Harvey

Harvey the Herring is adopted by the Stripers 24-7 online forum. In addition to buying a tag for Harvey, the group sent me a Stripers 24-7 hat! Harvey was tagged on April 23, 2007, and even though the Ipswich River was still fast and chilly, he made it into the trap at Ipswich Mills Dam the first day it was opened.

Harvey was last seen on April 25, 2007 at Site 9 (our final receiver in the study area) at 1:17 am.

April 23: Harvey is tagged and released at 6:00 pm, near Site 2. He spends his first night in the area, not leaving the range of this receiver until 11:35pm.

April 24: Harvey passes by Site 3 undetected, perhaps due to the high water.

April 24, 6:49 am: Harvey arrives at Site 4 early in the morning. The water here is fast flowing and Harvey sticks around for about an hour and a half before moving upstream out of the range of the receiver here.

April 24, 8:51 am: Harvey passes Site 5 quickly, a fish with a mission!

April 24, 4:17 pm: Harvey is the first tagged upstream migrant to be read by a receiver above Willowdale Dam (Site 6). No readings were picked up directly at Site 6 due to technical problems, but Harvey is spotted at Site 7 just after 4pm.

April 24, 7:32 pm: The Great Wenham Swamp doesn't seem to slow Harvey down: he continues upstream and passes Site 8 in just 4 minutes.

April 25, 1:10 am: Just barely into Harvey's second day in the river, and already he's made it to Site 9, our final receiver. He sticks around for a few minutes before moving onward.

Where did Harvey go?! Although we tracked fish in 2006, we never expected fish to run straight upstream, and so quickly! Harvey appears to be a determined upstream migrant, which we expect to see in anadromous fish. We hoped we'd see him again, and twice a week we conducted intensive manual tracking through the Cedar Swamp (launching from Thunder Bridge) in hopes of finding Harvey and several other fish that went right upstream. No luck! We know that Harvey was not alone, as the receiver data shows that at least two tagged fish (we don't know how many untagged fish) were swimming near or with Harvey as he ran upstream. What do you think happened to Harvey? Do you think he had better luck spawning than fish that stayed further downstream?