Orangethroat Darter?

According to current information this fish is not in the area I caught it...as near as I can figure out it is an orangethroat darter. notice the dominant male is darker that the others (i spot caught him - saw him and chased him he has maintained his colors in captivity). this is their color all the time - will be interesting to see breeding colors. I have about 5 pairs in captivity. Oh - their population density in this area is off the chart, they were everywhere... but mostly in this one riffle.

here are a couple of photos of males and females...

Dominant Male
 orangethroat_darter_dom_male.jpg   145.47KB   6 downloads
Sub-dominant Male
 orangethroat_darter_sub_male.jpg   148.31KB   5 downloads
Pair
 orangethroat_darter_pair.jpg   128.95KB   4 downloads

That appears to be a Rainbow darter (Etheostoma caeruleum)

Below I've compared the anal fins of rainbow vs. orangethroat darters in Northern Illinois.

Nice looking fish and good photos!

 rainbow_darter_anal_fin.jpg   20.48KB   3 downloads

 1_066.jpg   28.34KB   3 downloads

I'd say that you have a group of rainbow darters, Etheostoma caeruleum. Rainbow males have different banding patterns in the dorsal fins than orangethroats, such as rainbows don't have prominent white banding in the first dorsal fin. Your fish doesn't have any white patterns. If you caught these fish in western MD, they're a recent introduction that seems to be working its way down the Potomac as I understand it. Probably Matt Ashton has more insight into that than I do. The nearest orangethroats would be somewhere in Ohio.

Thanks Uland for posting the pics as I was going to chime in but had nothing to show the differences.

Matt Ashton (ashtonmj) or Karl (element) would be your best contact for information regarding the rainbows. As fundulus said, they are relatively new introduction (sometime in the 90's) coming in from PA.

But those would be the closest rainbow darters to my house, especially if you found them around Frederick.

I made the same mistake when trying to ID my first darters. http://forum.nanfa.o...wtopic=1788&hl=


I agree with everyone above, this looks like a rainbow to me.

Tom

Man am I a popular person today. We've PM'ed back and forth. They are in fact rainbow darters which are not native to Maryland. For Marylanders or anyone interested .... Rainbow distribution link for a map of rainbow darter. The data set is not up to date, only up to 2002, but you get the general idea. There is also a great illustration (Dave N.). I will add that during our invasive crayfish survey we found them quite frequently in the mainstem of the Monacacy River, but I don't remeber how far up off the top of my head. So what distinctively makes it a rainbow, and not an orangethroat as was posed to me in a PM...Uland's anal fin coloration is a great example for field ID (and dorsal fin colors). You can also see a difference in the bandnig pattern along the sides. There is also some overall body shape differences. Sorry for the misinformation you got but the hatchery guys were plain wrong. Interdepartment communication/education is grand isn't it?

There is also a great illustration (Dave N.).

Wish I was that good at drawing. Very nice!!!

Yup, definately rainbows. They're more widely distributed than the MBSS map indicates

I'm actually trying to put together a manuscript on this; I've appended some relevant bits below, hope it's of interest.

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Stauffer et al. (1978) reported the first records of Etheostoma caeruleum from the Potomac River drainage, based on collections from two sites in the upper South Branch of the Potomac River, in Pendleton County, WV, where they were localized and uncommon. Esmond and Stauffer (1993) used discriminant function analysis (DFA) to test the hypothesis that the Potomac population represented either a bait-bucket transfer from proximal drainages in the Ohio River system, or a highly insularized native population. DFA was able to correctly assign 84% of the samples to the correct population, indicating differentiation between all populations examined, leading Esmond and Stauffer (1993) to conclude that the Potomac population represented a native population, differentiated from proximal drainages and isolated via stream capture. However, since 1978 rainbow darters have exhibited a pattern of rapid dispersal through the Potomac River drainage that is inconsistent with natural dispersal of a native taxon and also inconsistent with multiple anthropomorphic introduction events.

Additional specimens of Etheostoma caeruleum were taken in the South Branch of the Potomac near Moorefield (48 rkm downstream from original site) in 1982, and near Romney (83 rkm downstream) in 1984 (Dan Cincotta, pers. comm., 2001). During November 1985, the Potomac River drainage experienced a substantial flood event. The following year, specimens of Etheostoma caeruleum were reported (visual observation) at Harpers Ferry (313 rkm from origin), at the junction of the Potomac and the Shenandoah rivers (Paul Kazyak, pers. comm. 2001). By 1992 Etheostoma caeruleum were common at sites along lower Sideling Hill Creek, and moving upstream rapidly. By 1996, rainbow darters had ascended the Potomac River to a 5 m low-head dam at Cumberland, MD (167 rkm from origin, 35 rkm of which was upstream [DAN collection]), and had been taken just above the Fall Line in Muddy Branch, Montgomery Co., MD (375 rkm from origin [DAN collection]).

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Esmond, E.F. and J.R. Stauffer, Jr. 1983. Taxometric comparison of the Atlantic Slope and Ohio River populations of Etheostoma caeruleum Storer. Am. Midl. Nat. 109(2):390-397.

Stauffer, J.R., Jr., C.H. Hocutt, and D.S. Lee. 1978. The zoogeography of the freshwater fishes of the Potomac River basin. IN K.C. Flynn and W.T. Masin (eds). The Freshwater Potomac: Aquatic Communities and Environmental Stresses. Interstate Commission on the Potomac River Basin, pp. 44-54

The discussion with the hatchery guys was not regarding this fish - but a greenside darter...and according to what you said there is a good population in the monocacy drainage...this one population is ver ver isolated....up in the frederick watershed..I need to check on them when I get a chance..

Thank you for the info via pm, I just thought other people might want the info too??