XIX.-REPORT'ON THE ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF CODFISH 

 AT WOOD'S HOLL, MASS., FOR THE SEASON OF 1886-'87. 



By Charles G. Atkins 



The experiments in the hatching of codfish at the Wood's Holl Sta- 

 tion for the season of 1886-87 extended, in point of time, from the 

 ICth of November to the Gth of April. The spawn was obtained, for 

 the most part, from codfish brought in by the schooner Grampus from 

 the Gulf of Maine, a single lot of 170 adults having been secured from 

 local fishermen who had caught them at Nantucket Shoals and about 

 11,000,000 eggs having been taken by the Grampus from the fish on the 

 fishing-grounds off Cape Ann. The hatching was all conducted in the 

 hatching-room of the laboratory, and all, with the exception of a few 

 experiments, in the Chester hatching-boxes. The total number of eggs 

 handled was 43,575,000, of which 22,040,000, or a little more than 50 per 

 cent., were hatched, and 19,495,000 were liberated alive in the waters of 

 the adjacent coast. 



The scale of operations, which under favorable circumstances might 

 be greatly extended, was limited by the difficulties attending the col- 

 lection of the parent fish. The first fish that came to hand were col- 

 lected by the schooner Grampus to the eastward of Cape Cod and 

 brought to the station on the Kith of November to the number of 195 

 codfish, together with a few pollock, haddock, hake, and cusk. Only 

 the codfish yielded spawn. Another lot of adults, numbering 273 live 

 codfish, were brought in by the Grampus from the same waters on the 

 9th of December ; on the 11th of December 170 codfish were obtained 

 from Nantucket Shoals ; and, filially, on the 25th of January, 219 more 

 were brought in from the Gulf of Maine by the Grampus. By the lat- 

 ter date the temperature of the sea along the coast, especially in the 

 harbors, had fallen to so low a point that it seemed quite probable that 

 an attempt to collect codfish and bring them to the station in the well 

 of the Grampus, as had been done with the lots brought in by her so 

 far, would fail by the death of the fish from the excessive cold to which 

 they would be exposed should the vessel be compelled to seek a har- 

 bor during the trip. 



The result of the observations heretofore made on this point is, in 

 general, that codfish will live in water not colder than 30° Fahrenheit, 

 [1] 783 



