TIMES & TRANSCRIPT STAFF
Supply and Services Minister Ed Doherty scrambled down the banks of the Little River near Salisbury yesterday to release a bucket full of six-month-old Atlantic salmon into the chilly, fast-flowing water.
GREG AGNEW/TIMES & TRANSCRIPT
Premier Shawn Graham and Chief Joey Knockwood of the Fort Folly First Nation chat at a news conference yesterday.
More than 67,000 young salmon have been dropped into the Petitcodiac River watershed this year, and yesterday morning's ceremonial dumping followed a news conference held in Moncton where Premier Shawn Graham announced that work on restoring the river is well under way and everything is on target for next year's opening of the gates.
"The countdown is certainly on," Graham said yesterday. "Restoring the river will definitely take time but the Petitcodiac will be back to its former glory."
The specific date hasn't been set, but the gates of the causeway are expected to be opened sometime next spring, ending a 40-year choke-hold. Scientists and engineers say that once the gates are opened, the powerful flow of the Bay of Fundy tides will gradually sweep away the tons of silt that have accumulated in the river over the years and allow it to get wider and deeper.
Opening the gates will result in the river being about 60 metres wide, but removing a large portion of the causeway later will increase that opening to about 225 metres.
The provincial government has already committed over $20 million to the river restoration project and the result of that spending is evident along the banks where new dikes have been constructed to reinforce the shoreline and protect agricultural land from the river when it begins to rise.
Scientists and engineers will continue to study the river after the gates are opened and see what changes occur.
"This destruction was caused by the hand of man but this is an opportunity for nature to begin to repair itself," Graham said.
But "restoration is not an overnight thing," said Petitcodiac Riverkeeper Tim Van Hinte "It's not going to take one day or two days or weeks. It's going to take years for the river to restore the way that they are predicting it to, which is about 80 per cent over several years. To believe in this project you have to take a long-term view. This is the end of the beginning because restoration is a process that's going to take a lot of work."
But even though consultants say the river will be restored to its former glory, it could take a very long time before the tides sweep out a navigable channel that can be used by boaters at low tide.
"There's no forseeable recreation use for the river," said Jacques Paynter, communications manager for the project.
In the part of the river that passes through Metro Moncton, the river looks full and flowing at high tide but is reduced to barely a trickle at low tide. Paynter said the flow of the tides will eventually sweep away the silt to create a wider and deeper channel but it is doubtful whether that channel could ever support boats at low tide.
In a couple of years, most of the causeway will be torn out and replaced by a real bridge. Graham said design work for the bridge is already under way and construction should begin in 2013, even though the federal government has not committed to funding that part of the project. Graham said he would continue to press the federal government to get involved in the project.
"The restoration of tidal flows and fish passage along the Petitcodiac River is an important first step in repairing 40 years of environmental damage caused by the causeway," Graham said. "Restoring the tidal flow is also critical to rehabilitating the 3,000-square-kilometre Petitcodiac River watershed, which is a significant ecological asset for the Westmorland-Albert region and all New Brunswickers."
Graham was joined at yesterday's news conference at the Moncton Press Club by Joey Knockwood of the Fort Folly First Nation and Gary Griffin, both long-time advocates of river restoration.
"The construction of the Petitcodiac Causeway did not simply block the river," Graham said. "It devastated the river's ecosystem, eliminated commercial fisheries and changed a way of life for residents of Fort Folly First Nation who had used the river for fishing, travel and trade."
Residents of Metro Moncton have noticed heavy equipment building new banks along the river this summer and the next phase should begin soon. The contract for a new main water pipe running from the Turtle Creek reservoir under the river to Moncton has been awarded and work on that project should begin soon. The contract is worth $6.3 million and has been awarded to Michels Canada.
Boyd Touchie, senior consultant and engineer, said the current water line is buried under the river near the causeway, but it must be moved because it is anticipated that the heavier flow of the river could damage it. Touchie said drill rigs will be set up on the Riverview side and on the causeway. Together, they will drill a horizontal hole 550 metres long and then pull the pipe through it. This pipe will become the main water supply route for Moncton and Dieppe.
After yesterday's news conference, Doherty joined several consultants and media on a bus tour along the river route to Salisbury where the salmon were released into the river.
The tour stopped at areas where new dikes have been constructed to protect agricultural land from the expected rising water after the gates are opened. The new reinforced dikes along the river were made with silt, sand and gravel from the river itself and, in some places, were built on top of dikes that were originally constructed hundreds of years ago.
John Bagnall, a biologist with AMEC consultants in Fredericton, explained that the salmon usually swim upstream in the fall to spawn. The eggs usually hatch in the spring and the salmon will stay in the upper portions of the river for two seasons before they make their way downstream to the ocean. They will spend their winter at sea and then make their way back to their home river to spawn.
The salmon have been doing this for thousands of years but their progress has been blocked by the causeway for the last 40 years. New Brunswick fish hatcheries have preserved the genetic line of Bay of Fundy salmon who are "programmed" to return to their home river in the hope of restoring their line to the Petitcodiac.
"Opening the causeway gates will allow these fish to get out," Bagnall said, noting that most salmon are lost to predators in the area of the headpond near the causeway.
In recent years there has been an increase in birds like osprey, cormorants and even bald eagles around the Petitcodiac.
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Jocelin
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