Canada To-day and To-morrow

by Arthur E. Copping

GOVERNMENT BUILDINGS, VICTORIA, B.C.

TOURISTS IN VANCOUVER CITY, B.C.

According to the most recent reliable figures accessible to me at the moment of writing, the fisheries of England and Wales (leaving Scotland and Ireland out of the reckoning) represent a greater annual money value than the fisheries of Canada—a fact that assumes considerable significance in the light of two other facts, namely, (1) that the fisheries of Great Britain have been severely depleted, and (2) that the fisheries of Canada are the largest and most prolific in the world. Great Britain, it will be noted, is the richer in caught fish; Canada is the richer in uncaught fish. In other words, Canada has more fish than Great Britain, but Great Britain has more fishermen than Canada.

The remarkable results secured by the old lady—to revert to the personal metaphor—are due to a comprehensive thoroughness of effort. Her luggers go in fleets to all the sandbanks—their trawls search each estuary that is likely to harbour a pair of soles or a pint of shrimps. At low tide the old lady examines her mud shores for every wet and glistening periwinkle.

The daughter is not in a position to do that. Her staff of helpers is wholly inadequate to cope with all the occupations and opportunities that crowd upon her. With so many fisheries available, the only ones that get attended to are those that shout for notice. The fish would not get caught unless they practically insisted upon it. British Columbia salmon assemble in such myriads in certain of the rivers that their protruding backs, at times, make a dense mat of fish from shore to shore, almost hiding the water. That statement may look like an exaggeration to the Englishman accustomed to angle all day and secure, peradventure, a couple of small roach as the reward of his patient industry. But the statement describes an actual, familiar sight; and, indeed, the natural resources of Canada scarcely lend themselves to exaggeration. Again and again I have seen and heard those natural resources not over-stated, but ludicrously under-stated. The mistake is constantly made, if quite unintentionally, by Canadians themselves.

Let me give another instance of a Canadian fish that assembles in force, refusing to be overlooked. I refer to the humble herring. “In 1903”—to quote unimpeachable testimony—“the run of herring was very large. At Nanaimo the fish invaded the harbour in such numbers that thousands were washed up on the beach, like seaweed, by the waves created by passing steamers.”

As a matter of fact, the waters of British Columbia are alive with halibut, cod, flounders, anchovies, whales, sardines, shad, oysters, clams, crabs, seals, prawns, and other useful creatures that are more or less neglected by a sparse and preoccupied human population. One of the few fish that happens to receive careful, not to say minute, attention in British Columbia is the sturgeon. It is caught, esteemed, and, as I am officially informed, subdivided into commercial uses according to the following classification:—(1) caviare; (2) isinglass, made from the swim bladder; (3) the flesh—fresh, salted, smoked, or otherwise prepared; (4) oil, which is of great value in the leather industry; (5) fertiliser, made from entrails and scrap; (6) the soft, gristly backbone, with its sheath, which, prepared, is called wesiga, and in Russia is a popular article of diet; (7) the brain and nerve cord, which, when smoked and dried, is considered a great delicacy in China; (8) the back portion of the sturgeon, or dorsal region, is made into balyki; (9) the ventral part, or belly, of the fish is utilised as a food called pupki; (10) a valuable glue, differing from the isinglass of the swim bladder, is derived from the nose, fins, tail, etc.; and, lastly (11), leather is made from the tough and dense skin. Thus there is apparently no waste in the case of this all-round fish.

With regard to the famous British Columbia salmon, the first fact to be noted is that they are not salmon. They are very like salmon, and they are as good as salmon, if not better; but they do not belong to the genus. In thinking otherwise the pioneer population of British Columbia made one of those little mistakes that are natural and excusable in the excitement of occupying a new country. The fish in question belong, as a matter of fact, to the genus oncorhynchus, of which there are five species, all represented in British Columbian waters—the sockeye, the spring, the coho, the dog, and the humpback. When a mistake of this sort has a sufficiently long start, the correction cannot overtake it. The fish that are not salmon are now recognised as salmon all over the world. Were you to ask your grocer for “a tin of oncorhynchus,” you would probably make him jump.

Another fact has to be noted in connection with the great so-called salmon industry. Its historian has not yet put in an appearance. I made that disappointing discovery while talking with Mr. W. H. Barker, president of the British Columbia Packers’ Association, than whom, I had been assured, no man in Canada knows more about the catching and canning of oncorhynchus.