Fish Ladder and Watershed Visitor Center Exhibits, Displays and Activities Focusing on The Connecticut River and Its Watershed - Free to Visit!
The Nature Museum staffs the Fish Ladder and Watershed Visitor Center in Bellows Falls, Vermont. The facility is owned and operated by TransCanada Corporation, which also owns the hydroelectric facility. The Nature Museum has added displays and exhibits to the Fish Ladder Center that focus on the plants and animals of the Connecticut River watershed. The operation of the Center is made possible by a grant from TransCanada Corporation, and through the cooperation and support of Matthew Cole, the External Affairs Officer for TransCanada Corporation. The Fish Ladder is located in the village of Bellows Falls, Vermont, next to the post office building on Bridge Street. If you would like more information, please call 802-843-2111.
Open weekends from Memorial Day to Labor Day
While the visitor center is open all summer, the water does not run through the fish ladder throughout the open season. TransCanada Corporation, is instructed to open the ladder by the Fish and Wildlife Service when the Atlantic Salmon has been spotted passing through the Vernon facility. The ladder is most likely to be open between Memorial Day and the 4th of July. Dates vary widely year to year. Call The Nature Museum for more information at 802-843-2111.
Visitation Hours
Saturdays 10 AM-4 PM
Sundays 12 PM-4 PM
If you are interested in the "Fish Passage schedule" information, the Fish and Wildlife Service has a website that lists the fish that pass through the various sites along the Connecticut River.
A new rock and mineral exhibit, which includes a dinosaur footprint from the Connecticut River Watershed, was installed by the beginning of July 2011. The exhibit was designed by Sue Hadden of the Vermont Museum of Mining and Minerals on Pleasant Street in Grafton, Vermont. In addition to its Connecticut River Watershed specimens, the Mining Museum contains the finest collection of Vermont minerals in existence. That museum is open Saturdays and Sundays 10-12 and 1-4 each day through the end of October or by appointment by calling Sue Hadden at 802-875-3562.
The new two-case exhibit at the Fish Ladder features impressive minerals and fossils from the Connecticut River Watershed. According to Ms. Hadden, "The geology of the Connecticut River Valley Watershed is quite complex, but extremely important in understanding mountain building and subsequent glacial erosion, not only in relation to farmland, but to quarrying and mining as well."
While there are many large and colorful examples of various minerals displayed at the Center, some might say that the very unsparkly "jewels" of the collection are the footprints of a Grallator dinosaur and the various concretions that formed around fossilized leaves.
The Grallator was a bipedal, carnivorous dinosaur from the late Triassic to early Jurassic period (about 200 million years ago). Its name means "stilt walker." The herding dinosaur is known from its fossilized, large-clawed, three-toed footprints about 7" in length. It weighed about 75-100 pounds and has been found in parts of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Canada, and Europe. It looked a lot like the Velociraptor portrayed in Jurassic Park.
