Snyder. — Netting of Coarse Fish. 203 



time and money to any effort to give effect to their views. 

 Unfortunately few, if any of these men who are so positive 

 of the correctness of their views, have given the question any 

 dispassionate thought or careful study. As a result their 

 views are of little or no help in uncovering the truth. How- 

 ever as this question has come up again and again all along 

 the Great Lakes and at many smaller lakes and along many 

 rivers and bays it seems that out of all this discussion some- 

 thing fixed, clear, definite, secure, should come. It is this 

 something fixed and safe that the writer wants. Many 

 factors necessarily enter into the solution of this question. 

 Many of these factors belong to a field in which the writer 

 regrets he is not qualified to enter, a field belonging to those 

 having a scientific education and training and a love or 

 passion for research work, but so general and wide-spread 

 is the interest in this question and so vital in its correct solu- 

 ton and applicaton to so many people that it seems some- 

 where there must be trained men who are giving or have 

 given it careful study. If there are any of these men pres- 

 ent at this meeting it is to them that the writer appeals. 

 Among the factors entering into the correct solution of the 

 question the writer takes the liberty to mention the follow- 

 ing: 



1st — To what extent are we justified in spring netting 

 of coarse fish because of their commercial value to the net 

 fishermen and their food value to our people? Undoubted- 

 ly this phase of the question deserves careful consideration. 

 The writer understands that in a restricted disputed area in 

 the vicinity of Cape Vincent last spring over 60,000 pounds 

 of coarse fish were taken in nets and sold for food. The 

 food value of these fish was doubtless equal or greater 

 than the food value of all the bass taken throughout the year 

 from these same restricted waters. During the spring of 

 1918 when netting of coarse fish was permitted in the St. 

 Lawrence River hundreds of thousands of pounds of coarse 

 fish were taken and sold for food. This being true we can- 

 not ignore the food value of these coarse fish and we seem 

 unable to get them in large numbers except by netting. 

 Netting is most effective in catching them in shallow water 

 in the early spring during their migration to shoal water 

 to spawn. 



2nd — What effect does the removal of these coarse fish 

 have upon mature bass? We know that at least in some 

 measure small suckers, perch, bullheads, etc., serve as food 

 for mature bass and for bass fingerlings. Doubtless the 

 extent to which this is true varies greatly in different waters 

 but Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River seem to be well 



