Last spring a grassroots organization in Gardiner, Maine called Upstream asked my colleague Ryan Smith and I to help them create a video explaining their work to restore fish passage along Cobbossee Stream, a tributary to the Kennebec River in central Maine. What a story it turned out to be! What we expected to be a short 3-minute advocacy piece for their Facebook page became an 11-minute short film that is going be making the rounds at US film festivals this year.

The gist of the story is that anadromous fish (fish that live in the ocean but spawn in fresh water) like river herring have not been able to reach their spawning habitat in the Cobbossee Stream watershed for more than 250 years because of dams. Most of those dams have been removed as industry left Gardiner, but three remain and if fish passage can be restored around those dams, millions of fish could potentially return every spring to the watershed. And there are some amazing people in Gardiner working to make this a reality.

Here’s the trailer:

Our first festival screening is next week at the Dunedin International Film Festival, and we’re excited to see the reaction.

If you like the trailer and want to watch the entire film, but can’t make it to the festival, you can see it on my video page. Here’s a link to my post about this project from last spring: Video Preview: Restoring Fish Passage Around Dams in Maine | (ecophotography.com).

Let me know how you like it!

Cheers!
-Jerry