SEMOTILUS — FALLFISIIES 121 



mentous alga* and miscellaneous vegetable debris. Occasionally 

 fragments of insects or a specimen of the mud-loving Ento- 

 mostraca may be found in the general mixture, and individual 

 specimens have been reported to eat decayed fish in the 

 aquarium. 



Its spawning season, if we may judge from our collections, is 

 from May 15 to June 15 in central Illinois. Dr. Eigenmann re- 

 ports that the eggs are sometimes laid on the under surface of 

 various objects submerged in shallow water. He found them 

 throughout June and a part of July, one of the parents being, 

 as a rule, on guard about the nest. The snout of the male in 

 the breeding season bears three rows of large tubercles, seven in 

 one row at the margin of the upper lip, five in a row directly 

 above this, and four in an upper row, two of them between the 

 nostrils and one on each side between the nostril and the eye. 



Genus SEMOTILUS Kafinesque 



FALLFISHES 



Body robust; mouth terminal; upper jaw protractile; a small barbel 

 on the upper side of the maxillary just in front of its extremity (not at its 

 tip as in most American minnows) ; teeth 2, 5-4, 2, hooked, without grinding 

 surface; intestine short; peritoneum pale; dorsal rays 7 or 8; anal rays 8; 

 scales 45 to 60 in lateral series; lateral line continuous. Size large, 6 to 18 

 inches. Two species, S. oiromaculatus being found from Maine to Wyoming, 

 and S. corporalis, the large chub or fallfish of the Eastern creeks, being 

 confined to the east of the Alleghanies. 



Fig. 25 



SEMOTILUS ATROMACULATUS (Mitchill) 



HORNED DACE; CREEK CHUB 

 (Map XXIX) 



Mitchill, 1818, Am. Month. Mag., II, 324 (Cyprinus). 



G., VII., 269 (Leucosomus corporalis); J. & G., 221 (corporalis) ; M. V., 66; J. & E., 



I, 222; NT., 45 (corporalis); J., 62 (corporalis); F., 75 (corporalis); F. F., I. 6, 



88 (corporalis) ; L.., 15. 



—17 F 



