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Topic: cabezon OR sculpin?  (Read 3809 times)

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Sin Coast

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I went shorefishing for rockfish last Thursday south of Carmel. We hiked through a canyon and past a small crik that flowed directly into the ocean. Seemingly too small to support a run of steelhead. But on the return hike we noticed a small fish darting around in the pool we crossed. This pool was no deeper than 4 inches.
Intrigued by the small fish, I paused, crouched down, and scooped it up out of the water. Turns out it wasn't a steelhead. It was a ... a ... cabezon? HUH? This thing looked just like a small 4 inch cabezon. But it was in freshwater, about 50 yards up from the ocean. I have to believe it was a sculpin, but it sure as heck looked like a cabezon! It even had some blue undertones on its belly and a huge mouth/head.
Any ideas?
 
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bsteves

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I've seen a lot of 4 inch cabezons and that doesn't quite look right, it just seems too long and skinny. But then again it's hard to tell from an out of focus photo. Given that a cabezon is just a large species of sculpin, you can safely just call it a sculpin and be right.

As for where you found it, 50 yds from the ocean might be more estuarine than purely fresh water depending on how steep the grade of the stream.   Anyway, there are many species of freshwater sculpins.  I did a quick search and came up with two in particular that are found in coastal streams in California (the Prickly sculpin and the coastrange sculpin).

Brian

« Last Edit: June 04, 2007, 11:03:48 PM by bsteves »
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bluefin17

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Brian's got the two possibilities.  Its impossible to know which one it is because you'd have to count fin rays to tell the difference.  Being a salmon biologist, we catch these by the thousands in the spring and summer sampling efforts, up to 6 and 7 inches.  Good guess saying cabezon, although juveniles can be found in estuaries, adults are always found only in the ocean.  Those sculpins are very closely related to cabezon, in fact they have the same genus name.


promethean_spark

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I've caught little sculpins in putah creek by UCDavis, I'm pretty sure they weren't cabezon.  That fish's dorsal and anal fins look too long to be a cabby, but it's hard to tell.
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Malibu_Two

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Sounds like another species of sculpin, not a cabezon. There are freshwater sculpin that trout eat...I've seen sculpin flies, too.
May the fish be mighty and the seas be meek...


 

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