bassinbrooksy disclaimer: before i get some aggrevating hippy comment about how they are protected . the catch was reported to NOAA and i emailed them the pics and catch info and was thanked for the info. cought this on my striper gear while drifting a dead mackerel thrwe the mouth of the merrimack . ive never seen anything run so fast in my life and after almost getting spooled twice we backed up the boat so i could gain some line back. i thought i had a small shark til i finally saw it was a sturgeon about 10 feet from the boat at which point i chose to remove the hook (foul hooked near the tail) and get a quick measurement and a few pics rather than cut the line. the fish was NEVER removed from the water,was at the side of the boat for maybe 90 seconds and swam away on its own just fine.

10y