198 



IMS< K n.lTKK 



fish egg* can be brought to maturity in one season. 

 In 1890-91, 2,310,0(10 eggs were incubated, 81,500 

 yearling trout sold and 40,000 yearling trout re- 

 tained, to grow into two-year-olds, and 19,000 two- 

 year-old trout sold and 6000 retained. 



The pond- at Huwietoun are extensive and in- 

 geniously planned, but h for beauty and convenience. 

 Water is supplied to them from a burn burning from 

 Loch Coulter, a lake of comiiderahle size, and largely 

 fed by springs. They arc divided into a larger and 

 a smaller group. The former consists of ten ponds, 

 of which the largest measures 200 feet in length by 

 90 feet in width, and is 12 feet deep. Next to 

 this is a Hub-group of three ponds lying parallel to 

 each other, each 270 feet by 45 feet, and 10 feet 

 deep. These also contain Lochleven trout of 

 different ages, and about 5000 in numlier in each 

 pond. The remaining twenty-five ponds are each 

 about 100 feet long, and contain respectively 

 American brook trout (Salmo fontinalis), yellow 

 trout (Salmo fario), and more Lochleven trout 

 under three years of age. Their various levels are 

 BO arranged that by means of open tracts and 

 dividing-boxes the water is slowly but constantly 

 (lowing from the highest to the lowest pond in the 

 series, and sluices are provided so that any single 

 one can be emptied when required. Each pond is 

 also provided with a cleansing pipe. 



At Howietoun the young fry are fed chiefly on 

 grated eggs and beefsteaks mode up into strings 

 like vermicelli, yearlings and two-year-olds are fed 

 (in minced horse-flesh, mid older trout on shellfish. 

 But some pisciculturists strongly recommend that 

 additional kinds of food, such as boiled liver, 

 chopped worms, fish-roe, and biscuit-dust, should 

 lie given in turns to fry. A large proportion of 

 trout die many, as some experienced persons think, 

 of starvation during their first year, even when 

 kept in ponds regularly supplied with food. The 

 strong repel and devour the weak at feeding-time, 

 but the mortality, in so far as it may tie caused by 

 food at all, is prolmbly more due to the kind used, 

 or to the form in which it is given. In the case of 

 rearing-ponds situated near the sea, mussels and 

 shrimps are much used for feeding purposes. At 

 Ouildtord, Surrey, the trout are allowed to find their 

 own food, but with this system the ponds must be 

 large in proportion to the number of fish contained 

 in them, as well as favourably situated with respect 

 to a sufficiency of natural food. Near St Pollen, 

 Lower Austria, this plan is adopted. There are 

 a number of small ponds or ditches with stagnant 

 water and aquatic plants, which are used as nurseries 

 to propagate the larvm of insects, small crustaceans, 

 and other low forms of animal life on which limit 

 naturally feed. From time to time part of Uie 

 water swarming with these creatures is admitted to 

 adjoining ponds witli pure water in which the fish 

 live. It probably depends on the locality of the 

 |imds which method of feeding succeeds best in a 

 eoinmerc.ial sense. 



In Great llritain it is as vet only membera of 

 the Salmonidie family which nave been artiliciiilly 

 reared on a commercial scale. But quite recently 

 Home attention has been given to the cultivation of 

 what are called 'coarse' fresh- water fish. My this 

 is meant pike, perch, roach, carp, tench, and a few 

 others. Of these pike and perch are perhaps the 

 two most likely to V profitable. It is feared, how- 

 ever, that so long as the markets are fairly well 

 supplied with sea fish, salmon, and trout the 

 chance of these coarse fish being largely consumed 

 as food is not great . They have all, more or less, 

 a comparatively insipid taste, but this could no 

 doubt be improved by proper attention to their 

 food. Pike being great cannibals, there is more 

 difficulty in stocking ponds with them, even when 

 there is not much difference in their size, than 



with most other fish. Perch which have an 

 extraordinary |>ower of increase spawn readily in 

 riinlinfiiit'tit, but it is said that the fry are not vny 

 easily reared. In America persevering efforts are 

 being mode to acclimatise the mirror carp, which 

 is a favourite fish for the table in Germany. See 

 PIKE, I'Kuni, and CARP. 



Pisciculture is practised in America on a very 

 large scale. The TJnited States Fish Commission 

 have several stations for hatching eggs of the 

 Salmonid:e, the largest lieini; on the M'Leod Kiver, 

 California, established for the ova of the California 

 salmon (Salmo quinnat). The report of the com- 

 missioner, Professor Spencer Baird, gives the total 

 production of eggs at this station for the season of 

 1879 as about 9,500,000; but the number for 1878 

 was 14,000,000. In 1879, 2,300,000 were hatched at 

 the station to keep up the stock in the Sacramento 

 I liver, 4,150,000 were taken to the eastern states, 

 and the remainder were sent to Canada, France, 

 Germany, and Holland. The Californian salmon 

 can adapt itself better than the common sirecies to 

 comparatively warm water, so that it will thrive 

 in some rivers where the latter will not ; but 

 whether it will be successfully introduced into 

 Eurpjie is still a matter of uncertainty. This 

 station is now chiefly used for hatching the rain- 

 bow trout (Salmo indent), 28,700 fry being planted 

 in the M'Leod Kiver in 1885. There is another 

 hatching-station at Bucksport, Maine, for the 

 Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar); and a third at 

 Grand Lake Stream, Maine, for breeding the 

 Schoodic or landlocked salmon, which is a variety 

 of the Salmo salar. In the United States there 

 are several hatcheries for the propagation of shad, 

 the aggregate yield of which in 1885 was 38,000,000 

 young fisn. As regards nnmliers, however, both 

 salmon and shad sink into insignificance compared 

 with the quantity of white fish, of which the most 

 important species is Corcgunus clupeiformit, reared 

 in the piscicultural establishments of the Lake 

 States (see CoREGONUS). The production of eggs 

 of this fish in the year 1885 reached the grand total 

 of 268,000,000. Besides the hatcheries under the 

 direction of the Fish ('ommis.sion, most of the states 

 have hatcheries of their own. In 1890 those belong- 

 ing to the state of New York alone distributed 

 39,930,000 fry and eggs of trout, shad, pike, \c. : 

 the station at Caledonia, in that state, has dis- 

 tributed 18,000,000 trout, salmon-trout, carp, pike, 

 and mu&calongue in one year. Hatching-stations 

 for the cod and other sea-fish are also being tried. 

 For oyster-culture, SIT OYSTER. 



Canada is not far behind the United States with 

 respect to the scale of her fish-breeding establish- 

 ments. The principal ones twelve in number are 

 owned by the government, and their production for 

 the year 1889 amounted to 11,673,500 salmon e^-s, 

 5,140,000 salmon-trout eggs, 30,600,000 eggs of 

 white fish (Coreqonus albus), and 21,000,000 eggs 

 of members of the Percidie family, besides smaller 

 numbers of other s|)ecies, making a total of 

 68,700,000. The common or Atlantic salmon 

 been introduced into Tasmania, and seems now 

 to be thoroughly acclimatised, numbers of adult 

 fish, besides shoals of the young, occurring in the 

 rivers. One or more species of British trout have 



also IMTOII stablished in Tasmanian as well as 



in Australian and New Zealand rivers. At Otago 

 there is a trout-hatchery. In Victoria the Caii- 

 fornmn salmon has been found to succeed better 

 than the common species. 



See works mi Pisciculture or department* of the subject 

 by Armmtoad (1870), Andrew* (nn salmon and trout, 

 1886), A *h worth (on Stormonttk-ld, 1875), Atkini 

 (tilting* for salmon -culture, Washington, 1879), Bocciiu 

 ( 1841 and 1848), BuckUnd ( 1863 and in Nat. Hint, of Brit 

 Fitktt, 1880). Bnrgesi (1891), Capel (on trout, 1877), 



