536 



NATURE 



[October ig, 191 1 



ol weights and measures had been put forward by Mr. J. 

 Porter, two papers, that brought the meeting to a close, 

 were read by Prof. Bottomley. In the first he adduced 

 further evidence in support of his contention that the 

 bacteria Azotobacter and Pseudomonas fix more nitrogen 

 per unit of carbohydrate consumed when grown together 

 than when grown separately. In the second he claimed 

 to have obtained evidence of the existence of bacteriotoxins 

 in the soil. 



A new feature introduced this year was a semi-popular 

 lecture, by Mr. Hall, on the local soils and farming 

 practices. So great was its success that a semi-popular 

 lecture is likely to become a regular part of the programme 

 ol the \gricultural Section. 



THE EAST AFRICAN NATURAL HISTORY 

 SOCIETY. 1 



"FHERE has been no falling off in the East African 

 Journal of Natural History : No. 3 of vol. ii. is as 

 interesting as its predecessors. The scientific student of 

 Africa welcomes these genuine, first-hand studies, these 

 notes and records without the flim-flam, facetiousness, and 

 vague inaccuracy which so often characterise the articles 

 contributed to similar societies in young colonies. 



In the part under review the most noteworthy articles, 

 perhaps, are : — " Notes on the Common Pathogenic- 

 Protozoa in British East Africa," by R. Eustace Mont- 

 gomery; "Some East African Pigs," by C. W. Wood- 

 house; and "Mendel's Principles of Heredity," by Dr. 

 A. H. Marsh (this last with reference to the crosses between 

 Bos 1 mints and B. indicus). 



Mr. Montgomery is the veterinary bacteriologist for 

 British East Africa. In his paper he devotes himself 

 chiefly to describing the protozoa of the groups Mastigo- 

 phora and Sporozoa. Of the first-named, the Spirochasta? 

 — causing diseases among cattle and domestic poultry — are 

 transmitted mainly or entirely by ticks of the genera 

 Boophilus, Argas, and Ornithodorus, and another tick 

 seems to be the introducer into the human system of the 

 Spirochaeta duttoni, which is the cause of human relapsing 

 fever. (The closely allied flagellate, Treponema pallida, is 

 the cause of syphilis. We are all aware of the ordinary 

 and normal manner of conveying the infection of syphilis, 

 but the question arises whether in Uganda and similar 

 countries where it rages infection may not also be con- 

 veyed by the agency of a tick.) There are four recognised 

 trypanosomes in British East Africa and Uganda : 

 T. gambiense, the deadly germ of sleeping sickness; T. 

 dimorphon, which may produce disease in horses, cattle, 

 dogs, 4c, but does nothing to man ; T. vivax, of which 

 the same may be said ; and T. lewisi, a parasite in rats. 

 The transmitting agencies of the trypanosomes appear to 

 be not only the notorious Glossina palpalis, or tsetse-fly, 

 of equatorial Africa, but possibly also other Glossina;, 

 a gad-fly, Tabanus, and a mosquito, Stomoxys. 



Among the East African Sporozoa, the genera Babesia, 

 Nuttallia, Theileria, and Anaplasma are pathogenic among 

 cattle and dogs. The transmitting agency for all these 

 sporozoa of the suborder Acystosporea is a tick — Boophilus. 

 Rhipicephalus, or Ha?maphysalis. Babesia is the cause of 

 red-water, or Texas fever, and also of tick fever in the 

 dog ; Nuttallia creates biliary fever in horses, asses, and 

 mules ; Theileria is the parasite of East Coast fever in 

 cattle; and Anaplasma produces a form of gall sickness 

 in cattle. 



With regard to the article on Fast African pigs (in which 

 there is much fresh material concerning the appearance 

 and habits of the giant forest pig), a puzzling mistake 

 occurs in the first paragraph, wherein reference is made 

 to an Abyssinian type of " wart-hog," Pkacochoertis 

 joknstoni. This should be Potamochoerus johnstoni (the 



African river-hog) ; and it is not, we bi lii ' 

 in range, but equatorial East African. 



A question is raised on p. 76 as to the attitudes of 

 marabou storks during flight. It has always seemed to the 

 present writer that in the normal attitudes of this bird 



1 The Tournnl of the 

 ol ii., N. 



id Uganda Nam 1 

 (London: Longmans, Green and Co.) Price 



NO. 2If)0, VOL. 87] 



when flying the neck was stretched out like that of other 

 storks, or slightly curved and retracted, especially when 

 wheeling. Others have asserted that the marabou drew 

 back its neck into the ruff of shoulder feathers as a 

 heron would do. It is a point which could best be decided 

 by instantaneous photographs. As a general rule, storks, 

 Balasniceps, and Scopus (besides ibises) stretch out their 

 necks when flying ; herons and pelicans retract them. 



This No. 3 contains as a frontispiece a remarkable 

 photograph of a record head of a Cape buffalo from 

 Uganda — a splendid specimen almost recalling in length 

 and curve of horns the extinct Bos atitiquus. There is 

 also an interesting article on birds in Uganda forests, 

 another on anthropometry, and a third on the seasonal 

 variation of the Junonia genus of butterflies. 



H. H. Johnston. 



WHELKS AND THE VALUATION OE THE 

 SEA A 



IN the first of these Teports Dr. Petersen discusses the 

 possibility of combating the harmful animals of the 

 fisheries, especially the whelks (Buccinum and Nassa), in 

 the Limfjord. It appears that these animals are exceed- 

 ingly troublesome in the Limfjord owing to their great 

 abundance and rapacity. They feed on the plaice caught 

 in the nets (gill-nets), and Dr. Petersen estimates the loss 

 to the fishermen at a third of the year's total catch, a 

 very considerable amount. The process of deliberate 

 extermination is not recommended, however, as being too 

 costly and uncertain, nor does it appear possible to make 

 any economical use of the whelks ; but it is suggested that 

 the fishermen should clear their nets at more frequent 

 intervals, and for the rest hope for an epidemic among 

 the whelks. The possibility of the latter seems by no 

 means remote. 



In the twentieth report Dr. Petersen displays the founda- 

 tions of an extensive and notable work on the quantita- 

 tive determination of the animal life on the bottom of the 

 sea. The investigation is stated to be a logical extension 

 of Hensen's ideas; but, as a matter of fact, the "census 

 of the sea " of Hensen, Brandt, and Herdman is widely 

 different from the " valuation of the sea " of Petersen. 

 Where the former lay stress on the plankton, and ignore 

 the part played by the organic matter dissolved in sea 

 water and in the bottom soil, the latter rather discredits 

 the plankton, pointing out, in agreement with Lohmann, 

 that its " producers " are not always able to supply 

 sufficient food for its own " consumers," and lays stress 

 on the organic matter. In the first part of this report Dr. 

 Boysen Jensen discusses the results of his chemical analysis 

 of the bottom soil and sea water, and concludes, infer alia, 

 that the organic matter must come essentially from the 

 benthos flora (algae, and especially Zostera) in the 

 Limfjord. The benthos animals — e.g. the oyster — are 

 dependent on this organic matter, and not on the plankton. 



It follows from this that the methods of investigation 

 used by Dr. Petersen are entirely different from those of 

 the planktologists. The basal idea is to determine the 

 quantity of animal life on a fixed unit of surface (o.i m. 2 ) 

 at as many different stations as possible, and at all seasons 

 of the year. For this purpose Dr. Petersen has designed 

 a special apparatus, which is simple in construction and 

 can be used at any depth. To count the animals, after 

 sifting, from such a unit of surface is obviously a much 

 easier matter than the enumeration of the plankton. But 

 Dr. Petersen goes much further, and. with the assistance 

 of Dr. Boysen Jensen, gives the equivalents for each species 

 in grams of organic matter. This common denominator 

 thus serves as a basis of comparison of : 1 only 



of the different species, but also of different areas or fish- 

 ing grounds. From this basis also it is possible to com- 

 pare the amount of nourishment available and the amount 

 consumed, as by the fishes. Fvr-n the fishes are reduced 



1 Nineteenth Report from the Danish Biological Station. Seme Experi- 

 ments on l*-r Possibility of combating the harmful Animals of the Fisheries, 

 especially the Whelks in ihe Limfjord. By C. G. Joh. Petersen. Pp. 20. 



'I iv, mi. >' 1 1 , !' • ,11 ,,t the 



Pea. I. Animal I Food and Q Qua ititative 



Studies). By C. G. Joh. Petersen and P. Boysen 1 : with 6 



tables, 3 charts and 6 plates. (1911.) 



