REPORT OF STATE BOARD OP FISH COMMISSIONERS. 31 



It would have been impossible for the Department of Hatcheries and 

 the Restoration of Fishes to have done with its small funds the amount of 

 work it has accomplished without the generous help which the Southern 

 Pacific Railroad Company has extended in giving an annual free pass to 

 the Superintendent to all parts of our State in his frequent trips to 

 the hatcheries from San Francisco; also, in giving free passage in the 

 baggage car for the salmon and trout eggs and all the cans of trout in 

 the many shipments for distribution from the Sisson Hatchery, in the 

 shipments of Black bass, and free passage for the attendants with the 

 fish. The railroad people were very kind also in giving us the use of a 

 handcar and right of way on their road in shipping the young salmon 

 down the Sacramento for distribution. I would like to give an instance 

 in which the railroad people have shown their kindness to the Fish 

 Commission, and at the same time show why but few salmon have been 

 up the Sacramento to spawn during the fall run for a long while past. 



I was told by different parties that at a point on the Sacramento 

 River, near the railroad tunnel No. 3, there was a horseshoe bend in 

 the river; through the neck of this bend a mining company, years ago, 

 had made a tunnel to drain the river in the dry season, so that they 

 could mine the bed of the river around that bend. In August and Sep- 

 tember, when the salmon make their great migrations to their spawn- 

 ing beds, it was noticed that for years past but very few salmon made 

 their appearance in the Sacramento River above the bend, while in early 

 times the salmon went up in thousands. 



In August and September the river is very low, and most of the water 

 went through this tunnel, leaving so little water in Horseshoe Bend 

 that it was almost impossible for the salmon to make their way up, 

 while they congregated in thousands at the lower end of this tunnel, 

 where the volume of water came through with such force, and made such 

 a jump off into the river below, that the fish could not get up. Here 

 the Indians, and also white men, would assemble, and while the salmon 

 were using up their strength in continually making ineffectual eftbrts to 

 leap up into the tunnel, they would destroy them with grab hooks and 

 nets. This point is but a little way above where the Pitt River joins the 

 Little Sacramento. 



I determined to stop, if I could, this destruction of salmon and give 

 them a chance to get up on their spawning grounds and deposit their 

 eggs. I went down to this tunnel and made an examination, and saw 

 at a glance that the railroad people — with their ties and old bridge tim- 

 bers, with their handcars to carry them to the tunnel, and the crews of 

 road repairers to do the work of putting in the timbers to face the 

 tunnel, and blasting down the overhanging bank to fill up the open 

 cut — could do the work much cheaper than I could. So I called at 

 Fourth and Townsend Streets and told my story to the railroad people, 

 showing the importance of this tunnel being closed up, that the salmon 

 now being stopped there might not be hindered in making their way 

 up the river to their spawning grounds; and asked them if they would 

 not, as a great favor, have this job done by their men and send in their 

 bill of expenses to the Fish Commission. They readily assented to have 

 the work done, and, at the same time, said that if it did not cost too 

 much, no charges would be made. In a short time they had the tunnel 

 closed (1889), but, owing to the great pressure of the waters in the 

 floods of the present year, 1890, the dam at the tunnel was torn out. 



