368 PRAIRIE AND FOREST. 



time varying in different waters on account of season 

 and position as to latitude. 



If I may judge from the quantity of spawn the 

 female contains, they must be immensely prolific ; for 

 although the individual ovum is small, the roe is 

 very large in proportion to the bulk of the fish. 

 From my own observation and inquiries, I believe that 

 the spawn is from sixteen to twenty days in maturing, 

 after being deposited, which would give ample time for 

 its transportation across the Atlantic. I am further of 

 opinion that, indiscriminately, gravel or soil bottom is 

 selected on which to deposit the eggs ; for many of the 

 rivers and ponds in which I have captured this bass 

 flowed through, or were situated in deep bottom lands, 

 where a stone, even as large as a pebble, would be 

 difficult to" find. One pond in Southern Illinois I 

 particularly remember ; it covered a space of about 

 thirty acres, with an average depth of about three feet, 

 except in the southern extremity, where about eight 

 feet of water could be found. The bottom was entirely 

 composed of mud ; yet this pond swarmed with black 

 bass. Lake Champlain, the St. Lawrence, and Lake 

 Ontario (all who have visited these regions will 

 remember) are remarkably clear, with gravelly or 

 rocky bottoms, and each is a favourite haunt of this 

 fish. 



A friend, once a resident of the Isle of Skye, and a 

 well-known successful trout and salmon fisherman, 

 had a beautiful little lake, about ten acres in extent, 

 on his estate, not many miles from Toronto, which he 

 had stocked with black bass. In a few years their 

 numbers so much increased, that, in an hour or two, 

 trolling of an evening, a dozen or more could easily be 



