Starting Our Two-Week Shift

April 14 - 28, 2020 (Part One)

These last two weeks have been our first shift with the MOWI fish-fry farm.  Because we are only part-time employees we were only allowed to work 11 out of the 14 days.  On April 14th, which was supposed to be our first day of work, we ended up not working at all.  Because of the COVID-19 virus, as I think I mentioned before, the two shifts have been completely isolated.  Jason and I work with the three employees, the manager and two others, who also live here in Ocean Falls, and the other shift is the crew that flies up from Vancouver Island.  There is no contact between the two shifts, so we could not go over to work on the 14th until the other crew had left.  The floatplane was supposed to come in at around noon, but they ended up not arriving until after 14:00.  By the time they had left, it was decided that there was no point in us going into work that day, so we started at 07:00 on Wednesday the 15th instead.  
On Wednesday, our alarm went off at 05:45.  We hopped into our tender an hour later, and after the initial frustration of getting the motor started, we planed our way over to work.  What a lovely commute!  
Fish-fry farm on the left, with the crew housing and dock nearby.

We tied Kiki up to their dock, which is connected to a floating barge home that has been made into a full accommodation building with an exercise room, pantry, freezers, washer and dryer, kitchen, living room, multiple bathrooms and showers, and bedrooms for the crew.  This is where the crew stay who come up from Vancouver Island for their shifts.  It is quite a nice accommodation and we were told that we were free to make use of it if we wanted to.  It is nice to be able to do our laundry while at work, and to shower before going home. 
Over our time at work we got two separate tours of different areas of the operation.  There is a lot more to the art of raising fish than I would have thought.  It was interesting to see the whole operation, from their water intakes at the lake, to their oxygen and ozone production systems, to their fresh and salt water mixing basins, to the tanks.  There really is quite a science behind maintaining the correct water temperature, oxygen levels, salinity, and feed levels.  
Right now there are no fish on site, but perhaps we will have the opportunity to see how things run when the next batch of fish fry arrives.  
On the top of the dam.

On one of these tours we went right up to the dam, and since the farm is on the opposite side of Link River from the town of Ocean Falls, we got a whole new and lovely view from the opposite side of the dam.  
View from the top of the dam, Fish-fry farm below and the Red Witch in the far distance on the right.

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