Lake sturgeon look like the fish you don't want to meet in a dark alley. They are big, old, and mean looking.
They can grow to over six feet long and 300 pounds, have a torpedo-shaped body, barbels hanging from their snout, and a tail like a shark's. They were once part of a vibrant commercial fisheries operation on the lake, but now they are endangered. And we don't really know how many are swimming in the lake right now.
We talk with Chet MacKenzie, Vermont Fish & Wildlife's fisheries program manager, about the characteristics of this intriguing fish and about the efforts to protect and replenish their numbers. And Lisa Izzo, a PhD student at UVM, explains the efforts being taken to get a count of the lake's sturgeon.
Also on the program, Kate McCann, a high school math teacher at U-32 Middle and High School, was named Vermont's 2017 teacher of the year. She talks about what the honor has meant to her and how she hopes to promote a couple of her academic priorities.
Plus: radio signals helped shape the culture of the 20th century. From VPR Classical's Timeline series, we'll learn how the technology was developed by the pioneers of radio into something we take for granted today.
Broadcast live on Thursday, January 12, 2017 at noon; rebroadcast at 7 p.m.
