Middletown transcript., 1881-09-09
A LEECH FARM.
A CURIOUS INDUSTRY ON LONG
ISLAND.

small leech farm in Kent avenue, vii
liamsburg, L. /. In course of tim'
this small establishment was aban
doned, and one of thirteen acres was
established near Newton L. l., and tt
him the writer is indebted for the fol
lowing information and description o.
the only leech farm in America. ThC
breeding ponds consists of oblone
squares of one and half acres each
The bottoms of these ponds are of clay
the margins of peat. In June the leeches
begin forming their cocOons on the
peat margins of the pond.
The greatest enemies to the young
leeches are the muskrats, water rats
and water shrews, who dig the cocoons
out of the soft peat breeding margins
Next to rats and shrews is overheatine
of the peat or the water of the pond
In fact nothing is so fatal to leecheS
as a too high temperature. Mr.. White
tells the Oil and Drug Ners he has had
leeches frozen in solid ice, but by
slowly dissolving the ice and gradually
increasing the temperature of the
water the leeches sustained no injury
The depth of the water in the ponds
during the summer is three feet il
winter time the depth of the water il
increased to avoid freezing.
The leeches are fed every six months
on fresh blood placed in thin liner
bags, which are suspended in the
water The leeches, as soon as they
smell the blood, assemble from all parts
Of the pond, and attaching themselves
to the outside of the bag, suck the dis.
solving cOagulated blood through the
linen. Digestion proceeds very slowly
with the leech, during which time the
blood remaining undigested in the
stomach of the leech is in a fluid state,
as if just taken in. The excremental
deposits are of grass-green color.
The best substance for packing leeches
in is the peat of their natural ponds
made into a stiff mud. Water con-
tanning tannin, tannic acid, lime, salt,
or brackish water, must be guarded
against always iron is not objectional,
but it is an advantage in small guam
titles.
The demand for leeches in the last
few years has somewhat fallen off in
the Eastern and Southern States. The
Western States and California are now
the heaviest buyers. Mr.. Whites sales
alone average thousand a day. The
number of leeches imported into the
United States amounts to about thirty
thousand yearly.
The custom of stripping and sailing
leeches, to cause them to disgorge after
having been applied, has passed away,
as many established cases have occurred
of infectious diseases having been COM
municated on the application of the
same leech to a second party. A very
popular error exists that a leech when
applied takes only bad blood (whatever
that may be) and rejects the good this
is a mistake. With a leech blood is
blood, be it the cold blood of fish OF
the warm blood of a human being, no
matter how diseased that human being
may be. So long as the blood is not
tainted or putrid the leech will thrive
on it. A friend of mine, who was the
of a large leech-breeding es-
tablishment at the foot of the Hartz
when wishing to feed his
leeches, was in the habit of hiring poor
laborels, at six cents per day, to stand
in the water for half an hour nearly up
to their thighs, that the leeches might
obtain full gorging of human blood.
In the marshy lands of Roumania
the wild leeches are captured by means
Of men entering the water and allowing
the wild leeches to faster on their naked
bodies. The leech fishers then strip
them off after reaching the shore.
If it is dangerous to apply the leeches
a second time the druggists should
beware of the Hartz leeches. And the
question may be asked whether the
blood feeding practiced at Newton may
not also produce poisonous leeches.-
Scientific american.