Kenai Peninsula students had a close encounter with the salmon life cycle last week, as part of Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s annual “Salmon in the Classroom” educational series.

On Wednesday, Oct. 11, about 400 elementary students from schools in the central and southern peninsula attended hourly outdoor presentations and coho salmon egg takes in the Anchor River State Recreation Area in Anchor Point. An egg take is the process of artificially spawning salmon to produce fertilized eggs, according to an Oct. 3 press release from ADF&G.

Attending schools included Aurora Borealis Charter School, Chapman School, Little Fireweed Academy, IDEA Homeschool, McNeil Canyon Elementary, Redoubt Elementary, Kaleidoscope Charter School, Connections Soldotna, Mountain View Elementary, Connections Homer, Paul Banks Elementary and Nikolaevsk School.

A similar educational event also took place on Tuesday, Oct. 10 at Bear Creek near Seward, with about 100 students from northern Kenai Peninsula and other Alaska schools attending.

ADF&G’s “Salmon in the Classroom” program is mainly run by the Soldotna office, though the educational events are “definitely a collaborative effort with different parties on the peninsula,” fishery biologist Kayla Hansch told Homer News on Thursday, Oct. 12.

During Wednesday’s event, students had the opportunity to visit multiple education stations by the Anchor River, including a table set up with fish anatomy puzzles and a station where they could learn to identify various species of juvenile fish, taken directly from the Anchor River and held in tanks for the day.

“We have Homer ADF&G staff that helped us set minnow traps the night before for the juvenile fish ID station. We worked with Cook Inlet Aquaculture pretty closely for the Bear Creek egg take, and the Forest Service as well helped us set minnow traps for that egg take,” Hansch said.

ADF&G was permitted to collect the juvenile fish from the Anchor River or Bear Creek for the egg take events. The fish are held for the day of the event and released at its conclusion, Hansch said.

Hansch and Soldotna area biologist Jenny Gates also educated the gathered students on the five species of salmon found in Alaska, the internal and external anatomy of salmon, how salmon spawn, and the overall life cycle of Pacific salmon during their presentations.

The highlight of the day’s presentations, however, was the egg take itself.

Hansch and Gates brought out two coho salmon, one male and one female, taken from Bear Creek and asked for a couple of student volunteers to help with the artificial fertilization process. They removed the eggs from the belly of the female salmon, holding them in a large pitcher, and then covered the eggs with the milt, or seminal fluid, from the male salmon. Finally, Hansch poured water into the pitcher to complete the fertilization process.

“Salmon don’t lay eggs on dry ground,” she told the gathered students. “They lay their eggs in the water, so we need to add water for these eggs to be properly fertilized.”

Coho salmon are used because their spawning season coincides better with the school year, Hansch said on Thursday.

“Sockeye salmon have their early runs in June, and then the later sockeye salmon run is more in July,” she said. “Coho salmon spawn a little later, so it works out well that they’re not ready to spawn until October because students are back in the classrooms.”

Each class was given approximately 300-400 eggs to take back to their schools to raise into free-swimming coho salmon fry by the end of the school year. According to the press release, students will observe the eggs as they develop through different life stages, learning about salmon biology in their classroom throughout the school year.

Twenty-two schools are participating in this year’s “Salmon in the Classroom” education program. Schools or classes who were unable to attend the egg takes had coho salmon eggs delivered by ADF&G to their school.

“We also have some middle and high schools that are raising coho salmon fry,” Hansch said. “The egg take events are really geared toward elementary-aged students, so we just have the elementary students attend. So any schools that weren’t able to attend, we had eggs delivered to them that same day during those egg takes.”

Homer Middle School is also raising coho salmon fry this year, in addition to the Homer-area schools previously noted.

Hansch said that, barring equipment malfunctions, they typically see about 90% survival rate with the eggs raised by the schools.

“They’ll release a pretty similar number of eggs as to when they received their eggs,” she said.

“So about a couple hundred fry released in the spring.”

When grown, the coho salmon fry will be released into an ADF&G-permitted landlocked lake, so they can’t enter other waterways and reproduce with wild salmon stocks, and stocked there for later sportfishing opportunities.

Later in the school year, students will have the opportunity to attend other components of the “Salmon in the Classroom” program, including salmon dissections, ice fishing trips and the ADF&G Salmon Celebration in the spring.

More information on the “Salmon in the Classroom” program can be found at https://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=educators.salmonclassroom.

Alaska Deparment of Fish and Game fishery biologist Kayla Hansch explains the salmon egg fertilization process to the gathered third grade classes during ADF&G’s “Salmon in the Classroom” salmon egg take event on Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2023 in the Anchor River State Recreation Area in Anchor Point, Alaska. (Delcenia Cosman/Homer News)

Alaska Deparment of Fish and Game fishery biologist Kayla Hansch adds water to the fertilized salmon eggs to complete the process during ADF&G’s “Salmon in the Classroom” salmon egg take event on Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2023 in the Anchor River State Recreation Area in Anchor Point, Alaska. (Delcenia Cosman/Homer News)

Alaska Department of Fish and Game area assistant manager Jenny Gates (center) explains to gathered third-grade classes the five species of salmon found in Alaska during ADF&G’s “Salmon in the Classroom” salmon egg take event on Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2023 in the Anchor River State Recreation Area in Anchor Point, Alaska. (Delcenia Cosman/Homer News)

Students identify species of juvenile fish at one of the activity stations during Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s “Salmon in the Classroom” salmon egg take event on Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2023 in the Anchor River State Recreation Area in Anchor Point, Alaska. (Delcenia Cosman/Homer News)

Students check out fish anatomy puzzles at one of the activity stations during Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s “Salmon in the Classroom” salmon egg take event on Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2023 in the Anchor River State Recreation Area in Anchor Point, Alaska. (Delcenia Cosman/Homer News)