PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF FOOD FISHES, 1931 665 



pose. During an invasion of the Richmond Island brood pond, negative rheo- 

 tropism was exhibited by the bass fry in the pond. This habit of the small fry 

 of swimming witli the current showed it to be desirable to fill as many gaps be- 

 tween the sloughs and the river as possible to avoid currents out of them. Ac- 

 cordingly, during the summer and fall of 1930, as many of these gaps were filled 

 as were found possible and practical. 



Great difficulty was experienced during the early spring of 1930 in finding 

 adult golden shiners in sufficiently large numbers to stock nursery ponds. This 

 experience showed that dependence could not be placed on obtaining this supply 

 in spring before the beginning of the spawning season. A small pond, fed by 

 springs, was built in the fall of 1930 in Perrot State Park, near Trempealeau, Wis., 

 and over 20,000 shiners were safely wintered in it. The early introduction of the 

 shiners in the nursery ponds has shown its value, judging from the number of 

 young shiners which may be seen in the ponds during the current season. 



Of the 157,000 largemouth bass fry trapped from the Richmond Island brood 

 pond and transferred to the sloughs during the spring of 1930, 27,000 were re- 

 turned to the river as fingerlings in the fall. Many of the fry probably escaped 

 to the river soon after they were introduced in the sloughs, as the river descended 

 following the June rise. 



MARINE SPECIES 



Due to low market prices and a scarcity of fish, the collections of 

 cod and pollock eggs were below those of the previous year. Of the 

 five species handled, haddock and winter flounder showed sizeable 

 increases. All the marine species are planted as eggs and fry. The 

 individual accomplishment of special note in this field was the record 

 collection of over 2,500,000,000 winter flounder eggs at the Boothbay 

 Harbor (Me.) station. 



BOOTHBAY HARBOR (ME.) STATION 

 [Thomas H. Dorr, Superintendent] 



A new record for the collection of winter flounder eggs was made during the 

 fiscal year 1931. Eggs of this species to the number of 2,716,449,000 were taken 

 from 12,572 brood fish, which were captured in fyke nets in bays and coves within 

 a radius of 12 miles of the station. Two boats of the bureau, the Pelican and 

 launch 22, were used to transport them to the station. Each boat had a crew of 

 three men and was equipped with tanks to transport the fish alive to the station, 

 where they were held until the eggs were collected. The fry produced — 2,471,262,- 

 000 — were liberated soon after hatching on spawning grounds in the vicinity of 

 the station. The winter flounder work extended from March 3 to April 16. On 

 April 7 the Pelican was assigned to the cod work and, with the assistance of launch 

 22, covered most of the ground from Damascove Island to Seguin Island. Because 

 of a shortage of spawn takers and lack of funds for chartering a third boat, the 

 total cod egg collections fell far below last year's record, when three boats were 

 available. Adverse weather conditions during the last two weeks of the season 

 also served to cut down the total. Cod eggs to the number of 1,083,306,000 were 

 collected and planted on the natural spawning grounds between April 7 and 

 June 19. In conjunction with this work 156,570,000 haddock eggs were also 

 collected and planted. 



Construction work on the house for the engineer was completed. Numerous 

 repairs were made to the fish culturist's residence and the hatchery building. A 

 new egg stirrer, operated by electricity, was purchased and installed. A consid- 

 erable amount of time was expended on the care of the aquarium. Work on the 

 station boats was also necessary from time to time, and all the floating equipment 

 was repaired and painted during the year. 



GLOUCESTER (MASS.) STATION 



[C. O. Corliss, Superintendent] 



Active fish-cultural operations opened November 1, witli the collection of pol- 

 lock eggs and resulted in a take of 388,130,000, which produced 241,683,000 fry. 

 The great falling off in this work as compared with that of recent years was due 



