WWF prepares new resettlement of sturgeons in Danube

WWF prepares new resettlement of sturgeons in Danube
WWF Bulgaria is resettling the sterlets under a project funded by Operational Programme “Environment” within which we will release total of 50 000 tagged small sturgeons. After the new “parcel” of sterlets reaches sizes of about 10 cm, each of them will be tagged with a brand with unique number. Thus after some time we will know which sterlets are of natural origin and which not. This information is of crucial importance since at the moment there is almost no official data for the status of the four remained Danubean sturgeons or for their places of reproduction. The most adequate way for preservation of a species is the conservation of the environment which it inhabits. For this reason within this project we conduct research of the places of reproduction of sturgeons.

However, the project is coming to its end and we sought the opinion and the cooperation of the competent institutions and stakeholders for the achieved results so far and for the future steps. In Sofia we met with nearly 40 representatives of authorities, fishermen associations, nature parks and scientists. The participants in the consultative council showed considerable interest to the work of WWF Bulgaria on sturgeon conservation and shared their opinion how the species state could be make better. According to the specialists it is important that the measures, such as the ban for sturgeon fishing, be joint with the Romanian ones; since for the fish the state boundaries do not matter. This proposal is significant because the Bulgarian and Romanian ban expires in 2015 and a decision whether to be extended is pending.

More information for the work of WWF Bulgaria for the sturgeons you can find on our website.

Here you can find pictures of the newly hatched sterlets and use them referring to the author WWF/Stoyan Mihov.

Watch our website also for news about the new resettlement of sterlets.