BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 287 



their spawning grounds and feeding upon tlieir eggs and young fry. 

 Some bold that the natural spawning grounds are being destroyed by 

 mud and rubbish from mining operations. Another thing proposed as 

 the cause is the excessive and destructive mode of fishing practiced by 

 the Chinese in the Sacramento River. It shoukl be stated also that 

 many i)eople in the upper counties along the Sacramento attribute this 

 decrease of salmon principally to the excessive fishing at the canneries. 



I have taken much pains to ascertain the cause of this decrease, and 

 have followed the Sacramento River from the ocean to its headwaters. 

 Beginning with the sea-lions in the Bay of San Francisco, it is safe to 

 say that they destroy a great many large salmon that otherwise would 

 ascend our rivers, but I see no reason for supposing that the number 

 destroyed of late years is in excess of their consumption of previous 

 years. 



Taking the catfish into consideration, it is probable that a small per- 

 centage of the young fry, as they first rise from tbeir gravelly beds, find 

 their way into the stomachs of these ugly little catfish, yet I think to 

 no alarming extent. In our rivers also, where salmon deposit their 

 eggs on the swift riffles over clean, gravelly beds, I think that very few 

 of these eggs are disturbed by the catfish, which are more inclined to 

 follow the slow, muddy places in the river. 



As regards the Chinese, it must be borne in mind that they are not 

 communicative in respect to any matter of business in which they are 

 interested, and they will not knowingly impart any information that 

 may in the slightest degree be utilized by those of other races. Yet by 

 closely inspecting the streams near the locality in which they reside, it 

 is found that they are using a beardless hook, something of their own 

 manufacture and peculiar in shape. Strong lines are placed across the 

 stream or a portion of it, as the case may be. These hooks are fastened 

 to short leaders, which vary in length, and which are suspended from 

 the main line to a depth of 1 foot from the surface to the bottom of the 

 river. Hundreds of hooks are used on a line, and quantities of the 

 larger fish are caught as they endeavor to pass ; many more are fatally 

 wounded, but make their escape, only to die in the streams above. 

 They also take many young fish, which are dried and exported to China, 



I also found a point of the river, near Sacramento, where many of the 

 vounff salmon are lost in their downward course to the ocean. It is a 

 well-known fact that for the past few years the bed of the Sacramento 

 River has gradually been rising, caused by hydraulic mining on the 

 streams above, and the filling up of the river has caused an overflowing 

 of its banks during high water. Levees have been constructed to pre- 

 vent damage of property in the city, and to confine the water to its own 

 channel, but at present many places in the levees are broken, and there 

 are also points some distance above where in high water the river over- 

 flows and sinks into a large tract of marsh land. In seasons when the 

 first rise of water, which carries the young salmon down to the ocean, 



