Striped shiner
(Luxilus chrysocephalus)
Image source: Yinan Li | inaturalist.org
General data
The striped shiner (Luxilus chrysocephalus) is a member of the family Cyprinidae. It a silvery fish with three to four dorsolateral stripes and dark crescents on the sides. The scales and sensory pores on the snout can be outlined in black. Fins are milky to clear in color while the caudal fins have a milky base with a black or gray spot.
Males can have pink snouts with areas of red or pink on the rest of the body.
They have large, terminal mouths and can get up to nine inches (twenty-three centimetres) in length.
Striped shiners eat and wide range of items. Mostly they feed up in the water column on a range of insects including: termites, mayflies, dragonflies, caddisflies, beetles and terrestrial midges. They also feed on the bottom materials like algae. They feed continuously day and night but feed more on the bottom at night.
These shiners can be found in the mid to upper regions of streams and rivers. They can also be found in rocky pools in clear and turbid creeks.
Great Lakes and Mississippi River basins from western New York and Wisconsin, south to Alabama, Louisiana and eastern Texas, USA; Gulf Coast drainages from Mobile Bay in Georgia and Alabama, to Sabine River in Louisiana, USA. Introduced to Escambia River system in Florida and Alabama.
