Mississippi River states seek to limit sturgeon, caviar industry

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Like the sturgeon they snare in their nets, caviar fishermen in Mississippi River states are increasingly being targeted because of their productivity.

Wildlife regulatory agencies in Missouri, Illinois, Tennessee and Kentucky -- the core of the Midwestern caviar industry -- are pushing new regulations aimed at limiting the size and scope of the sturgeon catch.

The goal is to spare the shovelnose sturgeon, also known as a hackleback, from joining the list of endangered or threatened species.

"Basically, every sturgeon population in the world that has been subject to harvest for the caviar industry has been depleted," said Steve Eder, the fisheries administrator for the Missouri Department of Conservation.

The most prized source of caviar is the beluga sturgeon, found in the basins of the Black and Caspian seas. But overzealous fishing recently prompted the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to declare the beluga a threatened species.

As beluga have become rare, the market for North American caviar has grown, and so has the demand for shovelnose sturgeon, a primitive fish with a long snout and bumpy back that produces small black eggs.

In Missouri, commercial fisherman caught an average of 5,000 pounds of sturgeon annually from 1945 through the 1990s. Since 2000, that has risen nearly sevenfold to an average of 34,500 pounds a year.

It typically takes several fish to reap a pound of eggs, which retails as caviar for $200 to $300.

Many southern states have long banned commercial sturgeon fishing. Texas began prohibiting it in 1980, Mississippi in 1984 and Louisiana in 1989, said Bobby Reed, a state fisheries manager in Louisiana.

As result, the caviar industry has cast its nets upstream, where there were few -- if any -- regulations until recently.

"They're targeting the shovelnose sturgeon because that's just about the only one left in the country you can fish -- all the other ones are threatened or endangered or protected," said Reed.

Missouri took its first step last year, charging a $500 permit for sturgeon fishing on the Missouri River, limiting it only to residents and allowing fishing only from Oct. 15 to May 15.

The state also imposed a length limit of between 24 inches and 30 inches -- an attempt to prevent confusion with the typically larger pallid and lake sturgeon, both of which are off-limits to fishing.

A similar standard now is proposed for an 820-mile stretch of the Mississippi River. Wildlife officials in Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee have agreed on an Oct. 15-May 15 season, with a minimum length of 24 inches and a maximum of 32 inches. The four states are in various stages of the rule-making process.

Officials in Iowa and Indiana also are discussing whether to restrict sturgeon fishing.

Some fisherman have been protesting, but to little avail.

Charles Callaway, of Jefferson City, said his caviar haul fell by nearly half because of this year's May 15 cutoff on the Missouri River. May typically is his best month because sturgeon are spawning. But the river was too high in mid to early May, and when it fell, the season was over.

"The shortening of the season this spring just devastated us," Callaway said. "They're just squeezing us out of business."

Callaway and caviar producer Cliff Rost both pleaded with Missouri conservation commissioners to reconsider the rules at an August meeting. Instead, commissioners expanded them to the Mississippi River.

"There was no justification for what they done other than the fact that there's people catching caviar and they want to stop it," said Rost, of Morrison, who with his wife sells up to 5,000 pounds a caviar a year.

Although Rost contests the figures, state sturgeon samples taken on the Mississippi River show a dramatic decline as commercial catches have risen. In 1997-1998, scientist Dave Herzog said he was finding about 20 sturgeon per net. During the past several winters, he has averaged about three sturgeon per net.

"It's pretty alarming," Herzog said, "but you can't convince people who are relying on the economics of caviar to say, 'We're having an effect, we're going to back off."'

Rost, 39, has no intention of cutting back. He has been fishing for sturgeon for eight or nine years; it's his livelihood, not his hobby. If the Mississippi River states all shorten the sturgeon season, he simply plans to set more nets when it's legal.

"We're just now getting these fish figured out to where we can catch them," he said.

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On the Net:

Mississippi River group: http://wwwaux.cerc.cr.usgs.gov/MICRA