Happenings in the Hatchery

Summer Spawning Szn!

Boulder Darter, *Nothonotus wapiti* - photo by Shannon

The summertime in the hatchery is one of, if not THE most, exciting parts of the year here at CFI! By now the majority of our species are spawning or are finished spawning, and we have thousands of baby fish hatching from their eggs and swimming around. Our earliest spawners, Roanoke Logperch and Leopard Darters, are finished spawning and their young are growing more and more every day! Boulder Darters have been laying so many eggs that we are setting up additional rearing tubs to accommodate them! One of our most finicky species, the Blotchside Logperch, are paired up and spawning. Pearl Darters, our newest species, are laying eggs and surprising us every day with how quickly their larvae are developing! Our resident nest associate, the Tennessee Dace, are living up to their reputation and dancing beautifully over their spawning nests, having laid over 2,500 eggs so far this year! Our field crew has gone out to collect nest rocks for Buck Darters and Duskytail Darters, both of which we rear in our facility, with our Conservation Biologists frequently grooming these nests as the males would do in the wild.

Ayana doing Blotchside Logperch field work - photo by Aster

Welcome Ayana!

Please join us in welcoming Ayana Montaque, our newest Conservation Technician! She will be primarily working as a Feeding Assistant, ensuring that our fish are well nourished, as well as assisting Species Leads by doing daily larval checks on our youngest fishes. Having grown up in a lake town going on boat rides and swimming on her grandparent’s dock, Ayana has always loved being in or near the water. After beginning college, her passion for fish flourished after taking an Ichthyology class, and getting hands-on experience in the field during other classes and while volunteering with CFI last year. Ayana graduates this month from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville with her Bachelor’s in Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences.

CFI Volunteer Program

CFI is thrilled to have three new volunteers joining us for our summer season! We have our first student coming from Walter State Community College, and two students who are currently attending the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. One of our UTK students is even able to apply this volunteer experience as an academic internship credit! If you are a student, or know any students, who would be interested in using a CFI volunteer opportunity for class or internship credit, please reach out to us! Our next volunteer season will be from September through November.

Save the Date

Head Underwater Panel Poster - designed by Aster

Endangered Species Day - Friday, May 17th

Many of the species that Conservation Fisheries has worked with, and a majority that are in our care at this time, are federally listed on the Endangered Species List. The work that we do here at CFI is aimed towards stabilizing wild populations of these species, ideally to the point where the species can be petitioned to be removed from the Endangered Species List. If the work that we do resonates with you, please consider donating to our organization to support not only the species we work with, but the Conservation Biologists who have dedicated their lives to protecting these imperiled fishes.

Head Underwater: Snorkel 101 - Saturday, June 15th | 6-8pm @ Remedy Coffee

Join us for a free evening discussing how to snorkel and enjoy our beautiful underwater biodiversity! Many of the things we love here at CFI cannot be seen above the water, and this year we want to encourage local folks to HEAD UNDERWATER. This free panel is led by CFI Director Bo Baxter with panel guests Casper Cox (Hidden Rivers of Southern Appalachia), Jennifer Webster (Little River Watershed Association, TN RiverLine, and Jon Michael Mollish (TVA). These folks are the experts on how to best enjoy our beautiful native biodiversity. Celebrate existence with us June 15th 6-8pm at Remedy Coffee for FREE.

Little River Fest - Saturday - Sunday, July 27th

Hosted by the Little River Watershed Association, please join us in celebrating the Little River at this community event! Come on out for a day of hanging out on the river with the opportunity to float, see some neat fish, or just bask in the sun! More details to be announced.

Species Spotlight

Roanoke Logperch - Percina rex

The Roanoke Logperch is making waves in the conservation community as it has officially been petitioned for delisting from the Endangered Species List! Based on an assessment by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, a delisting proposal was created due to the Roanoke Logperch’s successful restoration within it’s native range in Virginia and North Carolina. The restoration of a species is a nod to the collaborative effort that is necessary for successful conservation work. Conservation Fisheries, Inc. is proud to have been a part of the recovery for this incredible species.

The work that CFI has done with the Roanoke Logperch is largely in collaboration with the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission, the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Our role in the recovery of this species has been to develop the protocols to successfully propagate these logperch. Since 2008 we’ve been learning the intricacies of this species, observing their behaviors and preferences during each life stage from their semi-pelagic larvae all the way to the feeding and environmental preferences of the adults.

Roanoke Logperch has been one of the most exciting species to care for in our facility. As the “King of the Darters”, they are consistently one of the largest species that we keep, and exude playful behaviors such as flipping rocks with their large snoots to look for food. Each year they are one of our earliest spawners, laying their first eggs as early as late February or early March, which has truly been a marker of the spawning season for us over the last several years.

For more information about the delisting of the Roanoke Logperch, please see this press release by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, or read the proposal on the Federal Registrar.

Community Outreach

Coloring page by one of the 5th grade students

Coloring Pages

Have you ever wanted to color a native fish? Aster, our Designer and Outreach Coordinator, has started creating coloring pages based off of our beloved fish! They made their debut at the American Eagle Foundation Conservation Fest, where CFI staff had the honor of participating and learning about AEF’s conservation and protection of birds of prey. Most recently Aster donned their Mx. Frizzle persona at a local elementary school, teaching 5th graders about the importance and beauty of our local freshwater fishes, encouraging them to experiment with creative forms of science. We’re hoping to be able to make these coloring pages available to the public very soon!

Hidden Rivers Film Tour

It’s no secret that CFI loves Freshwaters Illustrated’s Hidden Rivers documentary. Earlier this year, Jeremy Monroe from Freshwater’s Illustrated traveled to East Tennessee for a week full of showings, free to the public. CFI staff were present at each one, answering questions, talking with community members about our role in local biodiversity, and chatting about our favorite fishes.

East Tennessee Aquatic Association Partnership

Many of the biologists at Conservation Fisheries are fish keepers at home, too! Some of us are even members in our local aquarium club, East Tennessee Aquatic Association. CFI is always happy to attend events hosted by ETAA to chat with like-minded folks about native fish and fishkeeping. We look forward to continued events and collaborations with ETAA!

Spring Highlights

Smallmouth Buffalo spawning run, photographed by Aster

Citico Creek Buffalo Run

Have you ever seen a Buffalo run? A Smallmouth Buffalo, that is! Each spring, the Smallmouth Buffalo that typically hangout in Tellico River migrate upstream into streams and creeks like Citico Creek in the Cherokee National Forest to spawn. This creek is clear and clean enough for folks to be able to observe this massive spawning event streamside. Smallmouth Buffalo are often misidentified as invasive carp, and we are eager each year to teach our community about these neat native fish that are right in our backyards!

Field Work

Early this year CFI biologists assisted the USFWS doing surveys of the beloved Barrens Topminnow. We partnered with biologists from the Tennessee Aquarium and were thrilled to find our sites filled with both adult and young Barrens Topminnows!

To do the propagation work that we do in our facility, CFI biologists must first take crews out into the field to collect adult fish before the spawning season begins! This year we have collected new broodstock for Tennessee Dace and Blotchside Logperch! We also collected Saffron Shiners and Highland Shiners and for the first time for our collaborative project with the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

For some species that we work with, instead of propagating them in our facility, we will collect their egg nests from the wild and bring them back to our facility to rear them. This is the case for a few species, including the Buck Darter and Duskytail Darter! Over the last month we have brought in a few nest rocks from the wild for each of these species and have worked diligently to care for them as the males would in the wild. We anticipate nest collecting for two more species this year - the Marbled Darter and Yellowfin Madtoms!

Gar Lab Collab

This spring we have been thrilled to partner with Dr. Solomon David of GarLab, educating our community about the intricacies and neat life history of gar! Solomon is the leading expert on gar, and has put many years into effective and impactful science communication about this often misunderstood native species. To check out this collaboration, follow our Instagram and Facebook profiles, and be sure to follow The Gar Guy himself for all the latest and greatest information about gar!

Partner Feature

Tennessee Valley Authority

CFI Biologists Shannon Murphy (center) and Bo Baxter (right) with TVA’s Hunter Terrell releasing Boulder Darters, photo by Susan Ehrenclou (TVA)

In April, CFI held a mini-release of Boulder Darters in partnership with our friends at the Tennessee Valley Authority. Several TVA aquatic biologists had the opportunity to help us release these fish during a time of year where they’re at peak coloration! Often when we do fish releases the fish are young, but for this spring mini-release we were releasing adults who had been breeders in previous years and were now getting ‘retired’ to Shoal Creek.

TVA has long been supportive of CFI’s mission, funding several of our projects over the years, and has a long history of being connected with CFI and the Boulder Darter. TVA oversees the operation and management of all hydroelectric dams in the Tennessee Valley, including Tims Ford Dam on the Elk River - in the native range of the Boulder Darter. When electricity is generated, there is a rush of cold water into the river.

This was recognized as a problem when CFI founders Pat Rakes and J.R. Shute first started working with the Boulder Darter and realized that Boulder Darters have semi-pelagic larvae, meaning they spend about 4 weeks in a free-swimming stage before settling to the bottom like their benthic, bottom-dwelling parents. When electricity was generated during spawning season, the rush of water would push these recently hatched, free-swimming fish very far downstream while also shocking them with significantly cooler temperatures. Through a cooperative effort between USFWS and TVA, a management decision was made to halt the hydropower operations at Tims Ford Dam during their spawning season.

CFI’s Bo Baxter (left) with TVA’s Shannon O’Quinn (right) releasing Boulder Darters, photo by Susan Ehrenclou (TVA)

The relationship between CFI and TVA has only grown since then. For the last several years CFI has hosted TVA’s ZooCrew program for a tour and work day at our facility, teaching high school students about the importance of local conservation work. Several years ago TVA donated a backup generator to CFI to ensure the stability of our operation. Just last year TVA was a top donor to CFI’s fall fundraiser. These efforts demonstrate their support for not just the projects we collaborate on, but for CFI as a whole. We are extremely grateful for this partnership, and look forward to continuing our projects and collaborations.

Gratitude

As always, the folks at Conservation Fisheries, Inc. are so very grateful for the support of our community members, friends, family, partners, and everyone who interacts with and feels connected to our work. Please send us some extra love at this time as we enter the busiest months of the year, raising baby fishes and sending crews into the field to monitor these spectacular species.

— The CFI Team

CFI Newsletter: May 2024