664 EEPOET OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



for New York, in tin vessels of the capacity of twenty-two gallons each. 

 These were of different heights, and so arranged in an ascending scale 

 that the water from the upper vessel flowed into the second, thence 

 into the third. From the third it was dipped back into the first, and 

 this process continued throughout the whole voyage. Mr. Poppe had 

 no assistant, but performed all the labor himself, watching through the 

 long hours of the night that the comfort of the fish should be enhanced. 

 On account of the lack of ice on board the steamer, and Mr. Poppe's 

 consequent inability to keep the water at a sufQciently cool tempera- 

 ture, many of the fish died on the voyage. One after another was found 

 dead on the surface and thrown overboard. Upon the arrival of the 

 steamer near New York, only twenty were alive. A delay of two days 

 was had in New York Harbor, occasioned by some irregularity in the 

 quarantine regulations, during which time a dry, stifling wind arose, 

 and continued with unabated fury the whole of one night. This de- 

 stroyed twelve more of the carp, and when a landing was effected in 

 New York there only eight left. These were placed as soon as possible 

 in hastily extemporized ponds of the Croton Aqueduct Company and 

 left there for three days to become accustomed to their nati^ e element, 

 which, except in a highly impure state, and under very peculiar circum- 

 stances, they had not had since leaving their native land. After mak- 

 ing all the necessary arrangements with the railroad companies respect- 

 ing the rapid and careful transit of the fish across the continent, and 

 not forgetting, in this instance, a large supjily of ice, Mr. Poppe left 

 New York for San Francisco. In seven days he arrived there with the 

 whole number, not having lost a single one in traveling a distance of 

 over three thousand miles. In San Francisco there was another delay, 

 but on the day following his arrival, being the 5th day of August, 1872, 

 three months since leaving San Francisco, he landed his five puny, and 

 almost dead, carp in his ponds in Sonoma Yalley. Two fish died in San 

 Francisco, and one on the sloop to Sonoma, leaving five as the number 

 safely lauded. These were x)laced in one of the ponds already described, 

 and formed the numbers from which all the others sprang. 



At the time the carp were placed in the ponds, in August, 1872, they 

 were in a very i^recarious condition; the journey, if continued but a 

 little while longer, would certainly have killed them. They were about 

 as large as an ordinary steel pen, being the very smallest of the 83 

 with which Mr. Poppe started from Europe. In the May following, the 

 original five had increased to 16 inches in length, and the young 

 fish had increased to over three thousand. Since that time the in- 

 crease has been very rapid, but the sales have kept pace with it, so 

 tliat no overstocking has as yet taken place. The spawning season 

 takes place late in the spring — in the months of April and May. The 

 exact time, of course, is uncertain with them, because observations of 

 the fish in the ponds cannot be very accurate. The spawTi of the origi- 

 nal five carp, in May following their arrival (as was said before), num- 



