XXIV EEPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



These may consist, as already stated, of chemical substances, which 

 exert a directly poisonous influence, or of mechanical objects, such as 

 sawdust, which, it is said, gets into the gills of fishes, and ultimately 

 causes their death, or, falling to the bottom, with edgings, bark, &c, 

 covers up the gravel and destroys the natural spawning-beds, and 

 thus prevents the development of the eggs. 



These causes, however, apply essentially to rivers, and their injuri- 

 ous action in such cases has frequently been substantiated, and has in- 

 voked, in many instances, legislative interference. They exercise very 

 little influence, however, in regard to the fishes of the sea. The testi- 

 mony before the Ehode Island legislature would tend to show that, in 

 the immediate vicinity of factories on the Narragansett Bay and its 

 tributaries, many of the smaller varieties of fish were as abundant as 

 ever, and that, even in the vicinity of gas-works, the discharge from 

 which, as containing creosote and other substances, might be expected 

 to produce a very injurious effect, the only result was the imparting of 

 an unpleasant, tar-like taste to oysters and other mollusks that oc- 

 curred in the neighborhood. It is by no means impossible that some 

 fish might be driven away from the vicinity of the discharge of such 

 an establishment; but that any marked effect could be produced on a 

 large scale is not to be admitted. 



Whatever the condition of things may be in Xarragansett Bay, we 

 know that none of the agencies alluded to exist, to any considerable 

 extent, along other portions of the New England coast, where the fact 

 of a similar scarcity of fish has been equally established. 



We come, therefore, to the question of improper or excessive fishing. 

 The capture of the sea-fishes by man is usually prosecuted either by the 

 hook and line or by means of nets or weirs. Nets for the capture of fish 

 may be divided into those which are movable and those which are fixed. 

 Among the movable we may mention the seine, which incloses the fish 

 in bodies, and either hauls them to the shore or gathers them in the 

 open water, and the gill-net, in which the heads of the swimming fish 

 pass partly through the meshes of the net, by which, in their effort to 

 withdraw, they are held securely. These gill-nets may be either fixed 

 or floating; if the latter, they are called " drifting nets." 



The apparatus for capture by fixed nets have various names and modes 

 of operation, as " traps," "pounds," "weirs," "fykes," &c. The trap is 

 an apparatus peculiar to the Narragansett Bay, and consists of an 

 oblong inclosure of netting on three sides and at the bottom, anchored 

 securely by the side of a channel. Into this the fish enter, and the bot- 

 tom of the net being lifted to the surface at the open end, the fish are 

 penned in and driven into a lateral inclosure, where they are kept until 

 needed. A net of this character requires constant attention, as the fish,, 

 after making the circuit of the trap, can readily pass out, unless pre- 

 vented. On page 10, in Mr. Southwick's testimony, will be found a 



