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Status: Threatened
Habitat: This fish is found in stream riffles over loosely-packed gravel bottoms.
Adults prefer swift, shallow currents while young madtoms inhabit
deeper water with slower currents.
Behavior: The madtom eats aquatic insects such as mayfly larvae, usually in
the three hours before sunset. Little is known of its reproductive
habits, though biologists believe it spawns in June and July.
Why
It's Endangered: Dams and reservoirs have inundated much
of the madtom's habitat, destroying the gravel riffles and the swift
currents the fish needs to live. Cold water released from the Tenkiller
Dam killed off all madtoms on the Illinois River in Oklahoma. Reservoirs
which would destroy more madtom habitats are currently being planned.
Other
threats include gravel dredging and pollution from cattle feedlots.
Urban and agricultural runoff may also contaminate the rivers in which
madtoms live. During droughts people draw more water from reservoirs,
drying up the river downstream where madtoms live.
Fact Sheet prepared November
1997
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