Already more than 100 coho have been counted in the side channel and this year John Morgan, a professor with Vancouver Island University’s Natural Resource Protection Program, is hoping for a record coho run.

“Typically [coho] live to be three years old,” Morgan said. “So [the side channel] was seeded for the first couple of years from Nanaimo Fish Hatchery, but in 2010, 500 came back and about two dozen spawned in the channel, so there was fish in the channel for people to see.”