Production in 1926-1953 . - -Beginning 

 with 1926 when the Bureau of Fisheries intro- 

 duced the category of chubs and the states had 

 established the practice of compiling records 

 for all chubs separately from lake herring, the 

 chub statistics for Lake Michigan were freed 

 from the systematic defects that had made them 

 undependable for so many earlier years . This 

 same year also marks the beginning of greater 

 interest in chubs for smoking since the smoked- 

 fish trade lost a major source of supply with the 

 collapse of the Lake Erie Cisco fishery in 1925. 



The principal defect of the 1926-1953 

 statistics (table 2) lies in the earlier figures for 

 Indiana . The records for that state show a small 

 but fairly stable production in 1926-1941 that 

 ranged from 63, 000 pounds in 1941 to 352, 000 

 pounds in 1934 and averaged 201, 000 pounds 

 for the 16 years . The sudden drop in 1942 and 

 the lack of any reported production of chubs 

 for Indiana since 1943 do not reflect an end of 

 chub production by Indiana fishermen but rather 

 came from improvement in the handling of 

 statistics. It is questionable whether any sub- 

 stantial quantities of chubs ever have been 

 caught from the shallow Indiana waters. Fisher- 

 men from that state who have wished to fish for 

 chubs have of necessity purchased non-resident 

 licenses from the State of Michigan (in addition 

 to their Indiana licenses) and have carried on 

 their operations in Michigan waters . In report- 

 ing their catches they seem regularly to have 

 submitted identical records to the two states . 

 Most or all of the chubs listed for Indiana, 

 therefore, actually were caught in Michigan, 

 and furthermore were included in the statistics 

 for both states . The lake totals accordingly, 

 are too high by approximately the amount of the 

 Indiana catch £'. Fortunately this take at no 

 time made up a large percentage of the Lake 

 Michigan total (table 3). An adjustment of the 

 statistics to compensate this error would be 

 valid but is believed inadvisable because of 

 their long standing in printed records . 



6/ The Indiana statistics for lake trout offered 

 a similar problem (Hile, Eschmeyer, and 

 Lunger, 1951a). 



The total production of chubs in Lake 

 Michigan (four states combined) varied widely 

 in 1926 -1953 --from 1,630,000 pounds in 1941 

 to 11, 151,000 in 1953 (table 2, fig. 1). The 

 catch fluctuated erratically in 1926-1932 from 

 3, 123, 000 pounds in 1932 to 5, 038, 000 in 1930 

 and averaged 4, 023, 000 pounds for the 7 years 

 (table 4). The period 1933-1939 was one of 

 consistently high yield. All catches were above 

 4 million pounds and in 5 of the 7 years the take 

 exceeded 5 million pounds (peak of 6, 237, 000 

 pounds in 1934) . The average for the period 

 was 5, 249, 000 pounds . The next 5 years, 1940- 

 1944, on the contrary, had consistently low 

 yields . The catches were under 2 million 

 pounds in 3 years (minimum of 1, 630, 000 

 pounds in 1941) and did not exceed 2, 607, 000 

 pounds (the figure for 1944). The 5-year aver- 

 age was 1, 971, 000 pounds. 



The upward trend of production that 

 started in 1942 continued without interruption 

 through 1953. Beginning with 1949, each year 

 set a new record high for the 1926-1953 period, 

 and it is to be suspected that the take in most, 

 if not all, of these years also was higher than 

 at any time before 1926 . The average catches 

 (table 4) of 3, 952, 000 pounds in 1945-1948 and 

 9, 852, 000 pounds in 1949-1953 are of limited 

 significance, since the most important feature 

 of each period was the rapid increase . 



The percentage distribution of the annual 

 catch of chubs among the four states (table 3) 

 followed a definite pattern . Since most of the 

 reported Indiana production is known to have 

 been taken in Michigan, Indiana can be assigned 

 last place in all years despite listed percentages 

 in 1926 and 1927 that were higher than those for 

 Illinois . It should be remembered also that the 

 true percentages for other states were a little 

 higher in those years in which catches are listed 

 for Indiana. 



First place was held consistently by Wis- 

 consin . The percentage of the chubs caught in 

 Wisconsin ranged from 42.7 in 1948 to 72.6 in 

 1928 and averaged 60 .4 over the 28 -year period. 

 The relative contribution of Wisconsin was de- 

 cidedly greater in the first than in the second 

 half of the period; the mean percentage was 64.5 

 for 1926-1939 and 56.3 fox 1940-1953. 



