SEA DRUM AND LAKE DRUM. 



i43 



rus lentiginosus, is heard along the Mississippi River. Southwest ward, 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 

 Sciaenoids. This noise is thought to be made in the air-bladder by forc- 

 ing the air from one compartment to another. Another name used in the 

 southwest is " Jewel- head." 



"This species," writes Jordan, "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 import- 

 ant 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. It reaches a 

 length of four feet and a weight of forty to sixty pounds. ■ Those usually 

 seen in market are much smaller. Nothing is known concerning its 

 breeding habits. 



The ear bones or otholiths of the Lake Drum are large and have a tex- 

 ture like ivory. They are often carried as amulets by the negroes of the 

 South, and are also prized by boys in Wisconsin and elsewhere in the West, 

 who call them "lucky stones," perhaps in allusion to the fact that they 

 are marked by a figure which resembles the letter L. The name "Jewel- 

 head " refers, of course, to these bones, and Jordan's generic name Euty- 

 chelithus, proposed for a form of the Lake Drum, supposed to inhabit Lake 

 Huron, is a translation of the words "lucky stone." The Lake Huron 

 form is in all probability identical with that of the other lakes, and it is 

 hoped that the Indian name " Maleshaganay " may be preserved in con- 

 nection with these lacustrine sciaenoids. 



* Mr. Norman Walker, in a recent paper on " Outdoor Life in Louisiana," published in Outing, inf irms 

 us that "gaspergou " is an Indian word, meaning " fish," and is applied by Louisianians to anything fishy 

 from the sheepshead to the mudsucker. 



