58 SCIENCE SKETCHES. 
the dog salmon is practically almost worthless, ex- 
cept to the Indians, and the humpback salmon 
is little better. The silver salmon, with the same 
breeding habits as the dog salmon, is more valu- 
able, as it is found in the inland waters of Puget 
Sound for a considerable time before the fall rains 
cause the fall runs, and it may be taken in large 
numbers with seines before the season for entering 
the rivers. The quinnat salmon, from its great size 
and abundance, is more valuable than all the other 
fishes on our Pacific coast taken together. The blue- 
back, similar in flesh, but much smaller and less 
abundant, is worth much more than the combined 
value of the three remaining species of salmon. 
The fall salmon of all species, but especially of 
the dog salmon, ascend streams but a short dis- 
tance before spawning. They seem to be in great 
anxiety to find fresh water, and many of them 
work their way up little brooks only a few inches 
deep, where they perish miserably, floundering 
about on the stones. Every stream, of whatever 
kind, has more or less of these fall salmon. 
It is the prevailing impression that the salmon 
have some special instinct which leads them to 
return to spawn in the same spawning grounds 
where they were originally hatched. We fail to 
find any evidence of this in the case of the Pacific 
coast salmon, and we do not believe it to be true. 
It seems more probable that the young salmon 
hatched in any river mostly remain in the ocean 
within a radius of twenty, thirty, or forty miles of 
its mouth. These, in their movements about in 
the ocean, may come into contact with the cold 
