462 U. S. BUREAU OF FISHERIES 



Baker Lake station early in March, produced 4,113,000 fry and one consignment 

 of 100,000 eyed eggs, the latter being shipped to the Lincoln Park Aquarium, 

 Chicago, 111. The fry were carried on trays until the yolk sac was absorbed, 

 when most of them were planted. A few were held to be reared to the fingerling 

 stage. 



Following a slight rise in water level, a few male and female sockeye salmon 

 entered the creek, and 35,000 eggs taken from them were hatched. The resulting 

 fish, in the No. IJ^ stage, were on hand at the end of June. One hundred and 

 fifty thousand sockeye eggs, transferred to this point from Baker Lake station, 

 were transported by means of truck and pack team to lUabot Creek, 11 miles 

 distant from Birdsview, and seeded in the gravel along the shores of the lake. 

 This is a cold, glacial body of water, and as there is a good volume of water in its 

 tributary creek during the summer and fall months, it is believed it may be 

 possible to establish a run of salmon in the lake. With this object in view, 

 plants of eggs will be made here every spring until a sufficient length of time has 

 elapsed to determine what the results will be. 



The fry and fingerling steel head salmon on hand at the opening of the year 

 were distributed during August, various applicants being supplied, and the 

 remainder was planted in tributaries of the Skagit River. Steelhead eggs to a 

 total of 584,000 were taken between March 7 and May 21, this being a fair 

 average compared with the work of recent 3^ears. However, owing to the neces- 

 sity of holding the brood fish in pens for a considerable period to ripen, a large 

 percentage of them proved infertile. 



Duckabush (Wash.) substation. — The new trap site used for the first time last 

 season having been destroyed by flood waters during the succeeding winter, 

 permission was obtained to install a temporary trap under the State Olympic 

 highway bridge. The first chum salmon of the season appeared here late in 

 August, and beginning September 1 seining operations were conducted almost 

 daily up to September 20, when a 20-foot section of the rack was carried away 

 when a rise of several feet in the water level occurred. The fish held below 

 were thus able to escape upstream, and during the week intervening before the 

 river was again at its normal height the remainder of the run passed up, putting 

 an end to the season's work. The egg collections amounted to 3,340,000. 



The trap in Walcotts Slough, near the former eying station at Brinnon, Wash., 

 was placed in condition for work late in November with the view of collecting 

 eggs from the late run of chum salmon in that field. Brood females to the 

 number of 3,508 were taken between December 1 and January 3, and from them 

 9,760,000 eggs were secured for transfer to the Duckabush hatchery. Though 

 transported a considerable distance in the green stage, the losses on these eggs 

 during incubation were no greater than on the local collections. On a number 

 of occasions men were detailed from the Quilcene substation to assist in the 

 work at Wolcotts Slough and took back with them such surplus eggs as couM 

 not be handled in the Duckabush hatchery. Operating in this manner, it is 

 estimated that a saving of at least $1,000 was effected over the old system of 

 eying the eggs at Brinnon. The product of the eggs was conveyed back to the 

 slough and liberated in native waters. 



A large run of silver salmon appeared in the Duckabush River in December 

 and January, but the water level at that time was so high that practically all of 

 the fish surmounted the rack and spawned upstream. Early in February the 

 station received 2,000,000 eyed silver-salmon eggs from the Gold Bar hatchery 

 of the Washington Fish Commission. These were incubated with the local 

 collections and the fry were released in the sac-absorbed stage. 



As 1924 was the alternate year for the run of humpback salmon into Puget 

 Sound waters, no eggs of that species were available during the fall. However, 

 the station received by transfer 4,500,000 of the humpback eggs taken in Alaskan 

 waters by the Washington fisheries authorities, and the product was placed in 

 the station ponds in the advanced fry stage, the pond screens being removed 

 so that they might pass at will into the Duckabush River. In an effort to estab- 

 lish a run of chinook salmon in the Duckabush River 500,000 eyed eggs of that 

 species were transferred to the station early in December from the Little White 

 Salmon (Wash.) hatchery. When ready lo take food, the fry resulting irom 

 this consignment were transferred from trays to the ponds and fed three times 

 daily until May 28, when they were liberated. On account of the prevailing 

 high water during the spring, most of the run of steelhead salmon was able to 

 surmount the permanent rack and pass up the river, and only 35,000 eggs were 

 secured. At the close of the year the fry incubated from these eggs were being 

 cared for in troughs in the hatchery. 



