WOOLWICH

In 2014, when the new Nequasset Fish Ladder was built, volunteers counted 19,000 alewives and estimated 150,000 made it into Nequasset Lake.

While the count varies from year to year, Ruth Indrick of the Kennebec Estuary Land Trust — which oversees the count — said it typically operates on a four-year cycle.

“I think if we don’t reach 19,000, we’re probably going to be surprisingly close,” Indrick said.

The fish ladder is the last step for the alewives on their journey from the sea to the lake, where they return to spawn. The fish swim up through the sections of the ladder to make it over the Nequasset Dam — the last hurdle between them and their destination.

The alewives have been making this journey for countless generations and for hundreds of years, although not always up that fish ladder. The current fish ladder was built in 2014, but there have been human efforts to allow the fish to make their trip for hundreds of years.

“When the town of Woolwich became incorporated as a town,” Indrick said, “one of the first rules that came in was that they needed to keep fish passage open at that site.

“Nequasset is a site that’s had sustainable alewife harvests for a very long time,” she added. “In order to help better track the sustainability of the harvest, doing a count can document the number of fish that are getting into the lake.”

Every year, volunteers head out to the dam where they pick up a data sheet, a counter and a timer. They sit at the top of the dam, just before the final v-notch at the top of the ladder where fish finally finish their climb and enter the lake, and simply count how many fish go into the lake. Indrick said that they’re able to input the numbers from the count into a formula that gives them a good idea of how many fish are entering the lake.

“By doing the count, we can actually get numbers for the number that make it into the lake and compare those to the numbers they’re harvesting,” she said, “and figure out exactly how well the site is doing.”

While alewives are harvested for lobster bait, they also provide a food source for much of the wildlife in the region, and their massive numbers can act as a cover to protect other species, like salmon, from being preyed upon, said Indrick.

The fact that the fish can even make it up the latter seems miraculous. Watching the fish dart back and forth between finally slipping through the last notch into the lake can seem oddly exhilarating, knowing how many steps they’ve climbed to reach this last point.

The speed of the water coming down the ladder is vital to allowing the fish to climb up. Too fast, and the fish might be unable to swim up the ladder and will become exhausted. Too low and the fish might not be drawn to the ladder.

“Last year, there were fewer fish that were harvested and we had a lower percentage get up into the lake, so we weren’t sure if that had to do with the amount of water that was flowing through the ladder,” said Indrick. “Last year we had a lot of rainstorms, so it was hard to keep that water level consistent.”

As we enter May, Indrick said the end of the count is in sight.

“Usually we start seeing the first fish at the beginning of May, and we start seeing them tail off a little bit by the beginning of June,” said Indrick. “So we maybe have a week or two left.”

This year seems to be on track to match or surpass the record.

On the first day of the count this year, May 2, Indrick said a volunteer counted 100 fish entering the lake in a 10-minute period. During another 10-minute period later in the season, a volunteer counted 250 fish entering the lake.

“It’s exciting! It means that the ladder is working well and the fish are entering the lake,” she said. “It’s also fun to see when there are that many fish going through.

“It’s always great to have people come out and count fish,” Indrick added, “and anyone of every age is welcome.”

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