Common name: River Lamprey
Family: Petromyzontiformers
Species: Ichthyomazon Casteneus
Description: The River Lamprey is a snake-like fish and is confused with eels, but his circular sucking disk helps to distinguish the lamprey from the eel. Adult lampreys are brown above and lighter below. The lighter areas become yellow, during spawning season. Average length of River Lamprey is 24 to 30 inches.
Habitat: River Lamprey is found through the Columbia and Snake River. It’s also found in the tributaries of these two rivers.
Range/migration: River Lamprey is distributed along the coast of Western North America. Many of them can be found in lakes, islands and rivers.
Food: River Lamprey eats Small plants and animals like protozoan, diatom, algae, desmids and pollen.
Reproduction: River lamprey migrates to small streams to spawn. Spawning begins in May ends in June, when water temperatures reach 12-13 C (about 55 F). There the male Lampreys remove pebbles with their sucker disk to make a large spawning nest. Many males and females use the nest. Each female may lay anywhere from 20 to 40 eggs in spawning. A female will spawn many times over several days, until she has deposited all her eggs. Then they die after spawning.
Enemies: Lamprey are eaten by Walleyes, Muskellunge and small mouth bass.
More information: www.fishbase.org/identification/specieslist.cfm
www.rra.dst.tx.us/bi/fish/county/order/Petromyzontidae.htm
www.cbfwa.org/files/province/systemwide/projects/35009.htm