"In the course of field work in aquatic biology on Rock River it was noticed in the winter of 1925-1926 that almost every red-mouth buffalo (Ictiobus cyprinella Cuv. & Val.) was heavily infest with the leech, Pisciola punctata Verrill. This leech had not been taken during the tow preceding years of almost continuous work on this river, which included the collecting of hundreds of samples of the bottom fauna and the handling of many thousands of red mouth buffalo at all seasons of the year. Moreover, fishermen at many points on the river reported that no such infestation had occurred in the last half-century and that the only time they had ever seen any such leeches on the buffalo was about ten years ago when a few were noticed during some early spring fishing. The first appearance of Pisciola punctata in epidemic proportions was on February 25, 1926, about four miles above Rockford. The river's winter covering of ice having ""gone out"" of most of the channel the previous day, the remaining ice was moved of an eddy, and a seine haul was made which included, among a number of other fishes, 45 red-mouth buffalo weighing one to two pounds each, 38 of which were infested with this leech. The number of leeches on each of the infested fishes ranged from 1 or 2 up to 50 or more with an average of about 20."
Publisher
Champaign : Illinois Natural History Survey
Series/Report Name or Number
Illinois Natural History Survey Bulletin; v. 017, no. 03
ISSN
0073-4918
Type of Resource
text
Language
en
Permalink
http://hdl.handle.net/2142/45910
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