NOTES ON PISCICULTURE IN KIANGSI. 547 



and weight C pounds. The Huen yii, though a coarse-looking fish, has 

 an excellent flavor, and in the proper season is a very acceptable change 

 at one's table, after the everlasting perch with which our cooks con- 

 tinually supply us. The length of the specimen given was 17 inches, 

 S^ inches round, and weighed between 7 pounds and 8 pounds. The fry 

 of the Shih yu^ov shad, which ascends the river in May to spawn, does 

 not appear to be caught or bred in ponds or lakes. It is greatly 

 esteemed by the Chinese, and is undoubtedly the best fish of their rivers. 

 The season for it is soon over, lasting from about the middle of May to 

 the third week in June. In former years this fish used to be taken from 

 Nanking to Peking for the Emperor's table, but the labor of getting it 

 there fresh was so trying to the people engaged to carry it, that the 

 Emperor was induced to forego this luxury, and the practice was dis- 

 continued. 



The pike of these waters grow to a very large size, as will be seen 

 from the cut forwarded, the dimensions of which were 49 inches long, 

 21 girth, and weight 36 pounds. All attempts made by Europeans at 

 fishing with hooks appear to have failed, few even being rewarded with 

 as much as a bite, nor are Chinese often seen angling with rod and line 

 on the Yangtse. The system of taking spawn by forcible parturition 

 as practiced in the United States — a long description of which was 

 given in Harper's Magazine for June, 1874 — does not appear to be 

 known along the Yangtse, and it is a question which fish-culturists 

 can decide, whether the Chinese method of spawn collecting, or that 

 adopted in America and Europe, is the most effective. 



It is said that at Canton fish are caught and their spawn expelled, 

 and afterward impregnated with the milt of the male fish, as described 

 iu the magazine quoted, but the statement has yet to be verified. 



