298 



SCANDINAVIAN FISHES. 



others, iu spite of the insignificance of its economical 

 value. The attention paid to it is, therefore, clue chietly 

 to its singular appearance and manner of life. 



The Lump Sucker occurs from very deep water 

 up to the littoral region, ^vhere it prefers a rocky or 

 stony bottom. The Royal Museum has received spe- 

 cimens from a deptli of between 100 and 150 fthins 

 off Jaderen on the coast of Norway, and of l)etween 

 100 and 200 fthins, on the Jutland Reef in the North 

 Sea. Though a Ijottom-fish and thus of sluggish tem- 

 perament, it may sometimes be found swimming freely 

 about in the open sea. This does not depend entirely 

 on the cii'cumstance that it attaches itself to tioating ob- 

 jects and drifts al^out in their company, for it also dis- 

 plays considerable activit}' in the pursuit of its prey 

 and on its migrations to the spawning-place. Ekstkom 

 mentions its habit of attaching itself to tlie wooden 

 floats or liuoys {skofklabhar) used to support the Herring- 

 nets {skotarne). Couch" states, on good authority, that 

 a Lump Sucker has been taken firmly attached to a 

 Mackerel caught in ;i drift-net where the water was con- 

 siderably deep. Day also gives two observations, made 

 by Mr. Cornish'', of the capture of the Lump Sucker in 

 Mackerel-nets drifting at the surface. On the voj'age 

 of the Ingegjerd and Gladan, the two ships of the Swe- 

 dish expedition to Greenland in 1871, a young specimen 

 33 mm. long was taken in a, surface-net in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Newfoundland'. This species is most often 

 taken, however, though only by accident, in nets sunk 

 to the bottom or in tra^vls. 



The geographical range of the Lumj) Sucker extends 

 from Greenland, the extreme north of Norway'', and 

 tlie White Sea'' southwai'ds to the Bay of Biscay, on 

 the east of the Atlantic, and to Chesapeake Bay, on 

 the west. In Bohusliln it is far from rare, up to the 

 Laminaria region (Malm). In the Baltic, according to 

 Mela, it occurs up to the top (jf the Gulf of Bothnia, 

 where it is said, however, to l^c rare. As Lill.jeborg 

 has already remarked, however, the Baltic form is dis- 

 tinguished by several peculiarities; and we have above 

 given all the instances of these that we ha\e found in 



the specimens between about 14i) and 170 mm. long, 

 which the Royal Museum has acquired from Brsivik and 

 the island-belt of Stockliolm. Most of these peculiarities 

 indicate a persistency of the juvenile characters fully 

 analogous to the relation between tlie Baltic Herring 

 and the common form. One of these characters lies 

 in the greater length of the pectoral fins, in which re- 

 spect the Baltic form approaches the more arctic Cij- 

 clopferns sp'mosus. Others, however, as for instance 

 the greater height of the second dorsal and the anal 

 fins, contradict this impression and suggest a distinct 

 direction of development, even if this l)e not far enough 

 advanced to justify a distinction of species. According 

 to Benecke the Lump Sucker attains a length of from 

 20 to 30 cm. on tlie coast of Prussia. ( )ft' Morko Ek- 

 STHOM never found specimens more than 1.5 cm. long. 

 In the Baltic it probably does not attain so great a size 

 as in the Atlantic. Even in Kiel Bay, however, ac- 

 cording to MoBius and Heincke, it may be 40 cm. in 

 length. The Danish authors, after Kroyeh, state the 

 maximum length of tlie female at 45 cm. and of the 

 male at about 30 cm. Malm records the capture of a 

 female 48 cm. long in the island-belt of Bohuslan. 



The Lump Sucker has sometimes been met with 

 in fresh water, at least at the mouths of rivers: Day 

 mentions an instance of this at King's Lynn in Nor- 

 folk, and MoBius and Heincke another at the mouth 

 of tlie river W'eser. 



The spawning-season of the Lump Sucker occurs 

 at the lieginning of spring, in the Baltic at the end of 

 April or beginning of May, according to Ekstrom, in 

 Bohuslan at the same period or, according to an ob- 

 servation recorded by Malm, at the middle of May, 

 and in Greenland, according to Fabricius, at the end 

 of May or beginning oi .Tune. At this time or a little 

 earlier the Lump Sucker migrates from deep water to 

 the spawning-places, at a depth of some fathoms and 

 where the bottom is overgrown with seaweed, some- 

 times closc! to low-water mark, where the bottom is 

 almost dry during spring. Here the female lays her 

 numerous', red'' eggs, and after lier follows the male 



" Fish. Brit. IsL, voL II, p. 185. 



* Zoulogist, 2n(l scr., vol. VIII and IX, pp. 35:32 and -idCA. 

 ' Lat. 47°35'N., long. 52° 34' W. (26 Aug., 1871, Josua Lindahl). 



'' Where, according to CoLl.ETT, however, it is less common than in the south of Norway. 



'■ There is no record of its occurrence in Spitzbergen, where the genus is represented by the otlier species, Cydoptcrus spinosiis. 

 ■' The number of eggs and, probably, their size vary with the size of the parent fish. In .i female weighing 5 kgrm. Buckland (I. c.) 

 counted about 194,000 eggs. The entire roe weighed 730 gram. 



'J In the ovaries, according to Fabeicius, the colour of the eggs varies considerably, being white, red, yellow, blue or green. 



