Riverine Migratory Corridors

Long Island Sound Study: Priority Habitats
Riverine migratory corridors are river systems that drain to the Sound. They are often bordered by flood plain trees and wetlands. Migratory species, such as Atlantic salmon, shad, and herring, use these rivers to travel to fresh waters miles away from Long Island Sound to spawn. Recreational and commercial fisheries benefit when river corridors remain healthy and passable to migratory fish.
CASE STUDY: Lower Guilford Lake, Guilford, CT passageway. Dams, culverts, and other obstructions can block passage for fish to travel from the brackish waters of Long Island Sound to freshwater rivers to spawn. Removing these obstructions is preferable, but not always practical. For example, removing the dam at Lower Guilford Lake would have also drained a privately-owned 14.2 acre lake, an important scenic resource for 240 homeowners who live there. As a result instead of removing the dam, Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection, Yale University, and American Rivers create a natual-looking fishway to provide alewives and blueback herring passage to a freswhwater habitat in the lake and up the East River. The fishway allow to swim against the fast-moving flow of water from the dam’s spillway. The fish swim through narrow passageways created by embedding boulders in the steep channel. To get over the top of the dam the fish swim through a 10-foot long aluminum trough, with vanes that create turbulence to neutralize the downward flow of water.		boulder fishway, with aluminum pass in background Return to Habitat Restoration