PROPAGATION OF FISH. 253 



can give them is not natural to them, it is often given in 

 such coarse pieces that they cannot take it, and sometimes, 

 through the carelessness of a hired hand, they are neg- 

 lected two or three days at a time. 



Young salmon, young salmon trout, California moun- 

 tain trout, and above all young California salmon are 

 larger, have stronger appetites, and vsdll accept coarser 

 food. For them, although at first the liver should he 

 made as fine as for trout, when they are a few weeks old 

 it will be hardly necessary to dilute it at all, and in the 

 Course of a few months they will not only take the larger 

 pieces, often tearing them apart, but will scorn the finer 

 portion. At one time sour milk was almost exclusively 

 used for feeding young fish, but it has been given up. 

 Other foods have been tried, but with no better success. 

 The fish will not thrive on any of them as well as they 

 do on liver, and do not thrive on that as well as if it were 

 a natural food. Near the salt water, where soft clams 

 can be obtained, they are used in place of liver. 



As they grow older, other things may be substituted 

 or may be added to it as a change. They are fond of the 

 roe of other fish, of the spawn of the horse-foot or king- 

 crab ; of fish itself, and when they are large enough to 

 eat minnows, no better food can be given them. Liver is 

 too expensive when it has to be used alone for grown fish, 

 and beef lights are usually added to it or used in place of 

 it in a measure. It is miserable food, however, much of 

 it passing through the stomachs of the trout and salmon 

 wholly undigested and collecting in the bottom of the 

 ponds. It injures the digestive organs and must be del- 

 eterious to the health of the fish. Its only recommenda- 

 tion is that it is cheap. Maggots are bred on spoilt meat. 



