The Mill Bay and District Conservation Society is reporting a record day for its salmon relocation program, following a sediment spill that killed fish in Shawnigan Creek earlier this month.
Volunteers moved 921 fish upstream of a waterfall on Sunday, Oct. 11, setting a new single-day record for the program.
The society says the successful move follows a difficult start to the season after a sediment spill on Oct. 2 left creek water heavily clouded with soil and silt.
Around 800 coho salmon were being held in a fish trap when the spill happened, and volunteers later found several dead fish, with additional losses during the relocation effort.
“Our move event proceeded as planned and as the day progressed unfortunately we discovered 30 mortalities in the fish trap,” said the society in a statement on social media. “At our upstream release site, some of the fish appeared to have faired the poor conditions reasonably well, but we also spent a lot more time than normal attempting to resuscitate fish that were struggling, and we lost some more fish there.”
Many surviving salmon have since resumed migrating upstream, and coho continue arriving at the trap, according to the society.
Volunteers have cleaned the trap and are preparing for more relocation efforts, the society remains hopeful this could be another record year for salmon returns.
