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In existence since the time of the dinosaurs, sturgeons have remained nearly unchanged for 70 million years. These large, impressive fish can live to be 100 years old. But the longevity of the Kootenai River population is waning. It hasn’t reproduced in sustainable numbers in at least 30 years due to the alteration of its watershed habitat. The Center is fighting to preserve the sturgeon by protecting this habitat.
ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT PROFILE
PROTECTION STATUS: Endangered
YEAR PLACED ON LIST: 1994
CRITICAL HABITAT: 18 river miles of Idaho’s Kootenai River designated in 2006
RECOVERY PLAN: 1999
THREATS: The operation of Libby Dam, which has altered the sturgeon’s Kootenai River habitat and removed almost all possibility of the population’s reproduction
POPULATION TREND: In decline since the mid-1960s, the Kootenai River white sturgeon population has had almost no reproduction since 1974.
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SAVING THE KOOTENAI RIVER WHITE STURGEON
Since 1975, Libby Dam has altered the Kootenai River habitat by reducing spring peak flows by more than 50 percent and increasing winter flows by nearly 300 percent. The river’s flow has been so weakened that there is no water deep or swift enough to cue its sturgeon to migrate upstream to appropriate spawning habitat. Instead, sturgeon are spawning over areas with a sandy river bottom, where their eggs become encased in sand and drift downriver to die.
The Kootenai River white sturgeon hasn't had a successful spawning season since the gates of Libby Dam closed in 1975. Population estimates indicate that there are fewer than 500 adult sturgeon left in the Kootenai, and that they’re declining by a catastrophic 9 percent per year. The Kootenai population is aging, and unless more young fish live to spawning age, the species likely will be extinct in as few as 20 years.
In 1999, five years after the fish was designated as an endangered species, the Center filed suit to get the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to declare critical habitat for the sturgeon. The Service came back with a proposal to designate 11.2 miles of already-protected river miles as critical habitat — an area with a sandy bottom, which is a deathtrap for sturgeon eggs. In 2003, we sued the Service to force it to designate more critical habitat. We also sued the Army Corps of Engineers to force it to change the dam’s operation to allow the sturgeon to survive.
The Center won the suit to force the designation of more critical habitat, and the Service published an interim rule protecting an additional area — with appropriate sturgeon spawning habitat — in 2006, finalizing the rule in 2008. The suit against the Corps over its management of the dam is ongoing.
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Contact: Noah Greenwald
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