172 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



US in when we entered to take the catch, for I saw one riding in 

 on the back of Dr Betten's neck. They were abundant outside 

 and very hungry, and during the hour or more required to secure 

 all the specimens that had appeared since a previous visit, we did 

 not fold and pin the flaps very carefully. During the month 

 about half a dozen beetles and about as many Hemiptera appeared 

 in the tent — usually single specimens : but as these were nonaquatic 

 forms such as were common in the surrounding woods, we have 

 not listed them in the table; they may have fallen into the stream 

 and been washed under the tent by the rapid current. 



The table gives the totals for each species or group of species. 

 These numbers were in some cases a great surprise to me. Note 

 for example, the number of specimens of the stone fly Leuctra. 

 Our biggest collections in museums contain usually but a few 

 specimens of this genus (if they have any at all). I had in 1905 

 accumulated in my own collection, after several years of collecting 

 stone flies, about a score of specimens. Here on the 12th of 

 August we took 150 specimens from the tent at one picking, and 

 it yielded 351 specimens in all. 



The grand total of 3844 specimens represents the yield in adult 

 insects of six feet square of this brook for a month. The mile of 

 this little stream that was of quite similar character certainly fur- 

 nishes a quantity of insects that, however weighed, measured, or 

 estimated, is very considerable. 



We deeply regretted and still regret that there remained no time 

 to us for investigating the ecological relations of these forms in 

 the brook bed ; but we believe that the facts of the table justify 

 the large amount of labor that was necessary to collect, preserve, 

 study and classify all these specimens. 



Studies on fish food 



Out of the weed patch by the hatchery wharf, where, as already 

 noted, we collected oftenest and where we knew the life conditions 

 best, we took a number of common fishes for the purpose of study- 

 ing their food. These belonged to the three species that appeared to 

 be most common there ; the common bullhead, A m e i u r u s 

 nebulosus ; the common sunfish, Eupomotis gibbosus 

 and the red-bellied minnow, Chrosomus erythrogaster. 

 Food determinations were made by the only reliable method yet 

 devised — the microscopic examination of the contents of the ali- 

 mentary canal. While the food of these three species has been 



