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temperature on the pallid sturgeon. Pallid sturgeon inhabit areas where water temperatures <br />range from 0 C to 30 C or greater which is the normal range of water temperature of the <br />Missouri and Mississippi rivers. Ongoing lower Platte River studies have found pallid <br />sturgeon occurring in water ranging from 13.1 to 33.7 C. (E. Peters, University of Nebraska - <br />Lincoln, personal communication). Pallid sturgeon movement patterns in Lake Sharpe, a <br />Missouri River reservoir, may be linked to water temperature and food habits (Erickson <br />1992). All but one of the tagged fish moved upriver to cooler water when water temperatures <br />warmed in the reservoir in the spring, remained there through August, and moved back <br />downriver during the winter. <br />The pallid sturgeon historically occupied turbid river systems (FWS 1997). Turbidity levels <br />where pallid sturgeon have been found in South Dakota range from 23.3 nephelometric <br />turbidity units (NTU) to 142.9 NTU (Erickson 1992). Secchi disc depths ranged from an <br />average of 9.8 feet in the Missouri River immediately downstream from Oahe Dam to 2.2 <br />further downstream. In the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers in Montana and North Dakota <br />(1992 to 1994), the mean Secchi disc depth was 7.8 inches at 115 pallid sturgeon locations <br />(Bramblett 1996). <br />