238 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



districts far more families are supported by the water than by the 

 land.' In the West there is nothing of this sort. The markets 

 are almost bare of fish ; a few cat-fish, suckers, and pickerel con- 

 stitute the wretched and meager bill of fare they offer. The 

 muddy Mississippi contains little or nothing. The beautiful Ohio 

 has but one or two sorts of pike-perch, which the inhabitants 

 flatteringly call salmon, while cat-fish hide in most of the dis- 

 colored streams of our continent and suckers explore the bottom 

 for their food. 



If anything can be done to improve this state of affairs, to makft 

 fish and fishermen as abundant in the West as they are in New 

 England, and to develop tbe same activity in this matter that 

 exists in the East, it is well worth the serious consideration of the 

 Government. By this means a new industry, an addtional source 

 of income, an entirely different species of food would be introduced 

 and an immense increase added to the wealth of the whole region of 

 country. There is no reason why the waters of the West should 

 be less prolific than those of the East, provided the right species 

 were introduced ; and were trout, salmon, bass, shad, and stur- 

 geon to take the place of catfish, pickerel, and suckers, the gain 

 would be manifest. 



It seems to me clearly to be the duty of the Government to 

 assist iu this very work of introducing new varieties, as well as 

 replenish the old where they have been reduced. No private 

 person can own a shad which is here to-day and iu mid-ocean 

 to-morrow, nor is a single resident on a river's bank sufficiently 

 interested to incur the expense of importing fish for the benefit of 

 his neighbors. This is the nation's duty or it is nobody's. The 

 mighty rivers of the southern and western States, which now 

 produce generally only the poorer sorts, could readily be stocked 

 with the most palatable and prolific sorts. The shad has already 

 been acclimatized in some of the Alabama rivers, where it never 

 before was known, and the Potomac has been filled with black 

 bass almost to repletion ; but that was the unaided effort of in- 

 dividuals as a mere matter of experimental curiosity. Other 

 rivers remain still unimproved, and several foreign species of fish 

 should be introduced. For instance, the magnificent Danube 

 salmon, which attains a weight of a hundred pounds, might be 

 acclimatized in the Ohio and the upper Mississippi, while the true 

 salmon might be brought up to the Delaware and Susquehanna. 

 This is perfectly simple and easy. Salmon have been transported 



