Iconic Endangered Fish Making Comeback in U.S. Rivers

Maine officials recorded the highest number of Atlantic salmon in over a decade, after factors such as overfishing and pollution have caused numbers of the species to dwindle in the wild. The uptick is offering hope that the fish, which are protected by the Endangered Species Act, might finally be making a comeback.

The Penobscot River, home to the largest run of Atlantic salmon in the U.S., saw over 1,500 wild salmon return from the ocean this year, according to Maine state data. Though numbers have been trending up over the past several years—with over 1,000 in four of the last five years—this is the most salmon counted by researchers since 2,900 in 2011. However, sometimes only a few hundred return to the rivers.

Most of the salmon consumed by Americans are farm-raised from large aquaculture operations, as U.S. commercial fisheries for wild Atlantic salmon closed decades ago.

Sean Ledwin, director of the Maine Department of Marine Resources sea-run fish programs, told the Associated Press that the uptick could be indicative of conservation efforts succeeding. New England conservation groups have also been concentrating efforts on removing dams, which hinder salmon populations.

Although, Ledwin points out that numbers of river herring have also increased, which could be helping the salmon survive. 

“The increasing runs of river herring help distract hungry predators such as seals and striped bass from the relatively rarer Atlantic salmon, which may help increase salmon survival of the predator gauntlet,” he explained.

But while the numbers do indeed see promising, it’s still a far cry from when the Penobscot River once saw runs of salmon in the tens of thousands, before the over-damming of rivers.

“So it is a tick up compared to previous years, but in the grand scheme of things, it’s still abysmal,” said Dan McCaw, fisheries program manager for the Penobscot Nation, a Native American tribe that has lived along the river for thousands of years.