FISHERIES, BY STATES. 



227 



Products, by species. Table 1, on page 230, gives sta- 

 tistics of the quantity and the value of the fishery 

 products of Pennsylvania, by species and by apparatus 

 of capture. Oysters, blue pike, and lake herring con- 

 tributed to the total value of the product 34 per cent, 

 19 per cent, and 18 per cent, respectively, representing 

 in the aggregate 71 per cent of the total value. Sea 

 bass furnished 9 per cent of the total value, while shad 

 and whitefish each contributed 7 per cent. Thus six 

 species are shown to account for 94 per cent of th e 

 value of products. The remaining 6 per cent was con- 

 tributed by 21 species. Of the six leading species, 

 oysters and sea bass were taken from Delaware River 

 and Bay; blue pike, lake herring, and whitefish from 

 Lake Erie; and shad in nearly equal quantities from 

 the Susquehanna and the Delaware Rivers. Fish 

 proper represented 66 per cent of the total value of 

 products and oysters the remaining 34 per cent. 



Products, by fishing grounds. Of the total value of 

 the fishery products for the state, the Delaware River 

 and Bay district furnished 50 per cent, the Lake Erie 

 district 45 per cent, and the Susquehanna River dis- 

 trict only 5 per cent. The quantity and value of the 

 fishery products of the Delaware River and Bay dis- 

 trict, distributed by species and by apparatus of cap- 

 ture, are shown in Table 2, on page 230. 



Oysters contributed 69 per cent, or more than two- 

 thirds, of the total value of the fishery products of 

 this district. Of the fish proper reported, sea bass, ale- 

 wives, and shad were the most important as regards 

 quantity. Sea bass and shad exceeded o^her species 

 of fish in value also, representing, respectively, 56 per 

 cent and 26 per cent of the value of all fish caught, and 

 17 per cent and 8 per cent of the total value of products 

 for the district, being surpassed only by oysters; the 

 alewife catch, however, was of comparatively little 

 value. The sea-bass product was taken wholly with 

 lines, and the shad and alewives were taken with gill 

 nets and seines. 



The statistics of the fishery products rf the Lake 

 Erie district are given in Table 3, on page 231. 



One-half of the Lake Erie catch was composed of 

 lake herring, but the value of this product was some- 



what lower than that of the blue-pike catch, which con- 

 tributed 41 per cent of the value of the Lake Erie 

 product, as compared with a corresponding proportion 

 of 39 per cent for lake herring. Whitefish ranked third 

 in both quantity and value, the whitefish catch repre- 

 senting 16 per cent of the total value of products of this 

 district. Practically the entire amount and value 

 (96 per cent in each case) of the fishery product 

 of the Lake Erie district was contributed by these 

 three varieties of fish. Yellow perch was the only 

 other species that represented more than 1 per cent 

 of either the total quantity or the total value. Gill 

 nets, which were used for securing practically the 

 entire lake-herring catch and the larger part of the 

 catch of both pike perch and whitefish, were by far the 

 most important kind of apparatus of capture employed 

 by the fisheries of this district. 



Table 4, on page 231, presents, for the Susquehanna 

 River district, statistics of the fishery products similar 

 to those given for the other districts in Tables 2 and 3. 



Shad alone represented 79 per cent of the total quan- 

 tity and 73 per cent of the total value of the Susque- 

 hanna River catch, eels being the only other species of 

 any importance. About two-thirds of the shad product 

 was caught by dip and bow nets and the remainder 

 by seines and gill nets. 



The following tabular statement distributes the value 

 of products, by species, for the state and for each dis- 

 trict : 



i Less than $100. 



Products, by class of fisheries. The next tabular 

 statement shows the distribution, by species arranged 

 according to value, of the value of products for the 

 state as a whole and for the two classes of fisheries. 



The vessel fisheries account for 84 per cent of the 

 value of all fishery products of the state and for 76 

 per cent of that of the total fish catch. Of the products 

 of this class of fisheries, oysters were by far the most 

 important, contributing 41 per cent of the total value; 

 pike perch and lake herring were the most important 

 fish products, together representing 39 per cent- of the 

 total. Among the products of the shore and boat 

 fisheries, shad, reported exclusively by this class of 



