AGRICULTURAL ZOOLOGY. 851 



with rod and line as high as six pounds each, showing an excess in weight of four pounds in 

 sixteen months — a rate only known in the first rivers in England. But the most extraor- 

 dinary increase has been in the fish not indigenous. In the month of March of last year, a 

 fresh supply of jack was put in as stock from a neighboring water, the largest being three 

 pounds in weight ; these fish were marked by cutting off a portion of their tail fin. Two of 

 the fish thus marked were caught last week, one weighing eight and a half pounds, another 

 seven and a half pounds, thus showing a positive increase as to one of five and a half 

 pounds, in a period of eleven months, taking it even upon the assumption that the fish so 

 ■ caught were those weighing the excess of weight of three pounds when put in, and of which 

 weight there were but few. We have been informed that in these waters the other descrip- 

 tion of fish, such as carp, tench, perch, and eels, increase, as to the two former, after the rate 

 of two pounds per annum ; but this will form the subject of future experiment by marking, 

 which has not been hitherto done. It is generally known that change of water from that in 

 which they have been bred is most productive of profit to fresh-water fish ; but it would be 

 incredible, without the proof, that a fish of three pounds could add five and a half pounds to 

 its weight within the period of a year. For the information of amateurs in the gentle art, 

 the lake in which these jack are is of about ten acres, supplied with three continuous streams 

 of water running through it. No fish breed in it but roach, jack, perch, and eels, the cold- 

 ness of the contributory water stopping all breeding of carp and tench ; the supply of the 

 latter being through store-fish of from three ounces to half a pound, which, from observa- 

 tions made, increase in the ratio before mentioned. — Brussels Herald. 



Transporting Eggs of Fishes. 



In the last sitting of the French Societe Zoologique d' Acclimation, M. Millet detailed a 

 series of experiments he had lately made in conveying fecundated eggs. The result was, he 

 said, that the eggs, when wrapped up in wet cloths and placed in boxes with moss, to pre- 

 vent them from becoming dry and being jolted, may safely be conveyed not only during 

 twenty or thirty, but for even more than sixty days, either by water, railway, or diligence. 

 He added that he had now in his possession eggs about to be hatched, which have been 

 brought from the most distant parts of Scotland and Germany, and even from America. M. 

 Millet stated a fact which was much more curious — namely, that fecundated eggs of different 

 descriptions of salmon and trout do not perish, even when the cloths and moss in which they 

 are wrapped become frozen. "He had even been able," he said, "to observe, by means of a 

 microscope, that a fish just issuing from the egg, and of which the heart was seen to beat, 

 was not inconvenienced by being completely frozen up. This he explained by the fact that 

 the animal heat of the fish, even in the embryo state, is sufficient to preserve around it a 

 certain quantity of moisture." 



Effects of Legislative Enactments in Re-creating Fisheries. 



The following extract, from a recent report of the "Inspectors of Irish Fisheries," shows 

 conclusively the good effect of judicious protective enactments in re-creating fisheries in 

 rivers where they are rapidly dying out : — In illustration of the benefits of a steady perseve- 

 rance in a proper system, we may allude to the Foyle — a noble river in the North of Ireland, 

 washing the walls of Londonderry — " where the produce has been raised from an average of 

 forty-three tons previous to 1823, to a steady produce of nearly two hundred tons, including 

 the stake-weirs in the estuary, and very nearly to three hundred tons, as we believe, in the 

 year 1842." The inspectors also mention the effects of protection in the case of the small 

 river of Newport, county Mayo. In three years, after the parliamentary regulations were 

 introduced and enforced, the produce of this river was raised from half a ton, or, at the ut- 

 most, a ton every season, to eight tons of salmon and three tons of white trout, for the season 

 ending the third year, with every prospect of further increase. Another fact, bearing upon 

 this point in our own country, is, that by the enactment of certain prohibitory laws as to the 

 taking of the fish at undue seasons, and the erection of insuperable obstacles to the ingress 



