CAMBRIDGE—"Sturgie" is biding his time, waiting to be introduced to the right female.
Caught off Hooper's Island five years ago, the hulking six-foot Atlantic sturgeon passes his days lolling about in a large tank at the University of Maryland's Horn Point Environmental Laboratory near Cambridge. Scientists have been experimenting with him and dozens of other sturgeon here, trying to unlock the secrets of breeding them in captivity and ultimately restore a big, ancient fish that's virtually vanished from Maryland waters.
It's been slow going, in part because Atlantic sturgeon, which have been around for 120 million years or so, take more than a decade to reach sexual maturity, and they don't spawn every year. There have been only two chances so far, but no young fish.
"We knew coming in it was going to be a very long-term commitment," said Erin Markin, a faculty research assistant who oversees the lab's sturgeon work.
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