The Otselic River (aht-SEEL-ik), formerly known as Otselic Creek, is a tributary of the

Tioughnioga River The Tioughnioga River () is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed August 8, 2011 tributary of the Chenango River in central New York in the United States. It drains a dissected ...

in central New York in the United States. It drains a hilly area, mostly forested and agricultural, east of the

Finger Lakes The Finger Lakes are a group of eleven long, narrow, roughly north–south lakes located south of Lake Ontario in an area called the ''Finger Lakes region'' in New York, in the United States. This region straddles the northern and transitional ...

at the northern edge of the Susquehanna River watershed. Originally the Otselic Creek began at Hatch Lake in the Town of Eaton. When Hatch Lake was dammed in the 1830s to supply the Chenango Canal, all the lake water was diverted to the Chenango Valley to the east. The Otselic River now rises in Torpy Pond in southwestern Madison County, northeast of Georgetown, and meanders southwest through rich river bottom farmland. The Otselic Valley runs through Georgetown, Otselic,

Pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("pitches") the baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw ...

Cincinnatus Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus ( – ) was a Roman patrician, statesman, and military leader of the early Roman Republic who became a legendary figure of Roman virtue—particularly civic virtue—by the time of the late Republic. Cincinnatus ...

Willet The willet (''Tringa semipalmata'') is a large shorebird in the family Scolopacidae. It is a relatively large and robust sandpiper, and is the largest of the species called "shanks" in the genus ''Tringa''. Its closest relative is the lesser yel ...

, Lisle, and Whitney Point, where it is impounded to form Whitney Point Reservoir. Below the Whitney Point Dam, the Otselic River joins the Tioughnioga River from the northeast. Formerly, several "mill ditches" diverted the river water to mills in the town of Otselic. One such present diversion is a dam above the hamlet of South Otselic which originally supplied a mill in the hamlet of South Otselic and later was piped to supply the present New York State South Otselic FIsh Hatchery. The Otselic River holds both native brook trout and stocked brown trout in the upper reaches and warmer water species such as smallmouth bass,

walleye The walleye (''Sander vitreus'', synonym ''Stizostedion vitreum''), also called the yellow pike or yellow pickerel, is a freshwater perciform fish native to most of Canada and to the Northern United States. It is a North American close relat ...

s and

northern pike The northern pike (''Esox lucius'') is a species of carnivorous fish of the genus ''Esox'' (the pikes). They are typical of brackish and fresh waters of the Northern Hemisphere (''i.e.'' holarctic in distribution). They are known simply as a p ...

in the lower southern sections. Before the Otselic River was dammed in 1942 to form the Whitney Point Reservoir, eels and shad migrated up the Otselic River from the Susquehanna River.

References

{{Authority control Tributaries of the Susquehanna River Rivers of New York (state) Rivers of Madison County, New York

See also

References