120 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[Feb. 10, 1894. 



off pecuniarily, and then we would have more food fish left in 

 the waters. 



Me. C. IT. ChamberlAyne, of Massachusetts, spoke as fol- 

 lows: 



There are certain things, gentlemen, that we cannot ex- 

 pect here. One is uniformity of opinion. We cannot expect 

 that the pound-fishermen will be in favor of restriction; that, 

 the menhaden oil and guano men will desire to have a limi- 

 tation placed upon thin r business. Neither shall we expect 

 them to agree to the proposals of the friends of fish preser 

 vation for the regulation of dangerous devices like traps and 

 pounds. Such differences of opinion are absolutely essential 

 and will never probably be removed until human nature 

 shall radically change and the selfish interests of individuals 

 will yield to their public idea of justice and equal rights. If 

 we have such uniformity in mind, we are destined to disap- 

 pointment. 



A meeting of this kind, however, may well he utilized for 

 the collection of facts, and especially for the collection of 

 observations extended over a certain area of sea bottom for a 

 considerable length of time and under definite and observed 

 conditions. Such an experiment has been made in the waters 

 of Buzzards Bay, and in the few moments to which our 

 regulations very 'properly limit us I would like to state the 

 experiment which has taken place and certain of its results 

 in the hope it may possibly throw some light upon the value 

 and operation of these restrictions of netting and what geu- 

 eral benefits flow from restriction when enforced in certain 

 specified ways and under certain specified conditions. 



The conditions are these: Buzzards Bay is about twenty 

 miles in length, running from northeast to southwest. It is 

 about six miles wide in its widest part. It at no place shows 

 a greater depth than twelve fathoms of water and shoals 

 rapidly from the center to the headwaters and to either 

 shore, being over the average area of sea bottom, about six 

 fathoms in depth. It is entirely land-locked and free from 

 strong currents. 



The temperature of this body of water, under the influence 

 of the Gulf Stream, is between 6° and 8° warmer at the head 

 than at the foot of the bay, and the headwaters are from 8° 

 to 10° warmer than the adjoining waters of Vineyard Sound. 

 In connection with its eel grass bottom and its inflowing 

 streams and creeks, rich in fish food, it is admirably adapted 

 for the purposes of a spawniug ground, and is as a matter of 

 fact filled with myriads of young fry in the spawning season. 

 There are twenty-six varieties of spawning fish and fry, six- 

 teen of which are edible, found in the bay and presented, 

 preserved in alcohol, to our legislative hearings. Among t he 

 young fry are bluefish, weakfish, menhaden, scup, striped 

 bass, etc. 



This evidence, introduced at our legislative hearings by our 

 fishermen, is confirmed by the observations of the Woods" Holl 

 agent of the United States Fish Commissioner, who has 

 established the fact that the young fry, including menhaden 

 and the other varieties mentioned, have been taken by him at 

 all parts of the bay for a series of years, by the aid of bolting 

 cloth nets, so young as not to have shed or absorbed the little 

 sacks or bags attending their earliest infancy. 



In 1856, certain of our public-spirited citizens determined to 

 try the experiment of protecting these waters from the use of 

 nets and seines. They got an act, forbidding the use of 

 these devices in certain towns In 1870, this legislation was 

 made more protective by drawing an absolute line across the 

 headwaters of the B ty so as to include Bourne, Wareham, 

 Marion and part of Falmouth. Within this protected zone, 

 no moeable devices, gill nets, seines or fixed devices like 

 pounds, traps, etc., wee permitted at any time of the year. 



In 1874 that line was extended further down the bay, so as 

 to include part of Mattapoisett, and in 1SS6 the entire bay, 

 20 miles by 6, was freed from the use of nets and other mov- 

 able machines. Pounds were allowed below the line estab- 

 lished by the law of 1S7-1, under licenses issued by the 

 selectmen of_ towns. But the towns themselves voted to 

 stop it at their "annual election" or "town meetings," as 

 they are called. These meetings occur in March or April of 

 each year at a time when no summer visitors appear. Every 

 one is present of the citizens. It is absolute democracy. 

 Yet the result of these town meetings has been such as to 

 prevent the setting of pounds by the simple device of electing 

 town officers pledged against it. Such for three years has 

 been the annual course of Falmouth, Fairhaveu and Matta- 

 poisett by large and always increasing majorities of the 

 native populations. This coutinued until 1893, after which a 

 law was p.-.ssed at the request of these towns themselves 

 absolutely removing any pound, weir, trap, etc., from the 

 waters of Buzzards Bay. The experiment of 1856 was con- 

 cluded in 1893. Certain facts obtrude from this hasty sketch. 

 In the first place, it is not, in any candor, po.-sible to claim 

 that these fisheries are preserved for the benefit of a leisurely 

 class or as a matter of sport._ In the next place, I think it 

 significant that every extension of this legislative protection 

 of the fisheries of ' Buzzards Bay has been made at the 

 request of interested communities, who demanded it, to 

 whom it had not then as yet been extended, and that no 

 community which has ever enjoyed the benefit of that restric- 

 tion has ever petitioned for its removal. Iu other words, the 

 results of intelligent preservation are popular. Instead of 

 sport we are preserving these fish for food and livelihood. 



The experiment, gentlemen, of Fairhaven, one of these 

 towns, is so thoroughly characteristic and representative as 

 to be worth repeating. In 1889 the operation of the indis- 

 criminate use of uets and pounds in the waters of Fairhaven 

 had been such that the goose of the golden eggs was dead. 

 There were no more fish for any one to catch, and thenetters 

 themselves agreed that the use of traps and pounds should be 

 forbidden for a period of three years Such were the results 

 of that experiment that the Fairhaven Overseers of the Poor 

 have testified at legislative hearings that in their official 

 capacity they were able to realize in the decreased demand 

 for town support on the part of poor citizens that nothing 

 had ever so largely contributed to the supply of food in that 

 town, and especially to the destitute, as the abundance and 

 the consequent cheapness of food caused by their preserva- 

 tion. A man can never get cheaper food than that he can 

 catch for himself. Fish preservation is popular, not only be- 

 cause it means food, but also because it means livelihood. 

 Our towns have grown immensely in wealth, population and 

 comfort. One reason is that they are now able to give cheap 

 food to thousands of people, of moderate means from our 

 large cities, who find they can live more cheaply at the sea- 

 shore in a modest cottage, enjoying the health, air, bathing, 

 scenery and cheap fish food of our shores, than in the stifling 

 miasma of the city. 



Another class of citizens have been attracted to our shores 

 by the excellent fishing. They also fish for food, but enjoy 

 the incidental excitement of the capture. Millions of dollars 

 are invested in hotel property and private residences along 

 our shores. This means grateful relief in taxes to every one, 

 and constant and remunerative employment to our carpen- 

 ters, masons, painters and others in building trades; good 

 markets to our farmers for their provisions and our trades- 

 men for their supplies; good wages for boatmen, gardeners, 

 caretakers, coachmen, etc., to say nothing of more intangible 

 benefits from bringing wealth, education, refinement and 

 social position into our farming communities. We regard 

 the experiment as a complete success. 



A signal tribute to this success is the bitterness with which 

 we are annually attacked. Crows never flock where there is 

 no carrion. Our principal antagonist has been and is the 

 United States Menhaden Oil and Guano Association. In 

 ,1889 they openly violated the law of 1886, and suffered smartly 

 for so doing at Boston and Washington. But they strained 

 out all the fish in Buzzards Bay and carried them off to ' 



Tiverton for oil and manure. In 1892 they tried for the Lap- 

 ham bill to prevent our defending ourselves any further, and 

 again they failed. At present, having failed to defy or 

 annul our law, they think we have preserved fish enough 

 by our experiment to induce them to try and repeal our 

 laws, so that they may again carry them off. But if we can 

 judge by the results in 1889 this would mean unparalleled 

 calamity to our property and our people. 



If there be any question about the propriety of the use of a 

 purse net, there can be no question of its terribly destructive 

 energy when used iu a spawning ground where the depth of 

 the seine is greater than the depth of the water. If there is 

 any regulation of its use ever made, it certainly ought to 

 include their use in spawning grounds and in waters like 

 Buzzards Bay, where the depth of the water is less than the 

 depth of the net. 



When these parties came into Buzzards Bay in 1889 for the 

 purpose of putting purse seines 100ft. deep into water 70ft. 

 deep, they took, as I have said, everything we had, and how- 

 ever many statements may be made to the contrary, we 

 know that they simply took out all the fish that were in 

 Buzzards Bay, a result from the disastrous effects of which 

 we have not yet recovered. From this we can judge fairly 

 well the consequences of repealing our law which for years 

 has enjoyed the enthusiastic support of all our people. 



Mb. i. W. Adams— Q. Do you not know as a matter of 

 fact, Mr. Chamberlayne, that there was a very large body of 

 menhaden in Buzzards Bay last season? A. Yes, sir, I think 

 it was so understood. 



Q Do you not know as a matter of fact that there were 

 very few, if any, bluefish caught or seen in Buzzards Bay 

 last season? A. There were very few taken. 



Q. Now, as a matter of fact was there not in Vineyard 

 Sound and all along the Massachusetts water outside of 

 Buzzards Bay a large body of bluefish ? A. It was so re- 

 ported. 



Now, would not this prove most conclusively that blue- 

 fish do not necessarily feed upon menhaden? If it were so, 

 is it not fair to suppose that they would have been present in 

 Buzzards Bay in large numbers w T here the menhaden were 

 so pleutiful? A. My only personal knowledge in the matter 

 is that the fact would prove nothing if it were established. 

 Menhaden are not simply preserved because they are the 

 natural food of the bluefish, and the facts that you refer to 

 have no appreciable tendency to prove that they are not the 

 food of the bluefish. 



Me. N. B. Chukch— Q. He makes the statement broad 

 and very decisive that he knows, notwithstanding the testi- 

 mony of the people on the other side, that he knows they 

 robbed the bay of all fish. I would like to ask him how he 

 knows it? A. I am a lawyer, and the fishermen of our coast 

 in negotiating loans to make up the deficiency in the season's 

 work; my employment in 1889 in foreclosing mortgages on 

 their boats when they were unable to pay interest on their 

 mortgages; the practical experience of myself and friends 

 going down there; the common report of everybody in that 

 section of the country and the inherent impossibility of put- 

 ting a net 100ft. deep into waters always less than 70ft. deep, 

 buoyed at the top and sinking to the bottom without taking 

 everything large enough to be restrained by the net — all 

 these things enable me to say I know that your nets take 

 other fish than menhaden. 



Q. Now, will you please tell these gentlemen hmv you 

 knoiv that the purse net fishermen catch food fish while fish- 

 ing for menhaden? A. There is no question about it. 



Q. How do you know it? A. I know it, among other 

 things, from the sworn evidence of Mr. S. B. Miller, who 

 bought 70,0001bs. of weakfish from one of your steamers in a 

 day, and half a dozen other reputable gentlemen who have 

 been placed on record to the same effect. 



Mr. Chtjbch— Mr. Chairman, I submit from the gentle- 

 man's answers that he knows nothing about it. 



Robert B. Roosevelt— I am surprised at a great deal 

 that I have heard to-day, and I am still more surprised that 

 gentlemen who are interested in a pecuniary way and for a 

 livelihood in the handling of fish, should object to and op- 

 pose all measures taken to increase the supply of fish and to 

 protect them from destruction. Reflections have been cast 

 on the hook and line fishermen, but remember that the hook 

 and line fishermen have interests identical with those of the 

 men who fish for the markets. 



When it was stated that certain things don't take place 

 which we know do take place and which we have seen take 

 place, is it any wonder that we are surprised? Gentleman 

 say, for instance, that food fish are never intentionally taken 

 in purse nets, or if so taken are always seut to market. I re- 

 member distinctly lying with my yacht in the South Bay of 

 Long Island in the evening, after having fished during the 

 day for bluefish, and seeing a menhaden vessel sail in from 

 the ocean, send out his small boats with the uets, take a 

 turn right through the channel around the school of bluefish 

 close under the stern of the yacht and in one haul land more 

 fish than all the hand-line fishermen who would come there 

 for the next two weeks could have caught, and in those few 

 minutes destroy what would help support every man in that 

 bay who had a small boat. I saw them with my own eyes 

 do this, and take the captured fish into their boats and sail 

 off to the factory, which was not over 200yds. from me. Of 

 course, gentlemen, you may say they did not put them into 

 the vats. They were ouly intending to send them to the 

 New York market. As this occurred in the middle of the 

 sum tiler, the weather was hot for that purpose. I soon 

 noticed a suspicious smoke coming from the top of the fac- 

 tory chimney, and you may judge "by the smoke that grace- 

 fully curled" what became of the poor bluefish. Mr Sam- 

 misj who for so many years kept the hotel at Fire Island, 

 often complained bitterly to me of the menhaden fishermen 

 who drew their purse seines in the channels in the evenings, 

 cleaning them of the schools of bluefish which had been at- 

 tracted by the "chumming" of the hook and line brigade 

 during the day. He said if this could be stopped it would 

 make a difference of $10,000 a year to him. 



Speakers have claimed that the number of fish has not 

 diminished on our coast. I bought a place on Long Island 21 

 years ago, near the Great South Bay. At that time it was 

 nry habit to go out from the shore in the morning and after 

 a short sail of 15 minutes come to*anchor and catch 60 weak- 

 fish with rod and reel. To-day, gentlemen, you may fish the 

 Great South Bay from one end to the other, and if you catch 

 a weakfish iu a week you will be doing well. You would not 

 catch 60 in one day if you were to keep fishing for 60 years. 

 Yet the fish, we have beeu told, have not diminished on our 

 coast. At that time, 20 years ago. the market fishermen 

 were placing pound nets in the channel that led from the 

 inlet into the bay. The experienceof the Fishery Commission 

 of the State of New York, acquired from its many investiga- 

 tions, had satisfied the members that wherever you place a 

 pound net you destroy the fishing. That had been tried in 

 the Great Lakes, which were once, regarded as inexhaustible, 

 but wherever the pounds were placed the fishing was de- 

 stroyed, until the whitefish, which were then abundant, even 

 in the waters of the State of New York, cannot be caught in 

 any large numbers this side of Michigan, and would have 

 been exhausted there except for artificial propagation. When 

 I noticed these pounds 1 said, "If you keep this up you will 

 not catch a weakfish in this bay, in ten years." My predic- 

 tions came true, the old experience was renewed. Selfish folly 

 had its way. Spawning fish with countless eggs were served 

 on my table, and to-day there is scarcely a weakfish anywhere 

 about the bay, yet it has been said in this meeting that pounds 

 do no produce any injurious effect. At that time there were 

 twelve menhaden factories within twelve miles of my house. 

 Now not a single one is working, unless you except one 



which is making manure out of horsefoot crabs. Then the 

 fishing fleet were all sailing vessels and consequently on 

 calm days they could not catch any fish. Now all "bunker 

 boats" are steamers and there is no rest for the menhaden, 

 indeed the calmer the day the more easily the schools are 

 seen and captured. Often in those times when walking 

 along the shore I noticed masses of menhaden or mossbunk- 

 ers or bony fish— we on Long Island call them indiscrimi- 

 nately by any of these names — that stretched as far as the eye 

 couldreach, miles wideand miles long. Now you might stand 

 there and look till you were blind and never see such a col- 

 lection of fish. It would be a long time before you would see 

 any considerable school. I was seated once upon one of the 

 sand hills of the beach when I noticed a small school of men- 

 haden; that was some five or six years ago, after the new 

 methods of destruction got well into working order and the 

 results had fairly well developed themselves; at the moment 

 there was not a steamer in the neighborhood; soon, however, 

 one of the latter appeared coming for the prey like a shot. It 

 stopped outside of them and lowered its boats, but hardly 

 had these touched the water before another hove in sight, 

 rushing along to take part in the warfare. The school had 

 separated, and there was work for the latter also, but 

 another of the birds of prey loomed up, and before the 

 fish were all captured, a fate that befel every one 

 of them, there must have been five or six of the vultures 

 around the carcass. They came like birds of prey, The 

 first must have seen the school by the look-out at the mast- 

 head. The second, twenty miles away perhaps, had its at- 

 tention attracted by the actions of the first and followed. 

 The third must in the same manner have seen the second, 

 and so on, the last having possibly been fifty miles away 

 before the slaughter began. And mind you, hardly ever 

 does a fish escape; the operation cleans up the entire lot no 

 matter how large they may be. And we have been assured 

 that purse seine fishing does not exhaust the supply of fish I 

 What queer statements all of these; what foolish ones as 

 well. The gentlemen who called this meeting had no wish 

 to injure the menhaden fishermen; indeed they want to in- 

 jure no one interested in any way in fishing; on the contrary 

 they want to help them all. The present method of fishing 

 must be stopped; there must be an end to this wanton and 

 often wasteful destruction, or even the sea will not hold out. 

 One gentleman has told us the supply of fish from the pounds 

 on the Jersey coast has not diminished, and at the same time 

 he acknowledged that a number of these destructive 

 agencies had been increased within ten ye^rs from one to 

 twenty-four. That statement is its own answer; you can- 

 not go on multiplying in that ratio for the next ten years; 

 twenty-four times twenty-four is even too much for a 

 pound net fisherman to propose. This has got to stop, 

 and the sooner you, our opponents, who have came 

 here to oppose whatever the hook aud line fishermen may 

 propose, and now have your money invested in the business 

 through factories, steamers, pounds or purse nets, recognize 

 this, the better for you. Your entire investments are at 

 stake. The hook aud line men may lose their sport — you 

 will lose all you have invested. You have asked me why the 

 price of fish, the wholesale price— for no one denies that the 

 retail price has increased enormously — has been so low for 

 the last year. I reply that I presume it is by the formation 

 of a syndicate of the fish dealers, the same that keeps Pacific 

 halibut and Pacific shad, shad that I myself helped to plant, 

 out of New York market. But why should we be trying 

 evasions; why should we not meet this matter fairly and 

 frankly. You know the fish are diminishing, that the. sup- 

 ply is being exhausted, that it must soon give out, that in 

 five years all sea fish which cannot be artificially propagated 

 will be so nearly extinct in our waters, that they will be 

 above the reach of the poor who now consume them largely 

 and who used to consume them still more largely. Why 

 not unite with those who are endeavoring to find out the 

 best ways of protecting, preserving and increasing what we 

 have left while there is still time. In a few more years you 

 may be too late. When the fishing is exhausted in one 

 stretch of waters it is a long time before it recovers, the fish 

 are slow in returning. The true interests of all who are 

 present here are identical. Why should we not heartily 

 unite in our endeavors? 



At the close of Mr. Roosevelt's remarks further discussion 

 was suspended for the present, and an adjournment was 

 taken to the supper room. 



Thursday, Dec. 1 4, 1 893. 



On reassembling at 10:30 A. M., Mr. Robert B. Chalker, 

 of Connecticut, addressed the conference as follows: 



I represent the President of the Connecticut Fishing Asso- 

 ciation. It is an association of pound and trap net fishermen 

 on the south shore of Connecticut. Last spring, a bill was 

 brought into our Legislature to prohibit that kind of fishing. 

 After the hearing of the committee of fisheries before the 

 Legislature, we had the bill reported adversely to the 

 application for the annihilation of the industry. Iu that 

 investigation we brought out a good many facts, which I 

 wish I could more clearly state than I can. There had been 

 for quite a time a feeling that pound nets, trap nets, etc., 

 were destroying the fishing on the shore of Connecticut. On 

 a full investigation of the causes of the depletion of the 

 waters, it was found and satisfactorily shown to the com- 

 mittee, that there were other causes operating to a greater 

 extent than over-fishing, causing that destruction. More 

 particularly I would refer at this time to the pollution of the 

 water. As was said here yesterday, the shad fishing of 

 Connecticut is a thing of the past, comparatively. It was 

 shown before that committee that the date of its downfall 

 commenced with the damming of the Connecticut River. 

 The last thing we could observe was the dam at Holyoke. 

 Gentlemen, in connection with that, all of the small streams 

 and tributaries along the Connecticut at the lowest point 

 possible, are used for manufacturing purposes, aud the quan- 

 tities of deleterious matter coming into the river from those 

 factories, the effects of which can be seen by dead fish floating 

 at various times on the water, especially in the spring and 

 summer season, show that it depletes the water very rapidly. 

 It was also shown, aside from the shad fishery, that the 

 comparative falling off in other fish, the free swimming 

 fishes, was very small. As to shad fishery, up to the time of 

 the building of the Holyoke dam, and subsequently, we had 

 statistics from one trap net. It was placed there in 1854 at 

 this one position, and kept the same position up to the time 

 of the building of the jetty and of the dam, showing an aver- 

 age catch for the first five years, for the next ten years, and 

 the succeeding five. The first five years the catch in that 

 net was smaller than the next ten, and the last five was 

 greater than the catch of the first five. 



We have come together, as I understand it, to look for the ' 

 cause, as it is claimed, of the depletion of the waters of food 

 fish. I think in my observation, which has been in connec- 

 tion with the Board of Commissioners of Fisheries in Connec- 

 ticut for quite a number of years, also being conversant since 

 1876 in the propagation of shad, that one of the great obstacles 

 we have to contend with is the pollution of the stream. We 

 find it everywhere. You are aware that even in the Hudson 

 River and at Sandy Hook the refuse of this large city is 

 dumped in unlimited quantity. We know that theshad par- 

 ticularly like the purest water they can possibly find. We 

 think that these obstructions turn them off. It is a fact that 

 the Commission have passed by the idea of putting shad into 

 the Connecticut River on account of that. We think the 

 young fry do not live to grow up on account of the pollution. 

 As you are well aware, there now has been adopted a method 

 of retaining these fish in pounds. I think we should look 



