786 
SCANDINAVIAN FISHES. 
to Mela, occurs, though seldom, in the vicinity of 
Kuopio. 
The Asp, as we have mentioned, is a fish of marked 
predatory habits, resorting to vegetable food only by 
accident, or when reduced by necessity. It is there- 
fore lacking in the sociability of our other Cyprinoids, 
a feeling it evinces only in the spawning-season and 
perhaps during its winter sleep. “His name” (Germ. 
Proppe, Lat. rapax), writes Gesner, “is derived from 
his voracity, for he ranges the waters like a formidable 
pirate, to other fishes a no less dangerous, but rather a 
more destructive foe than the Sheat-fish or the Pike. 
In headlong chase of his flying victims, which in terror 
leap on dry land, he sometimes runs ashore himself.” 
Bleak and Smelt are its commonest prey; but it does 
not shrink from assailing larger fish or even water- 
rats, nor does it disdain smaller and lower animals, 
such as worms, mollusks, and the like. It is not very 
tenacious of life, dying soon on dry land. Its favourite 
haunts are clear lakes or gentle streams with clean, 
sandy or gravelly bottom. As long as the water is 
clear, it cunningly avoids all snares, and is difficult to 
take with net or seine; but a Minnow set on a trolling 
hook and cast enticingly before its nose is too tempting 
a bait to be resisted. When the water is thick, it may 
be more easily netted. Such are its habits in summer; 
but they assume a different aspect under the influence 
of sexual excitement. 
The spawning-season of the Asp begins early in 
spring, soon after the breaking up of the ice, in Swe- 
den in April or May. The males are then marked by 
the usual dermal eruption of small round tubercles on 
the head, the pectoral fins, and the dorsal scales back 
to the tail. The fish assemble in shoals, which ascend 
the rivers, or proceed to shallow parts of the lakes, 
where the roe is attached to stones or weeds, or simply 
deposited on the bottom. A middle-sized female con- 
tains, according to Benecke, 80,000 — 100,000 eggs. 
The large gravid female of which we give a figure, 
measured 75 cm. from the tip of the snout to the end 
of the caudal lobes, and when taken off Stockholm on 
the 22nd of April, 1886, had nearly the whole of the 
abdominal cavity under the air-bladder and forward to 
the diaphragm filled by the two ovaries with their three 
or four lobes. The eggs were about l 2 / 3 mm. in dia- 
meter, and their number was computed to be about 
300,000. Of the growth of the fry Norback states' 2 
that during the first year they attain a length of 9 cm., 
and Lilljeborg assumes specimens 15 cm. long, taken 
at the beginning of May, to be one year old. 
The flesh of the Asp is white and fat, but bony 
and difficult of digestion. It shows a tendency in pro- 
cess of boiling to separate into flakes (the muscular 
sections, myomeres ), which may be obviated, however, 
by putting it on the fire in cold water. Large and 
fleshy as the fish is, it is one of the most important 
Cyprinoids, and the head is considered a delicacy by 
many. Except during the spawning-season, however, 
no large catches of Asp are made in Sweden. Solitary 
specimens appear in the fishmarkets of Stockholm about 
Christmas; but the true season for Asp is from Febru- 
ary to June. The Asp is taken chiefly in nets or traps. 
Still it affords good sport to the angler, who should pre- 
fer a bait of live fish, though worms may also be used. 
Genus LEUCASPIUS'. 
Scales middle-sized and deciduous. Lateral line incomplete. Lower jaw distinctly projecting , with the point fitting 
into a shallow indentation at the tip of the snout. Lobes of the caudal fin pointed. Length of the base of the 
anal fin more than 10 % of the distance between this fin and the tip of the snout , and more than P/ 2 times the 
least depth of the tail. Beginning of the dorsal fin situated at the middle of the body or farther back, and the 
distance between it and the tip of the snout more them 86 % of that between the anal fin and the same point. 
An intermediate form between Aspius and Albur- 
nus, Leucaspius is nearly allied to the following sub- 
family. One of the most unmistakable signs of this is 
the relative position of the dorsal tin to the anal. In 
none of the preceding Leuciscines — except in young 
males of Phoxinus — have we found the distance between 
a Handl. Fislcev., F/skafu., p. 439. 
6 Hckl, Kn., 1. c.. p. 145. 
