| A FAMILY-LEVEL COMPUTER-INTERACTIVE KEY TO THE LARVAE OF FRESHWATER FISHES IN THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA |
| SNYDER, D.E., Larval Fish Laboratory, Colorado State University, 1474 Campus Delivery, Fort Collins, CO 80523-1474; desnyder@warnercnr.colostate.edu. |
| Nearly 800 freshwater and anadromous fishes, representing about 40 families, are found in the United States and Canada. This key, an ongoing work-in-progress, currently covers 26 of those families and can be limited to any desired subset of those families, one of which has been predefined for the Upper Colorado River Basin. Summarizing mostly published descriptive information by family, I built a database in DELTA (DEscription Language for TAxonomy) format using DELTA Editor and created associated files for use by the host program, DELTA Intkey. The host program can be downloaded over the Internet without cost at website http://delta-intkey.com/ – select "Programs and Documentation," then "Intkey." The data and associated files for this key (including a "readme" instruction file) are available for download at http://warnercnr.colostate.edu/larval-fish-lab-downloads/ – select "fam-na.zip." Computer-interactive keys are modern, flexible, and user friendly alternatives to dichotomous (and polychotomous) keys, but like dichotomous keys, they are tools to help facilitate identification and are not infallible. Among other limitations, errors in the data extracted from published descriptions may be perpetuated in this key, and it may suffer from inadequate or incomplete data for some taxa. Users are asked to notify me of any corrections or difficulties they may have, as well as forward suggestions for improvement. (A version of this poster was first presented at the annual Larval Fish Conference held in Kiel, Germany, 4-7 August 2008; it is presented here to reach a broader North American audience). |
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