NATIONAL FISHERY CONGRESS. 215 



can be made in connection with the proposed weir, the diagram of which is given. 

 The plans have been very carefully made, and meet the hearty approval of the State 

 fish, game, and forest commissioners. It has been placed in the inlet above the limit 

 of navigation and below the lowest place where the lampreys spawn. Two watchmen 

 are employed to alternate in watching this weir constantly, day and night, during 

 the ** running" season, and, empowered as deputy sheriffs, the watchmen will be able 

 to arrest any trespassers who might otherwise seriously interfere with the success of 

 the experiment. 



A specialist from Cornell University visits the weir every morning and evening 

 at regular intervals, and with a shallow dip net removes the lampreys and helps over 

 the good fish and lets them go on their way. A strict count and record is made of the 

 kinds seen and of the number of each, their condition, development, habits, and such 

 other points as are of economic or scientific interest and help to give correct answers 

 to the questions above asked. By conscientiously performing this work it is also 

 possible to determine what percentage of each species migrates in the daytime and 

 what at night. 



President B. H. Davis, of the Fisheries, Game, and Forest Commission, conferred 

 with Senator Stewart on this subject, and the latter, at the request of the former and 

 several other interested persons, introduced a bill, as an item in the general supply bill, 

 for $500 for this work. Last year our, legislators passed a bill appropriating 81,500 

 for the removal of the billfish or gar pike from Black .and Chautauqua lakes; and here 

 in Cayuga Lake, the largest of the interior lakes of the State, the lamprey is fully one 

 hundred times as injurious to the fishing industry as is the billfish, and the amount 

 asked for and granted is only one-third of last year's specific appropriation. The 

 appropriation was made without dissent, and the New York State fish-culturist, Hon. 

 A. N. Cheney, now has general charge of the affair. The special investigations and 

 experiments are to be made by the writer and the results published by the Fisheries, 

 Game, and Forest Commission of the State of New York. 



Many eminent scientists and other persons have written, expressing interest in 

 this subject and the possible results of this experiment. 



ITHACA, NEW YORK. 



ADDENDUM. 



APRIL 25, 1898. 



At this date the weir for removing lampreys from the inlet of Cayuga Lake is constructed and 

 in successful operation. Although it is too early in the year for any results with the lake lamprey 

 (PetromyzoH marinus unicolor), some interesting facts have already been obtained concerning the 

 brook lamprey (Lampetra wilderi). On April 9, the first day the weir was in working order, one 

 adult male of this species was found in it, and on the llth two others. Oil the 16th it contained 

 several adult males and females; on the 20th one male and two females, and on the 22d two more 

 females. These were striving to swim up the stream, presumably to regain the places from which 

 they had doubtless been washed during the past year as larva? in the sand, since their spawning-beds 

 are all above this. In a tank at Cornell University several specimens taken from the sand six weeks 

 ago have not only transformed into adults, but the reproductive organs of both sexes have matured, 

 and one female was spawning when she died. This was without having taken food, and we are still 

 further led to believe that adults of the brook lamprey are not parasitic, and, indeed, take no food 

 at all. 



H. A. SURFACE. 



