Rick Karlin reports for the Times Union that the Riverkeeper environmental group is getting a $150,000 grant from the state Department of Environmental Conservation to begin to remove the Mill Creek Dam. The group says that will help American eel and river herring travel from the Atlantic Ocean to this stream off the Hudson River in Rensselaer County. “We’re trying to restore the creeks for migratory species,” said George Jackman, senior habitat restoration manager for the Riverkeeper environmental group. “Since colonial times, the creeks one by one got walled off and dammed,” Jackman says. This dam was built in the 19th century for a felt mill. The numbers of both eel and herring have fallen lately, due to overfishing and disease. Riverkeeper estimates there are 1,600 dams on rivers and streams in the Hudson Valley. Riverkeeper is targeting dams that present the first barriers that fish swimming up the Hudson River might encounter after they head upstream. “Those are the ones that are strategically important to us,” Jackman said. Read more about this story in the Times Union.