Trout and Salmon 185 



ing, and from this and other similarities to the Atlantic form 

 among which is the fact that it will take a fly on its way up- 

 stream to the spawning-beds whereas Oncorhynchus gen- 

 erally will not, it could be called the true salmon of the 

 Pacific/ 



Salmo salar used to be enormously abundant on our At- 

 lantic coast. Dwellers along the Hudson and the streams 

 further north had no trouble in catching all the fish they 

 wanted from the great annual salmon runs. Now it is prac- 

 tically extinct — except in its landlocked form — south of the 

 Canadian border, and to catch it you must travel hundreds of 

 miles into remote country, and then probably pay a king's 

 ransom for the right to put your fly into the water. 



The Pacific salmon used to be enormously abundant in 

 the Sacramento River; here it, too, has been greatly reduced 

 by the progress of civilization, although surviving in suffi- 

 cient numbers to provide a significant fishery. However, in 

 the rivers further north, and especially in Alaska, the annual 

 spawning migrants are still counted in almost astronomical 

 figures. The capture of them is a great industry, and for this 

 reason they have been much studied. In Norway and Eng- 

 land, Salmo salar is still numerous, having been more care- 

 fully conserved in those old countries than it was on our 

 Atlantic coast; and there, being the basis of both a sport and 

 a commercial fishery, has received much study. Combining 

 these two sources, the two forms of salmon have received 

 more attention than any other fish. Experienced men, work- 

 ing for governmental and state agencies, have been reading 

 their scales for years. They have "marked" them by cutting 

 off one or more fins so that all members of a certain group 



^ It used to be firmly believed that none of the Pacific salmons would 

 take a fly. It is now realized that under suitable conditions some species 

 will, — especially the silver or coho and the chinook. Eventually ways 

 may be found to capture all of them in this manner. 



