SALMON FISHERIES OF PACIFIC COAST. 67 



of Washington, but for some reason the industry has languished 

 almost from the start. 



In 1882 the Alaska Oil & Guano Company established a fertilizer 

 plant at Killisnoo, Alaska, for the extraction of oil and fertilizer 

 from herring, and has operated the plant continuously ever since. In 

 some years large quantities of whole salmon have been handled at this 

 plant, and the resulting product was found to sell as well as that 

 from herring. 



Probably the most serious evil in the salmon industry to-day is the 

 enormous wastage which annually occurs. About one-fourth of the 

 total weight of each fish handled at the various packing plants is 

 thrown away. With the exception of the tailpiece, which is dis- 

 carded at most canneries owing to the excessive amount of bone 

 which would be in the product if canned, this waste material could 

 not be utilized as food, comprising as it does the head, viscera, fins, 

 and tail. When not conveniently near the very few fertilizer plants 

 at present in operation this product is either allowed to pass through 

 chutes into the water under the cannery, or is dumped into scows 

 and towed to the ocean or the deeper waters of the sounds, and here 

 thrown overboard. This procedure, not only exceedingly wasteful, 

 is also far from beneficial to the waters where deposited. 



The great desideratum in the salmon fisheries of the Pacific coast 

 at the present time is the invention of a small odorless- fertilizer 

 plant, costing not more than $2,500 or $3,000, which can be installed 

 at the various salmon canneries and salteries. The offal from the 

 cannery could there be utilized and the product obtained would 

 doubtless net a fair return on such an investment, while at the same 

 time the present (in the aggregate) enormous waste would be stopped, 

 and the waters adjacent to the canneries rendered far more agreeable 

 to the fishes as well as to the people on shore. It is absolutely essen- 

 tial that the plant shall be odorless, as the smell of the ordinary fer- 

 tilizer establishment would be very offensive to persons visiting the 

 cannery and would not enhance the demand for canned salmon. At 

 the present time the cheapest plant available costs about $10,000, and 

 very few canneries can afford to invest this sum of money in the dis- 

 posal of their own offal alone. 



