THE OREGON SPORTSMAN 167 



The PROTECTION AND PROPAGATION of GAME 

 AND ITS RELATION to TRANSPORTATION. 



(From an address of State Game Warden Shoemaker, given at a recent meeting 



of the Transportation Club.) 



The commercial fishing industry of this state is so important that 

 were it to be wiped out entirely over night it would directly effect the 

 means of livelihood of about 8000 of our citizens and indirectly would 

 cripple the incomes of many hundreds more, while thousands of dollars 

 worth of nets, wheels, geer, boats and machinery would become idle 

 and useless. Since authentic records have been kept the salmon in- 

 dustry on the Columbia river has produced over $100,000,000, or ap- 

 proximately $25.00 per acre per year for every surface acre on our 

 majestic river. Yet up to two years ago the industry was losing 

 ground. The pack was falling off from year to year and it was freely 

 predicted that the industry would within a short time become unprofit- 

 able and discontinued. 



The 1913 pack somewhere approached 400,000 cases. 1914 came 

 and went with the largest pack in the history of the industry when 

 about 650,000 cases were put up. This year when the fall pack has 

 been completed it is estimated that something over 750,000 cases will 

 have been packed and made ready for the market, the value of which 

 is said to be over $4,000,000. Men in a position to speak with authority 

 say that within three or four years these figures will be doubled. 



What then has caused this immense increase in the pack each year 

 for the past few years? Surely we cannot attribute it to the natural 

 increase of the fish — for until two years ago the catch was annually 

 falling off. The increase is due to one cause only and that cause is 

 the development of modern hatchery methods. Five years ago the state 

 of Oregon adopted, in spite of many doubts expressed as to its wisdom, 

 the system of feeding salmon fry in retaining ponds. Prior to that 

 time spasmodic efforts had been made along this line but it was not 

 followed up each year in order to determine its value. Fishermen 

 themselves shook their heads and would give little, if any, encourage- 

 ment to the idea. In the fall of 1910 the Fish and Game department of 

 the state determined to give the plan a fair and square trial. Under the 

 direction of Hatchery Superintendent Clanton the work was com- 

 menced. It takes four years to obtain results in this work, and in 1914, 

 the first year in which results could be expected, the industry had the 

 largest pack from a financial standpoint in its history. Still there were 

 some who doubted the work of the hatchery department and expressed 

 the idea that the run last year was unusual but liable to happen any 

 time. But when the figures for the 1915 pack began to roll in with an 

 increase of 15 to 18 per cent over those of 1914, the most skeptical 

 literally "sat up and took notice" and are now among the strongest in 

 their praise of modern hatchery methods. 



This season there have been liberated in the commercial streams of 

 the Columbia River district about 17,000,000 Chinook salmon fry by the 

 Fish and Game Commission. At the Bonneville hatchery the state has 

 on hand about 3,000,000 sockeyes which will soon be liberated. None 

 of the commercial fish are liberated till they are from four to six 

 months old and from four to five inches in length. By retaining them 

 in the feeding ponds until they have attained this age and size they 

 are more able to withstand the rigors of the streams into which they 

 are liberated and are better able to protect themselves from the cannibal 

 fish which infest all our waters. 



