65 



eat minnows, no better food can be given them. Liver is 

 too expensive when it has to be used alone for grown fish, 

 and beef lights are usually added to it or used in place of 

 it in a measure. It is miserable food however, much of 

 it passing through the stomachs of the trout and salmon 

 wholly undigested and collecting in the bottom of the 

 ponds. It injures the digestive organs and must be 

 deleterious to the health of the fish. Its only recom- 

 mendation is that it is cheap. Maggots are bred on 

 spoilt meat, hung over the ponds, and as they fall off and 

 drop into the water are readily devoured, and make ex- 

 cellent tood. Or a piece of spoilt meat may be placed in 

 a deep bottle like a preserving bottle, and the flies that 

 will collect in immense numbers during summer may be 

 caught and emptied into the water. This trap will take 

 many times its bulk of flies by being kept set all the time 

 and emptied when any one is passing it. Flies are prob- 

 ably the best food that can be given to trout. 



One difficulty with all this family of fish which is 

 accustomed to seize its prey while in motion, is that they 

 will very rarely pick up food from the bottom. To 

 obviate this, a plan of keeping the food in motion has 

 been carried out on a small scale by utilizing an inven- 

 tion made at the New York state works for hatching the 

 eggs, called the Holton hatching box, which will be des- 

 cribed more fully hereafter. The idea of this was to 

 introduce the water from below and carry it over the top. 

 A funnel shaped tin or wooden vessel is made with the 

 apex below, the water entering this creates a current that 

 prevents the particles of food from descending, and keeps 

 them in motion. Credit for this application of the inven- 

 tion is due to Mr. Winans of Baltimore, but it is at best 

 but partially successful, as the food soon becomes so 

 washed by the water that the fish will reject it, even if 

 they have taken it into their mouths. 



