DNR installs fish barrier on Little Manistee

[Hamilton Reef]

DNR installs fish barrier on Little Manistee

http://www.ludingtondailynews.com/news. ... y_id=37237

08/17/07 JOE BOOMGAARD - DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
jboomgaard@ludingtondailynews.com 843-1122, ext. 309

STRONACH TWP. — The Department of Natural Resources’ egg-take weir on the Little Manistee River was a hive of activity Thursday. In fact, the place was buzzing, much to the chagrin of Fisheries Biologist Mark Tonello.

Tonello — who was helping out fellow DNR members Scott Heintzelman, fisheries technician supervisor, and Eric Askam, fisheries technician, to install the low-head dam and fish blockage grates at the facility — was stung right between the eyes by an ornery yellow jacket that had taken up residence in a nest on the weir’s metal structure.

But the flying nuisances were only a minor cause for concern for the crew. Their mission was to install the fish barrier on the Little Manistee River. The weir blocks the upstream migration of all migratory fish that run the river in the fall. It is usually installed in the middle of August to allow a few Chinooks to enter the river while still blocking most of the annual run.

The crew first used an electric winch to lower the metal grates into the river and secured a piece of chain-link fencing between the grates and the weir itself to prevent fish from jumping over the grates. Then they lowered steel “boards” down into the water below the grates to create a low-head dam. The area between the boards and the grates funnels the fish toward the raceway and eventually into the holding pond. The grates must be cleaned of logs and debris at least once per week, Heintzelman said.

The fish stack up below the weir and go through a raceway into cement or dirt holding ponds, where they sit until they are ready to spawn. Once ripe, the fish are corralled into the weir building where the eggs and milt are harvested. The fish are then taken by a contractor hired by the DNR.

The river serves as the broodstock for most of the salmon grown in the state’s hatcheries and released into rivers and ports across the state before eventually growing in the Great Lakes, where they form a multi-million-dollar sport fishery.

Once the salmon arrive in the next few weeks, according to Tonello, they are allowed to age and reach sexual maturity before the eggs are harvested, usually toward the middle to end of September.

Unusually low water levels resulting from a drier than normal summer could delay salmon from entering the river at its shallow, sandy mouth at the southern end of Manistee Lake.

“Water could be a problem,” Heintzelman said. “It might take a while to get them up here.”

Tonello said if the warm weather continues, the salmon in Manistee Lake could be affected by warmer water temperatures.

“The fish will eventually come, but the low water doesn’t help,” Tonello said. “We’ll probably lose a few, but they’ll come in.”

The crew had to perform only minor maintenance on the nearly 40-year-old facility.

According to Tonello, salmon are running smaller this year, like last year. A 20-pound Chinook is a rare fish, he told the Daily News for a previous report.

In 2006, the DNR harvested 12,772 Chinooks and 238 cohos at the weir, while they allowed 417 steelhead and 56 brown trout to pass upstream.

This year, only Chinooks will be harvested. Little Manistee cohos, most of which are naturally reproduced, will be allowed to pass to the upper river and given a chance to spawn, according to a prior decision made by the Lake Michigan Basin Team. The move is intended to create a late fall sport fishery in addition to the river’s famed fall steelhead run.

The area within 300 feet of the weir is closed to fishing at all times. The river from the weir to the mouth is closed from Sept. 1 to Nov. 14. The southern end of Manistee Lake — from the squared red post east of the DNR access ramp southwest to the squared red post on the southern end of the Packaging Corporation of America plant — closes to fishing on Sept. 6 through Oct. 15 or whenever the DNR has harvested its quota of eggs. The entire river closes to fishing on Jan. 1.