Welcome to the Museum of Ectothermic Vertebrates

The CSUS Museum of Ecothermic Vertebrates contains two collections, a fish collection (Humboldt 115) and a herp collection (Humboldt 121).

By national standards, this is a small collection, but nonetheless it contains some important specimens for both teaching and research, e.g., we have a relatively large number of specimens of Sacramento Perch (Archoplites interruptus), the only native centrarchid west of the Mississippi.  Once abundant in California, it is now quite rare because its native habitat is where the city of Sacramento now sits.

Our official collection "Standard International Code" designation is "SSU" (i.e., Sacramento State University, 6000 J Street, Sacramento, California 95819-6077) as listed in Leviton et al. (1985).

The Curator of the Ectotherm Museum is Dr. Ron Coleman, rcoleman@csus.edu, 916-278-3474

The major fish collections in this part of the world are at the California Academy of Sciences (over 200,000 lots of fishes) and the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County (over 170,000 lots, over 3 million specimens).  In general, a "lot" refers to a jar, which may contain 1 or many specimens, all collected at the same time and same place.