Buck. — Fishzvays for the Rank and File 107 



larger. It is as true in the water as out of it that the higher 

 is absolutely dependent on the lower and the all-important 

 problem of fish culture is the food problem. Doubtless many 

 of the disappointments met by those who try to stock ponds 

 and streams are due to want of attention to this point. Too 

 little inquiry is usually made as to the amount of food in 

 the water or the date at which it becomes available. Fish 

 hatched prematurely and planted in water so cold that none 

 of the food creatures are yet developed in it, or fish pro- 

 duced or planted in too great numbers for the food-supply 

 of the locality must perish. These statements sound almost 

 exactly like platitudes, but they must be repeated as long 

 as they continue to be disregarded. 



DISCUSSION 



Prof. L. L. Dyche, Kansas : I am interested in this subject of fish- 

 ways, because the Kansas Legislature passed a law, influenced largely 

 by a number of petitions sent in by citizens, compelling owners of 

 dams and other obstructions in streams, which prevented fish from 

 going up stream, to put in fishways. Then the matter was turned over 

 to the Game and Fish Warden and he was told to see to it that the 

 fishways were put in. 



We immediately devised the very best fishway, for the least money 

 possible, that we could, with the help of a number of engineers; we 

 published an outline of it in the proceedings of this Society last year. 

 However, the planning of a fishway on paper and publishing it in the 

 Transactions is one thing, and building one that will actually permit 

 fish to go up stream is another. However, we had to make a start of 

 some kind to satisfy the demand for fishways made by people who live 

 above the dams. 



We have superintended the building of several fishways, and no two 

 of them are alike, because we find that the dams and obstructions in 

 streams are different, and the streams themselves differ greatly. 



The chief ideas in this fishway, as you will see by examining the 

 plan that was published in the proceedings last year, is a trough, some 

 four or five feet wide, starting up above the dam, and running down 

 to some pool below the dam, and having one foot elevation to five feet 

 of run. We put in three or four of those built along the lines sug- 

 gested in the plans that were published in the proceedings of this Soci- 

 ety. As yet we have not had time to secure definite information as 

 regards their success. If fish do not go up through them, they are of 

 no value. 



