FOOTNOTES:

Fig. 193.—Creekfish or Chub-sucker,Erimyzon sucetta(Lacépède). Nipisink Lake, Illinois. FamilyCatostomidæ.

It is certain that the limits of Lake Erie and Lake Michigan were once more extended than now. It is reasonably probable that some of the territory now drained by the Wabash and the Illinois was once covered by the waters of Lake Michigan. The cisco[135]of Lake Tippecanoe, Lake Geneva, and the lakes of the Oconomowoc chain is evidently a modified descendant of the so-called lake herring.[136]Its origin most likelydates from the time when these small deep lakes of Indiana and Wisconsin were connected with Lake Michigan. The changes in habits which the cisco has undergone are considerable. The changes in external characters are but trifling. The presence of the cisco in these lakes and its periodical disappearance—that is, retreat into deep water when not in the breeding season—have given rise to much nonsensical discussion as to whether any or all of these lakes are still joined to Lake Michigan by subterranean channels. Several of the larger fishes, properly characteristic of the Great Lake region,[137]are occasionally taken in the Ohio River, where they are usually recognized as rare stragglers. The difference in physical conditions is probably the sole cause of their scarcity in the Ohio basin.

The Great Basin of Utah.—The similarity of the fishes in the different streams and lakes of the Great Basin is doubtless to be attributed to the general mingling of their waters which took place during and after the Glacial Epoch. Since that period the climate in that region has grown hotter and drier, until the overflow of the various lakes into the Columbia basin through the Snake River has long since ceased. These lakes have become isolated from each other, and many of them have become salt or alkaline and therefore uninhabitable. In some of these lakes certain species may now have become extinct which still remain in others. In some cases, perhaps, the differences in surroundings may have caused divergence into distinct species of what was once one parent stock. The suckers in Lake Tahoe[138]and those in Utah Lake are certainly now different from each other and from those in the Columbia. The trout[139]in the same waters can be regarded as more or less tangible species, while the whitefishes[140]show no differences at all. The differences in the present faunas of Lake Tahoe and Utah Lake must be chiefly due to influences which have acted since the Glacial Epoch, when the whole Utah Basin was part of the drainage of the Columbia.

Arctic Species in Lakes.—Connected perhaps with changesdue to glacial influences is the presence in the deep waters of the Great Lakes of certain marine types,[141]as shown by the explorations of Professor Sidney I. Smith and others. One of these is a genus of fishes,[142]of which the nearest allies now inhabit the Arctic Seas. In his review of the fish fauna of Finland,[143]Professor A. J. Malmgren finds a number of Arctic species in the waters of Finland which are not found either in the North Sea or in the southern portions of the Baltic. These fishes are said to "agree with their 'forefathers' in the Glacial Ocean in every point, but remain comparatively smaller, leaner, almost starved." Professor Lovén[144]also has shown that numerous small animals of marine origin are found in the deep lakes of Sweden and Finland as well as in the Gulf of Bothnia. These anomalies of distribution are explained by Lovén and Malmgren on the supposition of the former continuity of the Baltic through the Gulf of Bothnia with the Glacial Ocean. During the second half of the Glacial Period, according to Lovén, "the greater part of Finland and of the middle of Sweden was submerged, and the Baltic was a great gulf of the Glacial Ocean, and not connected with the German Ocean. By the gradual elevation of the Scandinavian Continent, the Baltic became disconnected from the Glacial Ocean and the Great Lakes separated from the Baltic. In consequence of the gradual change of the salt water into fresh, the marine fauna became gradually extinct, with the exception of the glacial forms mentioned above."

It is possible that the presence of marine types in our Great Lakes is to be regarded as due to some depression of the land which would connect their waters with those of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. On this point, however, our data are still incomplete.

To certain species of upland or mountain fishes the depression of the Mississippi basin itself forms a barrier which cannot be passed. The black-spotted trout,[145]very closely related speciesof which abound in all waters of northern Asia, Europe, and western North America, has nowhere crossed the basin of the Mississippi, although one of its species finds no difficulty in passing Bering Strait. The trout and whitefish of the Rocky Mountain region are all species different from those of the Great Lakes or the streams of the Alleghany system. To the grayling, the trout, the whitefish, the pike, and to arctic and subarctic species generally, Bering Strait has evidently proved no serious obstacle to diffusion; and it is not unlikely that much of the close resemblance of the fresh-water faunæ of northern Europe, Asia, and North America is due to this fact. To attempt to decide from which side the first migration came in regard to each group of fishes might be interesting; but without a wider range of facts than is now in our possession, most such attempts, based on guesswork, would have little value. The interlocking of the fish faunas of Asia and North America presents, however, a number of interesting problems, for migrations in both directions have doubtless taken place.

Causes of Dispersion Still in Operation.—One might go on indefinitely with the discussion of special cases, each more or less interesting or suggestive in itself, but the general conclusion is in all cases the same. The present distribution of fishes is the result of the long-continued action of forces still in operation. The species have entered our waters in many invasions from the Old World or from the sea. Each species has been subjected to the various influences implied in the term "natural selection," and under varying conditions its representatives have undergone many different modifications. Each of the six hundred fresh-water species we now know in the United States may be conceived as making every year inroads on territory occupied by other species. If these colonies are able to hold their own in the struggle for possession, they will multiply in the new conditions, and the range of the species becomes widened. If the surroundings are different, new species or varieties may be formed with time; and these new forms may again invade the territory of the parent species. Again, colony after colony of speciesafter species may be destroyed by other species or by uncongenial surroundings.

The ultimate result of centuries on centuries of the restlessness of individuals is seen in the facts of geographical distribution. Only in the most general way can the history of any species be traced; but could we know it all, it would be as long and as eventful a story as the history of the colonization and settlement of North America by immigrants from Europe. But by the fishes each river in America has been a hundred times discovered, its colonization a hundred times attempted. In these efforts there is no co-operation. Every individual is for himself, every struggle a struggle of life and death; for each fish is a cannibal, and to each species each member of every other species is an alien and a savage.

FOOTNOTES:[100]Except possibly the Sacramento.[101]Unless the fauna of certain cave streams in the United States and Cuba be regarded as forming an exception.[102]For example, Elk River, Duck River, etc.[103]There are three species of darters (Cottogaster copelandiJordan,Hadropterus evidesJordan and Copeland,Hadropterus scierusSwain) which are now known only from the Ozark region or beyond and from the uplands of Indiana, not yet having been found at any point between Indiana and Missouri. These constitute perhaps isolated colonies, now separated from the parent stock in Arkansas by the prairie districts of Illinois, a region at present uninhabitable for these fishes. But the non-occurrence of these species over the intervening areas needs confirmation, as do most similar cases of anomalous distribution.[104]Thus,Dorosoma cepedianumLe Sueur andPomolobus chrysochlorisRafinesque have found their way into Lake Michigan through canals.[105]Oncorhynchus tschawytschaWalbaum.[106]Oncorhynchus nerkaWalbaum.[107]"In this isolated region of North America, in this zoological island of New England, as we may call it, we find neither Lepidosteus, nor Amia, nor Polyodon, nor Amblodon (Aplodinotus), nor Grystes (Micropterus), nor Centrarchus, nor Pomoxis, nor Ambloplites, nor Calliurus (Chænobryttus), nor Carpiodes, nor Hyodon, nor indeed any of the characteristic forms of North American fishes so common everywhere else, with the exception of two Pomotis (Lepomis), one Boleosoma, and a few Catostomus."—Agassiz,Amer. Journ. Sci. Arts, 1854.[108]Catostomus,Pantosteus,Chasmistes.[109]Gila,Ptychocheilus, etc.[110]Salmo clarkiiand its varieties.[111]GeneraNotropis,Chrosomus, etc.[112]As the fresh-water surf-fish (Hysterocarpus traski) and the species of salmon.[113]Salmo clarkiRichardson.[114]Coregonus williamsoniGirard.[115]Salvelinus malma(Walbaum).[116]Thymallus tricolorCope.[117]Salvelinus fontinalisMitchill.[118]Notropis rubricroceusCope,Rhinichthys atronasusMitchill, etc.[119]Evermann, A Reconnoissance of the Streams and Lakes of Western Montana and Northwestern Wyoming, in Bull. U. S. Fish. Comm., XI, 1891, 24-28, pls. I and II; Jordan, The Story of a Strange Land, in Pop. Sci. Monthly, Feb., 1892, 447-458; Evermann, Two-Ocean Pass, in Proc. Ind. Ac. Sci., 1892, 29-34, pl. I; Evermann, Two-Ocean Pass, in Pop. Sci. Monthly, June, 1895, with plate.[120]Ameiurus nebulosusLe Sueur:Ameiurus catusLinnæus.[121]Salvelinus fontinalis.[122]Notropis rubricroceusCope.[123]Cottus ictalopsRafinesque.[124]Notropis cercostigma,Notropis xænocephalus.[125]Labidesthes sicculus.[126]Gobiosoma molestum.[127]Myrophis punctatus.[128]Lepisosteus tristœchus.[129]Jordanella,Rivulus,Heterandria, etc.[130]Heros,Tetragonopterus.[131]LucifugaandStygicola, fishes allied to the cusk, and belonging to the family ofBrotulidæ.[132]Amblyopsis,Typhlichthys.[133]Lepisosteus tristœchus.[134]Esox vermiculatusLe Sueur.[135]Argyrosomus siscoJordan.[136]Argyrosomus artediLe Sueur.[137]AsLota maculosa;Percopsis guttata;Esox masquinongy.[138]Catostomus tahoensis, in Lake Tahoe;Catostomus macrocheilusanddiscobolus, in the Columbia;Catostomus fecundus;Catostomus ardens;Chasmistes liorusandPantosteus generosus, in Utah Lake.[139]Salmo henshawiandvirginalis.[140]Coregonus williamsoni.[141]Species ofMysisand other genera of Crustaceans, similar to species described by Sars and others, in lakes of Sweden and Finland.[142]Triglopsis thompsoniGirard, a near ally of the marine speciesOncocottus quadricornisL.[143]Kritisk Öfversigt of Finlands Fisk-Fauna, Helsingfors, 1863.[144]See Günther, Zoological Record for 1864, p. 137.[145]Salmo farioL., in Europe;Salmo labraxPallas, etc., in Asia;Salmo gairdneriRichardson, in streams of the Pacific Coast;Salmo perryi, in Japan;Salmo clarkiRichardson, throughout the Rocky Mountain range to the Mexican boundary and the headwaters of the Kansas, Platte, and Missouri.

[100]Except possibly the Sacramento.

[101]Unless the fauna of certain cave streams in the United States and Cuba be regarded as forming an exception.

[102]For example, Elk River, Duck River, etc.

[103]There are three species of darters (Cottogaster copelandiJordan,Hadropterus evidesJordan and Copeland,Hadropterus scierusSwain) which are now known only from the Ozark region or beyond and from the uplands of Indiana, not yet having been found at any point between Indiana and Missouri. These constitute perhaps isolated colonies, now separated from the parent stock in Arkansas by the prairie districts of Illinois, a region at present uninhabitable for these fishes. But the non-occurrence of these species over the intervening areas needs confirmation, as do most similar cases of anomalous distribution.

[104]Thus,Dorosoma cepedianumLe Sueur andPomolobus chrysochlorisRafinesque have found their way into Lake Michigan through canals.

[105]Oncorhynchus tschawytschaWalbaum.

[106]Oncorhynchus nerkaWalbaum.

[107]"In this isolated region of North America, in this zoological island of New England, as we may call it, we find neither Lepidosteus, nor Amia, nor Polyodon, nor Amblodon (Aplodinotus), nor Grystes (Micropterus), nor Centrarchus, nor Pomoxis, nor Ambloplites, nor Calliurus (Chænobryttus), nor Carpiodes, nor Hyodon, nor indeed any of the characteristic forms of North American fishes so common everywhere else, with the exception of two Pomotis (Lepomis), one Boleosoma, and a few Catostomus."—Agassiz,Amer. Journ. Sci. Arts, 1854.

[108]Catostomus,Pantosteus,Chasmistes.

[109]Gila,Ptychocheilus, etc.

[110]Salmo clarkiiand its varieties.

[111]GeneraNotropis,Chrosomus, etc.

[112]As the fresh-water surf-fish (Hysterocarpus traski) and the species of salmon.

[113]Salmo clarkiRichardson.

[114]Coregonus williamsoniGirard.

[115]Salvelinus malma(Walbaum).

[116]Thymallus tricolorCope.

[117]Salvelinus fontinalisMitchill.

[118]Notropis rubricroceusCope,Rhinichthys atronasusMitchill, etc.

[119]Evermann, A Reconnoissance of the Streams and Lakes of Western Montana and Northwestern Wyoming, in Bull. U. S. Fish. Comm., XI, 1891, 24-28, pls. I and II; Jordan, The Story of a Strange Land, in Pop. Sci. Monthly, Feb., 1892, 447-458; Evermann, Two-Ocean Pass, in Proc. Ind. Ac. Sci., 1892, 29-34, pl. I; Evermann, Two-Ocean Pass, in Pop. Sci. Monthly, June, 1895, with plate.

[120]Ameiurus nebulosusLe Sueur:Ameiurus catusLinnæus.

[121]Salvelinus fontinalis.

[122]Notropis rubricroceusCope.

[123]Cottus ictalopsRafinesque.

[124]Notropis cercostigma,Notropis xænocephalus.

[125]Labidesthes sicculus.

[126]Gobiosoma molestum.

[127]Myrophis punctatus.

[128]Lepisosteus tristœchus.

[129]Jordanella,Rivulus,Heterandria, etc.

[130]Heros,Tetragonopterus.

[131]LucifugaandStygicola, fishes allied to the cusk, and belonging to the family ofBrotulidæ.

[132]Amblyopsis,Typhlichthys.

[133]Lepisosteus tristœchus.

[134]Esox vermiculatusLe Sueur.

[135]Argyrosomus siscoJordan.

[136]Argyrosomus artediLe Sueur.

[137]AsLota maculosa;Percopsis guttata;Esox masquinongy.

[138]Catostomus tahoensis, in Lake Tahoe;Catostomus macrocheilusanddiscobolus, in the Columbia;Catostomus fecundus;Catostomus ardens;Chasmistes liorusandPantosteus generosus, in Utah Lake.

[139]Salmo henshawiandvirginalis.

[140]Coregonus williamsoni.

[141]Species ofMysisand other genera of Crustaceans, similar to species described by Sars and others, in lakes of Sweden and Finland.

[142]Triglopsis thompsoniGirard, a near ally of the marine speciesOncocottus quadricornisL.

[143]Kritisk Öfversigt of Finlands Fisk-Fauna, Helsingfors, 1863.

[144]See Günther, Zoological Record for 1864, p. 137.

[145]Salmo farioL., in Europe;Salmo labraxPallas, etc., in Asia;Salmo gairdneriRichardson, in streams of the Pacific Coast;Salmo perryi, in Japan;Salmo clarkiRichardson, throughout the Rocky Mountain range to the Mexican boundary and the headwaters of the Kansas, Platte, and Missouri.

TheFlesh of Fishes.—Among all races of men, fishes are freely eaten as food, either raw, as preferred by the Japanese and Hawaiians, or else as cooked, salted, dried, or otherwise preserved.

The flesh of most fishes is white, flaky, readily digestible, and with an agreeable flavor. Some, as the salmon, are charged with oil, which aids to give an orange hue known as salmon color. Others have colorless oil which may be of various consistencies. Some have dark-red flesh, which usually contains a heavy oil which becomes acrid when stale. Some fishes, as the sharks, have tough, coarse flesh. Some have flesh which is watery and coarse. Some are watery and tasteless, some dry and tasteless. Some, otherwise excellent, have the muscular area, which constitutes the chief edible part of the fish, filled with small bones.

Relative Rank of Food-fishes.—The writer has tested most of the noted food-fishes of the Northern Hemisphere. When properly cooked (for he is no judge of raw fish) he would place first in the ranks as a food-fish the eulachon, or candle-fish (Thaleichthys pacificus).

Fig. 194.—Eulachon, or Ulchen.Thaleichthys pretiosusGirard. Columbia River. FamilyArgentinidæ.

This little smelt, about a foot long, ascends the Columbia River, Frazer River, and streams of southern Alaska in the spring in great numbers for the purpose of spawning. Its flesh is white, very delicate, charged with a white and very agreeable oil, readily digested, and with a sort of fragrance peculiar to the species.

Fig. 195.—Ayu, or Japanese Samlet,Plecoglossus altivelisSchlegel. Tanagawa, Tokyo, Japan.

Next to this he is inclined to place the ayu (Plecoglossus altivelis), a sort of dwarf salmon which runs in similar fashion in the rivers of Japan and Formosa. The ayu is about as large as the eulachon and has similar flesh, but with little oil and no fragrance.

Fig. 196.—Whitefish,Coregonus clupeiformisMitchill. Ecorse, Mich.

Very near the first among sea-fishes must come the pampano(Trachinotus carolinus) of the Gulf of Mexico, with firm, white, finely flavored flesh.

The red surmullet of Europe (Mullus barbatus) has been long famed for its delicate flesh, and may perhaps be placed next. Two related species in Polynesia, the munu and the kumu (Pseudupeneus bifasciatusandPseudupeneus porphyreus), are scarcely inferior to it.

Fig. 197.—Golden Surmullet,Mullus auratusJordan & Gilbert. Woods Hole, Mass.

Fig. 198.—Spanish Mackerel,Scomberomorus maculatusMitchill. FamilyScombridæ. Key West.

Side by side with these belongs the whitefish of the Great Lakes (Coregonus clupeiformis). Its flesh, delicate, slightly gelatinous, moderately oily, is extremely agreeable. Sir John Richardson records the fact that one can eat the flesh of this fish longer than any other without the feeling of cloying. The salmon cannot be placed in the front ranks because, however excellent, the stomach soon becomes tired of it. The Spanish mackerel (Scomberomorus maculatus), with flesh at once rich and delicate, the great opah (Lampris luna), still richer and stillmore delicate, the bluefish (Pomatomus saltatrix) similar but a little coarser, the ulua (Carangus sem), the finest large food-fish of the South Seas, the dainty California poppy-fish, miscalled "Pampano" (Palometa simillima), and the kingfish firm and well-flavored (Scomberomorus cavalla), represent the best of the fishes allied to the mackerel.

Fig. 199.—Opah, or Moonfish,Lampris luna(Gmelin). Specimen in Honolulu market weighing 317½ lbs. (Photograph by E. L. Berndt.)—Page 323.

Fig. 200.—Bluefish,Pomatomus saltatrix(L.). New York.

Fig. 201.—Robalo,Centropomus undecimalis(Bloch). Florida.

The shad (Alosa sapidissima), with its sweet, tender, finely oily flesh, stands also near the front among food-fishes, but it sins above all others in the matter of small bones. The weak-fish (Cynoscion nobilis) and numerous relatives rank first among those with tender, white, savorous flesh. Among the bass and perch-like fishes, common consent places near the first the striped bass (Roccus lineatus), the bass of Europe (Dicentrarchus labrax), the susuki of Japan (Lateolabrax japonicus), the red tai of Japan (Pagrus majorandP. cardinalis), the sheep's-head (Archosargus probatocephalus), the mutton-fish or Pargo Criollo of Cuba (Lutianus analis), the European porgy (Pagrus pagrus),the robalo (Centropomus undecimalis), the uku (Aprion virescens) of Hawaii, the spadefish (Chætodipterus faber), and the black bass (Micropterus dolomieu).

Fig. 202.—Spadefish,Chætodipterus faber(L.). Virginia.

Fig. 203.—Small-mouthed Black Bass,Micropterus dolomieu(Lacépède). Potomac River.

Fig. 204.—Speckled Trout (male),Salvelinus fontinalis(Mitchill). New York.

Fig. 205.—Rainbow Trout,Salmo irideusGibbons. Sacramento River, California.

Fig. 206.—Rangeley Trout,Salvelinus oquassa(Girard). Lake Oquassa, Maine.

The various kinds of trout have been made famous the world over. All are attractive in form and color; all are gamey; all have the most charming of scenic surroundings, and, finally, all are excellent as food, not in the first rank perhaps, but well above the second. Notable among these are the European charr (Salvelinus alpinus), the American speckled trout or charr (Salvelinus fontinalis), the Dolly Varden or malma (Salvelinus malma), and the oquassa trout (Salvelinus oquassa). Scarcelyless attractive are the true trout, the brown trout, or forelle (Salmo fario), in Europe, the rainbow-trout (Salmo irideus), the steelhead (Salmo gairdneri), the cut-throat trout (Salmo clarkii), and the Tahoe trout (Salmo henshawi), in America, and the yamabe (Salmo perryi) of Japan. Not least of all these is the flower of fishes, the grayling (Thymallus), of different species in different parts of the world.

Fig. 207.—Steelhead Trout,Salmo gairdneriRichardson. Columbia River.

Fig. 208.—Tahoe Trout,Salmo henshawiGill & Jordan. Lake Tahoe, California.

Fig. 209.—The Dolly Varden Trout,Salvelinus malma(Walbaum). Lake Pend d'Oreille, Idaho. (After Evermann.)

Fig. 210.—Alaska Grayling,Thymallus signiferRichardson. Nulato, Alaska.

Fig. 211.—Pike,Esox luciusL. Ecorse, Mich.

Fig. 212.—Atka-fish,Pleurogrammus monopterygius(Pallas). Atka Island.

Other most excellent food-fishes are the eel (Anguillaspecies), the pike (Esox lucius), the muskallonge (Esox Roccus), the sole of Europe (Solea solea), the sardine (Sardinella pilchardus), the atka-fish (Pleurogrammus monopterygius) of Bering Sea, the pescado blanco of Lake Chapala (Chirostoma estorand other species), the Hawaiian mullet (Mugil cephalus), the channel catfish (Ictalurus punctatus), the turbot (Scophthalmus maximus), the barracuda (Sphyræna), and the young of various sardines and herring, known as whitebait. Of large fishes, probably theswordfish (Xiphias gladius), the halibut (Hippoglossus hippoglossus), and the king-salmon, or quinnat (Oncorhynchus tschawytscha), may be placed first. Those people who feed on raw fish prefer in general the large parrot-fishes (asPseudoscarus jordaniin Hawaii), or else the young of mullet and similar species.

Fig. 213.—Pescado blanco,Chirostoma humboldtianum(Val.). Lake Chalco, City of Mexico.

Fig. 214.—Red Goatfish, or Salmonete,Pseudupeneus maculatusBloch. FamilyMullidæ(Surmullets).

Abundance of Food-fishes.—In general, the economical value of any species depends not on its toothsomeness, but on its abundance and the ease with which it may be caught and preserved. It is said that more individuals of the herring (Clupea harengusin the Atlantic,Clupea pallasiin the Pacific) exist than of any other species. The herring is a good food-fish and whenever it runs it is freely sought. According to Björnsön, wherever the school of herring touches the coast of Norway, there a village springs up, and this is true in Scotland, Newfoundland, andfrom Killisnoo in Alaska to Otaru in Japan, and to Strielok in Siberia. Goode estimates the herring product of the North Atlantic at 1,500,000,000 pounds annually. In 1881 Professor Huxley used these words:

Fig. 215.—Great Parrot-fish, or Guacamaia,Pseudoscarus guacamaiaBloch & Schneider. Florida.

Fig. 216.—Striped Mullet,Mugil cephalus(L.). Woods Hole, Mass.

"It is said that 2,500,000,000 or thereabout of herrings are every year taken out of the North Sea and the Atlantic. Suppose we assume the number to be 3,000,000,000 so as to be quite safe. It is a large number undoubtedly, but what does it come to? Not more than that of the herrings which may be contained in one shoal, if it covers half a dozen square miles, and shoals of much larger size are on record. It is safe to say that scattered through the North Sea and the Atlantic, at one and the same time, there must be scores of shoals, any one ofwhich would go a long way toward supplying the whole of man's consumption of herrings."

Fig. 217.—Mutton-snapper, or Pargo criollo,Lutianus analis(Cuv. & Val.). Key West.

Fig. 218.—Herring,Clupea harengusL. New York.

Fig. 219.—Codfish,Gadus callariasL. Eastport, Maine.

The codfish (Gadus callariasin the Atlantic;Gadus macrocephalusin the Pacific) likewise swarms in all the northern seas, takes the hook readily, and is better food when salted and dried than it is when fresh.

Next in economic importance probably stands the mackerel of the Atlantic (Scomber scombrus), a rich, oily fish which bears salting better than most.

Fig. 220.—Mackerel,Scomber scombrusL. New York.

Not less important is the great king-salmon, or quinnat (Oncorhyanchus tschawytscha), and the still more valuable blue-back salmon, or redfish (Oncorhynchus nerka).

Fig. 221.—Halibut,Hippoglossus hippoglossus(Linnæus). St. Paul Island, Bering Sea. (Photograph by U. S. Fur Seal Commission.)

The salmon of the Atlantic (Salmo salar), the various species of sturgeon (Acipenser), the sardines (Sardinella), the halibut (Hippoglossus), are also food-fishes of great importance.

Variety of Tropical Fishes.—In the tropics no one species is represented by enormous numbers of individuals as is the case in colder regions. On the other hand, the number of species regarded as food-fishes is much greater in any given port. In Havana, about 350 different species are sold as food in the markets, and an equal number are found in Honolulu. Upward of 600 different species appear in the markets of Japan. In England, on the contrary, about 50 species make up the list of fishes commonly used as food. Yet the number of individual fishes is probably not greater about Japan or Hawaii than in a similar stretch of British coast.

Economic Fisheries.—Volumes have been written on the economic value of the different species of fishes, and it is not the purpose of the present work to summarize their contents.

Fig. 222.—Fishing for Ayu with Cormorants in the Tanagawa, near Tokyo. (After Photograph by J. O. Snyder by Sekko Shimada.)

Equally voluminous is the literature on the subject of catching fishes. It ranges in quality from the quaint wisdom of the "Compleat Angler" and the delicate wit of "Little Rivers" to elaborate discussions of the most economic and effective forms and methods, of the beam-trawl, the purse-seine, and the codfish hook. In general, fishes are caught in four ways—by baited hooks, by spears, by traps, and by nets. Special local methods, such as the use of the tamed cormorant[146]in the catching of the ayu, by the Japanese fishermen at Gifu, may be set aside for the moment, and all general methods of fishing come under one of these four classes. Of these methods, the hook, the spear, the seine, the beam-trawl, the gill-net, the purse-net, the sweep-net, the trap and the weir are the most important. The use of the hook is again extremely varied. In the deep sea long, sunken lines, are sometimes used for codfish, each baited with many hooks. For pelagic fish, a baited hook is drawn swiftly over the surface, with a "spoon" attached which looks like a living fish. In the rivers a line is attached to a pole, and when fish are caught for pleasure or for the joy of being in the woods, recreation rises to the dignity of angling. Angling may be accomplished with a hook baited with an earthworm, a grasshopper, a living fish, or the larva of some insect. The angler of to-day, however, prefers the artificial fly, as being more workmanlike and also more effective than bait-fishing. The man who fishes, not for the good company of the woods and brooks, but to get as many fish as possible to eat or sell, is not an angler but a pot-fisher. The man who kills all the trout he can, to boast of his skill or fortune, is technically known as a trout-hog. Ethically, it is better to lie about your great catches of fine fishes than to make them. For most anglers, also, it is more easy.

Fisheries.—With the multiplicity of apparatus for fishing, there is the greatest variety in the boats which may be used. The fishing-fleet of any port of the world is a most interestingobject, as are also the fishermen with their quaint garb, plain speech, and their strange songs and calls with the hauling in of the net.

Fig. 223.—Fishing for Ayu in the Tanagawa, Japan. Emptying the pouch of the cormorant. (Photograph by J. O. Snyder.)

For much information on the fishing apparatus in use in America the reader is referred to the Reports of the Fisheries in the Tenth Census, in 1880, under the editorship of Dr. George Brown Goode. In these reports Goode, Stearns, Earle, Gilbert, Bean, and the present writer have treated very fully of all economic relations of the American fishes. In an admirable work entitled "American Fishes," Dr. Goode, with the fine literarytouch of which he was master, has fully discoursed of the game- and food-fishes of America with especial reference to the habits and methods of capture of each. To these sources, to Jordan and Evermann's "Food and Game Fishes of North America," and to many other works of similar purport in other lands, the reader is referred for an account of the economic and the human side of fish and fisheries.

Angling.—It is no part of the purpose of this work to describe the methods or materials of angling, still less to sing its praises as a means of physical or moral regeneration. We may perhaps find room for a first and a last word on the subject; the one the classic from the pen of the angler of the brooks of Staffordshire, and the other the fresh expression of a Stanford student setting out for streams such as Walton never knew, the Purissima, the Stanislaus, or perchance his home streams, the Provo or the Bear.

"And let me tell you, this kind of fishing with a dead rod, and laying night-hooks, are like putting money to use; for they both work for the owners when they do nothing but sleep, or eat, or rejoice, as you know we have done this last hour, and sat as quietly and as free from cares under this sycamore as Virgil's Tityrus and his Melibœus did under their broad beech-tree. No life, my honest scholar,—no life so happy and so pleasant as the life of a well-governed angler; for when the lawyer is swallowed up with business and the statesman is preventing or contriving plots, then we sit on the cowslip-banks, hear the birds sing, and possess ourselves in as much quietness as these silent silver streams which we now see glide so quietly by us. Indeed, my good scholar, we may say of angling, as Dr. Boteler said of strawberries, 'Doubtless God could have made a better berry, but doubtless God never did'; and so, if I might be judge, 'God never made a more calm, quiet, innocent recreation than angling.'

"I'll tell you, scholar, when I sat last on this primrose-bank, and looked down these meadows, I thought of them as Charles the Emperor did of Florence, 'That they were too pleasant to be looked on but only on holidays.'

"Gentle Izaak! He has been dead these many years, but his disciples are still faithful. When the cares of business lieheavy and the sound of wheels jarring on cobbled streets grows painful, one's fingers itch for the rod; one would away to the quiet brook among the pines, where one has fished so often. Every man who has ever got the love of the stream in his blood feels often this longing.

"It comes to me each year with the first breath of spring. There is something in the sweetness of the air, the growing things, the 'robin in the greening grass' that voices it. Duties that have before held in their performance something of pleasure become irksome, and practical thoughts of the day's work are replaced by dreamy pictures of a tent by the side of a mountain stream—close enough to hear the water's singing in the night. Two light bamboo rods rest against the tent-pole, and a little column of smoke rising straight up through the branches marks the supper fire. Jack is preparing the evening meal, and, as I dream, there comes to me the odor of crisply browned trout and sputtering bacon—was ever odor more delicious? I dare say that had the good Charles Lamb smelled it as I have, his 'Dissertation on Roast Pig' would never have been written. But then Charles Lamb never went a-fishing as we do here in the west—we who have the mountains and the fresh air so boundlessly.

"And neither did Izaak Walton for that matter. He who is sponsor for all that is gentle in angling missed much that is best in the sport by living too early. He did not experience the exquisite pleasure of wading down mountain streams in supposedly water-proof boots and feeling the water trickling in coolingly; nor did he know the joy of casting a gaudy fly far ahead with a four-ounce rod, letting it drift, insect-like, over that black hole by the tree stump, and then feeling the seaweed line slip through his fingers to thewhirrof the reel. And, at the end of the day, supper over, he did not squat around a big camp-fire and light his pipe, the silent darkness of the mountains gathering round, and a basketful of willow-packed trout hung in the clump of pines by the tent. Izaak's idea of fishing did not comprehend such joy. With a can of worms and a crude hook, he passed the day by quiet streams, threading the worms on his hook and thinking kindly of all things. The day's meditations over, he went back to the village, and, mayhap, joined a few kindred souls over a tankard of ale at the sign of the Red Lobster. But he missed the mountains, the water rushing past his tent, the bacon and trout, the camp-fire—the physical exaltation of it all. His kind of fishing was angling purely, while modern Waltons, as a rule, eschew the worm.

Back to Index Next