2010 Lake Sturgeon Spawning
And it begins...
Come Face To Face With Prehistory
Become one of the crowd as lake sturgeon make their annual spawning run up the Wolf River, Wisconsin.
Wolf River Sturgeon Spawning Update (4/02/10)
The warm weather over then last couple of weeks has our spring about 7 to 10 days ahead of schedule causing significant numbers of sturgeon to begin their final pre-spawn movements earlier than normal this year. Water temperature is the main driver of sturgeon spawning activity, including the rate of water warming, and the Wolf River from Shawano to New London is almost 50 degrees F approaching the optimal sturgeon spawning of 54-56 degrees. The upper Fox River is already at optimal spawning temperature for our sturgeon, but we have not seen any spawning activity yet. In years like this when the water warms very quickly, the sturgeon typically spawn at a higher temperature in the upper 50s. In years when we have a long cold spring and the water warms very slowing the sturgeon typically spawn at a much lower temperature in the low 50s. You can track water temperatures in both rivers on-line at the USGS web pages that report real-time data from flow and temperature gauges at New London on the Wolf River and at Berlin on the upper Fox River. Sturgeon spearing license funds are used to pay for operation of the real-time temperature probes at both of these sites. We use the data to track temperatures in the rivers which helps immensely with planning our spawning assessment work for sturgeon each spring.
http://dnr.wi.gov/fish/sturgeon/sturgeon_spawning.html
