'"50 FISHES OF THE EAST ATLANTIC COAST. 



"with greyish spots on a pervading black, and is always deeply 

 black along the dorsal. For a fish not swift in his movements his 

 extent of fin is great, especially noticeable in the dorsal and caudal ; 

 the j^ectorals also are very large. The head is very big and heavy ; 

 the back is high-arched immediately behind the head. The eye is 

 full and round, and the mouth is small and bordered by thick 

 fleshy lips. There is a heavy coat of scales over the whole body, 

 asd they are remarkably hard to get off in dressing the fish. This 

 <iiiiiculty can be partially done away with by dipping the fish in vin- 

 egar before scaling him. 



The blackfish runs in size from half a pound to ten or twelve 

 pounds, fish of the latter weight being taken in deep water. The 

 season for tautog fishing commences in the last of April — fishermen 

 say when the willows commence to bud — and continues through the 

 summer months, ending about the middle of October. 



The blackfish is a bottom fish ; he loves the rock-strewn tide- 

 Tsrays and the shelving sedgey edges of narrow channels. It was this 

 preference of the tautog that made New York Harbor and its ap 

 proaches the greatest blackfishing grounds known to the angler. 



The rocks of Hell Gate are renowned for their number, but only be- 

 cause of the vast traffic which jiasses through that channel ; they 

 do not exceed or even equal the myriad boulders which choke the 

 two river arms to the noi'th of it. Little Hell Gate is a a roaring 

 torrent when the tide is running up, and Bronx or Harlem Kills is 

 its counter2:)art. This last was the most famous place of all for 

 fclackfishing. 



Bight in the middle of the water about two thirds of the length 

 of the Kills from the Harlem mouth, there is a vast round rock, one 

 of those smooth topped boiilders, relics of the glacier that hollowed 

 •out the bed it left them in. At half tide the waters sweep by this 

 stone like a miniature Niagara and create a strong eddy behind it 

 There existed in this rock a huge iron ring ; no one ever knew how 

 it got there — and in times gone by if the angler could get his 

 ** painter" tied to that ring at the first of the flood tide he was sure 

 of as much sport with the blackfish as he cared to enjoy. It is need- 

 less to say to Harlem fishermen of to-day that a blackfish is a rara 



