142 BRITISH FRESH-WATER FISHES 



the greenish-yellow tints on the sides ; the iris is golden or 

 red ; the throat is black, the breast, pectoral fins,- and corners 

 of the mouth are red, and the belly is white. But all this 

 is subject to variation in individuals, and the artist who 

 proposes to represent the minnow faithfully must wield 

 a swift brush, for all these gay tints disappear soon after 

 death. I have seen it stated that, when spawning, 

 minnows emit a phosphorescent glow at night, but I am 

 unable to confirm this from observation, and may be per- 

 mitted to doubt it. 



There is no more sociable fish than the minnow ; he 



is never to be found save in company with his kind. No 



edible substance comes amiss to his unflagging 



Habits 



appetite ; if the morsel is too large for a single 

 minnow to tackle, his companions gather thickly round, 

 and soon demolish it among them. In this manner they 

 dispose of the dead bodies of their own kind. Spawning 

 in Britain is usually accomplished in May or June, when 

 the skin of the head and back develops warty tubercles, 

 which disappear immediately after the operation. The ova 

 number from 700 to 1,000 in well-grown females, and 

 are shed among the gravel in shallow water, where they 

 sometimes form coherent masses measuring as much as 

 eight inches by two. 



The minnow is found in suitable waters in nearly all 

 parts of Europe, except the Spanish peninsula, but it is 

 said not to be indigenous to Ireland, though it 

 n * has become established in some parts of that 

 island as the result of acclimatisation. In Scotland it is 

 locally abundant, but it is completely absent from certain 

 watersheds. Messrs. Harvie Brown and Buckland do not 

 mention it in their work on the fauna of the Moray 

 Basin. Though it is plentiful in the streams of Eastern 

 Galloway, especially in the Cree, which divides Kirkcudbright 

 from Wigtownshire, it is not found elsewhere in Scotland,. 



