The Mississippi Silversides was introduced into Clear Lake California in 1967, and they proliferated. The fish shown here were collected with a small seine. A maximum of 90,000 fish were collected with a single 10-m seine haul in 1980. The silversides are an important zooplankton predator, and are also an important forage fish for bass, crappie and a variety of other fish in the lake.


The taxonomy of the species has been revised several times with the following names being used:


Tidewater silverside, Menidia peninsulae, Menidia beryllina
Mississippi silverside, Menidia audens
Inland silverside, Menidia beryllina


See Wurtsbaugh, WA and H.W. Li. 1985. Diel migrations of a zooplanktivorous fish (Menidia beryllina) in relation to the distribution of its prey in a large eutrophic lake. Limnol. Oceanogr. 30: 565-576.