Morone
Morone is a genus of temperate basses native to the Atlantic coast of North America and the freshwater systems of the midwestern and eastern United States. Fossil evidence also suggests they inhabited Europe during the Paleogene and Neogene.
Etymology
The word morone is an archaic variation of "maroon". American politician-naturalist Samuel Latham Mitchill first coined the genus in 1814, describing all four species of "perch of New York" he included under the genus as having "ruddy", "scarlet", or "reddish, rusty and ochreous" fins. Species of Dicentrarchus were formerly placed in this genus, but can be distinguished by the presence of preopercular spines in Dicentrarchus.Species
The currently recognized species in this genus are:| Image | Scientific name | Common name | Distribution |
| Morone americana | white perch | fresh water and coastal areas from the St. Lawrence River and Lake Ontario south to the Pee Dee River in South Carolina, and as far east as Nova Scotia, lower Great Lakes, Finger Lakes, Long Island Sound and nearby coastal areas, Hudson and Mohawk River system, Delaware Bay and Chesapeake Bay. | |
| Morone chrysops | white bass | widely across the United States | |
| Morone mississippiensis D. S. Jordan & C. H. Eigenmann, 1887 | yellow bass | Mississippi River from Minnesota to Louisiana and may also be found in the Trinity River and the Tennessee River. | |
| Morone saxatilis | striped bass | Atlantic coastline of North America from the St. Lawrence River into the Gulf of Mexico to approximately Louisiana. |
The following fossil species are also known from Europe:
- †Morone aequalis - Miocene of Germany
- †Morone delheidi - Oligocene of Belgium
- †Morone major - Eocene of France
- †Morone shizurus - Eocene of Italy
- ?†Morone ubinoi - Cenozoic of Greece