We found Chessie! She is not the mystical Chesapeake Bay sea monster, but she is rare.

This fall, the Atlantic sturgeon gillnetting survey on Marshyhope Creek caught the largest female sturgeon in the survey’s history. This large female, nicknamed Chessie, measured just under 7 feet 10 inches and weighed over 200 pounds. Biologists tagged her with a passive integrated transponder (PIT) tag, an acoustic transmitter, and an external T-bar tag. She was then returned to the water, where she can be tracked as she moves around the Bay and up and down the coast.

The Chesapeake Bay population is listed as endangered under the federal Endangered Species Act. DNR’s tagging work allows for the collection of data that provides information on sturgeon movements throughout the Chesapeake Bay and supports research efforts in other systems along the Atlantic seaboard.