194 American Fisheries Society. 



and investigations as to the resources of the seas, to increase the 

 number of marine biological laboratories with competent scientific 

 staffs, and fish-cultural stations for the propagation and distribution 

 of commercial food fish. The development of practical ideas and 

 methods in the economic exploitation of the fisheries ; the demar- 

 cation of fishing grounds, employment of scout vessels, hydroplanes 

 and wireless communication in locating and following up seasonal 

 migratory fish ; practical instruction in the handling and packing 

 of fish for shipment to distributing centres; the dissemination of 

 information as to costs together with sources of supply of gear and 

 equipment, particularly nets, twine, bait, ice, packages and all com- 

 modities essential to production ; and recommendation for the re- 

 peal of all unnecessary legislation and the substitution of genuine 

 conservation measures are all helpful suggestions. 



POLLUTION. 



Pollution is exercising a great influence over our supplies of 

 fish, particularly the anadromous salt water fishes which spawn 

 in our rivers and brackish coastal waters, and, what is more im- 

 portant, the destruction by pollution of their food supply in inshore 

 waters, such as the minute pelagic forms of plant life and crusta- 

 ceans. 



The waters of our rivers and harbors, along the banks of which 

 great manufactories are located, are favorite dumping-grounds for 

 waste materials of all kinds, the most injurious to the fisheries being 

 oil-waste and tar. Drainage of waste oils and tar from gas-houses 

 and oil refineries, the accidental leakage and wanton discharge of 

 fuel oil by oil-burning vessels, are responsible, to a great extent, 

 for the depletion of our inshore fisheries. Waters such as the 

 Kennebec River in Maine, the Connecticut and the Hudson Rivers, 

 New York Bay, Chesapeake Bay and many others, for years famous 

 for their production of salmon, shad or striped bass, have in the 

 past few years become nearly barren of these valuable fish on 

 account of this most destructive agency — pollution. That the greed 

 of the commercial fisherman is not wholly to blame for the depletion 

 of these waters is borne out by the fact that, from time immemorial, 

 fishermen have been taking the fish, and the runs have been as great 

 one year as another, until the waters became contaminated with the 

 pollutions of civilization. 



In framing measures of conservation, the subject of pollution 



