Apex predator with gold scales caught in river in Georgia. It’s a new species

In a river along the Georgia-South Carolina border, an apex predator with gold scales swam through the water. Its red eyes scanned the surrounding riverbed, but it wasn’t the only one looking around.

Nearby scientists noticed the blotchy animal — and discovered a new species.

Teams of biologists, wildlife officials and university students visited the rivers of eastern Georgia and western South Carolina several times between 2022 and 2023 to survey aquatic life, according to a study published Aug. 19 in the peer-reviewed journal Zootaxa.

For years, “biologists and anglers” had reported “two distinctive” types of black bass fish from the region, even giving them nicknames, the study said. But no one had formally described these species due to the lack of non-hybrid specimens.

During their recent surveys, researchers collected dozens of these bass, analyzed their DNA and finally confirmed what many had long suspected. The fish “from the Savannah and Santee River basins” were a new species: Micropterus pucpuggy, or Bartram’s bass.

Bartram’s bass are “relatively robust,” reaching about 11 inches in length, the study said. They have an “oval tooth patch” in their mouths, and “deep carmine-red” eyes with a “black pupil ringed with (a) thin gold margin.”

Photos show the “light gold” coloring of the new species. The fish’s sides are “strikingly patterned” with dark brown blotches, researchers said. Its fins are “rosy-pink,” and its belly is “mottled.”

In general, black bass are “apex predators” in their river habitats, the study said. The new species was found in “pools and runs associated with rocky shoal habitats.”

Bartram’s bass are threatened by human-induced habitat loss or degradation as well as introduced, non-native species of black bass, researchers said. Conserving the new species “will depend on protecting (its) habitat” and “minimizing opportunities for hybridization with non-native basses.”

The new species “has been informally referred to as Bartram’s Bass for over 20 years” in reference to William Bartram, an American naturalist who traveled “through the native range of M. pucpuggy” in the 1770s, the study said.

The scientific name of the new species “honors the Seminole-Creek inhabitants of Florida, whose Chief bestowed the name ‘Puc Puggy,’ meaning the ‘Flower hunter,’ on William Bartram,” researchers said.

Bartram’s bass have been found at several rivers in eastern Georgia, western South Carolina and southern North Carolina, the study said.

The new species was identified by its DNA, tooth patch, coloring, fin spines, scale arrangement, body proportions and other subtle physical features, the study said.

The research team included Byron Freeman, Mark Scott, Kelly Petersen, Natalia Bayona-Vásquez, Andrew Taylor, Bryson Hilburn, Mary Freeman and John Wares.

The team acknowledged and thanked “the many (University of Georgia) Ichthyology students seeking research experience who have helped collect fishes and perform molecular work in the laboratory” as well as the South Carolina and Georgia Departments of Natural Resources.

Researchers also described a second new species of black bass: the Altamaha bass.

This story was originally published August 20, 2025 at 1:10 PM.

Aspen Pflughoeft

McClatchy DC

Aspen Pflughoeft covers real-time news for McClatchy. She is a graduate of Minerva University where she studied communications, history, and international politics. Previously, she reported for Deseret News.