Skip to agency navigation
Skip to main content

Official website

of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania

    The .gov means it's official.

    Local, state, and federal government websites often end in .gov. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania government websites and email systems use "pennsylvania.gov" or "pa.gov" at the end of the address. Before sharing sensitive or personal information, make sure you're on an official state website. 

    American Shad

    Learn more about our annual restorative work in collaboration with U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to bring the American Shad back to the Juniata River and greater Susquehanna Basin.

    PFBC staff wearing life jackets wade through the Juniata River with buckets and bags filled American Shad fry for releasing into the river.

    Raising Shad

    Every April, when the shad begin their migration run from the ocean to spawn in the Potomac River, the Fish and Boat Commission begins its annual efforts to bring American Shad, Alosa sapidissima, back to the Juniata River and greater Susquehanna River Basin. The project is a collaboration with the US Fish and Wildlife Service who supply the young shad to the Commission.

    Female staff member standing inside research station of large tanks for growing fish. She is scooping feed from a 5-gallon bucket to disperse into a tank with American Shad fry PFBC biologist standing inside VanDyke research station among large tanks for growing fish. She is scooping feed from a 5-gallon bucket to disperse into a tank with American Shad fry.
    Female staff member inside a tank scooping American Shad fry into a 5-gallon bucket. PFBC biologist scooping American Shad fry into a 5-gallon bucket.

    Staff spend weeks raising the tiny fry at the VanDyke Research Station. Intermittently, they also tag the fish with OTC (oxytetracycline) marking their tiny earbones (otoliths) for tracking. (It’s a chemical marking leaving unique patterns on the otolith, enabling researchers the ability to distinguish hatchery versus wild origin fishes.)

    Magnified image of an American Shad Fry earbone that has been tagged with OTC. Reddish rings indicate the days when the fish were tagged. Magnified image of an American Shad fry earbone that has been tagged with OTC. Reddish rings around the earbone indicate the days when the fish were tagged.
    Microscope enlarged image of an American Shad fry earbone. Blue and white variations in color show rings of growth on the bone. Microscope enlarged image of an American Shad fry earbone. Blue and white variations in color show rings of growth on the bone.

    Bringing Back American Shad: Prepping for the Journey

    Join part 1 of our series "Bringing Back American Shad." Learn how our biologists get 200,000 tiny American shad fry into 5-gallon buckets for the start of a long (and hopefully) successful journey. PFBC biologists spend weeks raising thousands of tiny American Shad in an effort to send them out into the Juniata River, but it is not easy to catch these little guys. By the looks of the challenge of catching them, you’d think they prefer staying in the tank at our Van Dyke Research Station. From the Juniata River, they begin their journey to the ocean where they will become adults. In 3-5 years, they'll come back to their release spot to spawn the next generation.

    Release is a tedious process beginning with corralling the transluscent fish, about the size of a small pin, who don’t want to be caught. They are carefully scooped into bags inside 5-gallon buckets. Each bag holds about15,000-20,000 fish. Before closing off the bag for transport, each one gets salt and oxygen to help the fish make the trip on the back of a truck to the Juniata River.

    Once at the river, crews patiently acclimate the fry to the river water. They place the buckets in the water and slowly add river water until the water in the bags matches the river temperature. When the river and buckets temperatures are the same, the fry are poured into the river to be on their way downriver.

    They will grow into juveniles in freshwater and journey to the ocean where they will become adults. In 3-5 years, they will effort a return to their natal waters to spawn the next generation.

    Bringing Back American Shad: To the Water

    After feeding tiny American Shad fry for a month, PFBC staff load up the tiny fish for the start of their journey down the Juniata River. On this day, 200,000 fish make the trip to the water in 5-gallon buckets. In late April, these fish started as eggs from the Potomac River when the shad run from the ocean to spawning grounds began. The project is possible because of a partnership with the US Fish and Wildlife Service. In 2025, the Fish and Boat Commission is stocking nearly 1.2 million Shad into the Juniata River in hopes that they will return in 3-5 years to spawn.

    The History of Shad Restoration

    Shad restoration efforts have been underway for more than 150 years. As a matter of fact, the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission owes its origin in part to the shad.  In 1866, lawmakers, alarmed by the reduction of shad on the Susquehanna River, appointed the first Commissioner of Fisheries, the PFBC’s precursor. In that year, the focus was on water pollution caused by deforestation. In the decades since, shad have been challenged by human progress in many ways including the construction of dams on Pennsylvania waterways.

    In recent years, the Commission has been releasing just over a million shad annually, a change in practice from decades past when tens of millions were released into Commonwealth waters.  And the number of fish that are returning continues to decline. 

    Restoring Fish Passage

    While the Juniata River fry are worth the effort, the challenges the fish meet in getting past dams in other Pennsylvania waterways are immense.

    Despite efforts by numerous partners, fish passage is a significant barrier to shad migration on the Lehigh, Schuylkill and Susquehanna Rivers. Even when fish ladders work properly like at Conowingo Dam (from mid-March to the beginning of June), since 2020 crews have had to resort to hand sorting collected fish to keep non-native aquatic invasive species like the Northern Snakehead that began entering the lifts. Better fish passage systems like the one on the Susquehanna River at Shikellamy State Park hold promise for greater success for fish passage in the future.

    There is some good news. In the Delaware River/Estuary where shad are not impeded by dams, a genetically distinct, self-sustaining wild population of American Shad persists. But even this population needs help to move from persisting to thriving.  Focus continues on efforts to improve fish passage through dam removal within the tributaries of the Delaware River Basin.

    The PFBC and partners manage the population and are learning more about the behaviors of the fish in the Delaware River basin with the help of anglers who share angler logs, an effort that connects science and those who care about the species that need our help.

    Partners

    In the Susquehanna River Basin, the Commission is part of the Susquehanna River Anadromous Fish Restoration Cooperative (SRAFRC) along with the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), NOAA Fisheries, Susquehanna River Basin Commission (SRBC), Maryland Department of Natural Resources (MDNR), and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDES).  The SRAFRC works with operators of dams located at Conowingo, Holtwood, Safe Harbor, and York Haven to ensure fish passage and proper biomonitoring efforts are conducted to determine the effectiveness of fisheries management plans specific to each facility. 

    In the Delaware River Basin, the Commission is part of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission.

    Join Our Restoration Efforts

    Participate in the angler voluntary diary program to help the Commission and partners better understand recreational fishery behaviors.

    The Commission conducts regular monitoring and is included in Commission Biologist Reports available to the public.

    Find information on the joint state and federal management of shad in the Delaware River Basin (Atlantic State Marine Fisheries Commission webpage on the Delaware River Sustainable Fishing Plan for American Shad). The plan follows Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC.org) objectives. 

     Information about migratory fish restoration and passage on the Susquehanna River can be found at the following locations:

    Read the Priority Invasive Fish Species Action Plan for the Susquehanna River Basin, which addresses invasive fish species concerns associated with the fish lifts at each facility.