FISHES OF THE GULF OF MAINE 



83 



the following April, and a third from 43% cm. 

 (17% in.) to 64 cm. (25% in.) from April 9 to the 

 following December. But sturgeon grow much 

 more rapidly after they go to sea, if ages (esti- 

 mated from otoliths) of 11 years for a 75-inch 

 sturgeon, and 12 years for two others of 88 and 

 100 inches are anywhere near the truth. 09 



The sturgeon is a bottom feeder, rooting in the 

 sand or mud with its snout like a pig (the barbels 

 serving as organs of touch) as it noses up the worms 

 and mollusks on which it feeds and which it sucks 

 into its toothless mouth with considerable amounts 

 of mud. It also consumes small fishes, particu- 

 larly sand launce. Small ones, while living in 

 estuaries and around river mouths, subsist largely 

 on amphipod and isopod Crustacea. Sturgeon, 

 like salmon, eat little or nothing while traveling 

 up river to spawn. 



When at ease sturgeon swim slowly to and fro, 

 seeming very sluggish. But they are capable 

 of darting ahead like an arrow on occasion, and 

 they often come to the surface to jump clear of 

 the water. Though they usually offer no resist- 

 ance when netted, large ones are very strong. 



General range.— Coastal waters from the St. 

 Lawrence River to the Gulf of Mexico, running 

 up into rivers to spawn; reported from Hudson 

 Bay, also Scandinavia to the Mediterranean, if 

 the American and European sea sturgeons belong 

 to the same species. 



Occurrence in the Gvlf of Maine.— The sea 

 sturgeon is (or was) well known in the St. John, 

 Penobscot, Kennebec, and Merrimac Rivers, and 

 has even been taken some distance from the 

 mouths of streams no larger than the Charles River 

 and the Parker River in Essex County, Mass., 1 

 where some are still seen jumping in July and one 

 is taken occasionally. In fact, sturgeon once 

 entered practically every stream of any size 

 emptying into the Gulf of Maine. Wood, writing 

 of Massachusetts in 1634," described them as 

 "all over the country, but best catching of them 

 be upon the shoales of Cape Code and in the 

 river of Merrimacke, where much is taken, 

 pickled and brought for England, some of these 

 be 12, 14 and 18 foote long." In fact, an odd 



•• See footnote 98. 



1 Two sturgeon 44 and 45M Inches long, netted in the Parker River at 

 Newbury, Mass. , July 23, 1933, are (or were) In the collection of the Boston 

 Boclety of Natural History, now the New England Science Museum (Bull. 

 Boston Soc. Nat. Hist., 69, Oct. 1933, p. 8). 



'» New England's Prospect, 1634, p. 37. 



sturgeon still enters the mouth of the Merrimac, 

 witness one of 230 pounds netted there on Sep- 

 tember 14, 1938 and landed in Newburyport. 2 



Sturgeons may be expected anywhere off the 

 coasts of the Gulf of Maine during their sojourn 

 in salt water. There is definite record of them at 

 sundry localities on both sides of the Bay of Fundy ; 

 off Mt. Desert Island; in Penobscot Bay; in Casco 

 Bay; at the mouth of the Piscataqua River; on the 

 Boars Head-Isles of Shoals fishing ground, where 

 several 3 to 4 feet long were taken in gill nets dur- 

 ing April and M&j 1913; at the mouths of the 

 Essex and Ipswich Rivers, where jumping stur- 

 geon have been reported recently in the daily 

 press ; 8 at the mouth of Gloucester Harbor, where 

 an angler reports catching one of about 12 pounds 

 while fishing for tautog; inside and outside Boston 

 Harbor; at Provincetown ; off Truro, Cape Cod; 

 and at Nantucket, as well as along the southern 

 New England coast to the westward. Some also 

 extend their wanderings to the offshore fishing 

 banks as they grow. Thirty, for example, rang- 

 ing in weight from 120 to 600 pounds were landed 

 in Portland and Boston by otter trawlers from 

 Nantucket Shoals, from South Channel, and from 

 Georges and Browns Banks, during the years 

 1927-1936. 4 Probably all of these were on bot- 

 tom when caught, to judge from their diet (p. 83), 

 and from the fact that sturgeon have been hooked 

 on cod and haddock lines as deep as 25 fathoms in 

 Scandinavian waters. Nothing beyond this is 

 known of their movements in our Guff. 



Importance. — It is only the scarcity of the sea 

 sturgeon in the Gulf of Maine that limits its com- 

 mercial importance there and in the tributary 

 rivers. The few taken are picked up acciden- 

 tally in traps or weirs, in drift nets, or by the otter 

 trawlers. 



In former years, when our streams were less 

 obstructed and sturgeons more plentiful, the catch 

 was of considerable value in some of the larger 

 rivers. It is interesting, for instance, to read that 

 sturgeon, doubtless from the Kennebec River and 

 cured near what is now Brunswick, Maine, were 

 shipped to Europe as early as 1628; and that large 

 quantities were also shipped to Europe from near 

 Ipswich, Mass., in 1635. In the Kennebec, where 

 an intermittent fishery had long been maintained. 



» Reported In the Boston Globe. Sept. 15, 1938. 

 » The Boston Herald, June 1950. 



< Reports collected by the late Walter H. Rich, U. S. Bureau of Fisheries, 

 and notices in the dally press. 



