Book Description

Excerpt from Contributions to Canadian Biology: Being Studies From the Marine Biographical Station of Canada, 1901 The founding of the Canadian Marine Biological Station under Government auspices three years ago, may be said, without exaggeration, to mark an era in the progress of science and technical research in the Dominion. Two primary objects were kept prominently in view by those who initiated the project, viz.: - The advancement of the fisheries of the country and the interests of the fishing population resident along our shores, as well as the enlargement of existing knowledge on marine fishes and other living organisms in the waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and along the Atlantic coast of Canada. Marine investigations, it must be remembered, have been carried on in our waters by Canadian and foreign workers for nearly seventy years; but the results of the work accomplished by scientific men, including such authorities as the late Sir William Dawson, Dr. J. F. Whiteaves, Professor Ganong, and certain eminent United States biologists, had a far less direct bearing upon the fisheries and fishing industries than would have been the case had a scientific school or Marine Biological Station existed upon our shores. Other countries long ago realized this, and founded and equipped such stations, where biologists have had every facility for attacking the pressing and difficult problems of the deep-sea and inshore fisheries. During my first maritime tour as Dominion Commissioner of Fisheries, I was impressed not only with the desirability of some thorough and systematic investigation into fish life, and marine life generally, in Canadian waters, but also with the absolute necessity for a laboratory, where exhaustive researches could be carried on, and adequate solutions attained in regard to questions vitally affecting the fisheries, and I ventured to point out in my first formal report, dated October 5, 1893, addressed to the Minister of Marine and Fisheries, at the time, (Sir C. H. Tupper) how urgently these matters called for attention. I laid stress on the scattered and limited amount of knowledge we possessed on such subjects as the spawning periods and breeding areas of valuable food-fishes, and the great loss of valuable fishery resources resulting annually, especially by non-utilization and waste, and I called attention to the urgency of preventing this waste of valuable fish-products, and of thus stimulating new fishery enterprises. The Minister was forcibly impressed by some of the points I stated, and he requested me to fully report as to the best means of accomplishing a systematic fisheries survey, of improving the fishing industries, and of creating the new enterprises to which I referred. Accordingly, in 1894, I prepared a special report, published in the Annual Report of the Department of Marine and Fisheries, entitled: 'A Marine Scientific Station for Canada,' and I laid stress on the growing interest being taken by the public in this country and in other countries in biological investigations upon the conditions of life in the sea. Further, I drew special attention to the peculiar richness, variety and value of the Canadian fishing grounds as a field for investigation. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com