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Alternative restocking strategy could reverse declines of a critically endangered sturgeon

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2022

Joshua H Daskin Open the ORCID record for Joshua H Daskin [Opens in a new window]  and
Andrew R Tilman
Joshua H Daskin*
Affiliation:
US Fish and Wildlife Service, Division of Conservation and Classification, Falls Church, VA22041, USA Current address: Archbold Biological Station, Venus, FL33960, USA
Andrew R Tilman
Affiliation:
University of Pennsylvania, Department of Biology, Philadelphia, PA19104, USA
*
Author for correspondence: Dr Joshua H Daskin, Email: jhdaskin@gmail.com
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Summary

Demographic modelling can reveal options for improved conservation management, especially for rare or long-lived species not amenable to experimentation. Sturgeon (Acipenseridae) include many such species, endangered by demand for caviar, their unfertilized roe, and by dams blocking their migrations. Restocking of sturgeon populations with farm-raised individuals has probably prevented extinctions and widespread extirpations of some species, but it has rarely led to true recovery in Eurasia, given ongoing harvest. We used modified Leslie matrix models to test whether restocking with year-old juveniles instead of weeks-old fry could recover the critically endangered Amur sturgeon (Acipenser schrenckii), endemic to the Amur River basin along the Russia–China border. Without restocking, or even releasing an expert-recommended annual volume of young fry (10 million), we project that three of four Amur sturgeon populations will be nearly extirpated within 30 years. However, restocking with 5% as many (500 000) year-old juveniles annually could grow three populations (currently 0–425 mature females) and slow declines in another so that each has over 6400 mature females within 30 years. Retooling stocking efforts to use fewer juveniles that survive at higher rates than do small fry could buy time to reduce harvesting pressure on Amur sturgeon and for other related sturgeon species.

Keywords

AcipenserAmurChinaCITESfishharvestmatrix modeloverfishingpopulation viability analysisRussia
Type
Report
Information
Environmental Conservation , Volume 49 , Issue 1 , March 2022 , pp. 53 - 58
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Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Foundation for Environmental Conservation

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