Tribal Land Management and Stream Connectivity

The Penobscot Indian Nation has inhabited the Penobscot River drainage since time immemorial. The abundant diadromous fisheries resources of the Penobscot River sustained the Penobscot people for thousands of years. Currently, the Penobscot Nation owns large tracts of land in the drainage held in Trust status with the federal government.  One piece of their trust lands contains nearly all of the Mattamiscontis stream drainage, a sub-watershed in the Penobscot River system.  The Penobscot Nation, in collaboration with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, National Marine Fisheries Service, Maine Dept. of Marine Resources, U.S. Dept. of Agriculture Natural Resource Conservation Service, the Atlantic Salmon Federation and the Nature Conservancy has been active in completing stream connectivity projects at lake outlets and road stream crossings.  Recent projects have been opportunistic in nature, but a catalog has been developed of impacted sites to be addressed in 2015 and future years.  It is the goal of the Penobscot Nation to reconnect the entire Mattamiscontis Stream drainage to the Penobscot River for the benefit of all species, which could be used as an example to other connectivity practitioners of a focused effort achieving long range benefits for the entire river system.