What's Happening?

Wow has this year flown by!!!

We did our bi-annual census of the pupfish in La Cienega. We are pleased to report that our population has nearly doubled since introducation last April. The staff set 9 traps in the water this morning. After waiting 2.5 hours, we came back and counted 446 individual fish, releasing them back into the water once. We in addition to the trapped fish, we observed probably 70-100 fish that didn't get trapped. Most of these were too small to get caught, many of them were baby fish or "fry" from this year's breeding season. Tim said some were only days old. Many were smaller than 10mm in length. Just eyeballs and tails!

We estimate that the observed fry in addition to the trapped count, tally to about 516 to 546 fish in the water!

Good job guys! The fish are healthy and the water is clear this summer. We hope the students enjoy their summer.

It has been a long, hot summer. The pond is doing well, though we have experienced an algal bloom that seems to be hanging on. The water is cloudy and we have seen some big old fish at the end of their life cycle die. Many of the new fry are still visible in the shallow water, though many of the older fish have retreated to the deeper areas. We are running tests to make sure the environment is healthy for the fish.

Ajo Middle School has restructured its classes. Mr. Orr has agreed to allow his high school chemistry class to continue with the water quality study. Stay tuned to see how this new school year is shaping up.

All of the fish have been moved. In fact, they are already showing signs of spawning behavior and we have seen some new baby fry already. 234 fish were moved in total, now we watch to see how they do.

Good job everybody!

Today was a day that made the whole project worth while. A team of 8th Graders joined us at Quitobaquito to trap and move our first set of the endangered Quitobaquito pupfish. We started the day collecting some water from La Cienega and doing some final water quality tests. The results were good, so we trapped 159 fish and moved them to their new home.

I'm happy to report that every single fish made it to their new home and are still happily swimming about. Good Job everybody!

To see more about what happened today click here!

Today was a great day! A team of Sixth Graders came out and harvested plants from the pond and stream at Quitobaquito and then got very muddy transplanting them into our new pupfish habitat.

They harvested bullrush, cattails, traveling spikerush and some pondweed. These plants will provide shade and protection to the little fish when they arrive to their new homes in just two weeks.



Stay tuned, April 18th is the big day! The Eighth Graders will return to La Cienga, check the water quality and give us the go to move our first batch of fish. Then they will travel to Quitobaquito and help us trap approx 250 fish, record the vital fish statistics and release the fish into our beautiful new habitat.

Today a group of Seventh graders came out and we traveled back to Quitobaquito. While there, we loaded up some sand, some mud and some water to transplant into the new habitat.

These students specialized in finding out what the pupfish need in the habitat for food and they will to the final testing to be sure enough small invertabrates and insects were transplanted into the pond with the mud.

Considering it was pretty rainy, the kids did a great job without complaint!

Well, the liner arrived late, so we had to postpone the installation.

After a good holiday break the Eighth graders returned and together we lined the new habitat and got some water in it!

Now we wait for the sixth and seventh graders to complete the habitat so we can move the fish in the spring.

Dig Day 3!!!
Today the kids finished the depth and the shape, and even one of the trenches for the water line.

Now we are waiting on the pond liner which was special ordered to fit the pond design. Hopefully it will arrive this afternoon.

If not, Dig Day 4 will have to be postponed until it arrives.

Dig Day 2!!!
Another set of Eighth graders came in today and picked up the shovels and almost completed the shaping of La Cienega. Only a couple of inches left to excavate from the deep end.

Notice the "girl power" in the
soon-to-be pupfish habitat. These are some tough women with shovels.

Dig Day 1!!!
Eighth grade students picked up some shovels and started excavation. The final plans were designed by one eight grade student (the one in the yellow sweatshirt) and unanimously voted the design to submit by all students, and ORPI staff. Click here for more design info. By the end of the first day, the outline of the new pond was clear and about 1/3 of the dirt was removed.

10/13/04

Two days of 8th Graders studying water quality. They are now looking at how to monitor the water in La Cienega and deciding the depth and shape of the new refugium.

It has been a very busy couple of weeks. We officially launched our website with student resources so the students can start their classroom research. Field trips are being scheduled so students can conduct their field work in October.

The Park staff is heading out next week to do our annual census of the pupfish populations. This data will help students plan for the day when the fish move into their new home!