180 lb Sturgeon?

[Havin' Fun]

Anyone hear about this or have any info on this monster? Or did I just hear a new folk lore?

Seams rather "fishy" to me. 180lbs is ridiculous!

[This message has been edited by Hammer em' (edited 02-17-2004).]

[Xplorer]

Actually 188 pounds.
http://www.jsonline.com/outdoors/feb04/207669.asp
Article about the brute!
Xplorer

[Havin' Fun]

Holy dump!!!

[FishinFix]

That whole idea seems like a slaughter fest. Pulling that many fish in two days seems sort of sad to me. These fish are dinosaurs in my book. I enjoy fishing sturgeon with a rod and reel but always practice CPR. I never knew one could or should I say thousands of people could spear for sturgeon. But anyways that's just my opinion. 188 lbs. that's a monster.

An In-Law of mine holds the record for rod and reel at 176 lbs. That's on 12lb test and a med heavy rod back in the 70's. when the equipment wasn't nearly what we have today. And that fish still swims the lake I fish today.

[can it be luck?]

The 2004 lake sturgeon spearing season on Lake Winnebago opens this Saturday, Feb. 14. Spearers must have purchased their spearing tags by last Oct. 31 to participate in this season. Those who did purchase tags will enjoy a higher harvest cap for sturgeon this year, because the number of sturgeon speared in both 2002 and 2003 remained below levels set to protect populations of this ancient, slowing-maturing fish.

The 2004 season represents the 73rd consecutive spearing season on Lake Winnebago. The Winnebago System supports North America’s largest self-sustaining population of lake sturgeon and boasts the world’s oldest program to manage their population; DNR’s sturgeon management program celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2003.

The harvest is limited to 5 percent of the adult lake sturgeon population because overharvest can crash a population and rebuilding can take generations because female lake sturgeon don’t start spawning until they are 20 to 25 years, and then spawn only every three to five years. When spearers reach 80 percent of any of those harvest caps, the season closes at the end of spearing hours the next day. If none of those triggers are reached, the season closes after 16 days.

OSHKOSH, Wis. (7/5/01) -- More than 375 leading scientists from 23 countries will converge on this small Wisconsin town next week to share the latest research on the world's sturgeon populations and see firsthand why the numbers of Lake Winnebago's sturgeon have quadrupled in the last 40 years while populations of this ancient fish have collapsed in many other countries.

The 4th International Symposium on Sturgeon runs July 8-13 at the Park Plaza International Hotel and Conference Center in downtown Oshkosh. The symposium will feature scientific presentations and workshops and presentations on law enforcement and public involvement. Participants will visit a site on Wolf River where state fisheries biologists will use electrofishing boats to bring lake sturgeon to the water's surface to be netted, tagged and measured; the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Great Lakes WATER Institute, a laboratory that studies sturgeon; and the Menominee Indian Reservation, where symposium participants will learn about the Menominee's' cooperative effort with state and federal government to restore lake sturgeon to their tribal waters.

"This symposium provides a forum for leading sturgeon scientists, natural resource managers and aquaculturists to come together to share information and learn from one another and from the successful management program we have here," says Ronald Bruch, a Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources sturgeon biologist and member of the symposium steering committee. Fred Binkowski, University of Wisconsin Sea Grant aquaculture specialist and another member of the steering committee, said that the symposium will help set the future course of research and management worldwide for a species that "desperately needs help in many parts of the world and in our own country."

Twenty-five different species of sturgeon cruise the waters of the northern hemisphere, relics from 100 to 200 million years ago that have survived since the time dinosaurs roamed the earth, Bruch says. Now, many of these sturgeon species teeter on the brink of collapse in the Caspian Sea, in Europe, and in some parts of the United States. Poaching, dam-building, pollution and habitat loss have all taken their toll, Bruch said, with poaching becoming rampant in some parts of the world. "Sturgeon are very good at surviving," Bruch said. "They can survive drought, climate changes, food shortages. One thing they cannot survive, though, is overharvest. They're very sensitive to too many of them being taken out of the population."

Demand is greatest for female sturgeon, which produce the eggs from which caviar is made. However, females are slow to mature sexually. Lake sturgeon, for instance, do not spawn until they are 20 to 25 years old and then only every three or five years, although some other sturgeon species mature sexually at an earlier age.

In the Caspian Sea, which supplies 90 percent of the world's best caviar, poaching has flourished since the Soviet Union broke up in the early 1990s, and sturgeon stocks have plummeted. The United Nations agency that oversees trade in endangered species last week rejected a ban on Caspian Sea caviar proposed by a scientific advisory body but gave the countries bordering the Caspian until the end of the year to reach an agreement on better managing sturgeon resources and to conduct a survey of caviar stocks.

A special symposium workshop will be dedicated to law enforcement and trade issues in different states, provinces and countries and to the treaty that governs trade in sturgeon and other internationally endangered resources. Sponsors of the 4th International Symposium on Sturgeon include Sturgeon for Tomorrow, the Great Lakes Fishery Trust, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Great Lakes WATER Institute, University of Wisconsin Sea Grant Institute, the Menominee Indian Nation, the University of California-Davis, and RL&L Environmental Services, Ltd.

Binkowski, also a senior scientist with the WATER Institute, thinks that symposium participants will be receptive to the management model they'll see at work in Wisconsin.

"I think that the majority of them will be going back to their respective countries with a clear understanding and a better appreciation for preserving the wild resource and not necessarily putting the emphasis on commercializing it," says Binkowski, who has conducted sturgeon research at the WATER Institute for the past 20 years. Historically, lake sturgeon were found in most of the major rivers systems in Wisconsin and all of the state's boundary waters, which would include Lake Michigan, Lake Superior, Green Bay, and the Mississippi River, Binkowski says.

But lake sturgeon populations were decimated in the late 1800s by commercial fishermen who regarded the gigantic fish as a nuisance because they tore the nets used to catch more commercially valuable fish. Fishermen then realized lake sturgeon had many uses-for caviar, meat, leather, oil, glue, and a gelatin that could be used for making jams and jellies and for clarifying alcoholic beverages-and fished them until their populations plummeted. In 1903, Wisconsin began developing regulations to better protect the population. In 1915, it closed the harvest season and then banned the commercial sale of sturgeon caviar and flesh.

For the past 70 years, Wisconsin has allowed a limited recreational spearing season on Lake Winnebago and a brief hook-and-line season for lake sturgeon populations on the Lower Wisconsin River and on other waters supporting a self-sustaining population.

"The key to the success story of having the largest and healthiest lake sturgeon population in the world in Wisconsin has to do with two main issues," Binkowski said. "Good biological management and good, strong law enforcement regulation. "

# # # # # # # # # # # # # #
Created in 1966, Sea Grant is a national network of 29 university-based programs of research, outreach, and education dedicated to the protection and sustainable use of the United States' coastal, ocean, and Great Lakes resources. The National Sea Grant Network is a partnership of participating coastal states, private industry, and the National Sea Grant College Program, National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce.

John Karl
Science Writer

University of Wisconsin Sea Grant Institute
1975 Willow Drive
Madison, WI 53706-1103

Phone: (608) 263-8621
FAX: (608) 262-0591

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http://groups.msn.com/canitbeluck

[This message has been edited by can it be luck? (edited 02-17-2004).]

[biff]

What century is this?

[biff]

Just a uh, stab at the whole spearing thing. But anyway, I dont want to get into the whole spearing debate...I wonder if these things would bite under the ice. I can see it now maybe a jig and cutbait, monster sturgeon, screaming drag as the unseen behemoth runs away under the ice; I dont suppose anyone has tried this? Anyway they are a fun fish on rod and reel...180+ pounds would be one epic battle.

[AWH]

I've heard of a number of them that have been caught through the ice. So they are catchable in ways other than by spear in the hard water season.

[Bagoeyes]

They are catchable with hook and line, especially in the spring when they are in the wolf river with the walleyes. It is illegal to take they out of the water at all though and you must cut your line. I was fortunate enough to spear 1 this year in my first time out. Most fish that are speared weigh around 40lbs, the big girl was a new record. This year was an abnormal year with the number of fish taken. About 1 in 8 tags were filled which is crazy. Many people go for years without even seeing 1 and often miss when they do.

[Sinker]

What a monster.Good for them.I have never speared but have caught sturgeon while ice fishing on the St. Croix River when fishing for walleye.If you spear,enjoy it.If you don't think it's right,don't spear.End of story.I believe the WI. DNR has a handle on the sturgeon harvest,as "Can it be Luck" mentioned.It's quite a successful sturgeon population they are managing.As for ethics,it's no different than spearing a big northern pike,which I believe is legal in MN.