Conservation Fisheries, Inc.

Newsletter #18 June 2003

Spring 2003 Update

As usual, I’m running behind on the newsletters! This is an incredibly busy time of year for us. So many of our charges are in the mood for love in the hatchery. Field season is finally underway now that the monsoons have subsided (for now, anyway).

 Of interest… Duskytail darters

 Duskytail darters

We were finally able to get into lower Little River near Rockford, TN and snorkel for duskytail darters, Etheostoma percnurum. This population has suffered from the general decline of water quality conditions in Little River. The population that once persisted upstream (at the U. S. 411 bridge) is apparently gone (maybe). We saw one individual there a few years ago after much looking. This is the only one seen there for perhaps 15 years. Twenty years ago, they regularly turned up in collections at this site. Last year, we resurveyed the area and were unable to find any. The downstream site (at the U. S. 33 bridge) had historically been a pretty good site. We were able to sample there five or six years ago and they were still present. Poor conditions have prevented us from sampling here in recent years. This spring, however, the water was clear enough to effectively snorkel and we were able to collect several fish to use as breeders. We were also lucky enough to collect a rather large nest. The nest has done well at CFI and the fish have spawned twice more. We are hopeful that some of these fish might be available to transplant upstream, above some of the impacted areas. Habitat looks good for them there. Having them upstream, in somewhat cleaner waters, will hopefully give this population a better chance for long-term survival!

The other duskytail darter populations we are monitoring are doing pretty well. The ones we have been stocking into Abrams Creek are approaching numbers comparable to Citico Creek, the source population! We are now stocking propagated duskytails (from the Citico population) into the Tellico River in hopes of establishing a viable population there.

Other news…

We had high hopes of producing propagated Conasauga logperch, Percina jenkinsi, this spring. We have three individuals collected last fall that have been conditioned over winter. They started producing eggs earlier this spring, but unfortunately, all have been infertile. It appears we have three females! The sexes are indistinguishable, so we had no way of knowing what we had when we collected them. We have made three attempts to locate more of this elusive fish this spring. In each case, we found no Conasauga logperch! There’s no reason to believe that anything has happened to them. More likely, they are utilizing some habitat other than that which we normally see them in (usually in late summer and fall). We will make a renewed effort to collect a couple more fish this fall and try spawning them again next spring.

Conasauga logperch

Another large darter we hope to begin work with is the tangerine darter, P. aurantiaca. We have been contracted to try to restore this beautiful fish to the improving waters of the Pigeon River. I must say, we’re pretty excited at the thought of seeing tanks of propagated tangerine darters around the hatchery!

I’ll try to update you soon on some of the other projects we have currently underway at CFI in the near future. Until then, thanks for your continued interest!

J. R. Shute

26 June 2003