Lake, River and Sea-Run Fishes of Canada

Victor Clulow is a zoology professor at Laurentian University.

The first thought to cross one’s mind on picking up this volume is how
it might differ from Freshwater Fishes of Canada (1983), recognized as
the standard reference text on Canadian fish. The answer is quickly
evident: this book has been written for, and should appeal to, a wider
audience, because of its less technical nature and its more up-to-date
information.

A brief but informative foreword by Professor Nelson points out how
very recent Canadian fish populations are (they had to re-establish
after the retreat of the glaciers some 14,000 years ago) and describes
fish anatomy, physiology, and life cycles. Wooding then runs seriatim
through Salmoniformes, Esociformes, and so on, through
Gasterosteiformes, giving attention to species (or groups of species, as
appropriate) within each Order; the content of these units is highly
varied, ranging from sizes, anatomical oddities and other features,
through folklore and diet, to the current status of the fishes and how
good they are when cooked. Attention is also given to breeding habits
and natural population fluctuations of many of the types and to records
of outstanding catches (thoughts of 57-kg chinooks or 816-kg sturgeons
may well inspire anglers approaching the limits of their patience on wet
afternoons ... but accounts of attacks by pike on humans may give them
pause when reaching for any catches they make!).

Although the book is intended as a popular guide, it is a puzzle to
this reader how little is included on the current status of populations
of many of the species discussed, especially Pacific and Atlantic
salmon. Restocking and restoration are touched on, but little is said to
account for the near extinction of some fish populations.

A few infelicities have crept into the text here and there (e.g., the
Coppermine and Mackenzie rivers are surely not 1000 miles or even 1609.3
km, as the author so precisely states, west of Point Barrow, Alaska),
but any such lapses are more than made up for by the well-chosen
citations and references that point the way for further reading.

A readable, informative, and well-produced book that fills a niche and
deserves to be used by many.