June 25, 2012 – The bridal shiner has not been seen since the 1960s in the Chowan River Basin and was never spotted in those waters in North Carolina, until now.
On May 1, Tyler Black, a fisheries biologist, and Michael Young, a fisheries technician, were surveying Deep Swamp Branch in Hertford County looking for the rare Chowanoke crayfish. What they did find was the bridal shiner, with its distinctive black band that runs the length of its body. According to the official release, “the bridle shiner’s historic range spans from Lake Ontario in Canada to the Santee River in South Carolina. However, in North Carolina, the bridle shiner has been found only in the Neuse River and not since 2001.”
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