A 10,000-Year Story Fighting to Stay Alive

In the desert rivers of the Southwest lives a fish older than dams, canals, and every city on the Colorado River: the razorback sucker. Once raised by spring floods, their young no longer survive in today’s controlled, predator-filled river. So biologists step in — raising juveniles in protected ponds until they’re strong enough to return home. This film follows that journey: harvesting the young, checking their health, and sending them back to the Colorado River to keep a species alive against impossible odds. Conservation isn’t perfect, but it’s hopeful — and as long as these fish return to the water that shaped them, their story isn’t over.