Anadromous fisheries investigations

Anadromous fish species such as the Rainbow smelt, American shad and river herring play an important role in the sport and commercial fisheries of Massachusetts. River herring are actually two closely-related migratory species the alewife or Branch herring (Alosa pseudoharengus) and the blueback or Glut herring (Alosa aestivalis). The alewife is the most abundant anadromous fish in the Commonwealth. The blueback herring is often confused with alewives by the untrained observer. Because their life cycles are very similar and their spawning migrations into coastal systems overlap the alewife and blueback have traditionally been managed as a single fishery. During this reporting period, a total of 727 river herring were recorded entering Lower Shawme Lake, via the Dexter Mill fishway on Mill Creek, Sandwich, MA. Fifty percent of the run had passed the counting station by the 8th of May. An additional 5,000 gravid alewife were stocked into the system by the Division of Marine Fisheries (DMF). Project: AFC - 29 Annual Report Grant no. NA66FA0416