FISH IN FOREST STREAMS AND LAKES 



587 



interesting points on the breeding habits of this species, 

 which he very truly says "prefers still and clear waters. 

 In the spring of the year the female prepares herself a 

 circular nest by removing all reeds or other dead aquatic 

 plants from a chosen spot of a foot or more in diameter, 

 so as to leave bare the clean gravel or sand ; this she 

 excavates to the depth of three or four inches, and then 

 deposits her spawn, which she watches with the greatest 

 vigilance ; and it is curious to see how carefully she 

 guards this nest against all intruders. In every fish, 

 even those of her own species, she sees only an enemy, 

 and is restless and uneasy until she has driven it away 

 from her nursery. We often find groups of these nests 



being in shallow water, as Doctor Kirkland observes, 

 we may say this only holds true where there is no great 

 rise and fall of tide. For example, those who have 

 studied the breeding habits of the Common and Long- 

 eared Sunfishes (Fig. 6) in the Potomac, near Wash- 

 ington, know very well that, in such localities as the 

 inlet at Four Mile Run and similar places, the tide may 

 rise many feet; and that at high tides, where the sun- 

 fishes have built their nests close to the edge of the pond 

 or inlet in shallow water, these will often be far from 

 the shore and in comparatively deep water. So far as 

 known, all other species of our sunfishes of this and 

 closely allied species possess the same breeding-habits. 



WHERE WASHINGTON FISHED 



Figure 4. One of the finest rivers in which to fish for Black Bass is the Potomac River. The scene here shown is at Miller, Virginia, less 

 than a mile west of Mount Vernon. General Washington and his friends fished off this point more than a century before the little 

 boathouse was built there. 



placed near each other along the margin of the pond or 

 river that the fish inhabits, but always in very shallow 

 water; hence they are liable to be left dry in times of 

 great drought. These curious nests are most frequently 

 encircled by aquatic plants, but a large space is invari- 

 ably left open for the admission of light." 



The writer has seen these sunfishes breeding in many 

 waters in a number of the States east of the Mississippi, 

 and their habits in this respect vary considerably, 

 although essentially similar. Occasionally it will be 

 observed that the female fish, where the bottom is 

 pebbly, has the habit of pushing the pebbles away from 

 the area she has chosen for a nest, and in so doing 

 forms a circlet of them about the latter that causes it 

 to- appear more like a "nest." As to the latter always 



It may be of interest to the readers of American For- 

 estry to know that the beautiful Long-eared Sunfish 

 here shown in Figure 6 inhabited one of the large tanks 

 in "The Grotto" at the United States Fish Commission 

 Building in Washington as long ago as 1900. It is by no 

 means an easy matter to photograph active fishes like 

 this Long-eared Sunfish while it is swimming at large 

 in a tank containing three or four hundred gallons 

 of water. The day the photograph was taken was a 

 very warm and sultry one in July, and the lens of the 

 camera had to be focussed on some imaginary spot 

 near the center of the tank, with the hope that the 

 fish might come to rest there sooner or later as it swam 

 about its home. After waiting for an hour or more, 

 this actually happened, and an instantaneous exposure 



