Yellow Perch ; Ringed Perch 



tive because our wives and children who are spending the summer at 

 the little inland lake are always able to bring in good strings of delicious 

 yellow perch. As Thoreau has said in " Walden Pond": " It is a true 

 fish, such as the angler loves to put into his basket or hang on top of 

 his willow twig on shady afternoons, along the banks of the streams." 

 Only the yellow perch is by preference a fish of the small lakes rather 

 than of the streams. 



This perch is gregarious and may usually be found in schools. 



"Perch, like the Tartar clans, in troops remove, 

 And, urged by famine or by pleasure, rove; 

 But if one prisoner, as in war, you seize, 

 You'll prosper, master of the camp with ease; 

 For, like the wicked, unalarmed they view 

 Their fellows perish, and their path pursue." 



Artificial propagation, in the full sense of the term, has not been 

 attempted with the yellow perch, but mature fish have been placed in 

 aquariums and their naturally fertilized eggs hatched. The eggs are 

 arranged in a very interesting manner, being laid in a single mass, 

 which soon unfolds into a ribbon-like structure. The length of 

 this string is very great, sometimes exceeding 7 feet. One yellow 

 perch in a Fish Commission aquarium at Washington deposited a string 

 of eggs 7 feet 4 inches long, 4 inches wide at one end and 2 at the 

 other. After being fertilized this string weighed 2 pounds 9 ounces, 

 while the weight of the fish before the eggs were discharged was only 

 i pound 8 ounces. The eggs are very small, measuring only T 1 ^ inch in 

 diameter, and requiring 28,000 to the quart. At Washington the spawn- 

 ing-time extends from the middle of March to the middle of April. 



Through the various fish commissions the yellow perch has been in- 

 troduced quite successfully into a number of small lakes in Washing- 

 ton, Oregon, and California. 



Colour on back, olivaceous; sides golden yellow; belly white; side 

 with about 6 or 8 broad dark bars, which extend from back to below 

 axis of body; lower fins largely red or orange, especially in the spring; 

 upper fins olivaceous; a distinct black spot sometimes present on spi- 

 nous dorsal. The colour varies greatly: the yellow is sometimes very 

 bright, at other times quite pale; and the black bars are much stronger 

 in some waters than in others. There is also frequently a greenish, 

 sometimes coppery, reddish or purplish wash on head and sides; 

 sometimes in mature breeding fish the lower fins are very brilliantly red. 



367 



