dis Bea lee IRCA 
(Perca fluviatils) 
Tue perch is distributed generally over Great Britain, and is a 
very handsome fish. Its back is olive-coloured, the sides yellow, the 
belly white, and there are six well-defined dark bands along the sides. 
The dorsal fin, the chief weapon of defence, has twelve spines, 
which often draw blood from the unwary angler’s hand. Below this 
is another dorsal fin without spines. The ventral, anal, and tail fins 
ate tipped: with scarlet. — he scales are large and hard. bhe eill= 
cover is also hard and bony and ends in a sharp point, which is also 
used in defence. The flesh of the perch is excellent. 
Perch as a rule proceed in shoals and frequent quiet parts of a 
river. Few are found in quick-running rivers. In many lochs they 
simply swarm, and if food is plentiful, grow to a large size. The 
largest I have seen weighed 5 lbs. This one and others from 3 to 
5 lbs. were caught in a small loch in Cambridgeshire. In Scotland 
they seldom exceed 3 lbs. in weight, the average weight in many lochs 
being about 1 lb. They spawn in May and are very prolific. The 
ova, like that of the pike, is attached to branches and weeds. By the 
middle of August the perch fry are about an inch long and sport 
about in large shoals. Trout and other fish feed much upon them, 
and I have frequently caught trout whose stomachs contained many 
perch fry. It is interesting to watch trout devouring these fry. One’s 
attention is usually drawn to them by seeing a number of terns dive 
down into the loch, and on approaching the scene of action one sees 
the surface of the water all eddying and swirling with trout chasing 
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