16 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



and run near the sliore at difl'erent points, while the majority of locali- 

 ties may be entirely destitute of fish. 



14. — WHEN THE DECREASE BEGAN. 



The.oldest fishermen I have met claim from twenty-five to twenty-eight 

 years' fishing in the lake. They assert the fish to have been abundant, 

 running in near shore, and that hauls of large quantities were made with 

 the seine. 



The custom in many places was to employ the Indians to watch the 

 sliore for a near run of fish, and when discovered draw the seine around 

 tliem. Immense quantities were taken in this way. 



There are no recorded statistics that show a reliable calculation of 

 dates, but the testimony of fishermen, dependent on their recollection of 

 their purchases of nets and changes in their modes of fishing, places the 

 beginning of a marked decrease within about ten years. 



15. — THE AMOUNT OF DECREASE. • 



The amount of decrease, in the absence of statistics of capture, cannot 

 be decided very definitely'. The records of shipments from Two Rivers, 

 on a previous page, show a decrease of fifty per cent, in four years. 



The redaction in the number of boats at different localities, perha[)« 

 indicates to some extent the amount of decrease in the fish. 



In 1858 there are said to have been thirty-three gill-net boats, fishing 

 from Milwaukee, Wis. In 1871 there were but fourteen. 



Between Kenosha, Wis., and Chicago, 111., the ponnd-nets have 

 diminished from thirty-six in 1869, to twenty-seven in 1871. 



At White-Fish Bay, Door County, Wisconsin, formerly an extensive 

 fishing-ground, there are now but three pound-nets. 



A profitable fishery at North Bay is now entirely abandoned. The 

 pound-net fishermen at Two Rivers complained of the scarcity of 

 white-fish, and one asserted that a law prohibiting pound-net fishing 

 would not be a very serious loss, in consideration of the poor success 

 they had had for a few years. Compare this condition of things with 

 the record of 18G4, in the report of Hon. Theodore Wendell to the 

 Michigan legislature, in which, from four pounds, 2,800 half-barrels of 

 fish were taken in White-Fish Bay, Wis., and with a few more nets a 

 firm of fishermen, Sage & Douglas, took 4,000 half-barrels in the same 

 region. The pound-net men generally acknowledge the^iecrease of the 

 fish in their own localities, and attribute it to various causes. 



At Ausable, Mich., on Lake Huron, there are said to have been forty- 

 two boats in 1865; while at present there are but six. 



The estimate of decrease, within safe calculations, is all of fifty per 

 cent., which, in a period of ten or twelve years, is sufficiently large to 

 be alarming. 



16. — THE CAUSE OF THE DECREASE. 



If the take of fish, by nets of all kinds, is greater than the natural 



