Some Great Lakes fish could be upward of 400 years old: Study | Gravitas

When the Taj Mahal was being built, the Mughal Empire was still ruling large parts of India. The Renaissance was still unfolding in Europe, and Shakespeare was still more than a century away from being born.

But some fish swimming in North American waters today could be even older than all of that.

A new study says Michigan’s lake sturgeon may live for as long as 427 years, turning these already famous "living dinosaurs" into some of the oldest freshwater animals on the planet.

Researchers from Michigan and Wisconsin reached that estimate after analysing 44 years of data from five lake sturgeon populations in the Great Lakes.

They repeatedly captured, measured, marked and released the fish, then tracked their growth when they encountered the same animals again years later.

Unlike humans, lake sturgeon continue growing throughout their lives. Researchers used those growth patterns to estimate how long it would take a fish to reach a particular size.

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According to the study, a 63-inch male could live between 90 and 279 years. For females, the estimate stretches even further. A 71-inch female could live anywhere from 99 to 427 years.

Earlier research had placed their maximum age at about 150 years.

For perspective, Greenland sharks can live for up to 512 years, making them the longest-lived vertebrates known to science.

And lake sturgeon themselves have been around for roughly 150 million years, long before humans ever appeared.