January 13, 19 10] 



NA TURE 



MARINE BIOLOGY AT PORT ERIN. 



THE annual report of the Marine Biological Station at 

 Port Erin, Isle of Man, being the twenty-third annual 

 report of the Liverpool Marine Biology Committee, has 

 just been published, and it may be ot interest to refer 

 briefly to some of the features of a successful year's work. 

 The station appears to have been more active than ever 



-The Ei( 



al Slali 



this last year, and the record of work indicates that re- 

 searches of a most varied nature have been carried out. 



The adjoining fish hatchery (the expenses of which are 

 met by the Isle of Man Fishery Board) has been employed, 

 as usual, in the hatching of plaice eggs, and a total of 

 7,124,500 larviE were liberated in the open sea. Some of 

 the eggs have been used for experimental purposes, and 

 a series of extremely good photo- 

 graphs, taken by Dr. F. Ward, and 

 illustrating various stages of the 

 larvs from the time of hatching until 

 metamorphosis had begun, are in- 

 chidcd in the report. The number of 

 workers who occupied tables in the 

 laboratory is forty, of whom twenty 

 were senior students of the Liverpool 

 University attending an Easter class 

 in marine biology, which has now- 

 become an annual fixture. As a 

 matter of fact, the station is usually 

 crowded during the Easter vacation, 

 and a visitor would be struck immedi- 

 ately by the number of people taking 

 .advantage of the laboratory, and by 

 the economical way in which the 

 work is carried out. More than one 

 foreign professor of zoology has been 

 surprised, on learning the finances of 

 the Biological Station, that the place 

 could be kept going with active 

 workers there at all, for it must be 

 remembered that this is not a labora- 

 tory subsidised by Government or 

 county council, but depending for the 

 main part of its income upon the 

 voluntary contributions of those 

 interested in the work. 



In addition to the report of the 

 curator (Mr. Chadwick) are minor 

 reports on some of the research work, 



including statements of Mr. \V. J. Dakin's work on the sense 

 organs of Mollusca, Mr. F. H. Gravely 's studies on the 

 polycha^te larvae, and Dr. Roaf's researches on the digestive 

 processes in marine Invertebrata — histological, biochemical, 

 and faunistic work being thus represented. An article by 

 Prof. \V. A. Herdman on " Our Food from the Sea " com- 

 ])letes the report, and alludes to the scope of the quantita- 



features of Port Erin work. The article is illustrated by 

 some photographs of practically pure plankton catches, of 

 which two are reproduced here (Figs. 2 and 3). 



No doubt many scientific workers in other branches of 

 zoology who have not considered this quantitative plankton 

 work in detail still hold more or less to Haeckel's view — 

 that time is being lost by using methods which are in- 

 accurate, based upon principles which are impossible. It 

 may be useful, therefore, to consider some of 

 these points here, for a report of this kind brings 

 one up against the question of the practicability 

 and value of quantitative plankton research. 

 During the last few years the number of workers 

 studying the plankton of fresh and salt water has 

 greatly increased, and some of the most remark- 

 able problems in marine biology have been shown 

 to be bound up in plankton questions. I might 

 refer, in the first place, to Putter, who but a 

 short time ago propounded certain startling 

 theories concerning the food of marine organisms. 

 According to this author the planktonic organisms 

 are insulhcient to provide for the wants of many 

 marine animals which can only obtain their food 

 from filtered sea water, and he asserts that the 

 latter is in itself a nutrient fluid. 



Many facts, both biological and chemical, have 



been brought forward against these theories, but, 



whether correct or not, Piitter has shown the 



need o.f further research and the importance of 



the problem of animal metabolism in the sea. 



The actual food requirements of the animals must 



be determined by physiological and biochemical 



methods, and quantitative plankton methods alone 



will show whether the plankton can supply the demands 



made by the physiologist. The total plankton present _ at 



any time is the result of a series of processes — productive 



and destructive — and it is important to know how the 



volume or quantity varies. 



No qualitative work will sliow the seasonal, or even 

 dailv variation in the volume of the plankton, though it 





'^y 





-Pl.inkton 



nly of Cc 



ii.sting almost entirely 



tive plankton investigation, which 

 NO. 20qS, VOL. 82] 



I mav indicate the specific change. The interest in^ such 

 problems is immediately aroused when catches with a 

 certain net, after averaging a few cubic centimetres in 

 volume, suddenly rise to 40 cubic centimetres, remain there 

 for a period, and then as suddenly fall to about i cc. or 

 2 cc. for the summer season, and this is a characteristic 

 annual change observed in the Irish and Bahic Seas. 



has been one of the I What determines these changes in volume? When do they. 



