488 Roosnrlt Wild Life Annals 



insects, while mites, crawfish, amphipods, cladocerans, snails, sponges, and plants 

 including algae made up most of the remainder. DeRyke ('22) reports on 

 J'.hRgills he collected in Winona Lake, Indiana. His summary (pp. 33, 37) shows 

 that 143 fish were studied, their length about 3^-6 inches. Entomostracans and 

 chironomid larvae were the chief food material taken from specimens up to about 

 five inches long. Larger fish showed a more varied diet of aquatic insects, hydrach- 

 nids, worms, snails, and vegetable material. Fish eggs constituted a considerable 

 part of the stomach contents of the Bluegills. In three of eight fish examined from 

 Douglas Lake, Reighard ('15, p. 233) found chiefly aquatic plants, among which 

 were recognized parts of Chara, Elodca, and some that appeared to be Potamogcton 

 and Water Milfoil. Some insects, hydrachnids, and ostracods made up the animal 

 food. Reighard concludes as Forbes did that plants form a normal part of the 

 food and are not taken in accidentally with animal matter. ^Marshall and Gilbert 

 ('05, p. 518) found plant food, CcratophyUum, in nine of twenty fish examined, 

 together with other material such as plankton, insect larvae, gammarids, leeches, 

 and snails. Moore ('20, p. 17) gives the food of advanced fry and fingerling 

 Bluegills from certain ponds at Fairport, Iowa, as cladocerans, copepods, ostra- 

 cods, chironomids, and damselfly and May-fly nymphs. Wilson ('20, pp. 226 and 

 227) found both young and adults feeding on Odonata nymphs. Krecker ('19, p. 

 446) reported May-fly nymphs and filamentous algae in a speciiuen from a pond 

 near Sandusky, Ohio. Evermann and Clark ('20, Vol. i, pp. 297, 400) who 

 examined one hundred and fifty of these sunfishes found that the smaller ones 

 had eaten mostly plankton, Bosniiua, Cyclops, DapJmla, insects, and water mites ; 

 and the larger ones, many CJiironouius larvae and water jilants. In the fall they 

 have been known to consume Phiniatclla polymorpha, Rh'uhiria. and Chora. 



Distribution Records. Only one specimen (No. 365) in one collection was, 

 so far as we know, taken from Oneida Lake. It was reported caught in May, 1916, 

 and was given to us by H. N. Coville, who had the fish market at lirewerton. 



Enemies and Disease. F'vermann and Clark ('20, Vol. i, p. 628) found siuall 

 Bluegills in the stomach of the Water Dog. A'cctiinis niaeiilosus. They note 

 (p. 400) that the species is quite free from animal parasites, probaljly due in part 

 to the fact that it does not prey on other fishes; but the Bluegill is a sensitive 

 fish and many are killed by water mold (p. 402). LeFevre and Curtis ('10, p. 

 624) list it as a fish quite susceptible to infestation by mussel glochidia and one 

 which will quickly succumb to infection. Marshall and Gilbert ('05, p. 518) 

 found that seventeen of thirty Bluegills they examined harbored parasites in the 

 form of cestodes, nematodes and Acanthocephala. Colbert ('16, pp. 34, 35) found 

 thirty beached specimens at Douglas Lake, in most of which the gill chambers 

 were infested with parasitic copepods. Wilson ('19, p. 231) found F.rf/asilits 

 centrarchidarim Wright on the gill filaments of specimens from Lake Alaxin- 

 kuckee; also Achthcrcs amhloplitis Kellicott on the gill arches. These two forms 

 were also found on Bluegills by Evermann and Clark ('20, Vol. i, p. 298), who 

 in addition record leeches, trematodes, cestodes and Acanthocephala as infesting this 

 species. Magath (Fisheries Service Bulletin No. 29. p. 9) found in the Bluegill 

 a parasitic trematode which has its larval stage in the Kingfisher (Ccryle alcoyon). 



