SALMON-FISHING IN THE FAR NORTH
Tide that rises twenty-five feet--Wholesale suicide of
salmon--Fish-eyes as a delicacy for sea-gulls--How the
natives store fish for the sledge-dogs--The three varieties
of salmon--An Arcadian land for the birds.
Leaving the mouth of the Tigil River, we steamed northward into the
upper arm of the Okhotsk Sea. The shore line showed rolling hill and
mountain country without much timber. Three days of steady steaming
brought us to the extreme limits of the Okhotsk Sea, at the mouth of
the Ghijiga River. Owing to the shallowness of the water, we were
obliged to anchor eighteen miles off shore. We had on board a small
steam-launch, for use in towing the lighters to the shore, each
lighter carrying about twenty-five tons. The launch and lighters were
soon put over the side and their cargoes loaded into them. At ten
o'clock at night we set off toward the shore. It was necessary to
start at that hour in order to get over the bar at flood-tide. We
entered the mouth of the river at three in the morning. The sun was
already up. The width of the estuary was considerable, but it was
enormously increased by the tide, which rises twenty-five feet and
floods the fields and plains on either side. The air was literally
full of sea-gulls, flying very high. Some of them were going inland,
and some out to sea. The odor of decaying fish was almost
overpowering, and was plainly perceptible five miles out. This was
caused by the enormous number of dead salmon that lay on the bar,
having been swept down the river.
About the tenth of June the salmon come in from the sea and work their
way up the river until the lack of water bars their further progress.
Salmon do not run up these rivers until they have attained their sixth
year of growth. From the moment they enter the fresh water of the
river, they get no food whatever. For this reason they must be caught
near the river's mouth to be in good condition. The female, having
gone far up the river, finds a suitable place, and deposits her eggs;
after which the male fish hunts them out and fertilizes them. As soon
as this has been accomplished there begins a mad rush for death.
However many millions of salmon may run up the river, not one ever
reaches the sea again alive. They race straight up the river, as if
bent on finding its source. When the river narrows down to two hundred
feet in width, and is about a foot deep, the fish are so crowded
together that the water fairly boils with them. And still they
struggle up and ever up. One can walk into the water and kill any
number of them with a club. After the fish have gone up the river in
this fashion for fifty or sixty miles, they are so poor that they are
worthless as food, for they have been working all this time on an
empty stomach. As they fight their way up, they seem to grow wilder
and wilder. Whole schools of them, each numbering anywhere from a
hundred to a thousand, will make a mad rush for the shore and strand
themselves. This is what the gulls have been waiting for. They swoop
down in immense flocks and feast upon the eyes of the floundering
fish. They will not deign to touch any other part. Bears also come
down the river bank and gorge themselves. I have seen as many as seven
in a single day, huge black and brown fellows, feasting on the fish.
They eat only certain parts of the head, and will not touch the body.
They wade into the water and strike the fish with their paws and then
draw them out upon the bank. Wolves, foxes, and sledge-dogs also feast
upon the fish, and for the only time during the year get all they
want.
[Illustration: A River of Dead Salmon--August.]
As the fish get further and further away from the sea, their flesh
grows loose and flabby, the skin sometimes turning black and sometimes
a bright red. They dash themselves against stones, and rub against
the sharp rocks, seemingly with the desire to rub the flesh off their
bones. The eggs of the salmon remain in the river during the winter,
and it is not until the following spring that the young fish are swept
down to the sea by the spring floods.
Along the banks of the river live the half-breed Russians and the
natives in their miserable shanties and skin huts. They fish with long
nets made of American twine. Fastening one end of the net to a stake
on one side of the river, they carry the other end to the opposite
side. In an hour or more, the farther end is brought back with a wide
sweep down stream, which, of course, is the direction from which the
fish are coming. The two ends are brought together, and a team of a
dozen sledge-dogs hauls the net to the bank. The children kill the
fish with clubs. Then they are carried to the women, who squat upon
the sand, and, with three deft sweeps of a sharp knife, disembowel
them, and cut off the thick pieces of flesh on each side of the
backbone. These pieces are dried in the sun and form the chief article
of food among this people. It is called by them _yukulle_. The
backbone, the head, and the tail, which remain after the meat is cut
off, are then dried, and they form the staple food for the
sledge-dogs.
After they have cut up enough fish for one year's consumption, they
make yet another large catch and throw the whole lot into a pit and
cover them with earth. If there should be no run of fish the following
year, these pits could be opened up and the contents fed to the dogs,
thus saving their valuable lives. The natives, who live mainly on
fish, will not cure more than enough for a single season's use.
[Illustration: A River of Dead Salmon--August.]
They may lay up future store for their dogs, but not for their
children. When an old fish-pit is opened up the stench is terrible,
but this does not trouble the dogs, for they will eat anything into
which they can bite. If the natives were willing to work fifteen days
longer, they could easily lay up enough food to tide over any ordinary
famine, but they will not do this unless forced to it. Consequently,
the Russian Government compels one or two from each family to work on
certain government nets, every fish caught being put in the
"fish-bank" and a record kept of the exact number due each individual
who helps work the nets. During several successive good years, enough
fish are laid up to supply the people at least in part during times of
scarcity. If these should not suffice, the government would buy up
reindeer from natives in the interior at fifty kopeks a head, and feed
them to the destitute people. Fifty kopeks make twenty-five cents in
United States currency, which seems a small price to pay for a
reindeer, but in the country of which we are writing that is a good
average price. A failure of the fish crop occurs about once in seven
years. For some reason not yet ascertained, the fish will entirely
desert a river for a season. Not infrequently it is found that of two
rivers whose mouths are not more than a few miles apart, the salmon
will frequent one and not the other.
The Russian Government forbids the export of salmon caught in the
rivers or within two miles of their mouths. While the people do not
destroy a thousandth part of one per cent. of the fish that run up the
river, we must bear in mind that not a single fish gets back to the
sea after depositing its eggs. As the fish are killed as near as
possible to the river's mouth, an enormous number of eggs are
destroyed. There is, therefore, a possibility of seriously diminishing
the supply if a wholesale slaughter takes place when the fish come in
from the sea. If they were taken after the eggs are deposited it would
be another matter; but this is never the case.
These salmon are of three different varieties, called, respectively,
the silver salmon, the "hump-backed" salmon, and the "garboosh." The
weight of a full-grown salmon is from eighteen to twenty-five pounds.
There is in the rivers another fish called the salmon-trout. It has a
dark-green back, with vivid pink spots, and it is a most delicious
article of food. The little lakes in the tundra also contain a fish
somewhat resembling the pickerel, which the natives catch in traps.
These are set in the little creeks leading from the tundra lakes. They
are cylindrical baskets, five feet long and three feet wide, and are
set in an opening in a dam built, for the purpose, of reeds and
stakes. Often as many as a dozen fish are taken from the traps at a
single catch. At the time when the salmon are running, hundreds of
sea-dogs (hair-seal) are attracted to the mouth of the river by the
smell of dead fish. As we went in from our steamer, they kept lifting
their heads from the water all about us, and afforded some good
shooting. The natives take them in huge nets made of walrus thongs
with a mesh of six inches or more. A good haul may net as many as
thirty of these big fellows, which weigh up to four hundred pounds
apiece. Their fur is of a mottled or speckled color. They are in high
repute among the natives, who use their hides for boots. The women are
able to sew them so as to be perfectly water-tight. The blubber is a
delicacy which is eaten cold. It is also made into oil, and in a
shallow dish, with a piece of moss for a wick, it forms the ordinary
lamp of the native. The sea-gulls, on their way north to breed, arrive
in May, and the air is simply filled with them. They make their nests
on rocky declivities or beside the rivers, or even on the open tundra.
The nesting and hatching of their young comes at such a time that it
just matches the running of the salmon, which is very convenient. The
young mature very quickly. When newly hatched they are gray. When they
come back the following season only their wings are gray, the body
being white. The egg harvest is a very important one to the natives,
who preserve the eggs by burying them in the ground on the north side
of a hill where there is perpetual frost. Besides the gulls, there are
countless ducks, geese, and snipe. These last often fly in such dense
flocks that the boys stand and throw clubs among them, and bring down
half a dozen at a throw. These youngsters are also very skilful with
the sling, and bag many ducks and geese with this primitive weapon. I
have seen a boy bring down a single goose with one of these slings,
though the general rule is to throw into a flock on the chance of
hitting one. Birds of all kinds here find the richest feeding-grounds
in the world. The sea birds, in countless numbers, feed upon the
salmon, while the insectivorous birds have only to open their mouths
to have them filled. At this season the ground is quite covered with
berries, which have been preserved all winter under the snow. Among
these are cranberries, blueberries, and huckleberries. When the birds
arrive in the spring they are generally poor, but ten days suffice, on
this rich fare, to make them fat. An hour's stroll is enough to use up
all the gun-shells one can conveniently carry, and to bag more game
than one can bring home. The hunter has only to sit down in a "goose
lane" or behind a blind of some sort, and shoot birds right and left.
The few merchants who reside in these trading posts kill large
quantities of birds in the season, and keep them in cold storage,
which can be found almost anywhere a few feet below the surface of the
ground. The natives, as a rule, are too poor to own shot-guns, and so
do not profit largely by this generous supply of feathered game.