STUDIES ON FURUNCULOSIS OF FISH IN BRITISH COLUMBIA

Abstract

Investigation of a disease occurring among Rocky mountain whitefish in the Elk river, 1931, and among hybrid Pacific salmon in a retaining pond at Cultus lake, 1932, showed similar pathological features in each epizootic. An easily cultivable bacterium, producing a brown diffusible pigment on nutrient agar, was isolated in pure and in nearly pure culture from lesions of typical cases in each outbreak. Experimental inoculation into goldfish and chub have established the pathogenic nature of the microorganism, and its relationship to the lesions described. No bacterium corresponds in all cultural and biochemical features with Bacillus salmonicida Emmerich and Weibel. The disease in each locality presents the pathological picture typical of "furunculosis."