278 Poisoning of rivers. App. E. 



Poisoning of Rivers. 



7. It may be interesting to commence this subject 

 with a notice of the substances used for poisoning the 

 rivers. They are: 



Croton tiglium, 

 Anamirta cocculus, 

 Capsicum frutescens, 



and Kare Kai (Tulu), a Posoqueria, probably 

 nutans or longispina. 



8. Though very considerable progress has been made 

 within the last two years in stopping the annual whole- 

 Pro. Govt., dated 27th sa ^ e poisoning of the rivers, much still 

 Nov. 1868, No. 2,982, remains to be done. As long as fish 

 para " 3> can be easily captured in large quan- 

 tities by this means, so long will this species of poaching 

 be popular. In the wilder forest-locked parts of the in- 

 terior it is not easy to observe and check it, and when 

 the sympathies of the village authorities and police are 

 with the people, it is doubly difficult. 



11. The destructiveness of poisoning is more exten- 

 sive than at first sight appears. Though there may be 

 many pools in a river, there are a few, at intervals of 

 four or five miles, which are specially affected by the 

 larger sorts of fish. These are generally the deepest and 

 longest ; they are sometimes as much as twenty feet deep 

 and a quarter of a mile long. They are generally cooler 

 from being overshadowed with trees and more or less 

 overhung with rocks. Their very depth also would keep 

 them cooler than the wide shallows, extending for miles 



