Category: suckers

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Be the Buffalo! (It’s Halloween: lighten up.)

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Are you, like me, not an enthusiastic participant in Halloween? Do family members and friends ask what your costume will be, then  shake their heads sadly when you answer? I’ve got just what you need. Download this super high-tech Smallmouth Buffalo mask, print it out, and spend half an hour with scissors, markers, glue and whatever else you need. Given their low expectations, you’re going to amaze everyone you know. Downloads: , , or (all are… Continue reading

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Blue Suckers for NANFA 2017 Convention in Missouri

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I was asked to design the t-shirt for this year’s annual meeting of the North American Native Fishes Association in Missouri (June 8-13, 2017, Meramec State Park). To register for the convention: http://www.nanfa.org/convention/2017.shtml There’s even something on the back, in case you’re being followed: The first batch of orders has shipped! To order a shirt (or a bunch of them): http://www.nanfa.org/cart.shtml#MOshirt (all proceeds go to NANFA, not me). They come in M, L, XL, XXL and XXXL.… Continue reading

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Iris Catches the Unicorn

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As parents, we want our kids to be better than we are and to do better than we have done. The other day I got a little taste of this idea in action. My daughters have fished as long as they’ve been able to hold a fishing pole. Both of them love it. But Iris, age 9, has developed a fishing addiction that rivals my own. All winter we talked about the fishing we’d do… Continue reading

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Shorthead Redhorse Spawning in Living Color

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Spring is the best season. Anyone who says otherwise is wrong. Anyone who claims fall is better is secretly paid to say it. Among the surest and most exciting signs of spring are the annual spawning runs of various fish in local waterways. The arrival of White Bass (Morone chrysops) in large numbers makes for exciting fishing. Though futile from a reproductive standpoint, the runs of Coho Salmon and Steelhead (Rainbow Trout) up Lake Michigan… Continue reading

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State Record Shorthead Redhorse Caviar

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I have asked myself many times what I would do if I happened to catch a record-sized fish. I suspect most of us who fish obsessively have thought about this. There are really only two choices. You either kill it, take it to a certified scale, fill out paperwork and get the record, or you photograph the hell out of it, measure it every way you can think of, then release it and bask in… Continue reading

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Black Horse, Blue Sucker

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 The following was first published, in an abridged form, in American Currents, (http://www.nanfa.org/ac.shtml and see my post about AC and NANFA here) Vol. 40, no. 1 (January, 2015). This online version will evolve as I find new information, new images, and additional sources. Fishing in the Public Domain Unlike features such as scale or ray counts, the names of fishes—scientific and common—are susceptible to the same forces as any human creation. What initially seem like… Continue reading

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1917’s Sweet Smell of Spring in Minnesota: 2 Million Pounds of Dead Buffalo & Carp

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DEAD FISH, BUFFALO LAKE, MARTIN COUNTY, SPRING OF 1917. Estimated 175,000 pounds smothered in this lake alone last winter. Game Warden Altenberg of Fairmount made a careful survey of the lakes of Martin county and found loss of fish in twenty lakes, the following, Martin, Charlotte, Cedar, Buffalo, Fish, North Silver, Iowa, Tuttle, Susan and East Chain, suffering most heavily. Mr. Altenbergy estimated the total loss from smothering of fish in Martin county last winter,… Continue reading

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Modoc Sucker Delisting: Public Comment Period Extended

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Anyone with scientific or other evidence regarding the health of the Modoc Sucker as a species has a very brief window during which additional comments may be submitted regarding the FWS proposal to remove the species from the Federal List of Threatened and Endangered Wildlife. De-listing was proposed a year ago (February, 2014). See my post about it here. The proposal states: We, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service), propose to remove the Modoc… Continue reading

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The World of Suckers (1909) and the Growth of Suckerism

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Cover of the World of Suckers by Lionel Josaphare (1909)

Suckerism is not a circumstantial folly but an active emotion. Lionel Josaphare All hail the great unacknowledged scholar of suckers and suckerism, Lionel Josaphare (1876–?), whose work belongs on the shelf with your other fish books. It even includes valuable information missing from all those old Jordan & Evermann books and your $250 copy of Becker’s Fishes of Wisconsin. Though they covered a great many species, they apparently ignored quite a few. According to The… Continue reading

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New Work on Species of Western Mountain Suckers (Pantosteus)

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A new paper does a lot for our understanding of the several Mountain Sucker species in the genus Pantosteus. It elevates Pantosteus back to genus and elevates some old species. It divides Bluehead Suckers into two species: P. discobolus (in the Colorado Basin) and  P. virescens (in the Bonneville and Snake basins). It divides mountain suckers into P. platyrhynchus (in the Bonneville and Snake basins), P. jordani (in the Missouri Basin), P. lahontan (in the… Continue reading

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Modoc Sucker no longer endangered?

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After almost 30 years on the endangered species list, the Modoc sucker (Catostomus microps) is up for delisting, according to an article from the Klamath Falls Herald and News, by Lacey Jarrell (found on the Oregon Public Broadcasting site) (see also this excellent post on the Introduction to Fisheries blog). The species, which lives in a small area of northern California and southern Oregon, was listed by the state of California in 1980, then federally… Continue reading

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Moxillumination

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Sunshine and a cooperative little shorthead. Is there a word or term for that zone of both rays and barely-formed scales, or for the stage of scale formation where they are more hints than scales? If not, there ought to be. Suggestions? This little channel catfish (8 or 9 inches at most) also had a healthy glow when x-rayed by the sun. Continue reading

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A blue sucker in the hand is worth 100 in books

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I have held blue suckers. A bunch of them.   (There are more photos below. Read on or scroll down.) It turns out that if you start a site devoted to catostomids, and you’re very polite to the right people, you might find yourself spending a sunny May day on board a boat in the Wisconsin River with a net in your hands and hundreds of suckers (of many species) and sturgeon (of two species)… Continue reading

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Juvenile quillback carpsuckers on hook and line

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Multi-species angler Ben Cantrell managed to catch a couple of juvenile quillbacks (Carpiodes cyprinus) recently (late March, 2013), and since I have never seen any this young—in person or in photos this clear—I asked if he would let me post them here. (Edit: Ben has since written up this story on his own blog, along with other fishing successes. Check it out for some great fish and photos: http://bencantrellfish.blogspot.com/) These were caught in an area… Continue reading

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Two brothers, two days, two Illinois state record redhorses

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This story is a few years old (the following is based on Dale Bowman’s report in the Chicago Sun-Times on May 14, 2008, linked below), but it’s a beauty: Brothers Andrew and John Chione were fishing the Fox River west of Chicago in 2008 for carp, catfish and anything else that would bite. On April 24th,13-year-old John caught a 25.5 inch, 6.71 pound silver redhorse, got it weighed on a certified scale and had the… Continue reading

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December Redhorse Dorsal

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a dorsal fin

Got out fishing in a favorite creek today, and though it’s December 2nd, for a while a long-sleeved t-shirt was too warm. For the first time in months, a sucker was caught. I’d really hoped to get one more before snow, ice and holidays derailed my fishing. The rock bass were on fire, including one that missed becoming the new Illinois state record (1 pound, 10 ounces) by only a few ounces. Largest rock bass… Continue reading

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Recovery and protection of the Robust Redhorse

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Judging from the photos I’ve seen, and from the gorgeous tuberculate specimen depicted by Joseph Tommeleri (see the factsheet pdf mentioned below), the robust redhorse is an awesome fish. They get big, they live a long time, and they have come back from extinction. For more on robust redhorse see The Robust Redhorse Conservation Committee website (http://www.robustredhorse.com/) and download their 2 page fact sheet. This video gives a very brief account of the efforts of… Continue reading

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Northern Illinois Greater Redhorse, April 2012

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How often do you get to meet a new fishing buddy, discover half a dozen excellent multi-species fishing spots within an hour of home, sample the fish resident in those new locations while learning a bit about handling several different types of seines, learn a bit about photo tanks and fish photography, and see and handle dozens of new fish species, including one that’s listed as endangered in the state? Not very often. In April… Continue reading

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New World Record Buffalo (and maybe a World Record Gar) in Texas

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Lots of amazing fish being caught in TX recently. David G. and his brother got into some monster fish, including big alligator gar, huge smallmouth buffalo and what might have been a world record longnose gar at 61 inches and an estimated weight (based on length and girth) of 49.6 pounds. The world record, which some say is probably a hybrid longnose/alligator, is 50 pounds and change. The brothers G didn’t have a scale, so… Continue reading

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Flannelmouth sucker, on a fly, in Colorado, in February

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Angler with flannelmouth sucker on Roaring Fork River, Colorado

I spend a fair amount of time reading about fishing—in books and online—and, as I’ve noted elsewhere on this site, I’m weary of the preponderance of trout writing and trout photos. As I’ve also said, I am a big fan of trout and trout fishing. I just don’t like to see fishing limited to a few types of fish. I’ve wondered if the many bloggers and authors posting amazing trout photos have shots of other… Continue reading

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Largescale Suckers on the Fly, Montana, January

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Bitterroot River largescale sucker

The lucky SOBs highly skilled anglers over at False Casts and Flat Tires got a surprise gift from the Bitterroot River recently, and I’m jealous: a bunch of 20″ largescale suckers (Catostomus macrocheilus) and some trout to keep them busy while waiting for another sucker to bite. I can’t go home to Montana and catch fish like these now, so I’m grateful they chose to post excellent photos (and give me permission to post them… Continue reading