Fearnow. — Transporting Live Fish. 99 



is necessary to the life of the fish. Experiments in connection with the 

 use of the evaporation jacket described in an article entitled "A New 

 Method of Carrying Live Fish," and published in the Transactions 

 of the American Fisheries Society in 1921, convinced the writer 

 that the large amount of water used in transporting fish could be 

 materially reduced. 



After numerous experiments it was found that with means 

 for controlling the temperature, fish could be carried as satisfac- 

 torily in eight or ten inches of water, the ordinary milk can being 

 used, as in sixteen inches of water. These experiments were con- 

 ducted on two of the cars and extended over a period of several 

 months. One of the car captains used an ordinary garbage can 

 13 inches high and 12 ^^ inches in diameter, carrying as many fish 

 therein as were handled in the regulation can. Another captain 

 carried fish from Marquette, Iowa, to New Mexico, in 8 and 10 

 inches of water. 



INCEPTION OF IDEA. 



Practically every individual who has been connected with the 

 distribution of live fish has observed one or two trout or bass in- 

 advertently left in the bottom of a fish can in a very small amount 

 of water. Fish in such condition have been known to survive for 

 a number of days without attention provided no sudden change of 

 temperature occurred. It has also been noted that fish in land- 

 locked ponds and pools along streams survive months in a very 

 crowded condition when a large surface of the water is exposed 

 to the air. The 10-gallon can now in use carries a depth of sixteen 

 inches of water, and when the fish are poured from one of these 

 cans into a tub or lard can where the water is shallow they seem 

 to do much better. In fact, it not infrequently occurs that a 10- 

 gallon can of fish is poured into a shallow fifty-pound lard can and 

 shipment made a considerable distance with good results. 



Certain species most difficult to transport successfully, such as 

 trout, habitually seek the bottom of the container where the water 

 is less affected by the absorption of the oxygen of the air. Since 

 a considerable body of water is less affected by change of the atmos- 

 pheric temperature and does not become polluted as quickly as a 

 smaller volume, it has been customary to fill the containers com- 

 paratively full, notwithstanding the desirability of carrying fish 

 near the surface of the water. 



