Native species

[Danoinark]

Terry...you may be a Missourian now, but you will never be NATIVE to Missouri..you are an Arkie and will always be an Arkie, so you are NATIVE to Arkie...but on the same hand you may become WILD to Missouri..

Oh, you ARE WILD to Missouri..

Same way I look at any species of fish!

Dano

[gonefishin]

SM: You make a good argument and certainly an interesting read. One point you touched on but did not bring into your discussion is migration. Yes, man migrates and other species do too. If Rainbow or Brown trout had migrated here naturally I would consider them native, if carp had migrated here naturally I would consider them native and so on. The problem is they did not migrate here naturally they were brought here by man. In some cases the species brought here by man would not survive without mans continual 're-stocking'.

Terry: Sorry I apparently misunderstood your post. If SMB migrated here naturally then they are native IMO. In the case of Brown Trout; how would they have ever naturally migrated to Missouri?

Dano: Yeah, what you said.

[Wayne SW/MO]

I think the answer is simple Terry, any species that exist here without mans help is native. The bigger question is "How much help has man been in some instances?". Would Kentucky's, which are native river fish, have moved into new territories had man not fooled with the rivers?

There are so many introduced species now, and I'm talking about deliberate introduction, such as Striper's, Trouts, Carp, not to mention species that have been moved around such as Redears for example.

There was a native trout, it was a Char, probably a Brook, or close to it.

[motroutbum]

Just because something is wild doesnt mean that it is native. In ecology, an indigenous species is an organism which is native to a given region or ecosystem. Indigenous species contrast with introduced species. An introduced species, also known as a naturalized or exotic species, is an organism that is not indigenous to a given place, but has been transported there as a result of human activity. ie the new zealand mud snail or zebra mussel.

An indigenous species is not necessarily endemic. In biology and ecology, endemic means exclusively native to the biota of a specific place. An indigenous species may occur in more than one locale.

The terms endemic and indigenous do not mean that an organism necessarily originated or evolved where it is found.

Take eastern red ceaders for instance. They are everywhere, but they are not native to missouri or the ozarks. They are an invasive to this area. Hedgeapple aka osage oranges are not native to missouri either. Rainbow trout are not a native fish to missouri or any of the interior united states. They are however native to Alaska and the west coast states. Brook trout are native to the appalachain states. Cutthroats are are native to the western states.....Colorado, Wyoming. The only native species of trout in colorado is the Greenback Cutthroat. everything else has been stocked. Even the brookies here are an invasive species.

what biologists consider to be native and non native is all based on historical records. If you have any questoins, get ahold of a biologist at any university and ask them if you dont believe what i am saying.

[Al Agnew]

Interesting...

My take on it is that a native species is one that became indigenous to an area naturally. I kind of alluded to that in the other post. If you look at the "native" ranges of various fish species, for instance, you will see that the various waterways of their native range are either connected, or have been connected in the prehistoric past. For instance, smallmouths were originally native to the streams of the Mississippi river basin, including the upper Mississippi, the Ohio, and nearly all streams of suitable habitat that flowed into those two master rivers. They were also native to all suitable waterways that flowed into the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River. While those two drainage basins were not connected in historic times (until the canal from Lake Michigan into the Illinois River was built), they WERE connected at around the time of the last ice age. Smallmouths were not native to the streams of the east coast that drained directly into the Atlantic, because those rivers had never been connected to the smallies' native range. And they weren't native to the streams draining into the Missouri River, because even though the Missouri was and is connected to the Mississippi, in prehistoric and early historic times the Missouri was simply too muddy for smallmouths to use it to extend their range, so it was a barrier even though connected.

As for spotted bass, they were native to the Ohio river basin AND the streams that flowed into the LOWER Mississippi, below the mouth of the Ohio. Those streams included those that drained southward in the Missouri Ozarks, because those streams were either part of the White River system, which entered the Mississippi far down in Arkansas, the Arkansas system, which enters the Miss. in the same area, or the St. Francis and Castor, which also entered below the mouth of the Ohio. They may never have spread farther up the Mississippi and hence into the streams of the northern Ozarks, probably because the Missouri, and the Mississippi between the mouth of the Missouri and the mouth of the Ohio, were too muddy or otherwise not suitable habitat. So, without something altering that habitat, they may never have been able to spread to the northern Ozarks. Humans altered the habitat, by building big dams on the upper Missouri which trapped a lot of the silt and made the Missouri--not clear--but not nearly as muddy as it was before. And humans also gave the spotted bass a shorter shot at the northern Ozark streams, either by stocking directly into them (Osage river system, back around the 1940s), stocking in nearby streams flowing into the Missouri from the north (MDC, 1960s), or by building the Diversion Channel, which gave Castor River spotted bass a short route up the Mississippi to the Meramec. So, any way you cut it, spotted bass probably would never have reached the northern Ozark streams without the inadvertent help of human activity. Thus, they are an invasive species in those streams, and very hard on the native smallmouths.

You will find very few, if any, fish species that have spread naturally to waters new to them in historic times. If you look at fish distribution, colonization of new waters has just about always occurred either as the result of direct intervention by man, or by large scale alteration of habitat. On a geologic time scale, the distribution of just about any creature is fluid and subject to change over time, but on a human time scale, it simply doesn't happen that fast unless we hasten it along somehow.

But when you get right down to it, the philosophy that, since man is a part of the earth, anything we do is "natural"...that's right, even if we produce a lot of substances and occurrences that have never been and probably never COULD have been made and done without our activity. The REAL question is not, "Is it natural?", but "Is it harmful?" Not every natural herb is harmless to humans. Not every chemical produced by humans is harmful to wildlife. And not every "introduced" species is invasive or harmful to native wildlife. But a lot of them are.

Trout in MO are an introduced species. They probably alter the native distribution of species where they are stocked in the Ozarks, but they have apparently not been responsible for pushing out and replacing any species that we know of, and they are "naturally" limited in where they can survive. So they would not be an invasive species, and their net effect is more diversity, not less. Invasive species tend to push out or wipe out native species, so their net effect is less diversity. Less diversity is seldom a good thing.

[crappiefisherman]

Aint the internet a wunerful thang, I think ill prolly go fishin. this is darwins broom closet.Lmao.

[gonefishin]

I guess the wild hogs people are griping about are native now. If someone turned loose some Elephants I guess they would be native too. It all seems silly to me but I am just a guy who likes to fish. I agree with crappiefisherman; I think I will go fishing.

[motroutbum]

Dont even think for one second that those hogs are native. and elephants didnt occur here naturally so umm lets see nope they wouldnt be native either.

[Gavin]

I used to care about things like this, but I dont get to flustered about it anymore. I like to fish for native wild fish if I can, wild non-natives as long as I consider them to be a desireable gamefish, but I wont turn up my nose at stocked non-natives either. I dont turn up my nose at fishing for non-native invasives either..someone needs to kill em. Cheers.

[MoCarp]

after a while introduced species can become "naturalized" be it desired or otherwise..in effect a wildflower in a wheat field is a weed....its all moot

rainbow trout are not and never have been native in Missouri as largemouth bass where never native to California....ARE THERE CONFLICTS? yes..does it out weigh the benefits? IMHO no..man has forever alterd our waters so think of it like this what is native in a farm pond? nothing as the pond is a non-natural water--just as tablerock is not the whiteriver any more and the fish interactions are differnt....somethings to chew on

Cheer

MO