PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF FOOD FISHES, 1923. 7 



SENTIMENT IN FAVOR OF FISH PROTECTION. 



One of the bureau's functions has been to impress upon the various 

 States having- inadequate fishery laws, or none at all, the necessity 

 for taking steps to protect the fish life within their boundaries. It 

 is felt that the bureau can not afi'ord to make large plants of fish 

 in the waters of States that have no laws providing for their pro- 

 tection. Such legislation should not only establish an adequate 

 closed season so that the fish may spawn without molestation but 

 should provide for regulations to cover a bag limit and a minimum 

 size at which fish may be taken. It should rigidly prohibit the 

 dumping of refuse in fish-cultural waters, as the presence of waste 

 matter drives the fish away, destroys their feeding grounds, and 

 makes it difficult ever to restore fishing in waters that have been 

 contaminated. 



It is gratifying to note that country clubs and other associations 

 throughout the country are taking more interest in protection than 

 ever before. In many instances such organizations have leased large 

 tracts of land and have incurred considerable expense in stocking 

 the waters located thereon. Some have gone so far as to maintain 

 small hatcheries, while others have sought the aid of the bureau in 

 their fisli-cultural ventures, with the understanding that after reserv- 

 ing a sufficient supply of the fish produced for their ow^n use the 

 remainder will be planted in public waters. 



The effect of the growing sentiment in favor of protection has 

 been far-reaching and beneficial. Large numbers of men and women 

 in different sections of the country are at the present time forming 

 organizations having for their object the adoption of measures for 

 adequately conserving natural resources, and the good results of 

 their efforts along this line are very apparent. This sentiment in 

 favor of the preservation of fish life is probably stronger throughout 

 the Mississippi Valley than anywhere else. The people of that sec- 

 tion look upon fish conservation as a matter vitally affecting their 

 personal interests. A diminishing supply means the cutting off of 

 their only means of obtaining fresh fish for food, and they are very 

 urgent in their demand that the fishes stranded in landlocked pools 

 and lakes in the flooded regions of the Mississippi River be trans- 

 ferred to living waters. Before this river became obstructed by 

 poA\er dams it constituted a natural fish hatchery for the great 

 ^fiddle West, but, as these dams are recognized as a national neces- 

 sity, their greater value than the fish life is not questioned. The con- 

 struction of the dams has resulted in cutting off the ascent of the fish 

 to headwaters and it is thought to be no more than just that fishes 

 stranded in the overflowed sections should be rescued and returned 

 to the parts of the rivers thus cut off. 



The sentiment in favor of this salvage of fishes from the over- 

 flowed lands has become so great that the resources not only of the 

 bureau but of the States of Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois, 

 as well, have been severely taxed in an effort to increase the scope 

 of operations. It is estimated that during the fiscal year 192-^ ap- 

 proximately one million pounds of fish were thus saved from de- 

 struction. 



