Culture techniques and ecological studies of the robust redhorse Moxostoma robustum: assessment of incubation temperature flows, reproductive and recruitment success, and population dynamics

Principal Investigators: Cecil A. Jennings, Jay Shelton (Univ. of Georgia), and Greg Looney (USFWS)

Funding: Georgia Power Company

Robust redhorse (Moxostoma robustum) are large (maximum total length 760 mm), riverine catostomids. These fish were thought to be extinct for more than 120 years, but were re-discovered in the Oconee River by personnel from Georgia Department of Natural Resources (GA DNR) during the summer of 1991. In October 1997, a single adult individual was caught in the Savannah River below the New Savannah River Bluff Lock and Dam by personnel for GA DNR. Eventually, a second population of robust redhorse was discovered in the Savannah River near Augusta, Georgia. Historically, these fish inhabited medium to large rivers in the southeastern Atlantic slope, from the Pee Dee River system in North Carolina to the Altamaha River system in Georgia. Currently, populations in the Oconee and Savannah rivers are the only known extant populations. The Oconee River population is comprised of mostly older individuals, and concerns among biologists from private, state, and federal agencies about possible recruitment failure and eventual extinction of the species led to the formation of the Robust Redhorse Conservation Committee (RRCC). The RRCC, established in 1995 by a Memorandum of Understanding signed by GA DNR, Georgia Power Company (GPC), the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and the US Geological Survey (among others), took a pre-listing approach for organizing and developing conservation strategies to recover this species. Short term goals of the RRCC are to protect and manage the remaining populations and establish captive-breeding populations through artificial propagation; long-term goals include the establishment of refugial populations in suitable river systems within the species' former range.

Jobs performed by the Georgia Cooperative Fish & Wildlife Research Unit:

Habitat use, movement patterns, and recruitment dynamics of juvenile robust redhorse Moxostoma robustum in the Oconee River, Georgia

Population dynamics of robust redhorse Moxostoma robustum in the Oconee River, Georgia

Reproductive and Recruitment Success of Robust Redhorse in the Oconee River, Georgia