Part IL] Pond Fish. 55 



HOW TO DISTINGUISH WHITE CRAPPIE. 



However, the best way for the novice to distinguish the 

 White crappie from the Black crappie is by the number of 

 sharp spines in the dorsal fin. In the White crappie the 

 number of sharp dorsal spines is typically six, very rarely 

 five or seven. In the dark colored, or Black crappie, which 

 will be the next one described, the typical number of sharp 

 dorsal spines is seven and sometimes eight, but rarely nine 

 and very rarely ten or six. The White crappie is longer and 

 thinner in proportion to its weight than the Black crappie 

 and is lighter in its general color on its sides and back. 



HABITAT OF WHITE CRAPPIE. 



The White crappie has for its habitat most of the bodies 

 of water from the Great Lakes region southward through the 

 Mississippi valley to the Southern states, and westward in- 

 cluding Kansas and Nebraska. So far as we have been able 

 to ascertain this crappie makes itself at home in nearly all 

 the Kansas streams, and in all ponds and lakes where it has 

 been planted, or which have been in the past in any way con- 

 nected with the streams. 



OLD RIVER-BED PONDS. 



When Kansas rivers are swollen with storm and flood 

 waters, many sloughs and old deserted creek and river-bed 

 ponds are filled with over-flow waters. The crappie, together 

 with many other kinds of fish, such as carp, shad, buffalo, and 

 the catfishes, go into these over-flow ponds seeking new feed- 

 ing grounds, and many of them are left there when the waters 

 recede. Some of these ponds hold water from year to year 

 unless the season is quite dry, and many fish live and spawn 

 in them. If the ponds dry up, as they sometimes do, many 

 fish perish. During periods of low water we have seen thou- 

 sands of young crappies in some of these over-flow ponds, and 

 have, at different times, helped to move them to bodies of 

 water where they could live until they might meet with better 

 water conditions. 



THE BLACK CRAPPIE (OR CALICO BASS) . 



The Black crappie (Pomoxis sparoides) is also known as 

 the Small-mouthed crappie. It has a variety of local names, 

 depending upon the locality where it is found, such as Straw- 

 berry bass. Grass bass and Calico bass. This last name was 

 undoubtedly suggested by the beautiful calico patterns of color 

 delineated on the body of this species. 



In Kansas the Black crappie is frequently called the Giant 

 crappie by fishermen, owing to the fact that a very consider- 

 able number of fish weighing from one to two pounds each 

 are caught. This crappie does well at Lake View and is 

 highly prized by fishermen not only as a very fine food fish, 

 but as being worthy of the attention of the sportsman who 



