NOAA’s Fisheries Service today announced that it will consider listing Atlantic sturgeon as threatened or endangered under the federal Endangered Species Act.
The agency received a petition from the Natural Resources Defense Council in October 2009, requesting that the species be listed throughout its range.
NOAA has been evaluating the need to list the species since 2007, when a formal status review was completed for the species by a team of biologists from NOAA, the U.S. Geological Survey, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.