700 
BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF FISHERIES 
pack has averaged 229,147 cases, valued at $3, ISO, 000 per year (average price just 
under $14.00 per case). At present prices the former sockeye pack would be worth 
$10,960,000 per year — as much as the present fishery for all five species combined — 
and yet the present sockeye catch only averages about 15,000,000 pounds, or 13 per- 
cent of a regional total of 1 13,000,000 pounds. 
NEED FOR INVESTIGATION 
Although the entire region should be considered in general as a biological unit, 
the fact that the salmon are taken on the high seas, and in both Canadian and Ameri- 
can waters, has caused each governmental agency to keep only records of the catches 
landed under their own jurisdiction. Furthermore, during the period covered by this 
report, these agencies have usually collected onty such records as have been necessary 
for purposes of taxation or general production statistics. Hence, only a few of the 
existing catch records were of any biological value. 
In order to determine such relative factors as the seasonal progression of the 
runs, or changes in abundance of the various species, it was imperative that catch 
data be obtained which included the daily landings of individual units of fishing 
gear. Many valuable records of this type still exist in private hands, although, 
with the passage of time, a large part of various individual company records have 
been destroyed or lost when certain companies changed ownership or ceased opera- 
tion. Accordingly, the authors gathered a vast quantity of these records from both 
American and Canadian companies which, together with total catch records from 
the publications of various agencies, have been analyzed in this report. 
Such analyses were complicated by the many changes which have occurred 
during the long period of development of these fisheries. Not only were new fishing 
areas pioneered, and new types or radical improvements of the old forms of gear 
developed, but there has been a considerable shift in intensity of the fisheries for 
some of the species, both for economic reasons and because of changes in abundance. 
Because these changes directly influenced the exploitation of the resource, the his- 
tory and development of the major forms of gear have been carefully traced. Differ- 
ences in fishing locality, seasonal operation, and effectiveness in the capture of the 
various species of salmon have necessitated the separate consideration of each of the 
more important forms of gear. 
The different species of salmon enter the fishery in varying abundance at certain 
parts of the season, hence it has been necessary to determine the curves of seasonal 
occurrence for each species. The changes in abundance that have occurred during 
the course of the fishery have in the past been measured largely from the total 
annual production of canned fish, a measure which is especially inaccurate in view of 
the influence of changing economic conditions, changes in fishing effort, and the 
obscuring of the decline in certain species by the increase in intensity of the fishery 
for others. The authors have endeavored to present, for each species, the best 
measure of abundance possible from the available data. The varying importance of 
the species in certain districts and in different types of gear, and the differences in 
production of the major spawning areas have also been treated. The complexity of 
these problems and the differences in their life histories have made it necessary to 
consider them, like the major types of gear, in separate sections of the report. 
