Fishes of the Chicago Region

Francis M. Veraldi is a fish biologist and restoration ecologist for the US Army Corps of Engineers, where he leads multidisciplinary teams for the formulation, design, and implementation of aquatic ecosystem restoration projects. Stephen M. Pescitelli is retired from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, where he spent thirty years as a Natural Resources Advanced Specialist and stream biologist. He was responsible for monitoring fish assemblages in the watershed areas of the Des Plaines, DuPage, Fox, Kankakee, and Mazon Rivers as well as the Aux Sable Creek. He was also involved in stream restoration, focusing on dam removals in northeastern Illinois. He also worked and studied at the Illinois Natural History Survey. Philip W. Willink is an academic researcher for the Illinois Natural History Survey. He was previously a senior research biologist in the Daniel P. Haerther Center for Conservation and Research at the John G. Shedd Aquarium and the assistant collections manager for the Fish Division at the Field Museum of Natural History.

“Can you tell the difference between a highfin carpsucker and a hornyhead chub? (Hint: they’re both fish.) If not, and if you’d like to be able to, then the expansive Fishes of the Chicago Region is for you. Filled with full-color images of sturgeons, loaches, sticklebacks and smelts, the 500-page tome is a must-have field guide for fans of Second City area fish. . . . Ichthyologists have been studying Illinois fish for more than a century, and there’s a rich history of books about them. But massive ecological changes in the area—redirected waterways, the reversal of the Chicago River in the late nineteenth century—have also caused massive changes in the region’s fish populations. Fishes tells you where these creatures now live and spawn, what they eat, which ones we like to eat and so on. Many of the fish here are lovely, in their way, like the aqua and orange northern sunfish. Others are the stuff of nightmares (sea lampreys, with their circular maws ringed with rows of sharp teeth), while still others, like sturgeons, hail from the age of the dinosaurs, and look it. If many of the common names of the fish sound like hurled insults, the scientific names are even stranger, with Latin elements that roughly translate as ‘forgetting intestine,’ ‘with large buttocks’ and ‘odorous.’”

• ForewordPrefaceChapter 1: IntroductionChapter 2: Book OrganizationChapter 3: Pictorial Key to the FamiliesSpecies AccountsChapter 4: Lampreys (Petromyzontidae)Chapter 5: Sturgeons (Acipenseridae)Chapter 6: Paddlefishes (Polyodontidae)Chapter 7: Gars (Lepisosteidae)Chapter 8: Bowfins (Amiidae)Chapter 9: Freshwater Eels (Anguillidae)Chapter 10: Mooneyes (Hiodontidae)Chapter 11: Shads and Herrings (Clupeidae)Chapter 12: Suckers (Catostomidae)Chapter 13: Barbs and Carps (Cyprinidae)Chapter 14: Sharpbellies (Xenocyprididae)Chapter 15: True Minnows (Leuciscidae)Chapter 16: Loaches (Cobitidae)Chapter 17: North American Catfishes (Ictaluridae)Chapter 18: Pikes (Esocidae)Chapter 19: Mudminnows (Umbridae)Chapter 20: Salmon, Trouts, Chars, and Whitefishes (Salmonidae)Chapter 21: Smelts (Osmeridae)Chapter 22: Trout-perches (Percopsidae)Chapter 23: Pirate Perches (Aphredoderidae)Chapter 24: Hakes, Lings, Rocklings, and Burbots (Lotidae)Chapter 25: Gobies (Gobiidae)Chapter 26: New World Silversides (Atherinopsidae)Chapter 27: Topminnows and Killifishes (Fundulidae)Chapter 28: Livebearers (Poeciliidae)Chapter 29: Sunfishes (Centrarchidae)Chapter 30: Temperate Basses (Moronidae)Chapter 31: Drums and Croakers (Sciaenidae)Chapter 32: Darters and Perches (Percidae)Chapter 33: Sticklebacks (Gasterosteidae)Chapter 34: Sculpins (Cottidae)AcknowledgmentsAppendix: Fish IdentificationGlossaryReferencesPhoto CreditsTaxonomic IndexSubject Index