PROTECTION AS AN AID TO PROPAGATION. 
BY SAMUEL F. FULLERTON, ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA. 
Mr. President and gentlemen of the American Fisheries 
Society: The subject that I am asked to write a paper on— 
“Protection” —is so closely allied with “Propagation” that it is a 
very difficult matter to separate the one from the other; alone 
either is worthless. Protection is just as essential as propagation 
if we would reap the benefits from the money and labor expended 
in the propagation of our fish. 
T need not relate what every thinking man knows to be a fact 
and that is our fish are disappearing from the Great Lakes. 
Every housewife is reminded of that fact when she calls up the 
fish dealer, by the price—that great barometer of supply and 
demand. 
Now, when the American people are confronted with a prob- 
lem they naturally ask what is the cause. Are not the waters 
in the Great Lakes just as pure as they were thirty years ago? 
No known disease has destroyed these fish. The government has 
been most liberal and year after year has supplied these waters 
with millions of fry. Have the States bordering on the Great 
Lakes, whose duty it is to look after the fish and protect them, 
done their duty? There is only one answer, an emphatic “No”. 
They have not appreciated the necessity of taking care of that 
which was intrusted to their keeping for the benefit of all the 
people. 
Efforts from time to time have been made to get the States 
interested. I have attended three meetings in Chicago, myself, 
called for the purpose of arousing the States.to action. Reso- 
lutions were passed and speeches made but the matter ended 
when the meetings adjourned. There is only one solution— 
FEDERAL CONTROL. 
Now, I do not want to say one word that would in any way 
detract from the splendid work done by the United States Fish 
Commission and the different State Fish Hatcheries and the 
men in charge of same, but I do claim that we do not get the 
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