THUNDER BAY — Contractors are soon scheduled to start work on a habitat improvement project on the Current River.
The North Shore Steelhead Association is behind efforts to improve the fish ladder — or fishway — on the north-side urban watercourse. In a media release issued Monday, the not-for-profit said that work is expected to begin on June 23 and last six to eight weeks.
During that time, the structure will be dewatered, the association said.
The project has three main components, the media release stated: installing cameras and fish-counting devices to track the number of fish using the structure, concentrating water flows in the bottom two cells with the aim of attracting more fish, and creating openings below the water line in the walls of the fish ladder to better the migration corridor for fish.
The sixth cell will not see extra access points, the NSSA said, as it will remain a barrier to lamprey.
The years-long project is part of the association’s efforts to develop a self-sustaining population of rainbow trout (also called steelheads) in the Current River. Despite other urban rivers in Thunder Bay, like the McIntyre River and McVicar Creek, having relatively strong steelhead fisheries, there hasn’t been a recognizable run of the popular sport fish in the Current River, experts say.
“We hope to learn a little bit more about the rainbow trout population and under what the flow rates are best suited for migration,” NSSA treasurer and Current River project manager Frank Edgson told Newswatch in a previous interview. “The city has the ability to raise or lower the electronic gate that control (water) flows into the fishway.”
“So it would be to our benefit, and the city's benefit, to understand more about what it takes to make that fishway work properly.”
The fish ladder was completed in 1992. Fish ladders help river-migrating species bypass obstacles in a river — in this case, the Boulevard Lake dam.
The steelhead association has been working with numerous partners on the fishway project, including the city, Environment and Climate Change Canada, the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund, the Ministry of Natural Resources and the local Community Economic Development Corporation.
