Armed Bullhead; Pocket Fish. 129 



end of June, so spawning season evidently extends fully half 

 the year. Though with sweety taste and fairly good to eat, yet 

 they are rejected as food by the Thames fishers, save a very few 

 poor elderly people; but we are told that at Queenborough, 

 Wivenhoe and Tollesbury they are frequently used among the 

 fishermen's families paucity of flesh being said to be their 

 chief drawback. 



Fam. Cataphractl. A near relative of the foregoing, and 

 one of our very common small fishes, is the ARMED BULLHEAD 

 or POGGE (Agonus cataphractus) . By the Thames fishermen it 

 is known as Hardhead, sometimes as Miller's Thumb,* and 

 receives from them immediate despatch overboard as rubbish. 

 It has quite an old world form, with great broad head, tapering 

 body, clad entirely in a coat of mail in spiny rows. The 

 Pogge seems to prefer hard sandy ground, and feeds on minute 

 crustaceans. Females with eggs are got in January and 

 for several months afterwards. On 16th June, when with 

 shrimper, hauls were made near the West Oaze Buoy, when 

 these fish were brought up in amazing numbers some 50 of 

 them were measured, and there was a regular gradation of size 

 from 2} to 4J in. Such forms Toshf computes are over a year 

 old. Howsoever be it, these and younger stages are freely 

 devoured by other fishes. The Spaniards is another spot where 

 at times the Armed Bullhead congregate in hordes. Elsewhere 

 older fish are got scattered in fews, and they become scarce 

 above South end. Mr. Fitch has obtained specimens in the 

 Blackwater 5 to 5f in. long. There and in the. Crouch it is 

 abundant and only familiarly known by the name " Miller's 

 Thumb." A few 6 in. and over at intervals come up in the 

 trawl-net Thames mouth. 



Fam. Pediculati. The ANGLER (Lopliius piscatorius) is locally 

 known as the " Pocket Fish," but elsewhere goes by such fanciful 

 names as Sea Devil, Fishing-frog, Kettlemaw, &c. It is a common 



* The Pogpre is not to be confounded with the true Miller's Thumb (Cottug ffobio), 

 which inhabits our fresh-water streams. 



t Twelfth Ann. Rep. S. Fish. Board, (for 1603). 



