In May 1779, Martin Hawkins allegedly spotted a sturgeon near Mayo’s Island while he was angling for shad. He grabbed onto its flukes and rode the beast like a Colonial Pecos Bill. The 10-foot, 300-pound fish eventually tired of trying to buck him off, and Hawkins, so the story goes, managed to beach the big one on the Manchester side of the river. There the unlucky fish provided for an evening of feasting and revelry.
Some 242 years later, after a September afternoon of abrupt torrential rain and swiftly rising waters, I followed up on an invitation from the James River Association to join observers on the 40-foot pontoon boat Spirit of the James.
Our purpose did not involve riding or catching a sturgeon, rather watching the males breach, or leap, from the water.
These dinosaur-era fish are the largest creatures inhabiting the James. In mid-September, those fish that originated here make “the great return” to spawn. You can watch them breach and come crashing down.
At 6 p.m. we departed Rocketts Landing, leaving behind the joggers, the boat-bristling marina and the looming balconied terraces of condominiums, the steel-framed skeleton of an industrial building by the community pool, and the sprouted-up row of retro-looking townhouses that resemble some of the places cleared off nearby Fulton in one of Richmond’s worst examples of “urban renewal.”
The approaching dusk shoved sharp shards of blue between the battleship grey clouds. The Spirit of the James’ speed rose curled shoulders of spray, and the rushing wind added exhilaration to the acceleration. The assembled sturgeon-seekers settled in for the trip. Several passengers wielded impressive long-lensed cameras.
Then we came upon streams of plastic bottles and cups floating in a miasma. Our Cap’n, Aaron Bouchard, an environmental educator for the James River Association, explained that this flotsam belched a few hours earlier into the otherwise clean river due to that afternoon’s “CSO (combined sewer overflow) event.” That is, the powerful rains inundated the city’s combined sewer system, which couldn’t handle the strain.
During its August special session the Virginia General Assembly allocated $411 million, out of some $4.3 billion in federal American Rescue Plan Act funding, for clean water projects through the next three years. This includes $125 million for fixing combined sewer systems, including those in Richmond and Lynchburg, to prevent the eruption of untreated sewage into the James River during heavy rains. Richmond is scheduled to receive $50 million toward an estimated $883 million in total need.
Our vessel continued past dormant two-story weathered metal docks, including one sporting a sign that in merry postcard cursive exclaimed, “Welcome to Richmond!” Alongside the gritty Port of Richmond we negotiated around tugs pushing barges.
Bouchard talked sturgeon to us. After swimming in the James for three to five years, they head to sea. They fall within a special class, the euryhaline, who through osmoregulation survive both in fresh and salt water. This gift of nature allows our sturgeon to return home twice a year. Unlike salmon, they don’t breed and die. Sturgeon can live up to 65 years. In the James, their most significant predators are shipping vessels.
The ferocious-looking fish, which hasn’t changed in appearance for some 200 million years, shields its muscular back with five rows of bony plates, called scutes.
But sturgeons are toothless.
They Hoover their food off the floor.
The sturgeon’s relationship with humans along the James River is complicated. Members of the Pamunkey tribe, due to the fish’s great size, afforded them great respect, and legends say some may have prefigured Martin Hawkins and caught a ride as a rite of passage. Capt. John Smith, no stranger to big-fish stories, wrote that during his 17th-century expeditions, the plenitude of sturgeon caused traffic jams capable of impeding the progress of small reconnaissance boats.
Sturgeon were captured and eaten by the early colonists, who didn’t consider the fish a delicacy but a means of survival.
Immigrants of the later 19th century knew of Atlantic sturgeon and their roe as caviar. The meat became an offering in Richmond’s markets and restaurants. In some crude instances, captors used chains to lash the huge struggling fish to pier pilings and bridge supports to harvest their roe.
Overfishing, dams and pollution drove the sturgeon to near extinction. Virginia in 1974 made killing them illegal. In 1998, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission banned fishing and poaching of sturgeon from Maine to Florida. And in 2012 the fish received an endangered species designation that coincided with improvements made to the James River. Sturgeon sightings increased, and other wildlife continued reinhabiting the waterway.
During our cruise, Bouchard pointed out for us two separate bald eagles perched atop trees and a flight of egrets. A great winged heron veered off along a creek as though running up a city alley. The Spirit of the James throttled to stillness within sight of the Pocahontas Parkway bridge. The sounds of birds, crickets and cicadas wafted toward us.
Why do sturgeons breach? Bouchard listed possibilities: breeding behavior ("Look, ladies, at how high I can jump!"), a way to regulate their swimming bladder or, my favorite: because it’s fun.
Julia Carson, senior environmental educator with the James River Association, stood at the ready alongside a tripod-mounted camera.
“Sturgeon when they breach aren’t as graceful, like dolphins or whales,” she says. “More like a belly flop.” She’d recorded some of this action the previous week.
A few sturgeon splashdowns occurred, the sound reminding me of a big person cannon-balling at the pool’s deep end, but I missed spotting the nearest and loudest, though I observed the sizable plume.
The sturgeon spotters went, “Ooohhh!” as one does at a fireworks display.
We soon turned back for Rocketts. I contemplated in the stirred eddies the James’ great history, the first people plying these waters by canoe as their interstate; the Europeans who rounded the bends not knowing what they’d encounter; those who chose a new life here and those who had no choice; mariners and warriors; explorers and exploiters and steamship excursionists enjoying nights of music and merriment. Coming this way, the city’s lighted towers evoke a certain romance that highways cannot match.
So let’s take care of this river, and it’ll take care of us. And if you’re fortunate, one day you’ll witness a sturgeon taking a flying leap from the pure joy of living and being home, again.
"fish" - Google News
September 21, 2021 at 11:49PM
https://ift.tt/3hWT4T5
A Big Fish Story - richmondmagazine.com - Richmond magazine
"fish" - Google News
https://ift.tt/35JkYuc
https://ift.tt/3feFffJ
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "A Big Fish Story - richmondmagazine.com - Richmond magazine"
Post a Comment