230 BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION". 



stream of water, at each of Nvliick is stationed a man with a gauged 

 dipper to measure the eggs in. Besides these, there are two other men 

 in the hatching-house, whose business it is to bring the eggs to the meas- 

 urer at the tubs, and two or three others on the other side of the packers 

 to keep them supplied with moss and mosquito bar for packing. There 

 is also one other man, who sits on one of the rafters overhead, looking 

 down on the whole, and who keeps count of the number of layers of 

 eggs that are put in each box. When everything is ready to proceed 

 with the packing, the two men in the hatching-house bring the eggs to 

 the measurers and pour them into the tubs. Here the stream of water 

 running through the tubs cleanses them, and they are dipped out with 

 long-handled tin measures into pans of water, which are placed on a 

 bench in front of the Indian pickers who pick out the dead ones. When 

 the pans have been thoroughly freed from dead eggs, they are placed 

 on another bench, within reach of the packers, who take them up and 

 strew their contents very skillfully and neatly over the bottom of the 

 packing box, a layer of moss and one thickness of mosquito bar having 

 previously been carefully placed in the box for the eggs to rest on. The 

 packers immediately cover up this first layer of eggs with another piece 

 of mosquito bar and a layer of moss, and, having placed a piece of mos- 

 quito bar over the moss, they proceed as before with another pan of 

 eggs, and so on till the requisite number of layers of eggs have been 

 packed, when the box is removed and another empty one substituted 

 in its place, and the packing goes on. 



By the method just described we were enabled to pack the eggs very 

 rapidly, three quarters of a million of eggs having frequently been packed 

 in an hour, and after this we had no trouble in getting a car-load of eggs 

 ready in a very short time. 



THE WATER SUPPLY. 



The supply of water which was furnished by the little brook on which 

 we operated the first year was of course wholly inadequate for the ma- 

 turing of salmon eggs on a large scale, besides being unsuitable for the 

 purpose in consequence of its occasional high temperature and liability 

 to disturbances. I therefore gave up all thonghts of using it another 

 year, and resolved that the next season I would use the river water for 

 the hatching-house, raising it to the necessary height by some device 

 not yet determined upon. Accordingly the next summer I moved the 

 cabin and hatching-trough and all onr belongings from the brook where 

 we spent the first season to the north bank of the McCloud River, close 

 to the water's edge. The device which I finally concluded upon for rais- 

 ing water from the river was a current wheel. The first wheel we built 

 was only 12 feet in circumference and raised the water only about 7 feet, 

 but by erecting the hatching-troughs on a low bar not many inches above 

 the level of the river's surface, we made this height (or fall) answer our 

 purpose very well. The wheel worked admirably, and I cannot too highly 



