The team achieved a significant success in the fall of 2024: in the course of regular monitoring, which has been carried out since 2018, twelve young sterlets were caught for the first time, which, based on their size, must have clearly hatched in the spring of 2024 and grown up in the wild. The young sterlets could either come from the release of 1.5 cm larvae in spring 2024 or – which would be a sensation – from the first documented natural reproduction in Lower Austria or Vienna in over 40 years.
A genetic maternity analysis will now clarify whether it has been possible for the first time to prove natural reproduction, which is most likely due to the offspring of the LIFE Sterlet animals that have been released. The LIFE-Boat4Sturgeon project has been systematically monitoring the sterlet population downstream of Vienna for years. Detailed data on the population size and age structure is collected using so-called catch-recapture methods. The results help to make the project’s measures even more targeted and ensure the long-term survival of sterlets in the Danube.
