THE ATLANTIC SALMON.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18173, 19 August 1922, Page 10

THE ATLANTIC SALMON.

ACCLIMATISATION WORK. EXTENSION CONTEMPLATED STOCKING ADDITIONAL RIVERS. [BT TELEGRAPH.-- SPECIAL REPORTER.] WELLINGTON. Friday. Dealing with the success attained in the acclimatisation of the quinnat salmon in New Zealand waters the Hon. G. J. Anderson, Minister for Marine, etated today that it wa 8 now 54 years since _ the first shipment of Atlantic salmon arrived in New Zealand. This shipment was brought out in tho ship Celestial Queen, which arrived at Port Chalmers on May 2, 1868. The shipment consisted of 200,000 eggs, obtained from the rivers Tay and Tweed, in Scotland, and the eggs survived the voyage. Up to 1902, about 15 shipments Aver© brought out, but several el tho earlier shipments arrived in bad condition, and none had a loss of leas than 25 per cent. Up to 1908 there was no proof that the fish had been acclimatised, as no salmon had been found which had returned from the sea, and were sexually matured. The Government then deoided to make a vigorous and systematic effort to establish the Atlantic salmon in one of the best rivers, and the Waiau River, in Southland, was chosen as the most suitable. Three shipments of eggs were imported from 1908 to 1911, 250.000 from Eastern Canada in 1908 and 1,000,000 in 1909. and"again in 1911 from Great Britain. The opinion was held by British, and other authorities that the "homing," or "narent" river instinct was strongly marked in the Atlantic salmon, and this seemed to bo borne out by the fact that tho larger number of fish observed spawnin<». had been in the TJpukuroro River, where they were originally reared. Now that the acclimatisation of the Atlantic salmon had become an established fact, it was the intention of the Government to collect as largo a quantity of eggs as possible next season for the purpose of stocking somo other suitable river, and to follow the same method of stocking, as had proved so successful in the case of the quinnat salmon.