The vermilion darter (Photograph provided by Alabama Museum of Natural History)
In April 1962, two biologist seining Turkey Creek near the Birmingham suburb of Pinson noticed some odd-looking fish in their samples. Over the next thirty years, other scientists visited the area to collect more specimens and were likewise puzzled by their finds. In 1992 the vermilion darter was formally (and finally!) described in the Bulletin of the Alabama Museum of Natural History by University of Alabama professors Herb Boschung and Rick Mayden and given its scientific name, Etheostoma chermocki. The latter commemorates Ralph L. Chermock (1918-77), long-time professor of biology who founded the University of Alabama lchthyological Collection.
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