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Thousands of parr released into Osborn Pond at Bear Mountain

Fish will complete their fresh water development at pond before returning to ocean
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Members of the the Goldstream Volunteer Salmonid Enhancement Association, Bear Mountain Resort and grade three and four students from Lakewood Elementary school released 5,000 parr into the Osborn Pond on te 15th hole of Bear Mountain’s Valley Course. (Westin Bear Mountain Resort photo)

The Osborn Pond at the Bear Mountain’s Valley Course is now home to thousands of juvenile coho salmon.

On Tuesday, members of the Goldstream Volunteer Salmonid Enhancement Association, Bear Mountain Resort and grade three and four students from Lakewood Elementary school released 5,000 parr into the pond on the 15th hole of the course.

“It’s our hope that this initiative and a second one planned for Matson Lake will help strengthen coho stocks and enable this fragile fish population to once again become self-sustaining,” said Peter McCully, technical consultant and biologist for the Goldstream association in a release.

“With recent survival rates for South Vancouver Island streams as low as one-half of one per cent, giving these young fish a fighting start is extremely important.”

This is the sixth year that the pond has served as a nursery for juvenile coho and is an integral part of a larger conservation initiative to strengthen the numbers of coho, chum and chinook salmon in the waters off the south easterly tip of Vancouver Island.

The juvenile fish will complete their fresh water development in Osborn Pond before entering the Millstream watershed to return to the ocean in Esquimalt Harbour next spring.


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kendra.wong@goldstreamgazette.com