Ozark Shiner

Diet and feeding

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 feeding positions include bottom feeding. The compilation combines published observations; diets can vary with age, locality, and available food.

Habitat preferences

Reported habitat associations include medium to large rivers, streams and small rivers, still-water habitats.

The source records associations with muck, clay or silt, sand, gravel, cobble, boulders, vegetation, organic debris. An association indicates reported use, rather than an exclusive requirement.

Reproduction and parental care

The compilation reports a representative maturity age of 1.5 years. Its maturity field summarizes mean, median, or modal estimates, usually for females; male estimates can be used when female data are unavailable. It is not a fixed age at which every fish first breeds.

Recorded spawning months are May, Jun, Jul, Aug for the source’s reporting region (MO). This is a regional calendar, not a range-wide schedule.

The reproductive-guild classification includes spawning on open substrates without guarding the brood.

Size and recorded longevity

FishTraits reports a maximum total length of 7.5 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.

Native range

Above Fall Line in White and Black River systems, Missouri and Arkansas. Formerly in upper St. Francis River drainage, Missouri, but now extirpated (Page and Burr 1991).

Introduction history

Unknown; possible bait bucket release.