THE PACIFIC COAST SALMON 



taking a spoon, is, that it is in obedience to the eating habit, or 

 that they are annoyed. 



"When the quinnats reach the spawning grounds at the head 

 of the river they are badly injured, cut and worn. They pair and 

 the male forms a smooth place or nest in a gravelly spot where the 

 eggs are deposited. This accomplished, the tragedy ends by 

 both fishes, weak and emaciated, drifting slowly downstream, 

 tail first, and sooner or later dying. The eggs hatch in about 

 sixty days, and the young remain in the vicinity until the spring 

 freshets when they, doubtless, go down to the sea, remaining 

 there until the fourth year when they re-enter the nearest river 

 as adults, where, if smaU, they are known as grilse. 



The range of salmon up and down the coast is interesting. 

 The king salmon, or chinook, ranges south to the San Buena- 

 ventura Eiver on the borders of Los Angeles county, or in lati- 

 tude thirty-two degrees. Dr. Jordan has observed aU the species 

 in the Columbia and Fraser Elvers, ' all but the blueback in the 

 Sacramento and aU the waters tributary to Puget Sound.' 



There is a great difference in the appearance of the salmon at 

 times. In the early spring aU are silvery, and the big chinook, 

 or king salmon, I have taken at Monterey were beautiful objects 

 resembling molten silver. As the spawning season approaches 

 they lose the silvery hue, and the flesh, a salmon-red, becomes 

 paler. But, like rainbow trout, some may be red, and some 

 white, without apparent reason, although anglers and habitants 

 have many ingenious explanations — ^food, temperature, and 

 others. As the season advances the male changes ; the tip of 

 the lower jaw is prolonged, both jaws become strangely hooked, 

 and there are often extraordinary changes. The blueback 

 turns red ; the head green. The dog salmon assumes a dark-red 

 tint, with black bars, while the quinnat takes on a dark or black 

 hue. In the spring when they enter the streams they are silvery, 

 in the late fall they appear distorted and|weird caricatures of 

 their former selves. 



The value of the salmon fisheries per annum in Alaska 



