Key ID Features: Freshwater drum average 10-14 inches in length. There is some indication that this fish, with its big molar-like crushing teeth, may be learning to eat zebra mussels.Freshwater drum is the only member of its family in North America to occur completely in freshwater habitats.
Freshwater drum's eggs float on the water surface until they hatch, sometimes traveling for miles on rivers or windswept lakes before the tiny fry (newly hatched fish) emerge.The otolith help fish stay balanced and oriented in murky water. All vertebrates have ototliths in the inner ear but the freshwater drum’s can be an inch in diameter. Native Americans strung together the freshwater drum’s large otoliths (granules of calcium carbonate) as necklaces or bracelets.Anglers may be surprised to feel them vibrate like a cell phone. Male freshwater drum makes its unique sound with muscles rubbed along its swim bladder.It can use its high snout and forehead to flip stones and expose food. It feeds on many different types of food from crustaceans and seeds to minnows and aquatic insects. This adaptation allows the drum to pick up vibrations in the water and better locate food and enemies. A freshwater drum’s lateral line (a visible line of sense organs on the side of a fish for detecting pressure and vibration) extends to the end of its tail, which is farther than most other fish species. Other names include silver bass, gray bass, lavender bass, and gaspergou from the French casse-burgeau "to break a clam." Locally many anglers refer to them as "sheepshead."įreshwater drum like turbid water and inhabit slow or moderate current over sand or mud bottoms. That noisiness generated many colorful nicknames, including croaker, thunder pumper, grunter, grinder, bubbler. Males make a grunting or rumbling sound during the breeding season, which is thought to attract females. The freshwater drum is a fish known for its noise. Fish of the Mississippi River Introduction
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