FISHES. 



217 



etc., and it is with reference to such a diet that the pliaryngeal armature is so well 

 developed. In some places it is a source of great annoyance on account of its rava- 

 ges upon oyster beds. " In New York bay, off Cabin point, where the old Black 

 Tom reef is now converted into an island, one planter of Keyport lost his whole 

 summer's work, material, and labor, in a single September week, through an attack b}- 

 drums," and a City Island planter repoi'ted " a loss of $10,000 in one season a few 

 years a<To." The "vexation of it is, too, that the drum does not seem to cat half of 

 what he destroys, but, on the contrary, a great school of them will go over a bed, 

 wantonly crushing hundreds of oysters and dropping them untasted, but in fragments 

 on the bottom." 



The drum is a market fish, but is regarded as inferior in quality. Sometimes its 

 scales are made use of in fancy work. 



The drum-fish or sheepshead of the rivers and lakes {Hajjlodiiiotns grunniens) is 

 also a large species, but much inferior in size to its salt-water relative. It has no bar- 



FiG. 123. — Eqtu's tanceolalus. 



bels to the lower jaw, and its tail is extended backward in the middle. It is a fish 

 but little esteemed, although there seems to be some diiference of opinion as to its 

 merit, or perhaps real difference according to locality or season. Along the rivers 

 it is held in some regard, but on the lake coast it is considered as inferior. 



The least of the sciaenids which we need to consider is a small fish currently known 

 in the northern United States as the Lafayette or spot. This species is well distin- 

 guished by the absence of teeth from the lower jaw, and likewise by its coloration ; it 

 is bluish above and grayish silvery below, while about fifteen dark bands extend 

 across the side from the dorsal obliijuely forward to below the lateral line, and there 

 is also a very distinct spot upon the shoulders. It is a small fish, but regarded quite 



