COMMERCIAL FISHERIES OF THE HAWAIIAN ISLANDS. 747 



means of hand dip nets. In the sea ponds the gate is opened when the tide is coming- 

 in and closed when it turns. 



There is usually a small runway, built of two parallel rows of loosely piled stones, 

 from the gate to about 10 feet into the pond. As the fish congregate in this runway 

 when the tide is going out, it is very easy to dip out the supply needed for market. 

 Seines and gill nets are also used in taking fish from the ponds, a method which is 

 easy, owing to the shallowness of the ponds. 



The sea ponds usually contain only the ama-ama, or mullet, and the awa. In the 

 fi'esh and the brackish water ponds gold fish, china-tish, oopu, opae, carp, aholehole, 

 and okuhekuhe are kept. Fractically no attempt at fish-culture is made with these 

 ponds. Besides the tish which come in through the open gates at certain seasons of 

 the year, the owner usually has men engaged in catching young amaama and awa in 

 the open sea and bays, and transporting them alive to these enclosures, where they are 

 kept until they attain a marketable size, and longer, frequently, if the prices quoted 

 in the market aie not satisfactory. It costs almost nothing to keep them, as they 

 find their own food in the sea ponds. It is supposed that they eat a fine moss which 

 is quite common there. 



There are probably not more than one-half the number of ponds in use to-da}'^ 

 that there were thirty years ago. There are numerous reasons for this, the principal 

 ones being the following: 



1 . The native population is rapidly disappearing, and where there were prosperous 

 and populous villages in the early years of the last centurv there is practically a wil- 

 derness now. Owing to this depopulation, there is no sale for fish in the immediate 

 neighborhood of the ponds, the only market possible, owing to the difficulty in trans- 

 porting any distance without the use of ice. The ponds have thus naturallj^ been 

 allowed to go to decay, the walls breaking down from the action of storms, and the 

 sea filling them with sand if they are located on the immediate shore. This condition 

 of affairs is especially prevalent on Molokai. 



2. Two of the important crops of the islands are rice and taro. As both must be 

 gi'own in a few inches of water, and are very profitable crops, a number of the interior 

 ponds were turned into rice fields and taro patches. Oahu has shown the greatest 

 changes in this respect. 



3. On tlawaii ponds were filled up by the volcanic lava fiows of l.sol and 1859. 

 The Kameharaeha fish pond, which was filled up in this manner in 1S59, was said to 

 have been the largest on the islands. Only traces of it are now to be found on the 

 beach. 



4. At Hilo, on Hawaii, some ponds, mostly quite small, are so filled with the 

 water hyacinth that it is no longer possible to use them for fish. This year a few of 

 the best of these were cleaned out, but as there is very little profit to be made from 

 them, and their ownership is in dispute, there is but little desire to do much to build 

 them up. 



5. Other ponds have been filled up to make way for building operations and for 

 other purposes. This is especiall}- true of ponds in and ai-ound Honolulu and 

 Lahaina. There used to be a number of fish ponds on Lanai, but they have all been 

 allowed to fall into decay. 



