Chinese sturgeon (Acipenser sinensis) has been listed among the first-class protected animals in China, and a flagship species in the aquatic ecosystem of the Yangtze River. Due to hydraulic engineering construction, shipping, overfishing and environmental pollution, the population in wild is exhausted. Artificial propagation and releasing are the main strategies for the restoration of Chinese sturgeon resources. However, it was until 2024 that the large-scale release had been initiated, and the cumulative released number exceeded one million for the first time throughout the year.
To comprehensively evaluate the effect of releasing, such as the adaptability of the released individuals and calculate the population of arrival in the estuary, net recapture and ultrasonic tagging monitoring have been adopted to track the Chinese sturgeon released in 2025. As a result, more than 80% of the recaptured juvenile Chinese sturgeon showed good adaptive capacity to the wild environment based on the biological information. Among the population marked with ultrasonic tags, 80.6% of the individuals have been monitored along Yangtze River main stream, in which 57.9% reached the estuary, indicating the maintaining of migratory instincts of the artificially-bred Chinese sturgeons.

 

Chinese sturgeon,Ultrasonic Detection,Restocking,Net recapture