Gatineau’s Green Fund

Ottawa Riverkeeper obtains city funds to study eels

Gatineau granted $25,000 from its Green Fund in April to the Ottawa Riverkeeper to carry out scientific research coupled with a public awareness campaign about the American Eel in the local waters.

Adèle Michon, Ottawa Riverkeeper’s Director of Operations for Quebec, told the Bulletin the goal is to chart the eels’ migration movements. Their work will focus on the biodiverse Brewery Creek, a natural bypass of the Chaudières Falls. Some people have reported seeing eels in Brewery Creek, but this has to be scientifically confirmed.

“If we can confirm their presence here, it would be interesting because the federal government is studying this fish, native to eastern Canada,” noted Michon.

According to the Riverkeeper, “it is estimated that the historical population of this species, once numbering in the thousands, has decreased by as much as 90%, leaving only hundreds. American eels are now designated as a species-at-risk in Ontario.”

Eels travel through the Ottawa River Watershed from the Sargasso Sea, in the Atlantic Ocean, where they hatch. “They migrate along oceanic currents to the many freshwater streams and rivers along North America’s east coast. They stay there for years before going back to the salt water.”

Michon explained that eels, once omnipresent in the northern Ottawa River Watershed, have seen their populations crash with the construction of dams without fish ladders. “They are unable to cross the dams and when they try, turbines chop them up,” added Michon.

The Riverkeeper project will piggyback on an Ontario-Quebec pilot project that includes introducing eels from the St. Lawrence River to the Ottawa River in its third year.

“In July, 400 eels will be introduced in the Ottawa River. We will tag some, with the Canadian Wildlife Federation and the Ministère des Forêts, de la Faune et des Parcs,” said Michon.

The project follows their movement with two types of tags, one with simply a number and another with a transmitter. The goal is to see if they enter Brewery Creek, where a receptor will be installed, to circumvent Chaudières Fall.

“If they reach the dam at Brasseurs des Temps (the brewery) we will install a temporary fish ladder to see if they will go over the dam,” said Michon. “We will also fish in Brewery Creek in August to test for the presence of tagged eels.”