The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1880-05-07
HOW FISH FIND THEIR OWN RIVERS.

The long held and only recently rejected
theory, that the shoals of fishes moved in a
vast mass along the coast, sending off detach-
ments into each river as they pass its mouth,
is to he attributed to John Gilpn and some
other authorities, who have written flowing
| ly on the subject The recent careful inves-
legations Of naturalists indicate that the
anadromous fishes, those entering the rivers
and bodies of fresh water from the sea, do
not have an extended range in the ocean and
that the.riyer's colony remains, after return
ing, in the deep waters opposite their riv-
| cr.
The motive for the movement of these
shoals of anadromous fishes, or rather how
it is melted, has scarcely been explained
The life of the fishes has always been a mys.
terry. 1t is not a search for food as they do
not eat while in fresh water the opening of
hundreds Of stomachs will fail to find food
present. 1t is an easy disposal of the quos-
tion as to how each colony recognize its ma
| tive river to say that 1T is instructive So it
is, also, VIXEN the butchers horse recognizes
the familiar gates but we have some evi
dence as to what sense he uses. The fishes.
probably, prompted by functional disturbance
from the tumid ovares and spermares, are
melted to movement The course of the sea
unmarked as they are, are within each colo
ny's limit, their hsbltual pathways An un.
erring capacity in the fish for finding its own
river may be more than that which guides
the hermt-crab to the ndticd The latter
goes to hide its sensitive body, with an appa
rent nervous trepidaton at its unprotected
condition. The former, with an uneasiness
of body from the functional changes it is un-
dergoing, is impeled to activity. The trans
mitted habit of ascending the stream u.s. as it
were, blended and aloyed with the substance
of the nerves, and reused by its condition.
carries it, without conscious purpose into the
river of its proeenitors and its own. The
impulses of the fish are only in slightly
more complicated series than those of the
crab. That it should be the instinct for a
specific stream, established through inheri-
tance of many generations is easier to under
stand than that it is sort Of memory or the
place of its immature life, as the theory of
tish-culture makes it, and as observation
seems to sustain. In the waters of the Della
ware, where there were no salmon originally,
the young salmon placed in Busbkill creek,
returned after five years, and were taken, not
only in the Delaware River, but the large
number in the neighborhood of Bushkill
creek 1t is not essential that all the fishes
should have this impelling influence, whatev-
er it may be, as like gregarious animals and
birds they flock together, following the lead
ership Of whichever for the time takes it,
The idea is suggested that the senses may be
along the coast, or tasting the streams, until
it recognizes its own The convexity of the
cornea must afford the fishes very limited
range of vision. The supposed dullness of the
sense of smell and of taste in fishes might
alone dispose of the suggestion that these are
employed. The following occurrence, how
ever, would seem to decide to the contrary
The Russian River, emptying into the Paci-
fic, north of San Francisco, had its mouth en-
tirely closed by the waves during storm
The colony OF salmon made their yearly mi
grafton from the deep waters toward the
mouth Of the river, and many of them raced
through the surf, and landed high and dry on
the sand that walled them out from their ma
tive river
The migration of the salmon into some OF
the Pacific rivers is IA frenzied advance over
shoals, rapids, aud cascades, far into thin
streams and brooks, where they arrive bat.
tered and weary, to accomplish their exhaust
i've reproductive labors and drop back, the
sport of the current, dead aud dying, towarC
the sea flames w. .Ntaer in HnPer's Mag
d.iRe for Ndy