ZOOLOGY. 141 



do not go far from the sea or ascend the small tributaries ; but 

 elsewhere they ascend every little brook, up to points where 

 there is scarcely enough water for them to swim ; and in these 

 expeditions they are so much exhausted and bruised that they 

 soon die ; but the number thus killed is as nothing compared 

 w^ith those which go out to sea again. The female salmon 

 having found a suitable place, uses her nose to dig a trench in 

 the sand about six feet long, a foot wide, and three inches 

 deep, and having deposited her spawn in it, throws a little sand 

 over it wath her tail, and departs, leaving her eggs to be 

 hatched and the offspring to be fed as best they can. In the 

 month of May the young salmon are found on their way to the 

 sea, from three to six inches long. It is supposed that the 

 salmon always return to the river in which they were born ; 

 so that the salmon born in the Klamath River never enter San 

 Francisco Bay, nor do those born in the Sacramento and San 

 Joaquin Rivers ever enter Humboldt Bay. Although the sea- 

 son in which salmon are abundant in the rivers extends from 

 November to June, yet some of them are found in the streams 

 of California at all seasons, and they can be had fresh in the 

 San Francisco market every day in the year. 



The quinnat is the chief salmon of all the streams and bays 

 of California, but Gairdner's salmon {Fario gairdneri) is found 

 in the Klamath River, and the stellatus salmon in Humboldt 

 Bay and its tributaries. Gairdner's salmon has a silvery-gray 

 back, silvery sides, and a yellowish-white belly. The body has 

 numerous indistinct, blackish spots. The stellatus salmon is 

 light-olive in the back, yellowish- white on the belly, and rarely 

 exceeds two or three pounds in w^eight. 



§ 109. Halibut. — There are two species of halibut on the 

 coast of California, the Californian {IIlj)2^oglossus califoriiicus) 

 and the common {Hlppoglossus vulgaris). There is some 

 doubt whether the latter species is properly named ; if it be, 

 then w^e have one species of fish found on the Atlantic coast. 

 The CaUfornian halibut is a slender fish, weighing at the 

 largest twenty-five pounds, in color grayish-brown above and 



