FISHERIES OF ALASKA IN 1907. 19 



have been compelled to go farther and farther away each season in 

 order to secure sufficient salmon to operate their plants. Two of the 

 canneries liave a number of traps set in Icy Strait, some 80 miles 

 away, and depend upon these for the greater part of their fish, but 

 they have found the long haul quite expensive, and after the season 

 had closed tlie Pacific- American Fisheries, which operated a cannery 

 in Chilkat Inlet, erected a new cannery in Excursion Inlet, an arm 

 of Icy Strait, close to the location of the traps. The company in- 

 tends to retain the old cannery intact and use it should the necessity 

 arise. 



In last year's report mention was made of an objectionable practice 

 in the Chilkoot and occasionally in the Chilkat River, namely, the 

 fishing of the Indians of the neighborhood, who take large numbers 

 of red salmon with gaff hooks and sell the catch to the three canneries 

 operated in the vicinity. As stated above, the run of red salmon in 

 this section has been growing less and less each season, and it would 

 seem that after the fish have run the gauntlet of the numerous traps 

 and nets in Ljam Canal and the Chilkoot and Chilkat inlets they 

 should be permitted unobstructed passage up these narrow rivers to 

 the spawning beds in the lakes at the head. As the fish are in a 

 somewhat advanced spawning condition at the time of capture, and 

 are frequently badly torn by the action of the gaffs, they are not of 

 much value to the cannerymen. The latter claim that they pur- 

 chase them only because of the fear of incurring the ill will of the 

 Indians, and that they would welcome an order of the Department 

 closing both streams to all commercial fishing. 



It does not seem possible that it was the intention of the framers 

 of the Alaska salmon law to permit the use of spears, gaffs, and hooks 

 in rivers the size of these when the salmon are taken in such large 

 numbers and sold to canneries, the original intention doubtless being 

 to allow the Indians to secure only enough salmon by this means to 

 satisfy their own domestic needs; and these two rivers are the only 

 ones in Alaska in which this objectionable practice obtains. But 

 since the rod, spear, and gaff are excepted in the provisions of the 

 act for protection of the Alaska fisheries, apparently no remedy is 

 open to the Department without an amendment to the law. The 

 canneries, however, have it in their power to stop the practice by 

 declining to purchase the fish. 



About two weeks during the latter half of September were devoted 



to an examination of the shores of Chilkoot Lake and the streams 



entering it, with a view of locating the spawning grounds of the 



redfish and finding possible hatchery sites adjacent to proper water 



» supplies.'' Spawning redfish were found about the shores of the 



" The Columbia Canning Company, through its cannery force at Chilkoot, rendered 

 very material assistance in outfitting for and carrying out this trip. 



