44 AMERICAN FISHERIES SOCIETY. 



George Winne, of Locust Point, says : I fish gill-nets on the 

 reefs off Toussaint Point. In 1883 I caught two tons of white-, 

 lish from sixty nets, and in 1884 six tons from thirty-six nets. 

 A few years ago it got so it did not pay to go out on the reefs 

 to fish, and I quit and went sailing. Since the planting of 

 voung whitefish has been carried on, fish have become more 

 numerous, and I have done very well fishing, but best this last 

 fall. Think if the planting is not kept up whitefish will soon 

 become scarce again. Tliink a much greater percentage of eggs 

 put into hatcheries will live to become mature fish than those 

 deposited on the reefs by the fish themselves, for the reason th;U 

 the former are protected from their enemies while hatching, and 

 after the young fish are planted their chances are just as good." 



M. Shepherd, also of Locust Point, states: " Am fishing fif- 

 teen pound-nets off Locust Point. My catch the past season 

 was about as usual — no material difference. Think the hatch- 

 ing business a good thing, but the proper place for a hatchery 

 is on one of the islands ; then the eggs would have the natural 

 water, and when the fish are planted there would be no change 

 from the water they were hatched in to that which they are 

 planted in." 



Nelson Parsons, a practical fisherman of Vermillion, says : 

 " I have watched the fishing interests very closely for a number 

 of years, and noticed that whitefish are steadily decreasing in 

 numbers, until the supply was replenished by the planting of 

 young fish from the hatcheries. If something of the kind had 

 not been done, I think that whitefish would, ere this, have be- 

 come so scarce that it would not pay to fish for them. For- 

 merly we used to catch whitefish of all sizes at the same time, 

 but this season at Cleveland, where I was, the fish were nearly 

 all of one size — looked as if they were all of the same age, 

 and I believe they were a school of the planted fish. I think 

 if fishing is continued it must be done in this way." 



Edson & Nichols, of Vermillion, caught one ton less of white- 

 fish in 1884 than in 1883, but say : " We do not attribute the 

 falling off to a growing scarcity, but to the direction and 

 amount of wind, which is everything to us here in the fishing 



