Salt Water Fisheries of the Pacific Coast [pp. 149-163]

Salt later Fisheries of the Pac-ific Coast.
I rom Photo )v lo e
THE CRAB FISI-IER'S RETI'RN.
On account of the dense ignorance of
this class, who live for the day, and
their suspicious nature, it is difficult to
extract much accurate information from
them. As a class they are industrious,
and law-abiding citizens as far as the
fisheries are concerned. Some of the
large dealers are intelligent men, but
they cannot compensate for the general
ignorance.
From one or two of these large dealers
I was surprised to learn the extent of
territory receiving fresh iced fish from
the San Francisco market. A supply
is sent all over California, and choice
varieties, striped bass, pompano, or shad,
when out of season north, are shipped'
to Portland, Seattle, and Tacoma One
dealer alone sends yearly ten tons of
fresh fish to Butte City, Montana, and
one ton to Laramie, Wyoming.
Another dealer ships to Tombstone
and Tucson in boxes with pounded ice,
which are placed in the ordinary closed
freight car, and re-iced at Los Angeles
and Yuma. Recently, fresh fish have
been sent to the City of Mexico, at a
rateamounting to about five tons a year
for a single dealer.
Recent statistics of the U. S. Fish
Commissioners' report are surprising,
placing San Francisco the leading whaling station of America. This is but in
small part a Pacific Coast fishery, but it
is largely operated with San Francisco
capital. The value of the products
landed from the San Francisco fleet in
I889 was $540,927, as against $346,255
for the New Bedford fleet rendezvousing
in San Francisco. This was an extremely poor year, but it serves to illustrate the relative standing of the two
whaling centers.
San Francisco is the only port on the
acific Coast of the United States to
prosectute the cod fishery, which has declined materially of late years on ac
count of lack of demand, the keen competition of Eastern producers in Western
markets, and the attraction of capital to
the more profitable salmon canning industry of the north. The two companies engaged in this trade have curing
and outfitting stations in Marin County,
156
L.,ug.