128 American Fisheries Society 



was called to the fact that fishermen in the vicinity of West 

 Cornwall were in the habit of curing their nets by steeping them 

 in creosote "green oil," and subsequently passing them through 

 a wringing machine, thus leaving a minimum of oil. They were 

 then dried for some weeks and then given two or three treatments 

 with "cutch. " After this treatment it is stated that no creosote 

 could be detected. To quote: "Today, however, the treatment 

 is vastly different, with very few exceptions; whole long trains 

 of nets are shot out that have only a few days previously been 

 taken out of barrels or other receptacles, in which they have been 

 steeped in the "liquid," so that probably on the initial night of 

 the season, with a fleet of sixty drifters casting out their trains, 

 some hundreds of gallons of oil have been washed out, and has a 

 tendency to permeate the water for some miles. " 



The flesh of fish caught in these nets would undoubtedly 

 taste more or less of creosote, as this substance permeates very 

 quickly, and the oil permeating the water would tend to drive 

 the fish from the fishing grounds. 



In the same article experiments conducted by J. E. Allen are 

 cited. He found that the "green oil" at a dilution of one part 

 per 1,000,000 parts of sea water would kill young swimming 

 prawn, (heimysis) within an hour. An experiment is cited where 

 twenty-five prawn were put in a solution of one part in 10,000,000 

 parts of sea water. Half were dead in twenty-five hours, three- 

 fourths in two days, and all in five days. A control experiment 

 showed no deaths at the end of six days. 



Several samples of creosotes were obtained and small quan- 

 tities of these added to water containing fish proved to be extremely 

 toxic. The action of the creosotes on fish was very marked. 

 In most cases when put into solutions of 13 parts per 1,000,000 

 of water the fish immediately began to dart violently. The gill 

 movements were rapid at intervals, though at times the gill 

 movements were abnormally slow. At other times the slow and 

 rapid movements alternated for some time. In many cases the 

 fish began to swim rapidly on their backs. At other times a 

 gyratory movement was noticed. 



Light and dark spots were noticed over the bodies. Ordinarily 

 upon death the fish were of a fairly uniform color over the entire 

 body, but when death was caused by very toxic solutions of 



