Our Awesome Illinois Native Fish- For Aquariums!

So I've been keeping natives from around the Chicago area now since it warmed up and I was able to get out into the water. This has been something I've wanted to do for a long time, and now I've got the space to do it. As a teenager, I spent many an afternoon in the creek down the street from my house seining minnows to use for bait. Saw a lot of cool fish, but never put any in an aquarium. Time to get on that.

Spottail Shiner, Notropis hudsonius; Blacknose Shiner, Notropis heterolepis; Emerald Shiner, Notropis atherinoides

Natives are pretty cool fish. Not always the most colorful- sometimes they are- but there is such a variety present that you could keep your curiosity piqued for quite a long time keeping and collecting all the species (like Pokémon...).

Blackstripe Topminnow, Fundulus notatus

Most people think of native fish as gamefish that you would catch on a hook and line. There are so many more fish out there that are much more suitable for aquariums though, caught with nets (or micro fishing if you're a real geek). There are also a lot of different kinds; catfish, midrange minnows, suckers, topwater minnows, darters, and so on. Some, like the rainbow darter or very common orange throated darter give the most colorful cichlids a run for the money. Others are extremely abundant, making it extremely easy to keep a large school of similar fish. No more going to the pet store and being told, "This is a schooling fish, they like to be kept in groups of three or more," and then getting only the bare minimum just to have them terrorize the smallest one. Instead, one sweep of the net could bring home twenty 1.5" long fish. The bonus to this is that fish act differently when they're kept the way they're meant to live, in large groups.

Fathead chub, Pimephales promelas; Golden Shiner, Notemigonus crysoleucas; Central Stoneroller, Campostoma anomalum

There are a few things to watch out for though. One is endangered and threatened species. They exist, and not only are the consequences a good deterrent, but most likely they also aren't the most hardy. All you're doing by capturing them is decreasing the population. Second thing is that you need a fishing license to do this. All state rules and regulations that pertain to catching fish also pertain to netting fish. A third thing is specific to Illinois. Can't transport fish across the border- both ways. There's a disease called VHS that is supposedly going around (perhaps blown out of proportion) that the IDNR is looking to avoid spreading. Another thing is feeding. Most of the shiners and midwater minnows will take flake foods like little hogs, but they're going to need a lot of it, as well as good supplementation. They'll decline if they're not given live or frozen food often. A final issue is keeping fish you're not certain of. That cute little catfish or hog sucker is marked really pretty, but won't work too well when he grows to two feet long. Seeing how its illegal to put fish into waters they didn't come from, as well as returning a potentially diseased fish to its original water a year or two later, this isn't going to be feasible for most.

Johnny Darter, Etheostoma nigrum; Orangethroated Darter, Etheostoma spectabile; Banded Darter, Etheostoma zonale

In all, they're pretty interesting fish, and super easy to come by. Being that they're free (minus the $15 fishing license), there's a good incentive to keeping them in good company to watch them behave as they should.

I'm going to do several posts showing some of the individual species I have, giving an overview as well as some tips on care and requirements.  Stay tuned! (I promise I'll take better pictures next time...)





ill use the big faaaancy camera

What I want to say about Christians being afraid of the homosexual issue...

Yeah, I'm not afraid of the change coming. And this is how I feel toward those already plotting against Christ's church... if I wanted to make light of it. Which I kinda do.

Akira Toriyama Drawing style

Helping people out who have a hard time drawing Dragonball characters. New series means everyone's favorite thing to do is draw DBZ... this should make it easier!

Star Wars is a Samurai Movie

With the new Star Wars movie coming out, I thought I'd lay my theory on everyone. I've explained this idea to people before, and I think it makes sense, and so does everyone I explain it to.

Star Wars is a space samurai movie.

Let's Try This Again...

Been about three years since I've blogged, and now I think its time to give this a go again. Gonna try something a little different this time around, something more... ahem... well rounded. It took a considerable amount of time trying to write giant posts dealing with subjects too in-depth for a blog, and it just really wore on me and I got tired of it. So now, I'm going to try something different, something more... me.
I love theology, but I love a lot of other things too. Matter of fact, I pretty much geek out on a lot of random things that are only interesting to certain people. Sooooo, I'm going to try to hit all of it here and there. Theology will still be a big part of the blog, but I want to inject some other things in here too.
Shorter posts too. Writing those big theological essays took a long time. Took a long time for people to read too, which is kinda a deterrent unless you've got oodles of time on your hands or think waaay too highly of my opinion lol. So, I'm going to actually attempt an actual blog. Short and sweet. This way I can be more frequent, but less exhaustive (or exhausting).

So, we'll see how this goes. Hopefully better. Hopefully not worse.

Toodles,

Mike