Muscle tissue and eggs from 30 paddlefish snagged this spring have come back clear of any lingering effects from an oil spill in the Yellowstone River in Montana last January.
State Game and Fish Department fisheries chief Greg Power said Game and Fish and North Star Caviar, a nonprofit group that processes paddlefish eggs into caviar for sale, sent the samples to a lab for analysis to find out whether there was any contamination from 30,000 gallons of crude oil that entered the Yellowstone River near Glendive following a pipeline break in mid-January.
“Since fish below the spill could have been exposed, and the Yellowstone River extends into North Dakota where our paddlefish season is open, it was imperative we sampled the edible muscle tissue and eggs to make sure these fish were clear of contamination,” Power said.
Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks found similar results earlier this spring upon analysis of 213 fish representing species known to live in the Yellowstone River between the spill site and the North Dakota border. All of those fish were found clear of any oil-related contamination.
