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I was just reading some of the rules around fishing in the Park because apparently that's where I am in terms of wanting some Algonquin content these days. Most of them I can figure out, but I'm wondering why you can't fish within 100 meters of a dam. Is it a safety thing or a fish conservation thing or something else entirely? Anyone know?
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Not entirely sure but I was always under the assumption that it had to do with fish conservation! Fish would congregate at or near the dam making it a lot easier for one to catch. Not really sporting in my opinion!
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It’s to help prevent the movement of invasive. Some fosh are on one side of the dam and not the others. The one I know of for sure is the dam at Annie bay leading into opeongo river. There are pike below the dam and, for the time being, none above the dam. Might be other reasons relating to keeping people away from dam runoff in the event of a release of water that could sweep someone away.
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It is all three.
Fish, particularly fish that migrate from lakes up streams to spawn do congregate below dams because they are artificial obstacles blocking the natural migration and spawning behaviour. Fish also gather at the bottom of natural rapids and falls but dams are considered to have a bigger impact both because they are artificial obstacles and because the existence of the dam is already have a huge impact on the population.
Jbonney is also correct that there is some benefit in reducing the likelihood of someone unintentionally moving an invasive upstream of a dam.
Then there is the safety issue, particularly around dams that are used for either power generation or flood/flow control where the flow downstream of the dam can change rapidly.
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Couple of things: the general regulation is "In Ontario it is illegal to fish in any manner within 23m downstream from the lower entrance to any fishway, obstruction or leap".
It's generally for conservation purposes as at certain times of year fish will literally stack up in these locations. If your anywhere near Port Hope you could go now and see many steelhead congregated below the dam.
Opeongo is a little different for the reasons mentioned, though the regulations there stipulate that you can't fish within 300m downstream of the Annie bay dam.
Now that we have that cleared up, please don't anyone ask what the hell constitutes an "obstruction or leap" ?
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