FISHERIES OF LAKE ONTARIO. 
195 
been discontinued at tbe very time when most important results were beginning to be 
manifested. To illustrate the apparent inadequacy of the measures taken to produce 
an abundant supply of shad in the lake, it need only be remarked that the average 
number of fry annually deposited was equivalent to only 17 flsli to the square mile of 
hike surface, and that the entire plants during a period of six years represented less 
than X ijo °f the quantity of fry that has been devoted to a single coast basin in a 
single season. It is estimated that probably 10,000 or 12,000 more or less mature shad 
have been taken in Lake Ontario. This is assuredly a satisfactory experiment, and 
strongly argues for the resumption of shad-culture in the lake. 
THE ATLANTIC SALMON. 
The Atlantic or salt-water salmon ( Salmo salar) was at one time an exceedingly 
abundant fish in Lake Ontario and its tributary streams ; to-day it occurs only as a 
straggler, a curiosity to the young and a relic of other days to the aged inhabitants of 
the region. The practical disappearance of salmon from the lake is another of those 
almost phenomenal changes which have occurred in the fisheries of Lake Ontario, but 
the comparison of the past and present abundance of salmon is much more striking 
than in the case of the trout and whitefish. The history of the salmon in this body 
of water is a forcible illustration of what may be expected to take place in all inland 
waters when the destruction of fish by man is not mitigated or counterbalanced by 
resort to artificial propagation of adequate scope, supplemented in the case of certain 
species by protection and encouragement during the important period of reproduction. 
The narration of the previous abundance of the salmon in Lake Ontario and its 
tributary streams reads like a romanee. and the possibility of reestablishing a good 
run of salmon in Lake Ontario and of restocking its waters with this valuable food- 
fish opens up one of the most important, interesting, and inviting fields connected 
with the present fishery agitation in this region, making a thorough inquiry into the 
past and present conditions very desirable. The accounts of the early abundance of 
salmon indicate that the fish at certain times ascended nearly every stream on both the 
American and Canadian shores, chief among which were the Salmon Eiver, Little 
Salmon Eiver, Black Eiver, Big Sandy Creek, and Oswego Eiver on the southern side, 
and Wilmot Creek in Canada, the first named being the most famous. The cause 
which led to the ascent of the streams was the same which now operates in the coast 
rivers in which salmon occur, namely, the reproductive instinct. The fish approached 
the shores in June and, if the water was sufficiently high, went up the streams to their 
head waters, deposited their spawn, and returned again to the lake. There are also 
numerous authentic records of another fluvial migration for the same purpose later in 
the year, usually in September, a circumstance which led some of the fishermen to 
believe in the existence of two kinds of salmon in the lake,* which were distinguished 
as spring spawners and fall spawners. 
There was an advent of salmon in the Oswego Eivef which was called the u June 
run.” This was usually two or three weeks earlier than the appearance of fish in the 
Salmon Eiver. The inland lakes in which the Oswego rises kept that river well filled 
most of the time, but the Salmon Eiver was ordinarily low when the salmon first came 
on the shore. 
* See paper by Dr. Edwards (hereafter quoted) and testimony of B, E. Ingersoll and John S. Wilson, 
