Endangered fish found in new territory
A routine day of fish population monitoring turned exciting when Mainspring Conservation Trust biologists found a federally threatened fish in a tributary of the Little Tennessee River, the first time that species had been found in that particular stream.
The spotfin chub was found swimming in Licklog Creek in Swain County. The 4-inch-long fish was once widespread throughout the Tennessee River Basin, but dam construction, water pollution and sedimentation levied severe impacts, and in 1977 the fish was listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. Today, it’s found in only four river systems within the Tennessee Valley, including the Little Tennessee.
The spotfin chub was once assumed to be a species confined to larger rivers, but in 1999 Mainspring scientist Bill McLarney, Ph.D., discovered that spotfin chub, along with other minnows, make a fall migration into smaller waterways. All to often, these migrations are blocked by man-made barriers such as culverts.
In fall 2017, Mainspring led a stream restoration project funded by the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission to modify a culvert at the mouth of Licklog Creek to include a fish ladder. It didn’t take long for this project to see results — on Nov. 21, the first spotfin chub was found in Licklog.
