Twice I have had the wonderful privilege
of collecting fishes from the Peruvian Amazon with David M. Schleser.
Among my Amazon collecting buddies, he is known with great respect
and affection as "Dr. Fish." So I knew that it would
be a wonderful treat to own and read Dr. Fish's North American
Native Fishes for the Home Aquarium (1998, Barron's, 169
p., softcover). Its main advantages over John Quinn's Our
Native Fishes (other than being in print) are three: 1) it
includes fishes from a broader geographic range; 2) its scientific
nomenclature is more up-to-date; and 3) it's illustrated with
color photos (as opposed to Quinn's black-and-white sketches).
Its main disadvantage when compared to Quinn is the exclusion
of marine fishes. But since most native fish hobbyists collect
and keep freshwater fishes, that shouldn't be a problem. All
the basics are covered: permits, collecting, nutrition, maintenance,
and diseases. Plus there's the welcome addition of eigh!!t pages
on conservation. The bulk of the text is given to short but information-packed
write-ups on commonly encountered fishes across 21 families.
My only cavil with the book is that Schleser apparently did not
have a complete file of American Currents to aid his research.
He mentions that he could not find any records of the flagfin,
sailfin, and bluenose shiners being bred in aquaria, despite
the fact that the captive spawnings of these fishes have been
described in NANFA's quarterly
publication.