New River Stops at Kanawha Falls?

Fish Distribution
Kanawha Falls is the primary physical barrier that divides the distinct fish fauna of the New River System from that of the Upper Ohio River System (fig. 4). About 90 native species are known from basin streams downstream from Kanawha Falls. This area, referred to as the Kanawha River System, is, along with other river basins throughout West Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, and Maryland, part of the Upper Ohio River System (Hocutt and others, 1986). Upstream from Kanawha Falls, the New River System includes the New and Gauley Rivers, their tributaries, and about one mile of the Kanawha River. The New River System has no more than 45 native species, 8 of which are endemic (found nowhere else in the world) (Jenkins and Burkhead, 1994). Many or most of the native species of the New River System are cold tolerant and thought to be relicts of Pleistocene glaciation (Jenkins and Burkhead, 1994). Many researchers have studied the routes of dispersal for the rest of the native species (Cope, 1868; Addair, 1944; Hocutt and others, 1978, Hocutt and others, 1979; Jenkins and Burkhead, 1994). Whatever the route of natural dispersal into the New River System, at the arrival of Europeans the New River was a depauperate (lacking in species) warm-water system surrounded by environmentally similar stream systems with richer faunas.
Starnes and Etnier (1986) consider much of all fish zoogeography speculative. The native status of several fish species in the New River System is not definitely known, because studies extensive enough to document fish species distribution were not done until after many non-native species were well established in many streams. Stocking records show that some fish species were introduced soon after the first survey of the fish in the basin, when collections were made at only four sites in Virginia (Cope, 1868; Jenkins and Burkhead, 1994). The second survey of the basin’s fish (at fewer than 10 sites) was made in response to a reported precipitous decline in Appalachian Plateaus fish populations caused by elimination of the virgin forest and related events, including widespread fires and commercial harvesting of stream fish using explosives (Goldsborough and Clark, 1908; Clarkson, 1964). No extensive basinwide fish collections were made until the 1930’s, well after fisheries managers had pursued aggressive stocking programs but probably before rapid transportation enabled anglers to move bait species extensively across drainage boundaries.
Addair (1944) collected fish throughout the West Virginia part of the basin during the 1930’s. He collected 28 fish species from about 50 sites upstream from Kanawha Falls, and some of these (smallmouth, spotted, and rock bass, common carp) were known introductions. Addair collected fish only by seining. Fish collection technology has improved since the 1930’s, making it possible to collect more species of fish from a given stream reach, including species that might have been present but not abundant during Addair’s surveys. However, human movement of bait fish across drainage basin boundaries became widespread during or shortly after Addair’s surveys. These trends combine to make the native status of species first collected in the basin since Addair’s collections ambiguous. Scientific judgment of the native status of several species in the New River System has changed through time (Jenkins and others, 1972; Hocutt, Stauffer, and Jenkins, 1986; Jenkins and Burkhead, 1994). Known non-native fish species continue to expand their ranges in the New River System (Cincotta and others, 1999); this expansion suggests that some species presently considered native or tentatively native, which were first collected in the 1970’s at only a few sites but are now more widespread, may not be native.New River