94 American Fisheries Society 



open and the ovaries carefully removed. The membrane 

 surrounding the eggs is then cut and all the loose ova are 

 poured into a pan. When a large fish is taken more than 

 one pan may be needed to hold the eggs. Live male fish 

 are taken and their milt is ejected over the eggs. As the 

 fish die quickly and the eggs and milt die with the fish 

 the men must usually act hurriedly. Unlike the shad and 

 some other fishes the eggs from a dead striped bass can- 

 not be fertilized, even though the fish has been dead but a 

 few moments. As soon as the eggs and milt are in the 

 pan a little water is added and the pans are then tilted 

 until the milt is thoroughly incorporated with the eggs. 

 When first taken the eggs are very small, but they rapidly 

 expand to many times their former size. During this 

 time they must be thinned up and given more and more 

 water and the pans must be agitated frequently or many 

 eggs will not expand fully and soon die. When fully ex- 

 panded they are put into buckets and taken to the hatch- 

 ery or they may be taken in the pans while expanding 

 and may even be placed in the jars with good results 

 before expansion is completed, but when unexpanded 

 eggs crowded in buckets are invariably lost. 



In the hatchery they are placed in the McDonald jar 

 having the brass top and glass and rubber intake tubes 

 just as in shad work, but in this case the nickeled rim 

 holding the brass top in place has a pitcher lip and no 

 discharge tube is used. The water falls directly from the 

 pitcher lip into the aquarium. Usually this fall is but 

 two or three inches but experiments with greater amount 

 of fall revealed no bad effects. In this my experience has 

 been different from that reported by Mr. Worth. 



The eggs are semi-buoyant, more so than those of the 

 shad and whitefish and are nearly transparent. During 

 incubation the egg or rather the vital part of it occu- 

 pies but a small part of the space within the egg mem- 

 brane. As it is heavier than water and light green in 

 color the vitellus is easily seen lying on the lower 

 inner part of the egg membrane and it keeps to this 

 position as the egg circulates in the jar. Incubation is 



