441 



' of from 50 to 100 pounds. Most of the other species are marine forms that only 

 ascend rivers to spawn, but this erne is permanently confined to the lakes. It 

 varies much with age, the young having a slender long snout, which becomes 

 quite blant in the adult, also sharp hooks on the bony shields, which become 

 smooth with age, while the ventral shields jirow smaller and finally disappear. 

 The dorsal shields average 13 in number (11-16), the laterals 34 (30-39), the- 

 ventrals 8-10, while the tin-formula is D 35, A 26. 



This species owes its scientific specific name to the reddish colour of the sides 

 of the body ; the dorsal surface, however, is dark in hue. 



The Sturgeon is hardly appreciated at its true value in Ontario, the greatest 

 proportion of the fish caught in Canadian waters being shipped to the States for 

 sale. It is a fish nevertheless, of high economic importance, its flesh being of 

 excellent nutritive quality and good although somewhat meaty flavour. The 

 sounds or air-bladders furnish the best quality of isinglass, and the roe the expen- 

 sive delicacy " caviare," but these accessory products are not properly taken 

 advantage of in the Province. 



On the whole the Sturgeon frequents comparatively shallow water, and is 

 therefore oftener taken in pound-nets than in gill-nets (p. 464) but it is most 

 easily captured in the spring of the year at spawning-time when numbers congregate 

 about the mouths of rivers. The spawning time may be as early as the middle of 

 May, but in Lake Superior it is delayed till July. At this time the habits of the 

 fish render them comparatively defenceless ; they run in schools, depositing their 

 spawn along seams in rocky ledges as has been observed at the head of the 

 Niagara River, the females followed by the males, and both rolling over and over 

 on the bottom, and then suddenly leaping from the water and falling back with a 

 splash. They can often be successfully gaff'ed, or taken by hauling a grapnel 

 hook along the bottom — a method which must wound many fish which after- 

 wards escape; finally they are sometimes speared even in comparatively deep 

 water (25 to 30 feet) by Indians, by means of a long spear with detachable handle, 

 the iron of which has a line fastened to it. 



The eggs are of large size (one-ninth of an inch in diameter) and very numerous 

 (from one to two millions in a large fish). Comparatively few of these can meet 

 with the necessary conditions for their successful development, as the adults are 

 not met with in the numbers which might be anticipated. 



A comparatively short time — four to five days — suflfices for the hatching 

 process, the embryos escaping at the end of this period. 



Nothing is known of the food of the embryo fish, but it is undoubtedly 

 formed of minute forms of life which afterwards give place to the shell-fish 

 {Physa, Planorhis, Limnoea, Valvata, etc.) on which the adult feeds. 



Unlike the Sturgeons, the bony Ganoids are utterly worthless as food, but 

 as before remarked, they have a high claim to scientific interest. They approach 

 the ordinary bony fishes in that the gill -cover has all the four bones, and the 

 branchiostegal rays. The air-bladder is almost lung-like in character and 

 accounts for the circumstance that the fish are able to live out of water for a very 

 considerable time, and are often to be seen leaping and snapping air. 



Externally the difierence between the Gar-Pikes and the Bowfins or Mud- 

 fishes is verv marked, for the enamelled coat of armour of the former is far more 

 unlike the scaly coat of an ordinary fish than is the skin of the latter, but in 

 their internal structure they oflfer a very close agreement. 



Three species of Bony Ganoids occur in Ontario, two Gar-pikes (Lepidosteus 

 osseus and L. platystotnus) and the Mudfish (Amia calva). 



The Gar-pikes have an elongated, almost cylindrical body covered with the 



