FLUVIAL SHINER
SCIENTIFIC NAME: Notropis edwardraneyi
CHARACTERISTICS: The body form of the fluvial shiner is stocky, with a characteristic blunt snout bending sharply downward near the tip of the mouth. The mouth is terminal and oblique, extending almost to the front eye, which is generally larger than the snout. Body color is silvery, with a diffuse, dusky lateral band extending along the caudal peduncle to the base of the caudal fin, where some individuals develop a faint, disjunct, wedge-shaped spot. The underside is devoid of pigment. Lateral line scales are bounded above and below by a single row of faint melanophores. In their description of Notropis edwardraneyi, Suttkus and Clemmer (1968) may have achieved a new record for systematic thoroughness: they examined 32,493 specimens collected in the Alabama and Tombigbee rivers from 1957 to 1968.
ADULT SIZE: 1.8 to 2.4 in. (45 to 60 mm)
DISTRIBUTION: Notropis edwardraneyi is endemic to the Mobile basin below the Fall Line, where it is generally restricted to the main river channels and lower reaches of large rivers, impoundments, and tributaries. It has recently been documented from the main channel of the Coosa River at the Fall Line near Wetumpka.
HABITAT AND BIOLOGY: The fluvial shiner is commonly and abundantly found over hard sand, gravel, or mud bars in impoundments, flowing channels of main rivers, and mouths of large tributaries. Spawning occurs from May through June. Although little is known about this relatively abundant species" biology, it is presumably a drift feeder, consuming plant material and aquatic and terrestrial insects.
REMARKS: This type locality is the Alabama River near Holly Ferry crossing, Wilcox County, Alabama.
ORIGINAL DESCRIPTION: The fluvial shiner was described by Suttkus and Clemmer in 1968.
ETYMOLOGY:
Notropis means keeled back.
Edwardraneyi means in honor of Edward C. Raney, Cornell University.
The copyrighted information above is from Fishes of Alabama and the Mobile Basin.
