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Town Brook Restoration

The NOAA Restoration Center has been supporting the Town of Plymouth for just over 20 years to remove 5 dams and enhance fish passage at a 6th dam on Town Brook in order to restore diadromous runs of river herring, American eel and rainbow smelt. The final dam removal was completed in 2019. As part of the project NOAA provided funding to install an underwater camera that allows for citizen scientists to count returning herring in order to determine the annual run size.

Project URL: https://www.plymouth-ma.gov/marine-and-environmental-affairs/pages/town-brook-herring-information

Geographic Scope: Town Brook, Plymouth, Massachusetts

Project Status: Periodically active - recruiting volunteers

Participation Tasks: Data entry, Observation,

Start Date: 4/1/2019

Project Contact: eric.hutchins@noaa.gov

Federal Government Sponsor:

NOAA logo

Other Federal Government Sponsor: National Marine Fisheries Service

Fields of Science: Animals, Computers and technology, Ecology and environment, Education, Nature and outdoors

Intended Outcomes: The focus of the citizen science part of the project to enable the public anywhere in the world to participate in the annual counting of herring on Town Brook. Through increased public participation our goal to increase the national interest in restoring migratory fish runs that have been impacted to made made blockages such as dams, bridges and culverts.