New Hampshire's Saco River: We Deserve Better

The Saco River in New Hampshire is one of the most beautiful rivers in New England. Unfortunately, it is now primarily a put-and-take trout fishery.

New England's Beleaguered Rivers - Part III: Saco River in New Hampshire

Bob Mallard - NFC National Vice Chair

Background…

The Saco River begins at tiny Saco Lake in Crawford Notch, and ends at Saco Bay in the Gulf of Maine. At 136 miles, it is the third longest river located at least partially in New Hampshire, behind only the Connecticut and Androscoggin. At 1,293 square miles, its watershed is huge and far-reaching.

Roughly 425 square miles of the Saco watershed is located in New Hampshire, approximately 80% of which is within White Mountain National Forest. From its headwaters at Saco Lake to the Maine border, a distance of approximately 40 miles, the Saco River drops roughly 1,500 feet in elevation.

Saco Lake, the headwaters of the Saco River.

The Saco River passes through Carroll, Harts Location, Bartlett, Intervale, and Conway which includes popular tourist destination North Conway, before entering Maine. Its largest tributaries in this section are Dry River, Sawyer River, Rocky Branch, Ellis River, East Branch Saco, and Swift River. This is where the river has its highest wild native trout potential.

Status…

Unfortunately, while many of the tributaries of the upper Saco River hold wild native brook trout, the river itself is nearly devoid of them in most sections. Unlike many White Mountain rivers whose headwaters are off the beaten path, the upper Saco parallels the highway for much of its length, especially in its critically important headwaters.

The easy-access nature of the upper Saco River and general law management — unrestricted bait, 5-fish, no length limit — results in a high level of angler exploitation. The only break it gets is a short Fly Fishing Only section in North Conway, but even here you can, and people do, harvest 2 fish a day.

Fly fishing only section on the middle Saco River in North Conway.

Interestingly, while New Hampshire Fish and Game doesn’t believe, or won’t admit, that angler exploitation is a problem on the Saco River, another state government agency, Department of Environmental Services, apparently does. Click here to read more.

“Historically, the Saco River was one of the premier trout fishing rivers in the Northeast. Today, the natural reproductive capability of native fish populations has been exceeded by angler demand, and stocking of hatchery reared brook, brown, and rainbow trout is carried out each year by New Hampshire Fish and Game. - NEW HAMPSHIRE DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL SERVICES”

Stocking…

The roadside location of the upper Saco River also results in a high level of state-sponsored trout stocking. And the Fly Fishing Only section is stocked by a local business as well as the state. Basically, the Saco River is managed for pure put-and-take trout angling with little regard for wild native fish.

The Saco River is stocked from its headwaters at Saco Lake all the way down Conway.

To put things into perspective, per New Hampshire Fish and Game, the Saco River received 15,184 stocked trout in 2018 alone. This included 8,483 brook trout as well as 5,128 nonnative brown trout and 1,573 nonnative rainbow trout. While most were 1-year-old fish, 565 were large piscivorous 2-year-old fish. Another 2,500 were fingerlings, virtually undetectable from wild fish. The numbers for 2016 and 2017 were over 10,000 and 15,000 respectively.

In addition to the state-sponsored stocking, in 2017 the Saco River received 100 adult nonnative browns and 200 adult nonnative rainbows through a private stocking sponsored by a local fishing group. While no stocking record could be found for 2018, even though the river was subject to private stocking that year, there were 100 so-called “trophy” nonnative browns stocked by a local business in 2019, and after the local fishing group had abandoned the program.

To make matters worse, there is no real plan for managing the stocking on the Saco River. In addition to scheduled stockings, it receives “surplus” fish, or hatchery excess, pretty much every year. In 2018 alone, the Saco received 4,390 surplus trout, including 1,149 brook trout, 3,168 nonnative brown trout, and 73 nonnative rainbow trout.

When it comes to stocking, the Saco River is in trouble right out of the gate. Tiny Saco Lake, the headwaters of the Saco River, received 1,100 stocked brook trout in 2018, including 100 large 2-year-old fish. I have caught these fish downstream in a small isolated pond. How far down the river they get no one really knows.

Another 850 brook trout were stocked in Crawford Notch Kids Pond in 2018, a small manmade impoundment on the Saco River roughly 2.5 miles downstream of Saco Lake. This included fifty 2-year-old fish. These fish can, and do, move both upstream and downstream. And like those stocked in Saco Lake, the fish stocked are much larger than what would naturally occur.

A large freshly stocked brook trout from the Saco River. Note fresh scar near the pectoral fin.

Downstream 15 or so miles in Bartlett, the Saco River receives its largest upriver tributary, the Ellis River. While there have been some reductions and species changes, like the Saco, the Ellis is heavily stocked. In 2018, the Ellis River received 4,175 stocked trout. While most were brook trout, 200 were nonnative rainbow trout, the latter of which were stocked in the lower end giving them access to the Saco.

Just downstream of the Ellis, the East Branch Saco enters the mainstem Saco. While a small stream with high wild trout potential, and more wild fish than most other tributaries, it too is stocked, receiving 1,778 1-year-old brook trout in 2018. There also appears to be some level of wild nonnative browns in the East Branch, likely the result of plantings in the mainstem.

Last up is the Swift River which enters the Saco in lower Conway. Like the Saco, the swift experiences a high level of angler exploitation. In fact, along with the Saco and Amonoosuc River, it is one of the most beleaguered high-potential rivers in the state. Receiving 9,463 stocked trout in 2018, including 1,300 nonnative brown trout, it is also one of the most heavily stocked.

Click here to read more about the Swift River

Click here to read more about the Amonoosuc River

As long-time local guide and NH NFC chair Nate Hill says, New Hampshire has as much a habit problem as it does a habitat problem. I’d be willing to go out on a limb and say even more so.

Habitat Problems…

To be fair, like other rivers in the area, the Saco has experienced epic flooding which has resulted in some significant habitat damage. While river wide to at least some degree, the worse damage seems to be downstream of the highest-potential wild brook trout water. But this is not to say that it doesn’t affect brook trout, it does, as some of the area is used as seasonal refuge.

The habitat damage is obvious in places like the fly fishing only section which lost important bank structure and critically important summer refuge. A large pool that provided seasonal refuge for trout has silted in, and the water diverted around a subsurface spring that provided important summer refuge.

There has also been significant damage to some of the lower tributaries, especially the Rocky Branch and East Branch. But where these streams have lost some carrying capacity, there are still wild fish there and the situation appears to be improving as the stream finds a new channel and silt is flushed away.

The Good News…

Unlike places such as the Rapid, Kennebec and Dead Rivers in Maine which are now home to highly invasive smallmouth bass, or the St. John RIver in Maine which lost its wild native brook trout to nonnative muskies, there are no invasive fish other than browns and rainbows in the upper Saco River. I have never encountered a bass upstream of Conway or in any of the tributaries.

While the conditions on the Saco are not perfect, as is the case with most somewhat sterile White Mountain region rivers and streams, the situation could be far worse. Without bass, a huge problem for native brook trout, the primary competition for food and space in regard to wild brook trout comes from stocked nonnative browns and rainbows. Stop stocking them and they would likely go away.

A large stocked nonnative brown trout from the Saco River in North Conway.

Conclusion…

The Saco River in New Hampshire, especially above the confluence with the Ellis River, should and I believe could, be a wild native brook trout fishery. Unfortunately, New Hampshire Fish and Game wants to allow a level of harvest and high-impact tackle that is just not conducive to such. rather than restricting what anglers can do, they resort to stocking to provide some level of a fishery, albeit an inconsistent and marginal one.

It also seems like folks in the area seem to have convinced themselves that wild brook trout are not possible, or desirable enough to try to have them. We no sooner get a long overdue suspension of the club-sponsored private stocking and a local business picks it up and runs with it. This furthers the belied that what we have is all we could have. It also gives cover to Fish and Game by legitimizing stocking as a management tool.

I used to fish the Saco River a lot. In my twenties I fished mostly the headwaters. After a sabbatical of fifteen or so years, I started fishing the lower end as well. It was once one of my favorite rivers to fish, but due to the near complete manufactured nature of the fishery and unreliable put-and-take fishing, I stopped fishing it a couple of years ago. To have such a beautiful resource and treat it so poorly is criminal, or at least it should be.

Hopefully folks will come around and realize what they could have. Hopefully they will be willing to show some restraint and make the concessions necessary to allow a wild native brook trout fishery to exist wherever it is possible to do so. Hopefully the local businesses will come to see that put-and-take fishing is not the answer, and that stocking where wild trout are viable is harmful and wasteful. Hopefully the Saco River will once again become one of the best trout rivers in New England.

Walking out of the lower Saco River in New Hampshire.