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[Britguy]

I noticed a lot of dead fish up at Buntzen lake recently and the lady in the store near by said that they died just after being stocked, anyone know what happened?

[Sam6140]

oh geez...  any chance that the water temperature difference/shock effect? Buntzen is damn cold!  Probably way colder than wherever they're raised and the transport tanks.  But I really don't know what I'm talking about.

[GoFishBC]

Hey Guys thanks for your concern regarding the Buntzen Lake stockings.  The first stocking of Buntzen and Sasamat took place on March 27th.  The reservoir was quite low but the water temperature was 8.0 Celsius, the water at the rearing hatchery was 6.0 Celsius so water temperature would not have been an issue.  We released 3000 fish at a size of 220 grams which is 660 kgs, this is a lot of fish.  Typically when the fish are released they are lethargic and lay on the bottom for a while before they adjust to the different water quality.  At this time most people think they are dead but they are not, if you look closely you can see that they are gilling and quite alive. Once the fish are in the lake we monitor their condition until they start moving around and look OK.  After the first stocking the fish looked good and there were no observations of any dead fish from the fish culturists who performed the stocking.  If for some reason there was a die off after hatchery staff have left the site then this should be reported to park staff who in turn will contact the Freshwater Fisheries Society and we would be able to look into it further.

Thank you very much!!

Tight Lines!! 

[deepcovehooker]

Interesting I guess a lot of us learned something by this. 

[typhoon]

I would have assumed that they stock Buntzen from the pens in Buntzen. Or are the pens no longer there?

[jeff]

A little off this topic but on tuesday i was at deer lake in Harrison this was the day before its stocking and there were about a dozen dead fish in one of the bays just wondering what might of caused this.

[jimmywits]

I would have assumed that they stock Buntzen from the pens in Buntzen. Or are the pens no longer there?

Pens are still there but are no longer used, they have been moved away from the channel and tied up to the shore up the west side in the first large bay.

[Dave]

A little off this topic but on tuesday i was at deer lake in Harrison this was the day before its stocking and there were about a dozen dead fish in one of the bays just wondering what might of caused this.

Were these trout, how large were these fish, and were you able to examine any?

[jeff]

Dave the fish were rainbows and they ranged in the 6 to 10 inch range and they were in water just out of reach from in the boat it was hard to really get a good look at them and the fish that were close to shore had been picked over by the birds pretty clean.

[Dave]

Thanks jeff.  Hard call on these mortalities, perhaps others have more information??

[firstlight]

Im assuming that 8 degrees is surface temp.?
10 feet below surface on Buntzen is dramatically colder than the surface temp.
Of any water ive ever been in Buntzen has the biggest temp change as you get deeper.

[Britguy]

Hey Guys thanks for your concern regarding the Buntzen Lake stockings.  The first stocking of Buntzen and Sasamat took place on March 27th.  The reservoir was quite low but the water temperature was 8.0 Celsius, the water at the rearing hatchery was 6.0 Celsius so water temperature would not have been an issue.  We released 3000 fish at a size of 220 grams which is 660 kgs, this is a lot of fish.  Typically when the fish are released they are lethargic and lay on the bottom for a while before they adjust to the different water quality.  At this time most people think they are dead but they are not, if you look closely you can see that they are gilling and quite alive. Once the fish are in the lake we monitor their condition until they start moving around and look OK.  After the first stocking the fish looked good and there were no observations of any dead fish from the fish culturists who performed the stocking.  If for some reason there was a die off after hatchery staff have left the site then this should be reported to park staff who in turn will contact the Freshwater Fisheries Society and we would be able to look into it further.

Thank you very much!!

This was well after March 27th so no way the fish were still alive on the bottom
there was a lot of them too
I was there last week too and there were still fish on the bottom
just a shame for so many to die like this after all the work you guys put into raising them
I hope someone can figure out what the cause was so it does not happen again

[Chehalis_Steel]

A little off this topic but on tuesday i was at deer lake in Harrison this was the day before its stocking and there were about a dozen dead fish in one of the bays just wondering what might of caused this.

I don't know if this is relevant but about half the fish I've retained from Deer Lake over the past two years had some kind of parasite (maybe fluke egg?) living under their skin and in their eyes.