At around 10 pm on Oct 1. 2024, Researchers from the Shanghai Aquatic Wildlife Conservation and Research Center Chongming Island Base have successfully bred Chinese sturgeon through artificial insemination for the first time, hatching nearly 5,000 fry of the endangered species. This is the first time that the Shanghai facility has artificially bred Chinese Sturgeon.

From 2018 to 2023, OBERMEYER together with its partner SCDRI ( Shanghai Construction Design&Research Institute Co., Ltd.) designed the vitally important 2nd phase of the Shanghai Yangtze River Estuary Chinese Sturgeon Wetland Nature Reserve. The Reserve integrates ecological exhibitions and research functions. It contains a series of internal and external conservation ponds that skillfully simulate the different sizes and salinities of the waters that Chinese sturgeon naturally migrates through, thereby optimizes conditions for their breeding and feeding.

The Reserve also includes an immersive aquarium, offering visitors a unique opportunity to witness the crucial conservation work being carried out as well facilitate education, deeply observe Chinese sturgeon research and breeding activities up close, and learn about the growth and development of Chinese sturgeon. 

OBERMEYER is deeply honored and proud to have contributed with professional architectural design knowledge to this foremost Reserve and provide solutions to the protection of the natural ecosystem. We are looking forward to more baby sturgeons being hatched in this high-end and multi-functional R&D complex, being released back to nature for the decades to come.

Knowledge

The Chinese sturgeon, revered as a "living fossil" crucial to understanding fish evolution, has roamed the rivers for some 140 million years. Despite being wildlife under first-class protection in China, its ability to naturally reproduce in the wild had ceased. In July 2022, the International Union for Conservation of Nature declared the Yangtze sturgeon extinct in the wild.