There & back again...our alewife journal begins here, in March. The drop-down menu opens each month.
March 15 March is waiting weather, as John Hay declared in The Run and a more apt name couldn't be found. The alewife scouts, the old timers, will be heading in on the equinox. Whether they will venture as far as Slough Pond is doubtful as the old ones make short work of it, the water is still too cold.
March 17 The first alewife scouts are spotted in Stony Brook. The water temperature in Cape Cod Bay is 40° which is still too cold for a run to start. Optimal temperature is 50-52°., equivalent in the ponds. Scouts, generally older fish, do come in at the equinox, testing the waters.
March 19 Walked down to the herring passageway, where Walker Pond connects to Slough, just in case the scouts had ventured this far, though my better judgment said not. I went down about an hour after high tide, as a full tide on a sunny morning bodes well for migrants. If the scouts seen three days ago were returning to Slough I might catch a glimpse of them, but there were none to be seen. (No scouts at the Stony Brook ladder either.) I walked the passageway and noted that the water level was higher than last month and running strong. This will certainly carry the scent of this pond out into the others where the alewives will soon be searching out and finding their home stream. Do anadromous fish use the earth's magnetic fields to navigate, like GPS to home? Studies show that saImon do. I noted that some natural debris had built up and there were some blockages here and there but nothing too extreme. The full force of the running water flowed through the culvert and it looked so small and dark, and no doubt rusty, and I recalled how the alewives often stalled there afraid to go through it. The woods were brighter and the scent of the earth had come alive. Doves were calling from the high pines. The creaking call of Red-winged Blackbirds, more numerous than just days ago, filled the air, but it was cold air and the waters frigid.
March 23 The automatic fish counter was installed at the Stony Brook fish ladder by the grist mill and 23 scouts were counted, up from 3 on the 17th.
March 29 The fish counter at Stony Brook is up to 223 as of today. Meanwhile down at the Walker to Slough passage there are still no fish arriving. The water temperature was up to 50° F/ 10°C today however so it shouldn't be long now. I still give it another two weeks. As you can see in the photos from today the leaf litter has built up making the water much shallower than it could be. Blockages are also causing the flow to be much slower, not widespread but definitely in need of attention which is on the way.
March 31 For our final March journal post we have some good news. While we await the clean up of the Walker to Slough passage, a member of the Alewife Committee installed a water gauge at the Slough Pond landing today on Old Red Top Road. He informed us that the water level has gone down 2 inches in the last 11 days, that is between March 20th and the 31st. The wardens will be monitoring the water level throughout the spring, summer, and fall to access the safe passage of the alewives. Here is hoping we do not have another drought year last we experienced last summer.
March Addendum For the sake of posterity, I am adding shared posts from FaceBook from March. I had reached out to the NRD at the time to inquire why Americorps did not have Brewster on its list for help with herring run clean up this year, 2023, as it has in the past. I was especially interested in the Walker/Slough connection, but I never heard back. You will note how well this partnership works (not only their herring run assistance but in all their other efforts) and how proud they are of their contributions. You may also note that along with clearing sticks and debris within the channels and cutting vegetation along the sides- of many herring migration routes across the Cape- digging out sand accumulations is required.