154 



Handbook of Nature-Study 



Bullhead at bottom of a pond. 

 Photo by Verne Morton. 



THE BULLHEAD 



Teacher's Story 



"The bull-head does usually dwell and hide himself in holes or amongst stones in 

 clear water; and in very hot days will lie a long time very still and sun himself and will 

 be easy to be seen on any fiat stone or gravel; at which time he will suffer an angler to 

 put a hook baited with a small worm very near into his moiith; and he never refuses to 

 bite, nor indeed, to be caught with the worst of anglers." ISAAK WALTON. 



HEN one looks a bullhead in the face one is 

 glad that it is not a real bull for its barbels 

 give it an appearance quite fit for the 

 making of a nightmare; and yet from 

 the standpoint of the bullhead, how 

 truly beautiful those fleshy feelers are! 

 For without them how could it feel its 

 way about searching for food in the 



mud where it lives? Two of these barbels stand straight up; the 

 two largest ones stand out on each side of the mouth, and two pairs of 

 short ones adorn the lower lip, the smallest pair at the middle. 



As the fish moves about, it is easy to see that the large barbels at the 

 side of the mouth are of the greatest use; it keeps them in a constantly 

 advancing movement, feeling of everything it meets. The upper ones 

 stand straight up, keeping watch for whatever news there may be from 

 above; the two lower ones spread apart and follow rather than precede 

 the fish, seeming to test what lies below. The upper and lower pairs seem 

 to test things as they are, while the large side pair deal with what is going 

 to be. The broad mouth seems to be formed for taking in all things eatable, 

 for the bullhead lives on almost anything alive or dead that it discovers as it 

 noses about in the mud. Nevertheless, it has its notions about its food 

 for I have repeatedly seen one draw material into its mouth through its 

 breathing motion and then spew it out with a vehemence one would hardly 

 expect from such a phlegmatic fish. 



