AQUARIUM 



Astonishingly Great Interest in 

 Aquarium. 



The New York Acmaritmi had a 

 greater number of visitors during the 

 year 1909 than ever before, the attend- 

 ance being 3,803,501, an average of 

 10,417 a day. These figures show 

 that the Aquarium has a greater 

 patronage by the public than all the 

 other museums of the city, including 

 the Zoological Park, combined, and 

 1,800,000 more, for the same period, 

 than the New York Hippodrome, 

 which has probably the largest at- 

 tendance of any theatre in the city. 

 These figures are unequaled by those 

 of any other museum in the world of 

 which statistics are available. — Scien- 

 tific American. 



The Dwarf Gourami. 



BY WM. T. INNES, JR., PHILADELPHIA, 

 PENNSYLVANIA. 



An important and comparatively re- 

 cent addition to the family of fresh- 

 water aquarium inhabitants is furnish- 

 ed in the dwarf gourami. This fish was 

 first imported about two years ago by 

 Air. William P. Seal and is as yet very 

 little known. If, however, my esti- 

 mate of its value as an aquarium fish 

 be correct, it will be a familiar friend 

 in the course of several years. Like 

 the Paradise fish, which I believe it 

 will largely replace, it comes from the 

 warm waters of India. Being of the 

 same family as the Paradise fish, 

 namely the Labyrinthici, or air breath- 

 ing fishes, they have many points in 

 common. Although they absorb some 

 oxygen, as do other fish, from the wa- 

 ter which passes through the gills, 

 they gather their chief supply from the 



air. This is done by occasionally com- 

 ing to the surface and taking a little 

 air into the mouth. At the same mo- 

 ment this is done, the former breath 

 of air, now probably having most of 

 the oxygen absorbed from it, is ex- 

 pelled through the gills. The air 

 breathing faculty of this group of fish 

 makes it possible to keep a large num- 

 ber of them in a small receptacle and 

 plant life for them is not a necessity, 

 since it is only necessary for them to 

 be able to occasionally reach the sur- 

 face of the water in order to secure the 

 oxygen needed to support life. I 

 would not, however, recommend for 

 them an aquarium bare of plant life, 

 for practically all fish like to swim 

 among the plants and the beneficial 

 effect of the plants on the water must 

 in some decree be reflected in the health 

 of the fish. 



The dwarf gourami attains a length 

 of about one and one-half inches. It 

 is very alert in its movements and 

 when occasion requires swims at great 

 speed. The action is at all times grace- 

 ful and pleasing. 



The male is beautifully marked on 

 the sides with alternating metallic blue 

 and reddish orange stripes running ver- 

 tically over a silver background. The 

 dorsal, caudal and ventral fins are 

 edged and spotted bright orange. The 

 pectoral fins are transparent, and as 

 these are the fins principally used in 

 swimming, it is difficult at first to see 

 what causes the fish to move about, 

 the appearance being that it moves 

 without effort of any kind. 



There is a curious optical quality 

 about the blue and orange stripes. The 

 orange stripes are transparent and are 

 most easily seen when the light is 

 coming through the fish to the eye. 



