312 EEPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



but not with any regularity, and as a whole these nets may be said to 

 have cut a small figure in connection with the fisheries of that region. 

 This has been especially so since the rapid increase in the number and 

 efiBciency of the traps began. In 1893 and 1894, when three or four 

 were in use, they did very well, and in the latter year a good proportion 

 of the cannery supplies at Point Eoberts were so obtained. In 1895, 

 however, the catch by this means was reported very small, as the traps 

 furnished sufficient quantities of sock eye from day to day to supply the 

 canneries and no silver salmon were canned. 



The total number of purse seines reported for the I^uget Sound region 

 in 1897 was 46, and in 1898 it was 40. 



DRAG SEINES. 



Although drag seines were sometimes employed on a sjmall scale in 

 connection with the early fishery of the Fraser River district, they have 

 been entirely prohibited for a considerable period throughout British 

 Columbia, except in certain localities outside the region under discus- 

 sion, where the water is too clear for gill-netting. In Washington they 

 seem to have been the earliest form of net introduced by the whites, 

 and they are still widely used, though not very extensively in any one 

 place. Their first employment to any extent was apparently at Point 

 Eoberts, where the traps have virtually superseded them. They were 

 there hauled mainly around the southwest corner of the point, and 

 thence up along the west side to a distance of 1^ miles, the shore else- 

 where being generally unsuited for the purpose. When rounding the 

 southwest corner a part of the salmon keep well in to the shore, yet 

 large catches of sockeye were never made there, and if 300 or 400 fish 

 were captured at a haul it was considered a fair result. In the early 

 fall, however, the silver salmon would be taken in greater numbers. 

 As the traps multiplied and were made effective the seines gradually 

 went out of use, though they may still be employed occasionally. 



The most important recent drag-seine fishery seems to he that whi,ch 

 has now been carried on for a number of years to obtain salmon for 

 canning purposes at Seattle. Eight nets, measuring from 200 to 600 

 feet long and with a 3-inch mesh, were in use in that connection in 

 1895. Near the mouth of the Skagit Eiver 6 seines were operated in 

 1894, 2 by the whites and 4 by the Indians. The former were about 

 600 feet long by 30 feet deep; the latter 180 feet long by 10 feet deep, 

 both having a 3-inch mesh. Seining is also done in the neighborhood 

 of Utsalady, in Skagit Bay, and in both of these localities relatively 

 large catches are said to be made. Good seining grounds are reported 

 iu the vicinity of tlie mouth of the Nooksack Kiver, though they had 

 not been much resorted to up to 1895. 



Small seines are employed to some extent for salmon, by both whites 

 and Indians, at several places along the south shore of the Strait of 

 Juan de Fuca, chiefly in Discovery Bay and about Dungeness and Point 

 Angeles, isearly all the catch is consumed locally, but small quantities 



