What is this? I didn’t think my pond had any fish but just saw this guy in there today, I wanted to stock it later this year but it’s different if it has fish already
Fisheries biologist here. I’ll try and weigh in. Clearly some member of the cyprinid family (minnows) which include shiners, chubs, dace, etc. You found it in Alabama which thanks to lack of any recent glaciation has a tremendous cyprinid diversity. Cyprinid identification can often times come down to counting lateral line scales, measuring the ratio of scale height to width, counting fin rays, or even counting individual pigment dots on certain areas of the body. Without many clear photos from multiple angles species is almost impossible. The heavily subterminal mouth seems distinct enough to get close for someone familiar with the region however. Genus could be possible but again without more information some kind of shiner is as far as I can get with not being familiar with that region.
Edit: Going through some online keys and a juvenile sharpfin chubsucker seems to be a very real possibility. So not even a cyprinid spp but a Catastoma spp. Admittedly chiming in outside of my region of knowledge was a poor choice…. But that’s my final answer Regis.
I hope when I ask a question on Reddit I get an answer even remotely that good.
Its a female bluefin killifish, Lucania goodei, in the topminnow family Fundulidae.
You know the eggs can go through water fouls intestines unharmed right?!
How ponds and lakes naturally get populated.
ROFL! Wife was sub. teacher for 2nd grade recently teaching about plants and forests and how seeds spead.She cringed because text said animals help spread seeds. She only paused a second before moving on. Didn’t want someone to ask “how do they spread the seed?”
Looks like some variety of Notropis sp. I’m not well versed on the southern species, but looks very similar to the Ironcolor Shiner Notropis chalybaeus
That is a blue fin killifish and the reason you have them in you pond now is because a bird pooped out the eggs from the mother that the bird eat.. you can find out more about it on Google, but I found the in my pond too. Crazy ha
If the eggs hadn’t been laid and fertilized they would not grow into little fishes
I recognize that little bastard. Those things always, always show up in our mud pond (in NC).
We refer to them as Gambusia, but I think the more common name is Mosquitofish. Looks like you’ve got a male.
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