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Now, with reference to the Michigan Fish Commission: we feel as though we 
had done a very good work in whitefish hatching. I was looking over reports com- 
ing down here; | found in the summary of fish planted in the last ten years, it 
amounts to more than five hundred million whitefish. That is a very large show- 
ing, but when you consider that more than half of it has been done within four 
or five years, you will see that we have not yet come where we can feel the full 
effect on the great lakes. In the same time we have planted nearly a hundred 
million of the wall-eyed pike. We have within the last two years doubled the 
capacity of our Detroit Fish Hatchery. We have now 1,950 jars. When those jars 
are filled we can distribute 160,000,000 of whitefish. We have this last year se- 
- cured an appropriation of the legislature to establish a hatchery in the upper penin- 
_ sula, and we have a hatchery there, all ready to do its work this fall with 300 jars. 
That increases our capacity nearly a third, so that if the ova can be obtained to fiil 
our hatcheries, we are able to plant nearly two hundred million whitefish a year 
in our lakes. Do you know it takes to fill our thousand and fifty jars, a hundred 
bushels of whitefish eggs? From the same jars, and in the same hatchery, and 
with the same force of men with which the whitefish are hatched and planted, we 
_ hatch all the wall-eyed pike we can get after the whitefish have gone out. We 
__ have been able to hatch but part of our house full. We can impregnate of the 
_ whitefish between ninety and ninety-five per cent. of the eggs taken, and we will 
hatch those eggs with a loss of from ten to twelve or perhaps fifteen per cent., still 
of the wall-eyed pike our loss is forty per cent perhaps ; and with a view of discov- 
ering the source of that loss and remedying it, if possible, we have spent a consid- 
erable sum of money in the employment of a scientist and microscopist to attend 
_ the men in their work to discover what there is about the wall-eyed pike egg that 
makes it so difficult toimpregnateand hatch in comparison with the whitefish. 
_ Those of you who have seen our report for last year have seen something of the 
_ work of that scientist, because in the appendix there is quite a long article des- 
_ eribing the development of the wall-eyed pike, and of course in addition to that 
he has given us many additional practical suggestions with reference to the best 
_ way to handle the eggs. 
Gentlemen, when you realize that the State of Michigan, (only one of the 
_ several bordering States I grant you, but the one in the Union most of 
all interested in the great lakes because she is surrounded by a coast on all sides, 
having upwards of two thousand miles of coast) ; when you realize that that 
amount of work can be done by the State of Michigan to-day, with her plant in 
the shape it is, you will recognize why the people of the State of Michigan are loath 
_ and reluctant to have any part of that work given up to anybody else. We invite 
the co-operation of anybody ; there is no question but that there is a field there for 
everybody. There is a field in these great lakes for all the money that can be 
gotten from the public for the hatching of fish for these great lakes. Why, we 
have only commenced the work! There is no room in our own government for 
any jealousy or wish to supplant anybody else, every State that has a coast border- 
ing upon these lakes ought to be interested enough to expend money enough to 
provide for the hatching of these fish. It can be done now at small expense ; it 
is not a matter of large outlay that requires the central government to take hold 
of it. 
I don’t know but I have trespassed longer, at least than I expected to, but I 
_ desire to be heard further on that general subject before the meeting shall close, 
_ and with these remarks I will leave the question. 
CHAIRMAN : Discussion is open to any gentlemen who wish to be heard. 
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