the origin of which I vainly tried to as- 
tain, in Rockland Co., N. Y., where it is 
called the The local 
names given to fishes vary in nearly 
‘“cannupera 
every township in the States, and this 
custom extends to the names of natural 
baits of precisely the same character 
used on different streams, but in adyja- 
cent localities. Readers of the AMER- 
ICAN ANGLER will remember my re- 
searches into the popular nomenclature 
of the helgramite or dobson—Coryvdalis 
cornu/us—and that I unearthed, without 
exhausting them, forty-seven different 
local names for this great lure for the 
black bass. A catalogue of the com- 
mon names of American fishes would 
be a massive but valuable volume. 
The stone roller—Cafostomus nigrt- 
cans—may be easily known by its head, 
which is flattened on top and concave 
between the eyes. It. has eleven rays 
in the dorsal fin and its upper lip is 
thick, with eight or ten rows of papillae 
on it. This fish has many common 
names, among which are hog sucker, 
stone toter, hammer-head sucker, stone 
Jugger, crawl-a-bottom, hog molly, hog 
mullet, mud sucker, etc., etc: The 
name of shoemaker has been given to 
it at Lake Erie, perhaps because of its 
resemblance in color to shoemaker’s 
pitch. It has a wide habitat, ranging 
from Western New York to North Car- 
olina, thence westward to Kansas. It 
grows large, up to two feet in length, 
and the young are almost ubiquitous in 
the mountain streams of the Eastern 
Middle States. Prof. G. Browne Goode, 
seems to have a warm penchant for 
the sucker family, and tosses his glove 
with a sort of chivalric nonchalance at 
the feet of Dr. Jordan, who is disposed 
to impugn the value of the sucker asa 
food fish, writes pleasantly and interest- 
ingly of the stone toter : 
The American Angler 
“ It delights in rapids and shoals, pre- 
ferring cold and clear water, and is ex- 
tremely abundant in running 
stream in the North and West, where 
its singular, almost comical, form is 
common to every school-boy. Its pow- 
erful pectorals render it a swifter swim- 
mer than any other of its family. Its 
habit is to rest motionless on the bot- 
tom, where its mottled colors render it 
difficult to distinguish from the stones 
among which it lies. When disturbed, 
it darts away very quickly after the 
manner of the darters. They often go 
in small schools. I have never found 
this fish in muddy water; although 
called the ‘ mud sucker’ in the brooks, 
it is most characteristically a fish of the 
running streams.” This little fish is 
called ‘ stone-slider” by the fishermen 
at Presque Isle,in Lake Erie, and as 
considered to bea most excellent lure 
for the black bass of that water. 
Another species of the Catostomt 
merits attention: the northern sucker— 
Catostomus catostomus. Its distinguish- 
ing feature is the snout, which consid- 
erably overhangs the mouth and is 
much longer than in the common 
sucker (C. feres). The mouth is large, 
but with a thin upper lip, upon which 
are two to four rows of papillae. There 
are ten to eleven rays in the dorsal fin 
and usually sevenintheanal. This fish 
ranges all through the Great Lake sys- 
tem westward to Alaska. Dr. Bean 
tells us that it is very common in Lake 
Erie and extremely abundant northward, 
reaching a weight of five pounds in 
Alaska, where, and in other northern 
sections, the head and roe are used in 
making a palatable soup. 
There’ are .several species: of- the 
Catostomi which appear to be peculiar 
to the Rocky Mountain region, of two 
of which we give illustrations. They 
every 
