February 26, 2020

An addition is coming to Old Mill Dam. Later this spring, we will be installing a fish ladder over the Old Mill Dam spillway. Our PIT tagging work has shown that, currently, alewife reach the bottom of the dam during their spring spawning runs. The installation of the ladder will make available almost a mile of extra, good spawning habitat.  The ladder will be an Alaskan steeppass design (see image below). After construction, we plan to install additional PIT tagging antennas on the fish ladder to assess its utilization by alewife. We are currently waiting for permit approval from the NJDEP, and anticipate construction to start end of March or April. This project is the result of collaboration with the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. Additionally, Wall Township, The Mill Lakeside Manor, and Atlantic Lifts, Dock & Bulkhead have been instrumental in getting the project to this stage.  Stay tuned for more information as we get closer to the anticipated construction time period.