52 U. S. BUREAU OF FISHERIES. 



for him but was in turn discouraged by the high water after he had dried 

 more than 100 small fish. 



The term " small fish " is used on the Kuskokwim to indicate red salmon and 

 chum salmon, no distinction being made between these two varieties by driers. 

 At the salteries, however, they split the reds for salting and dry the chums for 

 winter use locally. 



From observations and from reports of the white traders and trappers it 

 seems that the natives of the Kuskokwim do not depend upon dried sahnon 

 for their winter food supply in by any means as large a ratio as do the natives 

 of the Copper River region, or of the Kvichak district, one reason being that 

 about only one-half of the native families have dog teams, and those consist 

 of but two to five dogs. 



On the lower river — that is to say, between Bethel and the sea — the native 

 makes his living by trapping and fishing, deriving the larger part of his live- 

 lihood by shooting muskrats and trapping foxes. The natives are seminomadic, 

 each family apparently having three or four homes. One of these is a summer 

 salmon camp, where a tent is pitched or where there is an old barabara built 

 in previous years. There the family lives through the fishing season on 

 salmon and dries a few for winter use. After the salmon run the family will 

 move to some permanent camping grounds, usually a village, wliich is its winter 

 headquarters. There the native trades, bartering a portion of his dried fish 

 for food or other articles he needs, and fishes for the ever abundant whitefish 

 and smelt in the sloughs and for blackfish, called by the natives Chinagik, in the 

 lakes. All of these fish are easily taken and furnish a constant source of fresh 

 food supply during the winter in noteworthy contrast with the very large amount 

 of dried fish eaten by natives farther south in the Bering Sea region. For 

 these reasons and the further fact that he is an active hair-seal hunter in the 

 early spring, the Kuskokwim native is not dependent upon dried salmon to the 

 extent that natives in otiier sections are. 



There were roughly 150,000 small fish dried in the 15 native villages between 

 Bethel and the sea. This allowed 1,000 fish for each family, which is the 

 number the consensus of opinion on the river credited the average native 

 family with putting up and the average of the agent's counts tallied with 

 this number. One-half of these and sometimes more are sold or bartered, 

 leaving the I'est for home consumption. 



In 50 native villages and camps above Bethel 150 families were found, each 

 one of which averaged the usual 1,000 dried fish, or 150.000 in all. These 

 upriver natives impressed one as being more energetic and thrifty than the 

 lower Kuskokwim or tundra natives. With the conditions for fishing not 

 as good as on the lower river, they nevertheless made fair catches under 

 adverse circumstances. Driftwood, consisting of huge logs and roots of trees, 

 together with swift and high water throughout the entire fishing season, re- 

 sulted in the ruin of nearly all their fish wheels. 



As one of the matters to be investigated was the amount of salmon avalable 

 for the use of the natives, it can be reported, after traveling 300 miles up- 

 stream from Bethel and visiting more than 50 villages, that the natives have 

 sufficient dried salmon for both themselves and their dog teams. 



Whitefish, before referred to, are caught throughout the winter by natives, 

 giving them fresh fish, which are relished more than dried fish. The natives 

 also subsist largely on game in the winter, such as ptarmigan, Arctic hares, and 

 snowshoe rabbits. These, with an occasional moose and oaribou, together 

 with smelt taken during the run of this small fisli in the winter, and with 

 provisions secured from the white traders, such as flour, rice, tea, and sugar, 

 make ample provision for these people. Berries are an important article of diet 

 among families with a semblance of thrift. 



The Kuskokwim native is quiet and peaceable, possibly a little less advanced 

 in civilization than are the natives of the Kvichak River region. In all about 

 65 villages and camps were visited, and some of these contained as many as 

 30 families. 



There are tabulated below a few of the villages visited, with the number 

 of families in each and the amount of fish dried. The number of fish in the 

 shed were determined by entering the smokehouse or drying rack where the 

 fish were curing. Because the natives were late in beginning fishing, as men- 

 tioned before, they caught very few king salmon, many of the famil es drying 

 none at all. Many camps that had no name were visited. These have been 

 designated as camps and placed in the order in which they came, traveling 

 from Bethel up river. 



