THE AMERICAN ANGLER. 



Vol. 26. 



OCTOBER-NOVEMBER, 1S96. 



Nos. lo-n. 



FISH AND FLSHING IN AMERICA. 



BY WM. C. HARRIS. 



[Continued from page 263.] 



Eleven years ago much discussion 

 arose among anglers as to the existence 

 of lungs in the tarpon. It was asserted 

 that it was a warm-blooded fish because 

 it was known to rise to the surface and 

 "blow," as the whalemen term it. 

 Hence it required more air than other 

 gill-fishes, and that traces of true lung- 

 formation were found in the air blad- 

 der, all of which seemed to the dispu- 

 tants to substantiate the claim that the 

 tarpon was less cold-blooded than its 

 congeners of the southern seas. It was 

 argued that its high aerial leaps and 

 intelligent attempts to free itself when 

 hooked, indicated a higher degree of 

 development than exists in many other 

 fishes, particularly those of salt water. 

 During this earnest discussion among 

 the craft, Mr. W. H. Wood, of New 

 York, wrote me, in 1885, from Punta 

 Rassa, Fla. : 



" I have seen thousands of these fish 

 come up to the surface of the water to 

 take, as it appeared to me, a mouthful 

 of air, but until my last prospecting 

 expedition I never heard them make a 

 distinct breathing-sound. This only 

 instance was from a tarpon which came 

 up to the surface, head toward me, 

 being about thirty- five feet away, he 

 making the distinct sounds of blowing 

 out air and drawing in air, exactly 

 like the porpoise. Perhaps this is not 

 always done, for I have seen fish come 

 up and take the mouthful of air, and 

 after they had gone under I could 



trace them for a hundred feet or more 

 by means of the bubbles of air that 

 escaped. May it not be that generally 

 the air is gradually expended from the 

 air-chamber, and when empty the fish 

 comes to the surface only to fill the 

 same again ? 



' ' That these lungs are used for 

 breathing is, I take it, pretty well es- 

 tablished. Among many examples is 

 the fish I took season before last, 

 which, during about an hour after he 

 had given up leaping, was swimming 

 partly under my boat and towing it 

 stern first. This fish, about every five 

 minutes, would turn slowly to one side 

 from under the boat, scarcely changing 

 his course, and come slowly and 

 steadily to the surface of the water, 

 and, as I then thought, take a mouth- 

 ful of fresh air to pass through the 

 gills, in addition to the air subtracted 

 by the gills from the water, and then 

 slowly swim down to his former place 

 partly under the boat, not an inch of 

 line taken in or let out, but everything 

 under a strong strain. This fish, no 

 doubt, came up to breathe, though I 

 did not distinctly hear the blowing out 

 or drawing in of the air. He seemed 

 stronger at the end than at the begin- 

 ning of the hour. My observations are 

 that they come up about each half hour 

 when undisturbed." 



Notwithstanding these interesting 

 observations of Mr. Wood, the tarpon 

 does not possess a true lung. Like 



