54 PISHES OF THE CONNECTTCUT LAKES. 



permit of much generalization. The habits necessarily vary with the 

 habitat, also with the size of the fish. It may be said, however, that 

 by nature the trout is a denizen of cool water. It is carnivorous and 

 almost omnivorous within carnous limits, levying upon nearly every 

 class of animal, worms, mollusks, crustaceans, insects, batrachians, 

 fishes, birds, and mammals. It will eat its own eggs and young as 

 well as those of other fishes. We have never known a trout to 

 eat a frog or a tadpole, but have found in its stomach the next 

 thing to it, the common water-newt {Diemyctelus viridescens) , and 

 have caught trout with a land-newt {Plethodon erythronotus) as bait. 

 The main food supply of young trout is insect larvse, insects, and 

 other small invertebrates; a list of the insects and other things that 

 have been found in trouts' stomachs would " fill a book." But the 

 trout does not feed at all times. In most waters its feeding times are 

 usually morning and early evening; apparenth" it does not feed much, 

 if any, during warm sunny days, but if at all on such days, in the cool 

 of the evening. It is probable, as is indicated by its behavior toward 

 anglers, that it does not feed at all in warm bodies of water during 

 the latter part of the summer. It ceases to bite at the advent of warm 

 weather and begins to bite again on the first cool days of autumn. 



The following notes present some of the more important observa- 

 tions upon the food of the trout of these waters : 



June 30, Second Lake : One trout 12 inches long contained a num- 

 ber of chub minnows (Couesms plumbeus) . . 



July 6 and 7, Mud Pond Brook near First Lake : A trout 6 inches 

 long had in its stomach a blob {Cottus gracilis) 2.5 inches long, a 

 dragon-fly larva, and a worm; still another had been feeding upon 

 insects and insect eggs. 



July 21, in small spring inlet of Mud Pond: Five trout, 6.04 to 

 6.91 inches long, contained flies, caddis larvae in cases, and fragments 

 of other insects, and 2 contained 4 and 5 seeds of the yellow pond 

 lily, respectively, and some algse and confervae. 



August 18, Third Lake: Trout measuring from 10.75 to 13.25 

 inches long had most of them been feeding upon some fine stuff with 

 which the water this day was thickly permeated. It was a minute 

 livinsr organism the nature of which could not be determined. That 

 the trout were feeding upon this may account for the fact that no 

 trout were caught until evening. One contained a piece of back- 

 bone of some small fish, another had fragments of insects. 



August 29, Second Lake: A 14-inch trout contained a partly 

 digested chub minnow. 



The only intestinal parasites observed were in a small trout from 

 Mud Pond Brook near First Lake which contained a thread worm 

 (nemertean) and in a 13.25-inch trout at Third Lake which was full 

 of tapeworms {BotJvrioccphalus). 



