Elevators and water slides for fish may sound straight out of Dr. Seuss—but they actually exist in Michigan. Listen up:
Sturgeon go back to their home river to spawn. And for half the sturgeon in Lake Michigan, that means the Menominee River.
But hydroelectric dams block the river, forcing the fish to lay their eggs in less protected waters close to the lake. Only about 10 percent of the young survive.
Denny Caneff of the River Alliance of Wisconsin says the fish needed a creative solution.
“No one’s going to move those dams,” he says. “So the project called for literally building an elevator to get them upstream, and water slides to get them down stream.”
With access to better spawning grounds, biologists expect the sturgeon population in Lake Michigan to, ahem, be elevated by more than 20,000 in the next 40 years.
Hear More:
Denny Caneff describes an added benefit of these elevators and water slides: they help protect baby sturgeon!
Get Schooled:
- To “slide” into understanding of this transport system, watch this video by the River Alliance of Wisconsin
- Elevate your knowledge of sturgeon travel with this slideshow by the River Alliance of Wisconsin
- Get the facts about sturgeon with this factsheet by Fish, Wildlife, and Parks
The fine print:
- This segment was produced in partnership with Cornell’s Atkinson Center for a Sustainable Future