158 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 
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consequence elsewhere, has not taken a more prominent place among 
the industries of San Francisco. 
Salmon canning . — In 1888 only two fish-canning establishments were 
in operation in San Francisco. These were devoted to salmon-canning, 
but not exclusively, for considerable attention was paid to the preser- 
vation of fruit. The salmon utilized were mostly received from Hum- 
boldt County, although considerable quantities taken at the mouths of 
the rivers on the eastern side of San Francisco Bay were also used. 
The business was prosecuted with the most vigor when there was a 
surplus of fresh salmon in the San Francisco market and prices were 
low. In 1888 there were 453,700 pounds of salmon consumed in the 
preparation of 6,875 cases of canned fish. The fresh fish were valued 
at $22,685, and the resulting canned goods were worth, at the average 
price, $41,250, leaving $18,565 as the gross profits of the business. It 
seems probable that the salmon-canning industry of San Francisco is 
now almost as extensive as is warranted, taking into consideration the 
distance of the principal fishing grounds, the city’s great demand for 
fresh salmon, and the enormous pack on other portions of the coast 
where better facilities exist. So far as other fish are concerned, how- 
ever, San Francisco is seemingly the most available point in many 
respects, and there is reason to believe that it might maintain numer- 
ous factories for the utilization of the abundant supply of herrings, 
sardines, anchovies, and many other species found in the waters of the 
bay and the adjacent ocean. 
Sardine canning . — An attempt has recently been made to establish at 
San Francisco a sardine-canning industry, but the business had not 
developed to important proportions in 1888-89, though a cannery had 
been started under competent management and some goods had been 
packed. As has been stated, the sardine of the Pacific is so much like 
the European sardine or pilchard (G, pilchardus) that it would be diffi- 
cult for any one but an expert to tell one from the other, except, per- 
haps, by the difference in size, the western species being much the larger. 
Indeed, the chief obstacle to the profitable canning of the sardine at 
San Francisco is its size. It is well known that only the young or half- * 
grown pilchards are used in Europe for the preparation of sardines. 
Fish of this size have been considered more delicate and better adapted 
to canning in oil than larger ones, and the trade has come to recognize 
this to the extent, at least, that it demands sardines of the standard 
size, or a close approximation thereto. Wilcox thinks that young sar- 
dines of suitable size for canning can be obtained for nearly half of the 
year, as the species migrates from point to point, being south in winter 
and moving north in spring and summer. This is a matter of great 
consequence, for the excellent quality of the Pacific sardine will un- 
doubtedly bring it into high favor. 
The anchovy, which is much smaller than the sardine and a most 
excellent food species, is a good substitute for canning purposes, and 
