16.5 million fry

Well, they have sure been working me hard these past couple days and it's been a blast. The flight over here was amazing. We were on a float plane and it was definitely a great experience. We saw a group of seals resting on a little island near the hatchery. The hatchery is deep in the woods and in order to get to the pens of fish you have to take a john boat out into the water. Ill try to post pictures soon, but this wifi is anything but dependable. Yesterday was the first official day of work and we had orientation to get better acquainted with our surroundings and the job site. Our first project was to clean the remainder of the incubation room. We had to clean hundreds of fry screens (they protect the drain so the baby fish don't get in the tubing headed for the creek) and then we had to take out all the tubing and screens from the fronts of the incubators and clean all of them. (I'll have to post a picture eventually so you can see what I'm talking about) Around 1030 (high tide) we went out to the floating pens where they had two pens of baby pink salmon. We had to untie the net from three sides then go to the side still connected and pull the net all the way across releasing the salmon into the water. The most amazing thing was to see the adaptation of a species of cod that have been waiting around underneath the fry until we release them and began heavily feeding. Each fry is tagged so that when they return to spawn they can see how many of the millions released by the hatchery actually made it to maturity and returned. After we finished with that we went back to cleaning the incubation room and just have a few more rows to complete. We will start with that today... ill try to update it again tonight after work.

Anchorage

Well, it's 0400 in anchorage and I can positively say it is amazing here. I got here around midnight last night and the sun was just beginning to set, then after a few hours of sleep, stretched out in the airport chairs, I woke up to the sun rising at 0300.... amazing how much sun they have in the summer. The flight up here wasn't that bad at all, the only thing I would change is not being in the middle seat... ;) It was also the first time I had been to Utah and it was beautiful there as well. I got to see just a little bit of it before the sun went down- the mountains there were a sight to see. Ive got a fifty minute flight to cordova in a few hours then being taken to my hotel for the day/night. Tomorrow I start orientation and work! I'll update again tonight after I explore cordova throughout the day.

The day is drawing near...

Well, the day is soon approaching that I will be embarking on one of the greatest adventures of my lifetime. I'm headed to Cordova, Alaska to work at the Prince William Sound Fish Hatchery for the summer. These are the moments I am so thankful for the tight knit family that the CFR allows us to have and the awesome opportunities it opens up to us. I have been running around like crazy these past few months and now I'm trying to move while training everyday with ROTC for our cadet AT. However, I know that come next monday all this hard work will pay off and I will be enjoying every minute of this experience for the next 7 weeks. I hope you enjoy reading my day to day activities throughout the summer and I will post as many pictures as I can. See you in July!