The Oyster and the Lamprey. No this is not a story of a friendship between an Agnathan and a Bivalve. It's a story of my trip to the Oyster and Lamprey River my first freshwater (mostly) collecting trip to the coast drainage.

The Oyster River was on my list since I read that Banded Sunfish and Swamp Darters were not just present their but abundant. The fact that it also has the bridal shiner (a threatened species who appears on lists of many coastal and merrimack drainage rivers) and the endagered brook lamprey made it sound like a rich reserve for rare fish and a perfect place to start a search for banded sunfish, swamp darter, and redfin pickerel.

I forgot my research notes on spots to check so I decided to head to Mill Pond on the Oyster River as the three species I seek are pond centered. This pond was formed by a dam and conveniently located in a park.



It was raining on and off my day giving my sealife camera a new role of inclemant weather camera, going in its case when rain threatens and coming out of it when it clears.

This area was rich in cattails, lilly pads, pickerelweed, and duckweed. My lower legs were green with duckweed on leaving the water,a

The first fish I caught was a small american eel. A first in NH for me (I caught them with Justin in Mass before). Oddly enough despite being in my area of the state and me hook and line fishing since I was a kid I never caught one in my state before this. It was tough to keep the little guy in the net to photograph as he kept trying to slither out.



I next caught a sunfish, not sure if it is another unmarked banded or a bluegill, I am leaning a bit more towards 'gill



I decided to head up a bit and found a promising area but didn't enter the water as the bank was a bit steep and their were mute swans which I heard were agressive. (I did take a photo of one of the swans, also their are female two mallards hidden in the grass). One of the oddest sights I saw was a mallard rushing aggressively at a swan, which didn't seem to care. The image was resized smaller by the photo album so they'd likely be tough to see.



With only one sunny, no darters, and the only pickerel being the kind with pointy leaves and purple flowers I decided to check out the downstream side of the dam in hopes of finding different fish, What I found was far more different than I expected.

So I wandered to the river on the other side of the dam and what I saw surprised me. The water was low, sure many rivers are low around here from a few dry weeks, but it was very low and muddy. It looked like low tide.



Sure enough down their I saw mussels, dead crabs and dead horse show crabs, and even some barnicals. It was ocean, but that was an understatement. This river flows into great bay. Great bay is not a "pool cut into the shoreline" type bay, but a "lake like part up a river" bay. In order for the Oyster river to be saltwater (I know the bay is) the ocean has to flow up a river, through a bay, then up another river. I still cannot see how this can work without all the salt being flushed out at low tide.

This river was mainly inhabited by mummichogs. Even in a few of the narrow swifter parts below the dam.





I also caught some shrimp.



I also seen something flattened and elongated about 6 inches long between two rocks, I nudged it with the net to see if it was debris or not and it quickly wiggled between the rocks. Not sure if it was an eel or a gunnel.

I then jheaded back to my car and drove up mill pond road and oyster river road seeking another access point on the river. I checked my map and noticed something else, I was amazingly close to the Lamprey River, another river on my list to check. I decided to get two birds with one stone and check this river out as well.

The Lamprey River was named as in colonial times it had large lamprey runs harvested for food. (not sure how big the runs are now). The derryfield beef (as lamprey meat was called) was an important food item at the time.

I arrived here at 6 pm (I was at the oyster at 4 PM) and weave my way down to the river through a poison ivy lined trail.



The green vegetation in this picture are not lillypads like I thought but leafy tree branches blown into the water.

The river itself was made of three trecherous environments. The bridge area I entered at that was a single massive rock area with verticle ridges that would threaten to trip you on every move. A safer upstream area where vegetation beds broke up the rocks. And a downstream riffle area with sharp jagged pointy rocks. here is a picture of what I mean showing shoreline rocks.



My first sampling attempt was upstream in the grass, I have no pics from this point having left my camera near the entry point and it was two dangerous to travel back and forth. (plus it was late so I was focused mainly on trying to find new fish before dark).

Up here I caught a lot of common shiners (one of the few spots I found where they actually WERE common), a few blacknose dace, and maybe a fallfish or two (didn't look two closely but noticed a couple of the small silvery guys had white eyes). In the way back I brought a few to photograph but the photo didn't came out blurry.

So I headed downstream, this time carrying the camera bucket with me and putting it down before each sampling attempt. Just before the riffles I caught some blacknose dace.



I went further on down the river and saw a hummingbird feeding on red flowers and cedar waxwings on the rocks seeking drinks and catching bugs like flycatchers, One went inches away from my face. I wish I was less fish focused to take a picture of them.

On my way back I had a surprise. At first I saw the large yellow fish and thought I finally got my creek chubsucker. Then I realized it was the largest longnose dace I ever saw and one of the most yellow.



I returned to my car and set out to get a bite to eat and return home as it was getting dark. I didn't really get anything new like I wanted, but it was an interesting trip with a nice big golden longnose ending it.

Oh, I forgot to show a picture of a killie and a minnow fry from the salt side of the oyster river.



also in oyster river park i tried photographing a catbird, but like every other time it flew into the bushes as soon as I aimed my camera.

Looking at the lamprey river pics the blacknose dace looks a bit off, I wish I had a good picture of the dorsal fin as I wonder if it is a creek chub.

Some thing is bothering me on my blacknose dace pic. I spent most of the day worrying about it. The scales show up really well in the photo and I don't see that often. (which is why I had doubts it may be a creek chub). I am now regretting not looking at the fish closely, just scooping, taking a pic, and releasing. Why am I regretting it? I am trying to make sure I didn't catch a threatened bridle shiner by mistake.

Maybe I am lucky and the visible scales are just from a better camera showing more details (used my sealife not my nikon this time). Sadly the diagnostic traits I can find for a bridle either are shared by some blacknose dace (black line through eye), or obscured in the photo (shape of face and mouth angle). They also say the bridle had black edged scales but in none of the pics of one I seen when I searched did they look that way.

Maybe it's a creek chubSUCKER. Small Erimyzon have a prominent black lateral stripe, a black mid-dorsal stripe that forks onto each side of the head, and often red-orange fins. The mouth of course is very different from a Rhinichthys or Semotilus.

I would second the vote for creek chubsucker. I have seen bridle shiners once and they were in a very densely packed school, I would imagine you would catch more than one. The habitat looks perfect for chubsuckers, and I think if that were a bridle it would be a very large specimen also.

Thank you, if this is the ID I am glad it is not a bridled. But on the other side catching a new species without a correct ID does not feel like a successful capture.

The creek chubsucker is the one fish who bested me (I saw it once and could not catch it) and it feels like it did it again.

For sure it's not a Black nosed dace. Really nice Long Nose dace, btw!