A Current List of Fish Species Present in Cayuga Lake:
Family names in red, followed by Latin and common names. A plain list of common names follows. There are currently 49 fish species present in Cayuga Lake. Nine have been introduced, three of which are stocked game fish: Atlantic salmon, brown trout, and rainbow trout. Other coldwater introductions are the alewife, rainbow smelt, and sea lamprey. The warmwater species are the common carp, grass carp, and goldfish.
Petromyzontidae: Lampreys
- Petromyzon marinus sea lamprey
Acipenseridae: Sturgeons
- Acipenser fulvescens lake sturgeon
Lepisosteidae: Gars
- Lepisosteus osseus longnose gar
Amiidae: Bowfin
Anguillidae: Freshwater Eels
- Anguilla rostrata american eel
Clupeidae: Herrings, Sardines, Shads
- Alosa psuedoharengus alewife
- Dorosoma cepedianum gizzard shad
Sciaenidae: Croakers and Drums
- Aplodinotus grunniens freshwater drum
Cyprinidae: Carps and Minnows
- Carassius auratus goldfish
- Ctenopharyngodon idella grass carp (sterile triploid)
- Cyprinella analostanus satinfin shiner
- Cyprinus carpio common carp
- Notemigonus crysoleucas golden shiner
- Notropis hudsonius spottail shiner
- Rhinicthys atratulus blacknose dace
- Rhinicthys cataractae longnose dace
- Semotilus atromaculatus creek chub
- Semotilus corporalis fallfish
Catostomidae: Suckers
- Catostomus commersoni white sucker
- Hypentelium nigricans northern hog sucker
- Moxostoma sp. redhorse
Ictaluridae: Bullhead and Freshwater Catfish
- Ameiurus nebulosus brown bullhead
- Ictalurus punctatus channel catfish
- Notorus flavus stonecat
Esocidae: Pickerels and Pikes
- Esox lucius northern pike
- Esox niger chain pickerel
Osmeridae: Smelts
- Osmerus mordax rainbow smelt
Salmonidae: Salmons and Trouts
- Coregonus artedi cisco
- Coregonus clupeaformis lake whitefish
- Oncorhynchus mykiss rainbow trout
- Salmo salar Atlantic salmon
- Salmo trutta brown trout
- Salvelinus namaycush lake trout
Percopsidae: Trout-Perches
- Percopsis omiscomaycus troutperch
Gasterosteidae: Sticklebacks
- Culaea inconstans brook stickleback
Cottidae: Sculpins
- Cottus cognatus slimy sculpin
Moronidae: Temperate Basses
- Morone americana white perch
- Morone chrysops white bass
Centrarchidae: Sunfishes
- Ambloplites rupestris rock bass
- Lepomis gibbosus pumpkinseed
- Lepomis macrochirus bluegill
- Micropterus dolomieui smallmouth bass
- Micropterus salmoides largemouth bass
- Pomoxis nigromaculatus black crappie
- Pomoxis annularis white crappie
Percidae: Perches and True Perches
- Etheostoma olmstedi tesselated darter
- Perca flavescens yellow perch
- Percina caprodes logperch
- Stizostedion vitruem walleye
List of Common Names of Fish Species in Cayuga Lake:
- alewife (sawbelly)
- American eel
- Atlantic salmon
- black crappie
- blacknose dace
- bluegill (sunfish)
- bowfin
- brook stickleback
- brown bullhead
- brown trout
- chain pickerel
- channel catfish
- cisco
- common carp
- creek chub
- fallfish
- freshwater drum (sheephead)
- gizzard shad
- golden shiner
- goldfish
- grass carp (sterile)
- sea lamprey
- lake sturgeon
- lake trout (laker)
- lake whitefish
- largemouth bass
- longnose dace
- longnose gar (garpike, gar-pike)
- logperch
- northern hog sucker
- northern pike
- pumpkinseed (sunfish)
- rainbow smelt
- rainbow trout
- redhorse
- rock bass
- satinfin shiner
- slimy sculpin
- smallmouth bass
- spottail shiner
- stonecat
- tesselated darter
- troutperch (trout-perch)
- walleye
- white bass
- white crappie
- white perch
- white sucker
- yellow perch
Notes:
The presence of the American eel in Cayuga Lake has not been recorded since the 1980's. Similarly, the presence of the whitefish and cisco are in doubt, but it's very difficult to prove the absence of a species.
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Sources: Chiotti, 1980. Cayuga Lake Watershed Preliminary Watershed Characterization, Cayuga Lake Watershed Intermunicipal Organization, 2000. Fishbase.org. Animal Diversity Web. Personal identification (goldfish and grass carp).
