Hudson’s sturgeon vital to species’ fate

A sturgeon is tagged by a DEC crew. (Photo by Lynn Woods)

The impact that dredging and pile–driving will have on the sturgeon when construction of the two replacement spans for the Tappan Zee Bridge commences is yet another concern. John Lipscomb, Riverkeeper’s patrol boat captain, fears that the proposed dredging of a trench across the entire river for installation of construction equipment could destroy important sturgeon habitat and create a barrier to sturgeon and other fish migrating up the river to spawn. Similarly, plans to install an electric power cable from Quebec in the river could also have a negative impact on the sturgeon and other fish.

OK here, bad elsewhere

Despite these concerns, many people involved with Atlantic sturgeon on the Hudson said they were surprised when the fish was listed as endangered. The closing of the fishery 15 years ago seems to have resulted in a strengthening of the Hudson population, they said. “Anecdotally, people are constantly running into sturgeon in the ocean and river,” said one source.

Some people feel that the designation was politically expedient for the NMFS, which is under pressure to list species and had little to lose by listing the sturgeon, given the small size of the fishery.

But if the Hudson River Atlantic sturgeon is rebounding, it’s the one bright light in an otherwise bleak sturgeon picture. Atlantic sturgeon from the Delaware, once the most robust population on the planet, are barely hanging on. The fish have disappeared in nine of the 26 rivers in which they originally spawned.

Elsewhere in the world, relentless industrial activity — the building of dams, dredging, overfishing, and pollution — is wiping out these ancient fish. In Europe, where the sturgeon once ranged from the Baltic to the Black Sea, all that’s left, according to John Waldman, a biology professor at Queens College who has been studying sturgeon for 20 years, is a tiny population in a river in northernFrance. Sturgeon have been wiped out in Asia’s Yangtze and Amur rivers, and Caspian Sea caviar no longer comes from wild fish.

John Mylod, a fisherman based in Poughkeepsie, noted that the endangered listing is about to be contested. “Just last week, a couple of congressmen from New Jerseyinitiated legislation to request more money to determine the actual status of the Atlantic sturgeon populations, because nobody really knows. They want to delist the species.”

It’s a move former fisherman Steve Nack would welcome. Nack, one of a dozen or so sturgeon fishermen on the river, used to fish for sturgeon with his brother and his father, Everett Nack, near Catskill. The June run of sturgeon was part of a fishing cycle that started with shad in April and May (a fishery that has also been closed) and included eels all year round. “Most of the sturgeon we caught went to smokehouses,” Nack said.

Nack wishes the DEC would once again stock the river with fish from a hatchery, as it did in the 1990s. He said state officials had rejected this option because “the hatchery reared fish are considered genetically inferior, since they’re all hatched from one or two males and females.” Nack didn’t agree with the state’s thinking. “The hatchery fish mix with the wild fish,” he said, “and I don’t see why they wouldn’t come back here to spawn.”

Nack said he wasn’t against a sustainable fishery. But he complained about governmental policy. “On the river it’s been a very methodical chipping away of commercial fishing,” he said. “Every time something closes, it never opens again.”

Mylod used to catch sturgeon in shad nets. The meat is actually delicious, he said. A female with eggs was worth a couple of thousand dollars. After catching and tagging sturgeon for a researcher’s project in 1976, however, Mylod came to his conclusion. “We felt the animal was pretty impressive,” he said, “and didn’t feel we needed to take any more of them.”

Shortnose success story

The Hudson is home to a second species of sturgeon, the shortnose, a smaller fish that’s been an endangered species since 1967. The shortnose spends its entire lifecycle in the river and hence was particularly impacted by pollution. Its spawning grounds, located near Albany and the Troy Dam, were devastated by the disposal of raw sewage. However, thanks to cleanup of the river, the shortnose population has rebounded in the past 40 years and is estimated to be around 65,000.

Ironically, the species has benefited from the invasion of the zebra mussel, which is a favorite food, according to biologist John Waldman. “Most sturgeon populations in the world are grimly hanging on, and here we have a fourfold increase,” he said. “I can’t think of another species where that’s happened.”