596 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER UF FISHERIES. 
stomachs of carp. Although it is stated that carp do go about over 
the spawning grounds of other fish and that they devour the spawn, 
with the exception of the little given in this paper relative to the 
white-fish, I do not recall a single case that has been reported upon 
where sufficient evidence has been adduced to show that such is really 
the case. The absurdity, for example, of an assertion which has 
recently been made by a writer in Forest and Stream (Chambers, 
1904) is obvious on the face of it. This partisan, after deprecating 
carp as a food fish and speaking of its habit of uprooting wild rice, 
adds: 
When the stomach of one caught upon the St. Clair Flats was opened last autumn, 
it was found to contain at least a double handful of rice, while as an ill stration of 
their destructiveness upon the spawn of other fish it may be mentioned that a gallon 
of spawn which had been devoured was taken from an 18-pounder—a weight which 
the carp frequently attains. 
The italicsare mine. The enthusiasm of partisanship has apparently 
led this observer into mistaking the spawn of the carp still in the 
ovary for that of some other fish which has been devoured, for it 
seems altogether out of the question that the stomach of one 18- 
pound carp should hold a gallon of spawn. A double handful of 
rice—wild, or Indian, rice (Z/zania), I suppose is meant—might well 
be present. The greatest amount of material which I have ever 
taken from the alimentary tract of a single carp would surely amount 
to much less than a pint, though I can not say that by distention it 
might not hold more. 
In my own researches at the St. Clair Flats, where the black bass 
were nesting in numbers, I spent much time in attempting to get direct 
evidence relating to the question at issue. Most of these observations 
were made in a small bay where the general water level in the deeper 
parts was about 8 to 5 feet. The bottom was composed of a fine clay, 
in most places rather light in color. Practically the only vegetation 
in this portion of the bay consisted of scattered groups of builrushes, 
each clump usually radiating in long lines from a common ces‘ter. 
The bass“ nests were in this open part of the bay, large circular ex »- 
vations, a few inches deep, and usually appearing much darker than 
their surroundings on account of the removal of the top soil. Asa 
rule they seemed to be placed near the lines of bulrushes, and were 
usually plainly distinguishable for a considerable distance on account 
of the clearness of the water. 
Conditions about the margin of the bay were entirely different. 
Here the shallow water, 1 to 2 feet or so deep, was thickly grown 
up with vegetation—flags, sedges, lily-pads, and was succeeded 
Py. wet, marshy, grass-covered ground. The patton here was largely 
al Peueee fee were the eae montied ieee bass (Micropterus auaniea) iene I find no eeare 
of the species made at the time. 
