Seasonal Feeding Ecology of the Fantail Darter,Etheostoma flabellare, from Stinking Fork, Indiana

Abstract

The food habits of the fantail darter were studied in Stinking Fork, a tributary of the Little Blue River in southern Indiana. A total of 593 darters were collected and their stomach contents examined over the course of four seasons. Juvenile and adult diets were similar. Chironomid larvae were consistently the most important food item each season, while ephemeropteran naiads, plecopteran nymphs, and ostracods were of seasonal importance. Resource use seemed to be related to abundance and marks the fantail darter as an opportunist in its feeding behavior.

Selective predation by four darter (Percidae) species on larval chironomids (Diptera) from a Mississippi stream

“…It is well documented that chironomids are very important to darter diets (Wehnes 1973;Schlosser and Toth 1984;Strange 1997). Meanwhile, darters are typically classified as opportunists feeding on an array of benthic invertebrates (Hlohowskyj and White 1983;Strange 1991;Strange 1993), because relative abundances of prey in the diets usually reflect those prey Although darters selected other non-chironomid taxa, like Isonychia sp., simuliids, and ceratopogonids, they fed opportunistically on the most abundantly available prey (i.e., the Chironomidae), causing PS values to be relatively high (near and above 0.60). Phillips and Kilambi (1996) found that Etheostoma spectabile fed exclusively on the family Chironomidae (r i = 99%) and exhibited active selection for chironomids when comparing their availability in the environment (Ivlev's Electivity Index [IE] = 0.03, where values near 0 represent active selection; values near 1.0 represent opportunists).…”

“…For example, Strange (1993) compared the gut contents of 593 fantail darters, Etheostoma flabellare, to available prey and showed that this species fed as an opportunist. He found that chironomids were numerically the most important food item in all seasons, and there was no difference in diet among juveniles and adults.…”

Fine‐scale environmental heterogeneity shapes fluvial fish communities as revealed by eDNA metabarcoding

“…Tessellated darter is a common fish in Québec rivers that is known to live in sand or mud environments (Bernatchez & Giroux, 2012;Cole, 1967), which is in accordance with the high turbidity levels of the brown waters. In the same way, Trout-perch and Fantail darter occupy sand and mud substrates (Bernatchez & Giroux, 2012;Magnuson & Smith, 1963;Strange, 1993). In contrast, eDNA of Round goby, Longnose sucker, and Lake sturgeon predominated in stations located in green waters (i.e., less turbid waters).…”