62 AMERICAN FISHERIES SOCIETY. 



of over-fishing Lake Superior," then the fishermen began to en- 

 large tlie size of the mesh of their nets, and to discontinue tlie 

 use of the pound nets; and using only seine nets for their wortc, 

 the size of meshes was increased from 3)4in. to 4in. Still find- 

 ing their catches diminishing they inquired for causes; at this 

 point the U. S. Fish Commission by some means had circulated 

 along the chain of the Great Lakes the information that all offal 

 dumped into the lake near to spawning grounds was injurious 

 to spawn, and that both trout and whitefish would seek other 

 grounds to spawn if fish- offal was dumped into the lake. 



One after another all the old grounds had been deserted until 

 fishermen who went to Sucker Bay, twenty miles from Duluth, 

 now have to go one hundred miles away, and then only get an 

 occasional whitefish; while the fishing grounds proper lay in the 

 body of the great lake, too far for fishermen at the eastern end 

 of Lake Superior to reach them. It looked as if the fishermen 

 had "killed the goose that laid the golden egg," not by any 

 greed or gross carelessness, but by ignorance and inadvertence. 



Many of them believe firmly that the coming of the schools of 

 whitefish and lake tront are spasmodic, though they cannot as- 

 sign causes for this. They think that after a season of unusual 

 northeasterly gales succeeding spawning time the spawn is de- 

 stroyed by a too violent agitation of the waters. And as Lake 

 Superior eastern storms are often long continued and of destruc- 

 tive force, the next season's supply of young fry is very small 

 in numbers. Another cause may be the careless dumping of 

 fish offal on the feeding grounds, this causing the whitefish to 

 seek new grounds until this substance is destroyed, and thus in 

 three or four years the fish again return to the feeding grounds. 



The fishermen of Lake Superior have learned that the white- 

 fish is a very timid fish; that continued netting for two or three 

 seasons will drive them to seek new grounds; and that once 

 driven away it takes years for the schools to come to the same 

 grounds again. The sentiment is increasing that the utmost care 

 must be taken not to drive away the young fry that have been 

 planted by the Minnesota Fish Commission, and are finding their 

 way to feeding grounds that were fished ten years ago. 



DtdutJu Minn. 



