St Rose Students Release This Year’s Trout

By Eliza Hallabeck

“Goodbye fishies,” the group of St Rose of Lima students said from the side of the Pootatuck River in unison as science teacher Marde Dimon displayed the proper way to release a trout after school on Wednesday, April 28.

The trout were brought from their home, a tank in the science lab, to be released, because, as St Rose of Lima sixth grade student Larissa Spies said, “You have to let them go when they start eating each other.”

“They will cannibalize until there is none left,” said sixth grade student Luca Imbimbo.

The fact that the trout cannibalize each other was not the only thing the students learned during the school year while they helped and learned while Ms Dimon took care of the fingerlings. Student Kaylie Daniels said a fingerling is a trout that is about the size of a finger. Student Leah Mais said trout have nutrition pouches on their body.

The students all agreed that trout have to be raised in an environment that mimics that into which e they will be released. In this case, the trout were kept in fresh water and a temperature to imitate the Pootatuck River.

Raising the trout in the classroom is part of program at St Rose organized with the Candlewood Valley Chapter of Trout Unlimited (TU).

This is the seventh grade focused on the program, called Trout In The Classroom, but all grades are welcomed to release the trout. All grades also learn through the trout at the school.

“It’s really lovely,” said Ms Dimon about the program.

This year the students had an extra surprise when a two-headed trout came from two eggs that had fused together. The two-headed trout died, but, according to Ms Dimon, the trout is now preserved in 70 percent alcohol.