BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 457 



I caunot understand why the superintendents of markets were not 

 examined on this point. Then again, the questions were well chosen to 

 gain the admittance that menhaden could be caught as well two or 

 more miles off shore as inshore, and with nets of 3-inch meshes. 



The answers to these questions, given as they were, by men of prac- 

 tical experience, who had not seen each other, and who did uot know 

 the object of the questions put or their purport, fully gave the nega- 

 tive to the position it seems had been assumed, that the menhaden fish- 

 ing could be carried on at a distance of 2 miles from shore, and with 

 nets of 3-iuch meshes, with no ill effect upon the result; also that the 

 season should not commence till July 1. 



I am much pleased that the chairman, Senator Lapham, put his ques- 

 tions so shrewdly as to get at the truth of the matter. 



Now, on the part of the market or food fishermen, their testimony 

 amounted only to surmises. In answer to questions they either assume 

 certain things or admit that they know nothing about the question at 

 issue. Captain Wilcox very aptly put it when he said, "There are times 

 when there is a little scarcity of food-fish, and they will turn right around 

 and attribute it to the first thing that comes into their minds." 



Mr. Eugene G. Blackford reduces all of his testimony down to one 

 point in regard to legislative action, which, in his own language, sums 

 up thequestim as follows: "But from my experience in regard to all 

 fish, and protection of fish, there is no doubt but the protection of the 

 fish during the spawning-season would give greater results and be most 

 effective." 



Now, in view of this opinion, take a previous answer of his to the 

 question when the menhaden spawned. He answered, "The exact 

 time, the exact localities of spawning are not determined." 



If such is the case, when can legislative action be applied to the time 

 of menhaden spawning? And why should from April to July be a 

 close season any more than from July to November? The fact is that 

 there are more than one reason accounting for the scarcity, abundance, 

 or entire disappearance of fish, and that the prime causes of their ab- 

 sence or presence, besides food, lie in the conditions of weather, den- 

 sity and temperature of water. New York Harbor is becoming rapidly 

 destroyed by garbage, its waters defiled with waste products of manu- 

 factories; these combined have a tendency to make all fish scarce in the 

 waters adjoining New York. 



Some of our menhaden people are running a little wild on the ques- 

 tion of menhaden remaining in one locality according to the quality 

 and quantity of their food. Mr. Friedlaender argues that the fatness 

 of the fish caught off the capes of the Delaware would prove this, and 

 mentions that my catches off Long Island were not so fat as those fur- 

 ther south. In this he is mistaken, as careful inquiries developed the 

 fact that there has been no appreciable difference in the fat-producing 

 qualities of the fish caught between Narragansett and Delaware Bays. 



