Chir juveniles were released to rivers of Yamal, muksun is being grown for the next release

The company “Gazpromneft-Yamal” continues to replenish fish stocks in the Ob-Irtysh basin. The first release of this season took place on the basis of Sobsky fish-farming plant. 5 million chir (broad whitefish) juveniles with the weight of at least 0.5 grams were released. They are grown viable and adapted to conditions of wild nature and easily adapt to natural environment. Juveniles of muksun (valuable commercial fish) will be released after that.

The event was held in stages: due to the large amount of fish, the release lasted for several days. The information was given to the news agency “Sever-Press” in the press center of “Gazpromneft-Yamal”. Chir was grown in accordance with the plan and in compliance with all technological parameters. Readiness of the juvenile fish was defined by the commission that included representatives of the regional authorities, specialists of the Federal Agency for fisheries and state scientific centers.

Since 2015 “Gazpromneft-Yamal” has been working annually on restoration of aquatic biological resources in the arctic region. This is a systematic contribution of oil workers to the “stream” of general efforts on preservation of fragile nature of Yamal, where the company develops Novoportovskoye oil, gas, condensate field.

The muksun juveniles are being prepared for the next release now. They are switching to active external nutrition, and in July-August the muksun juveniles will be ready for “big swimming”.

By the end of the summer season other 8 million fish juveniles will be released - this is the overall amount of “Gazpromneft-Yamal” and “Gazpromneft-Razvitie”. In total, two enterprises of “Gazprom Neft” will release about 13 million juveniles of valuable commercial fish into rivers of the Ob-Irtysh basin in 2020.

“Implementation of the program on reproduction of aquatic biological resources is one of priority ecological tasks within the project on development of Novoportovskoye field. We have been working with fish farmers of Yamal for a long time, and we have established effective cooperation. The production capacity of Sobsky fish-farming plant allowed releasing successfully more than 12 million fish juveniles last season. This year we decided to focus on two fish species the most valuable for the region – muksun and chir (broad whitefish)”, said Aleksey Ovechkin, the director general of “Gazpromneft-Yamal”.

According to Dmitry Kolesnikov, the director of Sobsky fish-farming plant, the chir juveniles showed good growth rates - since the moment of hatching, in the beginning of March, they have reached the weight 0.5 grams by the beginning of June and are already viable in natural conditions.

“As for muksun, its juveniles are currently being actively grown. For this purpose, we will use two workshops of the plant, what means more than 160 fish ponds. The fish juveniles now weigh about 0.02 grams and by mid-July will reach the necessary weight for the release”, said the director of Sobsky fish-farming plant.

According to the head of the office for organizing and regulating of fishery under the department of agro-industrial complex of Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Okrug Sergey Gulyalov, reproduction of populations of valuable fish species is important and necessary work, which involves the authorities, economic subjects and science.

“The results of this work can be evaluated, when the fish juveniles being released today grow to the mature state, that is, in several years. The comprehensive approach being used now allows saying that in the future reproduction measures will show their effectiveness”, he said.