12G REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



Professor Baird. That element need not be taken into account at alL 



Mr. Eeed. We have had scup away np to the mouth of the Karra- 

 gansett River. It is a very lilthy river, too, because there are so many 

 manufacturing establishments, and among others that of hair-cloth, the 

 clippings of wliich are thro\Yn into the water. There are large manu- 

 facturing towns all the way up, and every kind of refuse is thrown into 

 the water. All the manufactories make their own gas, and they saw 

 wood, and so it is with all the branches of the river. But scup have 

 been caught right at the mouth of the Forestdale Eiver, where they have 

 thrown in tar. 



Professor Baird. The sea pollution cannot enter into the question, 

 except merely locally. The only thing that is injurious in this refuse is 

 the carbolic acid and tar, and this is so small in amount as to have 

 little influence. In fresh water it is a dift'erent thing, but in the salt 

 w^ater I do not think it need be considered. 



Mr. Eeed. The print-works empty everything into a narrow passage 

 twelve feet wide, that is about one-sixteenth of a mile from wdiere the 

 tide comes in. I have seen little fish, two inches long, feeding right at 

 the mouth of the river. And 1 liave dug clams there so dyed that they 

 looked red in consequence of the madder thrown down there. Prior to 

 the building of the print-works, I have been told, there w^ere no oysters 

 up there, but the year after it was started there was an unusual number 

 of oysters set in that little bay. 



Professor Baird. I have come lately to the conclusion that the 

 prime cause of the variation in the supply of food-fishes on this coast 

 is to be found in the blue-fish 5 but then I am also satisfied that the 

 trapping and pounding, coming at the heels of the mischief done by 

 the blue-fish, have intensified the evil ; and that, if we mean to restore 

 the fish, we must regulate one or the other. I tliink that if the fish 

 have a chance to reach their spawning-ground tbey w^ll multiply fast 

 enough for both hooks and lines and traps. We must exterminate 

 the blue-fish or regulate the trapping, or the evil will increase. I 

 can see very positively the relationship of the shore-fishing to the estab- 

 lishment of the trap. 



Mr. Eeed. I was told by a gentleman of Providence that he was pres- 

 ent the very day the traps were set this spring, at a certain place, and 

 he said they w^ere filled within fifteen minutes with scup and other fish. 

 He said the season was a fortnight ahead of them. The effect has been 

 that young scup have been cauglit this year ravay up tlie Seekonk 

 Eiver, so plenty that you could scarcel}^ throw in the hook without 

 catcliiug one. 



They have not been so plenty as this for a long time. They are 

 spawned in shallow water, in the inlets and bays. I do not believe 

 any scup would deposit spawn outside as far as off Point Judith. I 

 doubt whether fish an inch long would be found accompanying the 

 schools of big fish. 



Mr. PowEL. I saw some this spring ranging from two to four or five 

 inches in length, and I took some up to Professor Blake ; I think it 

 was the il5th of April. They were caught in a trap below iS'ewport. 



Professor Baird. I think the scup might have spawned oft' the Caro- 

 linas in March, and some of these might come along u]) with the 

 older scup. lUit my impression is, that the largest part of what are now 

 called " dollar scup," are this year's brood. 



In the middle of August it took five of the last year's scup to weigh 

 a pound, and now four will weigh a pound. They will come back next 

 year weighing about a pound each. 



