CHAPTER XXXIII
Our progress up Karluk River in the barge was so leisurely that we seemed to be "drifting upward with the flood" between the low green shores that sloped, covered with flowers, to the water. The clouds were a soft gray, edged with violet, and the air was very sweet.
The hatchery is picturesquely situated.
A tiny rivulet, called Shasta Creek, comes tumbling noisily down from the hills, and its waters are utilized in the various "ponds."
The first and highest pond they enter is called the "settling" pond, which receives, also, in one corner, the clear, bubbling waters of a spring, whose upflow, never ceasing, prevents this corner of the pond from freezing. This pond is deeper than the others, and receives the waters of the creek so lightly that the sediment is not disturbed in the bottom, its function being to permit the sediment carried down from the creek to settle before the waters pass on into the wooden flume, which carries part of the overflow into the hatching-house, or on into the lower ponds, which are used for "ripening" the salmon.
There are about a dozen of these ponds, and they are terraced down the hill with a fall of from four to six feet between them.
They are rectangular in shape and walled with large stones and cement. The walls are overgrown with grasses and mosses; and the waters pouring musically down over them from large wooden troughs suspended horizontally above them, and whose bottoms are pierced by numerous augur-holes, produce the effect of a series of gentle and lovely waterfalls.
It is essential that the fall of the water should be as light and as soft as possible, that the fish may not be disturbed and excited—ripening more quickly and perfectly when kept quiet.