50 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 
It is among the anadromous fishes that man in a Savage or semi-civ- 
ilized state finds his most copious supply of food, depending sometimes 
almost entirely upon it for subsistence through the year, eating it fresh 
during the run and dried or smoked the rest of the time. 
The most prominent fishes under this head belong more especially to 
groups of the salmon, the herring, the shad, and the sturgeon. It is 
in the temperate regions of the northern hemisphere, so far as I am 
aware, that the anadromous habit is seen in its grand development. 
No better illustration of the numbers in which anadromous fish enter 
the rivers can be given and the extent of diminution of the supply from 
various causes, hereafter to be referred to, than a presentation of the 
case as it relates to the Potomac River in the short distance between 
its mouth and the Great Falls of the Potomac, only twelve miles above 
Washington. Although this stretch of water is even now very pro- 
ductive, and annually becoming more and more so, as the result of care- 
ful propagation, many years will elapse, if ever, before it gets up to 
the measure of yield mentioned by Martin in his History of Virginia,* a 
work published in 1835. It is proper to say that some old fishermen 
along the river deny the accuracy of his statements in their detail, but 
admit that the numbers taken were enormously in excess of the pres- 
ent yield. I give, however, the statement, allowing it to speak for 
itself: ) ; 
“As Alexandria is the shipping port of the District of Columbia, and 
one of the principal marts for the immense fisheries of the Potomac, it 
may be well to mention that in the spring of the year quantities of 
shad and herrings are taken which may appear almost incredible. The 
number of shad frequently obtained at a haul is 4,000 and upwards, and 
of herrings from 100,000 to 300,000. In the spring of 1832 there were 
taken in one seine at one draught a few more than 950,000 accurately 
counted. The prosecution of the numerous fisheries gives employment 
to a large number of laborers, and affords an opportunity to the poor to 
lay in, at very reduced prices, food enough to last their families during 
the whole year. The shad and herrings of the Potomac are transported 
by land to all parts of the country to which there is a convenient ac- 
cess from the river, and they are also shipped to various ports in the 
United States and West Indies. The lowest prices at which these fish 
sell when just taken are 25 cents per thousand for herrings and $1.50 
per hundred for shad, but they generally bring higher prices, often 
$1.50 per thousand for the former and from $3 to $4 per hundred for 

*A new and comprehensive gazetteer of Virginia and the District of Columbia, 
containing a copious collection of geographical, statistical, political, commercial, re- 
ligious, moral, and miscellaneous information, collected and compiled from the most 
respectable and chiefly from original sources, by Joseph Martin. To which is added . 
a history of Virginia from its first settlement to the year 1754; with an abstract of - 
the principal events from that period to the independence ef Virginia, written ex- 
pressly for the work by a citizen of Virginia. Charlottesville, published by Joseph 
Martin. Moseley & Tompkins, printers, 1835, page 480, * 
EE 
