# Big new today about the river raisin



## raisinrat

The city of Monroe got 1.2 million in grant money to build fish ladders on the lower 7 dams. This is going to connect the lower 13 1/2 miles to lake Erie again.

Its not as good as removing the dams but if they build it right it should allow for some migration of white bass , shad, and walleye into the river. Working on getting the whole article for you guys.


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## raisinrat

*$1.2 Million to help fish move in river*

The city of Monroe has been awarded 1.2 million grant to restore fish passage in the river raisin.

City officials received confirmation of the grant Monday and Barry LaRoy, director of water and wastewater utilities, made the announcement at Monday night's city council meeting.
Mr. LaRoy said the $1,266,00 grant-part of the $160 million Great Lakes Restoration Initiative-will require no matching funds. He said the goal is to restore fish passage by allowing fish to migrate upstream.

The two-phase, so-called fish ladder project involving up to seven dams is set to begin as soon as the paperwork is received.

"It's excellent news for the community" Mr. LaRoy said."the plan is to put ramps in front of the dams to allow(fish) to migrate up over dams. It will extend from Hellenberg Field to just west of Monroe St. by the Martin Luther King Bridge with splash ponds working your way down from the dam. The fish will be able to migrate 13 1/2 miles upstream."

He said some businesses will aid in the project with one company offering a 40 percent discount on the stone.

Congress approved the great Lakes Restoration Initiative last year. It is administered by the Environmental Protection Agency. Monroe received word in June that is was on the list of finalists.

The plan is to increase the chances that a variety of game fish from lake Erie could swim up the river Raisin to spawn and populate the river waters that course thought the city


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## raisinrat

From what I understand these will not be your classic fish ladder it is going to be a series of ramps and pools in front of the dams. I am working on learning more about this for you guys .

If anyone hears anything let me know and post it up. It sounds like work may begin this fall on this project!


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## streamertosser

interesting... keep us posted... would sure be nice to see one of our local downstate streams turned into something really really special.


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## raisinrat

with TLC this river can be something really special.

There is also a progarm that is new that the DNR is doing with local farms. Its called CREP.

http://www.michigan.gov/mda/0,1607,7-125-1567_1599_1603---,00.html

I am seeing new signs pop up on some properties.


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## streamertosser

it sure could be... I know the fish it does recieve, but it would sure be nice to see this stream groomed for something specific, year round fishing is a bonus, but I would love to see it become phenominal for walleye or smallies, skams would be nice, but the DNR isn't hardly doing what is needed for some of the upnorth river systems that are capable of sustaining so i would be really surprised to see them put serious time/effort other than put n' take, into a system down our way, but one can always dream,lol


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## tsr770

This should be interesting to see happen, in a good way.
I have noticed that almost all summer they have had most of the gates open on the low head dams thru town, wasn't sure of what that was all about. Maybe to see where the water level will stay with the new ramps in place?
In all truth they could probably knock out a 4 foot section of the low dams in the middle of them and do the same thing. 

Does this address the Waterloo dam too? From there it would be all the way to Grape correct? 

I would love to see a walleye run up the river, but with Edison intaking on the river I highly doubt we will see that, but hey its a start.


*EDIT* I read it again... so only to the dam at SMCC? Isn't there 2 more low heads between there and Waterloo?


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## raisinrat

tsr770 said:


> This should be interesting to see happen, in a good way.
> I have noticed that almost all summer they have had most of the gates open on the low head dams thru town, wasn't sure of what that was all about. Maybe to see where the water level will stay with the new ramps in place?
> In all truth they could probably knock out a 4 foot section of the low dams in the middle of them and do the same thing.
> 
> Does this address the Waterloo dam too? From there it would be all the way to Grape correct?
> 
> I would love to see a walleye run up the river, but with Edison intaking on the river I highly doubt we will see that, but hey its a start.
> 
> 
> *EDIT* I read it again... so only to the dam at SMCC? Isn't there 2 more low heads between there and Waterloo?



Waterloo dam does have a fish ladder already in place, even tho it is a piss poor design and location for a few reason. There is 6 dams below waterloo. So what it sounds like is that they will be starting at the 1st one(hellenburg dam) and then working there way up from there. The gates are opened when ever the Drain commission does it river clean ups in town. This rivers Management plan on the short term is to improve Smallmouth fishing, which to do this is to make the river a river again instead of a series of long ponds that have current.

The nice thing about this is that by doing this we will see how potamodromous fishes will react to this.They have virtualley been eliminated due to the dams and also one other problem this river faces that is even worse then the dams in my mind.That is the cooling water intake at Detroit Edison Monroe Power plant, which is at the mouth of the river.The power plant water requirement is up to 3000 cfs, this greatly exceeds the annual mean flow of 741 cfs. The power plant basically sucks every bit of the water coming down the river into it,plus it reverse the flow at the lake and draws water from the lake.The plants water needs are only met during the winter thaw in Feburay, March and sometime in April.

Also at one time this river had a large delta system at its mouth kinda like the Huron has but a bigger, and it came together with Plum Creek in what is called plum creek bay.

This rivers fish history was once rich with spawning run of sturgeon, muskie, in fact it was one of the major spawning river for this fish in lake Erie.I really doubt the muskie runs will come back like what I have read about due to the lack of Flood plains, oxbow lakes and marsh along the river.

The yellow perch that my father grew up catch in the river are totally gone. The walleye are also for all practical purposes. The lower 14 miles is as very little Channel cats any more due to the lack of spawning ground for them in that section of the river.This river does boost a very healthy baitfish population also. It has many kinds of shiners, daters, chubs, suckers, and madtoms.


Ok sorry for the long windedness there boys, you get me started talking about the river I love so much and I just can't stop. I got to get back to tieing some flies. I got a Client in town from Cali that is going to be fishing with me tomorrow.


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## Fishndude

Not sure how well Walleye pass fish ladders - they don't seem to get past the one in Flatrock well at all. But they surely can't pass the overflow dams, so any chance is better than none. I know Bass migrate up fish ladders. That river would never support Skamanias. It just gets far too warm in summer, and doesn't get enough flow.


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## tsr770

Agreed, the Raisin isn't going to handle a skam run, there is little to no deep water between the mouth and the Grape Dam. That combined with the fact that this end of Erie and all its tributaries are just way to warm for them during the summer to ever get them to head this way.

It may be able to handle a put and take winter steelhead run like the Huron though. Muskies may be a option for stocking, expecially upstream from town, I would think that If all of the dams downstream of Dundee were either taken out or opened up to fish passage muskie would probably flourish, there a lot more areas for them to spawn below Dundee, and the Macon Creek/Saline River system for them to use too. 

Like RaisinRat said, the Edison plant at the mouth is the biggest problem for migrating fish. It's hard for them to home in on the natal stream when the water that they're trying to get to is all being sucked up, heated to 100 degrees and dumped out a mile away. I highly doubt that we will see anything done with that in our lifetimes.

Still I'm excited to see this happen, it's good to see our tax dollars getting used for something that may help us catch a few fish where we never could before.


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## tsr770

Oh yeah, anyone seen another river with such a thing installed on it? I'm curious of what it is going to look like.


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## raisinrat

I have been trying to find what they are talking about online and can't seem to find the a pic of what I have seen in person before. I might be giving Mr. LaRoy a call and see if he would be open to giving me more info and maybe a better idea of the design they are wanting to do. 

That way I can share it with you guys. I am going to try and reach him tomorrow.It would also be nice to have a angler group for this river. I just got to much coming in the next few years to get something like this started.


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## raisinrat

I do have an idea of how to fix the power plant problem, but I really doubt we could ever find the funding for that.I will have to scan the image I got of the old river mouth with the power plant laid over it do show you guys what it used to look like.

Who know maybe once I am done going back for wildlife and fishery management degree I can get lucky and come back to this river do some work to it.


One thing I would like to see before the work starts is to have the DNRE come in and Tag the Smallies and see how they are affected by this and see how they move. I might have to call the Fishery biologist and ask him if that is something that can be done.


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## raisinrat

_Click on the image to make it larger_.
*This 1st pic has the general location of all the major and secondary dams on the water shed.The dams that are going to be having the work done on them are from Dam 16 and the 6 beautificationrolleyes dams down stream in Monroe.*









* The second pic is of the Type of water quality rating the watershed has.*








* This is of how the waterflow changes at the power plant.*


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## raisinrat

From what it sounds like it could end up looking something like this during high water levels.


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## tsr770

I hope it looks even 1/4th as nice as that.... If you do get ahold of Mr. LaRoy, be sure to ask him if the DNRE is having any sort of input on how these are being built. If they are just an idea being dreamed up by the Drain Commission, City officials, etc... and not based off of a proven design that is being implemented elsewhere it may be one big waste of money.... 

Heck, I would go so far as to invite whoever is in charge of this to come here and give updates, talk about free publicity for the river, the city, and local area. Ya know, I am thinking I may just dig up his email and drop him a message inviting him to stop by here.


Edit.... And Done


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## raisinrat

I got super busy today and was never able to get a phone call in.


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## tsr770

raisinrat said:


> I got super busy today and was never able to get a phone call in.


 
I dropped a email to Mr. LaRoy inviting him to come here and address some questions and ideas we may have.


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## tsr770

tsr770 said:


> I dropped a email to Mr. LaRoy inviting him to come here and address some questions and ideas we may have.


 
And he responded, himself and one other person who is helping with the project are going to both register here to answer questions, take suggestions, and the such. 

It is nice to have local officials that are willing to converse with the little guys to possibly make something better for everyone.


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## raisinrat

Great to hear, maybe we can get this as Sticky for a little while. I am going to try and get pics of this project when it gets started. Did they say when this project would start in your e-mail?

One thing that I really want to know is this going to be labeled a fish ladder or is it going to be called something else. Being that we can not fish with in what 100ft of one that could be pretty important info.


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