The Daily Alaska empire Newspaper, January 28, 1934, Page 16

et s e s DEVELOPMENT EDITION—THE DAILY ALASKA EMPIRE, SUNDAY, JAN. 28, 1934. N { 0 8 By | FRANK T. BELL United States Commissioner of Fisheries | ITH the advent of the new year of 1934 many people |in Alaska no doubt are greatly | interested in what is to be done in the coming season regarding | the regulation of the fisheries. For | some time there have been rumors and counter-rumors as to this or | that drastic or sweeping action in the matter, and thus it may be timely to point out some actual | changes of primary interest. | The new annual issue of regu- | lations was signed by Secretary | Roper to be effective on January {1934, | based upon investigations which I ! made in Alaska during the past | season. Public hearings were con- | ducted at 20 places, and every | interested person was given the | fullest possible opportunity to | present his views. I made every | effort to contact everyone who I | thought might be able to give me |a complete picture of the fisheries |of Alaska and the needs for their 'prol(‘(lion and conservation. | As a result of my findings, the Fchanges in the regulations effective on January | have two outstand- ling features: (a) proper protec- tion of the fisheries, and (b) “humanizing’”’ the fisheries to the fullest extent practicable, so that PYRAMID PACKING COMPANY Incorporated CANNED SALMON those persons using small types . | of gear may have a better oppor- tunity to make a livelihood. This is directly in accordance with the ment as widely as possible. Probably the outstanding fea- ture of the new regulations is the reduction in the number of fish | traps, which class of gear makes CANNERY AT SITKA, ALASKA 380 Colman Building | large numbers of persons. Another of a number of waters giving employment to much larger All told, 93 trap sites—60 in These regulations are | President’s wish to spread employ- | large catches but does not employ | { | numbers of persons than do traps. | by the new regulations. | | Dutie Conservation of the Fisheries of Alaska T i e P § Federal Official Much of Whose| ... ... ' , Center in Alaska : . AR R ITT —By Courtesy of FRANK T. United States Commissioner SEATTLE, WASHINGTON | important change is the opening| to seines | and other smaller forms of gear previously closed About 30 bays and other waters to all commer | cial fishing for salmon are opened Most o these are in Southeast Alaska, but Southeast and 33 in other parts| some are in other parts of the of ‘Alaska—are closed by the new | Territory. regulations. The records show It is my feeling that the new | that the traps thus closed caught|regulations will meet with gen over 4,500,000 salmon in the last|eral approval upon the part of the year of their operation. e ||||||||||||l||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||l|||||||||||||lll|||||||||||||l||"|||||||||||||l|||||||' T AR ~“';‘""";;""":""'7'":“ ""%:“'""“""”“ i Close Co-operation is Keynote By H. B. FRIELE, President Association of Pacific Fisheries siderable rise in commodity prices and increased buying power of « the public ticipated in July and August have not mater- ialized, There isstilla large volume of pack to be sold before the 1934 sea- son begins, a Snug Harbor Packing Co. little larger than last year at the change of the vear. Compe- tition with T=zs H. B. FRIELE other canned fish products is be- coming keen—the increasing im- | portations of Japanese canned tuna, taking advantage of the de- preciated currency of Japan, men- aces not only the California tuna canner but also the higher grades | of canned salmon; on the other { hand, the California mackerel pack of this year is greater than ever | before and is causing trouble for the cheaper varieties of salmon, particularly chums. The total mack- erel pack this season is in the neighborhood of 800,000 cases of 48 1 pound talls, as compared with 'practlcnlly nothing last year. Price cutting by Alaska salmon canners to meet these competing items would be disastrous not only to the | canners themselves and to their employees, the supply houses, ete., but even to the Territory itself be- cause of the greatly reduced oper- . |ations that would result in 1934. For that reason, we are relying on more orderly marketing, higher quality and better standardized canned salmon to pull us through As well over 90 percent of our in- dustry signed the President’s Re- employment Agreement last sum- mer and is under the Blue Eagle labor costs were increased, parti- cularly in late Alaska districts and the State of Washington. It seems unfair, therefore, that we should suffer in any way from foreign competition and we may follow the lead of California tuna packers in appealing to the President and the NRA for increased duties and quo- tas on imported canned fish to protect the rising Amerfcan stan- dard of living under the NRA. PACKERS OF GANNED SALMON Smith Tower, Seattle PLANT—Snug Harbor, Alaska Our industry is relatively bettcrilmn held in off than a year ago but the con- |for the purpos generally an- ‘ | people of Alaska and those en |ing and standardizing the quality | | of its pack. I am referring to the first Annual Cutting Demonst Seattle last Mar of acquainting su- perintendents and foremen, as well | as the packers themselves, with the | mon from various districts and var- ious plants. Tt was not possible to have a thoroughly representative number of samples of canned sal- mon to cut and examine in detail because over 50 percent of the 1932 pack had already been sold, how- ever, the second cutting demon- stration, which will take place in March, will have the great advan- tage of covering all of the packs from all districts, and all grades, through the cooperation of the American Can Company and the Continental Can Company in as- sembling the samples. Each lot of samples which is cut at these dem- onstrations is judged by a group of experienced brokers and salmon examiners who are especially fam- iliar with the species of salmon being examined. Government offi- cials are also invited to be pres- ent. Addresses by these officials and by experienced salmon exam- iners, as well as reports by the chairman of each group of exam- iners, proved to be most interest- ing and of special benefit to su- perintendents and foremen, show- ing them the work that is being done by other superintendents and foremen +in the different districts. The other great advance made during 1933 referred to above was the installation of Salmon Pack Inspection by the National Cans ners Association laboratory and| staff in Seattle. It was a tremen- dous job to examine carefully and report in detail on 2,267 different parcels of salmon, aggregating 4,- 000,000 cases in all. The industry has been glad to undertake this thorough pack inspection at its own expense in order to assure it- self that only salmon in good con- dition would be shipped out into consuming centers. The results of this pack inspection service have been highly satisfactory, and the industry at the last annual con- vention voted unanimously to con- tinue the pack inspection and to extend it to those salmon canning concerns outfitting in San Fran- cisco. Judging by the results of the salmon pack inspection work this year, there is no question that the installation of this system and the effect of the annual salmon cut- ting last spring were to greatly improve the quality of canned sal- During 1933 the salmon canning industry took two great strides | mon from every standpoint thus the News-Tribune, Tacoma BELL of Fisheries gaged in the industry, both pack ers and fishermen. Naturally it is out of the question to think of satisfying everyone, but I feel that the liberalization and humaniza tion of the regulations will be| broadly beneficial to all concerned, ! - ¥ \Charles E. Bunnell and the cour- and at the same time Alaska’s|tesy of the officers of the Fair- greatest natural resource - the|panks Exploration Company, col- fisheries—will be properly con-|lecting of the bones of the anf- served. mals that lived during the Pleisto- | competitive situation mentioned above. Labor matters have required a h | great deal of attention this year,|the muck of the valleys, first because the industry wished to employ as many as possible of Alaska residents and for that rea- actual appearance of packs of sal- | gon it established employment of- | the bones, this muck overlying and fices in Ketchikan, Juneau and Anchorage—through these offices Alaskans were put in touch with the superintendents of a large number of different canneries with the result that several hundred Alaskans secured employment in the canneries that they might oth- erwise not have done. It is plan- ned to continue these employment offices and to make them as effi- cient as possible this coming sea- son. ‘Through the request of the Asso- ciation of Pacific Fisheries and the National Canners Association, and their insistence that the salmon packers sign up, we are glad to state that well over 90 percent of our industry signed up the Presi- dent’s Reemployment Agreement and is entitled to have the Blue Eagle. The payments for wages to cannery workers were therefore in- creased in many cases during the season, and it is expected will be increased for the 1934 season. Fur- thermore, the industry has cooper- ated in every possible way with the labor officials of the National Recovery Administration in work- ing out plans for better methods of handling contract labor, raising wages, and in other ways provid- ing many safe-guards for those employed in the salmon canning industry under the labor section of the salmon canning industry code, which will finally be adopted after the details have been worked out with government officials. The industry is facing some unique conditions in operations caused by new economic conditions as well as by new Government con- trol under the NRA and otherwise. I think the industry realizes the gituation and has already shown itself willing to do its part in meet- ing the desires of the government and cooperating with labor as well as government officials in solving the problems as they come up. We also appreciate the deep interest of the Territory of Alaska, as well as the Alaskans individually in co- operating with us in every possible way. We wish to work in close co- operation with them, as well as with government officials in Wash- ington, as we realize it is only by all those interested in our indus- try pulling together that we can do our share to pull our industry out of the depression and in so do- forward in the direction of improv- | enabling us to better meet theling help other allied Alaska indus- .QQj!tv | tries out of their difficulties. I feel the past year has shown a fine spirit of cooperation between the people of Alaska and the salmon | industry, which I think we all should realize is of utmost im- portance, as only through such co- operation and a united front can the industry, to the benefit of all connected with same, prosper and meet difficulties, and competition from other food products which are continuously invading our can- ned salmon markets. Our—and by our I mean the people of Alaska— and the salmon industry's keynote} for the coming year should be “through close cooperation and united front we will guard our own industry PALAEONTOLOGY RIGHT AT HOME | By 1 PROFESSOR WILKERSON The Ice Age, geologically known | the Pleistocene Period, found 1 laska climatically and topograph- {ically not very unlike today. Dur- iing the Ice Age some 4,000,000 sq. mi. of North America were covered | by the various glacial advances, | | reaching as far south as the Ohio | |and Missouri rivers. Alaska was| | free from glaciers except in its| | mountainous areas. | { The Territory presents a rich [life of the Pleistocene, scattered | | remains of that life occurring| throughout many sections. Space | | does not permit even the naming ' | of all the animals that were known | | to exist in Alaska but a few of the larger ones are here mentioned: | Elephas primigenius or the hairy mammoth; mastadon; both the | true and extinct species of Olvibus, or the musk ox; reindeer; moose; | caribou; mountain sheep and mountain goats; bison, both the | long horned and also those re-| | sembling recent species; horse; bea- | ver; various members of the cat| and bear families and various oth- er carnivores. Specimens Gathered Through the efforts of President |as {cene times has been carried on| during the past five summers joint- KARL THEILE, President Juneau, Alaska DIAMOND 1§ K PACKING Co. Incorporated PACKERS OF Choice Alaska Canned SALMON H. KITTILSBY, Superintendent Cannery Wrangell, Alaska ly by the American Museum of Natural History and the Alaska College. These bones are tempor- arily deposited in the American Museum for exhibition and study and some, when the animals are reconstructed, will be placed in the Alaska College museum. | | Throughout Alaska the bones of | | these animals have been found in in the Tanana Silts, and also in the more |recent river gravels. In the Fair-| | banks district the muck contains | underlying and mixed with “ground jice” formations in which solid beds |of ice of considerable thickness take the place of solid rock stra- ta. A considerable percentage of the remains of the former life of the district is to be found in bone pits, as if the animals had all died of some common cause at these places. * Coexistence of man and the mammoth, mastadon, and the su- per-bison in America and Europe has advanced beyond the stage of theory. In the Fairbanks district arrow heads and other works of /man have been found and it is hoped that the coming season’s| work will prove more conclusively that man coexisted with the mam- moth in the great interior of Al- aska. What a sport it must have been for mdn to hunt the great Mammoth with a bow and ar- TOWS. Among all the problems of the Pleistocene extinction in Alaska and the rest of North America, that of the horse and the Mam- moth are perhaps the most diffi- cult. The horse migrated fo Asia— but why? The Mammoth died out —but why? Because of disease? Because of inbreeding? Because of the influence of cold during the reproducing period? No one knows the answer. Perhaps future work in the Fairbanks district will an-| swer the puzzling questions of the Pleistocene. RAILROAD WILL USE TWO EXTRA GANGS IN TRACK BALLAST WORK Two large extra gangs are to be used early this year on the Alaska Railroad to complete the ballast work between North Ne- nana and Fairbanks. A steam shov- el will be used to load the mater- jal at Milepost 392, and another one will be used for loading ballast material between McKinley Park Station and Summit. WAGON ROAD GREAT HELP TO OPERATORS A government wagon road into the Nabesna section is proving of great help to the operators and prospectors in that mining dis- trict. IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII||IIHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIi Seattle Office—COLMAN BUILDING Cannery at HOOD BAY, ALASKA CANNED SALMON SEATTLE, WASH. HOOD BAY CANNING COMPANY Incorporated