The Penobscot’s Original People Promote Atlantic Salmon Restoration

This is a first in blog series observing National Native American Heritage Month through November.  I am Zintkala Eiring, Junior Native American Liaison, and I will be sharing stories of Native American efforts in conservation. 

The Penobscot Indian Nation is a federally recognized Native American Tribe in Maine.  The Tribe possesses 200 islands within the Penobscot River, which accounts for 6,000 acres of reservation land. “Nə̀pi”, or “water” in the Penobscot dialect of the Eastern Algonquian language, is very important to the Penobscot people who live in the Penobscot River Watershed, the largest watershed in the State of Maine. Surface waters include 1,224 lakes, 188 rivers and streams which total 7,127 river miles (Penobscot Indian Nation, 2017).

The Eastern Algonquian language is common to coastal river communities from Nova Scotia to North Carolina. The East Branch is named Wassategwewick for its fishing, and it is critical for restoring populations of Atlantic salmon. The Picataquis, meaning “little branch stream,” is very important to the Penobscot people as it is a travel route that has spawning habitat for Atlantic salmon.The lower Penobscot is where the name of the “Penobscot” came from, but the river is now dammed. Photo Credit: Atlantic Salmon Federation

The Penobscot River was first inhabited by the ancestors of the Penobscot Indian Nation. Archaeological evidence shows native inhabitants fished American shad 8,000 years ago and sturgeon 3,000 years ago from the Penobscot River. The Penobscot River is still the largest Atlantic salmon run remaining in the U.S., with 1,000-4,000 adult salmon annually, compared to 50,000 adult salmon historically (Penobscot River Restoration Trust, 2017).

Mattamiscontis means “a fishing place for alewives”. It is the stream that enters the west side of the Penobscot River above Howland, Maine. Migratory fish, including alewife, would fill the Penobscot River by the millions until dams were constructed in the 1830s and later. Traditionally, native peoples of the Northeast, including the Penobscot Indian Nation, used stone weirs along streams to harvest migratory fish. Atlantic salmon have not been able to be harvested because of the lack of sea-run fish above the Veazie dam. However, a wooden weir exists today in the Penobscot River drainage to capture adult American eels as they migrate to the ocean to spawn (Penobscot River Restoration Trust, 2017).

The Atlantic salmon was listed as endangered in 2011. The decline in the population was mostly from lack of habitat and connectivity of rivers used by spawning fish. For example, The Milford dam, West Enfield dam, and Weldom dam decrease the chances of connectivity for Atlantic salmon near the Penobscot Indian Nation’s territory. Additional riverbed damage occurred in the 1980’s from timber harvesting activities, destroying small protective pools for spawning fish.

The Penobscot Indian Nation applied to the Service’s Tribal Wildlife Grants (TWG) program and received funding for their 2017-2019 plan to increase the health of the culturally significant Atlantic salmon. The Tribe has been involved in the relicensing process for local hydropower dams, and in Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) meetings. Additionally, the Penobscot Indian Nation has delivered several projects to restore stream connectivity in the Mattamiscontis River.

Daniel McCaw, the Fisheries Biologist for the Penobscot Indian Nation, has been leading the aquatic efforts. In fact, McCaw hopes to see a significant increase of blueback herring and alewife in the Mattamiscontis outlet, East, and South Lake.

Wildlife Sports Fisheries Restoration (WSFR), TWG Administrator, Richard Zane (left) and Dan McCaw, Tribal Fisheries Biologist for Penobscot Indian Nation (right) viewing stream bank restoration site

The Penobscot Indian Nation’s Atlantic Salmon Enhancement project has created passages for spawning fish that haven’t existed since the Penobscot River was rerouted by roads and logging enterprises. The project has included the installation of arch culverts to increase stream connectivity and natural flow passages to improve migratory fish passage. “My five-year dream is to have tribal gatherings here with smoked alewife,” says Daniel McCaw, Tribal Wildlife Biologist.

The Atlantic Salmon enhancement project has been visibility successful by reconnecting the Penobscot River to its natural route. In Mattamiscontis stream, Atlantic salmon parr (juveniles) have been found. They were taken to Craig Brook National Fish Hatchery to increase the population for release back into the watershed.

: Atlantic salmon at the FWS Craig Brook Fish Hatchery in Orland, Maine

: Atlantic salmon at the FWS Craig Brook Fish Hatchery in Orland, Maine

The Atlantic Salmon Enhancement project was made possible by the dedication and efforts of the Penobscot Indian Nation and the Tribal Wildlife Grant program of the Service. For more information on the program, please contact Richard Zane, richard_zane@fws.gov (the Northeastern TWG program coordinator) or Timothy Binzen, the Native American Liaison for the Service’s Northeastern and Southeast Regions timothy_binzen@fws.gov.

A Tribal perspective: The Atlantic salmon and the Penobscot Indian Nation

Dan McCaw, fisheries biologist with the Penobscot Indian Nation

November is Native American Heritage Month. November is also spawning season at the Craig Brook National Fish Hatchery in Maine, which marks its 125th anniversary this year. In recognition of both occasions, today we hear from Dan McCaw, a fisheries biologist with the Penobscot Indian Nation, as he talks about the historical connection between native people and the species that helped sustain them for thousands of years, the Atlantic salmon.

The Penobscot Indian Nation has inhabited the Penobscot River basin since time immemorial. With its forested upland, diverse river and lake habitat, and once abundant fisheries, the basin has sustained the people of the Penobscot Nation for thousands of years.

The history, culture and economics of the tribe are intimately connected with the river and the sea-run fish that returned every spring. Atlantic salmon were at one time a herald of spring, a very welcome food source and leaping proof of the health of the river and its people.

Indian Island sits in the background of this photo of Milford Dam. Photo credit: Bridget Besaw, Penobscot River Restoration Trust

Indian Island sits in the Penobscot River about ten miles upstream from the head of tide and was the springtime home of the Penobscot Nation. It is a place where weddings, celebrations and important meetings between tribal clans have taken place over the centuries. All clans would gather on the island every spring and take advantage of the seemingly endless the supply of fresh fish.

A traditional Penobscot birch bark canoe. Photo credit: Meagan Racey, USFWS

A member of the Penobscot Indian Nation paddles a canoe by the area where Veazie dam once stood. Photo Credit: Meagan Racey, USFWS

Looking back a few centuries to the 1700s and 1800s, the stretch of river immediately downstream of Indian Island was called Old Town Falls. These falls had many islands and side channels that provided excellent opportunities for catching Atlantic salmon and other sea-run fish that swam up the Penobscot River every spring. Spears, nets, seines, weirs, birch bark canoes and birch bark torches were all used by tribal fishermen to harvest this incredible bounty.

But by the 1830s, most of the sea-run fish were gone with the construction of timber dams at Veazie, Great Works and Old Town Falls. The islands at Old Town Falls were permanently flooded by the construction of the concrete Milford Dam in 1906. The Penobscot River, like most rivers in New England, is no longer healthy and full of fish, as it once was.

We are the river – the river is us…“This river is the backbone of who we are as a Nation. Our name is derived from the description of the land in this region. The river that flows through it bears our name or we bear its name. We call ourselves ‘Pana wampskik.’ Jerry Pardilla, former Tribal Governor. Photo credit Penobscot Indian Nation DNR

Today, the Penobscot Indian Nation no longer supports itself on the bounty of the river. Atlantic salmon populations are now greatly diminished in numbers and the species is on the verge of extinction. The connection between the Penobscot Nation and the Atlantic salmon of the Penobscot River is but a legend today.

Currently there is more hope for the future health of the Penobscot River and its sea-run fish than ever before. The two main stem dams downstream of Indian Island have been removed from the river through the Penobscot River Restoration Project.  The Milford Dam is now the first dam on the river and has a new state-of-the-art fish lift that began operating in 2014.

USFWS staff at the Craig Brook National Fish Hatchery spawn sea-run Atlantic salmon. Photo credit: Peter Steenstra, USFWS

Today, through the vital restoration work of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Penobscot Nation, and other natural resource partners, Atlantic salmon and his sea-run brothers may once again provide sustenance for an indigenous people and show the world just how a healthy and functioning river can transform mankind’s definition of wealth.

Read about the Penobscot Indian Nation

Visit Craig Brook National Fish Hatchery

History of Craig Brook National Fish Hatchery: Charles Atkins, a pioneer in fisheries conservation

Charles Atkins – A pioneer in fisheries conservation

Peter Steenstra, visitor service specialist at the Craig Brook National Fish Hatchery. Photo: USFWS

This year marks the 125th anniversary of Craig Brook National Fish Hatchery, making it one of the oldest federal fish hatcheries established in the United States. Today we hear from Peter Streenstra, Craig Brooks’s visitor service specialist, as he takes a historical look back, profiling a pioneer in fisheries conservation and one of the hatchery’s first employees, Charles Atkins. 

Charles Atkins was a visionary of early fish biology and aquatic science. Photo: USFWS

 

 

Fisheries biologist Charles Atkins was truly a visionary in his time.  He followed a life-long calling in the science of fish culturing, and over his 80-year life span, his career would take him to Europe, across the continental United States to the Pacific coast and by invitation to Japan in his interest to educate others with his knowledge of fish culture.

Atkins was a New Englander, born in New Sharon, Maine on January 19, 1841. He attended Bowdoin College, and upon graduation accepted a teaching position at Green Bay, Wisconsin. But after a few years of teaching in the Midwest, his interest in fisheries conservation and declining fish populations of the eastern rivers undoubtedly caused him to return to his native Maine to pursue a life-long career in fisheries cultivation and research.

Atkins transfers fish at Dead Brook. The captured fish are used to spawn young fish for stocking back into the river. Photo: USFWS

Concurrent with Atkins’ early years, fisheries scientists were becoming increasingly alarmed by the decline of migratory fish species in the northeast United States. The states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey and Michigan formed a regional fish commission to address the issues. The State of Maine later formed its own fish commission, and hired Charles Atkins and Nathan Foster as its first commissioners.

The Maine commission’s first report in January 1868 stated that “the salmon is suffering from neglect and persecution. So peculiarly is it exposed to the attacks of man, so greedy and relentless has been the pursuit, and so regardless of their necessities has been the management of the waters, that in many rivers, both in Europe and America, it has become utterly extinct, and in very few of the remainder does it yield anything like the number that is was wont.”

The staff at Craig Brook National Fish Hatchery, 1914. Photo: USFWS

The U. S. Congress followed the states’ lead, creating the U. S. Commission on Fish and Fisheries on February 9, 1871— the forerunner of the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Spencer Baird was appointed its first commissioner, and among his first directives were to conduct studies on the decline of coastal and inland food fishes and methods of fish culture. Baird turned to Charles Atkins for his expertise, and directed him to locate a suitable site in Maine to raise Atlantic salmon. The site Atkins selected was a vacant mill located at the mouth of Craig’s Brook on Alamoosook Lake in mid-coast Maine.

Charles Atkins transferring salmon at Whitemore’s Point, on Penobscot Bay. Photo: USFWS

Thus began Charles Atkins’ 48-year career as a fisheries biologist. In the absence of fish culture training in America, he traveled to Germany where he received his fish culturing education in Berlin, receiving his diploma in 1880. Upon his return to the United States, Charles Atkins had already developed his meticulous style in scientific methodology, his accurate data recording and retrieval techniques, the production of his own skillful illustrations dealing with external morphology and embryological development of fish species– and a final benefit– the use of photography in scientific data retention. With his “Kodak,” Atkins recorded and left us a visual window upon his world– not a vignette, but a Saturday Evening Post portrayal of his life’s work. He produced hundreds of photographs which illustrate well the process and product of fish culturing in its infancy.

Stripping eggs from female salmon for spawning. Photo: USFWS

Transferring eggs during the spawning process. Photo: USFWS

Charles Atkins is known primarily for his work with Atlantic salmon, but he also conducted in-depth research with several other species such as cod, flounder, lobster, smelt, American shad, white perch and striped bass.

Atkins’ accomplishments won him considerable acclaim, as he published over a hundred papers, and wrote another hundred that were unpublished.  His extensive work and high quality photographic images, coupled with his insatiable desire for scientific detail and accuracy, earned him induction to the D. C. Booth Historic National Fish Hatchery Fish Culture Hall of Fame in Spearfish, South Dakota in 1996. Charles Atkins was truly an exemplary biologist of fish culturing as well as a model for human responsibility in stewardship for wildlife and wildlife habitats.

Today, the Craig Brook National Fish Hatchery continues this critical work for the restoration and conservation of Atlantic salmon and their habitat. The Craig Brook visitor center is open to the public and provides fun and educational experiences for families. 

Visit Craig Brook National Fish Hatchery

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Fish and Aquatic Conservation