turgeon is on the endangered species list, and a number of the others are species of concern (one step away from endangerment). The addition of fish ladders and passages to a dam helps the problem a little, but not much because the fish usually have trouble finding them (McCully,1996). Another major problem presents itself if the fish actually navigate the ladders and lay their eggs upstream: when it comes time for the young fish to make their way downstream to the ocean, an outrageous number of them are sucked into the dams huge turbines and chopped up. When the Edwards Dam was first built in 1837 it had a fish ladder, but a year later it was washed away in a flood and the owners refused to replace it. In 1880 fish passageways were built but they proved completely ineffective. The present-day Edwards Dam had neither of these, but instead implemented a fairly ridiculous procedure of sucking up the fish with a vacuum that had a twelve-inch tube, dropping them into large bins in a truck, and driving them around to be deposited in other rivers (Allen,1999). In theory it sounds plausible, but in reality the only fish this system helped were the smaller ones such as striped bass and alewives, because the eight feet long sturgeon and salmon just did not fit through the tube. Economically, the removal of the Edwards Dam would greatly benefit the entire region. Once the restoration of the river is underway, a significant increase in the anadromous fish populations can be expected in as little as one year after the breaching of the dam(Watson,1999). This will probably attract commercial fishing once the numbers rise again, but more importantly it will draw the attention of sport fishermen. Additionally, allowing the river to return to its natural free-flowing state will cause the formation of stretches of rapids, which daredevil recreational boaters will no doubt take advantage of. A rise in the number of tackle and outdoor outfitting ...
