THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, October 30, 1996 TAG: 9610290145
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: COASTAL JOURNAL
SOURCE: MARY REID BARROW
LENGTH: 78 lines
Last week Jim Willenbrink was named Wildlife Conservationist of the year by the Virginia Wildlife Federation for his efforts in providing a fish ladder for migrating gizzard shad to reach freshwater Lake Pembroke to spawn.
Shad are anadromous, which means they are saltwater fish that must travel upstream to freshwater to lay their eggs. In 1993 the gizzard shad that had traditionally gone from the Western Branch of the Lynnhaven River into Thalia Creek and over the Lake Pembroke spillway were stymied by a big rocky buttress that had been constructed to reinforce the dam.
``The rocks thoroughly blocked their migration,'' Willenbrink said.
The shad's instinct to reach fresh water is so strong, the fish would beat themselves to death on the rocks as they tried to make their way over the spillway and into the freshwater lake, he explained.
So last winter Willenbrink, a Pembroke Meadows resident who lives on the lake, came up with a design for a fish passageway. He marshaled the forces of his civic league, along with Louis Cullipher, director of the city's Department of Agriculture, and Mitchell Norman, a fisheries scientist with the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries.
One winter day, they all went to work to construct the passageway out of surplus concrete parking strips. On one side of the dam, the rocky abutment was gently sloped and parking strips were laid at an angle to slow the water down and create resting pools for the shad as they jumped up the spillway.
Late last winter Willenbrink first saw signs of success as he watched the shad more or less lined up to make their way up the dam.
``They'd flip up the dam and they'd rest and then they'd flip some more,'' Willenbrink said at the time.
The real proof came in late spring when standing on his dock, he looked down in the lake and saw thousands of tiny, shiny minnow-like young swimming in the water. Later, he could stand by the dam itself and watch big schools of the little fingerlings congregate along the spillway and fin their way over the dam, back to the salt water from whence their parents came.
A local wildlife federation member who saw a news article about Willenbrink's success nominated him for the Wildlife Conservationist of the Year award. Willenbrink received a bronze desk statue of a buffalo at a dinner in Richmond.
``I was flabbergasted,'' Willenbrink said. ``I thought it would be some little framed citation.''
At the dinner Willenbrink's project was praised as a ``model for leadership and stewardship needed to preserve the entire web of life in productive, self-sustaining good health. This leaders' only reward was seeing spawning fish succeed and the resulting fingerlings swimming out of the lake to their home habitat. Such pure motivation and energetic leadership is an inspiration to all who use or appreciate wildlife resources.''
Willenbrink appreciates the honor bestowed upon him by the federation but, he said, ``the greatest reward I've had was the elation I had when I saw those first shad in the water. That was reward enough. I didn't expect this.''
Willenbrink has always been interested in the lake, once an old farm pond dammed off from Thalia Creek. He has served as chairman of the Lake Pembroke Committee for many years and tests the lake's water quality weekly.
So his work for the shad will be ongoing. This fall he cleared away some of the parking strips to allow debris to flow over the dam and not get caught in the pools and in late winter he'll put the strips back again. This time he hopes to fine-tune the arrangement to make it even easier for the fish. ``It's still not an optimal design,'' he said, ``and some fish are still beating themselves to death on the rocks.''
Willenbrink's project has become so well known that his neighbors affectionately call him the ``shad dad.'' And if the shad could, they would too.
P.S. The Friends of the Francis Land House will hold its annual Christmas Craft Faire from noon to 5 p.m. Friday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, and noon to 5 p.m. Sunday at the historic house. Admission is $2; children under 12 free. To find out more, call 431-4000. ILLUSTRATION: Staff file photo
Pembroke Meadows resident Jim Willenbrink, left, came up with a
design for a concrete ladder for spawning shad on Lake Pembroke,
then enlisted the help of Mitchell Norman, above left, Louis
Cullipher and Jim Price in building it. by CNB