10 



with this valuable fish. As the white fish is only taken by nets, these 

 lakes will be fully stocked before it will be found profitable for fish- 

 ermen to make a business of catching them. A discovery of some 

 importance in the care of the young of the white fish was made by 

 Mr. J. G. Woodbury, in charge of the State hatching-house. This fish 

 lives on the Crustacea found on the rocks at the bottoms of deep lakes, 

 and as it was not known on what the young fish could be fed, it has 

 heretofore been necessary, within a few days after the young fish 

 have emerged from the egg, to place them in the lakes to find their 

 own food. Mr. Woodbury found that by pounding to a jelly the 

 flesh of the common salt-water crab, the young white fish would eat 

 and thrive upon it. He kept 50,000 on this food for more than two 

 months. This discovery is of much interest, as it enables the young 

 fish to be kept for some time, and thus distributed to stock mountain 

 lakes that are inaccessible during the winter months. 



SHAD (aLOSA SAPIDISSIMA). 



In June, 1878, we received from Professor Baird, United States 

 Fish Commissioner, from Havre de Grasse, 115,000 young shad; 

 these were placed in the Sacramento River at Tehama, where all 

 previous importations have been planted. The State has now received 

 from the United States Government, and by our own importations, in 

 all, 400,000 of these fish. There can be no doubt they find congenial 

 homes in Pacific Coast waters, and are thriving and producing their 

 kind. Several thousand mature fish have been taken and sold in the 

 San Francisco markets during the spring of 1879. A few are found 

 in market during almost every month in the year. After leaving 

 the Sacramento River, the great body of these fish follow the coast 

 south to the Bay of Monterey, where they must remain, finding an 

 abundance of food; for a few are caught in the nets of the fishermen 

 in this bay during every week throughout the year. If the appro- 

 priation were larger, we would do more towards stocking our rivers 

 with this fish. No discovery has yet been made of any substance 

 with which the young can be fed, and as seven days is the longest 

 period they can be kept alive without food, we are compelled to take 

 the number of young fish hatched from the eggs of one night's catch 

 in an Atlantic river, and hurry them by express trains across the 

 continent to Sacramento. The expense of such a journey with the 

 necessary attendance, is almost $1,800, and as the number of fish to 

 be obtained is uncertain, a larger importation of young shad would 

 involve an expense which would lessen the number of young sal- 

 mon which it seems imperative we should supply to the river each 

 season. 



SCHUYLKILL CATFISH (aMIURUS ALBIDUS). 



In 1874 we imported from the Raritan River, and placed in lakes 

 near Sacramento, 74 of these valuable fish. These have increased 

 to millions and furnish an immense supply of food. They have 

 become so numerous that they are as regularly on sale in the city 

 markets as the most abundant native fish, and are sold at about the 

 same prices. They thrive in our rivers and lakes, and in the still- 

 water sloughs of our plains, as well as in the brackish sloughs in our 

 tule lands. They appear to be equally at home in lakes on the 

 mountains and in artificial reservoirs in the valleys. Many farmers 



