FRESHWATER FISH EPIDEMICS IX QTEENSLAND RIVERS. 179 



Mr. Hogan reported (10th August 1918) that large numbers 

 of fish, principally jewfish and golden perch, had died recently 

 in the Mclntyre and Severn (Dumaresq) Rivers, the outbreak 

 being locally regarded as due to one or other of the follov^ing : — 

 (1) intense cold and continual heavy frosts destroying fish, 

 especially in shallow Avater ; (2) the prevalence of a disease ; 

 (3) the low state of the river. Death of the fish was not due 

 to the use of dynamite though this had been put forward as a 

 possible explanation. 



Mr. Bergin reported (7tli August) that dead fish were 

 coming down the river past Bengalla Station. On 28th August 

 he kindly forwarded to us additional information. The 

 Mclntyre River had been rather dry and stagnant, as little rain 

 had fallen from Christmas 1917 until August 1918, when 

 rain caused a fresh in the river and the epidemic ceased. 

 Murray cod, yellow-belh^ and jewfish were especially affected, 

 and diseased specimens were all found to be fat. During his 

 ten years' residence in the district he had only once previously 

 noted a similar epidemic, viz., during the great drought of 1915. 

 He also stated that he remembered fish dying in the Condamine 

 River some years ago, but believed that it was due in that 

 particular case to the pollution of the water by an adjacent 

 wool-scour. - 



Mr. J. McKinle)^ referred (2nd September 1918) to the 

 mortahty in the Mclntyre in the Goondiwindi district affecting 

 chiefly the Murray cod and golden perch, mainly small speci- 

 mens. Such fish when opened were found to be very fat, 

 though otherwise they looked normal. Since the recent heavy 

 rains the disease had disappeared. 



BURNETT RIVER. 



In July 1918 fish died in the lagoon at the junction of the 

 Nogoa and Burnett Rivers. When visited by Dr. T. L. Ban- 

 croft some weeks later only a few dead fish were to be seen 

 and these were all in the shalloAv water. 



" H. B. Ward has drawn attention to the effec-t of industrial 

 wastes on fish life in his paper on " The Elimination of Stream Pollution 

 in New York State" (Trans. Amer. Fisheries Soc. 48, 1918, pp. 1-25). 

 See also Sheliord 1917, 1918a, 1918b, 1919a: Shelford and Powers 1919; 

 Hofer 190G, pp. 83-86. 



