2023 Early Hearing Detection & Intervention Conference

March 5-7, 2023 • Cincinnati, OH

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6/05/2017 | 3:15 PM - 3:30 PM | WHEN A BARRIER IS NOT A BARRIER: USING FIELD SURVEYS TO IMPROVE CONNECTIVITY MODELS OF MIGRATORY FISH PASSAGE IN LAKE MICHIGAN TRIBUTARIES | 306C

WHEN A BARRIER IS NOT A BARRIER: USING FIELD SURVEYS TO IMPROVE CONNECTIVITY MODELS OF MIGRATORY FISH PASSAGE IN LAKE MICHIGAN TRIBUTARIES

A landscape-based predictive model has been used to predict that only 14% of the total tributary length in the Great Lakes Basin is available to migratory fish because of dams and road crossings. This model estimates fish passability for 268,818 road crossings and forms the core of an online decision support tool (greatlakesconnectivity.org) that evaluates alternative barrier removals to optimize habitat gain per removal cost at any scale within the Great Lakes Basin. However, a limitation of the model is that it had yet to be validated with field surveys of fish passage. We conducted surveys in Lake Michigan tributaries during fish spawning migrations to compare alternative perspectives on accessibility of spawning habitat upstream of a series of potential barriers. We also surveyed dams within the Lake Michigan Basin outside the spawning season for fish passage structures to evaluate dams that are more likely to block fish passage. Both types of field surveys have implications for interpreting modeled passability and for improving the management value of the decision support tool.

C12 Conservation Ecology
C16 Restoration Ecology
C02 Fish and Other Aquatic Vertebrates

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Presenters/Authors

John Rodstrom (), University of Wisconsin-Madison Center for Limnology, rodstrom@wisc.edu;