TIDAL WATER FISHES 



" snappers." These are seldom more than ten 

 inches in length ; but they come into the creeks in 

 vast shoals in the early part of August, and con- 

 tinue to do so until October. They are seeking the 

 killies or muddabblers or mummichugs, salt-water 

 minnows that swarm the creeks of the estuaries 

 from Nova Scotia to Florida. The snappers enter 

 these creeks on the first of the flood-tide, and leave 

 them on the last of the ebb. They come in small 

 schools, as a rule ; but these follow rapidly, and at 

 such times, with a six-ounce fly rod and a light 

 line and a live muddabbler bait, they are equally 

 combative as a trout, taking the lure near the sur- 

 face, and fighting on it. A score of five to ten 

 dozen " on a tide " is not unusual, and they are 

 delicious morsels. 



The blackfish, tautog, or oyster fish (Tautoga 

 onitis) is one of the most valuable food-fishes of 

 our coast, being very abundant, preferring shallow 

 water, and seeking its food among the rocks along 

 the shores. Its generic title, tautoga, is a latiniza- 

 tion of the Indian name "Tautog," and the specific 

 is the Greek for a kind of plant, the relation of 

 which to the blackfish is, as yet, unexplained. It 

 is a favorite fish of our ex-President Grover Cleve- 

 land, who spends hours in its capture from the 

 waters of Buzzard's Bay ; when of good size 



VOL. II. 17 2C7 



