94 American Fisheries Society 



especially to make) consider that scores and scores of tons of fish 

 are now being caught on the spawning beds to be salted or frozen — 

 which is a condition that did not formerly exist— and it is not 

 difficult to realize that the end is in sight. This sort of thing cannot 

 continue much longer or we will all automatically go out of 

 business with the extinction of the herring, just as the famous 

 catches of Lake Superior Whitefish are now gone, probably forever. 



The remedy is simple and yet, on account of our foolish system 

 of allowing each state to make its own game laws, this by no means 

 small portion of the nation's natural resources is in danger of 

 obliteration. In spite of the fact that it meant a temporary heavy 

 financial loss to some of us last winter, we worked with the Minne- 

 sota State Game and Fish Commission to correct the condition, 

 and did actually get passed a bill which increased the required size 

 of the mesh to be used in the gill nets. This means that no more 

 undersized herring can be legally caught in Minnesota waters. 

 The law also establishes a closed season to protect the herring 

 when spawning, this latter provision to become operative upon the 

 passage of a similar law in Wisconsin. But right here is the 

 difficulty; practically all the herring at the western end of the 

 lake begin to congregate in the late fall in great schools, following 

 the north shore westward until the spawning time arrives, which is 

 usually about the 10th of November. At that time they appear in 

 millions, not in Minnesota waters, but over the great muddy 

 bottoms in the shallower Wisconsin waters at the extreme western 

 end of the south shore of the lake. Here they congregate for three 

 weeks for spawning and then, as suddenly as they appeared, 

 they go. 



The problem is now one for Wisconsin to deal with. The 

 fishermen's lobby at Madison have side-tracked every effort made 

 in that direction for years. They did pass one closed season bill, 

 but instead of protecting the spawning fish they closed the season 

 for a month before that period. It is well to protect the fish 

 which are about to spawn, but it is certain that the damage that 

 could be inflicted at that time is insignificant beside the other. 



I am firmly of the opinion that migratory fish, like migratory 

 birds, should be protected by Federal laws. These are not Minne- 

 sota's fish, nor Wisconsin's fish, nor Michigan's fish, though the 



