FISHERIES, GAME AND FORESTS. 



205 



tion No. 14). We have also found pieces of adult lampreys that had been partially- 

 devoured, not only on the banks near the spawning beds, but also some distance from 

 the creek banks. 



2. Birds. The predaceous birds, hawks and owls, take lampreys from the spawning 

 beds, as the following evidences show. On May 25, 1899, we found, on a stump near 

 Cayuga Lake Inlet, a piece of skin, masses of eggs and fresh blood of a lamprey that 

 had evidently been eaten by a bird of prey. On June 2 we found, on a spawning bed 

 on the Pierson farm, a lacerated and bleeding lamprey, through whose freshly cut sides 



NOS. 5 and 6. — HEADS OF BROOK LAMPREY. 



-HEAD OF BROOK LAMPREY. 

 (BACK VIEW.) 



the eggs were oozing from two holes, and another gash indicated the work of claws 

 that were too sharp to hold their intended victim. 



On April 19, 1898, Mr. Spicer, my assistant, shot a little green heron {Ardea 

 virescens), in which was found the body of a Brook Lamprey. The tracks of herons 

 and bitterns, as well as of the true shore birds, are very common in the mud along the 

 banks of the stream inhabited by lampreys (see illustration No. 7), and shore birds 

 and waders are common inhabitants of those portions of the stream where the 

 lampreys occur. In Illinois we have been able to determine the abundance of fishes 

 in a pond before seining it by observing the unusual numbers of piscivorous birds 

 to be seen near it. We have found several adult lampreys with cuts or marks that 

 were undoubtedly made by the spear-like bill of the great blue heron [Ardea herodias). 



