262 BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STAGES FISH COMMISSION. 



plied rapidly. Thirty thousand distinct bodies of water in every sec- 

 tion of the United States have been occupied with this fish. These 

 represent an aggregate area of 100,000 acres of waste water, which have 

 been converted to profitable, almost spontaneous, production, yielding 

 at a moderate estimate 20,000,000 pounds of food per annum and add- 

 ing $1,000,000 annually to the value of the products of the country. 



Black Bass. — The black bass has been acclimated in all of the rivers 

 of the Atlantic slope, and while not increasing the aggregate food pro- 

 duct of the areas occupied by them, the introduction of this game fish 

 has indirectly contributed to the prosperity of various sections by at- 

 tracting sportsmen and summer residents. 



Trout. — The mountain sections of New York, iS^ew Hampshire, and 

 Vermont have their game and fish well preserved through the efibrts of 

 the State fish commissioners ; the trout streams being kept up by arti- 

 ficial propagation or planting, and by protection. The summer visitors 

 who are drawn to this region by the fame of its hunting and fishing 

 leave there annuallj' $15,000,000, according to the statement of the New 

 Hampshire commissioner. The larger part of this is to be credited to 

 the efforts in artificial propagation systematically carried on there. 



California Salmon. — The efforts to acclimate this species on the 

 Atlantic slope and in the Mississippi basin have proved abortive, un- 

 favorable temperature conditions, as I have elsewhere shown, having 

 militated against success. This, however, is to be regarded as an ex- 

 jieriment in acclimation rather than in fish-culture, the artificial propa- 

 gating and planting of this species in the Sacramento Eiver having 

 carried the annual production of that river up to double the volume it 

 had before planting was inaugurated, and added to its aggregate value 

 $300,000 per annum. 



Whitefish. — The propagating and planting of this species in the 

 Great Lakes was undertaken in the face of a rapid decrease, which fore- 

 shadowed the exhaustion of these fisheries in a few years. This decrease 

 has been arrested, and the product is again slowly on the increase. 



Shad. — The results of the artificial propagation and i)lanting of shad 

 cannot, in the absence of accurate statistics covering the whole coast, be 

 definitely stated. There is no question but the production of the Chesa- 

 X)eake area as a whole is steadily on the increase, though local causes 

 determine local failures of the fisheries each season ; local statistics, be- 

 ing the only mi^asure of increase that we have, of course can furnish us 

 no data by which we can determine the general advance in production. 

 Th'is, however, is shown by the decreased cost per pound of the shad 

 from season to season in the face of a continually increasing demand 

 brought.about by increasing population and increased facilities for dis- 

 tribution, the price to-day in the markets of Baltimore and Washington 

 being from $12 to $20 per hundred and Irom 3 to 4 cents per pound. 



Washington, D. C, May 4, 1884. 



