Artificial reef approved for sturgeon in James River

NEWPORT NEWS

The Atlantic sturgeon, a prehistoric fish that can reach 14 feet and weigh as much as 600 pounds, thrived in Virginia waters when dinosaurs roamed the planet 100 million years ago. But today, they're rarely seen here, suffering from pollution, overfishing, their own slow reproductive cycle, and ruined habitat.

On Tuesday, state regulators took a step to reverse that trend. They approved what will be the first artificial reef in the Chesapeake Bay watershed aimed at restoring the species.

Sturgeons, orange and covered with armored plates, need firm, rocky bottom on which to deposit their eggs, scientists say. Few places like that still exist in the Bay, dominated instead by soft mud and silt.

The experimental reef seeks to change this losing equation and will be built from chunks of rock and stone, 300 feet in length and 70 feet wide, in the James River near Richmond.

Sponsors expect to lay the reef early next month, just offshore from the Presquile National Wildlife Refuge in Chesterfield County, in time for spawning season this spring.

"We're not aware of anything like this on the entire East Coast," said Bill Street, executive director of the James River Association, an environmental group.

The structure is intended to give the few adult sturgeons in the James River a better chance for their eggs to latch onto something solid and successfully hatch. A scientific study indicated that the chosen site is close to where sturgeons historically have spawned in the James.

If the project shows positive results, organizers hope to build more reefs on other sites in the James. The James River project is part of a larger effort throughout the Chesapeake Bay to revive the Atlantic sturgeon and its cousin, the shortnose sturgeon, which is classified as an endangered species.

With a hard snout and bony spikes on its back, most Atlantic sturgeons top out at between 6 and 10 feet long. They typically travel throughout the Chesapeake in spring and summer, often winding up in Virginia to spawn in rivers and creeks, before leaving the Bay in the late fall and winter to wander offshore in the Atlantic.

States banned the catching of Atlantic sturgeons in 1998, but populations continued to shrink. A petition is pending before the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to declare the Atlantic sturgeon in need of federal protection.

The reef project is funded by a $50,000 federal grant. It took four years to piece together, said Frederickson, and culminated Tuesday with a unanimous vote and little debate from the Virginia Marine Resources Commission.

The James remains one of the best places in the Bay watershed to find sturgeons these days. Scientists netted more than 200 of the great fish between 2005 and 2006, many between Hopewell and Newport News, leading some to speculate that a comeback was under way.

Scott Harper, (757) 446-2340, scott.harper@pilotonline.com.