Biological Survey — Oswego Watershed 47 



in either lake, but learned from reliable sources that they are 

 present in certain localities. However they do not succeed as well 

 as in Canandaigua and Owasco. 



The small-mouthed bass is confined mostly to water from five to 

 30 feet in depth. It prefers a hard bottom, especially a stony 

 bottom where its favorite food of crayfish can easily be found. In 

 the spawning' season they are found near the mouths of creeks and 

 on gravelly bottoms of moderate depth. 



The large-mouthed bass is a fish of the weedy bays and shallows 

 and consequently is found principally in such localities as Otisco 

 lake, the foot of Cayuga, in Dresden bay, and the shallows of 

 Keuka lake near Penn Yan and Branch/port. It first appeared in 

 Keuka only a few years ago. We took no large specimens in any 

 of the lakes but quantities of young ones. 



The sunfish also prefers the weedy bays. Although found in 

 all the lakes this species is decidedly less common than we expected 

 except in such localities as the foot of Cayuga. 



The rock bass is more generally distributed than the sunfish 

 and is found during the summer both on weedy and stony bottoms. 



The burbot, ling or eel-pout, as it is called on Canandaigua lake, 

 is mostly a fish of the deep water like the trout and whitefish. 

 Young burbot, however, were taken in the inlet of Canandaigua 

 as far up as the village of Naples in brook trout water. The main 

 catch of burbot, both in winter and summer, is in water varying 

 from 30 to 100 feet in depth. It is mostly confined to the bottom 

 and does not range as widely as the cisco and lake trout. In 

 winter it is taken in the Seneca river and must occur to some extent 

 in Cayuga lake. 



Food of Finger Lakes Fishes. — During our operations between 

 June 15 and September 15 about 2500 fish stomachs were examined. 

 Of these 1736 contained food and the contents were carefully 

 analyzed by Dr. Charles K. Sibley. In the accompanying tabula- 

 tion data have been reduced to a percentage basis to show the food 

 taken by each species (see Table 2). 



Remarks on the Food of Different Species. — Of our food 

 fishes it will be evident that the lake trout, pickerel and pike are 

 almost exclusively fish eaters; that the rainbow trout, whitefish, 

 yellow perch, pike-perch, rock bass, black bass, and burbot rely to 

 a considerable extent on a fish diet. Larval insects, besides being 

 a very important food of young fishes, are an important item in 

 the case of the cisco, whitefish, sucker, carp, bullhead, yellow perch, 

 pike-perch and black bass. Flying insects which are mostly species 

 which have dropped on the lake during their peregrinations, and 

 emerging midges and mayflies, are to a considerable extent, in early 

 summer at least, a food of the cisco, the whitefish, perch and all the 

 basses. Small crustaceans or scuds are an important article of 

 food with the sucker, carp, bullhead, yellow perch, rock bass and 

 cisco; but plankton erustaeea were food of adult fishes only in the 

 case of the alewife, the whitefish, the cisco and the smelt.* The 



* Food of two specimens only was observed. 



