SALMON TAGGING IN ALASKA, 1929 193 
pared with the migration to the Kenai and Kasilof Rivers where important spawning 
grounds are located. 
None of the cohos were recaptured. 
Table 11. — Returns from red salmon tagged at Nikishka Bay, July 21 
Locality of recapture 
Number 
Time in 
days 
Locality of recapture 
Number 
Time in 
days 
East shore of Cook Inlet: 
East shore of Cook Inlet — Continued. 
1 2 
Moose Point 
2 
3-4 
1 
1 
Point McManus _ 
1 
3 
Kachemak Bav — ■ 
West shore Cook Inlet: 
1 
1 
Point Harriet 
2 
2-3 
Bluff Point - - 
i 
3 
North Foreland — 
1 
5 
Tyonek 
1 
2 
6 
6-9 
Cottonwood Point 
1 
6 
3 1! 
1-4 
Three Mile Creek 
1 
4 
East Foreland - - --- 
2 
3 
— 
1 
6 
'total 
37 
ii 
Pei cent returned . ___ 
15.1 
Sunset Packing Co. No. 1 
l 2 
i Reported taken before date of tagging. 3 Two reported taken before date of tagging. 
CONCLUSIONS 
The percentages of recaptured tagged fish vary greatly with the species and to 
some extent with the locality and date of tagging. The data are presented in 
Table 12. 
The percentages of tagged pink salmon recaptured are more uniform and are 
consistently higher, both in Prince William Sound and Cook Inlet, than those 
obtained for other species. The extremely high returns of pink salmon from the 
Cook Inlet experiments are most striking, because they are so much greater than 
any obtained in experiments conducted in other parts of Alaska. In an earlier 
report 3 it was pointed out that the percentage returns indicate, at best, a minimum 
percentage of the fish population captured in the commercial fishery because various 
factors are at work that keep the percentage returns of tagged fish below the per- 
centage of untagged fish that are captured and with which the tagged fish were 
associated at the time of their liberation. The retention of tags as souvenirs by 
fishermen, and the failure of the cannery men to report tags received by them because 
the information required was wanting or for other reasons, are important factors in 
keeping down the known percentage of recaptures. In Cook Inlet, where 50 to 66 
per cent of the released pink salmon were again taken, there can be no doubt that 
the actual drain on the resource is very much greater than those proportions; 
indeed it seems possible that the drain is so great as to menace the perpetuation of 
the supply. 
Table 12. — Percentage of tagged fish recaptured, 1929 “ 
Locality of tagging 
Red 
Pink 
Chum 
Coho 
Locality of tagging 
Red 
Pink 
Chum 
Coho 
Prince William Sound: 
Cook Inlet: 
11. 1 
35.6 
Flat Island 
24.2 
51. 8 
24 9 
16.7 
36. 1 
Nubble Point 
33.8 
63. 0 
51.0 
Hinchinbrook Entrance. _ _ 
48.5 
Nikishka Bay. 
15. 1 
Knight Island Passage - 
35.5 
Cape Starichkof 
37. 1 
66. 1 
15.4 
Johnstone Point... 
16.7 
34.2 
18.6 
33.3 
» Total number tagged, 4,143 total number recaptured, 1,613; percentage recaptured, 38.9 per cent. 
3 Second experiment in tagging salmon in the Alaska Peninsula Fisheries Reservation, summer of 1923, by Charles H. Gilbert 
and Willis H. Rich. Bulletin, U. S. Bureau of Fisheries, Vol. XLII, 1926 (1927). 
