It’s astonishing, the power and persistence of genetics. The landlocked salmon of Sebago Lake, blocked for over 150 years from their spawning grounds in the upper reaches of the Crooked River, swam right back up there the moment they could, when in 1972 the Scribner’s Mill dam between Harrison and Otisfield was partly removed and a fishway installed. And when a bit upriver the Bolster’s Mill dam was partially restored, allowing the passage of some fish, the salmon were waiting for that, too. Until 1972, the last salmon to swim past Scribner’s did so around 1845, but the memory of that migration has survived in the DNA of Sebago salmon so that dozens of generations later the fish know exactly where they want to go and what they want to do when they leave the lake and head upriver.

Sometime before the end of the year the owners of Scribner’s Mill are expected to file a petition with the Maine Department of Environmental Protection to rebuild the dam, for the sole purpose of lending “authenticity” to the museum which the mill is becoming. Authenticity would come at a great price to the Sebago salmon, the anglers who love them, and the Sebago fishing economy.

The proposal to rebuild the dam will certainly include a fish ladder or some other fish passage option, but any of the options would “intercept a significant proportion of the adult spawning salmon population,” according to Francis Brautigam of the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. Brautigam finds the idea of rebuilding the dam “very disconcerting.” At a moment in history when the Sebago salmon fishery is thriving again, thanks in large measure to the free passage of spawning salmon up the Crooked, here comes a proposal to do serious damage to a legendary, world-class fishery just so a reconstructed millwheel can be turned by water power to amuse a handful of tourists. What do they plan to tell visiting schoolchildren about the fish the dam is frustrating? About the “thousands of fish, boys and girls, that will not be able to practice their nasty spawning habits because of this authentic millwheel!”?

As Francis Brautigam points out in a letter to the New Hampshire engineer who is designing the dam, “dam impacts can not be fully mitigated” by fish ladders or other passageways. Note the unqualified “can not.” No way. For this reason the MDIFW strenuously opposes the dam, and so should you, angler or no.

Scribner’s Mill sawed its last barrel stave in 1962. Bolster’s Mill closed forty years earlier. Water-powered sawmills may be quaint and well worth preserving as historical artifacts -- I'd be happy to make a contribution to the restoration of the mill -- but we don’t need to dam rivers to turn millwheels anymore. Save the mill, sure -- but block that dam before it blocks the river again.

If you want to weigh in on the issue, contact the Maine Department of Environmental Protection’s Dana Murch. He’ll be processing the dam application when it’s filed. dana.p.murch@maine.gov