Susquehanna circa 1816

[flyflicker]

Had tough luck up on the rocks above the Rockville Bridge tonight...so I took some contemplative time with a lukewarm one while watching an eagle flying up river.

If some poor lucky chap had been fishing on the same rock 200 years ago, what could he have caught? (No bridge or Statue of Liberty at that time)

What was the major predatory fish in the Susky then? Certainly not fallfish.... brookies would be hanging at the mouths of the tribs, what would be out in the main flow? Sturgeon?

Beer thought for the evening....

 

[Swattie87]

Good chance it was actually Fallfish. At least in terms of numbers.

 

[outsider]

Shad, no smallmouth. Perhaps Stripers and Eels. I don't know when carp were introduced. Also believe Walleye were native, not quite sure.

 

[flyflicker]

Outsider, I agree but only at certain times of year (migrational fish). What would have been in the river August 5, 1816?

 

[salvelinusfontinalis]

Ask and ye shall receive !

http://fishandboat.com/pafish/fishhtms/chap2.htm

 

[Dave_W]

Yep, stripers and shad.
These would likely have been prevalent in that part of the river for most of the warmer months in varying numbers. Probably some sturgeon, American eel, redbreast sunnies, pickerel, and white bass.

A good selection... but this reminds me why I think that introduction of game fish like smallmouth bass and brown trout has been so much for the better. It's popular to lament the impacts of these introduced species (and these impacts are certainly real, in some areas, such as brook trout streams).

However, we FFers are lucky that we have such a wide array of game fish avaliable to us that weren't in rivers like the Susquehanna and its tributaries. Image our Mid-Atlantic rivers today without smallmouth bass.

 

[Dave_W]

Neat link - thanks Sal!

BTW: note that Chinooks were "Introduced" into the Susky - I think this was 1874, and was the first attempt to introduce Pacific salmonids to the eastern U.S.(if my memory serves me correctly).

 

[flyflicker]

I second Dave_W, thanks Sal! Great table. So if I were stripping or drifting a sz 6 black muddler back in the day....likely a huge pumpkins ed or pickerel. Not sure how I would handle an eel....

 

[troutbert]

salvelinusfontinalis wrote:
Ask and ye shall receive !

http://fishandboat.com/pafish/fishhtms/chap2.htm

There are some problems with that chart:

I = Introduced
N = Native
N = Present in drainage, status uncertain at this time

Also, the chart uses an X, but there is nothing indicating what X means.

Were walleye native to the Susquehanna drainage? Does anyone know?

 

[STONEMAN]

Anybody else read Mcphee's Founders Fish about shad? Best eatin fish imo.

 

[Dave_W]

STONEMAN wrote:
Anybody else read Mcphee's Founders Fish about shad? Best eatin fish imo.

Yes, The Founding Fish, is a fine read. Another good one is Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food, by Paul Greenberg.

 

[Dave_W]

troutbert wrote:
Were walleye native to the Susquehanna drainage?

I don't think so.

They have been prevalent for a long time and were known, as you know, as "pike perch" or "Susquehanna Salmon."

 

[afishinado]

Dave_W wrote:

troutbert wrote:
Were walleye native to the Susquehanna drainage?

I don't think so.

They have been prevalent for a long time and were known, as you know, as "pike perch" or "Susquehanna Salmon."

Walleye currently occur throughout Pennsylvania. Walleye were originally indigenous to the Ohio and Lake Erie Drainages in Pennsylvania. The Ohio drainage includes the Ohio River, Allegheny River, and Monongahela River drainages. Naturally sustained lake (lentic) and riverine (lotic) populations occur within these locations. It is believed that walleye did not originally occur in Atlantic slope drainages (Susquehanna, Potomac, and Delaware River drainages in Pennsylvania), however walleye have been widely stocked into the Susquehanna and Delaware River drainages for many years. Modest, naturalized (self-sustaining) walleye populations now occur in the Susquehanna River and Delaware River drainages.

http://fishandboat.com/pafish/walleye/00walleye_overview.htm

 

[sandfly]

shad were known to come up pine creek then along with eels and some stripers (schoolies). stripers were in the susky year round back then (before dams)

 

[troutbert]

sandfly wrote:
shad were known to come up pine creek then along with eels and some stripers (schoolies). stripers were in the susky year round back then (before dams)

What historical reference does the stripers in Pine Creek come from?

Do stripers run that far upstream in the Delaware system? Or other rivers?

Where do stripers spawn?

 

[Beefheart]

troutbert wrote:

There are some problems with that chart:

I = Introduced
N = Native
N = Present in drainage, status uncertain at this time

Also, the chart uses an X, but there is nothing indicating what X means.

Were walleye native to the Susquehanna drainage? Does anyone know?

My guess is that the "N" for "Present in drainage, status uncertain at this time" is supposed to be "X."

 

[afishinado]

troutbert wrote:

sandfly wrote:
shad were known to come up pine creek then along with eels and some stripers (schoolies). stripers were in the susky year round back then (before dams)

What historical reference does the stripers in Pine Creek come from?

Do stripers run that far upstream in the Delaware system? Or other rivers?

Where do stripers spawn?

Multiple articles and reports to read through here.

 

[sandfly]

stripers have been caught as far as the east branch Delaware

 

[sandfly]

Striped bass Species overview: In their native habitat, the Atlantic Coast from the St. Lawrence River to Florida and some tributaries of the Gulf of Mexico, the striped bass is a true anadromous fish, living in salt water but traveling to fresh water to spawn. Through stocking, striped bass have reached the West Coast. Striped bass can also live entirely in fresh water as a landlocked form that cannot reach the sea. In Pennsylvania, striped bass are found in the Delaware River, and historically had been found throughout the Susquehanna River, the fish traveling upstream from the Chesapeake Bay. Dams on the Susquehanna had blocked the striped bass upstream migration to spawning grounds, but fish lifts, or fishways, on the dams should soon make access possible to the middle Susquehanna for this and other anadromous fishes. Striped bass have also been stocked in several of Pennsylvania’s large inland reservoirs, with an especially good striper fishery having developed in Raystown Lake in Huntingdon County. Striped bass or hybrid striped bass are found in Blue Marsh Lake, Lake Arthur, Lake Erie, Raystown Lake Wallenpaupack Lake, Beltsville Lake, Lake nockamixon, Lake Redmond, the Youghiogheny River Lake, a tributary of the Monongahela River. Striped bass and hybrid striped bass are all stocked by the Pennsylvania Game and fish commission and all lakes or river systems have abundent schools of striped bass in them. There are also many privately stocked class A lakes listed at the bottom of the page with striped bass hybrids or pure bred stripers stocked in them as well. The Delaware river also is a major spawning ground for striped bass in Pennsylvania and the United States and holds resident fish and school bass year round.

 

[sandfly]

American shad
Native Americans along the Susquehanna River relied on fish as a substantial component of their
diet and caught American shad in large quantities long before European colonists arrived in
North America (Meehan 1897, Gay 1892). The Native Americans used many methods to catch
shad including "weirs and traps; seines, gill and scoop nets; spears, bows and arrows, gigs;
hand, poles and set lines" (Meehan 1897). In the latter half of the 18th century, colonists from
Connecticut settled in the Wyoming Valley and established commercial and subsistence seine
fisheries for American shad. Rights to these fisheries were disputed by the Pennsylvania
government. These disputes lasted 30 years and were given the term Yankee-Pennamite War (or
“shad” wars), which were characterized by the burning of buildings, plundering of produce, and
destruction of the seines (Meehan 1897). Eventually, Connecticut gave up its claim to the
northern tier of Pennsylvania.
Yankee settlers were allowed to stay and approximately 40 permanent seine fisheries were
established between Northumberland and Towanda (Gay 1892). American shad were a dietary
staple and an integral part of the local economy. Gilbert Fowler of Berwick wrote in 1881: "The
Susquehanna shad constituted the principal food for all the inhabitants. No farmer, a man with a
family, was without his barrel of shad the whole year round" (Gay 1892). The fisheries in the
North Branch (Susquehanna River above its confluence with the West Branch at
Northumberland, PA) were economically valuable and the fish were fantastically abundant.
Much of the pre-1900 information available comes from a report, written in 1881, by Harrison
Wright for the Wyoming Historical and Geological Society and recounted in Gay (1892) and
Meehan (1897).