the Spring, and whose eggs are adhesive, and attach them- 

 selves to aquatic vegetation, a series of permanently con- 

 structed ponds ; we have also purchased an efficient steamer, 

 of light draught, which will enable us at all times to visit the 

 fisheries of our bay and rivers, and learn more thoroughly 

 the requirements of the service. We can carry on the hatch- 

 ing operations, connected with the increase of those fishes 

 whose eggs will not stand transportation, and must be matured 

 in the rivers where the spawn is taken on a much larger and 

 systematic scale, with much better chances of success than 

 hitherto. We have also constructed several small boats' 

 suitable for gathering the spawn of Shad and Herring, and 

 have each year increased and improved the apparatus used in 

 perfecting the eggs of these fishes. 



In entering on the work of propagating Shad, although 

 Shad have been artificially hatched successfully, and 

 on a very large scale, for several years in many of the New 

 England and Middle States, we had a comparatively new 

 field of operation and research. In Maryland we found that 

 the conditions which surround the points, at which eggs could 

 be procured, vastly different from those which surround the 

 points at which Shad spawn could be procured, in telling 

 quantities, in those States which had set us the example, or 

 had taken the lead in the propagation of this valuable fish • 

 for instance, on the Connecticut river, near South Hadley, the 

 Shad are impec?ed in their upward migration by this impassa- 

 ble barrier, and congregate in the large pools just below the 

 Falls, where they are taken in considerable quantities by 

 short seines, making a great many hauls between 8 o'clock 

 at night and midnight, the hours in which most ripe fish are 

 taken. The current is somewhat rapid, and the river being 

 narrow, the hatching boxes are well protected from the wind. 

 The eggs, by using the boxes designed by Seth Green, are 

 kept in constant and gentle motion by the current. Similar 

 conditions surround the hatching camp of the New York 

 Commission, on the Hudson River, but our experience on the 



