The first Sunday in June is always a special day for the Bowen Island Fish and Wildlife Club (BIFWC) volunteers who have worked so hard over the last six months incubating, feeding, and releasing salmon fry from the Terminal Creek Salmon Hatchery into Bowen waterways: 200,000 chum fry were released last month and 20,000 coho fry will be released in early June.
BIFWC volunteers need help from Bowen children to release the last of the coho fry into nearby Terminal Creek. Parents, grandparents, and great grandparents can assist, observe, and ask questions about wild salmon and the importance of protecting salmon habitat. This is our favourite annual community event before closing the hatchery for the summer.
Metro Vancouver Parks, an important partner of the BIFWC, is celebrating their 50th anniversary this year. They will have an interactive nature-themed display during Coho Bon Voyage that will engage ‘children’ of all ages. The BIFWC is also celebrating the 50th anniversary of our formation as a Non-Profit Society in 1967.
COHO BON VOYAGE will take place Sunday, June 4th, between 11am and 2pm at the Terminal Creek Salmon Hatchery in Crippen Park. Parking is available across from the Public Works Yard and gas station on Mount Gardner Road. Please join the BIFWC and Metro Vancouver Parks to celebrate our 50th anniversaries. Most importantly, please join us to see the smiles on children’s faces as they carry and release salmon fry into Terminal Creek. Everybody is welcome.
To illustrate the beauty of salmon and the importance of salmon enhancement work on Bowen Island, check out Bob Turner’s film showing chum adults returning to The Lagoon last fall on YouTube and ask members of the Bowen Island Fish & Wildlife Club for details about the work we do.
Thank you for your support of wild salmon.
