11 



year old. I believe, with Mr. Clark, that one yearling trout 

 planted in a stream is as good as thirty-five or possibly 

 tifty-tive, but the expense attending it, I think, is greater 

 than will warrant." 



Mr. Clark said : '' I do not agree with Mr. ISIather at all 

 on the yjoint of exj)ense. There are a great many things in 

 regard to this expense that most people do not take into 

 account. If you have an establishment where you are 

 keeping tish and furnishing eggs, either shipping the eggs 

 to other States or getting the fish eggs from the fish as we 

 are doing, you have got to have about the same force. I 

 venture the idea here that the Michigan Commission or the 

 New York Commission can raise 100,000 yearlings with 

 the same force they have to-day. In regard to the loss, I 

 would say that the trout that we held last spring for 

 spawning gave us nearly 1,250,000 eggs ; of these, I think 

 my report will show the loss to be about 300,000, certainly 

 not to exceed 350,000. Another point : when we put a 

 certain number of fish in the stream, we know that there 

 are that many there, but that is not the case with the fry. 

 The planting of fry is all very well, but when planting fish, 

 we know that a certain number is there, because the car- 

 men count them before they are planted." 



Mr. Mather said : "In the hatchery that I have charge 

 of we do not actually count the eggs, but we measure them 

 in troughs ; the men keep an exact account of the dead 

 eggs, and my books will show the loss every day from the 

 time the eggs are laid down until they are distributed. If 

 I ask the foreman how many trout are in any particular 

 trough, he will tell me, and I will send one man 10,000 and 

 another man 10,000 and another man 5,000, and with a 

 trough holding 25,000, we know that this takes them all ; 

 one man may get more fish than another, but we know that 

 25,000 fish have gone somewhere, so that I think our sys- 

 tem is about as accurate as it can be. I do not think we 

 make any mistake in that respect. It is only a question 



