14 Modern Fishculture in Fresh and Salt Water. 



then carp, which I do not look upon with favor.^ All 

 these subjects will be treated at length under their re- 

 spective heads. 



Fishculture— and I always prefer this word to the 

 Latin, pisciculture, as I do the good English word eggs 

 to ova — is a paying investment for the government and 

 for such States as have suitable waters. If New York 

 had not hatched shad in the Hudson each year since 

 1869 there would be few or none there now. The in- 

 crease of population, and above all the facilities for 

 transportation, are so great that the drain on the river 

 would be more than it could stand. North River, 

 another name for the Hudson, shad are now sent to Chi- 

 cago, and beyond, and the number of fishermen has in- 

 creased with the demand for shad. This is why shad 

 do not become cheaper when so many more millions are 

 hatched. They seldom sell for less than $10 per hun- 

 dred at the nets. As proof of the assertion that shad 

 would be nearly extinct in the Hudson but for artificial 

 hatching, I will cite the case of the Connecticut River, 

 once so famous for the number as well as the quality of 

 its shad. Years ago there was an arrangement to share 

 the expense Oi' shad hatching by the States of Massachu- 

 setts and Connecticut, and they turned out many fish. 

 Then the commissioners quarreled ; the men of Mas- 

 sachusetts complained that they did not get their share 

 of the shad, because the pounds at the mouth of the 

 river took the bulk of the fish. The hatching stopped 

 , some twenty years ago, and now the Connecticut fur- 

 nishes very few shad, so few that it does not pay to 

 fish for them above the mouth of the river. There 

 was a similar dispute about the salmon in the Rhine ; 

 Germany hatched them and Holland caught thera, 

 reaping the benefit without any expense. 



