For the Love of a Fish

It all began during the 2003-04 school year when some of my students learned that the Mojave River watershed historically only supported one endemic fish species, the Mohave tui chub (MTC). Then they discovered, to their dismay, that it has been most likely extirpated from the river since the late 1960's and in danger of becoming extinct yet since the late 1800's, over 23 species of fish had been introduced to Mojave River system.

Two students work together during their junior and senor years to create web resource called Tui Chub Home. During the 2004-05 school year, both students attended a convocation of fishery biologists at Zyzzx, in the Mojave Desert of Southern California. During that meeting they suggested that a refugia be established on the Mojave River Campus of the Lewis Center for Educational Research. Their suggestion was included in a report published in 2004. One student conducted a habitat management experiment that took her to the California State Science Fair in 2005.

In January 2007, two year after both students had graduated from the Lewis Center's k-12 charter school, the Academy for Academic Excellence, fishery biologists with the the US Fish and Wildlife Service and the California Department of Fish and Game contacted me (Matthew Huffine) and asked if we were still interested in host a MTC refugia on the Lewis Center's Mojave River campus. By June, a site for two co-joined refugia had been identified and paperwork was being drawn up to establish a USFWS grant to aid in their development. By August, school staff and grounds workers removed 80% of the cattail and bulrush that was beginning to choke the shores of one of the refugia sites called Deppe Pond using the techniques that had been previously researched by a student. Plans were established with an existing strategic community partner, the Mojave Water Agency, to drill and develop a "minimally producing well" up to 10 acre-feet of water per year for the two planned refugia.

With the approval of the grant, $25,000 dollars, work began on October 10, 2007. As of March 12, 2008 the following actions have been taken:

October-November 2007

• Students experimented in how best capture and remove non-native species (Mosquito Fish, Gold fish and Bull Frogs) from the existing "Deppe Pond".
• Students began to collect water quality data from "Deppe Pond" and its water source (Apple Valley Ranchos Water District).
• Monitored nearby wells.

December 2007

• The long process to extirpate by non-native species from Deppe pond by first draining it to help "freeze-out" "dry-out", or displace the populations of unwanted species.

January 2008

• FMK or "For My Kids" Construction donated their time and earth moving equipment to reshape the road beds on the west side of the two refugia sites to decrease erosion into the ponds. They also dug a 294 foot long 20 foot wide, tapered 3 foot to six food deep trench that will be lined, damed at the north end and filled with well water by the fall of 2008. This site will be called "Tui Slough". It shape and dimension were inspired by the G2 seep at Larks Seep on the China Lake Navel Base in Ridgecrest.
  
• Constructed a water distribution system from the prospective well site to Deppe Pond and Tui Slough.
• WDC drilled two wells; one 120 feet deep to be used as a water source for our refugia, and the second well, 50 feet deep, to be used as a monitoring well. Both wells perforate two different aquifers.

Febuary 2008

• After visiting Bob Hilburn at the Desert Discovery Center in Barstow, California, I returned with the most of the information we needed to establish an aquarium to display the MTC to the public. I shared our undertaking with an administrator with PetSmart, and they provided us with a donation of $400 dollars in gift cards to get us started. An 36 gallon acrylic "bow front" tank and all of the supporting materials were soon purchased with this generous donation.
  
• Next, an aquarium stand was purchased to fit a location next to an existing "Waterwise Education" kiosk that is being developed for the Mojave Water Agency.
  
• The computer kiosk was next wired to the net (requiring the installation of conduit and cable). The kiosk programs and web access on this computer will be run using "KiOWARE".
  
• A web-camera and security dome was purchased and will be installed above the computer kiosk to provide 24-7 streaming video of the MTC in the new aquarium.