How have plant and animal populations in the watershed changed over time?
Historically, the Ipswich River Watershed was home to a number of large predators, such as black bear and wolf, which are no longer found in this region. The lack of predation has allowed explosion of some other species, such as white-tailed deer. Some species, such as New England cottontail, are now extremely rare, whereas the Eastern cottontail has proliferated. The fish population has been vastly altered. In early colonial times, the Ipswich River was noted for its outstanding spawning runs of salmon, shad and river herring. Alewife harvests were a mainstay of the colonial economy as far upstream as Wilmington, and Wenham Lake was the largest alewife nursery in the region. The construction of dams on the Ipswich River in the 1800’s doomed this fishery. The river has also lost its population of brook trout, fallfish and other species that depend upon flowing water. These fish cannot survive the low-flow problems of the river. The fish community is now dominated by just 3 fish species
