Beluga - fish, which is the largest predator of all living in the reservoirs of fresh water.According to historical records, in the old days, there are instances, weighing 1.6 tons.Now some individuals reach 1.2 tons.Scientists believe that white sturgeon can live more than a hundred years.At the same time, the longest life expectancy of officially registered representatives of sturgeon was 46 years old.As of the 70th of the last century the average length of females that were caught in the Volga River, is 267 cm, and weight - 142 kg.The corresponding figures for males were equal to 221 cm and 81 kg respectively.In addition, the fish is different from other types of acute its short nose and a thick cylindrical body.Massive lip surrounds the huge mouth, stretch the entire width of the head of such a kind as beluga.Fish, which is located below the photo, at the expense of the expression "person" has the nickname "sad."It refers to Globe varieties and lead different lifestyles in the big rivers.For example, in the Volga River dominates winter species that spend the winter in the pits, while the Urals most of migrating for spawning fish are spring crops.
Habitats
Archaeological evidence suggests that the fish belugas met in the basins of the Adriatic, the Black, Caspian and Azov seas, and rose in the mouth of rivers such as the Volga, Kama, Oka, Sheksna, and many others.There are notes on the catch of individual specimens of this species in the Moscow River.Now the habitat is limited to approximately the lower dam.With regard to the Azov Sea, where she had disappeared.In spite of everything, beluga - fish that can swim very far.Among the scholars are of the opinion that this distance depends on the size of the particular individuals, and the larger it is, the more spawns.There are cases where some specimens reach the Mediterranean, Adriatic and Black seas.According to historical records, in 1850, a beluga was caught in the vicinity of the Italian city of Venice.
Power
Beluga - a fish that starts to hunt in the river while still fry.At this time, it primarily interested in small shell with a thin shell, so the young are most concentrated in the estuaries.Eating beluga at sea usually are gobies, kilka, sprat, pike, herring, mussels and other creatures.In the stomachs of some of caught in the Caspian Sea species of seal pups found even.Do not shrink from eating its own juvenile beluga and other sturgeon species.
Reproduction
males ready to breed at the age of twelve years old, while the female, later - at sixteen.Beluga - fish, which spawn happens at the peak of flooding.The temperature of the water at the initial stage of 6-7 degrees.For the deposition of eggs must be rocky, deep water (from 4 to 15 meters) with a fairly swift current.Every single female depending on their size, may defer from 200,000 to 8 million eggs.Their embryonic period lasts for about 200 hours under the condition that the water temperature is about 12 degrees.How mature fish and fry immediately after spawning fall into the sea, without stopping in the river.It is impossible not to note the fact that the reproduction does not occur every year.
