Stocking Trout with the Outdoor Club

On November 5, I went up to South Mountains State Park with my Outdoor Club at work to help stock trout. I had heard that hatcheries sometimes need help with stocking smaller rivers and creeks through another blog, and thought I would find out if that was the case at South Mountains. It turns out that they were super excited to have our help. SM has delayed harvest designated water, which means that they are stocked four times a year, most of the year is 100% catch and release, and during the summer months you can catch and keep seven a day with no size limit. In the November stocking, the rangers usually have a training, so there is only one ranger in the park to help the hatchery truck stock. It takes several people to do the process efficiently because they have to take the fish from the truck to the river in five gallon buckets. For that reason they usually call up a nearby juvenile delinquent center, and ask for help from those kids. They were pretty excited to have a school group come and help with the process. Ten students came, along with one other teacher who helps with the club pretty often, and a bus driver I paint with over the summer named Johnny who loves to fish. It was a good size group, and the kids absolutely love the trip. We learned a lot about trout, and their habitat, as well as the importance of riparian zones. The students learned pretty quick how to identify brooks, rainbows, and browns.