Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: A LIST OF THE FISHES OF RHODE ISLAND. PLATES I To XII. BY HKNRT C. TRACT, A. M., BROWN mnVERBITT, PROVIDENCE, R. I. In the year 1898 the Commission of Inland Fisheries began a systematic examination of the physical and biological conditions of Narragansett Bay. The importance of the study of the fish fauna, as a part of this investigation, is obvious from a practical as well as from a scientific point of view. Such a knowledge of the fishes of Rhode Island waters as would be given by a thorough investigation of their distribution, times of occurrence, food, diseases, enemies, etc., would furnish a body of facts in themselves of very great value to the scientist, to the sportsman, and to the man practically interested in the commercial aspect of the fisheries; and, furthermore, it is only by the possession of such facts that important problems regarding the life history and life conditions of any species can be solved. Since the biological study of Rhode Island waters was begun, numerous isolated facts regarding the fishes of these waters have come into the possession of the Commission, some of which have been included from time to time in its annual reports. But the only systematic contribution to this investigation which has been published heretofore is the List of Fishes of Narragansett Bay, by Dr. H. C. Bumpus, which was contained in the report of the Commissioners of Inland Fisheries for 1900. This was a bare list of fishes, as the title indicates, with no notes or information regardingany of the species included. The report for 1901 contained a further contribution to this subject, under the title Additions to the List of Fishes Known to Inhabit Narragansett Bay, with Remarks on Rare Species Recently Caught. It is the purpose of this present paper to c…