"Fishes of Chautauqua, Cowley and Elk Counties, Kansas" by Artie L. Metcalf is a scientific publication written in the late 20th century. The work primarily focuses on the fish species found in the streams of three counties within the Arkansas River Basin of south-central Kansas, highlighting their distribution, habitat preferences, and ecological relationships. The opening of the book outlines the objectives of a detailed distributional study concerning the fish species inhabiting streams in Chautauqua, Cowley, and Elk Counties. It aims to determine which species are present, understand their habitat preferences, analyze faunal associations, and explore how variations in stream conditions affect fish distribution. The introduction also provides contextual information about the region's physical characteristics, including its geology and climate, which are essential for understanding the environmental conditions influencing the fish populations. (This is an automatically generated summary.)