INTRO: Hundred pound fish, five of them, have been caught up north. No they’re not the invasive Asian carp. They’re the native Lake Sturgeon. They’ve been around the Great Lakes for thousands of years. Chris McCarus reports.
The Department of Natural Resources and Environment hosted a spearing contest on Black Lake over the weekend. It’s divided between Cheboygan and Presque Isle Counties. 250 fisherman tried and only 5 were allowed to succeed. One of them was Matt Archambo. He’s a 12 year old from Cheboygan. He speared a sturgeon weighing 102 pounds.
“Well it was pretty calm when it was on the bottom. But when we first started to raise it up it went wild and turned ballistic and flew around everywhere so we let it back down.”
Matt’s dad has been fishing for sturgeon for 35 years. He’s never gotten one but he helped pull it onto the ice. The fish is six feet long.
“When it came in it looked huge. But I didn’t expect it to be that huge. It was about 4 inches taller than me.”
Overfishing and destruction of spawning beds has made The Lake Sturgeon a threatened and endangered species. Males can live ‘til they’re 55 and females ‘til they’re 150. Yes 150. So says Brenda Archambo, Matt’s aunt. She runs the website SturgeonForTomorrow.org.