A Nitw SPORT For old sportsmen 



OP-p.N MARSHES ON A SINGLE AFTERNOON fSEE PAGES 450-454 



Phnto by George Shiras, 3rd 



\ I'.OAT LOAD OE ANTLERS GATHERED ON THE 



harbor, and here they collect by hundreds 

 before making another effort to ascend 

 the stream, only to be carriefl further 

 down each time, until the death par- 

 oxysm seizes each, when, after a few 

 mad dashes with the head out of water 

 gasping for air, they die with surprising 

 suddenness. 



The salmon most abundant in the in- 

 terior streams of northwestern Alaska 

 is the sockeye, or red salmon. 



Investigations by the Bureau of Fish- 

 eries have shown that "this species is pe- 

 culiar in that it rarely or never ascends 

 a stream that has not one or UKire lakes 

 at its headwaters, and the s])awning 

 grounds are usually in small streams 

 tributary to such lakes or rarely in the 

 lakes themselves." The average weight 

 is about seven pounds, var)'ing accord- 

 ing to sex or condition. A\diile dead, 

 king" salmon were occasionallv seen float- 

 ing down the Kenai River, s( ime of 

 which must have weighed Go pounds, 

 the kind coming under the writer's par- 

 ticular observation, were the red salmon, 

 the most graceful and active of the Axcst- 

 ern salmon. 



When these fish first come from the sea 

 the)' are plump and vigorous and their 

 silvery forms often gleam high alio\-e 



the surface of the waters in the slow 

 ad-^'ance to the spawning ground. Orad- 

 ually the colors change to a light pink 

 and then by degrees to a deep, blood red, 

 s])lotclied with yellow, when they resem- 

 ble gigantic gold fish. At a later period 

 the body becomes gaunt, the head nar- 

 row and dark green, exhibiting gleam- 

 ing rows of shark-like teeth, and then 

 this once beautiful salmon of the high 

 seas becomes rejjtilian in form and dis- 

 position. 



It «'as in the quiet, shallow ])ools 

 of the inside channels of the upper Ke- 

 nai River, between long islands and the 

 shore, where the milky gdacial silt was 

 precipitated to the bottom and the waters 

 became clarified that the \\-riter was able 

 to observe and study for a number of 

 days the action of the imprisoned fish. 



( )ne hardly realizes in tra\'cling on or 

 along a glacial stream how beclouded 

 are such waters. ,\t the junctiiMi of the 

 Kenai and Russian rivers this becomes 

 strikingly apparent, where the latter, fed 

 by the springs from the lo\\'er hills, is 

 unusually clear, even though hundreds 

 of dead salmon covered its bottom when 

 we saw it. The photograph on page 470 

 gives a fairly good idea of this contrast. 

 Between August 29 and September 3 



461 



