FISHES OF NEW YORK 517 



arger, the second rarely obsolete, anal fin always smaller than 

 ;he soft dorsal; ventral fins more or less close together; skull 

 larrow, the parietal region very strongly convex in cross- 

 section, supraoccipital crest very small or wanting; lower 

 jharyngeals very narrow; vertebrae 33 to 39, usually 15+21^=36; 

 pyloric caeca three or four; bones rather firm. Coloration 

 k'arious, often brilliant. As here understood, a very large genus 

 covering a great variety of forms. Many attempts at further 

 subdivision have been made. Intergradations of all sorts occur, 

 and the technical characters do not always indicate the real 

 [elationship. Many of the species are excessively variable, each 

 brook having its peculiar race. 



Subgenus OLicocEPHAiiUs Girard 



255 Etheostoma coeruleum Storer 



Blue Darter; Rainbow Darter 



Etheostoma coerulea Stoker, Proc. Bost. Soc. Nat. Hist. II, 47, 1845, Fox 



River, 111. 

 PoecilicJithys coeruleus Jordan & Gilbert, Bull. 16, U. S. Nat. Mus. 517, 



1883. 

 Etheostoma coeruleum Meek, Bull. U. S. F. C. 119, 131, 155, 1891; Bean, 



Fishes Penna. 125, 1893; Jordan & Evermann, Bull. 47, U. S. Nat, 



Mus. 1088, 1896. 



Body short, comparatively stout; head large; mouth moder- 

 ately large, the lower jaw included within the upper. The 

 maxilla extends to the front of the eye. The length of the head 

 is contained three and three fourth times in the total length 

 without the caudal, and the depth of the body four and one 

 fourth times. Five rows of scales above the lateral line, eight 

 rows below the lateral line, and 45 rows from head to base of 

 caudal, nape and breast generally scaleless. D. X, 12; A. II, 7. 



The body of the male is olivaceous with darker blotches on 

 the back, 12 bars of indigo blue running obliquely downward 

 and backward across the sides. The spaces between the bars 

 are orange, as are also the throat, breast and cheeks. The base 

 of the spinous dorsal is crimson, surmounted by orange and 

 margined with blue. The soft dorsal is orange, its base and 

 margin blue. In the female the blue and orange colors are 



