Blue Sucker

Color is variable, from light steel-gray to almost jet black in the spring. The fish is streamlined, with an inferior mouth and a small/slender head that tapers to a fleshy snout. The mouth location allows the fish to feed off the bottom of its habitat. The body of this fish is elongated and slightly compressed. It has a long falcate dorsal fin which is elevated anterior with 24–35 rays. It has a long caudal peduncle and a forked caudal fin. The anal fin contains 7–8 rays on average. The scales are large and contain 55–58 along the lateral line.

The blue sucker is native to the United States and Mexico. In the U.S., it lives in the Mississippi River basin north to Minnesota and Wisconsin. The Blue Sucker also lives in the Missouri River drainage to North Dakota and South Dakota and Montana. This species can also be found in the Gulf drainage from the Sabine River to the Rio Grande.

Blue suckers obtain their food off the bottom of rivers and other bodies of freshwater through a mouth in the inferior position. Some organisms that they eat are aquatic insect larvae, crustaceans, plant materials and algae.

"Cycleptus" is a Greek word meaning circular or slender. "Elongatus" is a Latin word meaning elongated.