Restoring Life in the Hudson
 New
York Gov. George Pataki carries a sturgeon to be released into
the Hudson River at Haverstraw Bay Park Sept. 29, 2004. About
50 of the fish are to be released.
( Peter Carr / The Journal News )
By LAURA INCALCATERRA
THE JOURNAL NEWS
(Original publication: September 30, 2004)
WEST HAVERSTRAW — Don Gabel held the net tightly as he
walked to the Hudson River to release the Atlantic sturgeon that
wiggled inside.
He sank the net into the water, and the fish swam
off, one of 89 released yesterday as part of a state study and
restoration program.
Gabel, a member of Boy Scout Troop 36 of Pearl
River, said he hoped the program would be successful. He had a
good reason: The 17-year-old Blauvelt teenager also is an avid
fisherman.
"I'd like to catch one," Gabel said,
his sneakers and jeans wet from his partial entry into the river.
"I think the program's a good idea because it's going to
put the river back to how it was."
Gabel was one of about two dozen Cub and Boy Scouts
from Pack 36 and Troop 36, respectively, who helped carry the
fish from a truck into the river at Haverstraw Bay, the county's
only riverfront park.
But it was Gov. George Pataki who got the first
opportunity to free one of the long, thin sturgeon into the river.
In brown hip waders and a yellow slicker, the governor cradled
a fish and stepped into the water to gently release it.
Earlier, Pataki explained why the sturgeon, which
thrived in the Hudson until overfishing and pollution severely
reduced its numbers in the 1980s, had been chosen for the program.
"What we want to do is restore those fish,
restore those majestic symbols of the wildness of the Hudson River
itself," Pataki said.
The release and study program is a project of the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the state Department of Environmental
Conservation, whose commissioner, Erin Crotty, joined Pataki yesterday.
The program researches the habitat use, movement,
homing instincts and health of both wild and hatchery-raised Atlantic
sturgeon in the Hudson. Yesterday's release was the last of three
made this year, which have put a total of 350 sturgeon in the
river.
The fish released yesterday are the offspring of
Hudson River sturgeon, but they were born in a U.S. Fish and Wildlife
hatchery on the Susquehanna River in Lamar, Pa. They were between
the ages of 6 and 10 years old and were taken to Haverstraw by
truck from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources.
Pataki said it took 20 years for female sturgeon
to reproduce, so it will be at least 10 years before offspring
arrive. He also said it would take about 40 years before the success
of this year's release would be known, and he might not be around
to see the result.
But nodding toward the children in attendance,
Pataki said the hope was they one day would benefit from the effort
by being able to enjoy a cleaner, more accessible river that once
again teemed with fish.
Yesterday's release was made just up the river
from two power plants at Bowline Point. The plants use water from
the river in their cooling process, then release water that is
warmer than what naturally flows in the Hudson.
Frances Dunwell, director of the DEC's Estuary
Program, said cooling systems were a concern, but the state was
taking steps to decrease the fish kills that routinely occur by
requiring power plants to use better technology in their systems.
Polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, remain a problem.
General Electric legally dumped PCBs into the river at upstate
Fort Edward and Hudson Falls from 1940 to 1977. The Environmental
Protection Agency considers PCBs as probable human carcinogens,
or substances that cause cancer.
Dunwell said that while PCBs remained an issue
for humans who consume fish from the river, they do not appear
to be a significant problem for the survival of the fish themselves.
About 10 percent of the sturgeon have been tagged
so they can be monitored, Dunwell said. Some of the fish previously
released along upstate portions of the river already have been
tracked to Haverstraw Bay, she said.
Information from the project could be used to protect
critical habitats or determine which river system the sturgeon
will return to for spawning. No one is sure if the hatchery-raised
sturgeon will head up the Hudson or return to the Susquehanna
to spawn.
Cub Scout Michael McCoy, 8, and his sister, Colleen,
6, were just glad to help get the fish from the tanks on the truck
into the much larger river yesterday.
"They'll have more room to swim," said
Michael, as Colleen nodded.
Davis Natzle, who lives in New Paltz and is Dunwell's
son, said the sturgeon were a special part of the river.
"I don't think it would be good if they became
completely extinct," said Davis, 9. "Then we wouldn't
have one of the original fish in the river."
Reach Laura Incalcaterra at lincalca@thejournalnews.com
or 845-578-2486
 Jocelyn
Whitworth and Linda Richards of the Sloop Clearwater carry a sturgeon
to be released into the Hudson River at Haverstraw Bay Park Sept.
29, 2004. Gov. George Pataki was on hand as the fish were released.
( Peter Carr / The Journal News )
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