Bass, Pike, Perch, and OthersHenshall, James A. (James Alexander)
Science
Bass, Pike, Perch, and Others
Henshall, James A. (James Alexander)
Fishes; Fishing
It has an oblong, elliptical body, its depth being more than a third of
its length. The head is short, with a blunt snout and small mouth, and a
curved profile. There are well-developed incisor teeth in each jaw,
with peculiar horizontal bases. Its color is bluish-gray, with steely
lustre; the sides have numerous narrow, indistinct, yellowish or brassy
stripes, alternating with bluish ones; there is a pale stripe below the
eye, and a yellowish one above and below it; the fins are dull grayish.
The chub feeds on barnacles and other small mollusks, and is found
wherever they abound, sometimes in rather deep water. Its usual size is
six to ten inches, weighing from one to three or four pounds, but it
occasionally grows to fifteen or eighteen inches in length in favorable
locations. Its spawning habits have not been studied. It is an excellent
pan-fish. Light tackle is needed for the chub and pin-fish, both being
usually found together. The hook should be small but strong, with gimp
snell; Sproat hooks, No. 1 or 2, are very suitable. The best bait is
fiddler-crab or hermit-crab. It is quite a game little fish.
I was once staying for a few days' fishing at the Quarantine Station on
Mullet Key, in Tampa Bay. The station is built on piles in water twenty
feet deep. There was a trap-door in the floor of one of the rooms,
through which many kinds of fish could be seen swimming about in the
very clear water. These fishes could be readily taken with the hook or
the spear, as they were unable to see any one in the dark room above. I
was much interested watching the chub and sheepshead pinching off the
barnacles from the piles with their chisel-like teeth. A dozen could be
easily taken in as many minutes with fiddler bait, and the table was
kept well supplied with chub, which was the favorite food-fish during my
sojourn.
THE ANGEL-FISH
(_Chætodipterus faber_)
_Chætodipterus faber._ The Angel-fish. Body much elevated and
compressed, its outline nearly orbicular, the anterior profile
nearly vertical; head 3; depth 1 to 1-1/2; scales 60; D.
VIII-I, 20; A. III, 18; jaws about equal; no teeth on vomer or
palatines; teeth on jaws slender, somewhat movable; preopercle
finely serrate; two dorsal fins, somewhat connected; vertical
fins falcate in the adult; first soft ray of dorsal
filamentous; ventral fin with a large accessory scale.
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