American shad
Scientific name: Alosa sapidissima (Wilson, 1811)
Overview
The American shad is a species of anadromous clupeid fish naturally distributed on the North American coast of the North Atlantic, from Newfoundland to Florida, and as an introduced species on the North Pacific coast. The American shad is not closely related to the other North American shads. Rather, it seems to form a lineage that diverged from a common ancestor of the European taxa before these diversified.
From the Wikipedia article “American shad”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Conservation status
Least concern on the IUCN Red List, as recorded on Wikidata, citing The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2022.2.
Where it lives
Common names
Also known in English as Atlantic Shad, Common Shad, shad, White Shad.
Names in other languages (7)
- Chinese
- 美洲西鯡
- French
- alose savoureuse
- Indonesian
- Temparik Amerika
- Japanese
- アメリカシャッド
- Persian
- شاهماهی آمریکایی
- Russian
- американская сельдь, Американский шэд, Шед
- Spanish
- sábalo americano
Related animals
Sources
-
Catalogue of Life — scientific name, classification, common names.
Version 2026-09-11, CC BY 4.0.
This species in the Catalogue of Life.
Citation
Bánki, O., Roskov, Y., Döring, M., Ower, G., Hernández Robles, D. R., Plata Corredor, C. A., Stjernegaard Jeppesen, T., Örn, A., Pape, T., Hobern, D., Garnett, S., Little, H., DeWalt, R. E., Miller, J., Orrell, T., Aalbu, R., Abbott, J., Aedo, C., Aescht, E., et al. (2026). Catalogue of Life (Version 2026-09-11). Catalogue of Life Foundation, Amsterdam, Netherlands. https://doi.org/10.48580/dgz5n Source database: FishBase.
- GBIF — species page and recorded occurrences.
- Wikidata — conservation status, names in other languages. Q545697, CC0 1.0.
- Wikipedia — overview, from the article “American shad”, CC BY-SA 4.0.
- Photo — Shermon Foote Denton, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. File page.
- Range map — Cephas, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. File page.
Last updated: 4 October 2026