American Fisheries Society. 155 
ponds only confirms what has been stated before, namely, that 
the fish must be caught and placed in the ponds in the fall and 
not in the spring. A year ago last spring we were a little short 
of small-mouth breeders, so we took fifty adults from an inland 
lake and transferred them to a pond at Mill Creek. These fish 
did not mate nor show any indications of doing so, and not one 
of them spawned. Late in August I opened some of the females 
and found that most of the current crop of eggs had been cast 
and that the eggs remaining were very soft and apparently ready 
to slough away. Eggs for this season’s spawning were also in 
sight. The influence of a suspension of the spawning function 
through transporting in the spring, appears also to reach for- 
ward to the next season, for this same pond had only six pro- 
ductive beds during the season just closed. Involved in the 
propagation of small-mouth bass are many perplexities and un- 
certainties, but if there is any one feature concerning which a 
definite rule may be laid down, it is that the adults must be 
brought to their spawning quarters seven or eight months in ad- 
vance of the spawning season; this gives them time to become 
familiar with their suroundings and to get acquainted with each 
other before it is time to select their mates, build their nests, 
do their courting, get married and settle down to the business 
of multiplying and replenishing the waters. But if for any 
reason the union proves unfruitful, as is too often the case, and 
there is a tendency towards “race suicide,” then is your recource- 
ful man in charge ever ready with a convincing bunch of theories 
explaining it all and pointing out exactly what he proposes to 
do “next season.” On the other hand, if the bass haven’t spawned 
on Friday or the 13th of the month, and no one about the place 
has seen the new moon over his left shoulder, in short if all 
hoodoos have been sidetracked and the angel of good luck hovers 
gently o’er the scene, impelling the parent stock to cover them- 
selves with glory and their nests with a goodly bunch of fertile 
germs, then may the superintendent of a station smile serenely, 
throw a large and fragrant bouquet at himself, look wise and say, 
SL DON AT?’ 
