Inland Lake Elementary School first graders released two lake sturgeon named Mullet and Bert while third graders from Alcona Elementary School released a single sturgeon named Oreo – a name they came up with because of Oreo’s black and white pattern on its back.

According to Alcona Elementary third-grade teachers Annie Combest-Friedman and Sarah Harris, the students have worked on different data tracking projects on the fish, measuring the growth and weight of Oreo every week since they started in November.

“Every Thursday, we have a water chemistry day in science and we get to have the fish out, doing the weight and measurements every week,” Harris said. “It’s great because they get to see the reward of raising them from this little tiny fish into now a 45-centimeter fish and into the river.”

Both schools are a part of Sturgeon in the Classroom, a program with the Black Lake chapter of the nonprofit Sturgeon for Tomorrow in which students can learn about lake sturgeon and the importance of conservation and stewardship for the environment.

News Photo by Mike Gonzalez Inland Lake Elementary School first-grade students line up on the fence post at a campground, watching researchers catch lake sturgeon in Black River on Friday.

This is Combest-Friedman’s second year on the project and Harris’ third time out of the five lake sturgeon Alcona Elementary has raised. Combest-Friedman said this year’s release day is better than last year’s, as last year’s weather was overcast with no other sturgeon in sight.

This year, the sun shone down on Black River, helping lake sturgeon researchers as they waded into the river to catch the fish with large, green nets.

For both schools, the researchers caught multiple fish throughout the day, something that never happened last year according to school staff.

“So the best practices as we go down to the bottom is that we’ll look for their noses – it’s the first thing you’ll see, and then you look for that tag,” Max Majinska, a masters student at Michigan State University, said. “Then after that, you try to grab the pec fin and shove them into the net head-first, then it’s a wrestling match to get them up to the surface.”

As students, parents, and teachers watched in amazement as researchers wrestled with five-foot fish to collect data, volunteers with Sturgeon for Tomorrow stood watch in their mission to protect lake sturgeon during spawn season.

News Photo by Mike Gonzalez Jenny VanDaele, a teacher at Inland Lake Elementary School, stands in the water next to Max Majinska, a student at Michigan State University, as he holds a lake sturgeon in Black River on Friday.

Both field trips for the schools ended up at a campsite for the volunteers, who keep watch from April 20 to June 15 over Black Lake to deter illegal poaching or harvesting of lake sturgeon.

Jenny Schroeder, science facilitator at Alcona Elementary, said this is the school’s fifth year in the program, saying that it helps the students connect to the Great Lakes and helps promote place-based learning in local schools.

“It’s empowering teachers to teach science with place-based education and real-world applications,” Schroeder said. “The kids get to see their fish live in their natural environment and will keep that knowledge with them for their futures.”

By the end of Majinska’s showcasing of a sturgeon he caught in the river, the Alcona students had to say goodbye to Oreo.

Staff and parents moved a cooler with river water and Oreo closer to the river before one parent picked the fish up, showed it to the children, and then released it into Black River. The kids appeared both sad and excited to say goodbye to their friend.

“This project was really good,” Brady Lauwers, a third-grade student at Alcona Elementary, said. “I liked it because we learned more about sturgeon and see how long they’ve lasted for.”