820 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



a species of shad, sam-lai {Alosa Reevesii), alleged to be as savory 

 as our own, but larger and less bony. It ascends the Yang-tse- 

 Kiaug, a river three thousand miles in length, to spawn in its up- 

 per waters, but at the end of its long journey becomes worthless 

 through emaciation. As with ourselves, the first fish of the sea- 

 son command an extravagant price. The Chinese gourmet, how- 

 ever, differing from his Christian brother, maintains that it needs 

 to be neither baked, boiled, nor fried, but only steamed ; such 

 treatment, in his opinion, best developing the flavor. In most of 

 the European streams shad are found, but do not equal the Amer- 

 ican or Chinese variety in flavor or in nutritious value. We have 

 sent a number of shipments of fry to various parts of Europe with 

 the object of stocking its rivers with our superior fish, but the 

 effort has not been remarkably successful. 



Very different, however, has been the result upon the Pacific 

 coast, where the greatest and most brilliant feat of marine accli- 

 matization has been successfully accomplished. Little more than 

 a score of years ago the fry were borne across the continent, and 

 assiduous care and attention during their long journey of over 

 three thousand miles assured the survival of a due portion, which 

 were placed in the Sacramento River. From this and a few later 

 shipments has resulted their present abundance along a coast 

 line of twenty-five hundred miles, extending from southern Cali- 

 fornia to Alaska, being in their season so plentiful in some streams 

 that barrels of them are pitchforked out of the water. It was 

 only two or three years after the first planting that a few more 

 or less mature specimens were obtained from the Sacramento. 

 Gradually the number of marketable fish increased until now they 

 almost equal in some of their localities the salmon in abundance, 

 the price having declined from the initial figure of a dollar a pound, 

 obtained while the fish were yet scarce, to an average of ten cents 

 a pound in 1889, and four cents in 1802. From the slender colonies 

 originally transported, forming less than one per cent of the num- 

 ber annually placed in Atlantic waters, and involving the expend- 

 iture of a comparative trifle, the inhabitants of a long stretch of 

 coast now derive a valuable and important food supply. 



Until the Pacific coast plantings it was assumed that the shad 

 invariably returned to the stream that gave them birth, and this, 

 as a rule, is perhaps correct. The conditions of the California 

 coast evidently operate, however, to the diffusion of the fish, they 

 having in many instances established themselves in rivers far 

 from the Sacramento. This movement may be due to the balmy 

 Japanese current, the Gulf Stream of the Pacific, which laves its 

 northeastern shore and agreeably tempers its climate. Influenced 

 by its genial flow and pursuing its track, the shad have wandered 

 northward, and, if they maintain their advance, as they probably 



