VI -REPORT OF OPERATIONS DURING 1872 AT THE UNITED 

 STATES SALMON-HATCHIiNG ESTABLISHMENT ON THE 

 M'CLOUD RIVER, AND ON THE CALIFORNIA SALMONID.^ 

 GENERALLY; WITH A LIST OF SPECIMENS COLLECTED. 



By Livingston Stone. 



A— INTEODUCTORY EEMARKS. 



1.— THE SALMON-HATCHING ESTABLISHMENT ON THE m'CLOUD RIVEK. 



San Francisco, California, Becember 9, 1872. 



Sir : I beg- leave to report as folloAvs : 



lu pursiiauce of your iustructioiis received in July last, to proceed 

 without delay to the Pacitic coast, aud make arrangements for obtaining 

 a suj^ply of salmon eggs, I left Boston on the 1st day of August, for San 

 Francisco, Avith this object. As I was directed in your subsequent letters 

 to obtain , if possible, the eg-gs of the Sacramento River salmon, I set mysel f 

 at work at once to ascertain the time and place of the spawning of these 

 fish, but, singular as it seems, I conld find no one in San Francisco who wns 

 able to say either where or wlien the salmon of the Sacramento spawned. 

 Those best informed in regard to fisliing matters, advised me to locate 

 at Rio Vista, the chief salmon-fishing ground of the Sacramento. This 

 seemed practicable at first, but, on examination, the water at Rio Vista 

 was found to be wholly unsuitable, and this place was given up. For- 

 tuuatel}^ a short time after, I was introduced, through the kindness of 

 Hon.B. B. Redding, a member of the board of California commission- 

 ers of fisheries, to Mr. JVIontague, the chief engineer of the Pacific Rail- 

 road, who showed n)e the Pacific Railroad surveys of the upper waters 

 of the Sacramento, and pointed out a place on the map, near the junc- 

 tion of the McCloud and Pit Rivers, where he assured me he had seeu 

 Indians spearing salmon in the fall on their spawning-beds. This point 

 is one hundred and eighty-five miles nortli of Sacramento City. Fol- 

 lowing this clew, I proceeded to Red Bluff, the northernmost railway sta- 

 tion of tl»c California and Oregon Railroad, situated fifty miles from the 

 McCloud River. From inquiries made here, I became so well convinced 

 that the salmon were then spawning on the McCloud River, that as soon 

 as sup])lies and men could be got ready I took the California and Oregon 

 stage for Pit River ferry, two miles from the mouth of the McCloud. 

 We arrived here at daylight on the 30th of August. Leaving the stage 

 at this point we followed up the lefb bank of Pit River on foot, to the 

 mouth of the McCloud, and continued thence up the McCloud River. At 

 a distance of about two miles above the mouth of the river, we came 

 upon several camps of^ Indians with hulidreds of freshly caught salmon 

 drying on the bushes. Salmon could also be seen in the river in such 



