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season’s run, and which do not ascend to the headwaters of the 
main streams, but which spawn in the lower reaches nearer the sea, 
do not become nearly so highly coloured at the spawning period, 
many of the females not showing much, if any, red. The flesh of 
the sockeye is of a deep and unfailing red. They enter the Fraser 
River as early as April. They are not taken until July ist. The 
main run in the Fraser is looked for toward the latter part of July. 
The run is at its height during the first ten days of August. 
“The sockeye run in all our Mainland rivers, and in some of 
the rivers of the west coast of Vancouver Island, and in the 
Nimkish River, near the head of the east coast of that Island. In 
the rivers of the north-west Mainland coast they run a month earlier 
than in the Fraser. 
“The abundance of sockeye in the Fraser varies greatly with 
given years; there are years known as ‘the big years’ and as * the 
poor years.’ Their movement appears to be greatest every fourth 
year, and the run is the poorest in the year immediately following. 
The causes which may have led up to this most remarkable feature 
have given rise to much speculation, and many theories have been 
advanced to account for them, but none are sufficiently satisfactory 
to be generally accepted. This periodicity in the run of sockeye, 
which is so pronounced in the Fraser, has no marked counterpart 
in any other river in the Province or on the Coast. 
“The spawning period of the sockeye extends from August, 
in the headwaters, to as late as October and November in the 
waters nearest the sea. They usually spawn in lake-fed or in lake- 
feeding streams, the first of their run seeking the extreme head- 
waters. Very little is known of the life of the young or the length 
of time they live in fresh waters before seeking salt water. Nothing 
is known of their feeding grounds in salt water, as they are never 
found in the bays and inlets which distinguish our coast, and where 
the spring and coho are so common. It is thought that their feeding 
ground must be in the open sea. There is a smaller specimen of 
the sockeye found in many of our interior waters that appears to be 
a permanently small form, which is known to writers as ‘ The Little 
Red Fish,’ ‘ Kennerly’s Salmon,’ or ‘The Evermann form of the 
Sockeye,’ and which in some lakes of the Province can be shown 
not to be anadromous. This form of the sockeye is often mistaken 
by observers as a trout. It has no commercial value, and does not 
‘take a fly’ or any other device commonly used by anglers for 
taking trout. The Indians of Seton and Anderson Lakes cure great 
numbers of these small salmon by smoking them. They give them 
the name of ‘ Oneesh.’ 
