ZOOLOGICAL 
BULLETIN a 
Published by the New York Zoological Society on 
POCIEAY 
DEC iC 
Yomal Muse 
VotuMeE XXIII 
NOVEMBER, 
1920 NoumBer 6 
THE WORK OF THE AQUARIUM WELL-BOAT 
By C. H. Townsenp 
\HE possession of a first-class well-boat for 
‘| the collecting of specimens has recently en- 
abled the Aquarium to increase its marine 
exhibits, which are now larger than they have 
been at any time in the past. A boat of this 
kind has long been needed, as all public aquari- 
ums are under the necessity of procuring their 
living exhibits directly from Nature's sources of 
supply. The animal dealer has little to offer 
aside from marine mammals. 
Visitors are generally surprised when told 
that the fishes and invertebrates of the Aquarium 
are all brought in by our own men and a large 
proportion of them captured with our own nets. 
The work of keeping the tanks well stocked 
both in numbers and variety has until recently 
been no easy matter, as all transporting of live 
specimens had to be done in small tanks carried 
in boats or wagons hired for the purpose and 
constantly aerated by hand. 
With a well-boat always ready for service, 
fishes are now safely floated to the door of the 
building and disheartening losses in transit are 
eliminated, specimens are also received in better 
condition and are therefore better fitted to sur- 
vive under the conditions of captivity. 
Our well-boat, the Seahorse, was specially 
built for the service of the Aquarium by the New 
York Zoological Society. The vessel was 
launched from the boat-yard of A. Hansen in 
Brooklyn on May 20, 1920, and has been in ser- 
vice ever since. Collecting trips lasting from 
twenty-four to forty-eight hours have been made 
weekly during the summer and will be continued 
until sometime in November, when cold weather 
makes fishing unprofitable as well as difficult. 
The craft will then be hauled out for the winter. 
The Seahorse is thirty-five feet in length, 
eleven feet beam, three one-half feet 
draught, and is registered at nine tons gross. 
The well amidships is ten feet long at the bot- 
tom, with the width and depth of the boat. The 
forward cabin is ten feet long, the engine cabin 
seven feet, and there are berths for four men. 
The boat is strongly built and thoroughly sea- 
worthy. 
and 
The Seahorse has a twenty-five horsepower 
engine, is sloop rigged and is well adapted for 
the kind of work to be done. -The boat made 
nineteen trips to Sandy Hook and Raritan bays, 
bringing in nearly three thousand live fishes and 
over eight hundred crustaceans, to say nothing 
of other fishes and small marine forms used as 
fish food. 
The collecting outfit includes a twelve-foot 
seine boat, a three-hundred-foot haul-seine, and 
a beam trawl. Next summer an otter trawl will 
be added to the equipment. 
Owing to unfavorable weather conditions a 
few trips were barren of results. On the other 
hand, more than three hundred live fishes have 
been carried in the well of the boat on a single 
trip. The largest fishes secured were sand 
sharks and red drum from three to four feet 
in length, but fishes up to ten feet in length 
can be carried. About sixty different species 
of fishes were taken up to October 14. 
There are no beaches suitable for the hauling 
of seines near the City. It is necessary to go 
to the lower bay to find sandy beaches clean and 
free from bottom obstructions, but even there 
the nets are sometimes snagged and torn. 
The Seahorse makes the run from the Battery 
to Sandy Hook, a distance of sixteen miles, in 
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