Animal Diversity Web

Ge­o­graphic Range

The black crap­pie, Po­moxis ni­gro­mac­u­la­tus, is found in fresh­wa­ter streams and rivers as well as lakes and has a na­tive range that en­com­passes the ma­jor­ity of the east­ern United States. The black crap­pie can be found as far west as the Mis­sis­sippi River, north to the bor­der be­tween the United States and Canada, and south to the Gulf Coast. The east­ern bound­ary reaches from Vir­ginia south­ward through Florida. Due to the de­mand from sport fish­ing, the ge­o­graph­i­cal range of the black crap­pie has been greatly ex­panded. Stock­ing of lakes has in­creased the black crap­pies range to in­clude all of the con­ti­nen­tal United States. (Na­ture­Serve, 2013; Rohde, et al., 1994)

• Biogeographic Regions
• nearctic
  • introduced
  • native

Habi­tat

The black crap­pie is found in fresh­wa­ter lakes, streams, and ponds as well as reser­voirs. Char­ac­ter­is­tics of habi­tats most com­monly in­hab­ited by the black crap­pie in­clude; cool, deep, and clearer bod­ies of water with lit­tle to no cur­rent, sub­strate com­posed mainly of sand or mud, and ample cover for pro­tec­tion. The water depth black crap­pie are found in varies due to en­vi­ron­men­tal fac­tors, re­pro­duc­tive be­hav­ior, and feed­ing be­hav­ior. Black crap­pie are found in shal­low wa­ters dur­ing the win­ter months or when they are feed­ing or spawn­ing. (Phelps, et al., 2009; Ross, 2001; Traut­man, 1981)

• Habitat Regions
• temperate
• freshwater

• Aquatic Biomes
• lakes and ponds
• rivers and streams

Phys­i­cal De­scrip­tion

The black crap­pie is part of the fam­ily Cen­trar­chi­dae (sun­fish fam­ily) which are dis­tin­guished by ray-fins. The black crap­pie’s dor­sal fin con­tains 7-8 spines, which dis­tin­guishes it from the Po­moxis an­nu­laris (white crap­pie) which only has 5-6 spines. The black crap­pie is a lat­er­ally com­pressed, round-bod­ied fish with sym­met­ri­cal dor­sal and anal fins. Its large mouth is up­turned with the lower jaw pro­trud­ing out. The col­oration of the black crap­pie is typ­i­cally a dark olive-green to black on top and a lighter sil­very col­oration below the lat­eral line. The black crap­pie has black mot­tling on much of the body and lighter col­ored, spot­ted fins. Black crap­pie dis­play sex­ual di­mor­phism (males larger) and dichro­ma­tism (male is darker). Age and habi­tat also have an im­pact on the col­oration of the black crap­pie. Black crap­pies with less col­oration tend to be ju­ve­niles or live in habi­tats with tur­bid wa­ters. Habi­tats that are clear with ample veg­e­ta­tion are cor­re­lated with crap­pies that have darker col­oration and mot­tling. The typ­i­cal adult black crap­pie is 13.0cm-30.5cm in length and weighs 28.0g-800.0g. (Rohde, et al., 1994; Ross, 2001; Traut­man, 1981)

• Other Physical Features
• ectothermic
• bilateral symmetry

• Sexual Dimorphism
• male larger
• sexes colored or patterned differently
• male more colorful

• Range mass

  28.0 to 800.0 g

  0.99 to 28.19 oz

• Range length

  13.0 to 30.5 cm

  5.12 to 12.01 in

De­vel­op­ment

The black crap­pie starts as a fer­til­ized egg that takes ap­prox­i­mately 2-3 days to hatch. The eggs of the black crap­pie are spher­i­cal typ­i­cally mea­sur­ing 0.93 mm and con­tain one oil glob­ule. A newly-hatched lar­val black crap­pie is typ­i­cally around 2.3 mm in length and is trans­par­ent. As de­vel­op­ment con­tin­ues, the black crap­pie dark­ens and de­vel­ops the clas­sic col­oration through­out the first year of life and grow 50.8-76.2 mm. The black crap­pie dis­plays in­de­ter­mi­nate growth. How­ever, there are growth-lim­it­ing fac­tors which in­clude: pop­u­la­tion den­sity, habi­tat, and avail­abil­ity of re­sources. (Dock­endorf and Allen, 2005; Pope and Willis, 1998)

• Development - Life Cycle
• indeterminate growth

Re­pro­duc­tion

Male black crap­pies build loosely-de­fined nests for re­pro­duc­tion. These nest sites are typ­i­cally con­structed on firm sub­strates such as clay and sand. The nests tend to be in slow-mov­ing, shal­low wa­ters pro­tected by dense veg­e­ta­tion. Froese and Pauly (2015) found that the black crap­pie nest­ing sites are colo­nial with each in­di­vid­ual male nest av­er­ag­ing less than 60 cm from the next male's nest. These nest sites at­tract the fe­male black crap­pie to spawn. The black crap­pie is thought to be polyan­drous with one fe­male black crap­pie lay­ing eggs in mul­ti­ple male nests which are then fer­til­ized by the male crap­pie that built the nest. (Dock­endorf and Allen, 2005; Froese and Pauly, 2015; Phelps, et al., 2009)

• Mating System
• polyandrous

The re­pro­duc­tion sea­son for the black crap­pie ranges from spring to sum­mer, typ­i­cally from the months of March to July. Re­poro­duc­tively ma­ture fe­male black crap­pies begin spawn­ing once when the water tem­per­a­ture reaches 14 de­grees Cel­sius and stop once the water tem­per­a­ture drops below 14 de­grees Cel­sius again. While both sexes reach the age of ma­tu­rity at ap­prox­i­mately 2-4 years, cooler water tem­per­a­tures may slow sex­ual de­vel­op­ment.

Dur­ing the spawn­ing sea­son, the fe­male black crap­pie may lay up to 188,000 eggs, but av­er­age 40,000 eggs. The fe­male black crap­pie is able to re­pro­duce mul­ti­ple times dur­ing the one spawn­ing sea­son in the year. The male black crap­pie cares for the eggs and stays with the lar­val hatch­lings until they are able to leave the nest, ap­prox­i­mately 2-4 days after hatch­ing. (Bone and Mar­shall, 1982; Bun­nell and Marschall, 2003; Hunt­ing­ford and Tor­ri­celli, 1993)

• Key Reproductive Features
• iteroparous
• seasonal breeding
• sexual
• fertilization
  • external
• broadcast (group) spawning
• oviparous

• Breeding interval

  The black crappie may breed multiple times during one breeding season which typically lasts a few months and is controlled by the water temperature each year.

• Breeding season

  The black crappie breeds from the months of March to July.

• Range number of offspring

  188,000 eggs (high)

• Average number of offspring

  40,000 eggs

• Average time to hatching

  2-3 days

• Average time to independence

  2-4 days

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (female)

  2-4 years

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (male)

  2-4 years

After the black crap­pie eggs have been fer­til­ized, it typ­i­cally takes 2-3 days for the lar­val black crap­pies to hatch. The lar­val black crap­pies then re­main in the nest for sev­eral more days until they are able to swim and hunt well. Dur­ing this 6-7 day de­vel­op­men­tal pe­riod, the male black crap­pie guards the nest until all of the lar­val black crap­pies leave. (Froese and Pauly, 2015; Phelps, et al., 2009; Rohde, et al., 1994)

• Parental Investment
• male parental care
• pre-hatching/birth
  • protecting
    • male
• pre-independence
  • protecting
    • male

Lifes­pan/Longevity

The lifes­pan of the black crap­pie is ap­prox­i­mately 7 years. The longest liv­ing black crap­pie on record was 15 years old. Due to the pop­u­lar­ity of the black crap­pie as a sport­ing fish, fish­ing typ­i­cally lim­its the lifes­pan of the black crap­pie. (Dock­endorf and Allen, 2005; Froese and Pauly, 2015)

• Range lifespan
  Status: wild

  15 (high) years

• Average lifespan
  Status: wild

  7 years

• Average lifespan
  Status: wild

  7 hours

• Average lifespan
  Status: wild

  10.0 years

  Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research

• Average lifespan
  Status: captivity

  12.0 years

  Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research

• Average lifespan
  Status: wild

  13.0 years

  Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research

Be­hav­ior

The black crap­pie is a motile school­ing fish. The black crap­pie moves in­land in order to feed and re­pro­duce. It is mostly noc­tur­nal, typ­i­cally feed­ing from the hours of mid­night to 0200 hours. (Bone and Moore, 2008; Froese and Pauly, 2015; Hunt­ing­ford and Tor­ri­celli, 1993)

• Key Behaviors
• natatorial
• nocturnal
• motile

Home Range

There is not a lot of in­for­ma­tion on the home range of the black crap­pie. How­ever, the male crap­pie does build a small nest in shal­low wa­ters and de­fends the area until the lar­val black crap­pie de­part. (Froese and Pauly, 2015)

Com­mu­ni­ca­tion and Per­cep­tion

The black crap­pie has mul­ti­ple means of per­ceiv­ing its en­vi­ron­ment. The crap­pie's lat­eral line de­tects vi­bra­tions in the sur­round­ing wa­ters. The black crap­pie also pos­sesses sco­topic vi­sion, al­low­ing it to hunt in low-light con­di­tions when the black crap­pie most com­monly feeds. This abil­ity is due to the black crap­pies' high con­cen­tra­tion of red-sen­si­tive retinene2 pig­ment and an ad­di­tional lens, called the tape­tum lu­cidum, in their eye­ball that in­creases pho­to­sen­si­tiv­ity. (CIBA Foun­da­tion Sym­po­sium, 2009; Helf­man and Col­lette, 2011)

• Communication Channels
• visual
• tactile

• Other Communication Modes
• vibrations

• Perception Channels
• visual
• tactile
• vibrations
• chemical

Food Habits

The black crap­pie may feed dur­ing the day; how­ever it is most com­monly noc­tur­nal, ac­tive in the evening to early in the morn­ing. An av­er­age adult black crap­pie tends to sub­sist on a diet of small fish, crus­taceans, and in­sect lar­vae while the av­er­age ju­ve­nile sub­sists mainly on zoo­plank­ton and mi­cro­crus­taceans. While the black crap­pie typ­i­cally in­hab­its deeper wa­ters, it will move in­land to more shal­low wa­ters in order to feed. (Allen, et al., 1998; Rohde, et al., 1994; Ross, 2001)

• Primary Diet
• carnivore
  • piscivore
  • insectivore
  • eats non-insect arthropods
• planktivore

• Animal Foods
• fish
• insects
• aquatic crustaceans
• zooplankton

Pre­da­tion

The black crap­pie is vul­ner­a­ble to larger pis­civ­o­rous fish such as the large­mouth bass (Mi­cropterus salmoides) and chan­nel cat­fish (Ic­talu­rus punc­ta­tus). Black crap­pie eggs are sus­cep­ti­ble to pre­da­tion by re­dear sun­fish (Lep­omis mi­crolo­phus) and bluegill sun­fish (Lep­omis macrochirus). In order to com­bat these threats, nests are pro­tected from pre­da­tion by the male black crap­pie. Black crap­pies have also adapted to preda­tors by school­ing. (Bone and Moore, 2008; Dock­endorf and Allen, 2005; Phelps, et al., 2009)

• Known Predators

  • largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides)
  • channel catfish (Ictalurus punctatus)
  • redear sunfish (Lepomis microlophus)
  • bluegill sunfish (Lepomis macrochirus)

Ecosys­tem Roles

The black crap­pie plays a role in the food web of its ecosys­tem. Larger pis­civ­o­rous fish de­pend on the black crap­pie as a source of nu­tri­ents. Other large fish and some birds feed on the eggs and/or ju­ve­nile black crap­pie as well. The black crap­pie in turn helps con­trol the in­sect and small fish pop­u­la­tion by feed­ing on those or­gan­isms. The black crap­pie has been re­ported to be par­a­sitized by a trema­tode Hap­lo­clei­dus dis­par and a mono­ge­nean Clei­dodis­cus van­cleavei. (Bone and Moore, 2008; Dock­endorf and Allen, 2005; Froese and Pauly, 2015; Phelps, et al., 2009)

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Pos­i­tive

The black crap­pie is a hardy fish that is com­monly fished for sport. In mul­ti­ple stud­ies, the black crap­pie main­tained sta­ble pop­u­la­tions and showed no signs of over-fish­ing in com­mer­cial fish­eries. Due to this, the black crap­pie pro­vides an eco­nomic ben­e­fit to hu­mans through the use of this species as a sport-fish. Com­mer­cial fish­eries have posted rev­enues start­ing at $27 mil­lion dol­lars an­nu­ally. The black crap­pie is ref­er­enced as a "pan fish" and caught for in­di­vid­ual con­sump­tion. Its meat is light and flaky and lacks a strong "fishy" taste and is there­fore a widely pre­ferred fish to eat. (Schramm Jr., et al., 1985)

• Positive Impacts
• food
• ecotourism

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Neg­a­tive

There are no known ad­verse ef­fects of Po­moxis ni­gro­mac­u­la­tus on hu­mans.

Con­ser­va­tion Sta­tus

Ac­cord­ing to the IUCN Red List, the black crap­pie is a clas­si­fied as "least con­cern," in­di­cat­ing that it is wide­spread and abun­dant. The black crap­pie lacks any major threats that would cause a se­vere de­cline in pop­u­la­tions and the pop­u­la­tion is con­sid­ered sta­ble. There are no cur­rent na­tional sug­ges­tions for con­ser­va­tion ac­tions such as pro­tec­tion or man­age­ment for the black crap­pie. En­vi­ron­men­tal fac­tors such as water tem­per­a­ture, length of the spawn­ing sea­son, and avail­able re­sources have an im­pact on the abil­ity to sus­tain a sta­ble crap­pie pop­u­la­tion. In order to main­tain crap­pie pop­u­la­tions in spe­cific areas, catch and length lim­its may be im­ple­mented; how­ever, this is not typ­i­cally nec­es­sary. (Na­ture­Serve, 2013)

• IUCN Red List

  Least Concern

• US Federal List

  No special status

• CITES

  No special status

• State of Michigan List

  No special status

Con­trib­u­tors

Mary Cur­rier (au­thor), Rad­ford Uni­ver­sity, Karen Pow­ers (ed­i­tor), Rad­ford Uni­ver­sity, April Tin­gle (ed­i­tor), Rad­ford Uni­ver­sity, Emily Clark (ed­i­tor), Rad­ford Uni­ver­sity, Cari Mc­gre­gor (ed­i­tor), Rad­ford Uni­ver­sity, Jacob Vaught (ed­i­tor), Rad­ford Uni­ver­sity, Tanya Dewey (ed­i­tor), Uni­ver­sity of Michi­gan-Ann Arbor.

Ref­er­ences

Allen, M., M. Hoyer, D. Can­field Jr.. 1998. Fac­tors re­lated to black crap­pie oc­cur­rence, den­sity, and growth in Florida lakes. North Amer­i­can Jour­nal of Fish­eries Man­age­ment, 18/4: 864-871.

Bone, Q., N. Mar­shall. 1982. Bi­ol­ogy of Fishes. Lon­don: Blackie & Son Lim­ited.

Bone, Q., R. Moore. 2008. Bi­ol­ogy of Fishes. New York, N.Y.: Tay­lor & Fran­cis Group.

Bun­nell, D., E. Marschall. 2003. Op­ti­mal en­ergy al­lo­ca­tion to ovaries after spawn­ing. Evo­lu­tion­ary Ecol­ogy, 5/3: 457-459.

CIBA Foun­da­tion Sym­po­sium, 2009. Colour Vi­sion: Phys­i­ol­ogy and Ex­per­i­men­tal Psy­chol­ogy. Great Britain: John Wiley & Sons.

Dock­endorf, K., M. Allen. 2005. Age-0 black crap­pie abun­dance and size in re­la­tion to zoo­plank­ton den­sity, stock abun­dance, and water clar­ity in three Florida lakes. Trans­ac­tions of the Amer­i­can Fish­eries So­ci­ety, 134/1: 172-183.

Froese, R., D. Pauly. 2015. "Fish­Base" (On-line). Po­moxis ni­gro­mac­u­la­tus. Ac­cessed March 19, 2015 at http://​www.​fishbase.​org/​summary/​Pomoxis-nigromaculatus.​html.

Guy, C., D. Willis. 1995. Pop­u­la­tion char­ac­ter­is­tics of black crap­pies in South Dakota wa­ters: A case for ecosys­tem-spe­cific man­age­ment. North Amer­i­can Jour­nal of Fish­eries Man­age­ment, 15/4: 754-765.

Helf­man, G., B. Col­lette. 2011. Fishes: The An­i­mal An­swer Guide. Bal­ti­more, Mary­land: The Johns Hop­kins Uni­ver­sity Press.

Huish, M. 1954. Life his­tory of the black crap­pie of Lake George, Florida. Trans­ac­tions of the Amer­i­can Fish­eries So­ci­ety, 83/1: 176-193.

Hunt­ing­ford, F., P. Tor­ri­celli. 1993. Be­hav­ioral Ecol­ogy of Fishes. Lang­horne, Penn­syl­va­nia: Hard­wood Aca­d­e­mic Pub­lish­ers.

Is­er­mann, D., A. Thomp­son, P. Tal­mage. 2010. Com­par­isons of sex-spe­cific growth and weight–length re­la­tion­ships in Min­nesota black crap­pie pop­u­la­tions. North Amer­i­can Jour­nal of Fish­eries Man­age­ment, 30/2: 354-360.

Kleerekoper, H. 1969. Ol­fac­tion in Fishes. Lon­don: In­di­ana Uni­ver­sity Press.

Na­ture­Serve, 2013. "Po­moxis ni­gro­mac­u­la­tus" (On-line). The IUCN Red List of Threat­ened Species, Ver­sion 2014.3. Ac­cessed Jan­u­ary 27, 2015 at http://​www.​iucnredlist.​org/​details/​202603/​0.

Phelps, Q., A. Lohmeyer, N. Wahl, J. Zei­gler, G. Whitledge. 2009. Habi­tat char­ac­ter­is­tics of black crap­pie nest sites in an Illi­nois im­pound­ment. North Amer­i­can Jour­nal of Fish­eries Man­age­ment, 29/1: 189-195.

Pope, K., D. Willis. 1998. Lar­val black crap­pie dis­tri­b­u­tion: Im­pli­ca­tions for sam­pling im­pound­ments and nat­ural lakes. North Amer­i­can Jour­nal of Fish­eries Man­age­ment, 18/2: 470-474.

Reid Jr., G. 1950. Food of the black crap­pie Po­moxis ni­gro-mac­u­la­tus (LeSueur), in Or­ange Lake, Florida. Trans­ac­tions of the Amer­i­can Fish­eries So­ci­ety, 79/1: 145-154.

Rohde, F., R. Arndt, D. Lindquist, J. Par­nell. 1994. Fresh­wa­ter Fishes of the Car­oli­nas, Vir­ginia, Mary­land, and Delaware. Chapel Hill: The Uni­ver­sity of North Car­olina Press.

Ross, S. 2001. In­land Fishes of Mis­sis­sippi. Sin­ga­pore: Li­brary of Con­gress.

Schramm Jr., H., J. Shire­man, D. Ham­mond, D. Pow­ell. 1985. Ef­fect of com­mer­cial har­vest of sport fish on the black crap­pie pop­u­la­tion in Lake Okee­chobee, Florida. North Amer­i­can Jour­nal of Fish­eries Man­age­ment, 5/2B: 217-226.

Traut­man, M. 1981. The Fishes of Ohio. Ohio: Ohio State Uni­ver­sity Press and the Ohio Sea Grant Pro­gram Cen­ter for Lake Erie Area Re­search.