XXXIII -REPORT OF OPERATIONS AT THE UNITED STATES 

 SALMON-HATCHING STATION ON THE M'CLOUD RIVER, CAL- 

 IFORNIA, IN 1878.* 



By Livingston Stone. 



Charlestown, ]Sr. H. 



December 31, 1878. 

 Prof. Spencer F. Baird, 



United States Commissioner: 



Sir : I beg leave to report as follows : The winter of 1877-'78 was aji 

 extremely rainy one, and in this section of California it rained almost 

 incessantly from the 6th of January till the end of February. In con- 

 sequence of these rains the McCloud Eiver rose to an uniirecedented 

 height, and swept down through the caiion which incloses it with terrible 

 volume and velocity. When it was 14 feet 9 inches above the summer 

 level, it was just even with the floor of the fishery mess-house. From 

 that time till the waters began to subside the fishery buildings were in 

 great danger. The excessive rise in the river brought down drift-wood 

 that had been undisturbed for years, and in immense quantities. This 

 drift-wood coming down with great force in the swift current and com- 

 posed sometimes of the trunks of huge trees, endangered the buildings 

 to a most serious degree. The water was not high enough to carry away 

 the buildings by the mere force of the current, although it was in itself 

 very powerful, but the momentum of the drift-wood was sufiicient to 

 carry everything before it. 



During all the time of the high water, the men in charge, viz, Myron 

 Green, Patrick Eiley, and J. A. Richardson, together with four or five 

 Indians who helped them, worked with great resolution and courage. 

 During the whole of two days and one night they were in the water, 

 sometimes up to their necks, and often in danger of their lives, guiding 

 the drift-wood so that it would pass through the fishery premises with 

 the least danger. They worked so persistently and skillfully that the 

 houses were saved, but everything else was swept away. All the fences,' 

 flumes, chicken-coops, door-steps, h'atching-troughs, filtering-tanks, 

 eveything that was on the ground that would float, were carried ott'. The 

 whole of the interior of the hatching-house was cleared out and left as 

 clean as the dry bed of a river, which indeed it literally became. The 

 damage done to the fishery was so considerable that I applied to the 



* The species referred to in tlio accompanying rejiort is the Qniunat or California 

 Bahnon — Salmo quinnat. 



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