In 1608, English explorer and soldier of fortune John Smith left Jamestown, Virginia, on a mission to chart the upper Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries - including the Susquehanna River. He became the first European to find out that the Susquehanna is non-navigable. 

That’s because of the many, many obstacles in the mighty Susquehanna. There are countless natural barriers such as rapids and waterfalls. Also, the Susquehanna is famously a mile wide and a foot deep. These are just some of the factors that have prevented development of a continuous commercial waterway.

But that wouldn’t stop generations of people from trying. However, no matter how much they tried, no matter how much money they spent, they couldn’t do it. Then, utility companies came calling. 

If they couldn’t navigate the river, they would dam it and use it to produce electricity. 

But that created its own problems. Obstructions blocked the paths of fish that needed to swim upriver to get to their spawning grounds. Native species such as American shad and eels were dying at historic numbers. 

Solutions had to be developed to keep these important populations alive. But nothing has made a serious difference. One dam has a fish elevator that transports fish over the dam. Then, they the fish have to be trucked further up river. 

Fish passages were created, but older designs have not been incredibly helpful with guiding fish upstream. A new way of thinking was needed. A new kind of passageway was needed. 

In 2025, Shikellamy State Park became home to one of the largest and most naturalistic fishways on the East Coast. Located at the confluence of the North and West branches of the Susquehanna River, this new naturalistic fish passage would help aquatic life go around the park’s inflatable dam. 

Let’s learn more about this incredible project. 

On this episode, I speak with Gabriel Martin and Ben Bender. Gabe is a project civil engineer at Kleinschmidt Group and Ben is the Park Manager at Shikellamy State Park. 

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Hosting, production and editing: Christian Alexandersen
Music: Jon Sauer
Graphics: Matt Davis