FISHES OF THE PACIFIC COAST 

 color are scarcely distinguishable from the sand. 



There are fourteen anadromous species, that is, 

 species which ascend the rivers in the spring or 

 fall for the purpose of spawning in fresh water, 

 but which pass the greater part of their lives in 

 the sea. Of the anadromous fishes the most im- 

 portant are the species of salmon; the largest in 

 size are the sturgeons. But besides these species 

 several little fishes, such as the lampreys, have 

 similar habits. 



Four species are confined chiefly to the brack- 

 ish mouths of streams, a very small proportion, 

 because California has very little of estuary water. 

 Finally, as above stated, about forty-five species 

 are confined exclusively to the rivers. 



The fisheries of the coast as a whole are rela- 

 tively little developed. The bay of San Francisco, 

 the bay of Monterey, the bay of San Diego and a 

 region about Avalon are fully fished, overfished at 

 times, but along the great length of the coast the 

 fisheries remain almost untouched. Captain Col- 

 lins estimated that on the seven thousand miles of 

 the coast of California, Oregon and Washington, 

 the fisheries are about equal to those of 500 miles 

 on the coast of New England. The value of the 

 product is about the same in the two districts, and 

 may be roughly set down at $40,000,000 per year. 

 Of this amount, the salmon fisheries of the Colum- 

 bia represent between a third and a fourth, those 

 of Puget Sound nearly a third, and California 

 about $8,000,000. This represents from 50,000,000 

 to 80,000,000 pounds of fishes caught each year. 



The salmon fisheries of the Sacramento are 

 situated chiefly in the counties of Solano and 

 Contra Costa. For a number of years these fisheries 

 steadily declined. This was due to overfishing, and 

 to the destruction of the spawning beds through 

 lumbering and placer mining. Millions of the young 

 fry enter the bayous of the lower Sacramento and 

 are left to die when the water goes down. Prac- 

 tically the only spawning beds left in the Sacra- 

 mento Basin were in the river itself about Red 

 Bluff. The United States Fish Commission came 

 to the rescue and, through the hatchery stations at 

 Baird and Battle Creek, it has repopulated the 

 river. At present it is said that more salmon run 

 in the Sacramento than when the stream flowed 

 through primeval wilderness, but this statement 

 may be questioned. 



The salmon of the Sacramento is the quinnat 

 or king salmon (Oncorhynchus tschawytscha) , the 

 largest and finest of all the salmon tribe. It reaches 



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