A PLEA FOR THE SYSTEMATIC STUDY OF 

 FISH DISEASES 



By Tarleton H. Bean, 



STATE FISH CULTURIST, ALBANY, NEW YORK. 



It is not my intention in tliis paper to gi\"e a historical ac- 

 count (jf the e)rigin and growth of iish cnhure, Imt rather tu 

 call attention to a present condition which appears to me to 

 operate against the perfect and full development of this 

 important arm of the pnhlic service. 



We may hriefl}' recall certain salient facts, such as the ex- 

 periments of S. L. Jacohi, who, in 1741, took eggs from the 

 common trout of lun"ope and fertilized them artificiallv. He 

 liatclied the eggs in wooden troughs with gravel on the hot- 

 tom, imitating natiu'al conditions as nearl}' as possihle. In 

 1837 Jolm Shaw was the iirst to artificialh' fertilize eggs of 

 the Atlantic salmon in ( Ireat Britain: in 1854 Dr. Theodatus 

 Garlick hatched l)rook trout eggs in Ohio ; in 1856 Massachu- 

 setts appointed three commissioners, thereby inaugurating 

 the l^eginning of i)uhlic fish culture in the United States; in 

 1857 Carl Muller of New York and Henry Brown of New 

 Ha\en impregnated whitefish eggs from Lake Ontario, and 

 also tried to propagate the pike perch ; in 1864 salmon eggs 

 were sent from Europe to America, and they were hatched 

 in New York City by James B. Johnson; in 1865 codfish 

 eggs were first successfully hatched in Nor\\ay ; in 1867 the 

 shad hatching l)Ox, a floating Ix^x with wire bottom and fur- 

 nished with wooden cleats, so [jlaced as to tip the l)ox at an 

 angle to tlie current of the water, was invented and put into 

 [practical use. In 1868 New York State followed the example 

 of the New Iingland States by estal)lis]iing a fish commission 

 consisting of Horatio Seymotu", Robert B. Roosevelt and 

 Setli Creen. Idiese commissioners were appointed on A]^ri! 

 x'crv well-known Clerman association called 



