaneous
  • Lands Stewards
  • Mountain Talk
  • Sense Of Place
  • Summer Camp
  • VetsWork
  • VetsWork FireCorps

Check Out Instagram

This error message is only visible to WordPress admins
Error: There are no business accounts connected.
  • Back to Blog
  • Prev
  • Next



© Copyright 2021 Mt. Adams Institute. All rights reserved.
Mt. Adams Institute is an equal opportunity employer.
contact us | partnership inquiries | site by Greta Rose Agency