1^ 



REPORT OP THE FISIT AND GAME COMMISSION. 



regions stocked to the satisi'actioii of the iiiajniit y of tlie anglers, as 

 the open season is too long. The ti'oiit fry do not liave a chance to 

 grow. Fry planted diiring the summer and cai-ly Fall ai-c caught the 

 next spring, when tlicy are not over four or live inches in length. The 

 growing season in the Sierra Nevada range — where the great majority of 

 the stocking streams and lakes are situated — is during the spring, sum- 

 mer and fall. Ti-out do not make much of a growth during the cold 

 stormy weather of midwinter. To give the trout fry a chance to grow 

 and the adult fish to propagate, the season should be shortened at least 



Fig. .3. Sisson Lake, one of the three large salmon rearing- ponds at the Mount 

 Shasta Hatchery. Photograph by Homer Marston. 



one month in the spring and one month in the fall. Five months out of 

 the year should he ample time for the anglers to enjoy the privilege 

 of taking trout. 



There are streams in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in which there 

 are very few breeding or adult fish left. The anglers fish some of the 

 easily accessible streams until the only fish left in any great numbers 

 are the fry that have been planted the season before. They cannot 

 take all of the large fish ont of a stream and expect to have good fish- 

 ing. If the open season on trout is shortened to five months, the 

 results will be apparent in several ways. The number of fish taken 

 will be reduced. The fry will have a chance to grow, during the spring 

 and fall when there is an al>undanee of natural food, and the adult 

 fish will be protected during the breeding season. The rainbow, black- 

 spotted and steelhead species spawn in the spring, and the Eastern 

 brook, Loch Leven and German brown trout, in the fall. Thus there 



