FISH. 253 



without once leaving tlie nest. Finally he returned from one of his 

 trips in company with a fish a trifle shorter than himself and differing 

 in color in that the back was a lighter brown and the body was banded. 

 In the lighter colored bands, one could distinguish golden or orange- 

 colored scales mingled with others of a lighter shade. Upon entering 

 the nest, the newcomer, a female, came a little in advance and to all 

 appearances freely entered the nest. When once in the nest, she 

 avoided the owner for a time, dodging this way and that, but after 

 a few seconds she allowed him to conie abreast. In this position 

 they circled about for a few seconds, keeping the axis of their bodies 

 parallel and stroking in unison. Finally the female began to vary 

 her motion by rotating or turning her body so as to lay almost com- 

 pletely on her side, recovering her original upright position by a 

 quick stroke to resmiie her movement about the nest. I counted 

 eleven such circles in a minute, including the movements associated 

 with the turning of the body upon its side and the recovery of the 

 upright position. During this entire process, the male retained an 

 upright position in close proximity to the ventral surface of the fe- 

 male, the ventral surfaces of the two being very near together at the 

 time when the female was in a horizontal position. At the time that 

 the female made the quick motion of the tail that returned her to 

 the upright position, a little cloud of sperm intermixed with eggs 

 could be obserA^ed streaming in a general direction past the male 

 and toward the bottom. The spawning took place close to the bot- 

 tom where weeds and roots were present, and the body of the female 

 seemed actually to strike them at the time of the sudden movement. 



Spawning was continued from eignt to ten minutes (the actual 

 time occupied was observed for five minutes and the remainder esti- 

 mated) with only an occasional intermittance of a few seconds. At 

 the time, towards the last of the interval, when the male was dis- 

 turbed, the iemale remained rather c[uiet and exhibited every mark 

 of fatigue, such as the rapid movement of the opercular and sluggish- 

 ness of other parts of the body. At intervals, especially towards 

 the last, the female would appear to avoid the male and he would 

 bunt into her side above the ventral fins. These bunts were followed 

 in every case by spawning which extended over an appreciable time. 

 At the end, the male made a bunt at the female and she quickly left 

 the nest, pursued by him. 



37. Micropterus dolomieu Lacepede. Large-mouthed black bass. 

 — Generally not abundant but somewhat more common locally. 

 Specimens were taken in Orr's fish-trap, and in the upper and lower 

 parts of the Pigeon River. Recorded from Saginaw Bay by Cope 

 (1865, 83) under the name of Micropterus fasciaius Gill. 



