US: 500 young sturgeons were released into the Saginaw River system

Five hundred young sturgeon were released at four locations into the Saginaw River system last week as part of an ongoing effort by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Michigan State University to rebuild the giant fish's population.The sturgeons came from the Black Lake Stream Side Rearing Facility in Onaway, a facility opened by the DNR and MSU that supplies hatcheries all over the state. Each August, sturgeons are also released into the Black River, Mullett Lake in Cheboygan County, and the Boardman River in Grand Traverse County, the DNR and MSU said in a news release Wednesday.Researchers, graduate students and undergraduates catch newly hatched surgeons in the spring and raise them until August, the news release said. Over the three months, the sturgeons grow from less than 1 inch to 7 inches in length. They are then tagged with passive integrated transponders similar to pet microchips and released into rivers around the state.Illegal harvesting of sturgeons has ...