262 BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FLSH COMMISSION. 



the wind blowing constantly down the river, and no shad could get past 

 the seine. The wind at one o'clock on the fourth night changed and 

 blew directly up the river, and by daylight the outer end of the seine 

 had reached the windlass, one and a half miles from the railroad bridge. 

 At eight o'clock one hundred wagons and carts that had congregated 

 from Lancaster and Chester Counties were loading shad at $-4 per hun- 

 dred. Herring, rock, and other tish, were thrown in without charge. 

 Mr. Stump sent word for miles around in Cecil County to farmers to get 

 herring to manure thek" lands. It took three and one-half days to get 

 the seine inshore ; hundreds of wagon and cart loads of fish were put 

 on lands as fertilizers from that one haul. Shad are not caught at this shore 

 at the j)resent. Mr. John Stump now lives on the property", and, x)erhaps, 

 can give a more detailed history of that wonderful catch of fish. If my 

 memory serves me right, Mr. Stump, computing the wagon and cart-loads, 

 made th£i amount, in round numbers, 15,000,000 caught at that one haul. 

 At that time nearly every family put down one to three hundred shad 

 annually in Chester, Lancaster, York, and Dauphin Counties before dams 

 were made. Shad were caught 200 miles up the Susquehanna Kiver, 

 and if proper fish ways were made and government would establish hatch- 

 eries on this river, and put a heavy fine on all fish-baskets, during the 

 fall, when young shad return to the ocean, millions more shad might 

 be taken, and every family have the benefit of fresh and salt shad, even 

 as they did half a century ago. 

 Permit me to show what I think of the profits of shad culture : 



1,000 shad from the hatchery put into the river cannot cost over 

 $5. Suppose 33 per cent, return, then 333 shad, at 20 cents, 

 each, would be $60 GO 



Add four years' interest on $5, at per cent G 20 



The net profit would be 60 40 



Even if only one-fourth returned, the benefit to the masses may become 

 incalculable in the way of food. All animals produced on land require 

 vast outlays, while the i)roduction of fish is a mere moiety. IsTature 

 provides the element and food for fish without cost, and when man will 

 truly see his interest and comfort and give his influence in behalf of 

 the X)roduction of fish by artificial culture, which was wholly unknown 

 in our country forty years ago, he will, as in thousands of other cases, 

 wonder why the discovery of fish production was not known at an ear- 

 lier period. 



142 A Street, N. E., WasMngton, D. C. 



After sealing my letter I found I had omitted any allusion to the 

 planting of fish in Michigan. So far as I can judge our State will soon 

 be amply supplied with whitefish, eels, salmon, speckled trout, gray- 

 ling, and carp. Most of our inland lakes have outlets to the various 

 rivers. I beheve the carp will become our standard fish, as we have 



