The combined data bases and literature yielded a rich species diversity (163 total fish species) for these two southern North Carolina NCNERR components. The only comparative checklist for this area reported 249 marine and freshwater fishes from the Cape Fear River estuary, resulting from seven years of intensive sampling (Schwartz et al. 1982). Forty two of the fishes reported by Schwartz et al. (1982) were largely freshwater species that are unlikely to occur in the Reserve components. Thus, our listing encompasses 79% of the 207 marine fishes listed in this area. Most of the techniques used to sample fishes for the Reserve checklist were targeted toward shallow waters and small, juvenile life stages. Therefore, most of the larger species (e.g., sharks, rays) that probably occur in the Reserves were not adequately sampled.

These fishes were typical of the warm temperate estuaries of the South Atlantic Bight (Ross and Epperly 1985, Weinstein 1985). This ichthyofauna was marine derived with one exception, a single bluegill collected at Zeke’s Island. This fish was collected in Sep 1996 following large freshwater flows from the Cape Fear River after Hurricane Fran (Figure 5). Other noteworthy species included Bregmaceros atlanticus (antenna codlet), Paraconger caudilimbatus (margintail conger), Lutjanus apodus (schoolmaster), and Erotelis smaragdus (emerald sleeper). While the antenna codlet and margintail conger have been collected in offshore North Carolina waters, these represent the first estuarine records from this area. The margintail conger record, however, resulted from a species list in Innes (1992) where the specimen was not saved, and thus it is somewhat doubtful. Schoolmaster are generally not listed in literature for North Carolina, but juveniles have been collected in polyhaline estuaries between Cape Lookout and Cape Fear. Our record of emerald sleeper represents a new species for North Carolina, and it is being described in detail in a forthcoming review of gobioids from the region (Ross and Rohde, ms in review).

The ichthyofauna in these two Reserve components was dominated by relatively few families and species. Species of the families Clupeidae, Engraulidae, Cyprinodontidae, Sciaenidae, and Bothidae were ubiquitously present in large numbers which is typical of southeastern United States estuaries. The dominant life history trait exhibited by fishes in these estuaries is one where adults spawn offshore during late fall through early spring, larvae migrate into estuaries and as juveniles settle into shallow bays and creeks where they reside through the spring and summer, leaving for deeper waters in the fall.