Source: McClane's Angling World - A.J. McClane
1986 - The Country of our Youth pages 44-45.
"Although the island of Manhattan was fissured with ponds and streams, the early settlers had already netted some of these waters to near depletion. During the next two centuries the ponds were filled, the streams funneled into conduits, and the whole island gradually covered with asphalt. Seemingly, all the ghosts of the past were forever sealed from view.
Then in 1956, when a water main broke on 58th street and Madison Avenue, plumbing expert Jack Gasnick found a brook trout floping in the gutter as water poured down the street. Like most of his compatriots who worked the city underground, Mr. Gastnick had taken a variety of fish over the years including pickeral, carp, goldfish, smelt, catfish and eels. But this was his first trout possibly a relic from the Turtle Bay Stream, which still meanders under the east 50s. According to Mr. Gastnick who has since netted trout in the flooded basements of 301 and 325 east 52nd street, the stream is audible, as it whimpers behind walls and below cellars. In the eyes of its nomenclator "Salvelinus Fontinalis is a fish of the fountains and indeed there is modern proof.
One brook trout erupted from the outlet pipe of a lobby fountain in a newly built Greenwich Village apartment house, which straddles the site of what was once another productive stream - Minetta Brook. I won't speculate on the underground life of salmonids, as I can't even imagine what the pH of a Manhattan water main might be, and God knows how trout feed or reproduce in a no photo period environment. Maybe they just wander down from the Catskills along some labyrinth path and get mugged by a bib faucet. The point is, this beautiful native american char should have vanished over most of its range years ago -- but the spirit is indomitable".
To think I walked over these areas for years when I worked in Manhattan and did not know about this. Actually walked over this area 3 years ago while on business there.
Heres an obscure brook trout fact you can impress your fishing colleagues with !
1986 - The Country of our Youth pages 44-45.
"Although the island of Manhattan was fissured with ponds and streams, the early settlers had already netted some of these waters to near depletion. During the next two centuries the ponds were filled, the streams funneled into conduits, and the whole island gradually covered with asphalt. Seemingly, all the ghosts of the past were forever sealed from view.
Then in 1956, when a water main broke on 58th street and Madison Avenue, plumbing expert Jack Gasnick found a brook trout floping in the gutter as water poured down the street. Like most of his compatriots who worked the city underground, Mr. Gastnick had taken a variety of fish over the years including pickeral, carp, goldfish, smelt, catfish and eels. But this was his first trout possibly a relic from the Turtle Bay Stream, which still meanders under the east 50s. According to Mr. Gastnick who has since netted trout in the flooded basements of 301 and 325 east 52nd street, the stream is audible, as it whimpers behind walls and below cellars. In the eyes of its nomenclator "Salvelinus Fontinalis is a fish of the fountains and indeed there is modern proof.
One brook trout erupted from the outlet pipe of a lobby fountain in a newly built Greenwich Village apartment house, which straddles the site of what was once another productive stream - Minetta Brook. I won't speculate on the underground life of salmonids, as I can't even imagine what the pH of a Manhattan water main might be, and God knows how trout feed or reproduce in a no photo period environment. Maybe they just wander down from the Catskills along some labyrinth path and get mugged by a bib faucet. The point is, this beautiful native american char should have vanished over most of its range years ago -- but the spirit is indomitable".
To think I walked over these areas for years when I worked in Manhattan and did not know about this. Actually walked over this area 3 years ago while on business there.
Heres an obscure brook trout fact you can impress your fishing colleagues with !