Daily Arizona silver belt., 1907-10-17
STANDARD OCTOPUS SHOULD GRAB SALTON
 SEA AS 4 WORLD'S FISHERY
Possibilities of This Inland Ocean Would Drive Day Dreamer to Distraction Gould Easily Corner
 the Fish Markets of the World

One of the most interesting sights
 enjoyed by the travellers over the
 Southern Pacific the present summer
 has been watching the fish in the Sal
 ton sea. When the water of the Col
 orado river broke into the basin the
 great fish population was carried with
 it and there is now a. myriad of fish
 of varying size, many of them, like the
 Colorado salmon, being of an edible
 variety, says the Republican.
 So numerous are the fish that where
 the railroad crosses an arm of the sea i thousands may be seen from the car
 windows and platforms, sporting in the
 water under the trestle work and,
 strange as it may seem, they are ob- l livious to the noise or presence of the
 train The dining ear employees dump the kitchen refuse into the water and
 the fish eagerly dispose of it. The the ory advanced by some is that the fish are starving to death and have learned
 that about the only feeding place is where the railroad crosses the water. That is the reason they crowd to that point, having no fear of the train. They have learned to appreciate the whistle of the engine very much as the farmer boy does the dinner horn and respond just as quickly. When it is remembered | that the bed of the sea is nothing but | sand and salt, that very little vegeta-
 tion grows along its banks and that | little insect life infests the locality, it is not unnatural to suppose that the fish | have a hard time to get enough to eat. This condition is worse now than ever, since the Colorado river has been shut out and no new water freighted with fish food finds its way in, while the water already there is constantly talk ing on more saline mixture through evaporation.
 It may be expected as these condi- tions grow more and more strenuous that the fresh water fish will gradually evolve into salt water animals or, fol lowing the impulse of man, who adapts himself to conditions, will eventually have to carry canteens of fresh water for drinking purposes. There will sure ly be some interesting changes from the viewpoint of the nature faker or else the fish will have to die, an al- formative that the sympathetic do not
 ike to consider.
 1t has been suggested by one stu dent of natural history that someone with commercial instinct may make a fortune by waiting until the sea dries up a little more and the fish become so thoroughly saturated with salt that they succumb. The salt in them would preserve them, and all the business man would have to do would be to dry the | dead ones and box them up for the mar ket as dry salt fish. Another man sug- gests securing the lease of the lake | and planting it to eodfsh. It will not | dry up for great many years, but | when the final harvest comes he would | be able to practically control the dry | :odfish market. If not enough for cod fish ehe sea could be planted to bar racuda, mackerel. sea bass and ocean fish. They would find enough to live on for a long time to come by eating up the fresh water fish. By the time they were gone there would be enough | small salt water fish for the larger | ones to eat and in that way fishing preserve could be built up where the most unskillful angler could be sure of a bite. Transportation facilities would be incomparable, for the railroad is right here.
 If this proved success, before the sea finally dried up if the promoters were not already millionaires and anx- ious to retire, it would not cost a great deal not near as much as it did to stop the Colorado intake, to construct a pipe line and siphon enough water out of the Gulf of California to fill the sea up again, as the sea is two or three hundred feet below ocean level. The man who has foresight enough to seize this opportunity can corner the fish market of the country, for he will have his ocean fish where they can't get away, and he can plant them so thick