By the Light of the Sturgeon Moon

The August full moon is often called the Sturgeon Moon. According to the Old Farmer’s Almanac, sturgeon (a type of fish) are more easily caught in August and early September. Neither Barbie nor Ken is a fishing fanatic. So that bit of info would not appear to matter.

But they are environmentally conscious. The mighty Missouri River used to provide a habitat where the pallid sturgeon flourished. In its slow-moving muddy waters, the species proved frisky enough to outlive the dinosaurs. 

But during the 20th century, the building of upstream dams made for great game fishing of northern pike and other species.  The Dakotas and Montana now count on these activities for tourism. These projects also provided modest tools to limit flooding through Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri.

Downstream, the river was tamed by carving out a trough for shipping which made barge traffic practical. Today, the Missouri River channel has been narrowed by as much as 80%.  This human intervention has narrowed and deepened the river.  That eliminated the critical habitat of a previously slow-moving river. Organic material clouded the Missouri River and nurtured the pallid sturgeon for thousands of years.

Taken together, both developments have been bad for the pallid sturgeon. The fish do poorly in the deep, northern reservoirs. Likewise, the narrowed and faster-moving sections below the dams make for a lousy home.

When pallid sturgeon eggs hatch, the larval fish drift for up to two weeks before they can swim on their own. So today, pallid sturgeon hatched below the dams, are likely to be flushed into the churning Mississippi River within a week. Even if they didn’t wander that far, the Missouri current could be too stiff for them to handle.

Therefore, the pallid sturgeon . . .

. . . isn’t having much luck spawning in the wild anymore. These fish need help. So in 1990, the federal government added the pallid sturgeon to the endangered species list. Three hours south of Kansas City, in Neosho, Missouri, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service maintains a fish hatchery. Here a village of scientists breeds the fish. 

When a hard-to-find pure-bred female pallid sturgeon turns up, fertility crews spring into action. This process can take a year or more, depending on the female’s fertility cycle. Only when they succeed in nurturing the resulting offspring to their juvenile stage are these young set free in the Missouri River.

Today those young hatchery fish survive at reasonable rates in the river. However, there’s still little sign of spawning in the wild. So the fish are still unable to survive without the help of man. Thus continues the vicious cycle of testy fights between upstream and downstream interests regarding the management of the Missouri River.