Read Online Textbook Enchanted Ventures Belles of Broad Street Book 4 Ak Landow Ebook All Chapter PDF
Read Online Textbook Enchanted Ventures Belles of Broad Street Book 4 Ak Landow Ebook All Chapter PDF
FOOTNOTES:
[32] See Nature Reader, No. 1, Lesson 8.
LESSON XLIV.
FRY AND SCHOOL.
A fish comes from an egg, as a bird does. There are one or two
kinds that are born as little live fishes. But the rule is that the fishes
hatch out of tiny eggs. The mother fish drops these eggs in the
water, or carefully lays them in some place which she prepares for
them.
A CURIOUS CRADLE.
After they are laid, these eggs are called spawn. Before they are
laid, they lie in a solid mass together. There are many thousands of
them in each mass, and they are then called roe. I have told you of
the wonderful number of eggs laid by insects. But fish surpass even
the insects in the number of eggs.
These eggs are subject to very many dangers. Fish, crabs, and
water-fowls eat them. The waves may dash them ashore, and so
they will be dried up. Therefore it is needful that there should be a
great many, so that after all disasters a large number may hatch.
The eggs of fish are of a pearly white, or a cream color. They are
covered with a kind of glue, so that they stick together. They also
stick to weeds, or rock, or sand, where they are laid.
There are very few fish that carry their eggs about with them, after
they are laid. The fish presses its body against the eggs, which stick
to it, and are carried about, until they hatch. You have read of the
crab which took care of its eggs in this way.[33]
As the little fish grows within the egg, the soft skin-like case
becomes very thin. When the time comes for hatching, the little fish
breaks the case, and comes out. As a general rule, the little fish, just
out of the egg, looks and acts like the parent fish. But there are some
that change much between their first and their full-grown states.
Let us now look at some curious fish eggs and fish nests. Of all the
fin family, the dog-fish has the most curious cradle for its young. The
egg-case of the dog-fish is a horny bag, or purse. It is of a gray or
blackish color, about an inch wide, and two inches long. At each of
the four corners, it has a long, stiff, curly stem.
The mother dog-fish swims near the shore to lay her eggs. She
selects a weed, branch, or piece of tree, lying in the water. To this
she ties her egg-cases by means of their long stems, or strings. She
does this by swimming round and round the twig to which she means
to fasten the case. As she drops the case in the water, she ties it, or
binds it, by drawing with her the curly ends, as she swims, about the
branch.
She lays a number of these purses in a place. Then she swims off
and leaves them. It is lucky that she does, for if she stayed near
them, she would eat the little fish as soon as they came out!
I have seen a dog-fish tying its eggs to a branch lying under water,
and it was a queer sight. When the baby fish has grown large
enough to leave the case, it makes a little opening on one end, and
creeps out.
The skate, that is a cousin of the dog-fish, lays a case much like this.
But the case of the skate is of a shape more nearly square. It has
four sharp, curved horns, not long, curly ends; and the little skate
comes out of a hole in the middle, never at the end.
Another sea-fish, the mackerel, has no such protection for its eggs. It
drops thousands of them on the water, and they look like tiny pearl
beads. They sink to the bottom. As they are sticky, they cling
together, and to the sand, until they hatch.
That prettiest of fish, the trout, which lives in so many clear, shady
streams, where there are deep, quiet pools to bask in, is very careful
of her eggs. The mother trout sinks to the bottom of some clean
stream, and selects a nice sandy place. Then, with her tail, she fans
out all the coarse sand and gravel. If there are larger bits of pebble,
she carries them off in her mouth.
When she has made a nice smooth little nest, like a cup, she drops
her eggs into it. Then she covers them lightly with gravel, so that
they will not be floated away. When she has finished one nest, she
swims off to make another.
The black bass of our lakes and ponds makes a smooth bed for its
eggs. It prepares this bed in the shadow of a stone or sunken log.
Several bass will go together, and select and clear out such a bed.
Then they will lay their eggs there, and for days, until the eggs hatch,
will swim about near, to keep watch over them. Eels, cat-fish, perch,
and suckers, come to eat these eggs, and the big bass drive them
away.
The pretty perch does not take such care as this of her eggs. She
drops them in long chains, among grasses, and leaves of water-
plants, at the edge of the pond. When the yellow cowslips are in
bloom, you can find these eggs among the water-plants, like strings
of fairy beads.
When the baby perch come from the eggs, they are very nimble, and
begin at once to eat. When they are no longer than the nail of your
little finger, it is funny to see them in the water, darting after the living
atoms that serve them for food.
They see and know these tiny things in the water, and pounce upon
them with wide-open mouths.
The little fish, from the time they are out of the egg, until they are
about half grown, are called fry. Some fish, as the salmon, get
different names at different periods of their growth. A great many fish
together are called a school. Thousands of fish will come leaping,
rolling, and tumbling along in the water, and we say it is a school of
fish.
FOOTNOTES:
[33] Nature Reader, No. 1, Lesson 3.
LESSON XLV.
SCALES AND TEETH.
I told you that most fish had scales, and that these scales clothed
them in a gleaming, flexible suit of armor. Most of the beautiful color
of fish is found upon their scales. Many of the scales are iris or
rainbow hued. That is, they have the gleam of many colors,
according as the light strikes them. Have you not seen such colored
light in a glass prism?
The scales of different fish vary in shape, size, color, and hardness.
In general, they are horny like your finger nail, but thinner. Their
shape is nearly round, much like a rose petal. They are fastened by
the smaller edge to the skin of the fish. Then each scale laps over
the next one, and so on.
Scales are always so set that they turn or lap, from the head toward
the tail. In the middle of each scale, on the lateral or side line of the
fish, is a little groove or canal. It runs in the direction of a line from
head to tail. Let us see what it is for.
Have you noticed how slippery fishes are? Is it not hard to hold
them? If you rub your finger hard down their bodies, you rub off a
quantity of slime, or stuff like glue, or thin paste. This glue-like stuff is
made near the mouth of the fish. It is supplied to the scales by little
tubes near the mouth. It runs through that little canal in each scale in
a line upon the side of the fish.
This slimy stuff helps the fish to slide easily through the water. It
keeps the scales limber and healthy. It keeps the body supple. It
helps the fish to slip away from creatures that seize it. Also, I am
sure, it helps the fish to slide easily down the throats of birds,
animals, or fish that capture it!
The fact that the scales all lie turned from the head to the tail of the
fish, also makes it easy for birds or other fish to swallow it. But if a
fish is partly swallowed, it cannot be readily cast out, for its scales
rising, make a rough surface, and hinder it. I suppose that was why
the alwife duck I told you of could not get the partly swallowed fish
out of her throat.
Each kind of fish has its own especial shape and color of scales.
Some are pointed, some are rounded, some are flat, some are
curved, some are three-cornered. Some fish have no scales. Some
have such tiny ones that you will not notice them unless you look
sharp. Some fish, as the sturgeon, have great bony plates, like large
limpet shells, laid in lines up and down the body.
Fish not only have their own especial shape of scales, but their
especial color, and such colors have their especial place on the fish.
One flat, brown fish has all the under side of its body white, but spots
of red, like sealing wax, are laid all over the brown side, as if you had
dropped red wax upon it.
When you see a smoked and salted herring hung up for sale, you
are not likely to guess what a beautiful thing it was, when living in its
water home. It had a coat of blue, green, and silver, and gem-like
eyes. The eye of a dead fish is sunken and dull. The eye of a living
fish is full, and gleaming with light.
There is a little fish called a wrasse which looks as if made out of a
rainbow. It is dressed in bright blue, gold, bronze, and white.
The red bream is of a fine rose-red color, with silver sides. Its
luminous eyes are set in golden rings. The perch has dark, shining
bands on its silver coat, and it has gay, red fins. The gray mullet is a
quaker fish, trim, grave, quiet in its style, but lovely in its shape and
in the rainbow lights along parts of its body.
Once I saw in the water a fish called a gurnard. He seemed to have
borrowed a sunset to dress himself in. His scales were deep red and
bronze. There was a vivid blue on the edges of his fins. The fins
were in shape and coloring like a butterfly’s wings.
I never saw a boy who did not think that a trout was one of the
prettiest things ever made. Very much of the beauty of fishes lies in
the wonderful scales.
But you must examine scales for yourselves. If you have a
microscope to look at them with, you will be full of delight and
surprise at what you see. Once I looked through a very powerful
microscope, and thought I was looking at a lump of half-melted gold
set full of fine jewels. But it was the scale of a fish.
I will now leave the scales, and tell you a little about the teeth of fish.
Fish have a great many teeth. Their mouths are for the most part
hard and horny, and so covered with teeth that it is not likely that
they have very much sense of taste. Still there are some kinds of fish
that are almost, if not quite, toothless.
If you open the mouth of a sea-trout you will find that it is set entirely
round, with sharp, strong teeth. Then if you stretch the mouth open
and look into it, you will see that there is another row of teeth set all
round a bone inside the upper jaw. Look still farther in, and you will
see a row of teeth on the middle bone in the roof of the mouth. Look
still beyond, and you will see a row of teeth on each side of the
tongue.
Some fish, besides all these teeth, have the tongue quite covered
with teeth. Others, that eat vegetables, have little fine teeth all down
the sides of the throat. The French call such teeth as these, “teeth in
the velvet.” Some fish have the entire mouth and throat lined with
teeth.
These teeth may all be alike, not some “double” and some “single”
as you have. But sometimes fish have teeth of different patterns. The
most common form of teeth in fish that live on fish or other animal
food, is that of a slim cone, bent a little inward to hold firmly the fish
caught, so that it cannot slip away.
The fish that feed on weeds have short, roundish teeth with a flat
top, to make a good mill with which to grind or crush their food. Fish
that eat insects do not need such large teeth. They have a great
number of little teeth almost as fine as hairs. Rows of these teeth
look like a little brush.
Some fish are said to have “mill” teeth, as the carp, because their
large flat teeth roll upon each other like the stones of a mill grinding
grain.
The ray fish, that feed on crabs, shell-fish, and flat fish, need very
strong teeth for crushing such food. If you should look into their
mouths, you would see that they are made like a mill, and the upper
and under teeth roll against each other and crush fine all that is
between them. By looking at the mouth of fish and examining its
teeth, you can find out what kind of food it used, just as by looking at
the beak and claws of a bird, you can tell what were its habits and
food.
Some fish have the inside of the stomach thick and furrowed, very
like the gizzard of a fowl. This is to aid in cutting or grinding up the
food. The teeth of a carp have much the appearance of the teeth of
sheep and cows, only they are much smaller. They work against a
plate of gristle in the roof of the mouth and reduce the food to pulp.
The strong, sharp teeth of fish are used not only for eating their food,
but for biting and fighting other fish. Two great salmon have been
known to fight until one was killed. The dead one was found to be
badly wounded and torn by the teeth of its enemy.
Pike have very sharp, strong teeth, and a big pike has been known
to seize hold of the foot or nose of a dog, fox, or other animal, that
came to the water’s edge to drink.
The mouth of a dog-fish is set back on the under side of the head.
This mouth has a row of strong, sharp teeth all round it. When the
fish seizes its prey or its enemy with its teeth, it whirls itself over, and
this action enables it to tear out a large piece of the flesh held by its
teeth.
LESSON XLVI.
BIG AND LITTLE BROTHERS.
Yesterday, as I was going along the street, I saw a large globe full of
tiny fish. They were from one to two inches long. I stopped to
examine them. They were sticklebacks. You must know that little Mr.
Stickleback is a very pretty and curious fellow, and well worth buying.