244 EEPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 



wide, rising in high mountains, flowing with a swift current, and finally 

 ■emerging from its deep-sided canon with great force, where it plunges 

 into the Columbia Eiver. It may not be generally known that a strong, 

 rapid current of cold water is the most effective agent there is for in- 

 ducing breeding salmon to turn from their course up a large river. It 

 3S very much a matter of chance whether they enter a river, even a large 

 one, which is still and deep at its mouth. Such tributaries will cer- 

 tainly not attract the salmon into them from any great distance out in 

 the main river. The Umatilla is a stream of this character ; also the 

 Willamette, and to some extent the Cowlitz. Many of the Columbia 

 Eiver salmon that are pursuing their upward course near the south 

 t)ank of the river will verj'^ likely, when they reach these streams, be 

 "following the shore line, and in that way may be led into these rivers ; 

 l)ut the salmon that are coming up on the other side of the Columbia, 

 or are pursuing a middle course, will keep their course and disregard 

 i:hese streams that make so little impression on the main river. But 

 isuch rivers as the Deschutes, which pour a cold, vigorous, swift-running 

 ■volume of water into the main river, that makes itself felt to the further 

 shore and for many rods below its mouth — such rivers call salmon up 

 t;heir channels by shoals, not only from their own side of the river but 

 a-lso from the opposite shore. These rivers always have a great run of 

 salmon, and the Deschutes on this account would be a favorable stream 

 to operate upon for collecting salmon eggs were it not for one drawback, 

 and tbat a serious one, viz., It is unmanageable, for it is too large and 

 "violent a stream to control. As, I think, I have previously explained, 

 :the mere fact that the conditions for drawing a net in a salmon river 

 are favorable does not by any means make it a favorable place for a 

 large salmon-breeding station. To secure the necessary conditions of 

 success, the river must be of such a character that the salmon can be 

 stopped in some good seining place by erecting a temporary obstruction 

 across the river. This could not be done on the Deschutes except at a 

 'very great expense. About 30 miles up the river, however, at a place 

 ■called the "crossing" of the Deschutes, or sometimes simply Deschutes, 

 there is a high fall which, except at very high water, keeps the salmon 

 from going up any higher. Here the conditions are reversed. If now 

 the river below was quiet enough to allow the successful drawing of the 

 cseine, this would be a good place for a breeding station, but the river 

 liere passes through a high rocky canon with such violence as to ren- 

 der the drawing of a net impracticable. There are some other objec- 

 itions of less importance, but the one mentioned is enough. This point 

 imight, nevertheless, be a favorable one, if the falls themselves and the 

 land around the falls could be secured, but this spot has been taken up 

 l)y a settler who moved there many years ago and who now holds the 

 f)remises at so high a figure as to make it very desirable to find a place 

 somewhere else if possible. 



The next large stream down the Columbia is the Big Sandy, which 

 is a good salmon river, and probably has towards its headwaters some 



