.-lincricun I'Islicrics Society. 53 



and sustaining our commercial nshcries, consistency demands 

 that we close our brook trout hatcheries and rely on the same 

 remedy for the streams, where the conditions are much more 

 favorable for nature to sustain herself. If a new stream or sys- 

 tem of streams is to be stocked, transplant a few adults and 

 let nature, with a closed spawning season, do the rest. 



No doubt much confusion arises in the lay mind because 

 practical fish-culturists favor an open spawning season for lake 

 trout and whitefish and a closed one for brook trout. If the 

 latter were like the former in their habits and movements at 

 spawning time, open fishing would be the wisest possible plan 

 that could be adopted, for then millions of ova that are now 

 wasted could be saved and hatched, and there would be no neces- 

 sity of going to the expense and trouble of holding a stock of 

 adults under control the year round for the sole purpose of 

 procuring a supply of ova. But with nature's stock of brook 

 trout, there is no practical way to save the ova, if open fishing 

 were permitted, and hence for wild brook trout there is no- altern- 

 ative for natural spawning. At spawning time the breeders dis- 

 perse to innumerable brooks, where, if fishing were allowed, 

 they would fall into an indefinite number of hands that could 

 not if they would, save the ova and hatch it. 



But lake trout and whitefish, like a good many other species, 

 instead of scattering, concentrate their forces at spawning time. 

 The reproductive instinct assembles the parent stock into schools 

 on a comparatively few well-defined and well-known shoals, 

 thus making it practical to cover all fishing points with experts 

 prepared to save the ripe ova. The expense of holding a breed- 

 ing stock in constant confinement, as conditions compel us to 

 with brook trout, is rendered wholly unnecessary 



It may be noticed, in passing, that when a stock of brook 

 trout are held for breeding purposes, thus giving us an option 

 on jtropagating them by either natural or protected methods, 

 everv possible precaution is taken to prevent the former. Ac- 

 cording to the closed season creed, we commit the unpardonable 

 sin of "interfering with" and "disturbing" the sacred function 

 of natural spawning. If we followed the creed and allowed the 

 breeders to bed and spawn in the ponds and raceways, the 

 meagre hatch would, if carefully reared, recruit the ranks of 

 the adults, but there wouldn't be any surplus for distribution. 

 Bv violating the creed, however, and running the ova through 

 a hatcherv, the gain in hatching results enables us to distribute 

 a million fish annually from a stock of two or three thousand 



