Massachusetts NFC Seins Lower Cheesecake Brook to See What Species Could Use the Stream if Allowed to...

***Seasonal volunteer Travis Samarco, grandson of MA NFC board member Jeff Moore…***

Massachusetts NFC has been working with Charles River Watershed Association to bring some fish expertise to their project on Cheesecake Brook, a heavily altered urban stream. The stream has been straightened, dredged, walled, buried, infused with stormwater runoff, and blocked from the downstream river by a large sloping cement slab put in place to protect a municipal sewer pipe.

Other than what appears to be a pond comet, or type of domestic goldfish, Cheesecake Brook appears to be fishless. And it’s likely that the comet was there as a result of a release when it outgrew its tank or the owner tired of taking care of it.

In order to understand what species of fish might take advantage of the stream if they were able to, MA NFC undertook some seining downstream of the slab to see what fish could be found between there and the river. Three species of fish were encountered: Domestic feeder goldfish, nonnative fathead minnows, and native white suckers. We also believe that herring might enter the lower stream.

While there may have been some level of mixing between stream and river water at the site where the fish were encountered, it is a sign that water quality may not be the limiting factor. We will know better when we finish a season-long temperature logging excercise and some addition DO, salination, and chemical testing.