THIRTY-FOURTH BIENNIAL REPORT 19 



REPORT OF THE BUREAU OF FISH CONSERVATION 



By J. O. Snyder, Chief 



The former Bureau of Fish Culture is now known as the Bureau 

 of Fish Conservation. This slight change in name carries with it an 

 unmeasured amount of added responsibility. It definitely expresses 

 the theory that fish propagation is a part of fish conservation. For- 

 tunately the State of California has not reached the condition when 

 natural propagation is a thing of the past. Artificial propagation and 

 the distribution of its product must therefore take into account the 

 work of nature, so long as and wherever that remains productive. The 

 introduction or spread of competing species must be guarded with the 

 greatest care. Artificial propagation should be self sustaining in all 

 eases excepting only where the taking of wild eggs is plainly salvage. 

 Furthermore, the interest of the bureau rests not with the production 

 of small fish alone, but is extended through transportation and plant- 

 ing, even to the angler's basket. The change in name may also assume 

 that the bureau is in a measure responsible for such scientific inquiries 

 or investigations as pertain to the game fishes. The operations of the 

 various hatcheries are now completely coordinated, each having lost 

 something of its previously assumed sectional and individual impor- 

 tance. Each employee now has an opportunity to regard himself as 

 one of a large organization, while his interests are broadened accord- 

 ingly. 



The experimental propagation of bass has completed its fourth 

 year and amply demonstrated its feasibility in this region. Brood 

 stocks of small mouth bass have been spawned, fish have been success- 

 fully hatched and reared, methods of transportation and planting have 

 been tested, and fish produced at the experimental plant have been 

 traced to the angler's basket. Kentucky bass have been introduced to 

 the ponds at Friaut where a brood stock is now established, and from 

 where one small experimental planting has been made. It now remains 

 for those in charge to execute a definite plan of distribution for both 

 of these species, and determine the results of the work as accurately as 

 possible, that these may be balanced against the cost. 



There is a constantly recurring agitation for the introduction of 

 exotic species of fish. "While some requests and suggestions are so evi- 

 dently ill-considered as to be dismissed at once, others remain to be 

 brought up from time to time. Our native species together with those 

 already introduced furnish an ample fauna, and if with proper con- 

 servation and propagation these can not be made to sustain a reason- 

 able amount of sport fishing, the remedy is not to be found in the intro- 

 duction of other species. The introduction of a foreign species may be 

 simple enough while the result may be appalling. 



In assuming charge of the duties of fish rescue by this bureau the 

 activities of that work and the propagation of spiny rayed fishes have 



