The Wall-Eyed Pike, or Pike Perch.

BY THEODORE G. LANGGUTH.

The wall-eyed pike, or pike-perch, known also as salmon, jack salmon and wall eye, is one of the most valuable food fishes found in the Central States. Its range extends as far south as northern Georgia and Arkansas, and in the West it has been introduced in the lakes and streams of the Dakotas and Nebraska with good results.

This fish, in reality, is not a pike, but is classified as a true perch, being placed in the same family with the yellow, or ringed perch, a common and well known fish in the north, especially in the lakes. The pike-perch is taken in commercial quantities among the islands in the western end of Lake Erie, where it is classed according to three color varieties, yellow, gray and blue. The variation in color is no doubt contingent upon the age of the fish, or environment, as aside from the contrast in coloration, there apparently is no anatomical differentiation between the varieties. The yellow and gray varieties are largest in size, while the blue pike is smallest, usually not weighing more than a pound or two.

Those who are acquainted with the habits of the pike-perch know that it is a deep water fish. In the streams it inhabits deep holes at the foot of riffles, where it lies in wait for minnows that sport about in the shallows, and for crawfish, insects or other food that is carried near by the current.

As it is more or less nocturnal in its feeding habit a favorable time to fish for pike-perch is in the evening. Live minnows or small crawfish are the best live bait for them, but they are also often taken with a spoon hook, with wooden minnows, and at times, particularly on cloudy days with artificial flies, such as are used for black bass.

In the lakes this fish is generally found in water from ten to fifty feet deep, rarely in locations where vegetation is dense or

abundant. It seems best suited for waters that are cool, compartively clear, of good depth, with clay, sand, or gravelly bottom. Though a predatory fish, like the black bass and pickerel, the pikeperch in most waters probably destroys fewer desirable fishes than do they, owing to the fact that it inhabits deep water the greater part of the year.

Spawning takes place in early spring in shoal waters, on bars, or at the edge of deep water. Their small eggs, each about onetwelfth of an inch in diameter, are produced in great abundance, thirty to forty thousand to the pound weight of fish being a fair average. At the United States Fishery station at Put-in-Bay, Ohio, large numbers of pike-perch eggs are collected each year, the fish being obtained from the Lake Erie commercial fishermen as they are taken from the nets, and after being handled and stripped of spawn, returned to the fishermen. The eggs are delicate and must be handled with great care. They are comparatively light in weight, and on account of their buoyancy and adhesiveness it is necessary to hatch them in glass jars, through which a constant circulation of water is maintained. The boiling motion of the water in the jars prevents the eggs from massing, or adhering to each other.

The same style jar used in hatching the eggs of whitefish, shad, and grayling, will answer for hatching pike-perch eggs. Each of them has a capacity of about seven quarts. Water supplying the jars is conveyed from reservoir troughs or tanks. Brass cocks or faucets are fitted in the sides of the reservoir trough, six inches apart, in a row and are an inch or two from the bottom of the trough. The hatching jars are placed directly under the supply cocks so that when they are turned on, the water will fall in the center of the top opening of each jar. A piece of half inch rubber tubing is fitted over the outlet of each faucet or cock, the other end of the rubber tubing is slipped over a glass or metal tube that is suspended in the center of the hatching jar and extends almost to the bottom of it, the glass tube being held in position by an arm, or bracket that is fastened to the reservoir trough, or by an attachment on the top of the jar. When everything is in readiness the water is turned on, and the apparatus is tested to determine

whether there are any leaks or flaws in the rubber tubing or its connections. If there is a leakage, bubbles will appear in the glass feed tube, and this must be remedied, and all the air expelled from this tube before it is set in place in the jar. The eggs having been carefully placed in the jar only enough water is supplied to keep them in gentle, uniform movement. Where a large number of jars are being operated they are arranged in tiers, one above the other, constituting what is called a battery. A battery as used for hatching whitefish eggs, also eggs of pike-perch, consists of two sections, each one having several parallel rows, or tiers of jars. This simplifies hatching the eggs and collecting the fry, and economizes in the amount of water used and the space occupied. The water supplying the jars passes from the upper tier in section one across to the upper tier in section two by means of a transverse reservoir, or supply trough, and in like manner the water passes to and fro successively supplying each row of jars, falling the distance between the tiers in each passage, until it has passed through the last row of jars and is then received in a fry-collector tank on the floor. The jars stand on shelves, the upper tier together with the supply troughs, being at quite a height from the floor, considerably higher than a man's head. Screens of very fine wire cloth are so placed in the transverse supply troughs, that when the fry are hatching and pass out of the jars following the flow of the water they are not carried in turn through each row of jars, but pass directly with the overflow water into the fry-collecting tank on the floor. From this tank the fry are redistributed to other troughs or tanks in which they are retained until ready to be planted.

A battery, such as described, will operate anywhere from one hundred to two hundred or more hatching jars, and is in use only where work on an extensive scale is contemplated, and where a large supply of eggs is available annually. Pike-perch eggs are very small. About five hundred thousand can be handled in each hatching jar. Thus it will be seen that if only a few jars are successfully operated, the output will represent enormous figures.

Where the intention is to operate a comparatively small number of jars, various modifications of a typical battery construc