638 BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF FISHERIES, 
are caught within 9 miles of the river’s mouth. In 1867 and 1868 my father, 
the late N. W. Clark, who was one of the pioneer fish culturists of America, took 
whitefish spawn on the Detroit River, and his observations made at that time 
indicate that the species was very abundant. At Grassy Island and Mama 
Juda, two of the best-known fishing grounds, 1,000 fish at a haul was no unusual 
occurrence. At the present time a haul of 30 fish is considered large. The 
same is true also of the Au Sable region upon Lake Huron, where during the 
sixties from 40 to 50 boats were doing a very lucrative business and at the 
present time not more than a half dozen are operated with only indifferent 
success. In varying degrees this same decrease in numbers has taken place 
upon every fishing ground of the Great Lakes, in a great many places to such 
an extent that operations have been entirely abandoned. 
Why should this be so? If we can answer this question, and if the causes 
can be eliminated or in some measure restricted and controlled, we will have 
found a solution of our problem in so far as a solution is possible. 
First. The cutting of our forests and consequent floods and erosion of the 
soil, the discharge of sawdust and other refuse from the lumber and pulp mills, 
chemical works, and sugar factories, which go to make up the industrial life of 
the cities situated on the Great Lakes, have made the deposits from the mouths 
of our rivers offensive to the dainty senses of the whitefish and have gradually 
encroached upon its spawning and feeding grounds to such an extent that in 
thousands and thousands of acres which at one time were teeming with this 
species it is now an absolute stranger. This damage can not now be undone, 
but by wise legislation the cause of it may be to some extent prevented from 
further offenses. 
Second. The operation of the commercial fisheries under unwise laws and 
the nonenforcement of good laws has, in my judgment, contributed in a greater 
degree toward the decrease of the whitefish than all of the other causes put 
together. Most of the law-making bodies of the states bordering upon the 
Great Lakes have put the cart before the horse, so to speak. By their enact- 
ments they have permitted the taking of this fish at all times except during 
the spawning season and the period of incubation, which all students of fish 
culture insist is a kind of alleged protective legislation that does not protect. 
If we are to have closed-season laws they should cover the month or months 
when the largest lifts of unripe fish are made. It is then that our whitefish need 
protection, for their ova are immature and we can not half so well spare the 
parents as we can during the spawning season. When unripe adults are caught 
for market all their spawn is necessarily wasted, whereas if protected until the 
spawning season the different commissions would be given an opportunity to 
save the ova, hatch the fish, plant them in the lakes, and thus by artificial 
propagation cause each ripe female to furnish thousands of her kind. We have 
