Evening star., 1948-04-26

Snaooing shad during Potomt
The shad season Is here again.
It has arrived regularly each year since
the nrst settlers poked the prows OF their
ships past the Virginia Capes. 1t 1t the time
when Washington bills of fare are apt to
and bacon; the time when societies like the
Washington Board Of Trade are won't to in
dulge in the traditional custom OF holding
shad bakes, at which the succulent member
Of the herring family is split and planked to
. savory, smoky brown beside narrow trenches
Of glowing Goals; the time when snagging
becomes a popular pastime on the upper river.
But, will this always be so? Will this an
nual bounty so much a part Of the Capital
scene always be with us?
Behind the menus and the savory odors
there are strong possibilities it won't. Fed
eral fish experts warn, and have the sta
tistics to prove, that timely action is needed
to preserve the remnants of that horde of
Alosa Sapidissma Uatin for most palatable')
that once filled the Potomac and our other
Atlantic coastal rivers with living silver, some
times sold at = dollar the wagonload for
fertilizer
Inc simple IacC Oh Cne maCter Is CnaC the
shad run in the Potomac is being overhshed.
Probably none falls an easier prey to mans
eons-old genius for fashioning and setting
nets than this fsh ranked just below the
salmon and cod as Americas most important.
His rum unlike the salmon, Is concentrated
over a period of about six weeks in April and
May. He passes through well-worn and utterly
practicable watery bottlenecks in his migra-
tions. His slaughter can be made 90 per cent
effective. and with him dies the next. genera
tion Of his kind.
The Runs Are Growing Smaller.
There are abundant indications that the
Potomac shad run is likely to 60 the way Of
the Delaware rum now reduced virtually to
trickle (about a tenth of one per cent of it's
former size) unless more shad are permitted
to reach their spawning grounds between Oc-
coquan Bay and Little Falls above Chain
Bridge.
An infant shad has 4 1-in-50 chance of
Matching under conditions not complicated by
man.
He starts as q semibuoyant egg, one Of some
100000 deposited by some roe over a gravel
bar between the tidehead and the fall line.
Each day during sunlight hours the tiny
egg disappears, no one knows where. Each
night it rises to or near the surface, an easy
prey for predators and the vagaries of nature.
The tiny shad fry, still nourished by the
egg sac under his belly follows the same pc
culiar ritual, age old instinct telling him to
seek cover during daylight.
After three to five months in the river when
fall has dropped the water temperature below
so degrees, the tiny shad and those Of his
brothers and sisters lucky enough to have sur
vved 20 down to the sea.
From then on he is as good as lost for from
three to five years, no one knows for exactly
how long. Although adult shad have been
observed at sea of the Maine coast, they have
been few. Fewer yet have been caught. and
little is known of their offshore habits
That Urge to Migrate.
The same irresistible urge that sends salmon,
herring, alewives smelt and other anadromous
Coming to the rivers to spawn fish unerringly
back to the streams of their birth sends the
adult shad homing to the Potomac the Edisto
the Pee Dee the Hudson. the Housatonic or
another of our coastal streams.
Leaving the security Of salt water he now
comes in contact with the man made obstacles
80 deadly to his race-nets, dams and pollution
In the Delaware the foul sewer outpourings
OF Philadelphia and Wilmington have, virtually
made his return impossible. In the Hudson.
like the shad had returned in force to stay
pollution in some unknown way has edged past
the danger point affecting the survival of his
young after Matching
In the Susquehanna, the great power dam
at Conowingo cuts of this fish that steadfastly
refuses to use any but the largest and most
elaborate fishways.
In these rivers he either has disappeared
or is in imminent danger Of disappearing in
worthwhile numbers.
The Potomac shad's fate is less complex
Here pollution has not reached and likely
never will reach the danger point for shad
| No dams obstruct his route to the spawning
| grounds he has used since time immemorial
| Here in our river it is seines and drift nets
that prove his undoing, catching 80 per cent
| OF every run of fish.
Records in the possession of Miss Louella
Gable. shad expert for the United States Fish
and Wildlife Service, show that in 1896 the
Potomac produced 6s4oe3 shad weighing
1884, ,208 pounds. BY 1898 the catch dropped
permanently below the million-pound mark,
hit an all-time low of 102173 shad weighing
| 322,820 pounds in 1910, picked up to 1855 558
| weighing 537,700 in 1945 after the war had sent
| fishermen into service or provided them with
more lucrative defense jobs, and now is
slumping again.
The fact that the Potomac shad run is
falling OF has been known for many years,
but those concerned have felt there were other
means OF preserving it,, short Of forcing a
reduction in the number OF nets
= Conservation Plans.
Just as the country at large eagerly swallowed
national defense palliatives during the inter-
bellum. SO have fishermen and authorities al
layed their fears for the shad with talk of huge
hatcheries, pollution control limiting the size
OF nets and limiting the number of nets over
q certain size.
Miss Gable and others close to the shad stu-
alton have stopped kidding themselves and are
now trying to face the cold hard facts. They
have crossed Oh these half measures one by
one As follows: