The blacktail shiner (''Cyprinella venusta'') is a small freshwater fish in the family Cyprinidae native to the United States.

Description and anatomy

The blacktail shiner is a somewhat slender

minnow Minnow is the common name for a number of species of small freshwater fish, belonging to several genera of the families Cyprinidae and Leuciscidae. They are also known in Ireland as pinkeens. Smaller fish in the subfamily Leusciscidae are c ...

with 8-9 rays on the anal fin, and a prominent black spot at the base of the

caudal fin Fins are distinctive anatomical features composed of bony spines or rays protruding from the body of a fish. They are covered with skin and joined together either in a webbed fashion, as seen in most bony fish, or similar to a flipper, as ...

(tail fin). The back is usually yellowish-olive, and the sides are silvery with hints of blue. Adults usually reach in length. The blacktail shiner has a large, black caudal spot which distinguishes it from most other minnows. The caudal spot of the blacktail shiner may be faint, especially in populations inhabiting

turbid Turbidity is the cloudiness or haziness of a fluid caused by large numbers of individual particles that are generally invisible to the naked eye, similar to smoke in air. The measurement of turbidity is a key test of water quality. Fluids can ...

waters, and they could likely be confused with the

red shiner The red shiner or red-horse minnow (''Cyprinella lutrensis'') is a North American species of freshwater fish in the family Cyprinidae. They are deep-bodied and laterally compressed,Farringer R.T., III, A.A. Echelle, and S.F. Lehtinen. 1979. Repr ...

(''C. lutrensis''); however, the red shiner has 9 anal rays (versus 8) and usually 35 or fewer lateral

scales Scale or scales may refer to: Mathematics * Scale (descriptive set theory), an object defined on a set of points * Scale (ratio), the ratio of a linear dimension of a model to the corresponding dimension of the original * Scale factor, a number w ...

(versus 36 or more).

Geographic distribution

The blacktail shiner occurs in

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico ( es, Golfo de México) is an ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United ...

drainages from Suwannee River,

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...

and

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

, to Rio Grande,

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

;

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it fl ...

basin (mostly on Former

Mississippi Embayment The Mississippi embayment is a physiographic feature in the south-central United States, part of the Mississippi Alluvial Plain. It is essentially a northward continuation of the fluvial sediments of the Mississippi River Delta to its conflue ...

) from southern

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rockf ...

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

and west in Red River drainage to western Oklahoma. Blacktail shiners are found in the southern United States west of the

Appalachian Mountains The Appalachian Mountains, often called the Appalachians, (french: Appalaches), are a system of mountains in eastern to northeastern North America. The Appalachians first formed roughly 480 million years ago during the Ordovician Period. They ...

. The species ranges east and west from north central Florida to West Texas, and north to southern Illinois. In Texas, blacktail shiners are unknown in the Panhandle, being found primarily from the

Edwards Plateau The Edwards Plateau is a geographic region at the crossroads of Central Texas, Central, South Texas, South, and West Texas. It is bounded by the Balcones Fault to the south and east, the Llano Uplift and the Llano Estacado to the north, and the ...

eastward. The blacktail shiner has also been found from the Rio Grande basin in Texas, east to the Suwannee River, and north through the Mississippi River basin to the confluence of the Ohio River. Two of the three recognized subspecies occur in

Alabama (We dare defend our rights) , anthem = "Alabama" , image_map = Alabama in United States.svg , seat = Montgomery , LargestCity = Huntsville , LargestCounty = Baldwin County , LargestMetro = Greater Birmingham , area_total_km2 = 135,765 ...

. The slender blacktail shiner, ''C. v. stigmaturus'', is found in the upper Mobile River basin (most frequently above the

Fall Line A fall line (or fall zone) is the area where an upland region and a coastal plain meet and is typically prominent where rivers cross it, with resulting rapids or waterfalls. The uplands are relatively hard crystalline basement rock, and the coa ...

), while the eastern blacktail shiner, ''C. v. cercositgma'', occurs in the lower Mobile River basin and coastal rivers draining the state. Intergradations between these subspecies have been recognized in the

, Cahaba, and Tallapoosa river systems.

Ecology and habitat

The blacktail shiner feeds primarily on

invertebrates Invertebrates are a paraphyletic group of animals that neither possess nor develop a vertebral column (commonly known as a ''backbone'' or ''spine''), derived from the notochord. This is a grouping including all animals apart from the chordat ...

. Its diet includes algae, seeds, and aquatic and terrestrial insects.

Aquatic insects Aquatic insects or water insects live some portion of their life cycle in the water. They feed in the same ways as other insects. Some ''diving'' insects, such as predatory diving beetles, can hunt for food underwater where land-living insects c ...

and algae were the most common food items of blacktail shiners in the Blanco River, Texas; sediment and detritus were found in 21% of the 36 guts examined. Blacktail shiners feed primarily during the day. Blacktail shiners may serve as major food resource for

piscivorous A piscivore () is a carnivorous animal that eats primarily fish. The name ''piscivore'' is derived . Piscivore is equivalent to the Greek-derived word ichthyophage, both of which mean "fish eater". Fish were the diet of early tetrapod evoluti ...

spotted bass The spotted bass (''Micropterus punctulatus''), also called spotty, or spots in various fishing communities, is a species of North American freshwater fish belonging to the sunfish family (Centrarchidae) of the order Perciformes. It is noted fo ...

(''Micropterus punctulatus'') during the summer in Village Creek ( Neches River), Texas. The blacktail shiner is most common in pools and runs of clear, sandy-bottomed, small to medium rivers, typically in areas with sparse vegetation and strong current, but upland populations occur in creeks over substrates with more gravel and rubble.Page, L.M. and Burr, B.M. 2011. Peterson field guide to freshwater fishes of North America north of Mexico. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Boston, Massachusetts. Populations in the western part of the species' range are often found in turbid water. Blacktail shiner mesohabitat is ubiquitously distributed among pools, runs, and

riffles A riffle is a shallow landform in a flowing channel. Colloquially, it is a shallow place in a river where water flows quickly past rocks. However, in geology a riffle has specific characteristics. Topographic, sedimentary and hydraulic indica ...

with

silt Silt is granular material of a size between sand and clay and composed mostly of broken grains of quartz. Silt may occur as a soil (often mixed with sand or clay) or as sediment mixed in suspension with water. Silt usually has a floury feel ...

, gravel, and bedrock substrates. In the Blanco River, Texas, blacktail shiners were most abundant in swift runs in the spring and summer. The species occurred throughout the year in riffle and sandbank habitats in Village Creek (Neches River), Texas. During summer, most individuals were collected from sandbank habitats; they were also found in deep channel and riffle habitats, though no blacktail shiners longer than occurred in riffles. Individuals smaller than were found predominately in riffle habitats during fall and winter. Juveniles occurred almost exclusively in sandbank mesohabitat during spring. Blacktail shiners are commonly found in sandy or rocky areas of

Lake Texoma Lake Texoma is one of the largest reservoirs in the United States, the 12th largest US Army Corps of Engineers' (USACE) lake, and the largest in USACE Tulsa District. Lake Texoma is formed by Denison Dam on the Red River in Bryan County, Oklaho ...

(Oklahoma/Texas), generally in clearer water of the downstream area; they are occasionally abundant in the tailwaters, and rarely found in the

headwaters The headwaters of a river or stream is the farthest place in that river or stream from its estuary or downstream confluence with another river, as measured along the course of the river. It is also known as a river's source. Definition The ...

. The blacktail shiner hybridizes with the red shiner (''C. lutrensis'') in TexasHubbs, C., and K. Strawn. 1956. Infertility between two sympatric fishes, ''Notropis lutrensis'' and ''Notropis venustus.'' Evolution 10(4):341-344. and in Illinois.Smith, P.W. 1979. The Fishes of Illinois. University of Illinois Press, Urbana. 314 pp.

Life history

The lifespan of the blacktail shiner is up to 4 years in the Leaf River system, Mississippi and up to 5 years in the Blanco River, Texas.Littrell, B.M. 2006. Can Invasiveness of Native Cyprinids Be Predicted From Life History Traits? A Comparison Between a Native Invader and a Regionally Endemic Cyprinid and Status of an Introgresses Guadalupe Bass Population in a Central Texas Stream. Master of Science Thesis, Texas State University-San Marcos.61 pp. In Texas, the blacktail shiner spawning season is April through September. In Mississippi, it is late March through early October, with most females reproductive from April to early September.Heins, D.C. 1990. Mating behaviors of the blacktail shiner, Cyprinella venusta, from southeastern Mississippi. Proc. S.E. Fishes Council 21:5-7. In Village Creek, Texas, blacktail shiners revealed size distribution patterns consistent with a protracted spawning season.Moriarty, L.J., and K.O. Winemiller. 1997. Spatial and temporal variation in fish assemblage structure in Village Creek, Hardin County, Texas. Texas Journal of Science 49(3):85-110. Prime spawning habitat for the blacktail shiner is in fractional crevices; generally located in flowing water, preferring crevices in current velocities of . Populations in reservoirs chose crevice sites in locations of much lower current speeds. In the Blanco River, Texas, blacktail shiners were observed depositing eggs underneath small boulders and large

cobble Cobble may refer to: * Cobble (geology), a designation of particle size for sediment or clastic rock * Cobblestone, partially rounded rocks used for road paving * Hammerstone, a prehistoric stone tool * Tyringham Cobble, a nature reserve in Tyr ...

in a bedrock riffle in the swiftest current velocities available. Males respond to sounds produced by spawning females and are able to distinguish these sounds from those produced by related female red shiners. Males are territorial, defending a crevice from other males. Breeding pair swims along the crevice, the female deposits eggs; usually the sperm has already been released into the crevice, so the eggs are deposited into a crevice with viable sperm. Immediately after spawning, the male doubles back and eats any eggs that failed to make it into the crevice. Small males (sneakers) try to fertilize eggs by darting between the dominant male and spawning female. Both large and small males will enter another male's territory and deposit sperm in a crevice before the male courts a female to lay eggs in the crevice.Heins, D.C. and Dorsett, D.R. 1986. Reproductive traits of the blacktail shiner, ''NOTROPIS VENUSTUS'' (Girard) in southern Mississippi. ''Southwest Naturalist'' 31: 185-189. One study in the Blanco River, Texas found that female blacktail shiners had up to 340 ova. Another study in southwestern Mississippi found that clutch sizes ranged between 139 and 459 ova in females ; average mature ovum diameter was ; ovaries in mature females constituted 5.8-19.1% of the somatic body weight. Females from the

Pearl River The Pearl River, also known by its Chinese name Zhujiang or Zhu Jiang in Mandarin pinyin or Chu Kiang and formerly often known as the , is an extensive river system in southern China. The name "Pearl River" is also often used as a catch-a ...

, Mississippi, spawned 20-46 clutches during the reproductive season. The size of sexual maturation is between and . In the Leaf River system, Mississippi, average length was for age 1, for age 2, and for age 3; populations consisted mainly of age classes 0 and IBaker, J.A., K.J. Kilgore, and S.A. Foster. 1994. Populations variation in spawning current speed selection in the blacktail shiner, Cyprinella venusta (Pisces: Cyprinidae). Env. Biol. Fish. 39:357-364. In the first year, blacktail shiners reach about . Average length was for age 0, for age 1, for age 3 and older in the Blanco River, Texas.

Management

The blacktail shiner is of relatively low conservation concern. Their populations are stable, but some issues of concern include habitat changes associated with

flood control Flood control methods are used to reduce or prevent the detrimental effects of flood waters."Flood Control", MSN Encarta, 2008 (see below: Further reading). Flood relief methods are used to reduce the effects of flood waters or high water level ...

projects, siltation from development sites, deterioration of water quality, and recent water drawdown for mining and irrigation.Walser, C.A. and H.L. BART. 1999. Influence of agriculture on in-stream habitat and fish community structure in Piedmont watersheds of the Chattahoochee River system. Ecol. Fresh. Fish 8:237-246.Johnston, C.E. and T.M. Farmer. 2004. Status of fish species of high conservation concern in the Uchee Creek system (Chattahoochee River 39 drainage), Alabama. Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Report. Activities such as construction and operation of hydroelectric facilities, flood control, additional irrigation diversions, bank stabilization, oil and gas drilling, mining, grazing, stocking or introduction of nonnative fishes may jeopardize the continued existence of the blacktail shiner. Another potential impact on the population could be hybridization.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q6424547 Cyprinella Freshwater fish of the Southeastern United States Taxa named by Charles Frédéric Girard Fish described in 1856