Menidia

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Menidia
Fossil range: Pliocene to Present^[1]

Menidia menidia

Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Actinopterygii
Order:	Atheriniformes
Family:	Atherinopsidae
Genus:	Menidia

Species

Menidia beryllina
Menidia clarkhubbsi
Menidia colei
Menidia conchorum
Menidia extensa
Menidia menidia
Menidia peninsulae

Menidia is a genus of silverside fish (Atherinopsidae) found all around the shores of the Gulf of Maine from Nova Scotia to Cape Cod.

1 Description
2 Habits
3 Diet
4 Reproduction
5 References

[edit] Description

The menidia is six times as long as it is tall. Its body is covered with large, silver scales. Its fins are translucent bottle green, and the upper prats of the sides are speckeled with dark brown. A silver band outlined by a narrow black streak runs alone each side of the menidia. Its belly is smooth, rounded, and white. Its first dorsal fin, located halfway between the snout and the base of the caudal fin, is smaller than the second, which is located over the middle of the anal.

Menidia are often confused with young smelt. The two can be distinguished because the minidia lacks the adipose fin of the smelt. Also, the menidia has two dorsal fins - one spiny and one soft - while the smelt only has one soft dorsal fin.

Adult menidias are an average of 4 to 4½ inches long, though they can grow to 5½ inches.

[edit] Habits

Menidia congregate in schools and travel along sandy or gravelly shores and in brackish water. They also swim in sedge grass at high tide, but they rarely venture out to sea. During the summer, minidia ordinarily do not descender deeper than a fathom. In winter, they have been reported to venture as far as 5 to 12 fathoms for warmth, but this is not typical behavior.

[edit] Diet

Menidia are omnivorous. They feed chiefy on copepods, mysids, shrimps, small decapod shrimps, amphipods, Cladocera, fish eggs (including their own), young squid, annelid worms, insects that fall into water, algae and diatoms mixed with mud and sand, and molluscan larvae.

Natural predators of the minidia are every predaceous fish that comes inshore - chiefly the striped bass and bluefish.

[edit] Reproduction

Menidia span in May, June, and Early July on the southern New England Coast. For successful reproduction, they need summer temperatures as high as 68°C. To reproduce, they gather in schools and deposit their eggs on the sandy sea floor, often among sedge grass at high tide or above the low-water mark.

The species M. clarkhubbsi, an all-female species, reproduces asexually. (Echelle and Mosier 1982)