CHAPTER L 
THE ORDER OF SUCKERS, CARP, AND MINNOWS 
PLECTOSPOND YLI 
THE SUCKER FAMILY. 
C at-os-tom' i-dae- 
This huge Order contains 60 genera and 311 
species, divided into 4 Families. Of these 
Families, the Sucker Family is the most impor- 
tant. It contains about 70 species, all of which 
save two are habitants of North America. Be- 
sides the Suckers themselves the Family includes 
the buffalo fish, the red-horse and fresh-water 
“mullet.” These fishes have the mouth placed 
underneath the head, and fitted with very fleshy, 
tubular lips, well adapted for sucking food from 
the bottom. They have been specially formed 
to live upon mud bottoms, and in murky water, — - 
precisely the conditions that high-class fishes 
abhor. 
There are times when a sucker (or a carp) 
seems like a good fish for the table ; and that is 
when one is very fish-hungry, and there is no 
other kind of fish to be had. To my mind, the 
flavor of the flesh is either barely tolerable, or 
verging closely upon disagreeable. The very 
numerous and wholly unnecessary bones seem 
like a positive affront. Although these fishes 
are seldom eaten by choice, by the landlocked 
dwellers in the interior of our great continent, 
to whom clear streams and good fishes are only 
long-distance memories, the sucker, carp and 
bull-head are eaten with real relish, and a feeling 
of thankfulness that they are no worse. And 
after all, men who can eat musky squirrels, and 
call them “game,” ought to be pleased with 
suckers and carp. 
The Common Sucker , 1 Brook, or White 
Sucker, is qualified to represent a large section 
of this Family. In the home of this fish, ac- 
quaintance with it nearly always begins in the 
month of June, w r hen, if ever, come perfect days, 
and the annual spring “ run ” of Suckers, up river 
and creek to their spawning beds, brings them 
prominently into notice. 
I remember one wildly hilarious day of boy- 
hood, when a great run of Suckers came up Eagle 
Creek, Indiana, from the Ohio, via White River. 
Now Eagle Creek is a very beautiful stream, 
flowing over a fine bed of clear gravel and sand. 
Its waters are as clear as the sea, and 
the big sycamores that reach their long 
white arms across them are truly 
grand. All the young men and small 
boys turned out en masse, and rushed 
to a shallow, rock-bound channel 
above a big “ drift.” Each able-bodied 
“angler” was armed with a snare of 
soft brass wire loaded with enough 
lead to kill an elephant, and a pole 
that would have driven a real angler to a 
mad-house. 
The Suckers moved about restlessly in the 
swift current, and occasionally paused, head 
up-stream. That was the snarer’s only oppor- 
tunity; for the fish refused all baits. The heav- 
ily loaded snare was set as a hoop five inches in 
diameter, gently lowered ahead of the fish, and 
with a very steady hand and correct eye steered 
downward over the victim until it passed his 
pectoral fins. Then, at precisely the proper in- 
stant, steam was turned on, the erstwhile quiet 
fisherman became a raging demon of activity, 
and if the snare held just “so,” a 16-inch Sucker 
weighing 4 pounds would be yanked high in air 
by a human derrick, amid the shouts of a de- 
1 Ca-tos'to-mus com'mer-son-i. 
412 
