112 
Food of the Young. 
The smallest of nineteen specimens studied, was one inch i 
length—taken in July, in a prairie.pond near Normal. Ninety-fiv 
per cent. of its food was Cyclops and three per cent. daphnids. 
The trifling remainder consisted of a Corixa just hatched, and a 
Chironomus larva. i 
Nine specimens, ranging from one to two and a fourth inches in 
length, vary so little in food that it is not worth while to treat them 
separately. These were taken from various ponds, streams and) 
Jakes of Central Illinois. Their food was distributed quite gener- 
ally through the various orders of insects and crustaceans accessi-. 
ble to them, showing the indifferent appetite of this fish and the 
‘general effectiveness of its collecting apparatus. . bs 
Larve of Chironomus, Dytiscide, Staphylinidz, Corixas, ephell 
merid larve, Decapoda, Isopoda, Cladocera, cyprids and Copepoda 
were all found in considerable quantities in the food of these spec- 
imens. As usual, the most important insects were Corixas and, 
May-flies,—sixteen per cent. of the former and twenty-nine per 
cent. of the latter. About eight per cent. of the food was Cladocera 
(Daphnia, Simocephalus, Pleuroxus, Chydorus). . / 
Food of the Adult. 
The eight adults, from Northern and Southern Illinois, differed 
from the young in the disappearance of Entomostraca from the 
food, the larger size of the insects taken, and the appearance of 
fishes and crawfishes. 4 
Among the insects were a large Hydrophilus unknown to me, but 
nearly as large as H. triangularis, the larva of Corydalis cornutus, 
of Libellula and of some ephemerid. The fishes composed about 
thirty-six per cent. of the food. The only recognizable specimens’ 
were a small cyprinoid and a young buffalo-fish (Ichthyobus bubalus). 
Crawfishes and the river shrimp (Palamonetes) had been eaten by 
two of the specimens. ’ * / 
Lepiopomus pauLinus, Mit. Common Sunrisu. : 
This abuntlant, hardy and voracious species is found throughout 
the State, and may be regarded as the typical sunfish. It is most 
plentiful in thé larger rivers in Central Illinois, being replaced in” 
ponds by Apomotis cyanellus. 
i 
iy 
Consistently with its wide range and varied habitat, it is a gen-) 
eral feeder for a sunfish,—peculiar only in the fact: of its strictly 
non-predaceous character. Of forty-five specimens examined, only 
one had eaten a fish, and that one only a single small darter. i 
Undifferentiated Centrarchida.—lI introduce here the food of six 
specimens of this family which were too small for determination. 
They were too deep for Micropterus, and as they had but three 
anal spines, could not have been Ambloplites or Pomoxys. They 
