The Salmon Fishery of Penobscot Bay and River in 1895-96 | Page 7

been caught in midwinter. The following data relate to fish that probably belonged to the Penobscot school.
On June 19, 1896 a Gloucester fishing vessel brought into Rockland a 10-pound salmon that had been caught on a cod trawl 20 miles southeast of Matinicus. The fish was sent home to Gloucester by the captain of the vessel, through Mr. Charles E. Weeks, a Rockland fish-dealer.
Several salmon have been taken on hooks off Frenchman Bay within a few years. One 25-pound fish was caught on a cod trawl 3 miles off Gouldsboro, in 20 fathoms of water, and another was taken southeast of Mount Desert Island in 35 fathoms.
Some years ago, on May 22, one of the crew of the schooner Telephone, of Orland, Me., while fishing for cod on German Bank, caught a 10-pound salmon. German Bank lies about 50 miles southeast of Mount Desert Island and has 65 to 100 fathoms of water.

Destruction of salmon by seals.
Seals are known to kill a great many salmon in Penobscot Bay and the lower river. They enter and leave the weirs and traps without difficulty and cause great annoyance to the fishermen. When a seal enters a net, the fish are frightened and usually become meshed; the seal may then devour them at its leisure. The initial bite usually includes the salmon's head.
Fishermen in some places report a noticeable increase in seals in the past few years, and a consequent increase in damage done to the salmon fishery. The State pays a bounty of $1 each for seal scalps, which serves to keep the seals somewhat in check, although the sagacity of the animals makes it difficult to approach them with a rifle and to secure them when shot. Within a few years some weir fishermen have been obliged at times to patrol the waters in the vicinity of their nets, in order to prevent depredations. In the Cape Rosier region, where some salmon trap fishing is done, seals were very troublesome in the early part of the season of 1896. Mr. George Ames, who set three traps in 1896 and took about 100 salmon, had knowledge of 13 other salmon that were destroyed by seals while in his nets. Similar instances of relatively large numbers of salmon killed by seals might be given. With salmon worth 20 to 50 cents a pound the loss of 10 or 12 salmon by seals, in a total catch of 75 or 100, is a matter of importance to the fisherman.

Evidences of results of propagation.
The opinion is now practically unanimous among the salmon fishermen of Penobscot River and Bay that the artificial hatching of salmon by the U.S. Fish Commission is producing beneficial results. About the same arguments in support of their opinions are presented by all, and these accord well in the main with the observations of other persons who have given this matter attention:
(1) The opportunities for natural reproduction are exceedingly limited, owing to the obstructions to the passage of the fish to their spawning grounds in the headwaters of the Penobscot basin.
(2) The salmon that are naturally hatched are, even under the most favorable conditions prevailing at the present time, not numerous enough to keep up the supply of market and brood fish, with the fatalities incident to the long residence at sea and to the passage of immature fish down from the spawning grounds to the sea.
(3) The remarkable run in May and June, 1896, of fish of comparatively small size that had apparently just reached maturity and the relative scarcity of large fish that had evidently been in the river during one or two previous seasons seemed to show a tendency toward the depletion of the run of old fish and the substitution of a run of young, artificially hatched fish.
(4) A feature of the salmon supply in recent years, on which the fishermen nearly all lay considerable stress, is that the runs in April and July, which in former years were often quite important and remunerative, have of late been very poor, although the fish constituting them are of large size, while the runs in May and June have kept up, but have consisted chiefly of comparatively small fish. In this the fishermen believe they see evidence of the work of the hatchery, for the young salmon artificially hatched have been from eggs of May and June fish, and the fishermen think that such young fish, when they return to the river to spawn, will come at about the same time that their parents did.
Many salmon fishermen might be quoted on the question of results of propagation. A few sample statements and records of salmon taken will be given covering different parts of the bay and river.
Mr. Francis French, an experienced salmon fisherman of Stockton, on the western side of