I don’t understand how a lot of these aren’t more popular. This even goes for some of the best tropical nano fish like the Celestial Pearl Danio and Emerald Dwarf Rasbora. It blows my mind that some of the most beautiful nano fish aren’t being widely sold at places like Petco and PetSmart.
Native fish are so underrated. Especially darters and other stream fish in my opinion. I do really like the Florida and Georgia warm water species as well
@@Fishtory I did that for most of the year. It was awesome. Black spotted dace. Red shiners, central stone rollers and orange throat darters in a 55. It was not all of the year because here it would have frozen solid but the fish did get some below freezing days outside. Then they went in a thousand gallon pond for the rest of winter
US natives are incredibly underrated, so thanks for shedding light onto them Alex! Interesting to see if these fish will make it worldwide in the hobby
One of the wonderful things about pygmy sunfish is they will actually predate on young pond snails! If you feed sparsely they will definitely seek out food elsewhere in the tank and snails is one thing they seem to like.
This was really cool💯 I enjoyed learning about some of our native fish we have here. I really appreciate you showing the areas and the states these fish are found in. Something I really want to do is go collecting some day!!! I hope you're having a blessed day! Thank you for sharing Alex! 🤗👍🌿🐟🌿💚
I am currently keeping at home 6 of your top 10 ! Nice choices, although there are dozens more worthy of mentioning! I used to breed E. gilberti, which would get me 7 of 10, but I no longer have em. A lovely Top Ten video, thank you!
You do more research and pure work in this area of aquarium fish than any other person I know! An amazing body of helpful educational material! Thanks!
Hehe well I try and spend 40 hours a week researching and or observing fish/ talking about fish with people way smarter than myself. Plus I find a lot of leads and info from viewers like you! So thank you kindly.
All of these fish are absolutely underrated and look beautiful! There are so many other species that can be kept, we just try to look for the most exotic fish to keep in our tanks. Sure some of them look good, or make revenue when you breed them, but sometimes the beauty and simplicity of these native fish overweighs all that! Thanks for sharing Alex, and looking forward to more parts in this series of Natives!
I had never seen most of these species before. Crazy what beautiful nano fish we have right here in the US. Thanks for the video 👍🏼 excellent content as always.
I’ll be setting up a planted tank…15 gallons…and this is great. I’d much rather have native fish…these are every bit as beautiful as any of the non native nano fish. Thank you so much!
Great Job Alex. You might consider having a video on the the Critically Endangered Native (USA) Nano Fish. I would be interested in helping to raise the numbers to be reintroduced back into the wild.
Cool list Alexander! There are so many different species of darters here in the U.S. and so many are beautiful, especially those males in breeding colors. Glad you included a couple in your list.
@@Fishtory you bet! I’m excited to check out your other content and I’ll be sharing it with my aquarium buds🤘I’d really like to get some of those rainbow shiners!
Nice video! I've been keeping and studying native fishes for over 40 years and this list is not bad at all. I would, however, offer "more" correct pronunciations, I am also into biological linguistics, yes, it's a thing. So feel free to hit me up!
Haha thanks. Since I made this video, I've gotten much better, however I'm sure I still stumble on some latin ...especially when it's based on a last name or place name that I do not know
@@Fishtory Right! As to the list, my faves include Loach minnow Texas cichlid Candy darter, just about any Etheostoma Just about ANY pupfish, including sheepshead minnow and FL flagfish Orangespotted sunfish Plains killifish and, of course, sailfin molly Another amazing fish, now federally protected, is the peppered chub, Macrhybopsis tetranema. Look it up if you're not familiar. I've kept them before they were listed.
I see the I have to ask my wife first comments and it makes me sad and sick, I'm happily divorced and do my own thing, my wife used to bum me out with complaining about my aquariums which brought me joy, now she's gone ....
As a kid, I too collected natives a ton. I hope to get back into it, as now I'll have a house and yard (plus 2 small lakes within walking distance of my house.) Thanks for watching!
I probably would have put #10 much higher in the ratings. My favourite North American fish are larger than these, but these are certainly beautiful, and I would definitely like to have any of them in my tank. My favourite North American fish are the brook trout, the whole family of bluegills/pumpkin seeds/long ears and such. Then I also just love cutthroat trout, especially when they colour up for the spring spawning run. I'd keep them anytime, but oh my are they lovely in the spring in cold water. You'd almost need a chiller to keep the water cool enough to get them into their spawning livery though.
@@Fishtory well got some work to do on the aquarium got a bit over grown with jungle vale lol but I really like how it’s taken over the layout heck even got my first flower last week and I think the beautiful blues and black that the pygmy sunfish has would be cute how would they get along with black phantom tetras?
Awesome looking fishes I know in my state they have some small fishes that live in small streams that looks like a snakehead & the yellow minnows as well
Yes, there are many many more lovely and colorful fish, these are just a handful of the very smallest AND most colorful, fish, that tend to be 100% peaceful for a community tank also. Thanks for tuning in!
It's really awesome cause I've seen the turquoise darter and rainbow darter while admiring streams along my bike rides. As always, interesting information. Thanks, Alex!
@@yanjijay6752 saw someone on another vid ask the same question about the same fish, and someone responded saying a school of white clouds wiped out a whole colony of their shrimp. The comment also got 50 likes in a short time, so I would assume its safe to bet on white clouds chomping your shrimp.
That's the best collection point hehe. I have those, as well. Thanks for your enthusiasm and support in this community! I hope you're having a terrific week.
You're totally right. If we found out these were some new rare tropical fish, I bet many would be selling like hot cakes hehehe. But as it is, most sit in local rivers, waiting for an aquarium abduction team to find then
I think of this every day, there's not much in my aquariums as pretty as one of my creek pumpkinseeds. I will send some to Myanmar if they'll hook me up with female Dario darios 😝
Yes! Thank you for this. I love the native fish and in the future I so plan on setting up a species only pygmy sunfish tank. Mayne even that turquoise dartee since they are native to my state
I think someone is poised to be the Gary Lange of native species...great video and might I say you look very "contented" this morning lol. P.S. darters are dope.
Haha thanks... i was up all night, because I made the 40 minute long version first haha. There is audio for how to care for all 10 species and much more detail on locations and behavior, but I decided to keep the first video short and if it's popular, I'll find more film and or photos to make such a long video less boring haha
@@Fishtory Show us the long version! I'm really interested in these! Most of these are in my local waters, and I'm interested in keeping some of them to observe, then release. I had no idea there were so many colorful nano fish out there! Thank you, Alex!!!
Awesome list of native nano fish. Very much looking forward to more information about them. I have a love for all things native and feel we should spend more time getting to know our part of the world. As well as appreciate it more. These little fish wouldn't be here if they didn't serve a purpose in the ecosystem. The first native fish I have kept is flag fish. I love them lil guys and gals. Set up a 110 gallon pond that I want to do nano FL natives in. It already has flagfish breeding. I'm having a hard time deciding what else to add. Sooo many good choices.... Guess the only solution is to get more tubs/ponds....
@@michaelharrity9795 I got the darters at a LFS, the daces from dansfish.com (he's out) and the shiners at redfishbluefish.shop (he's also out). Dansfish still has some rainbow shiners as does aquaticarts.com last I checked. Jonahsaquarium.com has native fish.
Thanks for sharing. The Southern Redbelly Dace are definitely a great looking fish. They are not easy to see from above but it's nice to see them when they flash their Redbelly when they reach for the top. I have some in a tub. Native fish are really underrated. I also have Longear Sunfish juveniles that are a blast to watch. I think part of the reason is that in a lot of areas the regulations make it hard.
Totally! I just got my first house with a wife (we've lived in small apartments the last 14 years) but now we have room for a pond and plenty of unheated native tanks
The biggest reason I want native fish is that they are not tropical and I don't have to put an ugly heater in my tank that isn't draining my batteries and damaging them when the sun isn't shining. When I go out of town in the winter, my batteries die and so did most of my fish. I was super bummed out about losing my emerald eye rasboras, my guppies, my albino pleco, and my red and blue shrimp. I got home and the tank was 50 degrees. My betta and 5 of my dwarf rasboras survived.
Um jonahs aquarium online has a lot of them :) most are technically illegal to wild collect.. but Florida is a state where you can collect like 4 or 5 of the species listed... Tennessee and Alabama too, I believe
A step up from these guys but still kinda "nano" are the Banded, Blue-spotted, and Black Banded sunfishes. You could keep a very small group in a 20 gallon, but a 40 gallon would be much better. A group of these in a tannin stained tank is absolutely stunning.
I got Florida flag fish from my LFS 'over the pond' in the UK and managed to raise some fry last summer. I wish more of these beautiful American fish were available over here!
We wish they were available too haha. Flag fish, rainbow shiners and pygmy sunfish are really the only fish we see in stores. The rest are caught illegally or grey market ( under a permit as "live fish bait"....but pets would be illegal lol )
@@Fishtory I've kept fish on and off all my life, but COVID lockdown has somehow meant I've gone from 1 community tank to 10 and your channel has really inspired me to make little eco systems suiting the nano tanks. A big thank you for your laid back presentation and explanations - unlike channels where it's all about novelty aquariums and new aquascapes, you've really helped me have healthy tanks with my shrimps, fish and snails all thriving
@@nurseyj9 thank you very much. It warms my heart to hear that. If I can help bring a little more enjoyment and relaxation to just even a handful of people in the hobby, then it is worth it. I greatly appreciate your kind words and your viewership
Those are all fantastic especially the last one I really wanna know if there's any fish in Canada that's worth keeping I wanna set up a native aquarium
Last summer my backyard flooded and fish got trapped in puddles. I decided to net them to see if I found anything interesting. First encounter with bluefin killifish. What a beautiful thing! Also captured some sort of wild sailfin Molly like fish.
I have a 4 year old long pincered Crayfish and an ozark banded crayfish. I keep a red ear sunfish and some madtom miniature catfish, and rainbow darters along with top minnows. All native to my area
I watched a lot of videos thinking they will help me in giving me guild lines in securing a better trade but I realize It’s not all about watching trading videos, you might end up losing all.
Another colorful American fish is the red shiner (Cyprinella lutrensis), which is a fairly popular aquarium fish in China right now. I had a small school of them until I moved to a new apartment, but they didn't survive the trip. I've recently replaced them with rainbow shiners (Notropis chrosomus), your #10 fish. If your #2 fish, the rainbow darter (Etheostoma caeruleum) can be imported into China, I would love to get some of these, because they seem like they would be right at home in my unheated river tank. It seems like they're about the same size and have similar requirements to my Chinese goby species.
Nice list but I'm actually surprised that you didn't include Orangethroat darters since there's an enormous variety of coloration/sub species compared to ((I've 'also had them spawn multiple times in my aquarium like rainbow shiners)) rainbow darters also while we're on rainbow darters they're actually really easy to convert to frozen foods in my experience all wide ranged darters are the only species that I had a hard time converting was stippled darters and the picture at 9:15 is actually mountain redbelly dace. Hope to see Redside Dace if you make a list for slightly larger natives (just over 8cm) 😅👍
Hehe yeah there are around 12 darters I would have liked to include. Sadly no one would give permission to use images of them...but I agree with the orange throat and orangesided... candycane, and plenty more
Either just to show off more colorful fish, when i couldnt find an owner to let me use photos from my list...so i used some similar stuff from people who OKed the photo use. Or maybe im an idiot if i said something directly to the contrary on that slide
I’m thinking of setting up a native tank. I live in Montana and I love the idea of collecting myself and keeping them in a natural biotope with collected rocks and all. But I don’t think I’ve got many options here. I have a ten gallon laying around not in use. Seems like most fish are from warmer climates. Maybe I’ll try to order some Pygmy sunfish and see if I can’t get a pair and try to breed.
So the pygmy sunfish (elassoma genus...) they'd probably die in Montana winters. No fish do well in solid ice. Even fish that can survive ice, need flow or a layer under it to stay liquid. But if you keep it ice free then there are a bunch of options like shiners, darters and daces that'll do great
Would you recommend any of these for a tank containing native Missouri species of snails and shrimp (Mississippi grass shrimp, Palaemonetes kadiakensis)? We want some nano fish in there but don't want them to eat the shrimp babies.
I love the Florida flag fish, it just gets a bit larger than nano and more-so, it's available commonly in big box stores, where as these are far less common...or were 2 or 3 years ago
I didn't forget, but they get 4 or 5 inches long, and also there's probably enough shiners to do a top 10 colorful shiner list id bet! Maybe I'll do that soon. There's so many more cool fish...especially mid-sized. Sheep's heads, fatheadminnows candy striper darter, orange sided darter, candy candy darter, blue headed chub, blue ears, red ears, pumpkinseed fish, speckled dace, golden trout, rainbow trout, varden. Oh so many cool fish :) 😎
Hmm you're right... i wonder if it was mislabeled. There are 3 or 4 species in the hobby now and some express exceptional color and patterns so I can't really tell know
Awesome video bro. Thank you. Can I ask, what's the story with those amazing markings on the southern red belly dace in the picture @ around 9.20? They look nothing like any of the pictures I see when I look up this species. Such a cool looking fish. I want some!
It's a photo out of the Cahaba river if I remember correctly (Alabama). But I'm no expert...just a hobbyist and honestly I needed help IDing the proper photos on some ...there's one darter photo out of like 6 and I guess I messed up. It was some similar species but from a different county/same river haha (so 3 biologists have mentioned)
@@Fishtory Ah ok, thanks for replying. Such a cool wee fish.....but I've done a little research and I'm gutted to say it's actually on the Scottish banned species list, so I have no hope of ever keeping any. Ouch. First time that's happened to me ,to be honest. A wee taste of how things are in a lot of states over there I suppose. Cheers
@@Fishtory haha.. We might have some colourful ones somewhere out there, it's just too cold for anyone to go looking. 😂 Enjoyed the video anyway Alex and seeing the fish you showed. Some gorgeous fish there.
This was a nice selection, some I am unfamiliar with. Thanks. I will agree with your choices, but not your desire to selectively breed these fishes. They have been selected already for optimum performance in their environments. Also, I think you may have mixed up your Chrosomus oreas with Chrosomus erythrogaster.
I understand your opinion, I am curious however- Are you against the line breeding of fish such as goldfish (carp), ricefish or guppies as well? To me, I would personally not want to change the looks of the fish, but rather the ability for them to thrive in an aquarium, so as to be able to observe them and admire them more than the fleeting glimpses I see, whilst visiting their specific creeks and lakes.
Also, you are correct that I had photos labeled incorrectly, but in the dialog, I said that there are over 13 Variants of these fish that were once all grouped as one species (Jordan & Rafinesque 1877) but are now species in a wide and growing selection of species. It was not the most grateful slide show, I'm afraid. I admit that I'm not accustomed to editing with the software I used, and the voice over track may have led over into the next fish on the list by a few sentences. Thanks for your input!
@@Fishtory Thanks for the quick reply! Your videos are awesome! I learn so much watching them and you are one of most knowledgeable CZcamsrs that I’ve found.
I don’t understand how a lot of these aren’t more popular. This even goes for some of the best tropical nano fish like the Celestial Pearl Danio and Emerald Dwarf Rasbora. It blows my mind that some of the most beautiful nano fish aren’t being widely sold at places like Petco and PetSmart.
I know! Its strange...but im okay with it, I it protects the wild population
I love your list, but the volume on the video is very hard to hear.
I've only seen Celestial Pearl's one time.
And it was just recently.
They were only about 6 to 7 bucks a piece.
@@jeffalbillar7625 that's cheap
Yes, but can I get this pink blob-eyed bloated double tail barely swimming tons shitting goldfish?
Native fish are so underrated. Especially darters and other stream fish in my opinion. I do really like the Florida and Georgia warm water species as well
I want to do a darter and dace tank when I move...powerhead, but kept outside year round :)
@@Fishtory I did that for most of the year. It was awesome. Black spotted dace. Red shiners, central stone rollers and orange throat darters in a 55. It was not all of the year because here it would have frozen solid but the fish did get some below freezing days outside. Then they went in a thousand gallon pond for the rest of winter
That Turquoise Darter is absolutely gorgeous. Absolutely as beautiful if not more beautiful than many tropical fish.
US natives are incredibly underrated, so thanks for shedding light onto them Alex! Interesting to see if these fish will make it worldwide in the hobby
Thanks for your enthusiasm and support, brother!
One of the wonderful things about pygmy sunfish is they will actually predate on young pond snails! If you feed sparsely they will definitely seek out food elsewhere in the tank and snails is one thing they seem to like.
100% great point. Thanks again for your contributions to this community, as well!
Thanks Alex, it’s nice to see some of the native fish of the US. Most I’ve never seen or heard of before.
We have thousands , but I selected a few that are known to be kept in captivity successfully, and which are under 8 cm ...and somewhat colorful
Boosting for the algorithm 🙌 Love your work, keep it up! 🌻🐝
First time hearing about darters, thanks for the info
This was really cool💯 I enjoyed learning about some of our native fish we have here. I really appreciate you showing the areas and the states these fish are found in. Something I really want to do is go collecting some day!!! I hope you're having a blessed day! Thank you for sharing Alex! 🤗👍🌿🐟🌿💚
Yeah check out inaturalist.com or Fishbase.de (German site ironically) - there's info down to the exact GPS coordinates. Hugs, love you Paige!
@@Fishtory 🤗🤗♥️thanks and I will😁👍🌿🐟💚
I am currently keeping at home 6 of your top 10 ! Nice choices, although there are dozens more worthy of mentioning! I used to breed E. gilberti, which would get me 7 of 10, but I no longer have em. A lovely Top Ten video, thank you!
I'll be over in 4 minutes ;)
You do more research and pure work in this area of aquarium fish than any other person I know! An amazing body of helpful educational material! Thanks!
Hehe well I try and spend 40 hours a week researching and or observing fish/ talking about fish with people way smarter than myself. Plus I find a lot of leads and info from viewers like you! So thank you kindly.
This was an amazing video. I'd love to see a follow-up with native aquatic plants.
Oh great idea! I definitely will! Thanks
Great video, 🤜💥🤛
These are the types of fish that I've always been most interested in. Thank you for this great video.
No problem! Welcome, and stay tuned for more native content. I have a little bit (maybe 10 or 15 videos) on native fish on this channel, archived. don
All of these fish are absolutely underrated and look beautiful! There are so many other species that can be kept, we just try to look for the most exotic fish to keep in our tanks. Sure some of them look good, or make revenue when you breed them, but sometimes the beauty and simplicity of these native fish overweighs all that! Thanks for sharing Alex, and looking forward to more parts in this series of Natives!
@Coyote Plays Indeed! I for one always look around for as many plant varieties to keep
I had never seen most of these species before. Crazy what beautiful nano fish we have right here in the US. Thanks for the video 👍🏼 excellent content as always.
Thanks, and thank you also, for watching! Glad you enjoyed it. Take care, Tryston
I’ll be setting up a planted tank…15 gallons…and this is great. I’d much rather have native fish…these are every bit as beautiful as any of the non native nano fish. Thank you so much!
Certainly! Have fun.
Great list! I have several new things to research now, and the maps were super helpful. Thank you!
Great to hear! Enjoy!
Thanks for the video of some of our beautiful native American fish.
100%! Glad you enjoyed it. Cheers
Great Job Alex.
You might consider having a video on the the Critically Endangered Native (USA) Nano Fish. I would be interested in helping to raise the numbers to be reintroduced back into the wild.
Agreed. Ill consult an expert!
I like your top 10 list. I especially like the #1 the Gilberti Ellisoma Pygmy Sunfish! I have some for sale if you live in Denver! Beautiful fish!
Cool list Alexander! There are so many different species of darters here in the U.S. and so many are beautiful, especially those males in breeding colors. Glad you included a couple in your list.
It was a very hard choice haha... ill be doing a cold water and medium sized fish list z soon hopefully.
The red belly dace is how i found your video, AWESOME👍🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟😍
Right on! Welcome to (one of the) most nerdy fishtube channels lol
I thought I subscribed 3 months ago but just realized all this time I havent! Really enjoying the content, keep up the good work mate.
Thank you kindly
I live on the Gulf Coast and will be much more aware during my next creek or lake swim. Thank you!
Wonderful!
The exact video I was looking for 😂thanks for the solid content amigo! Subbed liked and hit that bell!🙌
No problem! Thanks for tuning in and dropping a line!
@@Fishtory you bet! I’m excited to check out your other content and I’ll be sharing it with my aquarium buds🤘I’d really like to get some of those rainbow shiners!
A few of them were really nice. Number 5 was awsome
I think so too hehe!
Great video man, super informative.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Nice video! I've been keeping and studying native fishes for over 40 years and this list is not bad at all.
I would, however, offer "more" correct pronunciations, I am also into biological linguistics, yes, it's a thing. So feel free to hit me up!
Haha thanks. Since I made this video, I've gotten much better, however I'm sure I still stumble on some latin ...especially when it's based on a last name or place name that I do not know
@@Fishtory Right! As to the list, my faves include
Loach minnow
Texas cichlid
Candy darter, just about any Etheostoma
Just about ANY pupfish, including sheepshead minnow and FL flagfish
Orangespotted sunfish
Plains killifish
and, of course, sailfin molly
Another amazing fish, now federally protected, is the peppered chub, Macrhybopsis tetranema. Look it up if you're not familiar. I've kept them before they were listed.
@@telsonboy Olympic mud minnow, striped top minnow too
Dude thank you! I need more tanks. First I need to consult with my wife.
You are most welcome! Thanks for coming by, my friend. Man your name on here has my mouth watering lol
I see the I have to ask my wife first comments and it makes me sad and sick, I'm happily divorced and do my own thing, my wife used to bum me out with complaining about my aquariums which brought me joy, now she's gone ....
Really enjoyed this. Great job!
Glad to hear it. Thanks for checking it out!
Awesome video! I absolutely love natives and have 4 of the 10 you listed here.
Oh right on! They're so under appreciated. It's awesome you have some of them too!
I've been really getting into the native species myself this summer...I'm going to up my game for sure next summer✌
Right on, brotha!
Great list! Thanks.
Thanks buddy. I appreciate you checking out the video. Cheers!
Great video Alex! Loved this one, i started this hobby with natives and have always liked that i can go collecting
As a kid, I too collected natives a ton. I hope to get back into it, as now I'll have a house and yard (plus 2 small lakes within walking distance of my house.)
Thanks for watching!
Thank you for this! Very interesting!
Of course. As always, thank YOU Carolynn! For your support.
Finally a post that addresses native fish. I want to buid a cold water tank father fish and walstad method tank. I wish moer people woud do vidieos.
Fish like the ones on this list are why I want to get into microfishing 😎 thanks for amazing information as usual!
I would really enjoy that also! Thanks buddy! Good to see yuh
That was very interesting..never knew of these!
Glad to hear it! We rarely see them in the USA hobby oddly
I probably would have put #10 much higher in the ratings. My favourite North American fish are larger than these, but these are certainly beautiful, and I would definitely like to have any of them in my tank. My favourite North American fish are the brook trout, the whole family of bluegills/pumpkin seeds/long ears and such. Then I also just love cutthroat trout, especially when they colour up for the spring spawning run. I'd keep them anytime, but oh my are they lovely in the spring in cold water. You'd almost need a chiller to keep the water cool enough to get them into their spawning livery though.
Excellent.
Thank you so much been wanting some bright nano options. Good to see your in good health 👍🏾
Thank you kindly! Hopefully some funky native fish will inspire you :)
@@Fishtory well got some work to do on the aquarium got a bit over grown with jungle vale lol but I really like how it’s taken over the layout heck even got my first flower last week and I think the beautiful blues and black that the pygmy sunfish has would be cute how would they get along with black phantom tetras?
Makes me want to set up a native tank again. My favorite colorful native is the Iowa Darter--delicately beautiful.
Very nice. Those photos you showed me from your cabin, were really beautiful too
Great video I never knew there was so many colorful fish in the US
There are many many more, but these are some of the ones people keep in aquariums successfully, and that stay really small
Cool looking fowad to. more on this subject
Thank you!
very beautiful i hope US can populate this fish and export for fish enthusiasts worldwide
That would be wonderful
Amazing. I love these more than tropical fish. I'm from Europe and we probably have as suitable aquarium fish as these. But there is not much info.
Check out the spanish and turkish killifish species.... you guys have neat stuff from end to end haha
Great video man, been looking for some new pond fish and I think red belly dace is gonna be the one!!
Niiiice! Yeah they're great. Just make sure you oxygenate the pond for most those species if it gets over like 70 Fahrenheit
Pretty cool list of fish. Totally fascinated to see that a couple on your list are as far north as me (I'm in Toronto). One day...
I know I know. I'm right there with you since I live in Seattle .
Awesome looking fishes I know in my state they have some small fishes that live in small streams that looks like a snakehead & the yellow minnows as well
Yes, there are many many more lovely and colorful fish, these are just a handful of the very smallest AND most colorful, fish, that tend to be 100% peaceful for a community tank also. Thanks for tuning in!
It's really awesome cause I've seen the turquoise darter and rainbow darter while admiring streams along my bike rides. As always, interesting information. Thanks, Alex!
@@Fishtory now will white cloud minnows try eating shrimps I want to get a planted tank done but not sure if they'll go for them or not
@@yanjijay6752 saw someone on another vid ask the same question about the same fish, and someone responded saying a school of white clouds wiped out a whole colony of their shrimp. The comment also got 50 likes in a short time, so I would assume its safe to bet on white clouds chomping your shrimp.
Too cool Alex..I'm planning a 20 long native plants and fish
Right on! Let me know how it goes!
I love the elassoma gilberti. They are my favorite native fish (so far) the pair I have originated from Wicassa springs.
Where can I get some
That's the best collection point hehe. I have those, as well. Thanks for your enthusiasm and support in this community! I hope you're having a terrific week.
@@michaelharrity9795 if you’re local to Seattle, Aquarium Zen might have a few left.
It's really sad how we look further afield and miss what's under our noses.
You're totally right. If we found out these were some new rare tropical fish, I bet many would be selling like hot cakes hehehe. But as it is, most sit in local rivers, waiting for an aquarium abduction team to find then
I think of this every day, there's not much in my aquariums as pretty as one of my creek pumpkinseeds. I will send some to Myanmar if they'll hook me up with female Dario darios 😝
I agree. Like Alex said, they'd probably sell way more if they were named as a new rare tropical fish.
@@MridulSinghMusic 100% haha
Yes! Thank you for this. I love the native fish and in the future I so plan on setting up a species only pygmy sunfish tank. Mayne even that turquoise dartee since they are native to my state
Oh that sounds epic! You are most welcome also
I think someone is poised to be the Gary Lange of native species...great video and might I say you look very "contented" this morning lol. P.S. darters are dope.
Haha thanks... i was up all night, because I made the 40 minute long version first haha. There is audio for how to care for all 10 species and much more detail on locations and behavior, but I decided to keep the first video short and if it's popular, I'll find more film and or photos to make such a long video less boring haha
@@Fishtory Show us the long version! I'm really interested in these! Most of these are in my local waters, and I'm interested in keeping some of them to observe, then release. I had no idea there were so many colorful nano fish out there! Thank you, Alex!!!
I like long and boring *Russian accent* lol
@@MrsBJPalmer I agree!
Awesome list of native nano fish. Very much looking forward to more information about them. I have a love for all things native and feel we should spend more time getting to know our part of the world. As well as appreciate it more. These little fish wouldn't be here if they didn't serve a purpose in the ecosystem. The first native fish I have kept is flag fish. I love them lil guys and gals. Set up a 110 gallon pond that I want to do nano FL natives in. It already has flagfish breeding. I'm having a hard time deciding what else to add. Sooo many good choices.... Guess the only solution is to get more tubs/ponds....
Right on! I totally agree that it's important to focus on those first. And yes , more tubs or more plants is always the solution lol
Rainbow Shiners and Dace are my favorites that I have experience with
Yes those are wonderful fish. Right on!
@@Fishtory fosho
I set up a 75 gallon with all native "rainbow" fish...shiners, daces and darters. Love that tank!
Where can I get some
@@michaelharrity9795 I got the darters at a LFS, the daces from dansfish.com (he's out) and the shiners at redfishbluefish.shop (he's also out). Dansfish still has some rainbow shiners as does aquaticarts.com last I checked. Jonahsaquarium.com has native fish.
Id love to see that. That's awesome!
Aquatic arts code (SECRETHISTORY15 or SECRETHISTORY10) For a discount...im working on Jonah's for a code too
@@Fishtory I came close to ordering more darters from them yesterday. I'll wait for the code now though.
I just caught some Pygmy sunfish and darters with a dip net while trying to catch crawfish in Florida
Love both those fish
I never knew Florida was Central USA, lol. I liked this list!! Thanks for sharing!
If you count the latitude of Hawaii and Guam it is :)
@@Fishtory Ohio must be in the west then lol
Great Video Bro !
Thanks Brotha! Hope you doin well lately. Take care, man.
@@Fishtory Hope you doin well too my Friend
Thank you
Hey, thank YOU! For watching and commenting. I appreciate it.
👍
Hehe, time for me to get a cast net and get some nice fish.🙂
Yes you do lol
Thanks for sharing. The Southern Redbelly Dace are definitely a great looking fish. They are not easy to see from above but it's nice to see them when they flash their Redbelly when they reach for the top. I have some in a tub. Native fish are really underrated. I also have Longear Sunfish juveniles that are a blast to watch. I think part of the reason is that in a lot of areas the regulations make it hard.
Totally! I just got my first house with a wife (we've lived in small apartments the last 14 years) but now we have room for a pond and plenty of unheated native tanks
@@Fishtory that would definitely be very awesome. I wish I had more room for more things myself
A great video. I hope you have recovered after the resent health scare
Getting there! Thank you so very much for your thoughts, though. Cheers!
The biggest reason I want native fish is that they are not tropical and I don't have to put an ugly heater in my tank that isn't draining my batteries and damaging them when the sun isn't shining.
When I go out of town in the winter, my batteries die and so did most of my fish.
I was super bummed out about losing my emerald eye rasboras, my guppies, my albino pleco, and my red and blue shrimp. I got home and the tank was 50 degrees.
My betta and 5 of my dwarf rasboras survived.
Understandable!
I love Saffron Shiners, Bluenose Shiners, Black Banded Sunfish, and Tangerine Darters.
Great fish suggestions!
Where do we buy these? Awesome presentation. Thanks..
Um jonahs aquarium online has a lot of them :) most are technically illegal to wild collect.. but Florida is a state where you can collect like 4 or 5 of the species listed... Tennessee and Alabama too, I believe
A step up from these guys but still kinda "nano" are the Banded, Blue-spotted, and Black Banded sunfishes. You could keep a very small group in a 20 gallon, but a 40 gallon would be much better. A group of these in a tannin stained tank is absolutely stunning.
Really would love the sunfish
I just caught one today!
I have an empty 5.5gal and was looking for us stocking ideas
I was thinking some pygmy gulf sunfish species
Or western mosquito fish since pest companies give them away for free here
Yes! Add a snail or some shrimp and plants...and that'll be a beautiful and dynamic tank
No need for filters or aeration on either species (elassoma or gambusia)
I like sunfish 🤷 they aren't "nano" lol but they're native & awesome ! Basically a cool water Oscar lol
Pygmy sunfish elassoma they are awesome and only get 1 inch long! :)
I got Florida flag fish from my LFS 'over the pond' in the UK and managed to raise some fry last summer. I wish more of these beautiful American fish were available over here!
We wish they were available too haha. Flag fish, rainbow shiners and pygmy sunfish are really the only fish we see in stores. The rest are caught illegally or grey market ( under a permit as "live fish bait"....but pets would be illegal lol )
@@Fishtory I've kept fish on and off all my life, but COVID lockdown has somehow meant I've gone from 1 community tank to 10 and your channel has really inspired me to make little eco systems suiting the nano tanks. A big thank you for your laid back presentation and explanations - unlike channels where it's all about novelty aquariums and new aquascapes, you've really helped me have healthy tanks with my shrimps, fish and snails all thriving
@@nurseyj9 thank you very much. It warms my heart to hear that. If I can help bring a little more enjoyment and relaxation to just even a handful of people in the hobby, then it is worth it. I greatly appreciate your kind words and your viewership
I kept darters tht I caught from my local creek in my aqurium to season it cuz it was easy to catch around here (north western indiana)
Awesome! We only have one species of darters in WA state, sadly
Those are all fantastic especially the last one I really wanna know if there's any fish in Canada that's worth keeping I wanna set up a native aquarium
the picture at 9:15 are no Southern redbellies but Mountain redbellies ;)
Oh, thank you for that correction , then. I'm still learning all these dace and darter's names
@@Fishtory
You can easily tell the difference by the black line on the side. Mountains have an interrupted one.
Any suggestions for native NA fish that would pair reasonably well with neocaridinas?
That's tricky.... maybe least killifish ( live bearers) they have done well with mine, and like 74 degree water
I keep Bluefin Killifish. They are really cool. I want to keep some of the other US native fish too, but I'm out of tank space.
We all do at some point haha 😄
Last summer my backyard flooded and fish got trapped in puddles. I decided to net them to see if I found anything interesting. First encounter with bluefin killifish. What a beautiful thing! Also captured some sort of wild sailfin Molly like fish.
Right on! Are you in Florida then?
@@Fishtory got that right 😉
That's crazy bro..
I have a 4 year old long pincered Crayfish and an ozark banded crayfish. I keep a red ear sunfish and some madtom miniature catfish, and rainbow darters along with top minnows. All native to my area
I watched a lot of videos thinking they will help me in giving me guild lines in securing a better trade but I realize It’s not all about watching trading videos, you might end up losing all.
Right on! Very nice
Man, not 1 fish in my neck of the woods 😔🤣 thanks for the information Alex.
Well I will do cold water fish soon! There's tons... but they need cold water year round, so I started here. Thanks for tuning in, buddy!
Another colorful American fish is the red shiner (Cyprinella lutrensis), which is a fairly popular aquarium fish in China right now. I had a small school of them until I moved to a new apartment, but they didn't survive the trip. I've recently replaced them with rainbow shiners (Notropis chrosomus), your #10 fish. If your #2 fish, the rainbow darter (Etheostoma caeruleum) can be imported into China, I would love to get some of these, because they seem like they would be right at home in my unheated river tank. It seems like they're about the same size and have similar requirements to my Chinese goby species.
Nice list but I'm actually surprised that you didn't include Orangethroat darters since there's an enormous variety of coloration/sub species compared to ((I've 'also had them spawn multiple times in my aquarium like rainbow shiners)) rainbow darters also while we're on rainbow darters they're actually really easy to convert to frozen foods in my experience all wide ranged darters are the only species that I had a hard time converting was stippled darters and the picture at 9:15 is actually mountain redbelly dace. Hope to see Redside Dace if you make a list for slightly larger natives (just over 8cm) 😅👍
Hehe yeah there are around 12 darters I would have liked to include. Sadly no one would give permission to use images of them...but I agree with the orange throat and orangesided... candycane, and plenty more
@@Fishtory dude..why would anyone have a problem sharing pix..they're fish for chrissakes
Coo fish.... I currently have some of those pygmy sunfish.
Fun eh?
@@Fishtory Yeah, they were just introduce to Lumbriculus variegatus recently (I think I copied that right). they might start breeding again.
While talking about Southern redbelly dace, you also showed pictures of Mountain dace and various killifish?
Either just to show off more colorful fish, when i couldnt find an owner to let me use photos from my list...so i used some similar stuff from people who OKed the photo use.
Or maybe im an idiot if i said something directly to the contrary on that slide
I’m thinking of setting up a native tank. I live in Montana and I love the idea of collecting myself and keeping them in a natural biotope with collected rocks and all. But I don’t think I’ve got many options here. I have a ten gallon laying around not in use. Seems like most fish are from warmer climates. Maybe I’ll try to order some Pygmy sunfish and see if I can’t get a pair and try to breed.
So the pygmy sunfish (elassoma genus...) they'd probably die in Montana winters. No fish do well in solid ice. Even fish that can survive ice, need flow or a layer under it to stay liquid.
But if you keep it ice free then there are a bunch of options like shiners, darters and daces that'll do great
Would you recommend any of these for a tank containing native Missouri species of snails and shrimp (Mississippi grass shrimp, Palaemonetes kadiakensis)? We want some nano fish in there but don't want them to eat the shrimp babies.
Probably only the least killifish, north American fish are pretty tough and all the nanos hunt shrimp and bugs if it fits in their mouth
No love for the Florida Flagfish?
I love the Florida flag fish, it just gets a bit larger than nano and more-so, it's available commonly in big box stores, where as these are far less common...or were 2 or 3 years ago
You forgot about the greenhead shiner
I didn't forget, but they get 4 or 5 inches long, and also there's probably enough shiners to do a top 10 colorful shiner list id bet! Maybe I'll do that soon. There's so many more cool fish...especially mid-sized. Sheep's heads, fatheadminnows candy striper darter, orange sided darter, candy candy darter, blue headed chub, blue ears, red ears, pumpkinseed fish, speckled dace, golden trout, rainbow trout, varden. Oh so many cool fish :) 😎
@@Fishtory i raise both rainbow and greenhead and they both max out at 4...ill be waiting for more video about our natives!
The pigmy sunfish looks like the pearl kilifish
Hmm you're right... i wonder if it was mislabeled. There are 3 or 4 species in the hobby now and some express exceptional color and patterns so I can't really tell know
Me living in Washington state and watching this like there was gonna be something 🤡
Lol yeah we kinda get screwed for colorful Nanos locally....some sticklebacks are really colorful, as are some sunfish
I’m super in to the turquoise darter but have no idea where to buy. Does anyone know?
Email jonahs aquarium and ask.... he has a quite a few that arent always listed
dude the bluenose shiner, how could u forget the bluenose shiner!
Not forgotten...there are just about 50 good choices. And I also chose species you can find bred in captivity as wall
The Candy Darter of Virginia and West Virginia is also a beautiful native species.
Yes! Honestly there are hundreds of species to compete for the top 10 slot
Awesome video bro. Thank you. Can I ask, what's the story with those amazing markings on the southern red belly dace in the picture @ around 9.20? They look nothing like any of the pictures I see when I look up this species. Such a cool looking fish. I want some!
It's a photo out of the Cahaba river if I remember correctly (Alabama). But I'm no expert...just a hobbyist and honestly I needed help IDing the proper photos on some ...there's one darter photo out of like 6 and I guess I messed up. It was some similar species but from a different county/same river haha (so 3 biologists have mentioned)
@@Fishtory Ah ok, thanks for replying. Such a cool wee fish.....but I've done a little research and I'm gutted to say it's actually on the Scottish banned species list, so I have no hope of ever keeping any. Ouch. First time that's happened to me ,to be honest. A wee taste of how things are in a lot of states over there I suppose. Cheers
I need to go fishing for native species.
You live in a really amazing place for finding great species. There's about 80% of the nation's fish diversity within 3 to 4 hours radius of you
You guys are lucky. All our natives are grey, silver, silver-grey or grey-silver. 😜
Well to be honest, we have thousands of fish, and 80% of ours are as well haha
@@Fishtory haha.. We might have some colourful ones somewhere out there, it's just too cold for anyone to go looking. 😂
Enjoyed the video anyway Alex and seeing the fish you showed. Some gorgeous fish there.
This was a nice selection, some I am unfamiliar with. Thanks. I will agree with your choices, but not your desire to selectively breed these fishes. They have been selected already for optimum performance in their environments. Also, I think you may have mixed up your Chrosomus oreas with Chrosomus erythrogaster.
I understand your opinion, I am curious however- Are you against the line breeding of fish such as goldfish (carp), ricefish or guppies as well? To me, I would personally not want to change the looks of the fish, but rather the ability for them to thrive in an aquarium, so as to be able to observe them and admire them more than the fleeting glimpses I see, whilst visiting their specific creeks and lakes.
Also, you are correct that I had photos labeled incorrectly, but in the dialog, I said that there are over 13 Variants of these fish that were once all grouped as one species (Jordan & Rafinesque 1877) but are now species in a wide and growing selection of species.
It was not the most grateful slide show, I'm afraid. I admit that I'm not accustomed to editing with the software I used, and the voice over track may have led over into the next fish on the list by a few sentences. Thanks for your input!
How do you go about catching these fish? Can I just use a minnow trap and some bread or do you need to use some other methods?
Fishing line, minnow trap or dipnet...sort of depends on the fish. Take a look at my florida collecting wild fish videos if you want to see
@@Fishtory Thanks for the quick reply! Your videos are awesome! I learn so much watching them and you are one of most knowledgeable CZcamsrs that I’ve found.
Do you have these pygmy sunfish for sale? #1 the blue fish? I'm starting a nano gentle community tank.
I do not (I only have 5 at the moment and they've been dormant all winter) but jonahs aquarium online sells them year round! Good luck!