Sensitive to pollution. Reproduction has suffered from dams blocking upriver spawning runs. Not considered a sport fish, it now supports minor commercial fisheries in New-Brunswick, Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan. Sells for more per pound than any of our other freshwater species. Often considered a gourmet item, as are the processed eggs, known as caviar.
Males mature at a smaller size and spawn every year or two.
Spawns in late spring, or early summer, usually in streams, but also in shallow areas of lakes where it is native to lentic waters. The largest and oldest living fish in Minnesota and the Great Lakes.