86 
AMERICAN FISHES. 
year, they are constantly active. The Sheepshead feeds almost exclusively 
upon hard-shelled animals, mollusks and barnacles, and particularly on 
young oysters as they grow, attached to stones and sticks of wood. With 
its strong cutting and grinding teeth and powerful jaws it easily rips off 
thick bunches of shells, which are quickly triturated by the mill-stone 
like jaws. The anglers of the South take advantage of their knowledge 
of its habits. 
The Hon. William Elliot, in his “ Carolina Sports by Land and Water,” 
describes the peculiar methods employed in Port Royal Sound, South 
Carolina : 
“ They are exceedingly choice in their feeding, taking no other bait but 
shell-fish. Their favorite food is the young oyster, which, under the form 
of barnacles, they crush with their strong teeth. Of course they frequent 
those shores that abound with fallen trees. On the Florida coast they are 
taken in great quantities among the mangrove trees, whose roots growing 
in the salt water, are covered with barnacles. Formerly they were taken 
in considerable numbers among our various inlets. Wherever there were 
steep bluffs, from which large trees had fallen in the water, there they 
might confidently be sought. But as these lands have been cleared for the 
culture of sea-island cotton, the trees have disappeared, and with them the 
fish ; and it has been found necessary to renew their feeding grounds by 
artificial means. Logs of pine or oak are cut and framed into a sort of hut 
without a roof. It is floored and built up five or six feet high, then 
floated to the place desired, and sunk in eight feet of water by casting 
stones or live-oak timber within. As soon as the barnacles are formed, 
which will happen in a few weeks, the fish will begin to resort to the 
ground. It is sometimes requisite to do more before you can succeed in 
your wishes. The greatest enemies of this fish are the sharks and por¬ 
poises, which pursue them incessantly and destroy them, unless they can 
find secure hiding-places to which to retreat. Two of these pens, near each 
other, will furnish this protection ; and when that course is not adopted, 
piles driven near each other, quite surrounding the pen, will have the same 
effect. Your work complete, build a light staging by driving down four 
upright posts at a distance of fifteen feet from the pen, and then take your 
station on it, provided with a light, flexible, and strong cane reed, of 
twenty feet length, with fourteen feet of line attached, a strong hook and 
a light lead. Instead of dropping your line directly down and poising it 
occasionally from bottom, I prefer to throw the line out beyond the per¬ 
pendicular and let the head lie on the bottom. The Sheepshead is a shy 
fish, and takes the bait more confidently if it lies on the bottom. When 
he bites you perceive your rod dipping for the water; give a short, quick 
jerk, and then play him at your leisure. If the fish is large, and your jerk 
