ETHNOZOOLOGY OF THE TEWA INDIANS 55 



The present absence of trout has been locally attributed to a heavy 

 flood which is said to have washed them away. There is evidence 

 along the bottom-lands that such a flood did occur, but that it 

 washed the trout out is highly improbable. It seems much more 

 probable that it may have filled the pools that once made it possible 

 for trout to survive protracted dry seasons, though it is not impossible 

 that the filling is due to the fact that the desiccation of the country 

 has at last reached a point where the stream is not able to take care 

 of the debris arising from lateral erosion of the valley. It is not at 

 all improbable that the creek may have completely dried up during 

 some particularly dry cycle within the last 20 years. In any event 

 we must believe that there were trout a quarter of a century ago, 

 and so we have no reason to doubt that they existed during the 

 occupancy of the valley by the ancient inhabitants, though that is 

 not a necessary conclusion. Of course we have no definite evidence 

 as to the species, but it was almost certainly the Rio Grande Basin 

 trout (Salmo mylciss spilurus Cope). 



Cope * says he saw Gila pandora Cope ( = Richardsonius pulcJiellus 

 pandora Cope Cockerell) in the creek below Ojo Caliente. Cope and 

 Yarrow 2 reported the following species from nearby Rio Grande 

 drainage localities, to which species we have applied probable modern 

 nomenclature, placing in parentheses the names under which they 

 were reported : 



Pantosteus plebeius Baird & Girard (P. jarrovii Cope). Sucker. 



Taos, San Ildefonso, and Tierra Amarilla. 



HybognatJius nuchalis Agassiz. Silvery Minnow. San Ildefonso. 

 Richardsonius pulcJiellus pandora (Cope) (Gila pandora) . North 

 ern Rio Grande Dace. Near San Ildefonso. 

 Notropis simus Cope (Alburnellus simus). Rio Grande Shiner. 



San Ildefonso. 

 Notropis dilectus Girard (Alburnellus jemezanus Cope). San 



Ildefonso. 



Notropis lutrensis Baird and Girard (Hypsilepis iris Cope). San 

 Ildefonso. 



1 Cope, E. D., Report upon the Extinct Vertebrata Obtained in New Mexico by Parties of the Expe 

 dition of 1874, Gcog. Surv. W. of 100th Merid. (Wheeler Survey), rv, pt. n, p. 21. See also .4 rm. Rcpt.for 1875, 

 p. 66, 1875. 



J Cope, E. D., and Yarrow, II. C., Report upon the Collections of Fishes Made in Portions of Nevada, 

 Utah, California, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona, During the Years 1871, 1872, 1873, and 1874, Geog. 

 Surv. W. of 100th Merid. (Wheeler Survey), v, pp. 635-703, 1875. See also Cockerell, T. D. A., The Nomen 

 clature of the American Fishes Usually Called Leuciscus and Rulilus, Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash., xxn, pp. 

 215-17, 1909; The Fishes of the Rocky Mountain Region, Univ. Colo. Studies, v, pp. 159-178, 1908; Jordan, 

 David Starr, and Evermann, Barton Warren, The Fishes of North and Middle America, Bull. 47, U. S. Nat. 

 Mus., 4 vols., 1896-1900. 



69231 Bull. 5614 5 



