A Native Fish Called “Wears a Feather”
Credit: NC Wildlife
Resources Commission
Have you ever seen a fish wearing a feather? Well, now you can…at least when you translate a newly named species of fish!
The sicklefin redhorse is a fish with a FIERY red tail and an olive-green body, and the species is now known as Moxostoma ugidatli. Ugidatli (pronounced ooh-gee-dot-lee) is a Cherokee word meaning “it wears a feather.” The name refers to the feather-shaped dorsal fin that sometimes stays visible above the water in the rivers of the mountains in Georgia and North Carolina.
The sicklefin redhorse has been well known to the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indians, but Western scientists have only known about the shiny fish for the last three decades.
“We felt it important to honor the Cherokee name as it occurs on the unceded territory of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, and it is right and proper to refer to the species using the name spoken by its
true discoverers,” said Jonathon Armbruster, an Auburn University biologist who led the effort to formalize the fish’s official description.
“The tribe was a part of the process, not simply a recipient of goodwill. That’s significant,” said Caleb Hickman, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation and supervisory biologist with the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians.
The 2-foot-long ugidatli has been an important food source to the region’s native tribes for centuries. The fish has sometimes been referred to as the “salmon of the South” because it has numerous similarities to Pacific salmon.
Unfortunately, the construction of dams across the tribe’s ancestral territory affected the fish and their ability to travel along their usual routes. That construction, along with pollution and nonnative, invasive species, have all been factors in a dwindling sicklefin redhorse population. Scientists estimate that there are only about 2,000 of the fish swimming in a few rivers.
While they are classified as threatened in North Carolina and endangered in Georgia, the hard work of the Sicklefin Redhorse Conservation Committee has helped to keep the feather-wearing fish off the federal endangered species list.
