Royal Ontario Museum - Ichthyology

The collection currently holds over 100,000 catalogued lots, including 160 holotypes and 1,302 paratypes, with additional types being added regularly through both in-house and collaborative research. The ROM houses the largest and most diverse collection of Canadian freshwater fishes in existence.

Of the 232 known fish species in Canada, the ROM collection presently holds 212, or over 91%, and provides a critical tool for studies on disappearing wildlife. The collection has significant holdings in Indo-pacific marine fishes and is growing rapidly in freshwater South American fishes. Highlights of the fish collection include the last Atlantic Salmon specimens from Lake Ontario before their extirpation in the 1850s; a Coelacanth from the Comoros; the world record Lake Trout from Lake Athabasca, Alberta; the Canadian record Muskellunge from the Moon River, Ontario; and one of the world’s smallest vertebrates, Trimmatom nanus from the Indian Ocean.