"Digital Yangtze River" escorts the first batch of Chinese sturgeon into the sea

After migrating more than 1600 kilometers from the release point in Yichang, Hubei, some released Chinese sturgeons have arrived at the mouth of the Yangtze River. On the 7th, China Three Gorges Corporation revealed that as of 9:00 pm, the first batch of 11 Chinese sturgeon released in 2015 with sonar beacons had passed through the automatic monitoring station located in Jiangyin, Jiangsu.

Chinese sturgeon is an ancient and rare migratory fish species unique to China, and is also one of the most primitive species of existing fish in the world. It has been thriving on Earth for 140 million years and is known as a "living fossil in water". It is also listed as an endangered species by the World Conservation Union.

On April 12th this year, the Chinese Sturgeon Research Institute of Three Gorges Group released more than 3000 Chinese sturgeons at the Yangtze River rare fish release point in Yichang Yanzhi Garden. Among them, 61 were implanted with sonar beacons for monitoring purposes. When each marked Chinese sturgeon passes through a monitoring point, it will be automatically recognized and recorded by the equipment.

Jin Heping, Chief Information Officer and Director of the Information Center of Three Gorges Group, introduced that with the help of automatic real-time transmission technology and geographic information platform, staff on Three Gorges Group's "Digital Yangtze River" geographic information platform have achieved real-time access to the latest activity information of released Chinese sturgeons and monitoring station records for the first time this year.

According to monitoring data, as of 9:00 on the 7th, 11 Chinese sturgeons implanted with sonar beacons have passed through the Jiangyin monitoring station. Among them, the Chinese sturgeon with the code "939" has been leading the way since its release into the Yangtze River. As early as 1:00 am on April 27th, it arrived at the Jiangyin monitoring station, which is more than 1500 kilometers away from the release point. This is the last automatic monitoring point for the Chinese sturgeon before entering the sea. Based on its daily average swimming speed, it can be inferred that the Chinese sturgeon 939 arrived at the mouth of the Yangtze River on the morning of April 28th. The first batch of released Chinese sturgeon arrived at the mouth of the Yangtze River, indicating a smooth progress in the release activity.

The reporter learned that since its establishment, the Three Gorges Group Chinese Sturgeon Research Institute has been continuously carrying out breeding and releasing work to save the Chinese sturgeon population. Currently, it has released Chinese sturgeon 57 times, with over 5 million fish released. Reported by Liang Jianqiang