Federal agencies are considering adding the Alabama shad, a silver-colored fish that’s part of Kentucky’s State Wildlife Action Plan , to the U.S. endangered species list.
The species’ potential status as endangered is being considered due to widespread population loss. A species is considered “endangered” when it is at risk of becoming extinct and considered “threatened” when it is at risk of becoming endangered.
“The Alabama shad has undergone substantial decline, really for the past century or so,” Matt Thomas, ichthyologist and program coordinator at the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources, said in a recent interview with the Herald-Leader.
The fish can grow to 1.5 feet long and up to about 3 pounds. They can live up to four years in the wild. It looks similar to the gizzard shad , a species native to Kentucky.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration conducted a 90-day review of the species’ status after a petition was filed March 7 and made a preliminary finding there is enough evidence to substantiate the possibility of the species being endangered.
The next step in the listing process is for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to conduct a 12-month status assessment to determine the species’ current status and trajectory. If the assessment finds listing the species as endangered is warranted, it will go into administrative review involving public comments and possibly a hearing.
Once it begins, there is no date set for when the administrative review will be completed, it could take as little as a few months or as long as several years.
How has the Kentucky environment been affected?
An individual Alabama shad was reported in Western Kentucky below the Kentucky dam in the lower Tennessee River in 1986, Thomas said, but the fish was thought to be a straggler from the Mississippi River or Missouri River and doesn’t represent a viable population in the state.
It’s hard to say exactly when the Alabama shad last thrived in the Bluegrass State, but Thomas said it was likely around the turn of the century from the late 1800s to early 1900s.
“It was at one time reported to be commercially important, populations were large enough to sustain commercial fisheries, but that’s no longer the case,” Thomas said.
The Alabama shad’s historic range was from Oklahoma to West Virginia, according to the NOAA petition, and it was found as far north as Iowa and as far south as Florida.
The species has been completely lost from 60 of the 75 rivers it used to be found in, the petition continued, and “all of its remaining populations are in severe decline.”
The Alabama shad is anadromous, meaning it moves from marine environments to freshwater environments to spawn. The fish would grow and mature in the Gulf of Mexico and travel all the way up the Mississippi River, moving nutrients into the United States’ freshwaters.
Along with being a marketplace protein for people, the Alabama shad was also an important food source for larger fish, mammals and birds.
What happened to the Alabama shad and where is it still found?
The most significant contributing factor to the Alabama Shad’s decline and the biggest threat to its viability is the construction of dams on major tributaries, according to NOAA.
“At least 85 dams have been built within the Alabama shad’s historic range in the last century,” the petition said.
Dams impede migration for spawning, feeding and refuge, NOAA reports, and they cause additional issues such as severing contiguous habitats and disturbing thermal patterns. Pollution, including fallout from oil spills, is another serious concern for the species.
The timing of the species’ decline aligns with when installation of locks and dams began in the Ohio River and some of the big tributaries in Kentucky, Thomas said.
While the Alabama shad has not been found in Kentucky since 1986, the species persists in small numbers in Missouri in the Meramec River and Gasconade River.
The Alabama shad is one of 77 fish species on the Kentucky State Wildlife Action Plan, meaning state wildlife officials deem it in need of conservation action.
The current primary conservation goal for the Alabama shad in Kentucky is to do more targeted surveys to determine whether it still exists in Kentucky waters, Thomas said, as the species is considered “data deficient” in the state at this time.
Thomas said one of the NOAA petition’s main requests is for critical habitat designation, which would identify specific rivers where conservation actions can be concentrated. Measures may include ensuring development is sustainable and preserves habitats and managing locks and dams to allow fish passage during times of increased fish movement.
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