The alewife (''Alosa pseudoharengus'') is an
anadromous species of
herring found in
North America. It is one of the "typical" North American
shads, attributed to the
subgenus ''Pomolobus'' of the genus ''Alosa''. As an adult it is a marine species found in the northern West Atlantic Ocean, moving into estuaries before swimming upstream to breed in
freshwater habitats, but some populations live entirely in fresh water. It is best known for its invasion of the
Great Lakes
The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes in the mid-east region of North America that connect to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River. There are five lak ...
by using the
Welland Canal
The Welland Canal is a ship canal in Ontario, Canada, connecting Lake Ontario and Lake Erie. It forms a key section of the St. Lawrence Seaway and Great Lakes Waterway. Traversing the Niagara Peninsula from Port Weller in St. Catharines ...
to bypass
Niagara Falls
Niagara Falls () is a group of three waterfalls at the southern end of Niagara Gorge, spanning the border between the province of Ontario in Canada and the state of New York in the United States. The largest of the three is Horseshoe Fall ...
. Here, its population surged, peaking between the 1950s and 1980s to the detriment of many native species of fish. In an effort to control them biologically,
Pacific salmon
''Oncorhynchus'' is a genus of fish in the family Salmonidae; it contains the Pacific salmon and Pacific trout. The name of the genus is derived from the Greek ὄγκος (ónkos, “lump, bend”) + ῥύγχος (rhúnkhos, “snout”), i ...
were introduced, only partially successfully. As a marine fish, the alewife is a US National Marine Fisheries Service "Species of Concern".
Description
Alewife reach a maximum length of about 40 cm (16 in), but have an average length of about 25 cm (10 in). The front of the body is deep and larger than other fish found in the same waters, and its common name is said to come from comparison with a corpulent female tavernkeeper ("ale-wife").
Etymology and folklore
In southwestern
Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland".
Most of the population are native Eng ...
, alewife are referred to as kiacks (or kyacks). In
Atlantic Canada it is known as the gaspereau, from the
Acadian French
Acadian French (french: français acadien, acadjonne) is a variety of French spoken by Acadians, mostly in the region of Acadia, Canada. Acadian French has 7 regional accents, including chiac and brayon.
Phonology
Since there was relatively li ...
word ''gasparot'', first mentioned by
Nicolas Denys
Nicolas Denys (1598? – 1688) was a French-born merchant, governor, author, and settler in New France. He founded settlements at St. Pierre (now St. Peter's, Nova Scotia), Ste. Anne (Englishtown, Nova Scotia) and Nepisiquit (Bathurst, New Br ...
.
William Francis Ganong
William Francis Ganong, M.A., Ph.D., LL.D., F.R.S.C., (19 February 1864 - 7 September 1941) was a Canadian biologist botanist, historian and cartographer. His botany career was spent mainly as a professor at Smith College in Northampton, Mass ...
, New Brunswick biologist and historian, wrote:
Gaspereau, or Gasparot. Name of a common salt-water fish of Acadia
(also called alewife), first used, so far as I can find, by Denys in
1672. Nowhere can I find any clue to its origin. It seems not to be
Indian.
Acadians named two rivers after the fish, the
Gaspereau River
The Gaspereau River is a river in Kings County, Nova Scotia, Canada.
It has a length of approximately 24 km from its source at Gaspereau Lake on the South Mountain south of Kentville to its mouth at Hortonville on the Minas Basin. The low ...
in Nova Scotia and the Gaspereau River in
New Brunswick
New Brunswick (french: Nouveau-Brunswick, , locally ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. It is the only province with both English and ...
.
In eastern Massachusetts, Alewife Brook flows through Arlington, Cambridge, and Somerville to the
Mystic River
The Mystic River is a riverU.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed April 1, 2011 in Massachusetts, in the United States. In Massachusett, means "large estuary," alluding to t ...
. The brook gives its name to the
Alewife Brook Parkway and the
Alewife Brook Reservation
Alewife Brook Reservation is a Massachusetts state park and urban wild located in Cambridge, Arlington, and Somerville. The park is managed by the state Department of Conservation and Recreation and was established in 1900. It is named for Al ...
. The
Red Line (MBTA)
The Red Line is a rapid transit line operated by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) as part of the MBTA subway system. The line runs south and east underground from Alewife station in North Cambridge through Somerville and Ca ...
of Boston's T ends at the
Alewife station
Alewife station is a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) intermodal transit station in the North Cambridge neighborhood of Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is the northwest terminal of the rapid transit Red Line (part of the MBTA subw ...
, so the name of this fish adorns the front of every northbound Red Line train. An extensive habitat restoration and education project, combined with a fish ladder with monitoring cameras, is yielding increasing numbers of Alewife back in the improving Mystic River watershed.
Both
anadromous and landlocked forms occur. The landlocked form is also called a sawbelly or mooneye (although this latter name is more commonly applied to ''
Hiodon
Hiodontidae, commonly called mooneyes, is a family of ray-finned fish with a single included genus ''Hiodon''. The genus comprise two living species native to North America and three to five extinct species recorded from Paleocene to Eocene age ...
'' spp.) Adult alewife are caught during their spring spawning migration upstream by being scooped out of shallow, constricted areas using large
dip nets. They are the preferred bait for the spring lobster fishery in Maine, and are eaten by humans, usually smoked.
In the North American Great Lakes
Alewife are known for their invasion of the Great Lakes by using the Welland Canal to bypass Niagara Falls. Alewife colonized the Great Lakes and became abundant mostly in
Lake Huron and
Lake Michigan. They reached their peak abundance from the 1950s through the 1980s. Alewife grew in number unchecked because the lakes lacked a top predator (
lake trout
The lake trout (''Salvelinus namaycush'') is a freshwater char living mainly in lakes in northern North America. Other names for it include mackinaw, namaycush, lake char (or charr), touladi, togue, and grey trout. In Lake Superior, it can also ...
were essentially wiped out around the same time by
overfishing and the invasion of the
sea lamprey
The sea lamprey (''Petromyzon marinus'') is a parasitic lamprey native to the Northern Hemisphere. It is sometimes referred to as the "vampire fish".
Description
The sea lamprey has an eel-like body without paired fins. Its mouth is jawless, ...
).
For a time, alewife, which often exhibit seasonal die-offs, washed up in
windrow
A windrow is a row of cut (mown) hay or small grain crop. It is allowed to dry before being baled, combined, or rolled. For hay, the windrow is often formed by a hay rake, which rakes hay that has been cut by a mowing machine or by scythe into ...
s on the shorelines of the Great Lakes. Various species of
Pacific salmon
''Oncorhynchus'' is a genus of fish in the family Salmonidae; it contains the Pacific salmon and Pacific trout. The name of the genus is derived from the Greek ὄγκος (ónkos, “lump, bend”) + ῥύγχος (rhúnkhos, “snout”), i ...
(first
coho
The coho salmon (''Oncorhynchus kisutch;'' Karuk: achvuun) is a species of anadromous fish in the salmon family and one of the five Pacific salmon species. Coho salmon are also known as silver salmon or "silvers". The scientific species name is ...
, and later the
Chinook salmon
The Chinook salmon (''Oncorhynchus tshawytscha'') is the largest and most valuable species of Pacific salmon in North America, as well as the largest in the genus '' Oncorhynchus''. Its common name is derived from the Chinookan peoples. Other ...
) were introduced as
predator
Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill th ...
s. Though marginally successful, this led to the development of a salmon/alewife fishery popular with many
sport anglers.
In spite of such biological control methods, alewife remain implicated in the decline of many native Great Lakes species. It is also a common predator of numerous native and non-native zooplankton taxa (''
Bythotrephes longimanus
''Bythotrephes longimanus'' (also ''Bythotrephes cederstroemi''), or the spiny water flea, is a planktonic crustacean less than long. It is native to fresh waters of Northern Europe and Asia, but has been accidentally introduced and widely dist ...
'', ''
Leptodiaptomus ashlandi'', ''
Leptodiaptomus minutus'', ''
Leptodiaptomus sicilis'', and ''
Leptodora kindtii'').
Conservation
Alewife populations have seen big declines throughout much of their
range
Range may refer to:
Geography
* Range (geographic), a chain of hills or mountains; a somewhat linear, complex mountainous or hilly area (cordillera, sierra)
** Mountain range, a group of mountains bordered by lowlands
* Range, a term used to i ...
. Several threats have most likely contributed to their decline, including loss of
habitat
In ecology, the term habitat summarises the array of resources, physical and biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species habitat can be seen as the physical ...
due to decreased access to spawning areas from the construction of dams and other impediments to migration, habitat degradation, fishing, and increased predation due to recovering striped bass populations.
In response to the declining population trend for alewives, the states of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Virginia, and North Carolina have instituted moratoria on taking and possession.
The alewife is a US National Marine Fisheries Service Species of Concern,
about which the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Marine Fisheries Service, has some concerns regarding status and threats, but for which insufficient information is available to indicate a need to list the species under the US
Endangered Species Act.
References
Further reading
Fisheries and Oceans Canada: AlewifeVirginia Marine Resources CommissionThe Man with the Salmon Plan
External links
Species Profile- Alewife (''Alosa pseudoharengus'') National Invasive Species Information Center,
United States National Agricultural Library
The United States National Agricultural Library (NAL) is one of the world's largest agricultural research libraries, and serves as a national library of the United States and as the library of the United States Department of Agriculture. Located ...
. Lists general information and resources for Alewife.
Fish Win: Maine About-Face Lets Alewives Return to Canada Border River*
*
{{Taxonbar, from=Q659283
Alosa
Fish of Canada
Fish of the Eastern United States
Fish of the Great Lakes
Fish of North America
Freshwater fish of North America
Fauna of Atlantic Canada
Fish described in 1811
Taxa named by Alexander Wilson (ornithologist)