104 Tzvcnty-sixtli Annual Meeting 



to impregnate a thousandth part of their eatch, it would be a 

 great saving. He expressed great confidence in the work the 

 fishermen were doing. 



He said the spawning season usuahy took two weeks and 

 with half a dozen men with $360 the whole work could be done 

 in a large area. 



Mr. Dickerson: It seems to me every fisherman ought to 

 have interest enough to impregnate those eggs and put them 

 back without expense to the state or general government. 



Mr. Tomlin: You must remember these fishermen's fingers 

 are all thumbs. It is a graphic expression but I almost split mv 

 sides laughing to see them handle the fish while they were 

 spawning and one big fellow, taller than myself, was in the waist 

 of the boat at one time trying to strip a fish, and the fellow 

 "kicked" him, as he called it, just about the time he was stripping 

 him and he came very near falling over the sides of the boat, and 

 would have done so if I had not been there. The fish went over 

 and his eggs all in its till. So, it is really a difficult matter to get 

 these men to know just what to do. Mr. Wise, of Duluth, has 

 three men working for him all the time. 



Mr. Clark: I have been very much interested in this discus- 

 sion but from my experience, having taken upon the great lakes 

 whitefish and lake trout eggs in large numbers and had a 

 wide experience, probably as long as any of the members, and 

 perhaps a little longer, 1 do not see where these gentlemen's argu- 

 ments come in good at all, for this reason: 1 failed to find a 

 place where ripe fish are caught and put in the boat, where the 

 eggs are not saved. If there are any such spots, if you gentle- 

 men will tell me where they are on the lakes, I will have men 

 there this fall to save the eggs. For four seasons at least 

 we have been short of eggs. We have some difficulty to find 

 places where whitefish were caught that were ripe. All on 

 Lake Huron, Lake Michigan on the east side, and at the Detour 

 there has not been a single spot fished where the United States 

 Fish Connnission has not had men in the boats, unless the Michi- 

 gan Conmiission or the Wisconsin Commission had engaged the 

 l)()at. I do not see how there are any whitefish eggs wasted. 



Mr. Tomlin has spoken to us al)out the great number of lake 

 trout eggs that are on the decks of the boats, I want to say it is 

 the same with trout eggs as with whitefish eggs. Two years 

 au"0 I oave the New York Conmiission two or three boats that we 



