Photo: Kindergarteners observe steelhead trout recently at Butte Vista Elementary School in Yuba City.
Standing on the boat ramp at 80 Second St. in Yuba City, two kindergarten classes at Butte Vista Elementary School released steelhead trout into the Feather River last week.
Suzanne Price, a kindergarten teacher at Butte Vista Elementary, said she started this fish release activity with the school about seven years ago to give kids an additional science curriculum.
Before the release on March 27, the classes learned about different life stages and observed the steelheads in special tanks that were temperature-set to match the Feather River for about one month. The Chico Area Flyfishers donated the tanks to the classes.
The Chico Area Flyfishers support fly fishing activities and participate in projects that enhance fish habitat. The classes got their eggs from the Oroville Fish Hatchery.
“So then we just house (the eggs) in our room, and the kids observe them and write in journals about them,” Price said.
According to kindergarten teacher Crystal Smith, who also was involved with the fish release, they watched the eggs become alevins. Alevins look like fish bodies but they have a big sack attached.
“And then they change from that. You start seeing their sacks like zipping up inside their body, and then they turn into fry. That’s the stage where we release them back into the river, when they are fry,” Smith said. “So (at the fry stage they’re) about the size of their pinky finger, which they love equating it to their body, and then we talk about how they live until they are four to six years old, which is like the age that they are.”
The kids appeared to get a kick out of the fry stage.
“They laugh really hard when they find out that […]
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