REPORT OF SPECIAL AGENT MURRAY ON THE SALMON 



FISHERIES IN ALASKA. 



Office of Special Agent, Teeasury Department, 



Washington, D. C, February 1, 1895. 



Sir : I have the honor to report that, pursuant to Department instruc- 

 tions dated June 12, 1894:, I sailed to Alaska, and visited and inspected 

 the salmon-canning establishments on many of the bays, rivers, and 

 streams of that Territory, an account of which is herewith respectfully 

 submitted for the information of the Department. 



July 10, 1891, 1 sailed from San Francisco on board the United States 

 revenue steamer Rush, Capt. C. L. Hooper commanding, and proceeded 

 to Port Townsend, Wash., Avhere we arrived on the loth, and where we 

 were afterwards joined by Hon. C. S. Hamlin, Assistant Secretary of 

 the Treasury, 



Jnly 23 we sailed from Port Townsend and steered for the seal islands 

 in Bering Sea, where we landed August 3, and on which we spent live 

 days going over the rookeries, noting their condition and the condi- 

 tion and numbers of the fur seals, and making inquiry into matters of 

 importance connected with the seal question. 



August 8 we left the seal islands, reaching Unalaska on the 9th, 

 where we remained one day to coal ship, and then, on the 10th, we 

 sailed along the Aleutian chain and the Alaskan Peninsula, calling on 

 the way at Akutau, Akun, Belkofsky, Sand Point, Coal Harbor, Kar- 

 luk, Kadiak, Yakutat, Sitka, Taku Inlet, Juneau, Douglas City, Fort 

 Wrangell, Kassan, Loring, Port Chester, or New Metlakahtla, St. 

 Marys, Port Simpson, Nanaimo, and Vancouver City, where Mr. Hamlin 

 left the shij) and proceeded by rail to Washington. Continuing the 

 voyage, I proceeded to San Francisco, calling in at Port Townsend, 

 New Whntcom, and Astoria on the way down. 



At Karluk, on Kadiak Island, we found what I considei* the finest of 

 all the salmon streams in Alaska, if not the finest on the whole Pacific 

 Coast; most certainly the finest from which salmon are at present taken 

 for canning purposes, quantity and (juality being considered, for I find 

 that nearly one-third of the entire Alaska pack for 1891 was put up at 

 the mouth of the Karluk River. 



Assuming, then, that it is the principal salmon stream in Alaska, I 

 shall take it as a model for all of the others for the purposes of illus- 

 trating what I have to say about the salmon industry of Alaska and 

 of the dangers by which it is beset. 



Excepting the great Yukon, which is navigable for thousands of 

 miles, theKuskokwim and a few others of minor importance, the rivers 

 of Alaska are small streams of from 20 to 200 miles in length, and many 

 a stream that is rich in the finest offish and of the utmost importance 

 to the fisherman is only a few miles in length — a mere drain for a very 

 limited watershed of high, rugged, and snow-clad hills, behind whicli 

 small lakes of the clearest, purest, and coldest water are to be found, 

 and in which the salmon deposit their eggs in season, and from which 

 hundreds of niillions of young salmon descend annually to the sea» 



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