112 Bulletin 47, United States National Museum. 



Family XXXIII. AMIID.E. 



(THE BOWFINS.) 



Body oblong, compressed behind, terete anteriorly. Head subconical, 

 anteriorly bluntisb, slightly depressed, its superficial bones corrugated 

 and very hard, scarcely covered by skin. Snout short, rounded; lateral 

 margins of upper jaw formed by the maxillaries, which are divided by a 

 longitudinal suture. Jaws nearly even in front ; cleft of the mouth nearly 

 horizontal, extending beyond the small eye; lower jaw broad, U-shaped, 

 the rami well separated; between them a broad bony plate, with radiat- 

 ing striae, its posterior edge free; jaws each with an outer series of con- 

 ical teeth, behind which in the lower is a band of rasp-like teeth; bands 

 of small teeth on the vomer and pterygoids; palatines with a series of 

 larger, pointed teeth; premaxillaries not protractile; tongue thick, 

 scarcely free at tip. Nostrils well separated, the anterior with a short 

 barbel; suborbital very narrow; a bony plate covering the cheek, similar 

 to the plates on the top of the head; operculum with a broad dermal 

 border. Branchiostegals 10 to 12. No pseudobranchiae nor opercular 

 gill; no spiracle; gills 4, a slit behind the fourth; gill membranes not con- 

 nected, free from the isthmus. Two peculiar, long, lanceolate, obliquely 

 striate appendages on each side of the isthmus, projecting backward and 

 covered by the branchiostegal rays, the anterior wholly adnate to the 

 isthmus, t he posterior free behind. * Isthmus scaleless. Gill rakers stout- 

 ish, very short. Scales of moderate size, rather firm, cycloid, with a mem- 

 branous border. Lateral line present. Dorsal fin long and low, nearly 

 uniform; the posterior rays not much higher than the others; its inser- 

 tion in front of the middle line of the body, opposite the end of the pecto- 

 ral. Tail somewhat heterocercal (more so in the young), convex behind. 

 No fulcra. Anal fin short and low. Pectoral and ventral fins short and 

 rounded, the ventrals nearer anal than pectorals. Vertebrae amphicoalian 

 or double concave, as usual among fishes, none of them specially modified. 

 Abdominal and caudal parts of the vertebral column subequal. Air blad- 

 der cellular, bifid in front, lung-like, connected by a glottis with the 

 pharynx, and capable of assisting in respiration. Stomach with a blind 

 sac; no pyloric coeca. No clpsed oviduct. Intestine with a rudimentary 

 spiral valve. Fresh waters of the United States. A single species known 

 among living fishes. Several fossil genera are usually referred to this 

 family. (AMIIDJS, Giiuther, Cat., vm, 324-325.) 



67. AMI A, Linnaeus. 

 ( BOWFINS.) 



Amia,^ LlNN-ffiUS, Syst. Nat., Ed. xn, 1766, 500; (catoa), not of Gronow, 1763, which is a non 

 binomial name for Apogon. 



*See Wilder "On the Serrated Appendages of the Throat of Amia," Proc. Amer. Assoc. Adv 

 Sci., 1876, 259, for a discussion of these curious organs. 



flf the nonbinomial generic names of Gronow are to be recognized, the name Amia must be 

 transferred to Apogon and the present genus must be called Amiatus. The date of Gronow's work 

 lies between that of the tenth edition (1758), of Linnaeus, Systema Naturae, and that of the twelfth 

 (1766). The character of Gronow's work is essentially pre-Linnamn, and it contains no reference 

 to the Linnsean system. It seems to us that the genera of nonbinomial writers should not be 

 given precedence over those of the binomial system. 



