| |
| |
Caption: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1888
This is a reduced-resolution page image for fast online browsing.
EXTRACTED TEXT FROM PAGE:
186 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS. Hart; an amanuensis, Miss M. J. Snyder, and a janitor. Drawing and other miscellaneous assistance is variously provided for according to circumstances. OPERATIONS OF THE LABORATORY. Our operations may be conveniently reported under the heads, investigation, office work, publication, and general educational work. The original investigations of the Laboratory now run along three general lines, never wholly distinct, but still usually distinguishable; those of general zoology, entomology, and cryptogamic botany. GENERAL ZOOLOGY. Our researches in general zoology have been chiefly directed, during the past two years, to the aquatic animal life of the State, which we are studying systematically, both in detail and as a whole, working at the identification, description and illustration of the species; at their distribution, haunts, food, and habits; at their relations to each other where they are thrown together, as in the same lake or stream; at their relations to nature generally, as determined by climate, season, quantity and quality of water, and the like; and at their relations to man as affecting the maintenance and increase of the food supply derived or derivable from the waters of the State—aiming thus lo present finally a picture of the aquatic life of Illinois, both plant and animal, in a form suited to attract the interest of the intelligent citizen, to instruct the student, and to contribute to the economic welfare of the State. Our work in this direction has lately come into close, and, I hope, mutually helpful relation to that of the State Fish Commission, as I shall show more fully when reporting upon the investigations of the present season. Field work on our aquatic zoology has fallen chiefly to Professor Garman, Mr. Hart, and myself. In 1887 we thoroughly studied several of the smaller lakes of Northern Illinois, and one of us spent a fortnight on one of the larger lakes of Southern Wisconsin, making soundings, dredgings, and surface net collections for comparison with those from the smaller lakes of the same series in our own State. Large collections illustrative of the food of fishes were also made at Quincy and Havana during the latter part of the summer by Professor Garman and myself, the material thus obtained enabling me to bring to a conclusion the general study of the subject, which I have had in hand since 1880. Beginning in November, 1887, surface net collections have been made twice a week for the Laboratory from the waters of Lake Michigan, off Chicago (except when the ice prevented), to enable
| |
