Field and Genetic Approaches to Enhance Knowledge of Ural River Sturgeon Biology

Doukakis, Phaedra; Erickson, Daniel L.; Baimukhanov, Mirgaly; Bokova, Yelena; Erbulekov, Sagiden; Nimatov, Akhat; Pikitch, Ellen K.

doi:10.1007/978-1-4020-8924-4_13

Cited by 4 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 41 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Estimates of age‐ or stage‐specific natural mortality would improve the estimates of the management benchmarks. We also assumed the Ural River population was independent of those spawning in other rivers, which may not be the case (Doukakis et al 2004, 2008).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Management and Recovery Options for Ural River Beluga Sturgeon

Doukakis

Babcock

Pikitch

et al. 2010

Conservation Biology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Management of declining fisheries of anadromous species sometimes relies heavily on supplementation of populations with captive breeding, despite evidence that captive breeding can have negative consequences and may not address the root cause of decline. The beluga sturgeon (Huso huso), a species threatened by the market for black caviar and reductions in habitat quality, is managed through harvest control and hatchery supplementation, with an emphasis on the latter. We used yield per recruit and elasticity analyses to evaluate the population status and current levels of fishing and to identify the life-history stages that are the best targets for conservation of beluga of the Ural River. Harvest rates in recent years were four to five times higher than rates that would sustain population abundance. Sustainable rates of fishing mortality are similar to those for other long-lived marine species such as sharks and mammals. Yield per recruit, which is maximized if fish are first harvested at age 31 years, would be greatly enhanced by raising minimum size limits or reducing illegal take of subadults. Improving the survival of subadult and adult females would increase population productivity by 10 times that achieved by improving fecundity and survival from egg to age 1 year (i.e., hatchery supplementation). These results suggest that reducing mortality of subadults and adult wild fish is a more effective conservation strategy than hatchery supplementation. Because genetics is not factored into hatchery management practices, supplementation may even reduce the viability of the beluga sturgeon.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Management and Recovery Options for Ural River Beluga Sturgeon

Doukakis

Babcock

Pikitch

et al. 2010

Conservation Biology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Other researchers who have attempted to use PSATs to describe horizontal movements of sturgeons are Erickson and Hightower (2007) with Green Sturgeons ( Acipenser medirostris ), Edwards et al. (2007) with Gulf Sturgeons ( Acispenser oxyrinchus desotoi ), and Doukakis et al. (2008) with Beluga ( Huso huso ) and Ship Sturgeons ( Acipenser nudiventris ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Gulf Sturgeons shed PSATs soon after tagging and therefore did not provide meaningful tracking information (Edwards et al., 2007). Radio‐frequency interference in the Caspian Sea region was so severe that Doukakis et al. (2008) recovered almost no useable data from PSATs.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Use of pop-up satellite archival tags to identify oceanic-migratory patterns for adult Atlantic Sturgeon, Acipenser oxyrinchus oxyrinchus Mitchell, 1815

Erickson

Kahnle

Millard

et al. 2011

Journal of Applied Ichthyology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Summary Oceanic‐migratory behavior of adult Atlantic Sturgeon, Acipenser oxyrinchus oxyrinchus, was examined using pop‐up satellite archival tags (PSAT). Twenty‐three Atlantic Sturgeons were caught and tagged with PSATs in the Hudson River, New York during 2006 and 2007. Fifteen of those fish returned to the ocean (with PSATs attached) 6–132 days after tagging. These PSATs remained attached to fish for a period of 108–360 days archiving light, temperature, and depth, before releasing from fish, ascending to the surface, and transmitting data to satellites. The location of PSATs was measured to within ±150 m by satellites using Doppler shift of radio transmissions within hours after tags reached the surface. Positions prior to pop up were initially estimated using only archived‐light data and the tag manufacturers’ proprietary software. Positional error associated with light‐based estimates is high, especially with regard to latitude. This error was reduced by applying depth, distance, and temperature filters. Thirteen of the 15 Atlantic Sturgeons that left the Hudson River with PSATs attached remained within the Mid‐Atlantic Bight for up to 1 year after tagging. Their geographic distributions generally extended from Long Island, New York to Chesapeake Bay at depths between 5 and 40 m. Aggregation areas were identified off southwest Long Island, along the New Jersey coast, off Delaware Bay, and off Chesapeake Bay. Depth distribution was seasonal; fish inhabited deepest waters during winter and shallowest waters during summer and early fall. Two Atlantic Sturgeons traveled outside of the Mid‐Atlantic Bight. One migrated north to Cobequid Bay (terminal end of the Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia), whereas the other traveled south to the coast of Georgia.

show abstract

“…The global climatic changes that are driving up temperatures in the basin and altering flows are enormously difficult to counteract, and steps to prevent pollution from entering the river would be costly. Moreover, although spawning, early rearing, and the feeding behavior of sturgeon are reasonably well understood, lack of knowledge about other aspects of sturgeon biology adds ambiguity to the problem of habitat restoration [1,106]. The overall challenge is compounded in the Ural River, which hosts multiple sturgeon species, each with its own needs and preferences.…”

Section: Habitatmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Reliance on a narrow gene pool from captive broodstock increases the likelihood of loss of fitness and introduction of undesirable characteristics into the population [139,141]. Moreover, the routes and timing of natural sturgeon migrations in the Caspian basin are not yet fully understood; new methods to monitor fish movements are available, but the scarcity of residual Caspian sturgeon populations has made it difficult to exploit them to increase our understanding of sturgeon biology and behavior [30,106,142,143]. The release of juveniles into wild populations characterized by depleted gene pools may also lead to undesirable interspecific hybridization [19,144,145].…”

Section: Stockingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Re-Establishing Naturally Reproducing Sturgeon Populations in the Caspian Basin: A Wicked Problem in the Ural River

Pueppke,

Nurtazin,

Murzashev

et al. 2023

Water

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Although Eurasia’s Caspian basin once supported the world’s richest and most diverse complex of sturgeon species, recent human activities have decimated populations of these ecologically and economically important fish. All five anadromous Caspian sturgeon species are critically endangered, and the potamodromous sterlet is also threatened. The precipitous decline of these species is due to a combination of factors that includes illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing; destruction of feeding and spawning habitat; water pollution; and the environmental consequences of climate change. International efforts are currently underway to re-establish sustained naturally reproducing sturgeon populations in the basin. Here, we update and review the status of sturgeon in the Caspian Sea with emphasis on the northern basin and the inflowing Volga and Ural rivers. We then focus on efforts to restore sturgeon in the Ural, which originates in Russia and flows through Kazakhstan before entering the Caspian Sea. With nearly ideal hydrological conditions for sturgeon, the Ural is the basin’s sole remaining river that allows migrating sturgeon unimpeded access to potentially productive spawning grounds. The challenge of re-establishing sturgeon in the Ural River exhibits the classical characteristics of wicked problems: ambiguous definitions, changing assumptions and unanticipated consequences, tradeoffs and economic dependencies, an incomplete and contradictory knowledge base, and no straightforward pathway toward a final solution. This challenge is examined here for the first time from the perspective of its wicked dynamics, with consideration given to approaches that have proven effective elsewhere in resolving wicked environmental problems.

show abstract

Field and Genetic Approaches to Enhance Knowledge of Ural River Sturgeon Biology

Cited by 4 publications

References 41 publications

Management and Recovery Options for Ural River Beluga Sturgeon

Management and Recovery Options for Ural River Beluga Sturgeon

Use of pop-up satellite archival tags to identify oceanic-migratory patterns for adult Atlantic Sturgeon, Acipenser oxyrinchus oxyrinchus Mitchell, 1815

Re-Establishing Naturally Reproducing Sturgeon Populations in the Caspian Basin: A Wicked Problem in the Ural River

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About