THE COD FISHERY OF ALASKA. 207 



practices of the fishermen upon the abundance of fish, it will be well to review the actual numbers 

 taken at different times and in various places. Captain Haley secured 10,000 fish in two weeks 

 from Indians on the Hoocheuoo Bank, and could have got many more. The Indians caught these 

 cod with bark lines on barbless, bent-iron hooks, two of them going off in a canoe and bringing in 

 from 25 to 50 fish, which were quite enough to satisfy their laziness. They would not allow any 

 one else to fish, but if they had the number would have been readily quadrupled. 



Mr. D. C. Boweu states that as many as 500 have been taken in a day by one hand-line fisher- 

 man on Portlock Bank, and that the average catch of the whole season per man is 75 per day. 



Here may be repeated the statement of Captain White, of the United States Eevenue Marine, 

 who reported the capture, south of Kodiak, of 250 fish, weighing 30 to 40 pounds each, with 

 twenty lines having four or five hooks each. This number was taken in two hours. 



From the New York Times of July 15, 1879, 1 extract a sentence by William S. Dodge, formerly 

 mayor of Sitka, to the effect that " at Kodiak Henry Eichard and Thomas Bache, fishermen, caught 

 alone, with hook and line, within the last six months, 22,000 cod." 



Capt. Andrew Anderson told me at Saint Paul that with a crew of ten men, on Seminoffsky 

 Bank, he has caught as many as 4,000 cod in a day, and that his average catch there was from 

 1,GOO to 1,800 daily. 



Mr. D. C. Bowen stated that John McCathriue and a man named Smith caught 1,700 cod in a 

 day on one trawl (a 12-line trawl of COO or 700 hooks) in Unga Straits. Their average catch was 

 1.200 fish. 



A correspondent of the San Francisco Post, writing of the season of 1876, says: "One man on 

 board the schooner Selma, which arrived the other day, had 13,000 fish to his credit," &c. These 

 were caught during a season of four mouths. 



Capt. J. C. Caton, who has been familiar with the Shumagiu fishery ever since the second year 

 of its existence, affirms that fish are plentiful enough to supply a large market when that is found. 

 The evidence of all the fishermen goes to prove that the great want is not fish, but demand for fish. 

 One such customer as Gloucester would whiten the Gulf of Alaska with hundreds of sails, where 

 now there are less than a dozen, and there is every indication that full fares would repay the 

 venture. 



As for the influence of fishing and its accompanying practices, we have information from only 

 two points, Kodiak and Pirate Cove. Capt. H. E. Bowen, of Saint Paul, Kodiak, says that cod 

 are as abundant there now as they were when white men began fishing ; that their haunts and 

 habits have not been changed by the influence of man, and their numbers have not been diminished 

 by over- fishing. Trawls have never been used in that vicinity. He regards the practice of throw- 

 ing gurry overboard as injurious to the fishery; the cod, he says, will leave and their place will be 

 taken by sculpins. 



Mr. Thomas Devine, of Pirate Cove, said that cod are scarcer there now than they were five 

 years ago. He accounts for their decrease by the increased fishing, especially with trawls, the 

 injurious practice of throwing gurry overboard, and, to some extent, by the capture of the mother 

 fish, which will sometimes take the hook freely. The loss of gear resulting from trawling has a 

 bad effect upon the fishery. 



FOOD. The food of the cod in the Pacific is as plentiful and as varied as in the Atlantic. 

 Most other fishes of suitable size are liable to suffer from its voracity, while certain species for 

 which it has an especial liking are slaughtered in great numbers. There is a wonderful abundance 

 of invertebrate animals, such as squid, shrimp, holothurians, crabs, marine worms, sea-fleas, and, 

 in short, just such forms as are well known to every fisherman on the eastern grounds. The waters 



