282 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



season is about the same as for the brook trout. The colors of 

 the male in the breeding season are gorgeous, and the sight of 

 a host of spawning fish in the water is one to be remembered. 

 Manj' large and small trout of this kind have been deposited 

 in Lake George and other suitable w^aters of the state. 



Family A.RGE:NTiNin)A.E 



Smelts 



Genus os.mervs (Artedi) Linnaeus 



Body elongate, compressed; head long, pointed; mouth wide, 

 the slender maxillary extending to past the middle of the eye, 

 lower jaw projecting, preorbital and suborbital bones narrow; 

 maxillaries and premaxillaries with fine teeth, lower jaw with 

 small teeth, which are larger posteriorly, tongue with a few 

 strong, fanglike teeth, largest at the tip, hyoid bone, yomer, pala- 

 tines and pterygoids with wide set teeth; gill rakers long and 

 slender; branchiostegals 8; scales large, loose, CO to TO in the 

 course of the lateral line; dorsal small, about midwaj' of the 

 body, over the ventrals; anal rather long; vertebrae about 40; 

 pyloric caeca small, few. Small fishes of the coasts of Europe 

 and northern America, sometimes ascending rivers; delicate in 

 flesh and considerably valued as food. (After Jordan and Ever- 

 raann) 



143 Osmerus mordax (Mitchill) 



Smelt; loe FWi 



Athcriua mordax Mitchill, Traus. Lit. & Phil. Soc. X. Y. I. 446, 1815, New 

 York. 



Osmerus viridescens Le Sueur, Joui*. Ac. Nat. Sci. Pliila. I, 230. May. 181S. 

 Boston to Newport: De Kay, N. Y. Fauna, Fishes. 2A3, pi. 39, fig. 124, 

 1842. streams flowing into Long Island Sound. Haekensack & Passaic 

 rivers; Stoker, Syu. Fish. N. A. 197, 1846; Gunther, Cat. Fish. Brit. 

 Mus. VI. 167, 18G6. 



Osmerus mordax Jordan & Gilbert, Bull. 16, U. S. Nat. Mus. 293, 1883; 

 Bean, Fishes Penna. 64, pi. 26, fig. 46, 1803; .Jordan & Evermann, 

 Bull. 47, U. S. Nat. Mus. 523, 1896, pi. LXXXVI. fig. 228, 1900; Ever- 

 MANN & Kendall. Kept. U. S. Coiumr. Fish & Fisheries for 1894, 

 593, 1896, Lake Memphremagog & Lake Champlain. 



The smelt has an elongate and somewhat compressed body and 

 a long, pointed head, with the lower jaw projecting. The mouth 



