1912 AND FISHEKIES COMMISSION. 91 



attraction to the Bportsman-toiirist from other Provinces and countries 

 to visit and pass some time in the Province. An annual influx of visitors 

 is bound to bring immediate pecuniary benefit, for they must pay for the 

 necessities of life, and in addition can confidently be expected to spend 

 money in other directions than tbose of plain living expenses. Perhaps 

 no better illustration of this could be adduced than the importance 

 attached locally to the annual exhibition held in this city. It is impos- 

 sible, in fact, to conceive of the outcry there would be amongst the mer- 

 chants of Toronto were it proposed to abandon this feature, and yet, 

 while equally great or even greater benefit to the Province at large is 

 to be derived from the angler tourist who passes a week or more in some 

 remote village, or even in the Avilds, in pursuit of his favorite pastime as 

 from the visitor to Toronto's Exhibition, this fact has not at yet come to 

 be generally, or in many instances even locally, recognized. Consequently 

 lakes, rivers and otlier waters in which sporting fish formerly existed in 

 abundance and whither there journeyed yearly a proportion of ardent 

 anglers both from Provincial towns and also from abroad, have in many 

 instances not only been depleted of their sporting fish, but the local resi- 

 dents have themselves been the chief means of effecting this depletion 

 through illegal or excessive netting, or disregard of the fishery regula- 

 tions, remaining the while oblivious to the material harm they were 

 working to their district and to the Province through the reckless de- 

 struction of the valuable sporting fishes. Naturally enough the visiting 

 angler-tourist requires good sport for the money he expends to secure it, 

 and if he cannot obtain it in one locality he will inevitably move to an- 

 other. In most of the States and Provinces of the central and northern 

 p<jrtions of this continent angling of some description is to be had, so 

 that it is evident that unless the sporting attractions of Ontario's fish- 

 eries are maintained to a higher level than the average, the Province 

 cannot hope to attract an increasing number of annual visitors bent on 

 angling, but rather that the number will steadily decrease. The accessi- 

 bility of Ontario and the excellence of her sporting fisheries in the past 

 have already built up for her no inconsiderable angler-tourist traffic, but 

 so many of her water areas have already become more or less depleted 

 that the complaints of visitors are to be heard on all sides, and had she 

 not possessed such a vast number of waters to draw on doubtless a 

 diminution in the yearly traffic Avould already have occurred. In any 

 ease every dissatisfied visitor is a misfortune to the Province, and if the 

 percentage of waters, depleted or comparatively depleted of sporting fishes, 

 continues to increase as it has in the past few years the effect on the ang- 

 ler^tourist traffic cannot but be most serious. It is to be noted also thiat 

 the waters which have suffered the most in this respect are, in many in- 

 stances, those most accessible; the very waters, in fact, w^hich, if well 

 stocked with game fish, should be drawing to them yearly the greater 

 number of visitors from outside, and the fact that this is the case must 

 militate against the popularity of the Province as a general tourist re- 



8 F.C. 



