FOREST AND 
STREAM 
209 
Pacific Salmon in New England Lakes 
Successful Transplanting of the Lordly Chinook Means an Era of Real Salmon Fishing to Anglers 
of Limited Time or Moderate Means 
By George H. Graham, Massachusetts State Game Commission. 
O more interesting experiment 
has ever been carried on in the 
line of fish culture than what 
has been done in the past ten 
years with the Pacific salmon 
known as “Chinook” in some 
of our New England lakes. 
The splendid record that has 
come from Lake Sunapee, N. H., and more re¬ 
cently what has been the result of planting these 
fish in Lake Quinsigamond in the city of Wor¬ 
cester, Mass., attracts the attention of fish cul- 
turists and anglers all over the country. Know¬ 
ing what had been the results of planting these 
salmon in Lake Sunapee and believing that 
equally good results could be obtained in the old 
Bay State the Commissioners on Fisheries and 
Game began to look around to see where to try 
the experiment. They found in Lake Quinsiga¬ 
mond what they considered an ideal lake; it has 
a large area of deep water and is very cold in 
places. It has a large amount of food for the 
salmon to feed upon in the shape of landlocked 
smelts which seemed to be increasing at an enor¬ 
mous rate. 
The lake was screened at the outlet so as to 
prevent the young fish from going down stream 
and when the fish were planted they were 
good sized fish from four to six inches long. 
Ten thousand of these fish were planted 
during the fall of 1912 and during July of 1914 
or within about twenty months from the time 
they were hatched, over 600 salmon were caught 
by the anglers ranging from one and one-half to 
five pounds each. 
These fish were caught both trolling and still 
fishing with live bait, and as there has been no 
limit on salmon in Massachusetts one man caught 
over twenty fish in one day. 
These eggs were furnished by the U. S. Bureau 
of Fisheries and were secured from the Colum¬ 
bia River in Oregon. They are larger than the 
eastern salmon eggs, being about the size and 
color of our half ripe currants. They are eyed 
out in one of the Government hatcheries before 
they are shipped east. The eggs are carefully 
spread out on a tray that is covered with cotton 
cloth and then covered over with thick wet moss; 
these trays are fastened together and then placed 
in the center of a large box and packed in firm 
with shavings and ice. They are shipped by ex¬ 
press with directions for having new ice put in at 
certain stations in order to have the eggs remain 
at a certain temperature until they reach their 
destination. 
The salmon that were planted in Lake Quin¬ 
sigamond were kept in the hatchery until they 
were from four to six inches long, and when 
they were planted they were well able to care 
for themselves. This lake, like so many others 
in our New England states, was well stocked 
with pickerel and perch and there were so many 
of these fish that doubt was freely expressed that 
the salmon would all be eaten up before they 
had a chance to grow. 
But such was not the case, as the results have 
shown. The Massachusetts Commissioners 
Samples of Transplanted Chinooks. 
were so well pleased with the experiment that 
they stocked five other lakes during November, 
1914 and at the present time they have 100,000 
Chinook salmon eggs hatching to be planted dur¬ 
ing 1915. 
When it becomes known that certain lakes and 
ponds that are now alive with pickerel and perch 
can be transformed into salmon waters and that 
good salmon fishing can thereby be placed in 
reach of the man who has a limited amount of 
time and money to spend, the demand from the 
sportsmen to stock our waters with these salmon 
will be quite large in every state. 
The acme of all fishing is salmon fishing and 
it is a sport that has been enjoyed by only a 
very few people during the past fifty years. In 
recent years, one in order to secure any sport of 
this kind had to have a fat pocketbook and lots 
of leisure time. In the early history of New 
A Real Catch of Pacific Salmon in a Massachusetts Lake. 
