Excerpt from Special Appended Reports, 1900

Dr. Richardson (fauna Boreali Americana) is recorded to have said that 'the flesh of the fresh water cusk is firm, white, and of good flavour; the liver and roe are consi dered delicacies, when well-bruised and mixed with a little flour, the roe can be baked into very good biscuits, used in' the fur countries as tea bread.' Professor Brown Goode spoke of it as a very excellent fish, especially for boiling, though Dr. T. H. Bean pointed out that apart from the liver, the fish is 'not esteemed in the Great Lake region and northward, but in the rivers of Montana the burbot is in great favour.

Perhaps the name 'minnow' is more generally applied, or misapplied than any other common popular term in use. When it is remembered that the term 'minnow, may on scientific and popular grounds be justifiably applied to small species of Pimp hales, of which there are at least four kinds, of Leuciscus, twenty - two species of N otro pis, one hundred and three species of Fundulus, forty-one species; of Cyprinodon, eleven species of Gambusia, nine species, and of Gastrosteidae at least fourteen species or varieties, or a total of just over two hundred distinct varieties of small fishes, it can be imagined 'how much uncertainty and confusion is bound to arise when the name minnow instead of being confined to this somewhat numerous group of seven, genera, is indiscriminately applied to any small fish if of a minnow-like appearance, whether the young of a well-known large species, or the adult of some small species. Indeed in my own experience I have heard characterized as minnows the young of salmon (that is the parr stage) of black bass, of pike, pike-perch or pickerel, of Whitefish and of many other familiar kinds in immature and young stages.

More than one word is scarcely called for on the matter of traders' names or com mercial names for fish. Such names are not, strictly Speaking, popular names at all, and as a rule are confined to the circle of traders which have adopted them. They do not mis lead the public to any great extent, though they often vitiate official statistical records, except in such cases as that of the small immature herrings caught in the Bay of Fundy and along the Atlantic coast, and used chiefly for canning purposes. These small fish, put up in oil and other liquids, are sent into the markets as sardines. They are not true sardines, but fishermen, dealers and local inhabitants never refer to them as herring. The traps or weirs are called sardine weirs the nets, sardine nets the fisher men, sardine fishermen; and it would be difficult to get into common use any other name than that universally adopted along the shores, viz., sardine. AS already pointed out, the danger of such misnomers is that in ofi'icial. Reports and statistical returns the information collected may often be misleading unless special care be taken to discrimin ate between 'ah erroneous local or trade name, and the correct and distinctive name which is in general use. It is plain that if it were open to any one at will to use, say, the term 'dog' when referring to the horse, and when speaking of cats use the term 'bears, ' no one would know what was meant, for not only would confusion result, but far worse, viz.: the spreading of misleading and erroneous statements. Yet, this is pre cisely what has taken place all over North America in regard to fish. Well-known names have been misapplied and misused, the same name has been given to fishes placed by naturalists wide apart, and on the other hand a variety of names, really belonging to diverse fishes have been applied to one fish.

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