DO SALMON FEED ? 177 



indirectly stated that the functional duty of the coats 

 of the stomach and the intestines ceased after the 

 salmon had left salt water. The report went on to 

 say that the stomach and alimentary canals contracted 

 and diminished in their dimensions. 



In order to justify his belief that salmon feed while 

 in fresh water, a contributor to the Fishing Gazette 

 recently advanced the following facts : In the first 

 instance given by this gentleman a salmon of 14 pounds 

 presumably a fresh-run fish was killed and taken 

 home, and on being opened was found to contain a 

 rat in his stomach. This rat which is the evidence 

 that salmon feed in fresh water must have been 

 swallowed some time before, but it had not, apparently, 

 suffered from the attack of the gastric juices which 

 this writer claims as being so powerful a solvent that 

 " any food that is swallowed is almost immediately 

 assimilated." Neither had it been vomited out, as it 

 should have been if the vomiting theory held by others 

 of his opinion could be accepted as accurate. 



In the second instance, he states that a huge kelt 

 was captured in his presence which had in its mouth a 

 partially swallowed J-pound trout, perfectly fresh and 

 apparently- just seized. The head and shoulders had 

 been reduced to a mere pulp, and he considers that 

 the rapid action of the salmon's gastric juices accounted 

 for the pulp-like condition of that portion of the 

 trout even before it reached the stomach of the 

 salmon, for he states that the tail end, from the dorsal 

 fin, was uninjured. The trout in this instance cannot 



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