Animals: Old Silverspot

Last week the Bemidji, Minn., Fish Hatchery telephoned long distance to its officials to tell them that Old Silverspot, matriarch of wall-eye pike, was safe at the hatchery. She had been missing for two years. Hatchery men had thought she was dead of old age or had been a fisherman’s prize 25-lb. catch. Fish officials hurried to Bemidji, found her swimming in a tub. They took her picture as Minnesota’s mother of millions.

The fish first appeared in hatchery nets twelve years ago, a chunky, gold-gleaming adult of 12 lb.† Hatchery men noticed a peculiar shining spot in front of her dorsal fin, named her Silverspot. Every year for ten years she was caught in Minnesota Lake waters, taken to the hatchery, stripped of her eggs and released. At one stripping she gave some 300,000 eggs. In

1923 the director of the hatcheries distinguished her among wall-eye pike by punching a hole in her tail fin in acknowledgment of her reproductive ability.

“Big Dog”

The crowd at a fair in Port Royal, Pa. sat quietly in the dark watching the fireworks display one evening last week. As a big rocket hissed over their heads lighting up the grandstand, a small boy shouted to them to “look at the big dog.” Sitting unnoticed in the stand was the fair’s lion, escaped from his cage. Children screamed. The lion roared. Several thousand people rushed to the exits. State troopers drew their revolvers, formed a circle about the beast while keepers lassoed him.

A Pig For Alice

Eva Le Gallienne, founder-directrix of the Civic Repertory Theatre, was last week looking for a pig. She had to have one for her friend Josephine Hutchinson to carry when she plays Alice in Wonderland. A complete search of Manhattan’s pet shops failed to reveal a suitable animal so Miss Le Gallienne wrote to the press about it. What she wanted was a pig that would not grow into a hog during the course of the play’s run. She preferred a quiet animal that could make its public appearance without wiggling, kicking, snorting. An occasional squeal would be permitted on stage, however, for the only way Alice knows that the Duchess’ baby, which she has been holding, is nothing but a pig is by its squeal.

†Because of their gold mottlings French Canadians call them dorés (gilded). They are distinguished by their large, flat eyes, are sometimes called glassy-eye pike. They weigh from three to 55 lb., are found mainly in Canadian and North ern U. S. lakes and rivers.