SUNFISH

the common title of a genus (Centrarchidae lepomis) of small pan-fishes of fresh waters east of the Rockies. The best-known is the little Common sunfish, or ‘‘pumpkin-seed,’’ but the only species commercially important is the ‘‘bluegill,’’ or ‘‘blue sunfish,’? which particularly favors small lakes and sometimes weighs more than a pound. The huge ‘‘ocean sunfish,’’ or ‘‘headfish,’’--a creature nearly all head!—is of a different family (Molde). SUNFLOWER SEED and OIL. Sunflower-seeds are seldom eaten here nowadays —the plants being grown chiefly for ornament or for silage, and their seeds fed to poultry —but they constituted one of the earliest of American foods, for the Indians relished and consumed them in pre-Columbus ages—the sunflower, now of universal citizenship, being native American by origin. They are nutritious and of pleasing flavor, with a ‘‘green nut’’ tang. In recent generations they have found their ehief commercial importance in Ru ia, which utilizes a very great quantity—the large seeds for eating, both raw and roasted, and small sizes for their oil, which is valued for table and cooking purposes, and industrially. The best grades of oi] are pale yellow, nearly odorle , and mild and agreeable in flavor—fully equal in quality to olive oil. The Black Sea provinces constitute the center of the industry. Sunflower cultivation is also of importance in some other parts of Europe, and in Egypt, Turkey, and India.