Stocking efforts continue to boost lake sturgeon recovery in Red River Basin

Sep. 21—Ongoing efforts to restore lake sturgeon populations in the Red River Basin are getting another boost this fall with stocking efforts in both northeast North Dakota and northwest Minnesota.

The North Dakota Game and Fish Department stocked 1,000 fingerling lake sturgeon into the Pembina River on Monday, Sept. 16, the second stocking in as many years.

"From the sounds of it, they were very nice fish, with some in the 11-inch range," said Scott Gangl, fisheries management section leader for Game and Fish in Bismarck.

During the

inaugural Pembina River stocking,

Game and Fish crews in September 2023 stocked 1,000 lake sturgeon fingerlings at three sites upstream from Walhalla, North Dakota. The stocking was done in anticipation of a project to modify an existing low head dam on the Pembina River, near the confluence of the Red River in Pembina, North Dakota, into a rock rapids fishway.

The fishway would allow lake sturgeon and other species to move freely between the Red and Pembina rivers.

Similar to last year, Game and Fish worked with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources to secure sturgeon eggs from the Rainy River on the Minnesota-Ontario border. The sturgeon then were raised to fingerling size at the Valley City National Fish Hatchery.

On the Minnesota side of the basin, the DNR plans to stock various Red River tributaries with sturgeon fingerlings until 2029, said Nick Kludt, DNR Red River fisheries specialist.

Like Gangl of the Game and Fish Department, Kludt said the average size of this year's hatch of sturgeon fingerlings is impressive. The Valley City National Fish Hatchery, he said, "has again raised absolute 'tank' fingerlings, which I'm very excited about."

With the excellent survival from egg take until now, Kludt says the DNR plans to stock lake sturgeon in four tributaries this fall. In early October, the DNR will stock 2,500 sturgeon fingerlings in the Otter Tail River, 1,000 in the Buffalo River, 3,500 in the Red Lake River and 1,000 in the Roseau River.

In related news, the Minnesota DNR recently released a

titled "Kings of the North: Lake Sturgeon Recovery in the Red River Basin."

The video highlights decades-long efforts by the DNR and partners to restore lake sturgeon along the Red River and its basin through stocking and the removal or modification of low head dams — replacing the dams with rock rapids fishways that still hold back water but accommodate fish passage — allowing sturgeon and other species to move freely throughout the basin.

"It's a story about teamwork, innovation and perseverance to restore an iconic Minnesota species," Kludt said in a statement. "For anglers, conservationists, people interested in clean water or 'kids at heart' who think swimming dinosaurs are pretty cool, this conservation story is for all Minnesotans."

The 30-minute documentary is available on the

DNR's YouTube Channel

Success stories associated with the sturgeon recovery can be found throughout the basin. In 2022, the DNR for the first time in a century documented lake sturgeon spawning in the upper Otter Tail River, a Red River tributary. In the Grand Forks area, anglers fishing the Red River reported a number of incidental catches this past spring and summer,

including a 56-inch sturgeon Andrea Charlebois of East Grand Forks caught and released

in May during a women's fishing event.