PISHES OF COLORADO II3 



the fins a barred appearance, 5 to 7 rows on the soft dorsal and 7 to 9 rows on the 

 caudal; ventrals and anal but faintly marked. Males in breeding season with 

 the fins and head dark to almost black. 



This interesting little fish is one of the best known of the darters. Like the 

 other species of this subfamily, it feeds and is generally found on the bottom of 

 the stream. Here it moves rapidly about among the small stones, often using the 

 pectoral and ventral fins as supports by resting them on the bottom. When 

 disturbed it darts away or it may almost bury itself in fine sand which it stirs up 

 with the caudal fin. Although generally occurring in shallow, rapid streams or 

 in lakes, it was found to be rather abundant in a deep broad pool with a silt bottom, 

 back of a beaver dam on West Plum Creek. 



Colorado specimens. — University Museum: St. Vrain Creek, Longmont, October 17, 1903 

 (9 specimens, 40-70 mm.), C. Juday and D. W. Spangler, No. 39; Boulder Creek, Boulder, October, 

 1903 (s9 specimens, 20-60 mm.), C. Juday and J. Henderson, No. 35; Boulder Creek 6 miles east 

 of Boulder. July 25, 1912 (7 specimens, 55-60 mm.), M. M. Ellis, No. 408; West Plum Creek near 

 Castle Rock, June 8, 191 2 (13 specimens, 40-60 mm.), A. G. Vestal and M. M. Ellis, No. 409; 

 Stale Teachers' College Museum: Greeley, A. E. Beardsley. Reported very common at Greeley 

 before the advent of the sugar factories, by A. E. Beardsley. 



Order Loricati 

 The Rockfishes, Sea Robins and Sculpins 

 Scales present or wanting; body often with bony scales or plates; a bony 

 process extending across the cheek from below the eye to the preoperculum. 



Family COTTIDAE 

 The Sculpins 



Body rather elongate, more or less fusiform; head large, broad and depressed; 

 scales wanting in most species (some species are irregularly scaled above the lateral 

 line), skin often rough and covered with minute prickles; lateral line present and 

 prominent; third suborbital bone connected with the preoperculum by a bony stay; 

 air bladder usually wanting. 



The Sculpins are rather small fishes foimd in both fresh and salt waters, many 

 species living along the rocky coasts. Other forms inhabit rather deep water, as 

 the species of Triglopsis, the Deep-water Sculpins of the Great Lakes. The more 

 common fresh-water sculpins are species of the cold, rapidly moving brooks and 

 mountain streams with rock or gravel bottoms. The food of such sculpins as have 

 been studied shows the Cotlidae to be voracious carnivorous forms often quite 

 destructive to the eggs and young of other fishes. Both individuals and species 

 are quite variable, and as Jordan and Evermann' state, "almost every species has 

 an individuality of its own, and among the marine forms it is necessary to recognize 



' BM. 47, VS. Nal. Mus., p. 1880, i8g8. 



