Young fish prefer quiet, shallow areas near shoreline. Spawning occurs in spring and summer when water temperatures are above 16 degrees Celsius (60.8 degrees Fahrenheit). Gravid females are probably attended by more than one male, and deposit their eggs in coarse gravel. The fry occupy backwater areas until they are able to swim strongly enough to remain in place in stronger currents.

Most Zuni bluehead suckers are mature by age 2 and may live up to 5 years.

Spawning occurs in spring and summer when water temperatures are above 16 degrees Celsius (60.8 degrees Fahrenheit). As with similar suckers (e.g., the Sonora sucker, C. insignis), gravid females are probably attended by more than one male, and deposit their eggs in coarse gravel. The fry occupy backwater areas until they are able to swim strongly enough to remain in place in stronger currents. Young fish prefer quiet, shallow areas near shoreline.

Zuni bluehead sucker spawning occurs from early April to early June when water temperatures range from 6 to 15 degrees Celsius (42.8 to 59 degrees Fahrenheit), peaking around 10 degrees Celsius (50 degrees Fahrenheit). Females typically produce 200 to 300 ova, or eggs, with larger females producing more eggs. Gravid females are likely attended by more than one male, and deposit their eggs in coarse gravel. Zuni bluehead suckers may grow to about 50 millimeters (roughly 2 inches) total length by the end of their first season (age 0), and have little or no growth during winter. By the end of the second growing season (age 1), most suckers are between 60 and 90 millimeters (2.4 to 3.5 inches) total length and they grow about 30 millimeters (1.2 inches) annually.

Zuni bluehead sucker feed primarily on filamentous algae that they scrape from rocks, rubble and gravel substrates. They also eat midge larvae and flatworms. Algae on rocks and plants are generally abundant where Zuni bluehead suckers are common.

The Zuni bluehead sucker is torpedo shaped, or fusiform, and slender with a subterminal mouth, meaning a mouth that is posterior to the tip of the snout.

Measurements

Length: 8 to 9 in (20.3 to 25 cm)

The Zuni bluehead sucker has a bluish head, silvery-tan to dark green back and yellowish to silvery-white sides and abdomen. Adults are mottled slate-gray to almost black dorsally, along the upper part of the body, and cream-white ventrally, toward the abdomen. During the spawning season, male suckers develop coarse tubercles, which are wart-like projections, on the rear fins and the caudal peduncle, which is the narrow part of the fish’s body to which the tail fin attaches. Males also have distinctive breeding coloration, becoming intensely black dorsally with a bright red horizontal band and a white abdomen.

Zuni bluehead sucker habitat includes stream reaches with clean, perennial water flowing over hard substrate, or material on the stream bottom, such as bedrock. They use pool and pool-run habitats that are shaded with water velocities of less than 0.1 meter per second (0.3 feet per second). Sucker-occupied pools are often edged by emergent aquatic plants and riparian riparian
Definition of riparian habitat or riparian areas.

Learn more about riparian vegetation, mainly willows. They tend to use pools 30 to 50 centimeters (12 to 20 in) deep with cobble, boulders and bedrock substrate. In general, Zuni bluehead sucker are rare or absent from stream reaches where a silt or sand-dominated substrate. Bluehead suckers, including the Zuni bluehead sucker, require clean gravel substrate with minimal silt for spawning because silt covers eggs and leads to suffocation. Young fish, known as fry, occupy backwater areas - quiet, shallow areas near the shoreline - until they are able to swim strongly enough to remain in place in stronger currents. 

The Zuni bluehead sucker is a subspecies of the bluehead sucker. It occurs only the headwaters of the Zuni River in New Mexico and Kinlichee Creek, and its tributaries in Apache County, Arizona and Cibola, McKinley and San Juan counties, New Mexico. Morphological, meaning pertaining to the physical form and structure structure
Something temporarily or permanently constructed, built, or placed; and constructed of natural or manufactured parts including, but not limited to, a building, shed, cabin, porch, bridge, walkway, stair steps, sign, landing, platform, dock, rack, fence, telecommunication device, antennae, fish cleaning table, satellite dish/mount, or well head.

Learn more about structure of the fish, and genetic information supports recognition of the Zuni bluehead sucker as being a valid subspecies distinct from both the Rio Grande sucker (Catostomus plebeius) and the bluehead sucker (C. discobolus).