Nest association of pumpkinseed, Lepomis gibbosus, and golden shiner, Notemigonus crysoleucas

Abstract

I investigated the nest association of pumpkinseeds and golden shiners in an upstate New York pond. Golden shiners spawned in about one-third of pumpkinseed nests. Field observations indicate that golden shiners preferred to spawn in nests of male pumpkinseeds that attracted conspecific females, and avoided nests of pumpkinseeds that failed to do so. Golden shiners did not spawn in any of the nests that I kept clean experimentally after abandonment by male pumpkinseeds, suggesting that a clean nest without a guarding pumpkinseed is not enough to attract shiners to spawn. In field experiments, shiner eggs that were placed away from pumpkinseed nests suffered significantly higher losses to predation than those in the nests. This indicates that golden shiners benefit from spawning in pumpkinseed nests through the protection of their young by the host pumpkinseed.