...previously sampled Gerking (1945) and/or Whitaker and Wallace (1973). Ten of the 51 previously found species were not found in 1999 or in any collections after 1987. They are Notropis atherinoides, Phenacobius mirabilis, Rhinichthys obtusus, Carpiodes cyprinus, C. carpio, Erimyzon oblongus, Etheostoma flabellare, E. gracile, Percina maculata, and Sander canadensis. The number of species of fish known from Vigo County is now 111, or 52.6% of the 211 species known from Indiana.

Keywords: Fishes, Indiana, Vigo County, Prairie Creek

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Vigo County, Indiana, was first sampled for fishes by Jenkins (1887), who reported 63 species of fishes there. However, he did not sample the Prairie Creek area. Prairie Creek is located in west central Indiana and is primarily a small stream (25 m), mostly sandy bottom, but with some gravel and rocky bottomed areas. Collections by Jordan (1877, 1890), Evermann & Jenkins (1888), Jordan & Evermann (1902), Hubbs & Trautman (1937), Blatchley (1938), and Gerking (1945) added 20 species to the known fish fauna of Vigo County, making a total of 83 species. Whitaker and Wallace (1973) during a study of the fishes of Vigo County reported an additional 25 species, yielding 108 species known from Vigo County. Based on historical collecting through 1973, 51 species of fish were known to occur in the lower Prairie Creek area. The Prairie Creek area is particularly interesting because it has been little studied, it includes a large tract of bottomland woods, and it appears to have high diversity at least for some organisms.

The purpose of this study was to assess the present distribution and abundance of fish in the lower Prairie Creek area of Vigo County, Indiana, and to determine changes in the fish community from previous studies (1945-1966) of this area, as compared to the period 1980 to 1999.

STUDY AREA

Prairie Creek drains much of the southwestern portion of Vigo County (Fig. 1), flowing west into the Wabash River bottoms, where it flows into Negro Ditch. As Prairie Creek turns south it drains approximately 650 ha (1600 acres) of forest. Oxendine Bayou runs west from Negro Ditch, then to the southwest. Muskrat Pond and Round Pond both lie west of the north-south portion of Prairie Creek and south of Oxendine Bayou. Most of Prairie Creek has a sandy bottom, but there are periodic riffles in the upper east/west portion. The stream width is about 9 m and depth is up to 1 meter. Oxendine Bayou is 6-10 m wide with a mud bottom. Except for periodic pools, much of Prairie Creek dries up in the summer, but the entire bottomland part of the study area (all sites except 4, l, and 14) may be flooded when the Wabash River floods.

METHODS

Fifteen collections of fish in the lower Prairie Creek area were made during 19-30 July 1999, including ten in Prairie Creek, three along Oxendine Bayou, one in Round Pond, and one in Muskrat Pond (Fig. 1). Four of the ten sites along Prairie Creek, two in Oxendine Bayou, and the one in Muskrat Pond had been sampled in previous studies. Also included are unpublished data from the 1990 Indiana State University vertebrate zoology class from Oxendine Bayou, which documented the first Gambusia in Vigo County, and one collection in Prairie Creek by Leanna Smith (1988).

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

Collections were made with either a 15 or 30 foot, 1/4 inch mesh seine. Collection sites along Prairie Creek and Oxendine Bayou averaged 100 m in length with the average width being approximately 7-8 m. Muskrat Pond was sampled with seine hauls throughout most of its length and width. Nomenclature follows the Revised Checklist of the Vertebrates of Indiana (Simon et al. 2002).

RESULTS

Sixty-five species of fish from 15 families and 40 genera have been taken in the lower Prairie Creek area, Vigo County, Indiana (Table 1). Fifty of these species were taken since 1988. The most abundant species in Prairie Creek by family in the recent collection were: Clupeidae--Dorosoma cepedianum, 44; Cyprinidae--Hybognathus nuchalis, 697, Cyprinella spiloptera, 174, Notropis blennius, 70, Pimephales notatus, 50; Catostomidae--Catostomus commersoni, 10; Centrarchidae--Lepomis macrochirus, 25, Etheostoma caeruleum, 24, and E. nigrum, 13. The most abundant species in Oxendine Bayou were Gambusia affinis, 104; D. cepedianum, 52; Cyprinus carpio, 44; L. rnacrochirus, 37; Pomoxis annularis, 24; P. nigromaculatus, 21; and Hypophthalmichthys nobilis, 21.

Fourteen species had not been found in the Prairie Creek area prior to 1988 and constitute new locality records. They are Lepisosteus osseus, Ctenopharyngodon idella, Cyprinella whipplei, Hypophthalmichthys nobilis, Notropis stramineus, Hypentelium nigricans, Ictalurus punctatus, Gambusia affinis, Labidesthes sicculus, Morone chrysops, Ammocrypta pellucida, Etheostoma chlorosoma, Percina phoxocephala, and Aplodinotus grunniens.

Ten species were taken before 1987, but they have not been taken in any of the collections since. Listed in order of decreasing numbers taken, they are: Notropis atherinoides (65), Erimyzon oblongus (9), Sander canadensis (9), Phenacobius mirabilis (6), Carpiodes cyprinus (4),...

NOTE: All illustrations and photos have been removed from this article.



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