Effect of Release Temperature from Three Gorges Reservoir on the Procreation of Chinese Sturgeons

Abstract:

Chinese sturgeon is the national list endangered fish species. Since the construction of the Gezhouba dam in 1981, the migration of Chinese sturgeon for procreating to upstream of the Yangtze River has been blocked which cause the only spawning ground was left locating in a narrow zone downstream close to the dam site. The procreation of Chinese sturgeons need suitable ecological factors, including temperature, hydrology, sediment and so on, but after impoundment of Three Gorges Reservoir (TGR), the environment have changed a lot that brings a great threaten to the Chinese sturgeons. In this paper, based on previous hydrodynamics and thermal coupled model of TGR, three different scenarios including dry, normal and wet year is simulated to access the influences of release temperature from TGR on procreation of Chinese sturgeons. The result indicates that due to the weak stratification of the TGR, the release temperature changes compared to natural river water temperature, as a result, the time of the procreation is slightly delayed in different scenarios because the release temperature is higher than the upper bound temperature for spawning, of which the days been delayed is about 14 in dry years, 13 in normal years and 5 in wet years, respectively, so temperature becomes a limiting factor to the procreation of Chinese sturgeons.

• Periodical: Applied Mechanics and Materials (Volumes 361-363)
• Pages: 958-961
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMM.361-363.958
• Online since: August 2013
• Authors: Shan Shan Lu*, Ling Quan Dai, Hui Chao Dai, Jing Qiao Mao
• Keywords: Chinese Sturgeons Procreation, Effect, Release Temperature, Three Gorges Reservoir

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