Since Edwin reached Connecticut just over a month ago, he has spent much of his time on the mainland with his most frequent location being the Latimer Brook area of East Lyme and the Niantic River just to the east of it (see map above and April 26 post below for Google Earth view).
According to Steve Gephard of the Connecticut DEP, the data points we have from Edwin along Latimer Brook and its fishway are where the alewives are running strong. He was there on April 25 watching two ospreys fish over about 2,000 alewives.
View a recently posted youTube video: Spring Alewife Migration-Latimer Brook
(At about 1:23 minutes into the video the camera goes underwater and you can see the alewife)
From time-to-time Edwin also visits the Groton Reservoir area (see April 22) and has paid a few visits to Fishers Island (see April 17-19) with two overnight stays (see April 15 and 16).
Back on the mainland Edwin has traveled as far east as Noank and Mystic (see April 24) and Rhode Island (see April 3). He has also taken a number of trips west to the Connecticut River for visits to places such as Selden Neck State Park (see April 25).
Steve Gephard said that at the Connecticut River, the alewife run is also in full swing but last week the American shad showed up: “Also, there are resident riverine species that are amassing in tributaries. White suckers and yellow perch are spawning now. The big cluster of the dots is around the Selden Island area of the mainstem, plus the creek. So that is probably alewife and shad. But there is also a cluster at Whalebone Creek (northernmost) which has strong runs of suckers and perch.”
April 15 Fishers Island overnight 1
April 16 Fishers Island overnight 2
April 25 Selden Neck State Park
April 26 Latimer Brook and Niantic River
To view his activities from these and other days, visit Edwin’s Blog of daily tracking on this website
[button link=”https://fergusonmuseum.org/osprey-cam/track-edwin/” color=”blue” target=”_self” size=”small”]View Tracking Blog[/button]
For more information
To learn more about the Latimer Brook Fishway, visit: www.nianticriverwatershed.org
Read a 2012 article published by The Day: Alewife running in record numbers By Judy Benson
