SOME SHOCKING EVENTS IN NEW YORK

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 2, 2 July 1938, Page 31

SOME SHOCKING EVENTS IN NEW YORK

New York Aquarium officials confirmed recently the revelation made by Dr. Christopher W. Coates in Washington that shocking events are taking place in the fish house down by the Battery, says the "New York Times."

It's a complicated story, and it involves rats, who are to blame for it; cats, who are the victims, and electric eels, who. provide the shocks. Dr. Coates, aquarist in charge of exhibitions, told it to the Institute of Radio Engineers and other scientific societies, meeting in Washington,' and Dr. Ross Negrelli, pathologist at the Aquarium, amplified the details. To begin with, rats —big, hulking river rats that scurry off the boats in the Battery—sneak into the Aquarium. They're particularly bad in the winter. They balance themselves on the tank tops, trying to grab fish that are sick and have to float near the surface.

Sometimes a rat will lose its balance, fall into the tank, and be drowned, but the Aquarium people can't depend on that. So Dr. Coates acquired three or four cats and turned them loose in the aquarium to catch the rats.

But trouble developed. The cats also like fish, and Dr. Coates found they were paying more attention to fishing than they were to killing rats. He had to teach them a lesson, and it had to be a drastic one.

So Dr. Coates went to a tank in

wtilch half a dozen snakelike creatures, about sft in length, were splashing around. He removed one and put it on j the floor. It was, of course, an electric eel (Electrophorus electricus, alias Gymnotus electricus), from the South American Amazon country, and it was, perfectly all right for it to be on the floor, for electric eels can live an hour or two out of water. Then he put his cats near it. Ah, the cats thought, fresh fish! They pounced upon it. And they jumped backalmost knocked out. The cats, according to Dr. Nigrelli, received mild shocks of only ten volts or so, for they touched Electrophorus electricus in only one place. "If they had touched both head and tail," Dr. Nigrelli said, "it would have been good-bye cat, for they would have got a jolt of 500 volts —enough to knock down a horse." After a few such experiences, the cats did not bother the fish, for, from then on, all fish looked like electric eels to the cats, and naturally they did not care for electric eels. That made the situation generally satisfactory to everyone concerned, except maybe the rats.

The funny thing about it, Dr. Nigrelli pointed out, is that the cats still like Dr. Coates. One of them in particular, follows him about the aquarium wherever he goes.