8o BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF FISHERIES. 



appearance, are a light reddish-brown color — neither pink nor as dark as the super- 

 ficial lateral muscle. The constituent fibers are loosely attached to the interhaemal 

 septa, and the pair of muscles between adjacent interhaemal spines are incased each in 

 a stout connective tissue sheath. This arrangement is also characteristic of the cor- 

 responding muscles of the dorsal fin. 



Muscles of the head. — The masseter muscle is the largest of the muscles of the head. 

 Under the name of "cheek muscle," the masseter is highly prized as a delicacy by the 

 fishery folk. It is of good size, has its fibers compactly arranged, and is not colored like 

 the trunk muscle of the salmon. The cheek muscle of feeding salmon has not been 

 examined, but the Ilwaco and Cazadero types, representing the mouth of the Columbia 

 River and the spawning grounds, respectively, are presented in the proper places. 

 Other muscles of the head region have not been examined for fat. 



NORMAL LOADING OF FATS IN THE MUSCLES OF THE KING SALMON AT THE TIME THE 



SPAWNING MIGRATION BEGINS. 



It is exceedingly difficult to secure salmon just at the moment when fasting begins. 

 In the first place, it is not easy to determine just when a salmon ceases feeding; that 

 is, whether a given salmon in hand is one that is still feeding or one that has just ceased 

 feeding. A second and more important difficulty is that of catching salmon at this 

 critical stage in the life cycle. There are only limited regions where the king salmon 

 are captured from the feeding grounds. There is no such place near the mouth of the 

 Columbia River. The lowest point at the mouth of the Columbia where fish are caught 

 is between the Canby Lighthouse on the north bank and the end of the Government 

 jetty on the south shore. Salmon from this locality have already ceased feeding, prob- 

 ably some little time earlier. 



Monterey Bay and its immediate vicinity is a popular ground for king salmon 

 fishing. When the salmon schools are in this vicinity they are actively feeding and are 

 readily caught with the trawl. During the spring and early summer months they are 

 taken in large numbers. At this time a considerable business is done in the salmon 

 fisheries at the city of Monterey. There is good evidence that the fish caught at Mon- 

 terey Bay are from schools which ultimately enter both the Sacramento River basin 

 and the Columbia River basin. This is indicated by the fact that on both rivers speci- 

 mens are occasionally taken which have in their mouths fish hooks of the type used 

 at Monterey." 



Monterey Bay is about loo miles south of Golden Gate, the entrance to the Sacra- 

 mento Basin. It is about 800 miles south of the mouth of the Columbia River. A 

 well-developed salmon from Monterey would ser\-e very well as a normal type for the 

 Sacramento Basin, provided one could assure himself that the fish were on its way to 

 and would enter the Golden Gate and the Sacramento. The amount of change that 

 could take place due to additional feeding between Monterey Bay and the Golden Gate 

 would be negligible, assuming a reasonably direct journey. If additional fat were stored 

 it would be too slight to change the average materially. But facts tending to verify 

 these assumptions can not readily be obtained. 



a Mr. George Warren, of the Warren Packing Co. of Portland. Oreg., showed me a number of such sahnon hooks taken from 

 salmon that have come into their packing establishments on the Columbia River. 



