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vessels, which arises from environmental variation. The remaining vessels are 
too weakened economically to range further from port for catch, or to equip 
themselves with modern search and capture gear with which to follow the fish 
when they move out, or down, from their accustomed area. 
There is presently some resurgence in demand being felt from the growing 
market for pet food, but so far it has not had a material effect on landings be- 
cause the fishermen have not been able to supply existing market on a regular 
basis. The vessels left in the mackerel fleet are few, old, and small. They are not 
very effective catching instruments anymore. 
(9) Pacific Herring.—Pacific herring is another fishery that has jnrorialk 
sharply in production in the past 30 years. It reached its peak of production in 
1937 when 263 million pounds were landed (almost all in Alaska). The yield 
from the fishery has declined steadily from that time until in 1967 only 16 mil- 
lion pounds were landed. As with the jack mackerel the reason for the decline 
is economic and not resource connected. Changing taste patterns removed the 
original salt herring market this fishery originated to fill. The fishery was always 
marginal economically in the fish meal business through problems associated 
with high labor costs, transportation costs to market, and cylic variability in 
herring availability near plants. The massive incursion of Peruvian fish meal pro- 
duction into the world market after 1958 finally put an end to the fish meal 
business in Alaska for the time being. 
The major factor, however, has been regulations placed on herring fishing 
for reduction by the salmon trollers who mistakenly believed that the herring 
fishery adversely affected the landings of their fishery, because Chinook and 
Silver salmon eat herring. They also eat any kind of fish available and there 
is no shortage of food available to them aside from herring. Nevertheless state 
regulations in California, Oregon, Washington and Alaska were obtained which 
eradicated the herring reduction fishery. There was not enough strength in the 
reduction industry to fight off these nonsensical State regulations. 
(10) Salmon.—The Pacific salmon fisheries are supported by five different 
species of fish. They have different life histories and biological characteristics. 
They have different texture, taste and appearance characteristics and thus differ- 
ent markets. Chinook and silver salmon take lures readily and are among the most 
famous and favorite of sport fish; chum and sockeye salmon more rarely do 
and are not much the object of sport fishing; pink salmon sometimes take lures 
readily and sometimes do not. The five species are caught in different propor- 
tions by different types of commercial gear. They make long migrations in the 
sea and have been persistent causes of interaction among Russia, Japan, Canada 
and the United States. They migrate up rivers to spawn and create problems 
with power dams, irrigation diversions, and other fresh water uses. Everything 
connected with the Pacific salmon and the fisheries based upon them is complex 
and controversial. 
There are few groups of animals that have been so long the object of detailed 
biological research at such a level of intensity, yet their behavior and population 
dynamics are still so uncertainly known that conservation management is still 
earried out as much by hunch and empiric observation as by scientific deduction. 
There are no other kinds of fish which have been for so long so fully under 
conservation management as these. The conservation management is so tight 
in all aspects of the salmon’s range as to create many economic wastes. Much of 
the regulation is quite frankly for social rather than biological reasons, for there 
is no sort of fish that rouses emotions in the electorate such as these. 
In spite of every sort of maltreatment of the resource that multiple use of 
waters can devise, and every economic abuse that can be thought of to apply ta 
an industry by four state governments, two international commissions, one in- 
terstate commission, the Federal Government and scores of biologists and admin- 
istrators, all five species of salmon persist throughout their entire original 
range, keep up volume of production fairiy well, and alternate with tuna from 
year to year as the second most abundant fish landed by U.S. flag vessels after 
menhaden, and the second most valuable after shrimp. For many years taxes 
on their production formed 80% of the revenues of the Territory and State of 
Alaska, and they are still of crucial importance to that State’s revenue and of 
substantial importance to Washington, Oregon and California. 
Kor many years the primary use of salmon in the United States market was 
for canning, and canned salmon dominated the United States canned fish market 
as well as being an important export item from the standpoint of value. Canned 
salmon has declined in production rather steadily for the last thirty years as 
canned tuna production has increased. In 1953 canned tuna overtook canned. 
