THE PBRCH. 163 



The perch usually spawns about April, and during that and the 

 following month, may be said to be out of season. The quantity 

 of spawn the perch deposits is so great that if but one twentieth 

 part of it were to come to perfection, in the course of a few 

 years the largest waters would be insufficient to contain the num- 

 bers of perch it would produce. According to* Harmer, Bloch, and 

 Gmelin, there are 300,000 eggs in a perch of half a pound 

 weight, and Picot has counted 992,000 in a fish weighing about 

 a pound. t 



In large waters perch seldom take a bait well till the mild wea- 

 ther sets in, according to some, not until the mulberry tree buds; 

 but this is the very worst time of the whole for fishing for them, it 

 being about their spawning time : still from the effects of this they 

 recover much quicker than the trout and many other fishes. In 

 brooks and ditches I have found the perch bite freely enough in 

 warm weather during the months of February and March, as also 

 late in the autumn ; and in such places they may be taken in the 

 middle of a warm day all through the winter, at times it would 

 be hopeless to expect a nibble in the more open and extended 

 waters. The best times of the year however for perch fishing are 

 the months of July, August, and September, just in fact at the 

 time trout fishing begins to flag, during the whole of which period, 

 either with a minnow or a worm, you will where the waters are 

 well supplied with fish, rarely fail of obtaining sport. 



And now I take my final leave of the perch, observing by the 

 way that he is an excellent fish for the table ; the flesh being firm, 

 white, and of good flavour, bearing some resemblance to that of a 

 John Dony : added to which he is remarkably wholesome, as well 

 as easy of digestion. 



Daniel, in his Rural Sports, mentions a singular kind of de- 

 formed perch taken in Llyn Kaithlyn in Merionethshire, having 

 the back remarkably elevated and the tail distorted as if tightly 

 compressed with a cord. A very well executed engraving of 

 this fish together with that of a common perch, both kinds 

 being found in the same water, is dis played in the work above 

 alluded to. 



Griffith's Cuv. vol. p. 272. 

 t Ib. ib. 



