6 Ihiircrsitij of California Publications in Zoologij [Vol. 15 



at sea was started. In view of the meagerness of funds, however, it 

 was decided to limit operations to dredging- and trawling in the neigh- 

 borhood of San Pedro, where the laboratory was then located. An 

 open forty-foot, tifteen horse-power gasoline launch, the "Elsie," was 

 hired for the work. Its equipment consisted of a hand-winch for haul- 

 ing tlie dredge and trawl, an improvised sounding-machine operated 

 by hand and supplied with 275 meters of galvanized steel wire (no. 10 

 of the American Steel and Wire Company), and an improvised ap- 

 paratus for taking sub-surface samples of water (see Ritter. 1902). 

 Two months' work from May 15 to August 15 was done, during which 

 the "Elsie" made dredgings around and in the vicinity of Santa 

 Catalina Island and San Diego, as well as at San Pedro, the region of 

 its main explorations. The main aim of the work being that of getting 

 acijuainted with the fauna with a view of determining the most feasible 

 place for a permanent location, collections were not made primarily 

 from a quantitative point of view, and the data obtained, while ex- 

 ceedingly valuable, have little quantitative significance. 



Owing to lack of funds no explorations at sea were made during 

 1902, but in 1903 work was resumed with Coronado as the base of 

 operations (Ritter, 1912). A small schooner, the "Laura," was 

 rented and outfitted with the meager apparatus at hand, put in charge 

 of an intelligent Portuguese fisherman, Manuel Cabral, and set to 

 work for six weeks during June and July. The experiences of 1901 

 had shown that, with a limited boat equipment, bottom and plankton 

 collecting could not be well combined and that on the whole plankton 

 collections could be made more efficiently and no less profitably from 

 the scientific standpoint. The apparatus consisted of a series of 

 ordinary tow-nets oi 000, 12, and 20 mesh, with which open vertical 

 hauls were made, in addition to the usual surface towings. As the 

 funds were insnfificient to permit the purchase of closing nets, a 

 method was improvised whereby water from any desired depth could 

 be pumped and filtered (see p. 11). Two summers and wnnters were 

 spent in telling work during the Coronado period. 



After carefully studying the coast. La JoUa, a suburb of San 

 Diego, situated fifteen miles north of the center of the city, was 

 selected as, on the whole, the most advantageous place for the perma- 

 nent location of the station, and in the summer of 1905 the laboratory 

 was moved from Coronado to La Jolla. During the summer of 1904 

 i\Ir. E. W. Seripps had placed his pleasure yacht, the "Loma," at 

 the disposal of the station, and in the fall of the same year he gave 



