FISHES OF NEW YORK 299 



Esox estor LE SUEUR, Jour. Ac. Nat. Sci. Phila. I, 413, 1818. Lake Erie; 



DE KAY, N. Y. Fauna, Fishes, 222, 1842; STOKER, Syn. Fish. N. A. 



1S4. 184-6. 



Esox boreus AGASSIZ, Lake Superior, 317, 1850, Lake Superior. 

 lAK-ius Indus JORDAN & LvERMANN, Bull. 47, U. S. Nat. Mus. 628, 1^ 



pi. C. fig. 269, 1900; E-VERMANN & KENDALL, Kept. U. S. Commr. Fish 



& Fisheries for 1894, 597, 1896. 



The pike lias a stout, elongate body and a long head, with 

 broad and produced snout. The greatest depth is about one 

 fifth of the length without caudal. The caudal peduncle is 

 nearly equal to one half depth of body. The eye is nearly 

 median and about one sixth of length of head, which is - a \ of 

 total without caudal. The mouth is very large and strongly 

 toothed. The tongue, roof of mouth, pharynx and gill arches 

 bristle with teeth in cardlike bands, giving the fish extraor- 

 dinary power in seizing and holding its prey. The dorsal and 

 anal fins are near the caudal. The dorsal base is a little longer 

 than its longest ray and equals depth of body at its origin. 

 Ventral fin midway between tip of snout and end of tail fin. B. 

 14 to 16; D. 17 to 20; A. 16 or 17. Scales in lateral line 120 to 

 125. 



The ground color of the body is grayish varying to bluish or 

 greenish gray. The sides are thickly covered with pale blotches, 

 none of them as large as the eye, arranged nearly in rows. The 

 dorsal, anal and caudal fins have many rounded, dark spots. 

 Adults without dark bar below eye. Naked part of opercle 

 bounded by a whitish streak. In the young the sides are 

 covered with oblique yellowish bars, which afterward break up 

 into the pale spots of the adult. 



Pike is the best known name for this species, though the 

 misnomer " pickerel " is rather extensively used. The origin 

 of pike is involved in uncertainty; some trace it to the resem- 

 blance in shape of the snout to the pike or spear, while others 

 believe it to refer to the darting motion of the fish when speed- 

 ing through the water. The name pickerel is used in Vermont 

 and around Lake George, N. Y. " Frank Forrester " (Herbert) 

 styles it the great northern pickerel. The name jack is applied 

 in Great Britain to young pike. Brocket is the French name, 

 hecM the German and lucclo the Italian designation of the 



