232 BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 



134 OPENinrO THE BROAO AIVU OTHER KIVERf^ OF IVORTH CARO- 

 LINA TO 8HA1>, BASS, ETC. 



By FRANK COXE. 



[From a letter to Hou. M. C. Butler.] 



I have taken great trouble for tlie past six or eight years to get our 

 rivers thrown open so that shad and other fish can come up as they did 

 forty years ago in great abundance. My iilautatiou is in the fork of 

 Broad and Green Rivers, in Polk and Rutherford Counties, ISTorth Caro- 

 lina, and after they join form Main Broad River, which, together with 

 the Saluda, make the Congaree at Columbia, S. C. The streams I live 

 on are now open to the ocean, as is evidenced by the run of shad at my 

 place. For the last four weeks I have had all the shad and other fish, 

 such as Southern black bass — known here as river trout — that I wanted. 

 My mother, who is eighty years of age, says that when she was very 

 young the river was plentifully supi^lied with shad and many other 

 kinds of iish. I give these points to show that the rivers are open to 

 salt water, and by referring to the maps you will see that we are nearer 

 to the coast than by anj- other stream running out of the Blue Ridge 

 Mountains. Ten miles .above me is Hickory Mountain Gap, at the foot 

 of Bald Mountain, wliere the shad have actually been taken in con- 

 siderable numbers. 1 believe that it is now an acknowledged fact that 

 shad and salmon must have highly aerated water to lay their eggs in 

 or they will not hatch. Such water is to be found only in our numerous 

 riffles and shoals, which the shad run to from instinct. ConseVpiently 

 the Cherokee Dam, which is about 30 miles below me on Broad River, 

 and was built some forty years since, was the cause of the fish almost 

 disappearing from the river below, as eggs deposited there would uot 

 hatch and the fish could not pass above it. Fortunately this dam has 

 at last washed out, and we see the good effects of it in the increased 

 quantity of fish from one end of the river to the other. If the run is 

 kept open I am satisfied we will have one of the finest streams for fish 

 on the Atlantic coast. I would like to have a million or two of shad 

 put in here if possible. Landrum Station, on the Spartanburgh and 

 Asheville Railroad, is about 12 miles from here, and I would have them 

 brought over myself from there. The only trouble this season in pro- 

 tecting the fish has been with the dynamite cartridge. We have a 

 ganger here for a small distillery a few miles below, who was seen 

 throwiug these cartridges in the river, which destroyed every fish, large 

 and small, in 50 feet around ; and when he was told he would be indicted, 

 said he would like to seethe State ofticer that could arrest him, and the 

 trouble is that three-fourths of the people believe what he says. 



Green River, N. C, June 7, 1884. 



