186 American Fisheries Society 



and when forced from the fish by a novice with contin- 

 ued stripping are released and appear like the other eggs, 

 but they are immature, and cannot be fertilized. This 

 adds more useless or dead eggs to the hatchery work. 

 More important yet is that the parent fish die and thus 

 diminishes each year our annual output of eggs. 



We are now more fully utilizing the lakes and reser- 

 voirs as a source of supply for eggs that the fry hatched 

 from them may be used for stocking barren and depleted 

 waters. We are not relying on our streams as heretofore 

 in the collection of eggs from wild trout. 



Packing and Shipping 



Packing and shipping green eggs of the native trout 

 from the field stations to the hatcheries requires great 

 care from start to end of destination. Packing the eggs 

 consists in placing them in cases, which are shaped so 

 that they can be put on pack-horses, each case holding 

 one hundred and sixty thousand eggs. Each horse can 

 carry two cases, a total of three hundred and twenty 

 thousand eggs. The native trout in these mountain lakes 

 (elevation 10,000 feet) spawns from the 15th of June 

 to the 15th of July. Thus the period for taking eggs is 

 quite limited. 



From the pack-horse, the cases of eggs are conveyed 

 by wagon to the railroad, thence to the several hatcher- 

 ies. From the time the eggs are placed in the cases, 

 until they are in the hatcheries, they are kept at a tem- 

 perature of 34° by ice and ice water poured over them 

 during transit. Should the temperature in the cases 

 rise, incubation starts and the eggs die in transit. The 

 eggs we take from the rainbow and brook trout are 

 handled in the same way when shipped green. We have 

 no sub-stations large enough to eye eggs before trans- 

 portation to the hatcheries. 



The state has seven operative trout hatcheries, ample 

 to stock all the waters of this commonwealth, and to im- 



