Etheostoma collettei
Percidae · freshwater water fish
2 minute read · Species guide
The Creole darter (Etheostoma collettei) is a species of freshwater ray-finned fish, a darter from the subfamily Etheostomatinae, part of the family Percidae, which also contains the perches, ruffes and pikeperches. It is endemic to the Eastern United States, where it occurs in the Ouachita, Red, Calcasieu and Sabine River drainages in Arkansas and Louisiana. It inhabits gravel riffles, current-swept vegetation and debris in creeks and small to medium rivers. This species can reach a length of 7.4 cm (2.9 in). The creole darter was first formally described in 1969 by Ray S. Bridsong and Leslie William Knapp with the type locality given as the Dugdemona River, Jackson Parish, Louisiana.
The specific name honours of the American ichthyologist Bruce Baden Collette, then of the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries Systematics Labroratory, to recognise his contribution to the study of the fishes of the perch family.
Article text: Wikipedia contributors, Creole darter (source revision). Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Retrieved 2026-10-11.
The FishTraits compilation records these diet categories for this species: invertebrates or larval fish. These are broad categories, not a claim that every individual consumes every example in a category.
Reported habitat associations include creeks.
The source records associations with gravel, vegetation, organic debris. An association indicates reported use, rather than an exclusive requirement.
Recorded spawning months are Mar, Apr for the source’s reporting region (OK). This is a regional calendar, not a range-wide schedule.
FishTraits reports a maximum total length of 6.4 centimetres. Some entries use an estimated asymptotic length; this value should not be treated as a certified record catch.
Recorded longevity in the compilation is 3 years. Wild observations were preferred, but captive records were accepted where wild records were unavailable, and unspecified records were assumed wild. The value is not a guaranteed wild lifespan or an aquarium life expectancy.
Range
A blank area on the dot layer usually means nobody sampled there, not that the fish is absent. Turn on “every survey site” to see where the survey looked.
The USGS stream survey caught it at 36 of its sites, in 2 states. That survey and the GBIF records are two different counts of two different things, so the site keeps them apart.
Habitat
Classification
Closest relatives
Same family
