Abstract
INLAND FISHERIES, AMERICA.—We are indebted to Mr. Theodore Lyman, one of the United States Commissioners on Inland Fisheries, for an early copy of the Twelfth Annual Report to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Among other interesting facts we gather from it that there is still a mystery about the young of the Californian salmon (Salmo guinnat), for, notwithstanding the hundreds of thousands that have been put into New England waters, no one has been able to say with certainty that a single smolt has been seen. In reference to the true salmon (S. salar) it is pleasant to know that the return of mature salmon to the waters of the Merrimac last year (1877) commences a new era in the history of fish-culture in America. From the observations taken many of these mature salmon were from eight to ten pounds weight each, and were from the parr put into the river in 1873; but some were seen from fifteen to eighteen pounds weight, and these were most probably the result of the first parr put into the river in 1872. From 1872 to 1876 upwards of 830,000 parr were put into the river, and hundreds of fine fish were seen passing up in the spring of 1877; and, so says the report, “it will be seen that what we have so long fought for, what the mass of people here have generally considered mere theories, visions of men who suffered from fish on the brain, has been fully substantiated. It is true it took a little longer than was at first thought, but now Massachusetts knows that while she was the first of the States to take an interest in fish-culture, so she has been the first to demonstrate the certainty of a good return, and she can restock those rivers where the fish have been for a long time killed out.”
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Biological Notes . Nature 17, 382–383 (1878). https://doi.org/10.1038/017382a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/017382a0