Snyder. — Netting of Coarse Fish. 205 



had at Cape Vincent. A few miles from the station there 

 is a depression on an island that fills up with water during 

 the early spring forming a pond of one or more acres. In 

 the late summer this pond dries up and weeds and grasses 

 grow all over the pond bed. Some years ago in May the 

 writer put 100,000 yellow perch fry in this temporary pond 

 intending to remove them later before the pond dried up. 

 At the time the perch were introduced the pond was simply 

 teeming with minute aquatic animal life. By the middle of 

 June these baby perch ranged from half an inch to one 

 inch in length averaging about three fourths of an inch in 

 length. They were plump and well rounded and it seemed 

 that every one had survived but by that time they had 

 exterminated the food in the pond. A week later they were 

 emaciated and turned cannibals and in a few days they 

 actually cut their numbers down to about twenty thousand. 

 Hundreds and hundreds of these perch were seen eating 

 their weaker brothers. This was about the time with us 

 when bass fry were just beginning to take food. The 

 question arises what possible chance would bass fry have 

 had in that pond at that time? It is true this was a pond 

 in which conditions were intensified but in open waters of 

 the lake and river teeming with millions of perch, pickerel, 

 pike, bullheads, sunfishes, carp, suckers, etc., where each 

 spring these fish deposit untold millions of eggs and later 

 where the shore line and bays teem with hordes of their 

 young before bass fry need food isn't there something of 

 this same tragedy effected? What chance have bass fry 

 where these conditions exist? The writer has seen myriads 

 of baby perch, bullheads, sunfishes, etc., along the lake shore 

 and in the shallow waters of the lake indentations prior to 

 the advent of bass fry and it seemed to him that these 

 myriads of little perch and other fishes must surely seri- 

 ously cut down the food supply available for baby bass. We 

 all know the cannibalistic tragedies that take place when 

 baby bass get hungry. It has been quite a few years since 

 the writer handled bass in ponds and doubtless many care- 

 ful observations and much progress has been made in pond 

 work since then but his observations led him to believe that 

 scarcity of food was the one biggest cause of loss of bass 

 fry in ponds. May not the same thing be true of bass fry in 

 the open water of lakes and rivers? If this is true then 

 will taking out coarse brood fish in the early spring before 

 they spawn conserve food for bass fry? At any rate the 

 writer feels that someone having the necessary training and 

 experience should delve into this, that we may have some- 

 thing authentic on which to base our judgments. 



