mo JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST. SOCIETY, Tol. XXVII 



beyond their precincts. The river banks in the intervals between the asyla 

 'are being planted with flower bearing, insect attracting, plants, and while it is 

 not anticipated that there will be a very great addition to the local food supply yet 

 EphemeridcB will be attracted and the trout will not so readily loss the fly-eating 

 habit. 



History: — In 1863, Dr. Francis Day attempted to import trout ova but they 

 'died before reaching the country. In 1866, he imported 6,000 ova and placed 

 those which survived in a masonry hatching house in the Government Gardens at 

 Ootacamund. Fine silt and the attacks of water organisms proved fatal to these. 



About the year 1867, Mr. M'lvor imported fry from Scotland. In 1869, he 

 transferred them to ponds in the Government House Gardens. From there, they 

 \were distributed to the Ootacamund Lake, the Khundahs and other places. 



Mr. M'lvor was at that time Superintendent of the Cinchona Plantations. He 

 was also charged with the care of the Government House Gardens. His activities 

 ■centered in Ootacamund. It was there that Dr. Day and he located the earliest 

 trout ponds and the hatchery. He clung to the relatively high slopes of Snowdon 

 and Dodabetta. He demanded low temperatures rather than an equable climate. 

 He established a tradition which for forty years made successful trout-breeding 

 impossible. There were no long stretches of clean gravel in the streams. Con- 

 tamination by sewage or cultivation was the rule rather than the exception. A 

 large percentage of the population were poachers by instinct. At the present day 

 it is doubtful whether there is a single trout in the Burnf oot or Lovedale Lakes, the 

 Sandy NuUah Stream or the Marhmund, Dodabetta and Tiger Hill Reservoirs. 



In 1877, Mr. Wapshare and Mr. Hubei't Knox put into the Pykara some carp 

 ■caught in the Ouchterlony Valley in the Wjmaad. In 1879, Mr. JBarlow, the Com- 

 missioner, reported that the PAdvara had been stocked with Mahseer (sic). When 

 and by whom it was stocked, he does not say. These experimental measures were 

 ■disastrous from the point of view of trout-culture. The myriads of carp in the 

 Pykara River at the present day are too shy to be of much use to the angler. Com- 

 peting as they do for the food in the river, they make it difficult for other fish to 

 eke out a precarious living. TM^elve miles of fine water from the junction of the 

 ]\Iukerti and Krurmund to the Pykara Waterfalls were completely spoiled. 



In the early eighties, fryponds were made at Pykara about 12 miles from 

 Ootacamund. A heavy flood about the year 1884 damaged the ponds and swept 

 the whole of the fish into the Pykara River. It was unfortunate that the ac- 

 cident occasioned a return to Ootacamund. Unsuitable as Pykara was owing to 

 the existence of Carp, it was at any rate preferable to the slopes of Snowdon and 

 Dodabetta. 



In 1884, the Game Association and the Collector reported that dynamiting 

 and the use of small mesh nets were becoming general. A notification under 

 Madras Act 2 of 1879 was then issued prohibiting such practices in the chief 

 reservoirs and rivers of the plateau. 



The position about this time was that the Ootacamund Lake contained Tench 

 and Carp wliilst the Pjdcara held numerous bony Carp. Trout were cons- 

 picuous by their absence. 



In 1892, the fry kept by Dr. Ross in a reservoir at Dodabetta were almost all 

 lost by the breaching of the dam. In 1893, the two females of the four large fish 

 maintained at Dodabetta spawned in February, but as the males were in milt in 

 November, the ova could not be fertilised. In this year, seven fry-ponds and a 

 stock-pond were made at Pykara. 



Fortjr thousand ova imported from England were put into thd icehouse at 

 Ootacamund where they froze and were destroyed. A second consignment 

 arrived on March 4th. The high temperature of the water, however, destroyed 

 the fry as fast as they hatched and only 83 survived. Messrs. Ross, Marsh, 

 Wapshare and Lawson spent considerable sums in further attempts to propagate 

 the species. The temperature of the water militated against success. Myriads 



