Pond Boss Forums PHOTO GALLERY Image Gallery Can anyone identify these minnows?

I caught a mess of minnows but when I went to look them up I'm not experienced enough to distinguish the 20+ species of minnows... Initially I thought they were chub's when I had small fry but now further upstream I found these I assume parents and they get over 5in long. These are from a local stream attached to a park near Kalamazoo, MI. The bottom feeder is about 2in saw some bigger ones up stream 3-4in but hard to catch with a net. He seems happy to just "sit on his fins" and once in a while swim around. I was thinking he was some kind of goby. Also discovered leeches live in the water and couple other fish which are very red on their sides around the same size. Stream is mostly a few inches deep with pockets going up to a foot or two. Very rocky lots of crawfish and schools of tiny fry along the edges. Plan on raising a few and stocking them in my brothers pond then using the rest for bait.
Thanks in advance for the help!

See this and tell us what you think.

http://cnre.vt.edu/efish/families/bridle.html

The fish on the left, the one that likes to hang out on the bottom is a sculpin. Sculpins are very hard to tell apart and your picture isn't the best, but I would say it is a mottled sculpin, Cottus bairdii. They are a cold water species found mostly in streams but can also be found in colder lakes. They are very predacious for being so small and I wouldn't recommend stocking them into a pond, even if they were able to survive in it which is unlikely.

The other two photos have a mix of species. The largest of which are creek chubs, Semotilus atromaculatus. The smaller fish that is directly in front sideways in the second picture is a longnose dace, Rhinichthys cataractae. The other species I can see in the photos is the blacknose dace, Rhinichthys atratulus. All three of these species do well in small to medium sized creeks. They can all survive in ponds but require moving water with a gravel bottom to spawn, making them poor candidates for pond forage.

If you found other fish that had red sides, they may be male blacknose daces as during the breeding season they can get a reddish orange coloration to their side. They may also be one of the redbellied daces.

I was wondering if I had multiple species. I threw back most of the ones that didn't have a distinctive line. Thanks for the help and extra information about them!

CJ - Good guesses based on less than good pictures.