406 
FOREST AND STREAM 
July, 1918 
PACIFIC SALMON IN ATLANTIC WATERS 
ANY SALMON THAT HAS MORE THAN TWELVE RAYS TO THE ANAL FIN IS AN 
ONCORHYNCHUS, A STRANGER FROM THE COUNTLESS HORDES OF THE PACIFIC 
By JOHN D. QUACKENBOS, A.M., M.D., Fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine; of the New Hampshire Medical Society; 
Member of the American Medical Association; Member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science 
F IVE species of salmon, distin¬ 
guished from the Atlantic 
forms by the greater number of 
anal fin rays have, since ages when 
the continent was young, ascended 
the streams of our northern Pacific 
coast in hordes that no man could 
number. These fish are classified by 
ichthyologists, and I name them in 
the order of their importance, as 
(i) The Quinnat, Chinook, King, 
or Columbia River salmon, the most 
widely known and the most valu¬ 
able as a food fish of ioo varieties 
of Sahnonidce described in scientific 
manuals — attaining an extreme 
weight of ioo lbs. though averaging 
only 22 lbs. 
(2) The Blueback, Red Salmon, 
or Sockeye (Nerka), the most valu¬ 
able of Alaskan fishes, a smaller 
form running from 3 to 7 lbs. in 
weight. 
(3) The Silver Salmon (Kisutch), 
canned in large quantities in Oregon 
and Washington. 
(4) The Humpback Salmon, a re¬ 
cent introduction in our waters. 
(5) The Dog or Calico Salmon 
(Keta) of vastly inferior quality. 
The last three salmons are small 
fish, varying from 3 to 10 lbs. They 
are fall runners, whereas the king 
and the blueback run in the spring. 
All these Pacific forms vary in 
the number of rays to the anal 
fin from 14 to 20. Our common Atlan¬ 
tic salmon (Salar) has only 9 such fin 
The author of this paper at the Palmer hatchery 
Twenty-seven pound chinook 
a veritable trophy 
salmon, 
rays, and the landlocked salmon or 
ouananiche does not exceed 12. Therefore, 
for diagnostic purposes, any fish with more 
than 12 anal rays is an oncorhynchus, a 
stranger from the Pacific. 
The chinook (16 anal rays) is regarded 
from the standpoint of food supply as the 
most valuable fish in the world. The year¬ 
ly plant of infant salmon from government 
and private hatcheries, now totals upward 
of half a billion. The average taken in the 
Columbia River is about 30,000,000 pounds. 
According to the latest data, the entire 
annual catch of the five species of salmon 
and the steel head trout in the United 
States, British Columbia, and Alaska, is 
estimated at 435,973,290 lbs. To this 
amount the chinook contributed 65 million 
pounds; Alaska returns annually in salmon 
alone more than the price paid to Russia 
by Secretary Seward for the whole coun¬ 
try ($7,200,000). 
Attracted by its wonderful fecundity, as 
well as by its value for food purposes, the 
students of fish life connected with the 
United States Commission have for forty 
years persisted in attempts to naturalize 
this fish in many waters, including the 
Atlantic Coast streams, the Mississippi, 
and the Great Lakes, but until recently 
with negative results. From 1873, when 
experiments with the chinook salmon be¬ 
gan, twenty-five million fry, fingerlings, and 
yearlings had up to 1913 been distributed 
by the government. Of this vast number, 
not 22 were recorded as caught in Atlantic 
waters, until after Lake Sunapee, N. H., 
was selected in 1904 for further 
trial. Here the chinook salmon 
has found conditions favorable to 
its growth. The fish were planted 
as fry. In 1908, six-pound speci¬ 
mens were taken; in 1909, 200 of 
much larger size were captured with 
hook and line. The heaviest fish so 
far caught weighed 20 lbs. A brief 
review of the life history of the 
quinnat will throw light on the cause 
of failure in the case of these early 
plantings of salmon. 
Most of the eggs deposited are 
destroyed, only one per cent, when 
left to nature, attaining the age to 
which fish culture carries ninety 
per cent. Most of the alevins, help¬ 
less during the six weeks required 
for the absorption of the yolk-sac, 
are swallowed by predatory fishes 
and birds. So we may start with 
the fry, drifting down stream tail 
first, subsisting on floating insects 
and larvae, and reaching the ocean 
when five months old. Their stay 
here varies from two to four or five 
years, during which they grow with 
phenomenal rapidity. But of the life 
of this and other salmon in the sea, 
practically nothing is known. The 
young are believed to remain near 
the mouths of the rivers they have 
descended, feeding voraciously as 
they grow on the schools of smelts, 
silversides, anchovies, herring, and 
dainties. In Puget Sound the 
salmon are taken in nets at all 
seasons, proving that when out of the 
rivers they are not far from the shore. 
All species of Pacific salmon, males 
other 
King 
Gaffing a thirty pound chinook salmon 
in Oregon waters 
and females, spawn but once. Death 
is the penalty of their nuptial acts. Im¬ 
pelled by their instinct to seek fresh water 
