Gold River & Burman River
Chinook Brood Collection
Each year in mid September, volunteers from the Nootka Sound Watershed Society team up with staff from the Conuma River Hatchery and the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation to collect brood stock on Gold River and the Burman River. Volunteers and staff meet at edge of the Gold River or the Gold River docks and are transported by jet boat to a remote site on the Burman River. There, everyone takes part in multiple beach seines, fish sorts, and the subsequent brood collection. The brood stock are transported by net pen and tanker trucks to the Conuma River Hatchery, where they are fertilized, incubated and reared to the smolt stage.
Nootka Sound Watershed Society helps to mobilize volunteers, and supports the hatchery staff. The smolts are eventually transferred into sea pens at the mouth of the Burman river, and lake pens in Muchalat Lake where hatchery staff and volunteers help feed and monitor the fish. Eventually, approximately 200,000 Chinook smolts are released into the Burman River estuary, and approximately 500,000 Chinook smolts are released into the Gold River watershed because of this collaborative effort.
