[3] WORK AT COLD SPRING HARBOR. 131 



land was leased to the Fish Commission, about fifty fish bcMug the ex- 

 tent of their number. In 1883 150,000 eggs of the brook trout were 

 presented by the U. S. Fish Commission from the ponds at Northville, 

 Mich., in charge of Mr. Frank N. Clark. The eggs were good, and ac- 

 cording to our records the loss in the egg was 9,000, and of fry 19,000, 

 leaving 122,000 when read^^ for planting. The next year we received 

 6,000 eggs of this fish from the United States and the fry was planted 

 in ponds near Locust Valley, Long Island, ajid at Cold Spring Harbor. 



RAINBOW TROUT (SALjMO IRIDEUS). 



Of the rainbow, or California trout, we had two lots of eggs di- 

 rect from the breeding-ponds of the U. S. Fish Commission on the 

 McCloud Eiver, California, one lot from the hatchery at Northville, 

 Mich., and one from the New York station at Caledonia. Kone of the 

 eggs were in first-class order and the embryos in many instances burst 

 the shell only to die. The first lot of 30,000 from California either failed 

 to hatch or died shortly after hatching, the majority dying in the egg. 

 The second lot, of 15,000, from the same place, did better and yielded 

 12,000 fry. The third lot, 30,000, from Caledonia, produced very weak 

 fish of which numbers died about the time of taking food, most of them 

 refusing it altogether. Out of these three lots, aggregating 75,000, we 

 obtained only 26,200 fish. Of 1,000 kept in one of our rearing-ponds 

 there were perhaps 300 fish on January 1, 1884, from 4 to 6 inches in 

 length, showing a remarkable growth. The house being full, the eggs 

 were hatched in the troughs outside where none of the eggs did well. 

 There being no fence about the place the public had access to the 

 troughs at times when the attendants Avere absent, and the sun was 

 often let into them with injurious efl'ect. During the summer of 1884 

 these fish did not grow well, although bountifully fed, and they died 

 freely, so that at the close of the season when they were transferred to 

 the larger ponds there was only 68 out of the 300 left. This is a fish 

 that I have never fancied much; and I am in greater doubts as to their 

 value since reading the last report of the New York fish commission, 

 which says : 



" A good deal is to be learned yet respecting temperature and other 

 local conditions affecting fish. Till the past year not enough has been 

 done in stocking with rainbow trout to warrant a judgment of their ul- 

 timate success in the waters on the Atlantic side. Their time of spawn- 

 ing occurring at a different season from that of the native brook trout, 

 it would not seem to be policy to plant them in waters inhabited by that 

 fish. The protective seasons would need to be different, and inhabit- 

 ing the same waters one kind might be taken often when the other was 

 fished for, and thus unintended violations would be liable to occur. An 

 obstacle to their ready success in our waters presents itself in the cir- 

 cumstance that at the season the fry are ready to plant, all otiier fish 



