Fishing from the earliest times - Blog

^^RUMINATION OF THE SCARUS 155Koi (pvKia aXXa, the difference between which seems accordingto Aristotle merely one of size.If a poll of writers on Fishing and of practical Pisciculturistswere taken to-day, a large majority would vote that sea-fishdo not eat seaweed, but feed on the larvce, and other minuteinsects in or on the various algcB or seaweeds. But against thisopinion is arrayed the authority of Darwin and Wallace, whostate that v^arious species of Scarus do browse, and do grazeon seaweed, and some of them exclusively on coral.*The Skaros (according to Aristotle) was the only fish whichseemed to ruminate, 2 whose food was seaweed, 3 and teeth,set in deep saw-edged jaws, were not sharp and interlocking,like those of all other fish,its beak resembled that of a parrot.but resembled those of a parrot, asFrom the seeming to ruminate of Aristotle we reach in laterwriters like Oppian, I. 134 ff., and Ovid, Hal, 119, the positiveassertion that the scarus did ruminate.Is it not possible, if a mere angler may hazard a suggestionon scientific points, that the belief of modern writers and pisciculturistsis not far out, and that while some of the Scari dobrowse and graze exclusively on coral, and some sometimeson seaweed, they do this to obtain as food only the minutelarvce, which their so-called rumination helps them to separatefrom the seaweed or coral ? ^A second very practical argument against the readingmusco suggests itself. Let us allow that some sea fish do eatnot only algcB but moss : even then, why should our Scarus1 Voyage of the Beagle, ch. 20: " Two species of fish of the genus scarus,which are common here (Keehng Island), exclusively feed on coral." Sir R.Owen, " The anterior teeth are soldered together and adapted to the habitsand exigences of a tribe of fishes which browse on the lithophytes, that clothethe bottom of the sea, just as ruminant quadrupeds crop the herbage of thedry land."2 N. H., II. 17 : n6vos Ix^vs SoKf7 n-npvKd(tiv. Cf., however, A''. H., IX. ^so.3 VIII. 2, 13.* Arist., N. H., II. 13. PHny, XI. 61. " Piscium omnibus (dentes)serrati, praeter scarum : huic uni aquatilium plani."* In VII. 113, we again find Athenaeus misrepresenting Aristotle.6 " Thig j(jea of rumination," according to Mr. Lones, op. cit., p. 237," by the parrot wrasse (Scarus cretensis), which is clearly the Skaros of theAncients, probably arose from its grazing or cropping off marine plants,and grinding them down, assisted by its having a strongly walled stomach ''(cf. the functions of the gizzard of a fowl) with which, out of the myriads ofM