"They ought to be willing enough to do that, I should think," said Colin; "it's for their own good in the long run."
"A lot of them want quick profits now, without any regard for the future," his host said
scornfully. "Of course, there are laws for fishery regulation in many of the States, but inspectors have their hands full in preventing violations. In Alaska, which is a territory still, that supervision is done by the government through the Bureau of Fisheries."
"It must be a little aggravating to the salmon men, just the same," said Colin thoughtfully, "when they are trying to keep their canning factories going full blast, to have to allow half the catch to go on up the stream. But," he continued, "why don't they catch the salmon coming down the stream again? I should think that would settle the whole question."
"It would," said the professor, "if they came down! But they don't. Every single salmon, male and female, that goes up the river in the spawning season dies up there. None of them ever comes down alive."
"I don't think they did that way in Newfoundland!" ejaculated Colin in surprise. "When I was staying with my uncle there I saw lots of salmon, and it seemed to me that they went down the river again."
"They did," was the reply. "The Atlantic or true salmon does not die after spawning, but not
a single fish of any one of the five different kinds of Pacific salmon ever spawns twice. Every yard of the shores of the upper reaches of Pacific coast rivers is covered almost solidly with dead salmon from September to December!"
"How awful!"
"It makes some places uninhabitable," the professor replied. "Where a market is near enough, the dead fish are collected and sold for fertilizer."