196 BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF FISHERIES. 
may remain prolific and an allurement to the lover of fishing. Guides and 
boatmen by the hundreds, the owners of vehicles, the builders of boats, the 
dealers in specially prepared clothing, food, and equipments make up an army in 
themselves. Laying aside all my natural bias due to the intense interest with 
which I regard all matters appertaining to angling, frankly, it seems to me that 
these few enumerated facts are prima facie evidence of the importance attach- 
ing to the sport. 
These great interests, however, combining both the strictly commercial and 
the no less important simply recreative, find themselves confronted with con- 
ditions that if not bettered will in a few years be no less than appalling from our 
standpoint. The causes of these conditions are many and varied and the 
necessary steps looking toward their reformation are fully as numerous. 
Ruthless deforestation, that most horrid mark of man’s insatiable greed, 
has contributed to the depletion of our beautiful waters. The inference here is 
plain that a renewal of the forests would be contributory to a reestablishment of 
earlier good conditions. Streams in many localities that but little more than a 
decade ago sheltered the fastidious grayling are now barren, for this beautiful 
creature must have eternal shade. 
Manufactories by the thousand pour their foul refuse into the living streams 
with which God has blessed this glorious land. As a practical man, with some 
knowledge of filtration and disposal of refuse matter, I feel warranted in boldly 
asserting that this type of offense could be remedied in ninety-nine cases out of 
a hundred without any severe tax on the offender. 
Night fishing with jack lights, seining, spearing, dynamiting, and all waste- 
fully destructive methods of capturing game fishes, together with the use of 
obnoxious, murderous lures, constitute an unending menace to the game fish 
life of our American waters, both fluvial and lacustrine. The remedy here, as 
in all cases, is proper laws, but, more important still, their proper enforcement. 
It may be asserted in generalities that the different state laws now in existence, 
and all more or less meritorious, fail in results because of their nonenforcement 
in an efficacious way. In many cases this nonenforcement is not venal because 
of no available resources from which to raise funds to provide for the mainte- 
nance of a proper force of officers. It is gratifying to know that in a few local- 
ities wise laws prevail and are properly enforced, and in these few localities 
results indicate splendidly the value of such conditions. 
Another potent cause of the falling off in numbers of our game fishes is 
their capture during the spawning season. This needs no dissertation, for we 
all know how prolific fishes are if given a chance to reproduce properly. Here 
again is a question for the lawmaker. 
Not the least cause of trouble arises from that peculiar phenomenon in 
human nature, the respectable lawbreaker. Honorable men, who would not 
pick a pocket or cheat in business or lie or break any of the usual laws, in many 
