352 BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 



in length, and the crib from 28 to 30 feet square. The mesh of pound nets, as now 

 used, is from 5 to 7 inches for all parts of the net except the crib, which is the part 

 daily raised. All except the very largest fish can go through the leaders and hearts 

 at will, and undoubtedly do so, and can swim under the crib of every pound on Lake 

 Erie, thus preventing no lish, except the very largest, from passing through. 



Of course, those fish that follow the leader, which is from 50 to 00 rods long, and 

 then into the hearts and finally get into the crib, are probably nearly all saved to the 

 fisherman. But what practical pound-net fisherman will say what proportion of the 

 fish, after striking a leader to a pound net, will make the journey along the leader 

 and then through the heart, and finally swim through the tunnel into the crib, and 

 what proportion will go through this large-mesh leader and finally escape altogether. 



Thus it is that while pound nets present something of an obstacle to the onward 

 progress of the fish seeking a proper place to deposit their spawn, they do not present 

 an absolute bar to their progress, by reason of the large-sized mesh used as above 

 indicated; while gill nets, being a small mesh net, set in long lines along the bottom 

 of the lake, present an absolute wall to the further progress of the fish, thus diverting 

 them from their natural course, and, in fishing parlance, breaking up and destroying 

 the schools. 



Then, again, pound nets can only be set near the shore, and being stationary nets 

 fastened to piles, can only catch the fish that come to them, while gill nets are set 

 here to day and there to-morrow, aud always in such manner as to head off and 

 obstruct the onward progress of the fish. Pound nets can, at best, obstruct an eighth 

 or tenth of the lake, leaving the balance of the lake a free passage, while gill nets, 

 in these late years, are operated in an almost unbroken line from shore to shore, and 

 were so operated last season. Beginning at a point near Vermillion, Ohio, these lines 

 of gill nets extended into Canadian waters, thus shutting the schools of herring off from 

 the island region and the head of the lake, where the spawning grounds mostly lie- 

 This was fully demonstrated by the very small catch of herring last season in the 

 western half of the lake. 



It is evident to men operating the fisheries that unless these fish are permitted 

 to reach the spawning-grounds, which lie all over the western portion of the lake, they 

 must of necessity rapidly decrease in the waters of Lake Erie, and as a practical fish- 

 erman I see only one remedy, and that is to limit the fishing of nets in such manner 

 as to leave a passageway for the fish to their accustomed spawning-grounds, and the 

 only practical way to do this is to prohibit the fishing of any nets at a greater distance 

 than, say, 4 miles from shore where the lake is 30 miles in width or more; and in all 

 passageways where the distance across is 10 miles or less, nets be permitted to fish at 

 a distance from either shore not more than one-fourth of the distance across, and that 

 all nets be set at right angles to the shore. This would leave a wide waterway for the 

 fish, unobstructed by nets of any kind, and thus permit their free passage to the 

 spawning-grounds, which lie all over the western part of the lake. 



The better-informed aud unprejudiced fishermen are all agreed that if nets are so 

 operated as to permit the fishes to reach their natural spawning grounds, no system of 

 fishing will ever reduce the supply below the present standard, aud not only that, but 

 that the fishes would soon show an increase. It may not be practical or right to say, 

 by law, that this or that system of fishing shall prevail, but it is both practical and 

 right to say that nets shall be so operated that the fish may, with a reasonable certainty, 



