28 FISH-CULTURAL ASSOCIATION. 
structiveness in man, and his small boy, had not proper repre- 
sentation in the great place, and nature, too heavily handicapped, 
must give up the contest so far as fish were concerned, at least 
in certain localities. 
The science of fish-culture came to the relief of outraged na- 
ture, and it was then seen that a part of the great plan was to 
use man as an instrument to prevent the extinction of certain, if 
not all, species of food fishes of our inland waters. 
Fish-culturists have done their work well to make over ninety 
fish grow where only five, or less than that number, were grown 
before, but their labors are not completed with the stocking of 
public waters with food fish for the people. Many waters, from 
the merciless warfare that has been waged against their finny 
inhabitants at all seasons, have become totally barren; others 
only partially depleted; but in both instances radical changes 
may have taken place, with an equally important item in the 
fish-culturist’s plan to reinhabit which may prove a bar to suc- 
cess—the item being fish food. The purity and temperature of 
the water may remain suitable for artificially-hatched food fish, 
but the fish food may have taken its departure, and remain only 
as alegend. Still there may be food in plenty for certain species 
of fish, but a desire for a certain kind may render the stocking 
or restocking of some waters a failure. To be sure this error 
would only be made by one not versed in the requirements for 
the well being of the different kind of fishes, but many fish 
are, of necessity, sent out from State hatcheries to be deposited 
as the judgment of those sending for the fish may dictate. With 
the exercise of the greatest care mistakes will be made, as in 
instances that have come under my notice. An abundance of 
proper food introduced into a body of water, barren of fish 
food, changes the food fish thereof from a very indifferent fish 
to a more excellent one for the table. 
My attention was called to the importance of fish food more 
than twenty years ago in a very practical manner. Near where 
I live was an artificial pond, on a stream that had once been a 
trout stream. I could recollect when the brook contained trout, 
but I could not remember when the dam, that formed the pond, 
was built. Neither contained trout at the time to which I refer. 
. 
