CAPTURING WHALES BY ELECTRICITY.

Southland Times, Issue 1127, 10 September 1869, Page 2

CAPTURING WHALES BY ELECTRICITY.

A good deal used to be talked about applying explosive bombs in the whale fishery ; but actual trials have shown the plan to be a failure. The explosion of a bomb, if attached to the harpoon, simply destroys the flesh in its neighborhood, aud hence also the hold on the fish, which is often thus lost and uselessly killed. From various causes, amongst which are, no doubt, the general use of gas for lighting, and the discovery of petroleum, the whale fishery has rather languished of late years, and it probably requires a stimulus such as would be afforded by diminishing its well known dangers. Whether this object would be obtained by a curious proposal submitted to the Society of Civil and Mechanical Engineers, by Mr H. J. Rogers, only actual trial will show ; but we understand that the project is partly brought forward by practical whale fishers. A galvanic battery is placed in the whaling boat with a powerful induction coil in communication. Prom the terminals of the battery two insulated wires pass as conductors, through a line of the size ordinarily used to the harpoon, which is made with two heads, separated from each other, each insulated wire passing through the harpoon to the points where they terminate. The handle of the harpoon is of course insulated. In this harpoon the circuit would be complete when it struck the whale. According to another plan, one insulated wire passes from one terminal through the rope to the end of a harpoon having one point only, the other insulated wire hanging in the water, and acting as a means for the return current. The experiments have been tried on eels and other small fish without perforating the skin, the two wires from the poles of the battery being simply directed in close proximity to each other towards the fish, or one wire at the head and the other at the tail, and the effect has been to produce rigidity and complete temporary paralysis, the eel and other fish appearing perfectly lifeless during, and even after the period of contact.