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Endangered sawfish saved from Bay Area pond
Kimberly Kuizon reports.
PALMETTO, Fla. - Sawfish were once a common sight in Florida waters, but now they're endangered and facing a number of threats – including an illness that causes them to spin.
One is now swimming freely in Tampa Bay thanks to a group effort that made sure a trapped sawfish was able to escape a pond in Palmetto. Researchers are thankful to a young fisherman with a keen eye.
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Local perspective:
You can often find 16-year-old Kane Mcree casting a line at Bishop Harbor Pond.
"Me and my grandpa used to come here a lot," Mcree told FOX 13.
In early June, Mcree was fishing from a paddleboard and got a bite during the Fire Charity Fishing Tournament. A 15-minute fight ended with the catch of a lifetime.
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"The saw that came out of the water. I saw probably the four-foot saw come out of the water," he said.
Mcree caught a smalltooth sawfish, and after documenting it for the tournament, he let it go. However, he was back at the pond a week later and caught the same sawfish again.
He figured a nearby culvert with grates was likely preventing the sawfish from swimming out of the area.
"I started to think maybe it was stuck," he said.
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That's when Mcree remembered a freebee from the Fire Charity Fishing tournament – a keychain with the number of the U.S. Sawfish Recovery Team.
"The keychain that said the sawfish number and I called," said Mcree.
The call went to Tonya Wiley, the team leader and president of Havenworth Coastal Conservation.
"We are very worried about the population of smalltooth sawfish and their ability to fend off extinction have put this population in a seriously precarious state, making it vital to maximize the survival for each and every sawfish out there," said Wiley.
Why you should care:
Sawfish are endangered and face a number of threats – from getting caught in fishing gear to loss of habitat. One of those threats also includes the recent spinning fish phenomenon reported in South Florida, resulting in more than 60 confirmed deaths.
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"It was very important for us to not give up and get that sawfish relocated," Wiley said.
It took three tries over the course of nearly three months. But, last week, using underwater cameras and a drone, the team captured the 7.4-foot female sawfish in the far corner of the pond.
Note: All activities were performed under the authority and guidelines of NMFS ESA permit #21857 and FWC Special Activities License #1918 issued to Havenworth Coastal Conservation.
Havenworth Coastal Conservation, NOAA and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission helped with the rescue.
"We know sawfish like water warmer than 53 degrees, so it was important we get her out of the shallow pond before winter, so she could migrate south to warmer waters," said Wiley. "We loaded it into a stretcher that had water on it. It took eight of us to walk her across the street, and then we brought her over here, took all of the measurements, put the tags on her."
Havenworth coastal conservation believes there’s a good explanation as to how the smalltooth sawfish got trapped in the pond.
"This sawfish likely got into the pond when Bishop Baror Road was underwater during Hurricane Helene and then was unable to get back into open water because of the grating over the open culvert," Wiley said.
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What they're saying:
They released the sawfish with the hope of learning more from samples taken and with gratitude to a younger fisherman.
"Kane is the reason why this sawfish is now in open water," said Wiley.
What's next:
The female sawfish was fitted with an acoustic transmitter that will help researchers track its movements in Tampa Bay and beyond. Researchers also collected biological samples that will be analyzed by scientists.
What you can do:
The U.S. Sawfish Recovery Team encourages the reporting of all sawfish encounters through www.SawfishRecovery.org, 1-844-4SAWFISH, sawfish@myfwc.com, and/or the FWC Reporter app.
The Source: Information was gathered by FOX 13’s Kimberly Kuizon through firsthand accounts of the rescue and from the fisherman who initially captured the sawfish.