Tag: Etowah River

Fish Weirs on the Etowah

Contributor: Steve Houghton
Stream Name: Etowah River
Location: Bartow County, GA

I love running the Etowah on a paddleboard, and the section from Euharlee to Hwy 411 is one of my favorites. The river here is Class 1 with small, easy rapids. Most of the rapids are caused by Native American fish weirs. The weirs are rocks piled into a v-shaped funnel that would concentrate fish in the narrow, downstream end. At the water level today, I was able to run all the rapids without catching my fin on any rocks. I have a single 2.5 inch whitewater fin on my NRS board. This section is often only a few feet deep in places and it’s great fun on a paddle board to be able to see the bottom. There are often large numbers of fish too. I saw a gar today that was at least three feet long, so big that it startled me a bit. The fish seem to congregate in the rapids and I sometimes find myself distracted from picking my way through the rocks because I’m watching the fish.

Looking back upriver at the Euharlee power plant towers
Running a fish weir
Notice the ‘V’ shape of the weir