CV1 DISEASES AND CAUSES OF DESTRUCTION. 



1879 the occupants of a small fish-pond at Seek, in the Duchy of Nassau, 

 were destroyed by a flash of lightning. The following morning the whole of 

 the fish were discovered dead on the surface, having all the appearance 

 of having been half-boiled, while they crumbled to pieces on being touched. 

 No injury could be seen, but the- water in the pond was still muddy 

 and dull the morning after the storm. At 3 p.m. on July 7, 1865, a 

 flash of lightning, observed Mr. Lloyd, struck a house in Hamburg, and 

 about 200 feet away in a shady spot in the garden, and in the open 

 air, was a large fresh-water aquarium containing forty-three fish, consisting 

 of tench, carp, dace, roach, gold-fish, and eels, two species of loach, etc. 

 At the moment of the flash of lightning every one of these fish became 

 suspended perpendicularly downwards in the water, with their tails at the 

 surface, feebly and vainly trying to swim towards the bottom of the tank, 

 with all their fins strangely attenuated, as transparent as fine tissue- 

 paper, and densely covered on both sides with myriads of fine air- 

 bubbles ; their heads and bodies were not so covered. In less than half- 

 an-hour forty-one were dead, strongly curved, almost in the form of 

 semi-circles, and already fast decomposing ; but two gradually recovered by 

 being placed in running' water. 



Hail and thunderstorms united will sometimes depopulate rivers in 

 tropical- countries (Dobrizhoffer) . On July 3, 1866, several salmon in 

 Scotland were killed by lightning during the intensely hot weather that 

 prevailed. Gales, likewise, are occasionally destructive to fish. Thus, on 

 April 13, 1874, one at Scilly was so violent that large fish, as conger, 

 hake, ling, &c, were tossed about in their watery homes, and at last flung 

 by hundreds on the rocks. Some had their scales knocked off, others their 

 heads stove in, while even those which live at the rocky bottoms fared no 

 better than their neighbours. It is well known that a high temperature 

 is injurious to fishes: thus about June 10,1882, a great destruction of 

 trout occurred in Harry Loch, in Orkney. The weather reduced the water 

 in the Loch, and the trout gathered in great shoals around the burn-mouths, 

 where they were landed in hundred-weights by the neighbouring farmers, 

 who are mostly small proprietors. One fisherman-farmer landed a thousand 

 trout in one haul ; while on another occasion five cartloads were caught in a 

 single sweep. 



Waterworks may suck in young fry by hundreds. The action of dynamite 

 is very destructive, and when blowing up the ruins of the Tay bridge, fish 

 as much as two miles away were destroyed : those killed sunk, those only 

 stunned mostly floated. 



3. Diseases by which they are directly affected, including those in the 

 ova state and infancy, as developmental or monstrosities, malformations or 

 consequent upon accidents. Space will nOt permit me to enter upon the 



