Species: Eastern Mosquitofish (Gambusia holbrooki) Location: Lake Fran Urban Wetlands, Orlando, FL Date: July 7, 2018 Perhaps the least impressive fish on my Lifelist is the Eastern Mosquitofish. Within 30 seconds of putting on a micro rig and targeting them in Central Florida, I caught one. I caught half a dozen of them in no time…
Species: Vermiculated Sailfin Catfish (Pterygoplichthys disjunctivus) Location: Lake Fran Urban Wetlands, Orlando, FL Date: July 7, 2018 My first night in Florida amounted to me being terrified for my life as I tried night fishing for Florida Gar and Bowfin. A gun went off within 50 yards of where I was standing, and I lost it. Read…
Species: Umpqua Pikeminnow (Ptychocheilus umpquae) Location: Umpqua River, Oregon Date: June 25, 2018 Odds are, you’ve heard of the Umpqua River. After all, it’s home to Oregon’s only real Striper fishery (though it’s still not great). Fish likely don’t even spawn but every few years, so the fish there are there in limited numbers. But the fish…
Species: Mountain Whitefish (Prosopium williamsoni) Location: Deschutes River, Oregon Date: June 21, 2018 The fish most Central Oregon anglers can’t avoid avoided me for decades. Probably because I didn’t know much about them. If you want to catch one, you should know the facts. All of these are 100% true. Whitefish Facts 1) My first Mountain Whitefish…
Species: Fluffy Sculpin (Oligocottus snyderi) Location: Oregon Coast Date: June 20, 2018 Do you believe in love at first sight? I’m not sure I did, but then I looked at a picture of a Fluffy Sculpin, the most beautiful little fish you ever did see. To further sell me on it, God made sure it comes in…
Species: Rosylip Sculpin (Ascelichthys rhodorus) Location: Oregon Coast Date: June 20, 2018 The nearshore saltwater species diversity in Oregon is pretty low. Excluding micros, there are only about 20 species you can catch from shore with any sort of realistic possibility. This sounds high, but when compared to southern California, Florida, or even the similarly temperate Puget…
Species: Redside Shiner (Richardsonius balteatus) Location: Corvallis, Oregon Date: June 16, 2018 After school got out, I loaded my car and drove up to visit my brother, Gabe. I knew it would be the last summer he lived in Corvallis with his roommates, the guys who had been surrogate brothers to me in the dozens of times…
Species: Dixie Chub (Semotilus thoreauianus) Location: Atlanta, Georgia Date: April 22, 2018 Hotlanta. Apart from some phenomenal tourist attractions such as the Civil Rights Museum and Coca Cola Headquarters, the mediocre attractions such as the Chik-Fil-A College Football Hall of Fame, and the blissfully above average Southern Food, Atlanta isn’t the best city. It lives up the…
Species: Speckled Dace (Rhinichthys osculus) Location: Link River, Klamath Falls, OR Date: December 15, 2015 As of right now, this is one species. Likely, the Klamath Speckled Dace, Rhinichthys osculus klamathensis, will soon be classified as a separate species. It, like a number of Oregon endemics, hasn’t seen a lot of attention in the past 100 years, so it’s…
Species: Klamath Marbled Sculpin (Cottus klamathensis) Location: Klamath Falls, OR Date: March 10, 2018 My entire life, I’d known sculpins existed in the Klamath Basin. I’d seen them in the stomachs of the trout I’d occasionally kept, dead along the shoreline, and darting in and out of the shadows when I’d return from a last-light wade-fishing…
