14 MUSEUM BULLETIN NO. 13. 



haunting species will generally neglect free swimmers and only cap- 

 ture occasional individuals that accident brings to their attention, 

 nor will they without good reason neglect an abundant, easily 

 captured food supply for a scarcer and more agile prey. The 

 salmon at all stages is a free swimming fish, very agile and quick 

 in its movements. The sculpin, on the other hand, is a ground 

 feeder, hugging the muddy bottom, and is more easily caught 

 than strong swimming salmon; therefore, so long as the former 

 are present in numbers, the latter are not likely to be hunted 

 or pursued extensively. The fact that the birds we obtained 

 from the sculpinless reaches of the river near the mouth had 

 empty stomachs, supports the view that salmon are difficult 

 of capture. The one bird that we know had been fishing in salmon 

 waters without results for an hour and a half further corroborates 

 this view. 



From all reports, the salmon in the rivers have been lately 

 increasing from year to year. One experienced man says that 

 ten or twelve years ago about thirty fish were taken in the 

 York river per year, while in 1913 from 120 to 130 were caught 

 by anglers. The cormorants are also generally increasing in 

 number, the rookeries are enlarging and new ones being estab- 

 lished. These facts taken together do not indicate that the 

 cormorants are markedly harmful to the salmon. In fact, they 

 may be more beneficial than harmful as a whole, in helping to 

 weed out the weak and unfit fish, and so keeping the stock up to 

 virile strength. The danger of removing all predacious in- 

 fluences was well shown by the grouse plague in Scotland when it 

 was decided, by the investigating committee, that the great 

 spread of the disease was due to the destruction of the vermin 

 that normally, quickly, eradicated diseased or weakly birds before 

 they had a chance to contaminate the remainder of the flock. 

 From the evidence on hand it is, therefore, evident that the 

 cormorants in the fresh water reaches of the rivers are few; that 

 those in the tidal mouths feed on bottom haunting fish, and that 

 as a whole the influence of cormorants upon the number of salmon 

 can be disregarded as too slight to be of economic importance. 



