The alewife is chiefly a plankton feeder like the herring; copepods, amphipods, shrimps, and appendicularians were the chief diet of specimens examined by Vinal Edwards and by Linton [page 104] at Woods Hole. However, they also take small fish, such as herring, eels, launce, cunners, and their own species, as well as fish eggs. Unlike herring, alewives often contain diatoms even when adult. Alewives fast when they are running upstream to spawn, but when the spent fish reach brackish water on their return they feed ravenously on the shrimp that abound in the tidal estuaries and which they can be seen pursuing. We have often hooked alewives on an artificial fly at such times.” Bigelow p.101