PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF FOOD FISHES, 1924 409 



ATLANTIC AND HUMPBACK SALMONS. CRAIG BROOK (mE.) STATION 

 [J. D. De Rocher, Superintendent] 



Because of the persistent refusal of the salmon fishermen of the 

 Penobscot River to render reasonable assistance to the bureau in the 

 prosecution of its Atlantic salmon work, no attempt was made to 

 secure brood fish of that species during the fiscal year 1924. The 

 work was therefore confined to the incubation of some 500,000 eggs 

 received from the Canadian Government in exchange for an equal 

 number of eggs of other species of the Salmonidae. Upward of 95 



?er cent of these eggs produced fry, which were distributed in the 

 Taraguagus, Denn3's, Piscataquis, and Penobscot Rivers, all in the 

 State of Maine. 



Of interest in connection with the fish-cultural work at this point 

 is the continued presence in the Dennys and Pembroke Rivers every 

 second year of a run of spawning humpback salmon. During the 

 month of September employees of the Craig Brook station secured ap- 

 proximately 600,000 eggs from these fish, and the resulting fry were 

 returned to the streams from which the eggs were derived. The 

 losses during incubation were rather heavy, amounting to nearly 35 

 per cent of the original stock. 



FISHES OF MINOR INTERIOR WATERS 



The more important fishes propagated at the bureau's stations for 

 the stocking of interior waters are the rainbow, black-spotted, and 

 brook trouts, landlocked salmon, the crappies, the black basses, cat- 

 fish, rock bass, and sunfish. The extensive fishing being done in the 

 public waters of the country at the present time is making it exceed- 

 ingly difficult to supply the ever-increasing demands for the game 

 fishes. This applies especially to the brook trout and to practically 

 all of the pondfishes, but more particularly to the large-mouth and 

 small-moutli black bass. In the case of the brook trout the output 

 is necessarily limited owing to the fact that a large proportion of the 

 eggs are purchased from commercial fish culturists and in many in- 

 stances are greatly inferior to those derived from wild fish. In the 

 production of the pondfishes the work is frequently handicapped by 

 unfavorable weather, and it is necessarily limited by the small poncl 

 areas available for carrying on the work. 



The cooperative relations that have been developed A\dthin the past 

 few years between the bureau and fish and game organizations in 

 practically all parts of the country have done much to improve con- 

 ditions pertaining to fish life in public waters. Many of these organ- 

 izations have been instrumental in having laws- passed for the better 

 protection of wild life in their respective States and have brought 

 about an increased respect for such laws on the part of the general 

 public. 



ROCKY MOUNTAIN TROUT STATIONS 



The activities of this group, comprising five main stations and a 

 number of substations and field collecting auxiliaries, are confined to 

 the States of South Dakota, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, and Montana. 

 They were engaged during the year in the cultivation of brook, rain- 

 bow, black-spotted, and Loch Leven trouts, and to a lesser degree in 

 the propagation of the Montana grayling. 



