102 Fish and Game Warden. [Bull. No. 1. 



the old fish do not feed upon their own young very much, and 

 when the pond is well stocked with aquatic plants the young 

 fish have a good chance to protect themselves from the old fish 

 and from their cannibalistic brothers and sisters. 



An early distribution of the young fish, beginning even when 

 they are fry, makes it possible to distribute greater numbers of 

 them. However, to do this it is necessary to begin moving 

 them soon after the spawning season has closed. We have had 

 much better success handling and distributing fish when we 

 waited until the cooler weather of September and October 

 arrived. We have said it before, but desire to say again, that 

 if the ponds in which the young fish are being raised are well 

 stocked with water plants, the young fish will soon distribute 

 themselves throughout the pond after they are deserted by the 

 parent fish. Thq stoneworts, or "chara moss," and other water 

 plants afford them a great deal of protection against their nat- 

 ural enemies and the cannibalistic members of their own tribe. 

 In this growth of vegetation the young fish find the greater 

 part of the food upon which they live, in the form of mollusks, 

 insects, crustaceans and the young of other kinds of fish. 

 Under such circumstances the young bass are not so liable to be 

 given to cannibalism. The breeding ponds should also be sup- 

 plied with gold fish, gizzard shad, crayfish, or some other ani- 

 mal life that will serve as food for the adult breeding bass. 



This morning (July 16, 1913) we spent two hours walking 

 around the edges of the ponds and saw great numbers of 

 young bass feeding near the shores. Many of them were 

 very busy grabbing small gnats that were hovering in 

 bunches near the surface of the water. When any small 

 insect touched the water, a young bass would snap it instantly. 

 They would grab any insect that we threw on the water. This 

 goes to show that insects are a natural food for young bass, 

 which they are perfectly willing to take if they can find them. 

 If they could get all the insects they wanted it might produce a 

 change in their food habits and reduce their cannibalistic appe- 

 tites very materially. 



While walking around the ponds we have noticed at difl'er- 

 ent times and in various places schools of minnows swimming 

 near the shore. Six weeks ago, when the bass were small, of 

 fry size, these minnows would dash into a school of them and 

 devour numbers of the young fish. However, this morning 

 when the smaller minnows saw the bass they themselves would 

 dash away to places of safety among the water plants to save 

 their own lives, the young bass giving chase. The bass are evi- 

 dently large enough now to take care of themselves and to give 

 chase to any small minnow that they might be able to swallow, 

 and their large mouths makes it possible for them to swallow 

 almost any minnow not larger than themselves. However, 

 when a yearling bass or sunfish appeared these same young 

 bass immediately skipped for hiding places among the water 

 plants. 



