MAINE PUBLIC • June 23, 2023
Hundreds of Atlantic sturgeon have turned up in a stream in downtown Gardiner, giving local residents a rare, close-up glimpse of the massive fish. Reports began circulating on Thursday that Atlantic sturgeon — a prehistoric-looking fish that can grow to 10 feet in length — were gathering in Cobbossee Stream in downtown Gardiner. Since then, crowds of onlookers have flocked to the Route 201 bridge over the stream to watch as the sturgeon swim and apparently spawn just underneath. Sean Ledwin, who heads the sea-run fisheries program at the Maine Department of Marine Resources, estimated there are at least 200 sturgeon just upstream from where the Cobbossee flows into the Kennebec River. “Sturgeon are a real success story,” he said. “The Kennebec River is the biggest spawning aggregation. And with the Clean Water Act, the clean up of the river and the removal of the Edwards Dam (in Augusta), the sturgeon population has really grown significantly.”