When a team of biologists went on a fishing expedition in the Little Tennessee River hoping to rob sicklefin redhorse of their eggs last month, they scored big, squeezing 27,000 eggs out of just seven fish.

Unlike caviar, the eggs won’t be eaten, but rather trucked to a high-tech aquatic lab in Knoxville, Tenn., to join an effort to keep a rare fish off the endangered species list. The eggs will be fertilized and hatched in the lab. Ultimately, the fish will be released into the Oconaluftee River in hopes of spreading the species.

“With the sicklefin redhorse, we have a chance to take some early conservation action and hopefully increase the size and number of spawning populations,” said Mark Cantrell of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.

The project is a joint venture by the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission, Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, and Conservation Fisheries, a Knoxville-based non-profit specializing in the captive propagation and rearing of the region’s most imperiled fish.

“No one has done this type of work with the sicklefin redhorse, so there is a steep learning curve,” said CFI’s Pat Rakes.

Once the fish grow to about 1.5 inches long, they will be moved to a Cherokee hatchery operated by the tribe. From there, they’ll be released in the Oconaluftee River upstream of the Ela Dam, where biologists hope they’ll expand their range up the river.

Some of the fish also will be put in the Tuckasegee River above the Dillsboro Dam. The fish hatched this year will return to spawn in about 5 to 7 years. By then, the Dillsboro dam will have been removed, opening up a good deal more river to spawning and migration by the fish.

So far, the project has been funded by US Fish and Wildlife. Next year, a grant from the Cherokee Preservation Foundation will allow the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians to hatch and rear the eggs at their hatchery.

What is a sicklefin redhorse?

The sicklefin redhorse, a recently discovered species, is found only in the western tip of North Carolina and a small bit of North Georgia. The extremely limited range of the fish and the precarious state of the streams where it lives raise questions about its long-term well being, and whether it needs protection under the Endangered Species Act.

The sicklefin is one of 15 redhorse species and was favored by Native Americans who built extensive fish traps and weirs for this important source of protein. The sicklefin is named for its long, sickle-shaped dorsal fin. It was first recognized as a distinct fish species by Roanoke College professor Robert Jenkins in 1992. Looking at various redhorse specimens, he noticed some specimens from the Little Tennessee River basin were different from others. It became clear that instead of being an odd fit for other species, this was a new species, the sicklefin redhorse, which is also found in the Hiwassee River basin.

Growing to about a foot and a half long, sicklefins are bottom feeders, eating aquatic insects, though they will forage along downed logs, even turning upside down and eating along the log all the way to the water’s surface where one biologist has even heard them slurp.

Spawning habits of the redhorse suggest they might imprint on a river, returning to the same spot they were born to spawn when they grow into adult fish several years later. The migration has been hampered by the construction of dams on rivers through the region.