144 AMERICAN FISH CULTURE. 



fishways over impassable dams. The New England States, 

 by concerted legislation, have a joint commission, which 

 gives us hope of a speedy restoration of shad and salmon to 

 rivers from which they have been expelled. 



In the report of the Commissioners of Fisheries for the 

 State of Vermont (October 11, 1866), it is said of shad, 

 that they " select their spawning-grounds in bodies of 

 water deeper and warmer than those occupied by salmon. 

 The deep eddies below dams and waterfalls are generally 

 selected by them. The eddy below Bellow* Falls was for- 

 merly a favorite spawning-ground for shad. The one 

 below Holyoke dam in Massachusetts, is now occupied for 

 that purpose, and thousands of shad are now annually 

 caught at that place." This was also the case below Fair- 

 mount dam long after the Schuylkill was obstructed there, 

 and but for the city gas-works, it would still have been a 

 spawning-ground. Even now, a few shad continue to 

 spawn there. A few years since, when returning from the 

 dam where I had been fishing for white perch, two or three 

 young shad (likely pursued by rockfish) leaped into my 

 boat. This occurred in the latter part of May, and the fry 

 were then between three and four inches in length. The 

 remarks just quoted, as well as my observations, are 

 corroborated by the experiments in artificial propagation at 

 Holyoke last summer, and prove that shad instinctively 

 deposit their spawn where it is kept suspended by the 

 action of the water, if such a place is accessible. 



The short term of incubation (60 or 70 hours), and the 

 fact of this fish being so prolific, are palpable arguments in 



