TNACI (Tennessee Aquarium Conservation Institute) - sturgeon tagging 8/29/19

Thursday, August 28th we took a bus over to TNACI, on Baylor’s campus, during our meeting time.
When we got there, the employees were working on tagging young sturgeon.
It’s kind of like a microchip, only it goes through the tip of the sturgeon’s nose.

In order to do this, TNACI needed a group of sturgeon separated into a smaller container,
closer to the equipment. The sturgeon were being held in “racetracks,” separated by size.
Our job was to use little nets to move some of the bigger sturgeon into a smaller tub.

It was really cool! After that, we spent the rest of the time learning about the baby sturgeons, and
we got to pick some of them up. When the babies are hungry, they do this thing called
“porpoising,” where they come about have way out of the water! That was super cute to see.

With our last few minutes, we walked over to some of the other tanks to learn about some
different fish species, like trout. We got to feel the water and learned that trout need very
cold habitats in order to survive! The very last thing we did was learn about how they were
going to tag the sturgeon and what equipment they use.