Species: Prosopium coulterii
Pygmy Whitefish
Species
Show on Lists
Encyclopedia of Puget Sound
).
Source: Encyclopedia of Life
Classification
Kingdom
Animalia
Phylum
Craniata
Class
Actinopterygii
Order
Salmoniformes
Family
Salmonidae
Genus
Prosopium
NatureServe
Classification
Other Global Common Names
ménomini pygmée
Informal Taxonomy
Animals, Vertebrates - Fishes - Bony Fishes - Salmon and Trouts
Formal Taxonomy
Animalia - Craniata - Actinopterygii - Salmoniformes - Salmonidae - Prosopium - applies to species in the subfamily Coregoninae.
Ecology and Life History
).
Source: Encyclopedia of Life
Short General Description
A small whitefish.
Habitat Type Description
Freshwater
Migration
true - true - false - In some regions moves to shallower spawning areas (Morrow 1980).
Non-migrant
true
Locally Migrant
true
Food Comments
Crustaceans, chironomids, ostracods, <i>Pontoporeia</i>, copepods, and fish eggs.
Reproduction Comments
Spawns at night, late fall and early winter, October-December depending on the region. Female fecundity ranges from 200-1000 eggs (Heard and Hartman 1965). In British Columbia, matures in 2nd or 3rd year, lives up to 9 years (McPhail and Lindsey 1970). In Alaska, both males and females mature at age one or two, sometimes as small as 6 cm (Heard and Hartman 1965, Bird and Roberson 1979).
Ecology Comments
Species considered a glacial relict and one of the most primitive of coregonines (Weisel et al. 1973). Has the greatest discontinuous range of any freshwater fish in North America (Eschmeyer and Bailey 1955 in Heard and Hartman 1965). Characterized by slow growth, low fecundity and short life cycle. Frequently found in large schools of several thousand fish in both rivers and lakes. Occurs sympatrically with other species of whitefish (Mackay 2000).
Length
27
Conservation Status
NatureServe Global Status Rank
G5
Global Status Last Reviewed
2008-01-15
Global Status Last Changed
1996-09-12
Other Status
C - Candidate
Distribution
Conservation Status Map
<img src="http://www.natureserve.org/explorer/servlet/GetMapGif?CA.AB=S1&CA.BC=S4&CA.NT=SU&CA.ON=SU&CA.YT=S4&US.AK=S4&US.ID=SNR&US.MI=S4&US.MT=S3&US.WA=S1&US.WI=S3" alt="Conservation Status Map" style="width: 475px; height: auto;" />
Global Range
Three disjunct areas: Lake Superior, Ontario and Michigan; Yukon River drainage, Yukon, to Columbia River drainage, western Montana and Washington; Chignik, Naknek, and Wood river drainages, southwestern Alaska; abundant except in Lake Superior where uncommon (Page and Burr 1991). Previously found only in North America; within the past decade has also been found on the Chukotski Peninsula in Russia (Chereshnev and Skopets 1992).