The big question: Is Ogopogo a sturgeon?

It’s summer again here in the sunny province of British Columbia and all is quiet on the cryptid front so far. There have been rumours of a couple of Ogopogo sightings this year, but we have not been able to track down any witnesses who might want to allow us to interview them. Ogopogo is Canada’s most famous lake cryptid and in these columns I hope to help Cryptomundo readers come to an understanding of an animal that is very real and not just the stuff of legend. I am kicking off a series of articles on our mystery denizen by dealing with an issue and question that is frequently asked.

When talking about Ogopogo with many people, one question that I am always asked is: Couldn’t Ogopogo be a sturgeon?

I would have to say that it is very unlikely as there are no recorded sightings or capture of sturgeon in Okanagan Lake. Years ago I remember talking to Chris Gibson who was PR manager for radio station CKIQ and he told me that there were sturgeon in the lake. I asked Chris how he knew that and he said there just were. I don’t know if our conversation was the catalyst of this, but CKIQ and Harv’s Outdoor Sports in Kelowna, B.C. sponsored the “Okey Dokey Lake Monster Derby” aimed at proving there were sturgeon in the lake.

CKIQ and Harv’s put up a cool $10,000 in cash for anyone who could prove that Ogopogo was a sturgeon. I fail to see how anyone could have picked up the cash as how do ‘prove’ that a sturgeon and Ogopogo are the same things. There is just no reasonable methodology for doing this, so I guess from the way the competition was worded nobody could have won the prize.

However, that did not stop people from attempting to fish for sturgeon in Okanagan Lake. I heard of people going out on boats with huge block and tackle in a bid to win the prize money, but despite a fair bit of activity, the $10,000 went unclaimed because not one person was able to pull a sturgeon out of the depths of the lake.

I have frequently gone through the catalogue of sightings of Ogopogo over the years and have found only one sighting that remotely fits the physical attributes of a sturgeon. All other sightings are of an animal far removed from the Acipenser transmontanus which is the dominant sturgeon species in British Columbia.

Both Arlene Gaal, the noted Ogopogo researcher, and the late Jim Clark, co-founder of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, wrote to the Federal Department of Fisheries to ascertain whether sturgeon are a constituent member of the piscid population of Okanagan Lake. The Department sent back a list of fish to both Arlene and Jim and conspicuous by its absence is the sturgeon.

Some will turn to me and say that my assertion that sturgeon most likely do not exist in Okanagan Lake can’t be right, because they point to the testimony of the divers who helped with the building of the Okanagan Lake floating bridge which was built in the mid-1950’s. The urban myth here is that the divers saw giant sturgeon at the bottom of the lake which scared them. However, I have researched this using materials supplies by a variety of sources and it is pretty clear that the divers did not specifically describe sturgeon, but very large dark shapes in the water that were unidentifiable and there fore spooked them. Somewhere along the way people inserted sturgeon for unidentifiable animals and that is how the sturgeon myth in Okanagan Lake arose.

I am perfectly happy to be proved wrong about there being sturgeon in Okanagan Lake, but the way things are now, there is no proof whatsoever that sturgeon are currently present or have been in the recent past.

I guess the question people should be asking me is: What do you think Ogopogo is? My answer is I don’t know, but I do want to find out and that is why I spend so much time up at Okanagan Lake. I also spend a lot of time at Okanagan Lake because some of the most pleasing wineries in the world surround the lake and I am very partial to some of their vintages.

Naturally a few too many vintages will result in the imbiber all too easily seeing Ogopogo!!!

John Kirk About John Kirk
One of the founders of the BCSCC, John Kirk has enjoyed a varied and exciting career path. Both a print and broadcast journalist, John Kirk has in recent years been at the forefront of much of the BCSCC’s expeditions, investigations and publishing. John has been particularly interested in the phenomenon of unknown aquatic cryptids around the world and is the author of In the Domain of the Lake Monsters (Key Porter Books, 1998). In addition to his interest in freshwater cryptids, John has been keenly interested in investigating the possible existence of sasquatch and other bipedal hominids of the world, and in particular, the Yeren of China. John is also chairman of the Crypto Safari organization, which specializes in sending teams of investigators to remote parts of the world to search for animals as yet unidentified by science. John travelled with a Crypto Safari team to Cameroon and northern Republic of Congo to interview witnesses among the Baka pygmies and Bantu bushmen who have sighted a large unknown animal that bears more than a superficial resemblance to a dinosaur. Since 1996, John Kirk has been editor and publisher of the BCSCC Quarterly which is the flagship publication of the BCSCC. In demand at conferences, seminars, lectures and on television and radio programs, John has spoken all over North America and has appeared in programs on NBC, ABC, CBS, PBS, TLC, Discovery, CBC, CTV and the BBC. In his personal life John spends much time studying the histories of Scottish Clans and is himself the president of the Clan Kirk Society. John is also an avid soccer enthusiast and player.

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