Ainerican Fisheries Society. 119 



Flats has increased b}' reason of the food that 3'oung carp make 

 for the bass, though he was not planted there. Millions of them 

 are up there and you will see their backs sticking up out of the 

 bullrushes. The only injurious thing that I believe they do is 

 to destroy the food for the perch. Our perch fishing is not what 

 it used to he, and the carp living up among the weeds and rushes 

 cleans out the weeds at the bottom so that there is not as much 

 vegetation there for food for the perch as there otherwise would 

 be; so it is my judgment that the carp has injured our perch 

 fishing but improved our bass fishing. 



Mr. Titcomb : We all know that Mr. Bartlett is an authority 

 on the carp; we also have here an authority on the bass. The 

 question which I was going to ask and which Mr. Peabody did 

 ask, was whether carp destroyed the spawn of bass. I say no. 

 but I am not an authority. Xow in Buffalo there is a strong 

 fish and game association which obtained permission of the New 

 York Fish Commission to seine the carp out of the river for the 

 alleged reason that they destroyed the spawn of the bass, and 

 when I passed through there they asked me to bring that ques- 

 tion lip at this meeting. Xow, I should like to hear from Mr. 

 Bartlett in answer to those questions which Mr. Peabody fired 

 out so rapidly, he answering them as direct questions and as an 

 authority, and I should like the views of others who have had 

 experience with either tlie carp or bass, on that question, so that 

 we can have a direct record on our minutes of these questions 

 which have l)een asked directly and answered directly, in addi- 

 tion to the valuable information wliich we have been getting 

 through the remarks of Mr. Townsend and yourself. 



The President : Do the carp destroy the spa\vn of black 

 bass ? 



Dr. Bartlett : You are placing upon my shoulders rather 

 more honor than Ixdongs to me. I am not an authority on the 

 carp fui'ther than an intimate association with tliein during a 

 number of years has given me the ])rivil('ge of a good deal of 

 observation. 



Our Illinois river is really a series of lakes from one end to 

 the other. The river itself is anywhere from seven to fifteen 

 miles wide, and there is a considerable chain of lakes or low 

 places on either side of the river, extending the whole length of 



