778 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



At tlie feeding season both sexes take bait and rise to tbe fly, and are 

 talien in Songo and Crooked Eivers and in Sebago Lake. In Long 

 Pond they are never taken except at the spawning season, while ascend- 

 ing the stream or near its month. 



3.— FORMER EFFORTS AT CULTIVATION. 



But very httle has been done in this dh^ection. I myself visited Bear 

 Brook in 1867 and secured about 8,000 eggs, but, being an utter novice 

 in the art, succeeded in impregnating but a very small percentage, and 

 nothing practical ever came of them. Shortly after that Mr. A. B. 

 Crockett, of K^orway, and a Mr. Holmes, associated with him, secured 

 small quantities of spawn several seasons in succession, but with what 

 result is unknown. In 1870 Mr. Brackett, of the Massachusetts com- 

 mission, visited Songo Lock and obtained a number of large fish, which 

 he transported alive to Winchester, Mass., and from these were obtained 

 several thousand eggs. 



Several years later Mr. Joseph R. Dillingham, of Songo Lock, began 

 to take spawn of these tish for the Maine commission. He followed it 

 up for several years, but never with any great degree of success. 



4.— ORGANIZATION OF OPERATIONS IN 1878. 



It was evidently very desirable to cultivate on a large scale a variety 

 of salmon of such sui)erior character. Previous attempts had been on a 

 small scale, and had not demonstrated the existence of great numbers 

 of breeding fish, but there were not wanting reasons for believing that 

 only efficient means of cax^ture were wanting to develop an amjjle supi^ly. 

 It was finally arranged between the Commissioners of Fisheries of the 

 United States and of the State of Maine that at their joint expense a 

 new attempt should be made by a i)arty well fitted out with all the ap- 

 pliances deemed necessary to a thorough trial of the locality. The 

 management of the affair was placed in mj^ hands. I selected Mr. Harry 

 H. Buck, of Orland, to conduct the experiment, my own presence during 

 the spawning season being imi^racticable. 



On the 11th of August I visited the locality with Mr. Buck for the 

 purpose of selecting sites for fishing and for developing the eggs, and 

 deciding other general questions. There seemed to be no doubt, taking 

 all the testimony at our command, that the most j^romising site for fish- 

 ing operations was at Songo Lock, and it was decided to construct here, 

 at the junction of the Songo and Crooked Rivers, a set of pounds, on 

 the principle of an ordinary fish-weir, of fine-meshed nets suspended on 

 si akes and weighted at the bottom by chains. The main net was to cross 

 the mouth of the Crooked River and intercept the ascent of fish and 

 lead them into the pounds, which were built immediately below the 

 Songo dam, aside from the current of Crooked River, and supplied with 

 Songo water. The best e\adence we could collect assured us that there 



