80 Book of the Black Bass. 



Food and Growth. 



After the young bass leave the spawning beds their food 

 at first consists of minute crustaceans; and later of insect 

 larvae; as they grow older and larger they devour worms, 

 tadpoles, small fish, etc. ; and, in later life, they vary their 

 diet with crawfish, frogs, mussels, and minnows, until, at- 

 taining a weight of two pounds, they will bolt any thing 

 from an angle-worm to a young musk-rat. 



Dr. S. A. Forbes, of the Illinois State Laboratory of 

 iSTatural History, was engaged, for a number of years, in 

 the study of the food of fishes and birds. His examinations 

 have been of the most careful and painstaking character. 

 The following results have been attained in reference to 

 the food of the black bass species.* 



Of the large-mouth black bass he examined the food of 

 fourteen adults and seventeen young of difEerent ages. The 

 first group, consisting of five specimens under one inch in 

 length, taken in June, July, and August of difEerent years, 

 showed that the entire food consisted of minute Crustacea, 

 all Eniomostraca, except in the case of a single fish, which . 

 showed seven per cent, of a very young amphipod. 



Six specimens, from one and a fourth inches to one and 

 a half inches long had eaten minute fishes (twenty-nine per 

 cent.) and insects (forty-six per cent.), the Crustacea drop- 

 ping to twenty-five per cent. The fishes eaten were not 

 large enough to determine the species. Two specimens be- 

 tween two and three inches long had eaten only insects. 

 Four specimens varying from three to three and one-half 

 inches in length had eaten nothing but insects and their 

 larvae. In the fourteen adults the food consisted of seven 



* The Food of Fishes. By S. A. Forbes. < Bulletin in. Ills. 

 State Lab. Nat. Hist., 18, 1880. 



