July, 1883.
152
THE WEST SHORE.
but in many instances long ditches would have to
be constructed, which will require considerable
capital, but it will pay the " biggest kind " for
mining purposes alone, besides such ditches could
be made to at to cover large areas of excellent
agricultural land and thus be made permanent
and profitable investments. Uoise City Hepub
lienn. From Mr. Henry Dateman, who recently ar
rived here from the Okinagan country, where he
has been on a semi-prospecting and land hunting
tour, we learn that there have been some rich
quartz Icilges tounil In that conutry. lie says
that although there has been no extensive work
done on the ledges, the surface rock is all good
ore and will pay a large profit above mining en
penscs. There were only ten or twelve miners
in the country when he left, but while coming
this way he met a number going into the mines
and some have started since his return here,
The mines are situated on the fifteen-mile strip of
Moses' reservation, Lately thrown open to settle
ment. Mr. IUleman is of the opinion that there
will he at least 1,000 people in that country by
this time next year. The military officers who
have been over that section of country are so
favorably impressed with the richness of the
mineral deposits that (ieneral Miles has written
to the authorities at Washington, advising them
to pay for the fifteen-mile strip and buy the entire
reservation. Senator Jones, of Nevada, a well
known and successful mine owner, has sent a
prosccting party to the mining district to prospect
or ledges. The prospectors arc trusted and tried
mining experts, and upon their decision Senator
Jones will rely. The party was put in the field
at an outlay of $J.ooo and is provided with
every facility for thorough prospecting. There
re several old ledges in the Okanagan country
which were discovered ten or eleven years ago
and on which shafts have been sunk fifty or sixty
feet, which the discoverers did merely to work
oui ine assessments, out they had no show to
work the ore as the ledges were on the Indian
reservation. There is no doubt that when the
entiie reservation is thrown open and settlers be
gin to flock in, mines will be discovered that will
make Washington territory rank with the best
mineral producing countries in the known world
Cheney Ttibunt.
Fisheries.
The Coiuille Packing Co. is erecting a build,
ing at I'arkersbuig, to be used as a cannery and
storehouse. It will be in rcadin.-ts for the fall
run of salmon in the Coquille river.
Two canneries have been erected just west of
Tacouii, and are now being fated up with ma.
chinery. They will be leady ftsr business by the
lime the fall run commences, and will give em
pIxyaHiit to some 300 men. "Tacoma Salmon"
ill be a new brand in the market.
At Clinton, six miles from Moscow, Idaho,
John Wolf has a pond containing about c.ooo
Uerman carp, both large and small. Two years
ago nt procured seven from California at five
dollars each, and this is the natural Increase.
The fish tell at the pood for a dollar each, and
Mr. Wolf aaseru that they pay better then wheat.
All canned salmon seeking an eastern market
has heretofore been sent by way of San Francisco,
and as the rate from Astoria to that city is twenty
cents per case, the packers of Sacramento fish
have had that much advantage over the Oregon
canners. As soon as the Northern Pacific is com
pleted, lish from the Columbia can be forwarded
to Chicago and New York as cheaply as from the
Sacramento, and then our packers will have
opened to them a large market which has been
practically closed in the past,
Spencer T. Baird, the U. S. Fish Commissioner
at Washington, has written as follows to Hon
M. C. George: "In compliance with your re
quest, 1 have sent Livingston stone, the officer in
charge of the McCloud river station, to make a
thorough exploration of the Columbia river, with
a view of determining at what points hatcheries
can best be established for the purposes of increas
ing the supply in the Columbia river." This is
certainly a step in the right direction, and the
next thing to do is to establish the hatcheries as
soon as Mr. Stone selects the proper location.
It now remains to be seen how much delay will
lie caused by red tape. It generally takes the
government two years to accomplish as much as a
business man can do in two months.
The canning season on the Columbia ends by
statutory provision on the thirty-first of July. On
the eighteenth the following resume of the season's
business was given by the Astorian, the best
authority on the salmon industry on the coast :
The present season has been most singular in
every respect. Starting with an unprecedented
amount of gear, with a most unfavorable market.
an inability to effect satisfactory sales, and a gen
eral belief in a short, catch, the canneries hav
throughout been in a most unsatisfactory position
1 he price of fish was set at the start at a fimire
.1 1. 1. . . ... . .. . 7.
consHieramy in advance 01 the price paid last
season. This had the effect of bringing up sufficient
iisnermen irom tne Sacramento to catch during
May and June all that came into the river ! during
.u... .... . .
Hicsc imiimis no uucmpi was mane more than
once to lower the prices, those who had their all
in the business lieine unable to see how th hih
price of the raw material and the low ptice of the
uwKciaoie arucie leu any mari'in for nrnfit
From seventy-five cents to one dollar wn nii,l
r- c.... 1 n 1 1 . . 1
iui .mi, mm mi mai nas Deen nackeii nn in r
cently cost, on an average, ninety cpni a HA
up 10 june 15111 it was believed by many that
the Dflck Would nut f.vrl inn fw . 1
ably it would be just as well, taking everything
into consideration, had events made good the
prophecy. Hut the increased number nf mnnjar-ic
and the extraordinary diligence manifested in
catching the fish ran the fitMirM im ror.1,11., .
that on the first of this month there were 340,500
. iiciug pui up; ine pack lor the
... oj, iu Hine aate, oeing reckoned at
vi. rrom ine way the sa mon hav hn
coming in since the 1st instant, more especially
during the last week, it is evident that the pack
will be fully up to last season's figures; should
the canneries all run to their full capacity to the
first of August this season's nirk will .-.i .1...
of'Si. -r--- u.
It is not their intention. The CTnrro I Irian
seems to be to fill all the cant on hand, or at least
10 use up all the tin plate in stock. Several of
" nave reiusea tisti this week.-excent (n
a certain limit. Others, who .lri r I.-.
lake a specified number, and when they are dis
posed of spend the remainder of the day in making
The extraordinary run of this month hat not
iwen equaled in site and numlwrs since 1879 It
hat been no uncommon thing for the fishermen to
bring in a hundred to the boat, and, of course,
the price at once fell. Since Monday, fish have
"guret rar uelow what would havelcattle.
been looked upon as a fair price twenty days ago.
Thirty cents, and from that to fifty, has been the
figure, and on yesterday's steamer went a large
crowd of fishermen who refused to catch at those
prices.
The state of affairs is very unsatisfactory. A
man who has invested a large amount of capital,
and who has been filling his cans with ninety-cent
fish all the season, can not feel very complacent
over matters when they come swarming in now in
such numbers as to exceed the capacity of the
canneries to dispose of them, and at the same
lime the question in his mind whether it is best to
keep on even on thirty-cent fish or to knock off
altogether and quit for the season. We do not
wholly agree in the opinion that the knowledge
that there is an unusual pack on the Columbia
river this season is going to keep the price of fish
down. The market for salmon, both in thit
country and in England, depends, of course,
primarily on the price at which it leaves the house
of the retailer, but it depends in a greater degree
on the demand. In this particular, fortunately
for our staple, the demand is a growing one. A.
good many exaggerated reports have been made
concerning the large stocks now on hand in
England. These stocks are not as large as rep
resented, and it will be the first of November be
fore the season's pack reaches England. The
large percentage which, this season, goes on con
signment, renders this an important item in itt
final disposition. Of course, to those who have
made sales, the matter is final.
The present result of the season that is now
closing will have great influence on future business.
It demonstrates the fact that the salmon are not
" giving out," for no better or bigger salmon have
ever been caught in the Columbia than are now
heading up stream to spawn. It will tend to
legitimatize the business and make it partake
more of the nature of usual lines of trade than has
heretofore been characteristic. The time has gone
by when a man could make a fortune in one
season on the Columbia river, but the time will
never be when by the same care and dilieence
applied to ordinary branches of trade, a man can
not mike money. That the business it now over
done is evident.
COLUMBIA RIVER LANDS.
It is with pleasure we again record the success
ful cultivation of th: lands along the Columbia
river, running back some twenty miles, which
have been universally condemned as "too dry."
Three years ago a company was organized to ex
periment with these lands, and a tract of over
5,000 acres was secured in the northwestern por
tion of Umatilla county. Amid all the prophesies
of failure the owners of Prospect Farm went sys
tematically to work and astonished everybody by
raising a crop of wheat averaging nearly twenty
five bushels to the acre. "You can't do it
again," was the cry that met them whenever they
boasted of their success. They did do it again,
and the people began to change their opinion
about that class of land. Many claimt have been
taken up by settlers and by men desiring to farm
on an extensive scale, and the probabilities are
that there will be a great demand for land of thit
character. The present season was the dryest
experienced here for yeart and if ever eropt may
be expected to fail in that region they thould have
done to now, and yet on Prospect Farm the crop
is turning out thirty bushels to the acre, and near
Alkali a farm of 1,000 acres on the same kind of
land and in the tame dry region it averaging
twenty-five bushelt to the acre. There are
thousands of acres of this land open to settlement
or purchase, and in a few years there will no
doubt be a continuous line of farms upon what
hat always been considered no better thin a desert
or at best fitted only for the grazing of sheep and