Scientists Witness First Wild Yangtze Sturgeon Reproduction

Scientists witness first wild Yangtze sturgeon reproduction

A tiny, half-translucent grey larva, no bigger than a grain of rice, wriggled out of its egg casing in the shallow waters of the Chishui River in southwest China's Guizhou Province.To an untrained eye, it might have looked like just another fish hatching.

Scientists witness first wild reproduction of Yangtze sturgeon after decades of conservation

The video footage was simple but extraordinary -- a tiny, half-translucent grey larva, no bigger than a grain of rice, wriggled out of its egg casing in the shallow waters of the Chishui River in southwest China's Guizhou Province. To an untrained eye, it might have looked like just another fish hatching. But for the team of scientists watching anxiously, this fragile creature represented something far greater: the first successful natural repro…