440 EEPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



flies trail down stream, with about CO feet of line out, tlie whirl of the 

 current keeping the liy in play at the surface. The first pull of the shad 

 will bend the pole into a circle, and its weak mouth necessitates the 

 most skillful play and management to get it near the boat, where it is 

 usually taken in with a dip-net. 



A singular point to fish from was the high bridge, some 40 fe 't above 

 the water. A number of men and boys were always to be found in the 

 evening withlonghand-lines trailing down stream over the bridge-railing. 

 When a sbad took the hook he was carefully drawn in until he was 

 landed on one of the small islands beneath the bridge, and allowed to 

 remain there until life was nearly extinct, when he was drawn up on 

 the bridge. Of course many more were lost this way than when fishing 

 from the boat. 



17.— SHIPMENT OF SHAD TO THE PENOBSCOT RIVER, MAINE. 



On the 10th we started for the Penobscot Eiver, Maine, with 100,000 

 young shad. While waiting at Portland some four hours between 

 trains, Mr. Mason went over to the bay and l)rought a pail of sea-water. 

 About two dozen of the shad were taken from a can and put directly 

 into the salt-water and were allowed to remain in it over two hours, at 

 the end of that time they were all apparently in as healthy and lively 

 condition as when taken from the fresh water, neither the salt nor the 

 difference in specific gravity affecting them in the least. If this exper- 

 iment should prove successful for a longer period of time, it would make 

 the transportation of shad across the ocean a comparatively easy task. 

 And it would be well worth while for some fish-culturist situated con- 

 veniently to the sea-coast to experiment on other species of young 

 fishes, as, if successful, it would simplify the carriage of fish on long 

 voyages very much. 



From Bangor, Mr. E. M. Stilwell, commissioner for the State of 

 Maine, accompanied us to Mattawamkeag, fifty-eight miles above Ban- 

 gor, on the Penobscot Eiver, at the junction of the Mattawamkeag 

 Eiver, where the young fish were consigned to the waters, in good con- 

 dition, at 1 a. m. of the'llth. 



18. — ESTABLISHMENT OF STATION ON THE ANDROSCOGGIN RIVER,MAINE. 



On the 14th we arrived in Topsham, Me., with the purpose in view 

 of establishing a hatching-station on the Androscoggin Eiver, and the 

 same evening employed a party of men to haul the seine about two 

 miles below the dam. 



A hatching-box wasT^urriedly made up from a soap-box and a piece 

 of raillinet, but the result of the fishing disappointed us, as only eight 

 spent shad were obtained, all of them with the abdomen shrunken 

 and slender, indicating that the spawning season was over with them. 



The next night, the 15th, four hauls were made, resulting in eight 



