Fish and Marine Life Illustrations

Rainbow Trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss), colored pencil and watercolor

About the illustration:
Commissioned by: California Science Center Foundation

About rainbow trout:
Rainbow trout are 12 to 36 inches in length. Steelhead, the ocean bound rainbow trout, get larger, from 20 to 48 inches in length. They eat planktonic invertebrates, shrimp, copepods, insects, arrow worms, krill, crickets, and young fish. Rainbow trout are anadromous, which means they live in the sea and breed in fresh water. In the case of rainbow trout, they will return to freshwater to breed after two or three years in the ocean. Thy spawn repeatedly. They are a cold water fish native to coastal streams and lakes in the western U.S. and Canada as well as Japan to the Bering Sea. When steelhead are in the ocean, they lose the rainbow colors and have a silvery color.

Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata (having a spinal cord)
Infraphylum: Gnathostomata (vertebrates with jaws)
Superclass: Osteichthyes (bony fish, including ray-finned and lobe finned fish)
Class: Actinopterygii (ray-finned fishes)
Order: Salmoniformes
Family: Salmonidae
Genus: Oncorhynchus
Species: O. mykiss

More about rainbow trout:
Alaska Department of Fish and Game: Rainbow Trout
Wikipedia: Fish Migration
Colorado Division of Wildlife: Rainbow Trout
Monterey Bay Aquarium: Steelhead/Rainbow Trout

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