Photo By Kelcy Hanson | U.S. Geological Survey employees perform minor surgery to insert monitoring tags in...... read more read more
The fish passage slated for construction at Lock and Dam 22 near Saverton, Missouri, will be the first of five authorized fish passage structures to be built on the Mississippi River as part of the Navigation and Ecosystem Sustainability Program (NESP). Its purpose is to allow fish greater access to upstream river and tributary habitats and it is also to learn how to design future fishways by careful monitoring and adaptive management.
“The fish passage is the first of its kind on the Mississippi River. As we look at how this is going to impact the ecosystem here at Lock and Dam 22, it will also provide us an example to continue research and study, to determine how this is going to benefit the ecosystem up and down the entire river and other river basins across the country. The impact this one project could have, could be nationwide or even global,” said U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Rock Island District Commander Col. Jesse Curry.
In October, representatives from a number of federal agencies gathered at Lock and Dam 22 to see firsthand the research already being implemented at the site. To gather information about where fish migrate on the Mississippi River, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) has been on site at the lock and dam tagging over 300 fish over the past year and setting up a receiver grid to record fish movements.
“It’s really neat the type of data we can garner from this type of work,” explained Kevin Haupt, lead Fisheries Biologist and Principal Investigator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services. “We get the fish, we keep them in as good of condition as we can, we reduce stress as much as we can, we perform a simple incision, put the tag in their gut cavity, sew the fish up and we let them go.”
After the fish are tagged with transmitters, information is gathered by a series of receivers placed all along the river’s shoreline. When a tagged fish swims near one of the receivers, information is ‘pinged’ and sent to the research team.
“What we’re doing with fish passage provides us the opportunity to create more places for fish and aquatic animals to have access to increase and enhance that ecosystem resilience,” said Mark Gaikowski, director of the U.S. Geological Survey’s Upper Midwest Environmental Sciences Center. “That is critical for us as we move into the future and we understand how climate change is going is impact the amount of water, the timing of water, flows of water and how fish and aquatic animals are going to have to interact with fish passage to respond and maintain their presence in the ecosystem.”
Once constructed, the fish passage will include a rock ramp designed to imitate a natural river, a bridge for pedestrian and vehicle access, water control structures (stoplogs), and fixed debris boom for debris and ice protection. The fish passage will benefit over 30 species of fish and restore the connection between river pools above and below Lock and Dam 22. The fishway will serve as a spawning ground for species requiring rock and gravel spawning habitat and increase migration capabilities of native fish species.
“I’m really excited about the intent of this project, which is a learning project,” said Mark Cornish, senior biologist with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. “We have the opportunity to understand fish movement in the Upper Mississippi River in a way that we’ve never been able to in the past.”
Although this project is fully federal-funded by USACE, many natural resource agencies and the science community as a whole will benefit from the research that will be conducted at this site.
| Date Taken: | 12.20.2022 |
| Date Posted: | 12.20.2022 16:40 |
| Story ID: | 435570 |
| Location: | ROCK ISLAND ARSENAL, ILLINOIS, US |
| Web Views: | 248 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Research Ramps Up at Lock and Dam 22, by Kelcy Hanson, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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