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Striped Bass; Rockfish; Rock — Part 2
Images coming soon.
All the published works on fishing in America describe the various methods by which anglers capture this noble fish, and we shall not take space to repeat them here.
Colour, olivaceous, silvery, often brassy-tinged; sides paler, marked with about 7 or 8 continuous or somewhat interrupted blackish stripes, one of them along the lateral line; fins all pale.
The rockfish may be easily distinguished from the white bass, which it most resembles, by its having 2 patches of teeth on its tongue instead of 1, and in not having the back arched.
GENUS MORONE MITCHILL
The White Perches
This genus differs from Roccus chiefly in having the dorsal fins joined, the spines stronger, the anal rays III, 9 (instead of III, 12), the spines not graduated, the jaws subequal, and no teeth on base of tongue. In all other important respects the 2 genera agree.
The 2 known species are both American and both excellent game and food-fishes.
a. Body with 7 very distinct longitudinal black lines on side, each interrupted posteriorly.....interrupta
aa. Colour, green or olivaceous, and silvery, with faint streaks. americana
Yellow Bass
Morone interrupta Gill
This handsome fish is found in the lower Mississippi Valley and north to St. Louis and Cincinnati. It occurs also in certain waters in northern Indiana, notably Tippecanoe, Eagle, Pike, Center, and Chapman lakes in Kosciusko County, and in Eel River at Logansport, from which place we have recently examined a specimen. Thirty years ago they were very abundant in the small lakes mentioned, and even now a few are caught every year, usually best after a June freshet.
This species reaches a foot to 18 inches in length and a weight of 5 pounds. Those usually seen do not exceed 1 to 2 pounds, though examples of 3 pounds are not rare. It is a splendid game-fish, even superior to the black bass, in the opinion of some of its admirers; and as a pan-fish it takes very high rank.
Head 3; depth 2 2/3; snout 4 1/2; eye 4 1/2; D. X, 12; A. III, 9 or 10; scales 7-50 to 54-11. Body oblong-ovate, the back much arched; head depressed, the snout somewhat pointed, the anterior profile concave; eye large; preorbital finely serrate; mouth small, somewhat oblique, maxillary reaching middle of eye, about 3 in head, somewhat scaly; dorsal and anal spines stout.
Colour in life, brassy yellow, with about 7 very distinct black longitudinal lines, those below lateral line interrupted posteriorly, the posterior parts alternating with the anterior.