American Fisheries Society. 107 



or forty years ago, and we know that that end of the spinal cord 

 has been absolutely paralyzed for the last fifteen years. Fisher- 

 men used to say there what they say here, if any interference is 

 attempted "you are ruining our business," and they are permitted 

 to go on in their own way, without any legislation and they are 

 accomplishing their own undoing. Their nets and boats are rot- 

 ting on the shores of Ontario. Their avocation has passed away 

 never to return, in all prol)ability. What are we of the fish com- 

 mission confronted with on these great lakes, to begin with, tak- 

 ing the life of the commission as of twenty years of age? With 

 the fact that unlimited fishing has been done from the very, earli- 

 est time \vhen the season opens and the nets can be set, until it 

 closes by the storms of fall. 



As honest fish culturists, we believe we are intrusted with 

 'a pul)lic duty; that we are not performing that public duty 

 by simply blindly hatching and putting fisli in the water. We 

 feel that we nmst take into consideration the possibilities of the 

 ultimate success of our work. If we propose to go on year after 

 year here and do nothing but plant fish and print the figures in 

 reports, we ought to be bounced out of office. We have a further 

 function to perform. I say to you such work is a misuse of 

 public funds that ought not to be tolerated by any honest com- 

 munity in these United States. 



Commencing in 1885, the first and most complete statistics of 

 the great lakes ever taken by anybody were taken by this board, 

 "•"'lere was then a lapse of five years, when the reports were imper- 

 fect. A law was passed that every fisherman should report his 

 catch to the su]:)erinten<lent of the conmiission in this city. They 

 did not do it. We went to work, beginning with '90, sending out 

 to everv fishing station of these lakes a man who has con- 

 ducted that work ever since, and a man who is absolutely inde- 

 fatigable in this work, and he gets the statistics and he gets them 

 all. So when we speak of the condition of Michigan's fisheries 

 we are not speculating on what exists in Michigan, but we are 

 talking of what we know to be the fact. 



Now, we have gone to the Legislature and said this: Gentle- 

 men, here is the iniquity of this matter. You protect the game, 

 the deer, tlie birds and everything of that kind, surrounding them 

 with proper protection during the season of reproduction yet the 

 state does not invest a dollar in their propagation. It is a sport- 

 ing business. But here is a great commercial fishery that with 

 all our persistence we cannot have protected even to prevent the 

 catching of immature fish, to prevent interference with the spawn- 



