498 :S^ATUEAL HISTORY OP AQUATIC ANIMALS. 



North America, yet, strangely enough, the only allusion to it in colouial times is in the 'Eemon- 

 strance of New Netherland,' addressed by that colony to the States General in 1649. It was first 

 brought before the world of science in 1814, when Pi-ofessor Mitchill named it Salmo fontinalis, a 

 name which has become almost classical, and will be regretfully set aside for the more recent one, 

 Salvelmus fontinalis. 



DiSTBiEXJTiON. — The Speckled Trout has its home between latitudes 32Jo and 55°, in the lakes 

 and streams of the Atlantic watershed, near the sources of a few rivers flowing into the Mississippi 

 and the Gulf of Mexico, and in some of the southern affluents of Hudson's Bay. Its range is limited 

 by the western foothills of the Alleghanies, and nowhere extends more than three hundred miles 

 from the coast, except about the Great Lakes, in the northern tributaries of which Trout abound. 

 At the south they inhabit the headwaters of the Chattahoochee, in the southern spurs of the Georgia 

 Alleghanies, and tributaries of the Catawba in North Carolina. They also occur in the great 

 islands in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence — Anticosti, Prince Edward's, Cape Breton, and Newfound- 

 land. Temperature is of course the chief factor in determining the distribution of the species, and 

 since few observations have Ijeen made in the field, our conclusions must needs rest on a study of 

 the species in domestication, an instructive though not entirely reliable method. The experience 

 of Messrs. Green, Stone, and Ainsworth, indicates that Trout cannot thrive in water warmer than 

 68° Fahrenheit, though they have been known to liv^e in swift-running water at 75°. Pishes hatched 

 in artificial ponds may probably be inured to greater warmth than wild fishes can endure, and it is 

 doubtful whether the latter are often found in water warmer than 60° or 65°. At the Oquossoc 

 and Cold Spring hatching establishments the water ranges from 45° to 49° throughout the year. 

 Below 36° Trout are torpid and refuse to feed, and instances are on record of their reviving after 

 being frozen stiff. The remarkable variations in the habits of Trout in different regions are easier 

 to understand in the light pf these facts. The identity of the Canadian Sea Trout and the Brook 

 Trout is still denied by many, though the decision of competent authorities has settled the question 

 beyond doubt. This being admitted, let us compare the habits of the Sea Trout and the Salmon. 

 Both inhabit the ocean a part of the year; both ascend rivers to spawn; both change their sea- 

 garb of silvery gray for the gorgeous crimsons, purples, and bronzes of the pairing season. Some 

 Salmon, detained by barriers or by their own preference, become permanent denizens of itesh 

 water, where they reproduce their kind, relinquishing their gray coloration, and assuming a brighter 

 dress peculiar to themselvies. Does not the analogy still hold out, and do not our Brook Trout 

 correspond with the Land-locked Salmon? In the Long Island region Trout live in salt water in 

 the coldest months, when its temperature is below 60°. North of the Bay of Fundy, at the 

 entrance to which the water barely registers 50° in midsummer, they inhabit the ocean abundantly, 

 except at the spawning time. South of New York the coast reaches of the rivers appear to jiresent 

 a barrier of warm water which the Salmon do not seek to penetrate from without, and which 

 immures the Trout in their homes in the hill country as closely as would a mountain wall. 



When Trout have' no access to the sea they still contrive to avoid a change of temperature 

 with the seasons. In midsummer they lie in the bottoms of lakes cooled by springs, in the chan- 

 nels of streams, or in deep pools, lurking behind rocks and among roots. In spring and early 

 summer they feed industriously among the rapids. At the approach of cold weather in autumn 

 they hasten to the clear shallow water near the heads of the streamlets. It is at this time that 

 they deposit their eggs in little nests in the gravel which the mother-fish have shaped with careful 

 industry, fanning out the finer particles with their tails, and carrying the large ones in their 

 mouths. After the eggs are laid, the parent fish covers them with gravel, and proceeds to exca- 

 vate another nest. The same nests are said to be revisited by the schools year after year. 



