Edited by Paul Holtan
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources
PO Box 7921
Madison WI 53707
(608) 267-7517
Fax: (608) 264-6293
E-mail address: paul.holtan@dnr.state.wi.us

Mississippi River States Seek To Increase Protection For Shovelnose Sturgeon

PRAIRIE Du CHIEN, Wis. – An international ban on the harvest of sturgeon for caviar from the former Soviet Union is shifting interest to other sources of the high-priced delicacy, including the Mississippi River.

In response, Wisconsin and other Midwestern states along the river are considering rule changes to assure greater protection of their remaining populations of shovelnose sturgeon in light of the burgeoning legal and illegal harvest of that sturgeon in the Upper Mississippi Basin.

Iowa has already enacted more protective measures, and Wisconsin and Illinois are seeking to tighten their rules. On Aug. 16, Wisconsin’s Natural Resources Board will consider authorizing public hearings for increasing the minimum length limit for shovel nose sturgeon. The minimum length proposed is 27 inches, measured to the fork of its tail, from 25 inches in total length.

The proposal adds a maximum harvest length to protect against harvest of lake sturgeon and pallid sturgeon, two similar looking species of sturgeon that grow larger than shovelnose sturgeon. Commercial fishers would be required to keep the eggs intact inside the fish until they bring their harvest to an approved, off-shore processing facility.

“Shovelnose sturgeon are a prehistoric fish. They have been in our waters since before man and they are an important part of the ecosystem,” says Patrick Short, Department of Natural Resources fisheries biologist stationed in Prairie du Chien. “We believe if we don’t move forward with the regulation now, there’s a good chance the shovelnose population could suffer irrevocable damage.”

The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, a United Nations agency, earlier this year banned export of caviar from four Caspian Sea countries -- Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkmenistan. These countries had previously supplied much of the world’s caviar but their sturgeon populations have been declining precipitously; the quest for eggs has since shifted, including to the United States -- the biggest market for caviar and home to several species of sturgeon, including shovelnose sturgeon and paddlefish -- where commercial harvest is allowed.

“We’re concerned about legal and illegal harvest of this ancient species – people are targeting the fish and harvesting more of them because of the money they’re getting for the roe,” Short says.

Because female shovelnose sturgeon are relatively late maturing, spawning when they reach about seven years and then not every year, removing too many females can cause the population to crash, requiring generations of fish to recover, if ever, he says.

Harvest pressure on shovelnose sturgeon is increasing all along the river as the price commercial fishers in the lower Mississippi River can fetch for shovelnose roe, or fish eggs, has increased from about $20 a pound in 2001 to $110 a pound today, Short says. Roe prices for shovelnose sturgeon from Wisconsin waters of the Mississippi River haven’t quite reached that level, but they are climbing.

Those increasing prices are spurring commercial fishers in more southerly states and in Wisconsin to increase the number of nets they put out for the fish. The southern states, in particular, are also noticing an increase in illegal activity, witnessed by the discovery of carcasses of pallid sturgeon whose bellies have been slit to look for eggs, Short says. Pallid sturgeon are federally protected.

“We haven’t seen a lot of illegal activity in Wisconsin, but some has been noted,” Short says.

The shovelnose sturgeon (Scaphirhynchus platorynchus) is the smallest of the North American sturgeons and is indigenous to large rivers of the Mississippi, Missouri and Ohio river systems. Its populations on the Mississippi were so large in the early 1800s that fishers considered them a nuisance because they got tangled in nets and destroyed them.

Shovelnose sturgeon distribution and abundance on the Mississippi and other large rivers has decreased during the last 100 years due to habitat alterations, water pollution, and overexploitation; the species is now classified as extirpated or at risk of extirpation in half of the states within its native distribution, and in the remaining states, shovelnose sturgeon populations have either declined during the past 65 years or the population status is unknown.

Currently, a significant commercial shovelnose sturgeon fishery exists in the Mississippi River upstream from the mouth of the Ohio River. While this includes fish harvested for both flesh and roe, roe sales have taken off in recent years.

In Wisconsin, for example, sale of shovelnose roe in Wisconsin was nonexistent in 2000 but is now climbing. Long-term tracking in Illinois shows that sale of shovelnose sturgeon roe has far outpaced the sale of shovelnose sturgeon flesh in recent years. The Illinois roe market alone now represents more than 50 percent of the total value of the entire Upper Mississippi River commercial fishery, Short says.

Wisconsin’s proposed rule would affect five Wisconsin-licensed commercial fishermen who currently actively pursue shovelnose sturgeon in Wisconsin-Iowa boundary waters, Short says.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT: Patrick Short (608) 326-8818; Ron Benjamin (608) 785-9012; Joe Hennessy (608) 267-9427