Overview After finishing studies at Jixian County School of Teachers in Henan Province from 1937 to 1940, he was admitted to the Fushengzhuang business personnel training class of the Agricultural Bureau of the Ministry of Economic Affairs, and then worked as a grassroots staff member of Fushengzhuang in Hancheng and other places. In 1942, he entered the Biology Department of
Northwest Normal University in Lanzhou to study. After graduating in 1946, he successively worked at Kaifeng Liming Middle School and Hebei Luanxian School of Teachers. After the summer of 1947, he went to Shenyang at the invitation of his friend
Bo Yang. At that time, the National Changbai Normal University moved from Jilin to Shenyang due to the civil war between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party, and taught vertebrate zoology at the school. In the summer of 1948, Changbai Normal University moved south to Beiping, where he was admitted to the Graduate School of
Beijing Normal University and served as a teaching assistant at the Normal University. He studied under Professor Zhang Chunlin, a pioneer in ichthyology research in China. Li graduated in May 1950, and initially worked in the Compilation and Translation Bureau of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (the predecessor of the
Science Press) led by
Yang Zhongjian. Li initially worked on Chinese nomenclature of vertebrates, specializing in fishes. Within five years, a standard reference on Chinese nomenclature of vertebrates was published, with a select group of Chinese zoologists as co-authors and contributors. Among them, Li and his mentor
Tchang Chun-Lin, along with
Chu Yuan-Ting, were responsible for standardization of fish nomenclature in the Chinese language. In October 1950, the Zoological Specimen Working Committee of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (the predecessor of the Institute of Zoology) was established in Xijiao Park, Beijing, with Chen Zhen as the leader. Li was transferred to this committee, joining a team of zoologists (including
Tso-hsin Cheng) engaged in consolidating and sorting out zoological specimen inherited from Fan Memorial Institute of Biology and National Academy of Peiping, two predecessors of the Academy of Sciences, in preparation of the later formation of the Institute of Zoology. He was responsible full-time for the sorting and integration of zoological specimens. and earlier surveys of marine fishes. But only until after
rehabilitation in 1978, Li was able to resume normal research activities. After the
Anti-Rightist Campaign in 1957, he suffered injustice for a long time. Several of the most important works in his life (including the discovery of several new species of fish and the writing of the representative monograph on the zoogeography of freshwater fishes "Studies on zoogeographical divisions for fresh water fishes of China") are among the most comprehensive morphological or osteological studies of flatfishes in modern times, and cited by
Joseph S. Nelson's
Fishes of the World. Among his findings, he concluded through systematic comparisons that
spiny turbots are the most primitive family of flatfishes. This conclusion is consistent with later phylogenic studies based on molecular biology.
Zoogeographical distribution of freshwater fishes of China In his book
Studies on zoogeographical divisions for fresh water fishes of China, Li divided the fauna of freshwater fishes in China into five major regions based on characteristics of fish
species distributions, geographic environments and
geological histories of these regions. The five freshwater regions in China are: (1) Northern region containing upper reaches of rivers that flow into the
Arctic Ocean, as well as
Amur River and its tributaries; (2) Western China region; (3)
Mongolian Plateau; (4) Eastern China region; and (5) Southern China region. According to his method, the demarcation line between
Holarctic and
Indomalayan realms in China, as far as freshwater fishes are concerned, lies largely along the
Himalayas and
Nanling Mountainsranges, where the Southern China region is basically on the south side of the Nanling Mountains, a
drainage divide between the
Yangtze River and the
Pearl River. This idea is close to those of
Wallace and
Mori, and contrasts with the prevalent view of demarcation line for
terrestrial animals between Holarctic and Indomalaya regions along the
Qinling Mountains (known as
Qinling–Huaihe Line, though the Qinling Mountains does not extend into Eastern part of China). Freshwater Ecoregions of the World (FEOW), a collaborative global
biodiversity project partly sponsored by
World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), cites this book as a source of references in delineation of
freshwater ecoregions of China. In 1989, he,
Sun Ruyong and Yao Hongzhen jointly put forward a proposal in the "Business Times" to comprehensively manage
saline-alkali lands by combining the cultivation of agricultural and forestry products with the cultivation of marine fish, shrimp, brackish-water fish or freshwater fish.
FAO noted in a recent newsletter that alkaline land is one area that there are innovative ways and opportunities for aquaculture to expand.
Fishes of the Yellow River His posthumous book "Fishes of the Yellow River and Beyond" was published in Taiwan in November 2015. Li Sizhong's systematic survey of fish species in the Yellow River started more than 60 years ago and the survey of fishery resources in the Yellow River system had been led by He Zhihui in the 1980s. These studies have contributed to the study of changes in fish biodiversity in the Yellow River over more than half a century and the profound impact of human activities on aquatic ecology. They serve as rare historical information and baseline materials for the evaluation of the degree of effectiveness of relevant environmental and ecological protection measures. Comparing fish species in the Yellow River in 2010–2015 and the survey results originally reported by Li in 1965 Based on the distribution characteristics of the Yellow River fish populations, the geological history and natural landmarks of the Yellow River Basin, he believed that the Heishan Gorge (at the junction of Gansu and Ningxia) and the boundary between the northeastern edge of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and the Weining Plain outlet, can be used as the boundary between the upper reaches and the middle reaches of the Yellow River; Hukou Waterfall can be used as the boundary between the middle reaches and the lower reaches of the Yellow River. The upper reaches of the Yellow River flow through the mountains of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the alpine swamp grasslands and its northeastern edge. It belongs to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau sub-region and Longxi Asia region in the geographical distribution of freshwater fish in China; the middle reaches running through the Ningmeng Plateau, Ordos Plateau, and Loess Plateau, correspond to the Hetao sub-region of
the Ningmeng Plateau area; the lower reaches flow through low-altitude valleys such as the Fenwei Basin, Shanxi-Henan Gorge, and the North China Plain, corresponding to
the East China River-Plain Sub-region.
Uncovering fish records in ancient documents Li Sizhong believes that the Chinese nation's love for fish has two meanings: first, it has developed fishing, hunting and breeding very early, and likes to eat edible fish; second, it loves fish-related customs and cultural activities. For example, there are a large number of fish-related stories in ancient Chinese literature, named characters and observations about fish. He attaches great importance to studying the records of fish in ancient Chinese works to examine the natural geographical distribution of indigenous fish before the impact of human activities (such as introduction and transplantation, canal digging, etc.). He co-wrote a paper with
Fang Fang Kullander on the natural distribution of the four major carps. It is widely cited by scholars in the fields of geography, aquaculture and aquatic ecological protection. == Fish species discovered or named ==