Fish of the Week!

Get the latest scoop on Northern Pike in Southcentral Alaska with Alaska Department of Fish and Game guest Parker Bradley. While this fish is highly sought-after and valued for subsistence and sport in the regions of Alaska where it's native, it is causing problems for salmon in Southcentral Alaska where it's been introduced. We deep dive into a nuanced look at how species can cause harm when they...

Get to know the Golden Redhorse! They fight hard, they're beautiful, and they're a great fish to introduce kids to fishing (soft mouth, no spines). During this episode you'll gain strategies to see their migration and catch/cook redhorse, identify redhorse species in your neck of the woods, learn how anglers are helping scientists understand more about these fish through an amazing piece of anatom...

Get to know the Emerald Bowfin, one of two native species of bowfin found in North America! Always hungry and angry, this gamest of fish is a dedicated parent and will roll and jump spectacularly on the end of your line if hooked...and once landed, it about as close as you can get to holding a living dinosaur. Guests Griffin Blegen and Tyler Winter help Katrina and Guy dig into where this fish is...

Get to know the American Star Drum: an abundant, silvery little bulldog-faced fish that feeds everything from popular sportfish to beloved birds and dolphins! Katrina and Guy are joined by two Georgia-based guests: Rachel Guy with the Sapelo Island National Estuarine Research Reserve/Georgia DNR and Bryan Fluech with the University of Georgia Marine Extension and Georgia Sea Grant. You'll learn ab...

Travel to North Carolina with Katrina, Guy, and guest Tyler Pait to get to know the beautiful Brook Trout of the Southern Appalachians! You'll learn about the habits of these fish, where you can still find them in the south, how to safely approach a high-elevation Brook Trout fishing adventure, and how folks with non-fish day jobs are making a difference (and how you can too!).

Head with us to the abyssal sea floor, a fascinating and important place with rolling hills, rock outcrops, and amazing creatures drifting by and sticking out of deep, fine mud.  This is where an abundance of fish with rat-like tails are feeling around and tracking the populations of surface dwelling fish above. Guest Jeff Drazen from the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa joins Katrina and Guy to ans...

Head to Birmingham, Alabama with us to get to know this fish and several other endangered urban darters. We explore the city and the well-known spring oases the Watercress Darter calls home, as well as the ways in which the community has rallied around their care. You'll hear from the man who first discovered and described this fish in 1965 and two guests from our Alabama Ecological Services Field...

Get to know a beautiful and rare native species found in pockets of tea-like blackwater habitats along the East Coast. Katrina and Guy are joined by three guests from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources: Jay Kilian, Seth Moessinger, and Jason Cessna. Learn more about the fish, their patchy habitats, and the amazing work being done by a variety of partners and states to locate, understand,...

Get to know the Pumpkinseed, "perfect in all its parts, looking like a brilliant coin, fresh from the mint." Learn what makes this fish tick, where to find it, how to catch it (in both open water and through the ice), and how fishing can take you to a happy place. Katrina and Guy are joined by Jeff Kopaska (Executive Director of the American Fisheries Society) and retired Minnesota fish biologist...

In contrast to the clinical, objective science of descriptive taxonomy, naming a fish is the one time scientists can be creative, personal, poetic, whimsical, and even mysterious. We dig into the process and history of formally naming fish species. Our special guest, Christopher Sharpf (the brains behind the ETYFish Project), has researched the names of literally ALL THE FISH!! You'll particularly...

What looks like a rock, vocalizes using its own bizarre internal instrument, and vibrates like a cell phone when picked up? Get to know the Rockhead Poacher: a fish that's developed a very special way to make itself heard in loud, acoustically complex tidepools along the Pacific coast. Whether you're a fish enthusiast, computer geek, gamer or art lover, this episode is for you. Fish biologist and...

Get to know the Saugeye! You'll get extensive tips how to angle for this fish, how it tastes, and what goes into producing this hybrid for fun fishing opportunities in Virginia. Katrina and Guy are joined by two guests from the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources.

Get to know a notoriously difficult-to-detect Noturus species: the Piebald Madtom! Matt Wagner, a biologist from our Mississippi Ecological Services Field Office, takes us into the field to learn about this very neat little American catfish with a big sting!

Tune in this week as Katrina and Guy head to Alaska's Kuskokwim River! U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service guests Frank Harris and Aaron Moses describe this fish, its importance to people, the river + Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge, and the logistical challenges of studying fish in remote Alaska (MacGyver story included!). If you like this episode, we've got another for you that offers an Iñupiat...

Get to know the Trout-Perch, an understudied yet important forage fish that makes its living across a large swath of North America! Katrina and Guy are joined by guests Ray Katula and Justin Lesser.

Co-hosts Katrina and Guy reflect on the past five seasons and take a sneak peek into season 6. Learn which 25 American fish top their lists and their shortlist of Mount Rushmore-worthy fishes. The episode ends with listeners' "fanmail darter" recommendations.

Get to know 'o'opu nākea, 'o'opu 'alamo'o, ‘o’opu nopili, ‘o’opu naniha, and ‘o’opu ‘akupa! From scaling waterfalls to farming algae, Hawaii’s native ‘o’opu gobies embody a mauka to makai (mountains to sea) way of living. These fascinating obligate amphidromous fishes (and our guests - Cory Yap, Cody Chacon, and Tim Grabowski), help us to open a window into Hawaiian culture, sense of place, a...

Get to know the invasive Round Goby! You'll learn about the history of this fish in the Great Lakes, their impacts, and how to tell them apart from native fishes like Mottled Sculpin and Johnny Darter. Our guests are Julie Nitz and Abby Wicks from Wayne State University.

Per listener request, get to know the fish so nice they named it twice! In this episode you'll learn about their fascinating coloration and behavior, fishing and underwater viewing strategies, and how to contribute to our collective understanding of the movements and lives of these fish by participating in one of the world's largest fishermen-driven tagging programs. Our guest is Wess Merten: Dire...

Meet a rockstar of a fish who develops a big pink head adorned with tubercles during the spawning season. Not only that, it moves thousands of rocks into spawning mounds that benefit all kinds of other fish! This species and other chubs in the Nocomis genus are very important indeed. Guy and Katrina dig into this fish and recent fan mail.

Meet the official state fish of Texas and the gem of central Texas: the Guadalupe Bass! Native only to the clear, groundwater-influenced streams of the Texas Hill Country, this spunky fish is an amazing catch and will absolutely tear into your light tackle and crater your topwater. "If they want to eat your fly, there's nothing you can do to get it away from them. They will outrun it, they will ea...

Get to know a fan favorite! Katrina and Guy visit with guests Bo Baxter and Derek Wheaton from Conservation Fisheries to understand the habits and history of this tiny cog and wheel in our amazing, beautiful world. You'll learn how and where to best visit with and photograph bluemask and related darters underwater...and how Conservation Fisheries raises and feeds (!) tiny millimeters-long "set-of-...

Get to know the lunkers of the lake that also need free-flowing rivers...Lake Sturgeon! This episode takes Katrina and Guy to Michigan where they talk with guest Ed Baker from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. Delve into the history of Lake Sturgeon in Michigan, learn what makes this fish so very cool, and explore what's being done to help them achieve the comeback they (and anglers) d...

Head to Alaska and get to know the big, beautiful rainbow trout of the Kenai River! You'll learn tips about when and how to float and fish the river, the habits of rainbow trout and other Kenai River fish, and how your fishing license and gear purchases contribute to improved access points along the river and beyond.  Our guests are Tracy Smith (Statewide Boating & Angler Access Program Coordi...

Get to know and explore the state of Utah by discovering its amazing cutthroat trout diversity! We are joined by two guests with the Utah Department of Natural Resources: Mike Slater and Trina Hedrick. You'll learn where these fish live, why they're so cool, how to go about completing the Utah Cutthroat Trout Slam, and how your license and gear purchases are put towards conservation and unforgetta...