FORTY-FIRST Bli:XXIAI> RKlMMn" 45 



two years were approximately equal, but tlic river laiidiiiiis of 1!I4!» were 

 considerably lower. The ditferenee in the river cati-hes was primarily ilne 

 to a strike by the river fishermen in the tall of l')4!). In the early part of the 

 1949 fall season before the salmon had be<>un to appear in any numbers, 

 the fishermen received about 18 cents for fish uiidir 14 pounds and 20 

 cents for those over 14 pounds, and evidently expected that this price 

 would last through the entire season. However, on Sejitember .Sth fish 

 began appearing in quantity; on September !)th the tlealers cut tlie price 

 to a flat 18 cents per pound, and the fishermen promptly went out on 

 strike. This strike lasted thi-ough the entire reiiuiinder of the season; 

 hence, the bulk of the fall nni was lost to the industry. A few fish were 

 taken by non-striking fishermen. A somewhat larger number were taken 

 upon the orders of the union itself. Each day a few fishei-men would he 

 assigned to go out, make their catches, and delivei- these catches to the 

 union, which would in turn market the fish. The number of fishermen 

 operating at any one time was small. The total nund)ei- of fish landed 

 during the strike was only a fraction of th;it which would have been 

 landed under normal fishing conditions; but, of course, it is imi)ossible 

 to estimate how good the catches would have been had fisliing operations 

 been normal. Catches of the few boats that Avere ojierating and of the 

 Division of Fish and Game boat Striper (which was catching salmon for 

 tagging purposes) are not at all conclusive, but such catciu's indicate that 

 the season w^ould probablv not have been nuich better or much worse than 

 that of 1948. 



The future of the salmon run in the main stem of the San Joacpiin 

 River looks bleak indeed. This is due to an intensification of the water 

 supply problems which have ruined the runs for the i)ast several years. 

 In the Fortieth Biennial Report of the Division of Fish and (lame, there 

 is a brief description of fish rescue operations in which pai't of the spring 

 salmon run of the San Joarjuin was trucked ])ast a di-y stretch in the San 

 •Joaquin River. This turns out to have been a wasted etfort, since it was 

 not possible to get enough water to enable the young of these salmon to 

 reach the sea in the spring of 1949. In order to avoi<l a repetiti(»n of this 

 waste of money and effort, the ]94f) spring salmon run was diverted into 

 the Alerced River instead of being trucked up the San .loaquin as was 

 done with the 1948 run. This diverting was done by sti-etching a net across 

 the San Joaquin River exactly at its junction with the .Merced -x. ijiat 

 fish coming up the San Joaquin would be divei'ted into the Mi-rced in- 

 stead of having to back downstream any distance in order to fiinl their 

 way to this river. The salmon accepted this rerouting with very little 

 fuss, probably because the small flow of return in-igation water coniinL-- 

 down the San Joaquin was so warm that it would have been fatal to 

 salmon to have had to stay in it for any prolonged length of time. Pre- 

 sumably the fish realized this instinctively and were willing to acee|)t the 

 cooler and more copious waters of the Merced K'i\er. I nfurtunately. the 

 salmon ascending the ]\Ierced River did not have a high rate of survival. 

 This Avas because the fish ascended the river rather slowly and the great 

 majority of them were too far downstream at the time when the irri- 

 gators started diverting almost the entire flow of the .Merced I{iver. Sum- 

 mer flows in the Merced are so low that salmon cannot or will not try to 

 ascend the riffles frcmi one pool to the next. As summer advances, water 

 temperatures in the lower Merced become so high that the salmon are 



