Sturgeon, America's forgotten dinosaurs, show signs of life

Sturgeon were America's vanishing disaurs, armor-plated beasts that crowded nation's rivers until mankind's craving for caviar pushed m to edge of extinction.

More than a century later, some populations of massive bottom-feeding fish are showing signs of recovery in dark corners of U.S. waterways. Increased numbers are appearing in cold streams of Maine, lakes of Michigan and Wisconsin and coffee-colored waters of Florida's Suwannee River.

A 14-foot Atlantic sturgeon as long as a Volkswn Beetle was recently spotted in New York's Hudson River.

"It's really been a dramatic reversal of fortune," said Greg Garman, a Virginia Commonwealth University ecologist who studies Atlantic sturgeon in Virginia's James River. "We didn't think y were re, frankly.

w, y're almost every place we're looking." Following late 1800s caviar rush, America's nine sturgeon species and subspecies were plagued by pollution, dams, and overfishing. Steep declines in many populations weren't fully apparent until 1990s.

"However, in past three deces, sturgeon have been among most studied species in rth America as a result of ir threatened or endangered status," said James Crossman, president of rth American Sturgeon and Pdlefish Society, a conservation group.

Scientists have been finding sturgeon in places where y were thought to be long gone. And y're seeing increased numbers of m in some rivers because of cleaner water, dam removals, and fishing bans.

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se discoveries provide some hope for a fish that is among world's most threatened.

But U.S. sturgeon population is only a tiny fraction of what it once was and health of each species and regional populations vary widely.

While some white sturgeon populations on Pacific Coast are abundant eugh to support limited recreational and commercial fishing, Alabama sturgeon are so rare that ne have been caught for years.

Across America, dams still keep some sturgeon populations low by blocking ancient spawning routes. And fish face newer threats such as rising water temperatures from climate change and sharp propellers of cargo ships.

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It will take deces to measure a population's recovery, experts say. Sturgeon sometimes live longer than humans. And y spawn infrequently, often requiring half a century to bounce back from overfishing.

Environmentalists warn that more conservation efforts are still needed.

"y've survived relatively unchanged for 200 million years," said Jeff Miller, a senior conservation vocate at Center for Biological Diversity, which is planning a lawsuit seeking federal safeguards for sturgeon in Great Lakes and Mississippi River watersheds.

"If y're going to survive us, y're going to need ditional protection." Sturgeon swam with disaurs. Bony plates line ir bodies. Whisker-like barbels hang from ir chins. ir toothless mouths telescope out and vacuum up anything from worms to mussels.

ir meat fed Native Americans, starving settlers of Jamestown and Lewis and Clark expedition. Delaware River sh fishermen would yank up ir nets as thousands of sturgeons swam toward spawning grounds. n came caviar. Russian delicacy of salt-cured sturgeon eggs became a f for Europe's new middle class and that took a heavy toll on American sturgeon.

"People just massacred m, just like we massacred buffalo," said Inga Saffron, author of 2002 history "Caviar." " difference being y were catching sturgeon as y were migrating to spawn," she said. "t only did y kill fish, y killed future generations of fish." By 1900, American sturgeon populations were collapsing. Dams were going up. Pollution sucked oxygen from rivers.

But as deces passed, fishing bans took effect, and environmental laws became stronger. Among species showing improvement is Atlantic sturgeon, whose range stretches from Florida to eastern Cana. population around Chesapeake Bay was feared to be extinct in mid-1990s. w, thousands of are believed to be re, according to Virginia Commonwealth University scientists.

Last fall, Matw Balazik, a sturgeon research ecologist with university and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, netted more than 200 baby Atlantic sturgeon in James River first seen re in years. "This could be a kind of a comeback generation," Balazik said.

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t every river is seeing improvement. Dewayne Fox, a fisheries professor at Delaware State University, said Delaware River's population remains low, possibly because of collisions with cargo vessels or dredging on spawning grounds.

But overall, Atlantic sturgeon appear to be slowly recovering after a species-wide fishing moratorium went into effect in 1998, according to a 2017 assessment by Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission.

shortse sturgeon also shows signs of bouncing back. In Maine, scientists have captured about 75 this dece on Saco River, where y were previously never seen.

In Maine's Kennebec River, shortse population nearly doubled from about 5,100 in late 1970s to more than 9,400 around 2000, and it has likely grown since, said Gail Wippelhauser, a fisheries biologist with Maine's Department of Marine Resources.