494 U. S. BUREAU OF FISHERIES 



and occasional droughts also claim their toll of eggs. It is highly 

 probable, although we have no positive data on this point, that 

 these losses far exceed those experienced in artificial salmon culture, 

 and whatever this difference is it represents the extent to which salmon 

 hatcheries should be credited as preservers of the industry. 



In the opinion of the author, the best way in which to conserve the 

 fisheries of the coast is by enacting and enforcing laws under which 

 a certain proportion of the runs will be enabled to reach the spawning 

 beds and perform the final and most miportant function of their 

 lives unmolested. If this is done, there can be no question of the 

 perpetuation of the industry, and if it is then supplemented by the 

 work of hatcheries, which would reduce the loss in the egg stage, 

 assurance on this point would be made doubly sure. 



If unrestrict-ed fishing is to prevail, however, with a dependence 

 upon hatcheries alone to repair the ravages of man, the industry will 

 suffer seriously, for, from the very nature of things, less and less fish 

 will annually escape through the fishing zone, resulting in a continu- 

 ally lessening quantity of eggs being obtained at the hatcheries, and 

 finally the latter will have to close down from sheer lack of material 

 upon which to work. 



Should eggs be brought to the hatchery from other streams, it 

 would merely be "robbing Peter to pay Paul," and in the end the 

 same result would follow in those streams. 



Fortunately these matters are becoming increasingly plain to the 

 people of the various States, provinces, and territories concerned, 

 and, while a few selfish persons in each are seeking solely their own 

 enrichment by any means possible, the greater number of those 

 interested in fishing operations want to see the industry perpetuated 

 and are willing to do almost anything that will work to this end. 



Immature salmon. — The rapid increase during recent years of 

 salmon trolling and purse seining on the feeding banks off the mouth 

 of the Columbia River and outside the Strait of Juan de Fuca and 

 elsewhere on the coast has resulted in the taking of large quantities 

 of small and immature salmon, and alarm is now felt lest the runs 

 of chinooks and cohos be seriously depleted. Several thousands of 

 large and small boats are being operated on these grounds from five 

 to eight months of the year, and while, when prices were compara- 

 tively low, but few of these immature fish were marketed, the high 

 prices which have prevailed during the last four years have caused 

 such an intensity of fishing that many thousands are now caught 

 each season. 



Investigations -^ by experts off the mouth of the Columbia in 1918 

 show that a large proportion of the chinook salmon caught by trolling 

 are 2 and 3 years old. These are generally sold to the canners, who 

 separate them into two groups, those under 5 pounds and those over. 

 Those under 5 pounds are called "graylings" by the fishermen, but 

 a mere glance at them is sufficient to establish their real identity. 

 The reports of one cannery during the period from May 11 to May 

 29 showed there had been received 4,0G1 pounds of these fish, none 

 of which weighed 5 pounds. From May 30 to June 12 this same can- 

 nery received 548 of these fish having a total weight of 1 ,483 pounds. 

 As the owner of this cannery was decidedly opposed to the purchase 



M The Taking of Immature Salmon in the Waters of the State of Washington. By E.Victor Smith, 

 State of Washington, Dept. of Fisheries. 44 pp., 8 pis. 1920. 



