Conservation
Based Sturgeon Hatchery
One initiative that
will have to be implemented to save the Nechako white sturgeon
stock will be a hatchery program. The Provincial Government
is leading this initiative, and is conducting several activities
related to assessing the feasibility of such a program and
the required infrastructure. The program is several years
away from being implemented.
The intention of this program will
be to preserve the remaining genetic material available within
the population by creating very closely regulated crosses
of male and female adults, rearing the progeny in family units
and releasing small numbers of juveniles from each family
into the river. The hope is that fish reared in the hatchery
and released in the river as 1 year olds will have avoided
any survival constraint(s) or bottlenecks that are limiting
wild recruitment. These hatchery juveniles will also provide
critical opportunities to better understand these survival
constraints.
The intent is not to produce large numbers of sturgeon to “enhance”
the population for subsequent harvest or other uses. When the
factors causing recruitment failure are better understood and
can be redressed, hatchery releases will cease when wild production
is revived. |
