Lake sturgeon are imperiled across the laurentian great lakes

This Project Grant awarded by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service under the Fish and Aquatic Conservation - Aquatic Invasive Species program (CFDA 15.608) will support habitat mapping and lake sturgeon habitat selection research in the Manistee and Muskegon Rivers of Michigan. The $413,667 grant will fund efforts to: 1) map instream habitat characteristics and develop habitat suitability indices to assess the reliability of existing lake sturgeon habitat models for Great Lakes tributaries, 2) quantify age-0 lake sturgeon habitat selection, and 3) analyze differences in daytime vs. nighttime habitat use. The research aims to guide future lake sturgeon reintroduction and conservation efforts in the region. Deliverables include habitat maps, management briefs, academic theses, and up to three peer-reviewed publications. The award period is from January 1, 2025 to May 31, 2027, and the grant recipient is Grand Valley State University.

Reintroduction is one means to bolster populations by RE-establishing stocks in tributaries. Given lake sturgeon life history (i.e., long lived with delayed sexual maturity), reintroduction efforts must occur over several years to decades that result in considerable economic costs. Thus, determining whether a system can support lake sturgeon is imperative prior to reintroduction.habitat mapping will be coupled with ongoing lake sturgeon surveys and acoustic telemetry to quantify habitat associations in the manistee and muskegon rivers. Quantifying habitat selection will allow for validation and updating of existing lake sturgeon habitat suitability indices (HSI), guiding lake sturgeon management efforts in the laurentian great lakes.objectives:1. Map instream habitat (e.g., substrate, water depth, and water velocity) and develop HSI maps to quantify the reliability of published lake sturgeon hsis when applied to tributaries of the laurentian great lakes and where possible update indices to improve their ability to identify suitable spawning and age-0 habitat.2. Quantify age-0 lake sturgeon habitat selection and determine if arrangement of patch types provides a better description of selectivity than a focus on individual patch types.3. Quantify differences in habitat metrics between daytime and nighttime detection locations of age-0 lake sturgeon to assess shifts in habitat selection throughout the day.deliverables:1. Flow models and maps of water depth, water velocity, and substrate will be produced for the manistee and muskegon rivers. Habitat maps will be available to support similar projects and efforts to assess habitat availability for other species in the study systems. 2. Study results will be presented at professional conferences and management briefs will be created for state, federal, and tribal agencies to help guide lake sturgeon conservation efforts.3. Validity of published hsis, quantification of age-0 lake sturgeon habitat selection, recommendations for age-0 HSI revisions, and recommendations for simplified hsis will be shared through presentations at scientific conferences and compiled in two masters theses available through grand valley state university. 4. Produce up to three peer-reviewed manuscripts from this proposal.