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 © 2004 Mark Godfrey/The Nature Conservancy The Nature Conservancy and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Team Up to Demolish Dam
The Nature Conservancy and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced the demolition of one of the two structures that make up the Cuddebackville Dam on New York’s Neversink River OverviewThe Neversink River begins in the Catskill Mountains and is one of the primary headwaters for the Delaware River. It is considered the purest source of drinking water for New York City. The Neversink watershed encompasses 435 square miles and harbors endangered mussels, trout, darters, sculpin and American shad. The watershed is also home to 132 species of birds, 17 reptile species and 14 amphibian species. The Cuddebackville Dam
The Cuddebackville dam on the Neversink River in New York prior to removal. The Cuddebackville Dam is located in the hamlet of Cuddebackville, New York, and 235 acres of the Neversink watershed are located upstream from the dam. The Cuddebackville Dam is actually two dams separated by a small island. The original structure was built in the 1820s to divert water from the Neversink River into the Delaware and Hudson Canal. The second structure was built in the early 1900s and the two dams served to divert water into a feeder canal connected to a small hydropower plant. The plant was abandoned in 1945 and the Cuddebackville Dam is currently owned by the local county. The southwest dam is 107 feet long while the northeast dam is 188.5 feet long. Currently, the dam forms an unnatural limit to the habitat of the dwarf wedgemussel and restricts the movement of its host fish, which the mussel relies on to move its larvae upstream. No dwarf wedgemussles have been found upstream of the Cuddebackville Dam. This limitation on the population size and range leaves the endangered mussel vulnerable to catastrophic loss. Additionally, the dam restricts the upstream movement of shad and trout. The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation reports that runs of American shad have been observed in the Neversink in schools of 100 to 1,000 that tend to move up the river before being blocked in their migration by the Cuddebackville Dam. This October, The Nature Conservancy teamed up with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Orange County to demolish the southwest portion of the dam in an effort to improve the habitat for migratory fish, endangered mussels and resident fish. There are currently about 100,000 dams in the United States and the demolition of the Cuddebackville Dam on the historic Neversink River will be the first dam removal in New York history for environmental reasons. 
Fly fishing on the Neversink river within the Neversink River Preserve, New York. American Fly Fishing HistoryIn the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Edward R. Hewitt and Theodore Gordon popularized the sport of fly fishing on the Neversink, and today the river is hailed as the birthplace of American fly fishing. Edward Hewitt was a famous fly fishing author who wrote about the Neversink and was the creator of the Bivisible and Neversink Skater flies. He once remarked in an interview not long before his death that he wished to have his ashes scattered over the Neversink because it would "give the trout a chance to get even." Gordon, an upstate New York native, realized the dry flies he tried to use in the Neversink’s waters imitated English, not American, insects. They also were designed for the smooth currents of English chalk streams, not the swift currents of this wild river. He developed many flies, the most famous of which was the Quill Gordon. He is regarded by many as the father of American fly fishing. For more information:
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Copyright
2009
The Nature Conservancy
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