132 NEW YORK ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY 



by harbor water which is merely brackish as to salinity and is 

 furthermore polluted by sewage. 



During the past summer interesting invertebrates were pro- 

 cured from Woods Hole, Mass. These animals could not be kept 

 in the stored sea water on account of its higher temperature and 

 the harbor water was not sufficiently pure. 



Before the Aquarium can be equipped to care for such ani- 

 mals it will be necessary to construct another storage reservoir 

 with separate piping and pumps. This would enable us to cut 

 off from the building entirely the cold but extremely foul water 

 now pumped from the Harbor. Some of the machinery now in 

 use would, however, be available for a new cold water system. 

 It is extremely doubtful whether the Aquarium will ever be able 

 to maintain an important collection of invertebrates without an 

 additional water system which can be kept at a lower tempera- 

 ture. 



During the early summer months the Aquarium has a great 

 deal of difficulty in maintaining certain fresh water fishes in the 

 Croton water now supplied to the building. This is due to the 

 fact that a great deal of Saprolegnia develops in Croton water, 

 which results in fungus growths very destructive to fish life. 



There are several artesian wells in lower Manhattan and 

 the experiment of drilling a deep well in Battery Park seems to 

 be worth trying. This, if successful, would furnish water of a 

 more even temperature, cold enough for trout and other north- 

 ern fishes in summer and warm enough in winter to keep those 

 fishes active which ordinarily lie inactive on the bottom of the 

 tanks. It would very likely permit of the abandonment of our 

 refrigerating plant which is now necessary to keep cold water 

 species through the summer. 



Another real need of the Aquarium is a boat for the collec- 

 tion and transportation of specimens. An important part of 

 our marine exhibits is collected by our own men from adjacent 

 waters, and the method is both expensive and unsatisfactory. 

 For fishing trips as far south as Sandy Hook where very inter- 

 esting collections can be made late in the summer, the cost of 

 hired launches is considerable and transportation in such 

 launches is far from satisfactory owing to the fact that the 

 fishes are transported in ordinary shipping tanks. A vessel, 

 built for the purpose, not unlike the old well-smacks used on the 

 New England coast before the days of refrigeration, or like the 

 well-smacks now in use at Key West and other southern points 



