REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XXXI 



deep and from 1 to 2 feet in length and breadth, are now employed, 

 and make at once the most compact, convenient, and economical 

 package with which I am acquainted. The eggs are placed in these 

 trays in layers, alternating with layers of moss, from which they are 

 separated by pieces of thin fabric. When filled and put together in 

 stacks, the trays are encased in sawdust, which protects from freezing 

 during long winter journeys. In packages of 50,000 to 100,000 they 

 occupy about one cubic foot for 5,000 or 10,000 eggs. 



The number of breeding-salmon bought and manipulated, their size, 

 the number of eggs obtained and distributed, and the number of young 

 salmon set free are exhibited by the following table : 



The ratio of impregnation has been about 95 per cent. 



Complete success has attended the incubation of the eggs, except in 

 the season of 1874-'75, when the eggs were all, or nearly all, affected by 

 a deficiency of strength in the outer shell. An average success was had 

 with those eggs that remained that season in the hatching-house at 

 Bucksport to hatch for the State of Maine ; but of those that were 

 packed for transportation large numbers were lost en route, or so greatly 

 injured that they died before hatching, or soon after. Mr. Atkins attrib- 

 uted this phenomenon to causes existing in the state of the water of the 

 pond and hatching-house, which remained, through prevalence of warm, 

 dry weather, in a low, foul state through the greater part of the spawn- 

 ing season. In 1873-'74 the water was renewed by copious rains, and 

 the eggs throughout incubation were in perfect health. 



In 1872 and 1873, and again in 1875, all the fish handled at the 

 spawuing season were marked with metal tags and dismissed to the 

 river. The mode of tagging in 1872 was by affixing a stamped alu- 

 minum tag to a rubber baud passing around the tail. This was a de- 

 fective mode, and no results were obtained from it. In 1873 the alumi- 

 num tags were attached directly by a platinum wire to the rear margin 

 of the first dorsal fin. A reward was offered in the following spring for 

 the return of the marked salmon, and about twenty of them were sent 

 in, nearly all caught in the river, and more than half of them above 

 Bangor, 25 miles further up the river than Bucksport, where they were 

 set at liberty, showing that instinct did not impel these liberated fish to 

 return at once to their marine feeding-grounds. They were all poorer 

 than when set free in the fall. In 1874 the marking was omitted, but 



