CHAR— AMERICAN, BREEDING. 251 



.k 

 dressed* from ■wliat tliey were on week-days. While Livingtou-Stone (p. 297) 

 advised that if you wish to prevent a lot of trout being hooked out in the night 

 by poachers, they should be well fed towards evening, and then two or three 

 be captured by a small hook, and after a moment or two thrown back into the 

 pond. They will create a panic amongst the rest, so that there will be no more 

 fishing that night with a hook. 



In the United States we are told that this fish cannot thrive in water warmer 

 than 68° Fahr., though they have been known to live in swift-running water at 

 75°, but Brown- Goode romai-ks this higher temperature has been among those in 

 fish-cultural establishments, and " fishes hatched in artificial ponds may probably 

 be inured to greater warmth than wild fishes can endure, and it is doubtful 

 whether the latter are often found in warmer water than 60° or 65°." Below 36° 

 they become torpid and refuse to eat. 



Breeding. — The eggs, as already remarked, arc only about half the size of 

 those of the brook trout, and although in some localities it has been observed to 

 deposit its ova earlier than the trout, it does so mostly at about the same period. 

 At Howietoun reducing food has been followed by decreased yield of eggs, and if 

 the food is very much diminished to prevent fungus, such has been followed by 

 temporary sterility. A very small amount of milt in these, and I believe likewise 

 in the British char, is sufficient to fecundate a large number of eggs.f At Howie- 

 toun the later in the season the eggs are obtained the larger seems to be the 

 mortality among them. While fish, the first time they breed, do not spawn quite 

 so soon as the older ones, they have not only a smallerj but a less number of 

 eggs in proportion to their weight and size. 



8 eggs from a -i-year-old averaged 0'18 of an inch each in diameter. 



® )) )j ^ )J 5) ^ ■^' j» n J3 )J 



The redds are not infrequently found in very shallow water§ and for this 

 purpose they commence running from about the middle of September, but there 

 is often a considerable difi^erence as to the time when all spawn, while naturally 

 they take from five or six to eight or ten days in the process. 



Milner in the United States tells us that at Waterville, Wisconsin, a pair of 

 these fishes had selected a spot near the banks of the stream where the water was 

 about 10 inches deep. The female had fanned the gravel with her tail and anal 

 fin until it was clean and white, and had succeeded in excavating a cavity. The 

 number of days the eggs take incubating at Howietoun in water from 43 to 43| 

 degrees Fahrenheit is from 79 to 81. 



Mr. S. H. Ainsworth has compiled a table respecting the incubation of these 

 fish in the United States, from which I extract the following : — 



Average temperature 

 of water. 



37-0 



38-5 



39-0 



40-2 



41-0 



42-6 



* Livingston-Stone, Z)omt's(/c<!(<,'d Trout, ed. 2, p. 219, observed that " their sensitiveness to 

 colours is seen every week at the ponds where trout are domesticated, especially when their 

 keeper changes a dark coat for a light one, or leaves it off altogether. The appearance of the 

 unaccustomed light coat or white shirt will often frighten well-tamed trout into a panic." 



t Mr. M. informed me (April 24th, 1884) that late in the season he found some female fon- 

 tinalis with ova, but possessed only two males, one of which was spent, and he merely obtained 

 about two drops of milt from the other for between 3000 and 4000 eggs : out of these from 94 to 

 96 per cent, hatched. 



I See Livingston-Stone's observations as to the cause why the eggs of these fishes from some 

 localities are smaller than in those from others (p. 25 ante). 



§ The secretary to the National Fish Culture Association informed me (Nov. 4th, 1886) that 

 some of these fish hatched in March, 1885, from eggs received from the United States, were 

 now 9^ inches long (having been measured by himself) and that between October 22nd and 29th, 

 47 fish, males and females, had already spawned, and between the last date and Nov. 1886, 

 20 more, from which he had obtained 8000 small eggs. 



