ZOOLOGICAL PARKS AND AQUARIUMS 927 



SECTION II. AQUARIUMS 

 SUGGESTIONS CONCERNING THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A PUBLIC AQUARIUM* 



During the writer's long connection with the New York Aquarium, 

 many cities in the United States have made inquiry respecting the cost of 

 maintaining a public aquarium and the proper procedure in establishing 

 one. Similar letters have also been received from countries as far away as 

 India and New Zealand. Only a few of these cities have as yet carried such 

 a project to completion. The communications, coming from local chambers 

 of commerce or commissioners of parks, were at first answered at consider- 

 able length, but the information desired was not such as could be satis- 

 factorily imparted by letters however lengthy, and involved frequently the 

 making of drawings and measurements. It became necessary to advise 

 applicants seeking such information to send an engineer to New York to 

 study aquarium methods and equipment. Some of the cities that estab- 

 lished them sent architects, having in mind chiefly an attractive building, 

 without considering in the least what the region in question afforded in 

 the way of exhibits, how extensive such exhibits were to be, or realizing 

 that an aquarium having fresh-water and marine collections requires a 

 complicated mechanical equipment. Some of the aquariums that were 

 eventually founded still depend for their marine exhibits on annual exchanges 

 with the New York Aquarium. The large size of this institution, created 

 many years ago and constructed within the walls of an old fort, did not 

 make it a very practicable model for an aquarium of smaller size, while 

 much of its equipment had not until recently been modernized. 



The considerations which follow are presented for the benefit of city 

 officials and organizations still making inquiry respecting aquariums. The 

 first points to be determined are those connected with the living exhibits, 

 whether they are to consist of fresh-water or marine life or both and how 

 many kinds are available within reasonable collecting and shipping limits. 

 The transportation of fishes includes that of heavy tanks of water. All 

 existing aquariums are still dependent upon their own efforts in collecting 

 and transporting the aquatic forms which they display, as there are no sources 

 from which such may be purchased. Many inland localities afford but 

 limited variety in fresh-water exhibits, while the gathering and transport- 

 ing of marine life by rail involves considerable expense and some losses in 

 transit. Moreover the keeping of marine life is dependent upon the storage 

 of sea water, its constant circulation and filtration, as well as heating in 

 winter if derived from tropical waters. The keeping of fresh-water forms 



1 Information Circular No. n, New York Zoological Society, by Charles H. Townsend, Director New York 

 Aquarium. 



