PROGRESS IN BIOLOGICAL INQUIRIES, 1921. 19 
aquatic vegetation the blue-spotted sunfish will prove a valuable 
addition, and if very shallow or swampy areas occur, the mud min- 
now. The common killifish is very effective in fresh and brackish 
tidal marshes, and the translucent killifish is useful in upland creeks 
and dams. Rapid multiplication of small fishes should be encouraged 
by providing suitable nesting sites and protection for the fry. 
Gambusia, the favored top minnow of southern waters, has not 
survived the northern winters but multiphes so rapidly that it may 
be used effectively against both Culex and Anopheles in small ponds 
and water gardens by planting a small number each spring. Small 
goldfishes are useful in fountain basins and small ponds with clean 
sides, and, for use in rain barrels and tanks, are preferable to Gam- 
busia. 
FISH-CULTURAL EXPERIMENT WORK. 
EXPERIMENTS IN PROPAGATING AND REARING FISH IN PONDS. 
The Fairport station has continued its valuable experimental work 
in reference to the propagation and rearing of fishes in ponds. Cer- 
tain observations were made on the value of fertilizing ponds with 
chemicals and manure, but data obtained to date are “auconclusive. 
Further study will be directed toward this problem. 
The small pond, which for several years has been handled as a farm 
pond with minimum care and expense, has yielded valuable informa- 
tion. Originally it was stocked with bluegill sunfish. Occasionally, 
when necessary, the pond has been wintered out. There has-been no 
manipulation of the pond in any respect other than the control of the 
number of bluegills of various ages in it. During the past year the 
actual production of fish meat in the ponds has been 333 pounds per 
acre. Of this, however, fishes of edible size represented about 33 per 
cent of the total fish-meat production. In this connection it may be 
well to note that the average annual production of beef per acre on 
untilled meadowland is said to be 125 pounds; that for hogs is 225 
pounds. 
Buffalofish, /ctiobus eyprinela, artificially reared in the station 
ponds, reached maturity and produced young for the first time at the 
age of 4 years. They averaged 13.6 inches in length and approxi- 
mately 2 pounds in weight. The small-mouth buffalofish, /ctiobus 
bubalus, which in previous years had failed to spawn in the experi- 
mental ponds unless an artific ial rise in the level of the pond was 
produced, spawned this year in a pond in which the rise did not 
occur. While the production of fry of this species does not appear 
to be as numerous as for those fish held in the pond with artificial 
rise, the occurrence indicates that the rise is not entirely necessary, 
though it may be advantageous. 
The channel catfish, /ctalurus punctatus, for which this station 
showed the feasibility of pond culture, has continued to spawn in the 
experimental ponds. Certain 4-year-old offspring of wild stock came 
to sexual maturity during the year and produced the first brood of 
truly domestic fish. The ‘adaptability of this species to pond culture 
is suggested by the fact that the catfish has spawned in certain of the - 
smallest ponds on the reservation, ene of which has a water-surface 
area, when completely full, of only 3,485 square feet (less than one- 
twelfth of an acre). 
