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Fallfish
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Length a foot to 18 inches. Abundant from the St. Lawrence basin to the James, east of the Alleghanies, in clear, swift streams, rock pools, below dams or falls, and in clear lakes; not found west of the Alleghanies.
The fallfish is much the largest of our eastern Cyprinidae, ranking with the western and some European forms. Though ordinarily not exceeding a foot or 15 inches in length, examples 18 inches or even longer are not rare. An example weighing 3 1/2 pounds has been recorded from Canadian waters, and several examples, each weighing 3 pounds, have been taken in the outlet of Lake Winnepesaukee. The veteran angler, William C. Harris, has taken a 2-pound fish of this species on the artificial fly from Lycoming Creek, Pennsylvania.
Many anglers who are familiar with the fallfish speak enthusiastically of its game qualities. The character of the waters in which it lives and the large size which it attains would readily suggest a minnow of unusual strength and gaminess.
The common names which this fish has received are numerous. The early Dutch settlers of New York called it corporaalen or corporal, and elsewhere it has been variously called chub, roach, silver chub, or wind-fish.
Thoreau says it is a "soft fish and tastes like brown paper, salted."
Head 4; depth 4; eye 4 1/2; D. 8; A. 8; scales 8-49-4, 18 to 22 before the dorsal; teeth 2, 5-4, 2, hooked, without grinding surface. Body oblong, robust, little compressed; head large, convex, the snout bluntly conic; mouth large, terminal, somewhat oblique, the lower jaw included; premaxillary below the level of the eye, the maxillary barely reaching front of orbit; eye moderate, rather high up and anterior; a small barbel on maxillary just above its extremity, not at its tip as in most American minnows, not always evident in the young; scales large, not much crowded anteriorly; dorsal fin somewhat behind middle of body, just behind ventrals, or midway between nostril and base of caudal. Colour, brilliant; steel-blue above, sides and belly silvery; males in spring with the belly and lower fins rosy or crimson; no spots on the fins.