Oops. I forgot to post the Pickerel feeding shot

very nice shot, grass pickerel i assume

If I can ever find a place around here where I can see my hand in front of my face under the water, then I'm going to have to get a snorkel. Those shots are awesome. Though I think 50F is my limit.

Back to the steelcolor... Was down on Paint Creek this past weekend. Some of the big boy steelcolor still had their noses a bit rummy. I was pretty surprised, not near what Brian's photo captured, but it was a pleasant thing to find.



The breeding males also had the elongation as Brian mentioned. I did find the dorsal webbing to be true to form right now, even among females. Only the whipplei had it, and the two species occupied different parts of runs. I found the steelcolor in deep areas with current and spiloptera in shallow rocky and still silty areas.

Would have been something to bother to quantify better, but I was pretty much messing around by myself at that point, trying to beat Trautman's Ohio one man seining record. Only got to 25 species this time, I think due to the high water (it made for too many deep water lifts, which is what'll kill ya). Couldn't find a smallmouth, bluegill or johnny darter to save my life, but got most of all the declined species hehheh. It was a weird situation to be complaining about catching "all these danged state threatened species". Gotta love riffles that are dominated by camurum and tippecanoe with few zonale, blennioides and caeruleum.

Todd