This year, the Sanday ova took a lot longer to hatch because of a slightly delayed transfer from the Kirbister hatchery to the school and due to the very cold spell of weather in February/March. In fact, it wasn’t before March 7^th (more than 2 weeks later than last year) that the alevins started hatching. The advantage of hatching ova in very cold water (an average of 4.6°C on Sanday this year) is that the mortality stays very low (4 casualties for over 150 ova)  but the downside is that the alevins haven’t quite reabsorbed their yolk sacs by the time we need to release them, before the Easter holidays.

This year, the most noticeable improvement on release day was undeniably the weather! While in March 2012, we had been battling against a westerly gale and released the alevins facing a mini-tsunami, this time, the Bea Loch was bathed in bright sunshine with a distinctive taste of spring and a gentle breeze from the east.

While Mr. Thorne, the Sanday ranger and Mr. Pietri headed for the loch with the alevins and transferred them in small bags for the pupils to release, the Primaries from Room2  and the secondary 1s, accompanied by Mrs. Butler, Mrs. Cawthorne, Mrs. Muir and Mrs. Thomson walked from the school to the loch.

As the last arrangements were made to release the fry, Mr. Thorne gave a little introduction regarding the loch environment and the challenges our fry would possibly meet in the future: mergansers, herons, cormorants, otters, eels without forgetting the bigger trout lurking in the depths…

Then, it was time to part with our alevins,  let them disappear amongst the weeds in the shallows and wish them good luck!

A big thank you to all the staff from the school who helped with the project, to the Sanday ranger Mr. Thorne  and to the Orkney Trout Fishing Association for providing the ova.

Mr.P