The Rutland daily globe. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1873-1877, 1874-03-13
n Communication about Fisheries
and Their Present Relation TO the
by NJ. GOLDSMITH, COMMISSIONER OF FISH
FRITs

BY NJ. GOLDSMITH, COMMISSIONER OF FISH
FRIES.
Continued from the last numberl
This much has commonly been applied
TO waters communicating with the sea and
so nearly SO, that the great migratons visi-
ble,a of those varieties whose pastures are
in the salt water and whose cradles are in
fresh water. /, will be seen that the ne
cessity for regulations permitting the pas
sage of fishes grows out of this part of
their nature. 1t is not the mere stergor Of
propagation which impcls these movements,
for that is the common provision of all va
rietes but that unknown n we call in
stinct, that mysteriously begottcn parental
solcitude and knowledge which, under the
coercion of universal law, manifests its
care for its young, either in personal pro-
lection during infancy, or in leaving its
young in conditions where all the wants of
lis life, for both birth and growth are found
ready and at hand in temperature, food and
security. 1t is not the mere distance be-
tween spawning ground and feeding
ground. 1t is not the fact that striped bass
90 from Long Island Sound to some near
stream not two miles away, or that the sal
mon leaves the weird coasts of frozen seas
to penetrate the vast distances of the Co
lumbia. 1t is the mere passage from the
ground they feed in and grow to maturity
Ia, e., Ia Lac, 10, In,
mines the natural limits of migration, and
this. no matter whether they 20 one mile
or thousand miles away. The obstruc-
ton to the miles trip is as bad as the oh
s'acic The thousand miles journey. 1t is
no matter whether the obstruction Is from
the deep pools of the lower reaches of
river to the spawning beds in the brooks
above, or from deep waters of st. Georges
banks to the salmon ridds of the Connecti-
cut The obstacle is Il efficient for evil in the
one case as in the other. 1t as effcctually
destroys the race in the one case as iu the
other. And the wrongfuncss of building
of an. obstacle to the migration is the same
in one case as is in the other. True the
effect upon the,fishing right is proportional
to the amount of the evil, or the amount of
quality Of the fish destroyed or rendered
impossible to human use.
If upon trout stream Il mill-dam sewers
feeding from spawning grounds, that mill
dam is n wrong. 1t may be in some cases
that the injury to the fishing is more than
paid for in the opportunities the created in
dustry furnishes, that, in small streams,
in which there are no migralions except of
the fishes native and constant to them. the
manufacture. in view of public policy,
may he the dominant interest. Still the
fact stands patent that as between individ-
uals the law OF distractions in water cOurs-
es is the same in trout streams that it is in
great shad rivers Whether the same pub
lie necessity demands the building of fish
ways in the one case as in the other is
another matter. What / wish to assert
here is that the principle of law which OBJ
tains in one case obtains in the other My
own impression is that the building OF fish
ways,as enforced upon landowners, should
be limited for the present at least, and per-
haps for a long time, to those on rivers up
which in former times salmon and shad
used to run. To cOercc mill owners on or
binary or moderately sized mill-streams TO
build hshways, might operate as serious
burden upon SINAI! industries, and, in view
of the fact that the fostering of manufac-
tories is one great, indeed the great interest
of our commonwealth, it may not be wise
to order such fishways to be built. unless it
may be on certain streams too far away
from railroad or water carriage to make
manufacturing an available occupation,
and presenting the best conditions for sue
cessful fish culture. But even in such ca
ses it may be well to prctermt for the
nonce all alteration of the present condi-
ton OF things and wait until the
growing experience in fish culture demon
strates more clearly the need of interference
While there can be no question of the
truth OF the foregoing statements in regard
to impediments to the natural. ancient and
accustomed run of fishes, it becomes
serious question whether the state can
cocrce the erection of fishways for the pas
sage of sea fish in rivers which have never,
in historic+pcriods, been the resort of such
migratory fishes. To rc-people n stream
with its olden salmon, to rc-establish an
ancient right, to restore property destroyed
by hecdlcssness or greed is one thing; to
COLOMBO a river with tribe all foreign to
it. to establish rights new to the region, to
add property and privilege where none
bavc been destroyed or have.cxistcd before,
Is another The common law, which gov
ems this matter of the obligation to pro.
vide fish-ways, is the slow accumulation Of
legal wisdom in a country all of whose
rivers, almost without exception, were the
annual resorts Of breeding fishes 1t ncycr
conceived of Mississippi or Ohio river. or
of great watersheds gathering each a rain
fall greater than that of all the lands be-
longing to the Crown, or OF vast systems of
interior lakes and rivers. cut off by great
waterfalls from migrations from the seas.
Happp n xvnull ,,,t la Ill
our streams to be governed by the English
law, except under such notifications of
that law as adapts it TO our conditions,
geographic as well rs political. Thus,
while the common law may be well left to
work the building of fsh-ways over all our
dams Obstructing the Connecticut, n river
up which sea fishes have always run in their
season-a river, but for artificial obstruc-
tions, accessible TO many of the migratory
varieties up to its highest reaches, it can
hardly, by paralellism of right, beallowed
to coerce the binding Of fsh-ways for the
passage OF salmon up Otter creek above
Nergennes, in which no salmon ever vet
has been seen or caught, and up which no
salmon, the most active of all emigrants,
could ever go if every mill-dam along the
stream were torn down to its foundations.
IT ever in such rivers il may be a profitable
venture 10 lHtlOuuCe SdilnOn ana DINER sea-
going fish, the charge of iish-ways must be
upon the public and not upon mill-owners.
From what has been said it will be seen
that there can be no question OF the power
and the equitable right of our Legislature
to pass laws requiring the building of fish
ways over mill-dams situated on streams
which are natural shad and salmon streams.
1t only remains to show their uses and the
necessity for them.
Fishways are artificial channels in which
the water, instead of falling precipltately
from higher to a lower level, flows along
a regular slope so nearly approaching the
horizontal, and in which the velocity with
which the water descends is SO interrupted
that the fish, seeking to ascend, can stem
and ascend through the current, and thus
pass the obstacle made by the dam These
channels or conduts are made by excava-
iona In, loo L., l,1. Al. 4