370 NATURAL HISTORY OP AQUATIC ANIMALS. 



120. THE FRESH-WATER DRUM HAPLOIDONOTUS GBUNNIEWS. 

 By DAVID S. JORDAN. 



This species is in the Great Lakes always known by the name of Sheepshead. In the Ohio 

 River it is usually called "White Perch" or "Gray Perch," often simply "Perch." In the lakes 

 of Northern Indiana it is called "Crocus," evidently a corruption of "Croaker." In the South- 

 ern States the name "Drum" predominates; that of "Thunder-pumper," also used for the bittern, 

 Sotaurus lentiginosus, is heard along the Mississippi River. Southwestward, in Louisiana, Texas, 

 and Arkansas, it is always known as the "Gaspergou." These names, "Croaker," "Drum," 

 "Thunder-pumper," etc., refer to the croaking or grunting noise made by this species in common 

 with most Scia?noids. This noise is thought to be made in the air-bladder by forcing the air from 

 one compartment to another. Another name used in the southwest is "Jewel-head." 



This Drum is very abundant in all large bodies of water throughout the Western States, from 

 the Great Lakes to the Rio Grande. It seldom enters small streams. It feeds largely upon crus- 

 taceans and mollusks, but sometimes swallows other fishes. It is rather a bottom fish than 

 otherwise. Its value as a food-fish depends on the water and food, and, unlike most fishes, its 

 quality seems to improve to the southward. Although from its size and abundance it becomes an 

 important market fish, it cannot at best be considered one of high quality. Its flesh is tough and 

 coarse in fiber, and often of a disagreeable shark-like odor, particularly in the Great Lakes, where 

 it is never eaten. The flesh of partly grown specimens is better than that of the adult. 



This fish reaches a length of four feet and a weight of forty to sixty pounds. Those usually 

 seen in market are much smaller. 



Nothing special is recorded concerning its breeding habits. It is apparently not at all 

 migratory. 



This species in the Lakes often contains numerous parasitic worms. 



f 



121. THE SPOT, OR LA.FAYETTE-LIOSTOMUS XANTHURUS. 



The Lafayette, or " Spot," Liostomus xanthurus, is found along our coast from New York to the 

 Gulf of Mexico, and is known in New York and elsewhere as the " Spot," on the coast of New 

 Jersey as the "Goody" and sometimes as the "Cape May Goody," in the Chesapeake region also 

 as the " Spot" and the " Roach," at Charleston, South Carolina, as the " Chub," in the Saint John's 

 River, Florida, as the " Masooka" this name being probably a corruption of a Portuguese name, 

 "Bezuga" and at Pensacola as the "Spot" and " Ghopa blanca." The name "Lafayette" w;is 

 formerly used for this fish in New York, though seldom heard at the present day. 



Although they sometimes enter the large fresh waters of the South (such as the Saint John's, 

 which they ascend as far as Jacksonville), Giiuther is by no means justified in his remarkable 

 statement that this is "a fresh-water fish inhabiting the rivers of North America." 



Like the other bottom-feeding members of this family, their food consists chiefly of the smaller 

 mollusks and crustaceans. Little is known about their breeding habits in the North. Mr. S. C. 

 Clarke states that at New Smyrna, Florida, they spawn in the bays and inlets in November and 

 December, while Stearns remarks that they spawn in the lower bays and inlets about Pensacolu 



Harbor Bay, near Beasley's Point, Capo May, at which 218 Drum-fish were caught, their entire weight being from 

 8,000 to 9,000 pounds. This is Haiti to be the largest haul of that description of fish ever made in that bay." 



Another still larger, noticed as a great haul of Druin-tish : "On Wednesday, June 5, 1804," says the postmaster of 

 Oyster Ponds, Long Island, "one aeiuo drew on shorn at thin place at a single haul l'J,250 lish, the average weight of 

 which was found to be thirty-throe pounds, making in the aggregate '202 tons 250 pounds. This undoubtedly is (he 

 greatest haul of this kind ever known in this country. A hundred witnesses are ready to attest the truth of the 

 above statement. They are used for manure." (The fish, I suppose, and not the witnesses. INGKHSOLL.) 



