STATISTICS OF THE FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES. 391 



arrangement, the statistical work received more substantial recognition than had 

 been previously accorded, and in the last year named extended inquiries were made 

 relating to the statistics, methods, and relations of the fisheries. The organization 

 of a separate force for the collection and compilation of statistics may be said to date 

 from 1886, although it was not until the following year that a special division for this 

 work was established. After the death of Prof. Baird, in 1887, ample encouragement 

 was accorded the statistical service by his successors, Messrs. Goode and McDonald, 

 and in 1888 this work was specially noticed and appropriated for by Congress; since 

 that year a specific sum has been annually allotted. 



While Congress has thus evinced an appreciation of this work and exhibited a 

 desire to deal liberally therewith, it requires but slight consideration to show that the 

 means and force available for the service are entirely inadequate to properly conduct 

 the investigations and to secure the publication of their results with satisfactory 

 promptness. To place the fisheries statistical service on an ideal basis, which would 

 permit an annual or biennial study of the entire fishing interests of the country, would 

 require a field force nearly five times as large as the present one and an appropriation 

 twice as great as that for 1893. The shore line of the States bordering on the coasts, 

 coast rivers, and Great Lakes is not less than 30,000 miles in length ; and there are 

 few long, continuous stretches of beach or shore that do not support fisheries of 

 greater or less importance, the investigation of which requires the personal presence 

 of the field agents. The canvass of the extensive territory in which commercial fishing 

 is carried on can not be accomplished in less than three or four years. This accounts 

 for the fact that the statistics available do not strictly relate to a single year, but 

 apply to the years 1890 or 1892, although, for all practical purposes, the figures may 

 be regarded as representing the present condition of the fishing iudustry. 



The fisheries of the interior rivers and small inland lakes of the United States 

 have never been thoroughly investigated. Even in the exhaustive canvass under the 

 direction of Dr. Goode in 1879-80, no satisfactory account of these fisheries was 

 obtained, owing to lack of time and means, and our entire statistical knowledge of 

 their extent is given in an estimate by Dr. Goode that they are worth about $1,500,000 

 annually. This is believed to be much less than the actual figure at the present time, 

 and it would not be especially surprising if inquiries would show that the products 

 resulting from professional and desultory fishing in the minor fresh waters would have 

 an annual value of nearly $5,000,000. The importance of these inland waters as sources 

 of food supply is great and increasing, and the Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries 

 proposes to begin an investigation of their extent, methods, and needs at an early 

 date. 



With these prefatory remarks we will proceed to a consideration of the condition 

 and extent of the fisheries of the United States as shown by the figures presented, 

 and will endeavor to interpret, so far as may be necessary, some of the facts brought 

 out in the tables, 



