6 FISHERY INDUSTRIES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



use of black drum, grouper, mussels, red drum, whale meat, and 

 other neglected fishery products for food. By means of ]>ractical 

 demonstrations and lectures, many persons have been more fully 

 acquainted with the dietetic qualities of fish, have been encouraged 

 to use this wholesome food in larger quantities, and have been shown 

 that certain of their prejudices against its use were without founda- 

 tion. 



Efforts to increase the use of the by-products of the fisheries to 

 the most economical advantage have been continued. The more 

 extended use of fish and shrimp waste, its manufacture into fish 

 meal as an animal feed, the use of the hides of sharks, porpoises, 

 and other unutilized aquatic animals for leather, the drying of shark 

 fins for the oriental trade, and the like have been encouraged. 

 Analyses have been made of the liver oils of several species of 

 sharks, of tuna oil, etc., to determine more definitely their individual 

 properties and the uses to which they appear best suited. 



The consti-uction of the Fishery Products Laboratory in Washing- 

 ton, begun in December, 1918, was completed the following June, 

 and the equipment of it is practically complete. Various important 

 investigations have been inaugurated, such as a technological study of 

 the methods of salting fish, experiments in the recovery of old salt 

 and brine for reuse, a preliminary examination of some of the features 

 of foreign methods of freezing fish in brine, development of possible 

 methods for the production of essence d' Orient from the scales of 

 native fishes, and some preliminary tests of the practicability of 

 putting noncommercial sponges to commercial uses. At its experi- 

 mental laboratory at San Pedro, Calif., methods of canning the 

 Pacific coast mackerel have been developed, considerable attention 

 has been given to canning other local fish, such as barracuda, bonito, 

 and rockfishes, and the fishing industry of that coast has been given 

 all possible assistance. 



Detailed statistics of the vessel fisheries centering at Boston and 

 Gloucester, Mass., Portland, Me., and Seattle, Wash., have been 

 collected and the results published in the form of monthly and annual 

 bulletins for trade use. A statistical canvass of the coastal fisheries 

 of the South Atlantic and Gulf States for the calendar year 1918 

 was be^un early in 1919 and nearly completed by the end of the year. 

 In addition, canvasses of the shad fishery of the Hudson River for 

 1919 and of the shad and river herring fishery of the Potomac River, 

 also for 1919, have been made. With the exception of the coastal 

 fisheries of the South Atlantic States, the present report contains 

 the results of these canvasses, together with the detailed tables of 

 the canvass of the fisheries of the Great Lakes for the calendar year 

 1917 and the fishery products received at the Municipal Fish Wliarf 

 and Market, Washington, D. C, for 1919. Statistics of Alaska 

 fisheries are collected annually and published in the Bureau's annual 

 report on Alaska Fisheries and Fur industries. 



The inadequacy of the present personnel for this division's part of 

 the Bureau's work has called for the maximum of service from its 

 members to complete the program outlined above. This has been 

 given loyally at a time when higher compensation and much more 

 adequate returns for their labor could have been obtained elsewhere. 



