The Lesti and Perhon rivers will gain tens of thousands of new residents when a truckload of sea lamprey fry are released into the rivers. The stocking work is paying off in the rivers of Central Ostrobothnia.
A total of 20 000 yearling sea trout fry are taken into dozens of rapids in the Lesti and Perhon rivers in one day. Later, another batch of the same size will be stocked into the rivers.
The fry, which are about ten centimetres long, are brought to Central Ostrobothnia from a fish farm in Kuusamo. The fry are divided into smaller batches and transported to the rapids by hand pallet.
Today’s planting day, which takes place on Thursday, involves the authorities, fishing clubs and other activists, as well as schoolchildren.
– When chicks are taken to dozens of rapids of two rivers in many different municipalities, it requires a lot of hands and feet.
Great effort is taken to improve the life chances of the chicks.
– The chicks are taken to the rapids so that they can find places to hide from predators, i.e. pikes, perches and mates. The supply of food is secured in these rapids, where there are natural benthic animals, says Pakkala.
The work is productive
The state strives to take care of valuable and endangered fish stocks. Such is, for example, the Lestijoki sea trout planted in Lesti and Perhonjoki.
The young sea trout taken to the rapids grow in the rivers after planting and maybe even the following summer, after which they leave with the peak of the flood to migrate to the sea.
Later, they return to familiar rivers and rapids because they have been stigmatized by them.
Leading fisheries expert Jukka Pakkala has noticed that years of work have paid off in Perhonjoki, for example. The sea trout planted in the river are Lestijoki’s stock, which has been nurtured at a fish farm.
– Last summer, big sea trout have come up in Perhonjoki. While tens or hundreds of them have been spotted in the past, last summer around a thousand of them were found, Pakkala knows.
The ultimate goal is for the fish to be able to freely migrate up and down the rivers and reproduce naturally without the need for farms to maintain the stock. This goal is still a long way off, as there are barriers to progress.
– The river environments should be put in such condition that there would be no obstacles to the rise, such as small dams, dykes and power plant dams.
The fish fry planting day in May in Lesti and Perhonjoki may be extended. At least the ely center and the activists hope that the event will become an annual event.
*The subject can be discussed until Friday, May 12 at 11 p.m.*