A massive "river monster" believed to be over 100 years old was reeled in from the waters of the Detroit River.
Crew members of the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Office in Alpena, Michigan, made the catch on April 22. The rare 6-foot, 10-inch lake sturgeon, believed to be a female, weighs an impressive 240 pounds and is one of the largest sturgeons to ever be recorded in the U.S.
"She likely hatched in the Detroit River around 1920 when Detroit became the fourth-largest city in America," the agency said in a Facebook post, noting that the fish was quickly tagged then released.
"It was the biggest fish our team has ever seen," Jason Fischer, one of the fish biologists who caught the sturgeon, said in the statement to People. "This fish took all three of us to get it onto our boat."
Speaking with the Associated Press, Fischer recalled the moment he reeled in the fish.
"I felt the fish thumping on the line. As it got closer, it just got bigger and bigger," he said.
"She was tired out and didn’t fight us very much," added fellow biologist Paige Wigren. "Imagine everything that fish has lived through and seen."
According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, male surgeons typically live up to 55 years while females can live between 80 to 150 years. The fish have been recognized since the Upper Cretaceous period, which dates back 136 million years. They are now considered either threatened or endangered by 19 states. The decline in populations is largely due to over-harvesting, habitat loss, damming of tributaries, and pollution, the agency explained.
"Today, while several populations have experienced varying levels of recovery, many lake sturgeon populations remain imperiled. Lake sturgeon are now protected with strict harvest regulations in most of the waters of the Great Lake," the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said.
Although there has been a decline in sturgeon populations, Fischer noted that more than 28,000 lake sturgeon use the St. Clair-Detroit River System. Of those fish, about 5,500 come from the Detroit River.
"The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service partners with a number of other agencies and universities, including the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, U.S. Geological Survey, Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, and Michigan Sea Grant," Fischer added. "Together we monitor lake sturgeon populations in the St. Clair-Detroit River System and help populations recover through habitat restoration projects such as constructing rocky spawning reefs."
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Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
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