When is a fisher not an angler?

In February 2023, an unlucky fisher was crossing the road and was struck and killed in Ashtabula County, Ohio. It wasn’t the ACSO, BCI, FBI, NCIS or other acronymic law agency contacted — it was the DOW, the Division of Wildlife. The case has been solved to the agency’s satisfaction and a public statement has been released. First, let’s learn about the victim.

This fisher was not an angler, it had four legs, a long, low profile while moving along the ground and its kind averaged 32 to 40 inches in length, including a tapering, 12 to 16-inch tail — about the same size as a fox. Often referred to as the “fisher cat”, that name could not be any more poorly chosen. The fisher is a member of the weasel family and is neither related to any cat nor does it expressly ever feed on fish. While its larger cousin, the river otter, is quite the angler, the fisher enjoys hunting the forest canopy and understory.

The legs of a fisher are short and strong with feet that possess retractable claws used to aid in climbing. Their fur is a dense, glossy, chocolate brown while the fur on the tail, legs and rump is usually black. The fur on the back and shoulders is often grizzled with gold and silver and enhanced by tricolored guard hairs. Males are often considerably larger than the females.

Primarily carnivores, they’ll also eat berries and fruit when available. They hunt rabbits, snowshoe hares, squirrels, raccoons, mice, reptiles, amphibians, insects, carrion and the occasional wandering house cat. Even though fishers are not fishermen, they will eat dead fish found on the shore. They are also one of the few mammals that prey on porcupines — a kind of sticky expertise with a bonus of built-in toothpicks.

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, fishers were virtually eliminated from most American states and eastern Canada including Nova Scotia. As is the case for most wildlife loss, it was the destruction of habitat that was the cause for the fisher’s disappearance although unregulated over-trapping quickened their population’s decline. By the 1930’s, states had placed restrictions on fisher trapping and much of the heavy eastern logging boom was coming to an end.

The focus on improving forest harvest management, natural resource protection and the regrowth of abandoned farmland helped remnant fisher populations to begin a very slow recovery in some areas. To help reestablish this arboreal weasel and welcome it to its ancestral range, fisher reintroduction efforts have occurred in Idaho, Michigan, Montana, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, West Virginia and Wisconsin. There have been similar efforts in the western U.S. but those have proven less successful than in the east and have not resulted in significant range expansion.

Getting back to that Ashtabula fisher, the Division of Wildlife now reports that it was pregnant at the time it was killed, although he hadn’t the opportunity to give birth. What this does mean is that this is a sign that fishers are colonizing Ohio.

This was exciting but not unexpected by many biologists. Fishers had been extirpated from the state by the mid-1800s and there was no sign of hide nor hair of this tree-climbing weasel for over 150 years. Then, in 2013, the first Ohio fisher was sighted and confirmed. Since then, there have been 40 confirmed fisher observations across nine northeast Ohio counties: Ashtabula, Columbiana, Geauga, Trumbull, Mahoning, Lake, Jefferson, Harrison and Tuscarawas.

Two-thirds of those sightings have occurred in the last three years. Many of these sightings can be linked to the seemingly ever-present trail cameras popular with hunters and wildlife enthusiasts. The division collects roadkill fishers found in Ohio, when possible, to determine age and test genetics.

In February 2023, biologists collected two roadkill fisher carcasses from northeast Ohio. Recently received laboratory results are what discovered that the Ashtabula animal was pregnant. The Division of Wildlife anticipates natural reproduction in fishers will be confirmed in the coming years or may already be occurring.

It’s important to note that the Ohio Division of Wildlife has never been involved in a fisher reintroduction program, so where are they originating? The key to the mystery can be found in the Keystone — Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania Game Commission began its relocation program in 1994 with its first relocation of wild-trapped fishers from New Hampshire and those efforts to protect and relocate continued. It hoped that a breeding population would take hold and begin expanding and re-colonizing its traditional range.

The commission’s long-term goal was to help establish a viable, healthy population that could offer a future possibility of a sustainable harvest. In 2010, just 16 years after the initial reintroduction, biologists concluded the time was right for a limited trapping season — much earlier than originally predicted. They based the decision upon the rapidly escalating roadkills, as well as the numbers of fishers caught unintentionally in trappers’ foot-hold traps. “We didn’t think it was in the near future at all, but boy they’ve increased quickly,” said Tom Hardisky, a Game Commission furbearer biologist. “It’s incredible. It’s almost an exponential growth.”

In 1844, John James Audubon used a fisher that was captured north of Harrisburg as the inspiration for his illustration in his book, “The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America.” Since 1851, his work served as one of America’s best wildlife reference books, giving that fisher a bibliographic immortality. They were gone shortly after his book was released. Today, they are slowly regaining a foothold in areas they were once considered common.

The Ohio Division of Wildlife relies in part on public reports to monitor Ohio’s growing fisher population, as well as black bears, badgers, weasels and bobcats. Report observations of these species, including photos or videos, to the Division of Wildlife via the HuntFish OH mobile app or at wildohio.gov. Please contact your county wildlife officer to report roadkill fishers. It’s not permitted to collect roadkill carcasses.

What’s the future for the fisher in Ohio? It’s likely that as populations expand in neighboring Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Michigan, the chance of the animal re-inhabiting the more heavily forested counties of Northeast and Southeast Ohio is no longer a question of “if” but one of time. I, for one, look forward to their return.

“Only if we understand, will we care. Only if we care, will we help. Only if we help, shall all be saved.”

— Jane Goodall