John Batchelder casts into Outlet Stream on Thursday in Vassalboro. Fishing, boating and wildlife watching are popular activities on the waterway, but some residents worry that removing some dams to promote alewife restoration might ruin the waterway.
Vassalboro resident Larisa Batchelder speaks recently from her dock on Outlet Stream, which flows from China Lake and into the Sebasticook River. Batchelder and other residents strongly oppose an effort to remove dams to allow alewives to move upstream.
Dwayne Rioux stands by the Mill Stream Dam on Wednesday in Vassalboro. Rioux, a registered Maine guide, is concerned about what removal of dams on Outlet Stream will do to the waterway.
Alewives swim past an observation window in 2013 at the top of the Benton Falls Hydro-Electric Dam on the Winslow side of the Sebasticook River. A fish elevator helps the silver fish up and over the dam to spawn. Alewife restoration efforts have been successful along the Sebasticook, but some Vassalboro residents are concerned a similar effort in that town will have an adverse effect on the waterways.
Zachary Turnham canoes with his sons Zachary Junior, 5, and Patrick Smith, 4, on Wednesday along Outlet Stream above the Mill Stream Dam in Vassalboro. Some town residents are concerned about the effect dam removal would have on the waterway.
Vassalboro resident Larisa Batchelder stands on top of the Masse Dam on Thursday near her home on Outlet Stream. Batchelder opposes the proposed removal of the dam and the nearby Lombard Dam to allow alewives to swim upstream.
Alewives swim upstream in 2014 to Webber Pond in Vassalboro.
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