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trap owners for the avowed sole
purpose of conserving salmon,
wc still find by the bureau’s own
figures that there are just as
many salmon canned today, if
not more, than at any time dur
ing the history of canning in
Alaska. ,
And those ineffectual orders,
issued as regulations for the
supposed sole purpose of con
serving salmon, which O’Malley
has made in the last six years
have deprived the citizens of
Ketchikan and vicinity of more
than $1,000,000. That million
was awarded to big corporations
in Seattle, San Francisco, Chi
cago and elsewhere. This comes
about when individual trap own
er is regulated out, as they have
been, and the big corporations
are allowed to let their traps,
which did not fish in sufficient
Quantity to pay, be rejected and
regulated out with the indiviu
uai independent nsnermen s
trap, thus enabling the corpora
tions to keep their choicest traps
which pay, and they are taking
out more with these traps left
them than they ever were before
any regulations were made by
the bureau of fisheries.
The writer has two suggestions
to make: one is to aid nature's
work and thus surely accomplish
your goal; leave all litter logs
and driftwood jams in the
streams, they make ponds a
bove and eddies below. These
are nature’s protected hatch
eries, and one fish spawned in
such a spawning ground is worth
many spawned in a flume tha~
carries the spawn down to salt
water to be destroyed. Such
fish, with their spawn is a total
loss to Alaska.
The other suggestion: there
are but a given number of
salmon to come to Alaskan
v-aters each season to spawn;
this is not only a natural sup
position, but is generally a fact.
Then why let a corporation use
a machine gun, while at the
sama time you take the little
fellow’s muzzle loader away
from him! Take one-half the
total sum of salmon in Alaska
and let them go unmolested to
the spawning ground; divide the
remaining half equally between
all fish traps and seine boats,
and let that be all for that trap
or boat. Over 90 per cent of our
states and territories have game
laws allowing a given bag limit
on game birds and animals, and
such laws have been vastly more
effective than has been Mr. O’
Malley’s policy of so-called con
soivation of fish in Southeast
ern Alaska.
The writer has no knowledge
of Mr. O’Malley’s ever having
held a public meeting to obtain
data from resident fishermen in
Southeastern Alaska; he holds
his meetings in Seattle Wash
ington, over 600 miles from the
nearest point in Alaska, and
never has the writer been able
to find a resident trap owner,
that is an independent, or a
seine boat owner having been
invited to such a meeting in Se
attle for the purpose of giving
the bureau first hand informa
tion on fish. He expects and
must of necessity get this first
hand information from the of
ficers of canneries who spend
three or four months in Alaska
during the fine summer, and the
balance of the year on the Pa
cific coast, usually sunny Cali
fornia. Mr. O’Malley’s inspection
trips in 1928 aboard the bureau
boat Brant carried him, among
other places, through Behm
canal, going by way of Steam
boat channel between Point
Alava and Point Sykes, then up
Eehm canal between Portage
cove and the Chickamin river;
yet he never stopped to take
Observations in or near any
creek or river, although Portage
cove and the Chickamin river
are two of the greatest spawning
grounds in Southeastern Alaska.
No business man in this civil
ized land would consider that he
had been given justice should
sorne department or bureau
hand him an order to close ins
legitimate business, without
complaint from some source.
Should this be done he would
be compelled to close and sell
his stock for whatever his com
petitors chose to pay him. Yot
this is exactly what has happen
ed to individual fish trap own
ers in Southeastern Alaska; and
O’Malley was the cause of it. The
writer has neither seen or heard
of any instance where"the Kai
ser of Germany or the late czar
of Russia ever issued such un
fair or confiscatory regulations
as have been issued by this bu
reau. And yet with all this his
conservation is a total, miser
able failure. In the name of
conservation he is destroying
the Alaska fisheries, the finest
on earth.
Ketchikan, Alaska, January
27, 1932.
Bills Before Congress
By James Wickershajji
H. R. 495 Provided, That no
boat, trap, or other properly
mentioned in this section, be
longing to any Indian or other
person residing in Alaska, shall
be so summarily seized and held
for forfeiture for alleged viola
tion of this section, until after
the arrest, trial, and conviction
in the courts of Alaska, of the
owner or operator of said boat,
trap, or other property; Provid
ing further, the manner of list
ing property being used in vio
lation of the law and court
procedure, seizure, sale and re
covery.
* * *
11. R. 497 “That it shall be un
lawful for any person, company,
or corporation v/antonly to waste
or destroy salmon or other food
fishes taken or caught in any of
the waters of Alaska. Nor shall
any portion of food fishes, ex
cept the offal, be manufactured
into or used for oil or fertilizer.”