249 



Another important commercial species which formerly existed in Lake 

 Ontario in marvellous abundance, but which is now so rare as to be an object of 

 curious intf-rest when seen, is the Atlantic salmon. Sixty years ago, eacli season 

 it ascended the St. Lawrence in vast numbers, and swarmed in all its tributaries. 

 Following both shores of Lake Ontario, it a.scended all the smaller streams which 

 fall into it and which afford suitable spawning grounds for the mature fish and 

 favourable nurseries for the fry during their period of river life. 



The following extract from the annual report of the Department of Marine 

 and Fisheries of Canada, for the year ending June 30, 1869, will be instructive as 

 well as suggestive: — 



Special Report of Messrs. WhiTcher and Venning, on Fish-Breeding at 

 Newcastle, Ont. 



" We proceeded yesterday to Newcastle, Ontario, in compliance with your 

 directions, anil made a personal inspection of the fish breeding establishment 

 there under charge of Mr. Wi I mot. The premises are situated on Baldwin's or 

 VVilmot's Creek, a sm-ill stream traversing the township of Clarke, in the county 

 of Durham, and discharging into Lake Ontario, about forty miles east of Toronto. 

 This creek is well situated for salmon, as it forms a natural inlet of the sheltered 

 bend of the lake between Bondhead and Darlington. Although at its entrance 

 into the lake it passes through a marshy lagoon, the bed of the stream farther 

 inland is of a gravelly nature and the water is pretty clear, regular, and lively in 

 its flow. In early times it was famous for salmon, great numbers of which fre- 

 quented it every autumn for the purpose of spawning. They were so plentiful 

 forty years ago, that men killed them with clubs and pitchforks, women seined 

 them with flannel petticoats, and settlers bought and paid for farms and built 

 houses from the sale of s dmon. Later they wt-re taken by nets and spears, over 

 1,000 being often caugi^t in the course of one night. Concurrently with such 

 annual slaughter, manufactories and farming along the banks had obstructed, 

 fouled, and changed the creek from its natural state, and made it less capable of 

 aflbniing shelter and spawning grounds. The yearly decreasmg numbers at 

 length succumbed to the destruction practiced upon them each season from the 

 time of entering the creek, until nearly the last straggler had been speared, netted 

 or killed. 



The history of the salmon fishery of Wil mot's Creek, so graphically told by 

 the Canadian Comniissioners, has been repeated in every stieam of the State of 

 New York which drains into Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River. All 

 were frequented by the salmon, and from each, each season, went out a numerous 

 colony of parr and smolts, which descended the St. Lawrence to the gulf, where 

 they remained until they had attained size and maturity, when, obeying the 

 impulse of reproduction, they ascended the St. Lawrence and distributed them- 

 selves to all the tributaries of lake and river, carrying back to these inland waters 

 the rich harvest of the sea which they had gathered. 



This magnificent fishery has ceased to be. Did it exist to-day, and were the 

 conditions which made such a fishery possible prevailing to-day, a hundred streams 

 now barren would afford salmon fishing as attractive as the more favoured waters 

 of Canada, and the catch by net in the lake itself would furnish the motive of a 

 valuable commercial fisheiy. 



The cause of the disappearance, practically, of salmon from the streams of the 

 St. Lawrence B^sin. has been chiefly and primarily the erection of obstructions in 

 all the rivers, which have prevented the salmon from reaching their spawning 

 grounds, and so natural reproduction has been absolutely inhibited. 



