100 NEW YORK ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



and kills both eggs and young fishes. The finer kinds of saw- 

 dust affect the larger fishes, getting into their gills, and dead 

 fishes are found with considerable quantities of sawdust 'in their 

 stomachs. 



Many nuisances which we tolerate could be abated through 

 active effort. A single instance from my personal experience 

 will serve to illustrate the indifference of anglers. 



There is a large sawmill on the east branch of the Delaware, 

 just above the mouth of the Beaverkill, which has for years 

 deposited sawdust in the river. The heap of sawdust remaining 

 on the bank is about the size of an ordinary two-story house, 

 its front base resting on the edge of the stream. As the river 

 has been cutting it away for years there is no ready means of 

 estimating the amount of matter carried down stream. 



The sloping cliff' of sawdust against the high bank — large as 

 it is — is merely a remnant. The annual waste from the mill goes 

 over it into the water and may be seen along shore for some 

 distance down stream. Many anglers pass this nuisance and 

 comment on it, but I have never heard of any steps being taken 

 to abate it. 



The State Fisheries office informs me that it has "a list of over 

 six hundred pollutions (of this kind) in the State," but that the 

 law is defective, making prosecutions extremely difficult. 



Paper and pulp mills use lime, caustic soda, sulphuric acid, 

 etc., all of which are deadly to fish life when drained into streams. 



Without further cataloguing of the injurious wastes liberated 

 into streams from factories of all kinds, we may truthfully assert, 

 with the support of numerous National and State fishery docu- 

 ments, that the maintenance of fish life is becoming impossible. 



Our whole national system of disposing of wastes is an immoral 

 one : the town and the mill can be kept clean, but the condition 

 of the stream itself has been utterly disregarded. 



Tn spite of the fact that there are laws in all States which pro- 

 hibit the drainage of dangerous matter into public waters, there 

 exist in factories without numbers secret waste pipes which are 

 opened during the night, the outpourings of which are so deadly 

 to fish life that the practice of operating ihem can only be named 

 as dastardly. 



We have lived under these conditions so long that we are used 

 to them. It is the old case of each for himself, with no thought 

 of the health, wealth or happiness of those farther down stream. 



In many l)eautiful streams, where fishing is still possible, 

 fishes have liecome uneatable through tainting of the water. 



