220 AMERICAN FISHES. 



ACANTHOPTERYGII. LABRID^E. 



THE TAUTOG. 



The Black-Fish of New York. Tautoga Americana ; DeKay. 



THIS, like all the fishes last described, is rather a general favorite 

 among both sportsmen and epicures, though I confess my own opinion 

 to be that he is generally overrated in both capacities. As a game 

 fish he is a dead, loggy, heavy puller on the hook, offering little resist- 

 ance beyond the vis inertia and dead weight, and on the table his excel- 

 lence depends mainly on the cook. 



The color of the Black-Fish is indicated by his name, but varies con- 

 siderably from deep dull black to glossy blue black with metallic 

 reflections, and occasionally to dusky brown. 



His body is elongated and compressed, the outlines of the back 

 arched forward of the dorsal to the snout, straight posteriorly. The 

 lateral line concurrent with the back. The eyes are rather small, the 

 scales small, extending over the gill-covers, which are very large and 

 rounded. The lips are very thick and fleshy, the teeth stout. The 

 branchiostegous rays are five in number. 



The dorsal fin has seventeen low spinous rays, and ten soft rays, 

 the pectorals seventeen soft, the ventrals one spinous, five soft, the 

 anal three spinous and eight soft, the caudal fourteen soft branched 

 rays. 



The Tautog ranges only from the capes of the Chesapeake to Mas- 

 sachusetts Bay. He is readily taken with the hook baited with crabs, 

 clams, or other small shell-fish, from April until late in the autumn, 

 especially in the vicinity of rocks, reefs, hulls of sunken wrecks, or old 

 deserted docks, whero he finds food in abundance. It is well to bait 

 the ground largely for several days in advance of fishing for him.* 



* NOTE TO REVISED EDITION. I have recently learned that this fish, as well as 

 the Providence Whiting, is becoming common in Charleston, having, it is believed, 

 eKaoed from the car of a fishing-boat, and bred there. 



