Brewster News: The Town of Brewster has selected Abigail Archer and Owen Nichols as alternate herring wardens. Warden William LeMaitre has retired from his position effective June, 2024. An alternate will be taking his place. The Select Board has chosen new member Amanda Bebrin as the Board's liaison to the Alewife Committee, replacing Kari Hoffmann who retired in June.
resource links: please scroll through listings below for a wealth of related content on herring, regularly updated. Note the "Brewster Specific" section below and The Ponds page for more detailed Brewster information.
Transactions of the American Fisheries Society Journal, "Feeling the Squeeze (Juvenile River Herring)", Matthew Devine, Dept. of Environmental Conservation, UMass/Amherst, co-author, 2021.
related links: Disclaimer- offering these links is not meant to convey any sponsorship by these organizations, which we are not a member of. Ours is an independent endeavor. They are listed here as resources only. See The Ponds page for more critical links.
Recommended Books & Videos: The Run, John Hay/ book (widely available) A Journey That Never Ends, John Hay's The Run/ Janice Riley & John Hay/ documentary (available in library) What a Fish Knows, Jonathan Balcombe/ book
The Alewife's Tale, Barbara Brennessel/ book Herring: A History of the Silver Darlings, Mike Smylie/ book A Tale of Two Rivers, Ron Lasko/ book A Moving Meditation, Stephen Waller/ book Red Gold, The Managed Extinction of the Giant Bluefin Tuna, Jennifer E. Telesca/book Beautiful Swimmers, William W. Warner/book
Historic Maps: United States Geological Survey (USGS) maps, 1887- 1961, with Slough Pond passageway. Maps prior to 1961 are not as reliable. We are assessing the presence of the Walker to Slough Pond fishway over time as the history of its evolution is lost in time. It appears in 1943 but may have been present as early as 1918, so we can safely average the fishway as being used for approximately a century, 80-100 years. It may have been dug to bring water to the cranberry bog that was cultivated in the Slough Pond low lying wetland area where the channel is at present. It may have been dug to bring migrating alewives into Slough Pond for fishing. These channels have been dug across Cape Cod and are in existence today as viable fishways. The Slough Pond fishway may have already existed as at least a stream for centuries. Click on images for full-sized pdf.
Graphs Presented by Biologist Brad Chase on July 13, 2023 at Brewster Natural Resources Advisory Commission Meeting.