Frostburg Mining Journal

Does Freezing Kill Fish?

A number of live perch were secured and placed in water at the ice manufactory, and the water was put in the process of crystallization. It requires about sixty hours to freeze a cake of ice, and during this time the fish were watched to ascertain the effect of the intense cold which surrounded them. They kept alive and continued to swim in the water until their confines were so narrowed that they had no space in which to move, says the New Haven Register.

The ice in its freezing process begins at the outside and freezes towards the centre, so the space in which the fish had their liberty was gradually narrowed down until the fish were encased and the water around them froze, pinning them tightly in its folds. Each fish, when the cake was completed, was as natural as life, its fins and tail being spread as they were while in the act of swimming. The cake of ice containing the fish was placed on exhibition, and numerous bets, involving several hundred dollars, were made as to the outcome of the experiment.

The cake was left intact for a day or so, and then cut open, and the fish taken out and placed in water. They were left for some time, and of the five fishes which were originally put in the cake none of them exhibited a return to life, so far as can be definitely determined, except one, and whether this one was indeed alive is open to conjecture. After being placed in water, this one fish, it is asserted, moved from the position in which it was placed and assumed an entirely different position, which it is believed the fish made itself. However, as no one saw the movement, it is taken that the death of the remaining fish is proof positive that this one fish was also dead, and that the change of position was the result of something else than life in the fish.