23 



another day. We can, therefore, only receive in one shipment the 

 eggs of the fish that can be caught in one night's fishing. This rarely 

 exceeds one hundred thousand. As the cost of the passages of the 

 necessary attendants from the Atlantic and their return, with 

 express charges, etc., equals twelve hundred dollars, we have not 

 felt authorized to make more tlian one importation a year. We 

 believe, however, that by eighteen hundred and seventy-eight shad 

 will be sufficiently numerous in the Sacramento to w^arrant the 

 attempt at taking ripe fish for the purpose of artificial hatching 

 in our own waters. Should we be successful, w^e can save the 

 expense and risk of importation, and all our appropriate rivers 

 can, in a few years, be filled with this valuable fish. Having 

 this in view, we would respectfully ask that you recommend the pas- 

 sage of a law restricting the catching of shad at all other times except 

 between January first and April first, of each year. This, if faithfully 

 observed, would give a part of the fish an opportunity to reach their 

 spawning places. 



It is well known that salmon, after going to the ocean, invariably 

 return to the river of their birth for purposes of reproduction, and 

 this was supposed to be the instinct of the shad, yet we have infor- 

 mation of a shad having been taken at Wilmington, and others in 

 Russian River and in the Columbia, points on the coast separated 

 by more than four hundred miles. It may be possible that as these 

 fish become more numerous they will return in schools to the Sacra- 

 mento, the young following their elders who have once made the 

 journey. Should they continue to enter diff"erent rivers on their 

 return from the ocean they will soon stock all on the coast that are 

 appropriate to them. 



WHITEFISH (COREGONAS ALBA). 



In January last we received from the United States Fish Commis- 

 sioner a donation of three hundred thousand eggs of the whitefish. 

 These were successfully hatched under the superintendence of Mr. 

 J. G. Woodbury, at the State hatching house at Berkeley, and the 

 young fish were distributed as follow's : Seventy-five thousand in 

 Donner Lake ; fifty thousand in Sereno and other lakes near the 

 Summit, in Placer County; and one hundred and seventy-five thou- 

 sand in Lake Tahoe. Including twenty-five thousand placed in 

 Clear Lake in eighteen hundred and seventy-three, and twenty-five 

 thousand in Tulare Lake in eighteen hundred and seventy-five, 

 there have been planted in the waters of this State three hundred 

 and fifty thousand of these valuable food fish. We believe they 

 have lived in Clear Lake, also in Tulare. It was reported in a Lake 

 County paper, that a whitefish was taken in Clear Lake April tenth, 

 eighteen hundred and seventy-six, wdiich measured afoot in length. 

 We have no positive information that they have found a congenial 

 home in Tulare Lake, but have heard reports that a few have been 

 seen. As these fish can only be taken with a net, and as these are 

 rarely used on these lakes, their waters will have an opportunity to 

 become fully stocked before they are extensively fished. There can 

 hardly be any doubt but they will succeed in Tahoe and other lakes 

 near the summit of the Sierra — the climate, water, and food being 

 not dissimilar to those of Lakes Michigan, Huron, and Superior, in 

 which they are indigenous. These fish live upon small Crustacea, 



