THE SALMON EXPERIMENT.

Southland Times, Issue 736, 14 October 1867, Page 3

THE SALMON EXPERIMENT.

(From the Melbourne Argus.)

It is to be hoped that no mistake has occurred in connection with the efforts to acclimatise the salmon in the waters of Tasmania. We have long ago abandoned the idea that anything better than failure had resulted from the ill-judged attempt to rear salmon from the ova placed in Badger Creek. "When in the first heavy freshet in that bed of mountain waters, the breeding places — boxes, ova, gravel, and all — were swept down into the " overflowing " Tarra, it was evident that nothing more was to be anticipated from that branch of the experiment. The ova would never come to life. At best they would serve as a titbit for the breakfast or supper of an acclimatised Murray , cod, whom nature would teach to appreciate the novel food accident had brought him- in contact with. It is true that veracious anglers have protested, by all that is sacred in the eyes of Waltoniana, that they have seen fish leaping in the Tarra that they were certain were young salmon. A disciple of the angle went so far as to assert that he had absolutely caught one, and after submitting it to the inspection of a skilled neighbor, hastily called to the scene, had restored it to the waters. It is also true that the blacks, acclimatised to semi-civilised habits at the reserve near Watts' Creek, were reported to make prey last season of numerous fish not before known in the Tarra ; and that the Acclimatisation Society, hoping beyond hope, jumped to the conclusion that these reputed strangers were nothing less than young " lords of the river," genuine descendants of those silver-laced " monarchs" of the English rivers, whose praises it has been the pleasure of river poets to sing since time began. But we fear Mr Sprigg was premature in the assurance at which he arrived, and that the police he summoned to assist him in the protection of the little strangers, have found no work to do. Nothing has since been heard of the Tarra salmon. The reports respecting them ceased as suddenly as they • began. The veracious angler, whose Sunday morning's sports in Studley Park so unexpectedly eventuated in the capture of a real young salmon of English parentage, has been incapable of repeating his capture ; and the blacks have not been ablo to furnish more testimony on the one side or the other. The fish they caught were probably brown trout, the produce of imported ova. That no salmon has returned to the Tarra from the sea, if ever a fry went down it to the waters of the bay, may be assumed almost too surely as a matter of fact.

Have we any greater assurance that the experiment in Tasmania has been attended with more certain results ? We have been in the habit of felicitating ourselves that a very great and important work in acclimatisation has been actually accomplished. It was assumed, in the great demonstration on the banks of the Shannon to Mr Toul, with which the Gralway papers made us acquainted the other day, that there was nothing more to do — that, in fact, the British salmon was now a colonist, and for all lime to come as much a Tasmanian fish as the trumpeter. We should be sorry to cast, without good reason, the smallest cloud on this fair prospect, or to damp in the slightest degree the enthusiasm of the gentlemen to whose patriotism and liberality we owe all that has been done in this singularly interesting matter. But we must ask, if only to incite people to renewed exertions, on what evidence do we found the belief that the experiment is an entire success, and that we have nothing more to do than to fold our hands in idleness, and wait patiently to see what we shall see ? We know that the ova placed in the ponds of the Plenty, came in due time to life ; that in their season the tiny things became parr ; that, in following thuir instincts, some went earlier than others from the shelter of the ponds of their childhood, to seek for the adventures of young salmon life, and that they were followed at a later season by the laggards, who also took a seaward coarse. But at this unsatisfactory stage, the positive testimony ceases. Nothing was seen or heard of the young fish on their passage, and nothing certain has been seen of them on their return. It is true that three or four gentlemen ha.ye testified that, about the time when the young grisle might be expected back from the sea, they saw fish leap in the Derwent, near its junction with the Plenty, which their recollection, extending back to days of boyhood, induced them to believe were young salmou. This, however, is very vague evidence on which to base any superstructure cf hopes. Were the fish which were seen to leap acclimatised brown trout, which had come down from the Plenty, or were they grilse seeking the river of their nativity for spawning purposes? It is diflicult to answer the question. It would be hard, indeed, for a person who had not, mayhap for forty years, seen either a big healthy brown trout or a very young salmon — pink, wbitling, or whatever else £QU may cfttt Mm-^throw himself iram

| the water in chase of a fly, to disi tinguish between their leaps, or to say J from the curl on the surface of the river whether it was made by the one fish or the other. "We know that Mr Earnsbottom has netted large-sized trout not far from, if not in, the reach of the river where the supposed salmon were seen to leap, and it is therefore open to us/ to conjecture that the fish which were supposed to be grilse returning from the sea were only large brown trout in search of flies. Nets have been kept in readiness to enfold, for identity's sake only, any forerunner of his race who might find his | way up the Derwent and into the Plenty ; but the watchers on the banks have not yet "been rewarded by the capture of a single genuine grilse. We may express 8 hope from these premises that over confidence in the success of what has been done will not induce the acclimatisers to suppose that their work in this matter is fully accomplished. The natural enemies of the salmon are not more numerous in Tasmania than in British waters. But, after all, tho number of salmon fry that went seawards to change their condition was but small, considering the risks to be run. The introduction of the ova from the fish of British rivers should be continued season after season till success is assured. It is obvious now that for some time to come New Zealand, as well as Victoria, must wait for the supplies of ova they expected from the fish presumed to be acclimatised in the Derwent.