Lake Maxinkuckee, Physical and Biological Survey 15 



waters of a size great enough to complicate the problems ; in other 

 words, the conditions should be bunched and the environmental 

 unit should be a fairly homogeneous one; furthermore, the lake 

 should be one where there are fishing and angling interests and 

 which would afford a field for fish-cultural studies and operations. 



Lake Maxinkuckee, in northern Indiana, was believed to meet 

 all these conditions. It was assumed to be typical of the class of 

 small glacial lakes. It was selected for study primarily because 

 of these facts. Its accessibility and the fact that the field expenses 

 there would be exceptionally small were also factors in determin- 

 ing the selection. 



Scope of investigations: In planning the investigations to be 

 made, it was desirable to make them as comprehensive as pos- 

 sible, that the report, when published, would be really a mono- 

 graph of the lake. Among the more important purposes to be 

 considered were the following: 



1. To gain a fairly good understanding of the physical and 

 biological conditions obtaining in a typical glacial lake. Accurate 

 knowledge of one lake of a type enables a study of other lakes of 

 that type to be made more readily and easily. 



2. To study carefully and fully the habits of as many species 

 of animals and plants of the lake as time permitted. This field 

 is practically inexhaustible and the opportunities infinite. The 

 writers know of no place where one can study more problems of 

 interest to fish-culture and general biology than at Lake Maxin- 

 kuckee. This is because of the unusual abundance of aquatic 

 animals and plants in that lake. There are now known from 

 Lake Maxinkuckee 64 species of fishes, 9 species of turtles, 18 

 species of batrachians, about a dozen species of crustaceans, more 

 than 130 species of mollosks, and more than 100 species of aquatic 

 plants. Each of these groups is represented by a greater number 

 of species than is known from any other lake of similar or even 

 considerably greater size in the world; and most of the species 

 are each very abundant as to individuals. 



3. To study carefully the physical and biological conditions 

 under which the more important of these species thrive. 



In short, Lake Maxinkuckee was utilized as a biological station 

 where scores of interesting problems were studied and where many 

 more problems can be studied more effectively than at any other 

 lake with which the writers are acquainted. 



In the spring of 1899 the senior author submitted to the Hon- 

 orable George M. Bowers, then United States Commissioner of 

 Fish and Fisheries, a memorandum setting forth reasons why an 



217618 



