7 ° 
AMERICAN FISHES. 
its merits, I hesitate not to pronounce it the fish for the million. It is a 
native of our Western rivers and lakes, where it usually resorts to deep 
and sluggish waters; yet in several instances, where it has found its way 
into cold and rapid streams, and even small-sized brooks, by means of the 
constructing of canals or by the hand of man, it has adapted itself to the 
change, and in two or three years stocked to overflowing these new loca¬ 
tions. As a pan-fish, for the table, it is surpassed by few other fresh¬ 
water species. For endurance and rapidity of increase it is unequaled. 
* * * The Grass Bass is perfectly adapted to stocking ponds. It 
will thrive without care in very small ponds of sufficient depth. * * * 
It will in nowise interfere with the cultivation of any number of species, 
large or small, in the same waters. It will live harmoniously with all 
others, and while its structure and disposition restrain it from attacking 
any other but very small fry, its formidable armature of spinous rays in 
the dorsal and abdominal fins will guard it against attacks of even the 
voracious pike.” 
Closely related to the Strawberry Bass is the Crappie, Pomoxys annularis. 
It is the form almost universally called Crappie in the Mississippi Valley. 
Dr. Henshall has proposed that it shall be called the “Southern Crappie,” 
reserving the name “Northern Crappie ” for the Pomoxys sparoides .* It 
is not such an easy matter to change the popular names of fishes, however 
flexible may be the terminology of the ichthyologist. Strawberry Bass 
* American Angler, III, 167 
