A TROUT’S LIFE

written and illustrated by ROSS ANDRE

I know how difficult it is to have fish survive in a tank because I have two fish tanks at home.  You have to have the temperature right, give the right amount of food, keep the water clean, make sure the air pump works, make sure there is gravel on the bottom, and make the environment safe.  The Brown Trout at our school have to survive in the tank in Mrs. Bennett’s room, but they also have to survive once we let them go in the Farmington River.

We started with 100 fish and now we have 50-60.  Some of the fish never got out of the sac, and some fry died because they never figured out where their food was.  In the wild, they are benthic feeders as fry, which means they eat from the bottom of lakes or rivers food like water bugs.  Their instinct tells them to go down for food, but in Mrs. Bennett’s tank they have to figure out that the food is on top.  At home, our fish are fed from the top of the tank also.

The food Mrs. Bennett feeds the fry is called Fish Meal.  It is made up of ground up fish, corn, and algae.  Our fish food at home is made up of brown rice, ground up shrimp, and algae.  Mrs. Bennett and my family both have to be careful not to over feed our fish.  It is actually better to underfeed them because all our fish in tanks will survive that better.

I get to sit and look at my fish at home and try to imagine how they might do if they were in the wild.  My dad makes the fish tank as realistic as possible.  He even has Catfish and Crawfish in the tank that sometimes eat our smaller fish.  He even put some frogs once.  Even with all that excitement at home, I still want to witness the feeling of letting the fry go in their natural environment.