FISHES OF COLORADO 99 



or a little more in the length of the base of the dorsal, anal spines III, rays lo to 

 12; scales cycloid, 6 or 7, 38-50, 13 to 15. 



General color greenish yellow, shading to orange or orange red below; sides 

 of the body crossed by 5 to 7 indistinct, greenish, vertical bars, each bar from 3 

 to 5 series of scales in width; top and sides of the head greenish to olivaceous, a 

 broad, light-blue, crescent-shaped band extending from the mouth along the lower 

 jaw and ventral margin of the opercular structures to the base of the opercular 

 spot; opercular spot black; fins dusky or bluish; last five or six rays of the soft 

 dorsal crossed by a row of dark-brown or black spots. 



The Blue GUI is one of the largest of the sunfishes, reaching the length of 

 18 inches and the weight of a pound or more. As a food fish it is much prized, 

 the flesh being excellent, Lepomis pallidus is found in schools in the deep water 

 just beyond the weeds along shore. It may be caught with almost any sort of 

 bait, a fact which makes this fish quite popular with the amateur fisherman. 

 The enormous number of this species taken in some parts of the Mississippi 

 Valley is weU shown by the statement of Forbes' that between 200,000 and 

 500,000 pounds of Blue Gills are caught annually in Illinois. 



Lepomis pallidus ranges from the Atlantic Coast throughout the Mississippi 

 and Great Lakes region south and west into Texas. It is here considered as an 

 introduced fish in Colorado, since the writer was told by several citizens of Alamosa 

 of its introduction into the Rio Grande and neighboring lakes. A species of 

 sunfish described by Baird and Girard^ from Brownsville, Texas, as Pomotis 

 speciosus but now considered as a synonym of Lepomis pallidus is found in the 

 lower Rio Grande. 



Colorado specimen. — University Museum: Rio Grande, Alamosa, July 27, 1912 (120 

 mm.), M. M. Ellis, No. 403; introduced by U.S. Fish Com. in ponds at Pueblo, 1912. 



Subfamily Micropterinae 

 Genus MICROPTERUS Lacepede 

 The Black Bass 

 Micropterus Lacepede, Hist. Nat. Poiss., Vol. IV, p. 325, 1802. 



Dorsal fin deeply emarginate at the junction of the spinous and soft portions; 

 anal spines III ; body rather elongate in large specimens. The two species of this 

 genus are the well-known Black Bass. Both the Large-mouthed and Small- 

 mouthed Black Bass have been introduced into Colorado. 



a. Angle of the mouth reaching the level of the eye or beyond; sides with a lateral stripe or a 

 series of blotches along the lateral line; scales on the cheeks in about 10 rows. 



M. salmoides (Lacepede) 



aa. Angle of the mouth barely if at all reaching the level of the anterior margin of the eye; no 



lateral stripe; scales on the cheeks in 17 rows M. dolomieu Lacepede 



■ Forbes and Richardson, Ichthyology of Illinois, p. 239, 1909. 

 ' Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., p. 24, 1854. 



