Freshwater Fishes of Connecticut
Page 2 of 8
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Smelt are important forage fish for large pelagic predators such as striped bass in estuaries and brown trout in lakes.
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Also known as “tidewater” silverside. They are less common than and very difficult to distinguish from the Atlantic silverside without magnification.
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Sculpins are sensitive to environmental degradation, requiring good-quality, coldwater streams to survive.
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Introductions of green sunfish have been implicated with adverse impacts on other fish species.
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Mullets are torpedo-shaped fishes with horizontal mouths.
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Yellow perch are one of the state’s most popular panfishes. They actively feed during the winter, making them a staple for ice anglers.
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Closely related to fallfish, creek chubs build long ridges of gravel for nests.
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Blacknose dace are a native minnow that prefer the pools and rocky riffles of small headwater streams.
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Blueback herring and alewives are so similar that the color of the gut lining (peritoneum) is the only sure way to tell them apart.
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The banded sunfish is listed as a Connecticut State Threatened Species. Their small size makes them vulnerable to predation by bass and other large gamefish, so they thrive only in protected, backwater areas.
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Looking a lot like other shiners gave the mimic shiner its name.
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Two native and one introduced pike species exist in Connecticut. All members of the family are predacious, primarily feeding on fish.
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The sheepshead minnow is a standard for use in many laboratory toxicity and genetics studies.
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Ninespine stickleback males build little tunnel-shaped nests out of bits of vegetation.
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Mudminnows are a small family of the Northern Hemisphere that look similar to killifish and minnows, but are actually more closely related to pike.