466 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



is 4^ inclies long. It has more dorsal and anal spines than are 

 usually present in this sunfish. 



The colors of living specimens were described by Prof. Baird 

 as follows: 



Dark greenish olive, with three or four irregular longitudinal 

 bands of dull greenish yellow, and occasionally cloudy spots of 

 golden green. Sides of the head of this color, with three indis- 

 tinct bands of dark olive. Iris purplish brown; cornea olive 

 green. Fins quite uniform, very dark greenish olive, with 

 darker margins, except the pectorals, which are light olivaceous, 

 and the ventrals, the spinous rays of which are uncolored. 

 Some specimens may be better described as dark golden green, 

 with longitudinal bands of dark olive, broken up by cloudings 

 of greenish. 



Baird called it the bass sunfish because of its resemblance in 

 shape to some of the basses. The species ranges from New 

 York to North Carolina in sluggish streams near the coast. 

 Baird collected it in Rockland county, N. Y. Eugene Smith took 

 it in the upper Hackensack valley. Baird found it not rare in 

 Cedar Swamp creek, near Beesleys Point N. J. in 1854; and the 

 writer obtained a single individual in Gravelly run, not far from 

 that locality, in 1887, associated with the pirate perch, striped 

 mud minnow, barred killifish and young pickerel. 



The mud sunfish reaches a length of 6 inches. It prefers 

 muddy water and may even lie embedded in mud. Eugene 

 Smith says it is shy, seclusive and nocturnal in its habits. 



Genus ambloplites Rafinesque 

 Body oblong, moderately elevated, compressed; mouth large, 

 the broad maxillary with a well developed supplemental bone, 

 lower jaw projecting; teeth on vomer, palatines, tongue, ento- 

 pterygoids and ectopterygoids, lingual teeth in a single patch, 

 pharyngeal teeth sharp; branchiostegals six; opercle ending in 

 two flat i^oints ; preopercle serrate at its angle ; other membrane 

 bones chiefly entire; gill rakers rather long and strong, dentate, 

 less than 10 in number, developed only on the lower part of the 

 arch; scales large, somewhat ctenoid; lateral line complete, the 

 tubes occupying at least the anterior half of the surface of the 

 scale; dorsal fin much more developed than the anal fin, with 10 



