216 FISH CULTURE 



gards, or affects to regard, tlie sucker as a 

 worthless fisli to be pursued and destroyed as 

 relentlessly as a potato bug. Those who seri- 

 iously take this view, do so on the ground that 

 it is destructive as a spawn-eater, and that it 

 is equally responsible with the "hog" fisher- 

 men and water-pollution for the depopulation 

 of trout-streams. A second division of human 

 kind considers the sucker as valueless for food 

 purposes — a fish with soft watery flesh and 

 numerous thorn-like bones. A third division, 

 nearly as large as the other two combined, does 

 not care how much trout-spawn a sucker may 

 eat, or of what sins it may be accused; and 

 pities the man, and considers him lacking in 

 taste, who belittles the food-qualities of the 

 sucker. The great majority of those who relish 

 the flesh of a well-cooked sucker or mullet, 

 boldly and without shame avow their prefer- 

 ence for it over any species of fish which swims 

 in fresh water. Few of them hesitate to affirm 

 that in the spring, while the water is yet cold, 

 the flesh of the sucker is firm and as palatable 

 as that of the brook-trout. 

 Experiments in propagating the sucker were 



