Why are NOAA and conservation groups interested in fish passage on the river?

The Narramissic-Orland River provides significant habitat for sea-run (migratory or diadromous) fish, including endangered Atlantic salmon and alewives. As a major coastal tributary to the Penobscot River, restoring the Narramissic will contribute to the larger Penobscot River Restoration Project.

Orland Dam Committee Chair John Barlow (left) shows the Orland Dam to NOAA Fisheries leadership, June 2015

A recent assessment of Northeastern U.S. rivers placed Orland among the top 5% of watersheds with the most anadromous fisheries potential. This is largely because the river still has fish, including a harvestable run of alewives, but also because the land area is relatively undeveloped and the water is clean. Fisheries scientists believe that restoring these migratory fish, millions of which once filled the Penobscot River and Gulf of Maine, will also help support restored populations of cod and other groundfish, which eat alewives.

For these reasons, The Nature Conservancy (TNC), a member of the Penobscot River Restoration Trust, has been working on Penobscot tributaries. TNC worked with the Town of Orland to replace a problem culvert on Winkumpaugh Brook ("a nice little trout stream" according to TNC's Jeremy Bell) under Happytown Road.

However, the current situation is preventing Orland's fish potential from being realized. Two existing fish ladders at the dam are too small, and cannot be accessed during periods of low tide, lowering the efficiency of passage for alewives, Atlantic salmon and American eel. The fishways only work, at best, 50% of the time when tides are high enough.

The dark cloud in the water is alewives crowding below the Orland Dam during their upstream migration, June 2015

Other species known to occur downstream of the dam—including endangered shortnose sturgeon, American eel and striped bass—will not use the ladders. There is no dedicated downstream passage, and outmigrating juvenile alewives are often stranded on the timber spillway of the dam. Below is a video of alewives, confused by the flows below the fishway, trying to get upstream.

NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), and US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) share responsibility for implementing the Endangered Species Act, the purpose of which is to conserve and manage threatened and endangered species and the ecosystems on which they depend. Generally, the USFWS has jurisdiction for land and freshwater species, while NMFS has jurisdiction for marine and anadromous species. Three species of fish in the Orland River are listed as threatened or endangered:

• Atlantic salmon (endangered)

• Shortnose sturgeon (endangered)

• Atlantic sturgeon (threatened)

Additionally, rainbow smelt and alewives are considered “special concern.” Thus the Town of Orland, as the owner of the dam, is liable for any harm that might occur to endangered species or their habitat, including delays in migration. The federal government, working on behalf of all American citizens, has a stewardship obligation to protect the Nation’s fish and wildlife.