22 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



and get from a few barrels to five hundred, and when the tide is over 

 we wait 5 we fish only when the tide is running in ; we do not expect to 

 get as many on the ebb-tide as on the flood, except in some places. At 

 Gooseberry Ishmd we fish on the ebb-tide. At Sachuest Point we have 

 fished two seasons, and I have fished at Point Judith on the flood-tide. 

 There is a westward tendency there at the ebb-tide. On the strong ebb, 

 these fish coming across the Sound strike through there. At Goose- 

 berry Island I wanted a flood-tide, and that brings an eddy inside, making 

 a bay for a mile or a mile and a half. 



On Saughkonet Eiver there is not much tide, only when it blows fresh 

 to the north or south. Tliere are two bridges there, and we always 

 thought we did best at them on flood-tide. We never set any nets on 

 the west side. When I went there in 1857, there were eleven trai)s ; 

 next year, fifteen ; and the next, seventeen. The traps were first started 

 in 184G, by Ben. Tallman. He invented the trap. 



Question. What do you think about the general question of traps ; do 

 they aft'ect the quantity of fish or not *? 



Answer. Yes, sir; I think, if they were stopped, the fish would be 

 much more plenty. 



I will give my reasons why I have answered '^ yes.'^ I do not mean 

 to say that traps should not be used on our coast. I do not mean to say 

 they should be abolished, but I do mean to say that, in the way they 

 are handled, and used, and allowed to be set anywhere, without regard 

 to water, place, »&c., they are an injury to the fisheries, and are what is 

 killing ofl* and curtailing the luxuries that the Creator has furnished, 

 and intended should be enjoyed. My ideas are derived from nine years' 

 experience in trapping and seining, and I have heard the other fisher- 

 men say the same thing. I am a fisherman, and expect to fish as long 

 as I do anything. 



In the first place, our bays are large in proportion to the size of our 

 State, and the school-fish have not a place where they can go and stop 

 wagging their tails long enough to lay their spawn, while the oysters 

 are protected. Here is a trap and there is a purse-net, so that from the 

 time they come in until they go out somebody is after them. 



And, what is worse than all, our own State's people cannot get them 

 at all. They will bring them in and sell them to carry away for a 

 quarter of a cent a pound, in the month of May : and now to day you 

 cannot buy them for ten cents a pound. Why ^ Because they have 

 been taken here for twenty years, before the spawning-time, and sent 

 out of existence for nothing. If you kill a bird before it lays its eggs, 

 where is your increase? And so, if you kill your sheep, where is your 

 stock ■? Can we raise anything if we don't try to keep our breeding- 

 stock good? Is it expected that we can have fish if we will put them 

 on the land for manure at a quarter of a cent a pound ? And now you 

 cannot buy them for ten cents a i)ound. Confute it if you can. 



When I could go out here and catch from three to five hundred-weight 

 of black-fish in a day, I have been told not to deliver them, and when I 

 brought them in, to cover them u\) with scup, and then carry them away 

 and throw them in the river after dark, and not sell them in Xew])()rt. 

 Why? So that the inhabitants would not know where Ihey came from. 

 I have done it. They are selling fish from oft' Point Judith, and sending 

 them to New Yorlv. 



But they have thrown striped bass into the dung-heap, because they 

 could not get ten cents a ])ound ; deacons of chui'ches did that. Now 

 you cannot get them at all. 1 used to get enough Saturday afternoon 

 to last my family a week ; go now, and you don't get a nibble. Give us 



