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| UNITED STATES COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 
Division of Fishes, 

+ 8. Nationa) Museu, 


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REPORT 


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THE COMMISSIONER 


FOR 


LS S.O:: 


A.—INQUIRY INTO THE DECREASE OF FOOD-FISHES. 
B.—THE PROPAGATION OF FOOD-FISHES IN THE 
WATERS OF THE UNITED STATES, 


¢ 


WASHING TON: 
GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE. 


18383. 


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FROM THE 


COAAMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES, 


TRANSMITTING, 


In compliance with law, his report for the year 1880. 


JANUARY 14, 1881.—Ordered to lie on the table and be printed. 


/ 


UNITED STATES COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIES, 
Washington, D. C., January 10, 1881. 
GENTLEMEN: In compliance with the law of Congress I have the 
honor to transmit herewith my report for the year 1880, as United 
States Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries, detailing, first, the result 
of inquiries into the condition of the fisheries of the sea-coast and lakes 
of the country ; and, second, the history of the measures taken for the 
introduction into its waters of useful food-fishes. 
Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
SPENCER F. BAIRD, 
Commissioner. 
Hon. Wu. A. WHEELER, : 
President of the United States Senate, and 
Hon. 8. J. RANDALL, 
Speaker of the House of Representatives. 


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CONTE NTs. 


I—REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER. 


A.—GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 


Page 

1. INTRODUCTORY REMARES...-.-. AQRDSLCrOce aaneoacases BEE BSS CCE OCODEOOO CHD ACEH EODmOb anesoads xvii 
Scope of present report...-...-.-- SoeccEdeneacccddoe BB RCS SCOR BORE COR ab GES EeOCOSRS so00085 xvii 
Duties assigned by Congress to the Commission ...--------.-------++------- SSoUscecudane ssa! 
Constant increase in the importance of its Work ........---2----0+--+e2---- Seo seac xvii 
Noteworthy features of the year......-- Sabsiaceasie cee sesssstecsoccoteccsenccpaceernaa= xvii 
(1) Carp production and distribution .........-.-.----2-------0+--- Bocas cnieeanenennes xvii 
(2) Shad production and distribution ...... Bee RC cnc caceee sus ceeaisntecas Sarldencaaeses xvii 
(3) Construction of Fish Hawk.......--.........------ ete cosencas Bee Aatecteoseccac xvii 
(4) Introduction of the gill-net in the cod fisheries .......-..-.------------eeeeee eee: xvii 
(5) Obtaining fishery statistics for the Tenth Census......-.--.------- coco ncsecasions xvii 
(6) Participation in the Berlin Fishery Exhibition...... Secadesseerseesssioamocces Sonen XVAl 
(7) The trips of the Fish Hawk to the Gulf Stream............ ws dencewassessectisies xvili 
(8) The exploration of the Great Lakes and of the coasts......-.--.--.----0+-------- xviii 
(9) The collection of fishes for educational series.-...-...-.------+------------------ xviii 
Deathiof£ Mry camer We Milnerres.cscs-cecesecswisecmcicascce casccnperececesaccecesnncs==s xviii 
2. PRINCIPAL STATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION .....--..---e-e0--------------+- xviii 
For research.....- leawoeccsistewatsesse hinecat Meee kescveracseees cennabiocsbesncbosaconcsscaencce xviii 
AGING WDOLGER Meek canoe cee scansascatassesotes setct aces cnsccess<tsccccocsceesscorsasns xviii 
On the Great Lakes and Gulf of Mexico...........-2----------ecncccccccncccececnececees xviii 
For propagation of food-fishes...........--.- Be ceceteecemucbasecteassees See cskieteeecenecemes xvii 
McClond River for California salmon...... Eee eee neeee selcattaceseneecos cose eeorecee xviii 
McCloud River for California trout -....-..------.. HBB OCC E LOOSE OH OERUS Ene cpa pEceGouEad xviii 
iNorthvalle) Mich., for white-fish --2-.-.-coc.ecccces esse nk Ses See See ee eater xix 
Bucksport, Me., for Penobscot or Atlantic salmon....--.-.----.-----------------+--+---- xix 
Grand Lake Stream, Me., for land-locked salmon........------------ eeweseeleeseoecmeeene xix 
Druid) Hill Park for Salmonids and carp... -<.- osc sccccecccncnnccecserensens~see-casine xix 
Washington Monument Lot for carp.....---..2.e-0-- cence ene e nen e nee n ee eee ne cece ene nee xix 
Washington Arsenal for carp..-.---- sors SEO COEEE RES EOC BSE E BIR E GUS OID UO EUBDESCHaCeSBS xix 
Washington Navy-Yard for shad .-....-.2. 20.22. ecccc en cce nn ne cance enc cw es ccee cece ececes xix 
Hayre'de Grace, Md.; for shad. os. 22... 5.5 ccc cccwnccccnceccencscauccccensseccars--e--08 xix 
$5 ASSISTANCE RENDERED TO THE COMMIBSION ..-.-02s000cocccsccccceccc cetera cnseccccacneeseccce xix 
By the Executive Departments, in accordance with requirement of law .-.-.------------- xix 
By the Secretary of the Navy, two steam launches, flags, ete..-..------------+---------+- xix 

By the Signal Officer of the War Department, of thermometers, temperature observa- 
TONBNELCeaeste ns ee cease wench acs cacese ses eee ela Sea See ee cane cumeeee oceet eases ss xix 
By General McDowell, a detail of soldiers.....-.......-------------- ++ -- eee eee eee eee e ee xix 
By the supervising surgeon of the Treasury Department, a detail of Dr. Guiteras ...-.-. xix 
By the railroads, facilities for carrying fish in baggage-cars.....-...--.-------------+-++- xx 
By the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, free transfer of goods for the Berlin Exhibition..... xx 
By the Pennsylvania Railroad, free transfer of goods for the Berlin Exhibition..-.....-. > 2.6 

By the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad, free transfer of goods for the 
Baril bxhibitions «5. .ee.d Sooc nf wadon= settee oct aeseneaneeteRs na. chzadaes voce Xx 
By the Boston and Maine Railroad, free transportation of shad.....--.------------------ xx 
By the North German Lloyds steamers, free transportation of the Berlin exhibit.--..--. xx 
By the French Transatlantic Steamship Company, transportation of fish eggs .----.---- xx 
By the Engineer Department of the District Commission, laying out the carp ponds..... xx 


iV; 


VI | CONTENTS. 


: Page 
4. COURTESIES RENDERED BY THE COMMISSION TO FOREIGN COUNTRIES.....-...-------------- afc Sicla dle MERE 
Applications for fish from other nations.....--..-..----.--------- 220s eee nee e ene ene een ne XX 
Relationships with Germany ..-.--.-.---------------- cigmenq qUa ae cbdcecboodse Aedaorocasos BO: 
California salmon sent to Deutsche Fischeret- Verein .a.cec---+--2+ceneneceeeeenenen ceenee =x 
White-fish eggs sent to Deutsche Fischeret- Verein ...0.0-2---0cnnene cence scene eee en en nnnee xxi 
Salmon eggs to FranGe...... ------ ---ne eee eee ene cee ne eee ne cree ee ewww ee ceenne en ne ones xxi 
Salmon eggs to England -.-.-....222.---2---- 00 eee ene nnn cee ne nee eae n eee nee enee xxi 
Salmon eggs to the Netherlands ---- 2.2.2.2... 2.202 snow ee conn ae nn nec cenne cence een eceeetace XX 
Correspondence with Dr. Fenner, of Guatemala..........-..-2---- 00-20. eo eee enone eee ee Xxi 
Applications from Ecuador and Guadeloupe.......-.-..--------------------- LBooockoocer xxi 
Salmonverysito Canada osc seqneeeas snes omanennias ana clemene acer ase naanD ce < aa ca—s aaieeeeiae xxi 
Care taken by the steamship companies ........-.-. .-----e--ece eens nese cen eecene ene nenes xxi 
B.—BERLIN FISHERY EXHIBITION. 

5. ITS ORIGIN AND SCOPE 2.222222 2202 ese e en een nn won nnn cece ne naan enn nn an cnnwen cece cennee es cannes xxi 
Proposed by the Deutsche Fischeret- Verein .-.---.2--00---n20- 02 cewnee connnecenens ce seeee- xxi 
Itsjintendediscopelees-ea-e-seesaaeie ee een anemia SmOnOREAScoEECOaSS0 sehadenducecesc xxi 

6: PARTICIPATION BY THE UNITED STATES (oe came eae sminicewseceaa= = nie wean eamenienleanaseleuarwisisianelnio= xxii 
Appropriation by Congress in February ....-.-.-------.- ROCESS TOBE OSOOCDOACOSeadcboanans xxii 
Briefness of the time for preparation ....0...--00- 2220 ene nne nonce s ccnn ne cee cetccec cannes xxii 
The Fish Commission represented by Mr. G. Brown Goode........-.---..-----+--------- xxii 
First steps for collecting the material. ..........0...2.2--cceenn cee n ne concen cnn ee nn -e--- xxii 
Material from the Philadelphia Exhibition utilized .........--.-------------------------- xxii 
Completion and shipment of the exhibit ...... 2.2.20. -22020. cence enn en eee een enen ee ee--- xxii 
Unexampled liberality of the railroad and steamboat companies. .......--.-.-----2..--- _ Si 
Departure of Mr. Goode and his assistants ........----.------------------ 2 eee eee eee xxiii 
Attention attracted by the American exhibit .............------------2-0---20--- eee eee: xxiii 
Prolongation of the exhibition until July lst........-.-...-.---------- ------ ++ eeeene----- xxiii 
Return of Mr. Goode and. assistants ..-....... 22.5005 e eco ce ecen en sane ER PEPA Eesha XXiv 
The great prize and numerous medals awarded the United States ....-.....---.--------- xxiv 
Why more medals were not awarded to the United States ...--..------------------------ Xxiv 
Return of the exhibit free of freight charges .............---------0- erence ceee er eee----- xxiv 
Exchanges in the interest of the National Museum..........-.-----------------++-----+- xxiv 
Preparation of a report on the exhibition.........-...----------------- Boao sobseeGoncogaG xxiv 


C.—INQUIRY INTO THE HISTORY AND STATISTICS OF FOOD-FISHES. 


{. KIXLD OPERATIONSIAT NE WEORT. hvcisl sy atsinal-iicle siatciciaaleleliafets ats ateisiarstetels ala stala/aielaio (alata ial alalelaielaietiajatele Xxiv 
Buildings/and'wharfage facilities <2 - 52. ccc sccc sce cena ns soem ee nenenc a sesecie en satinwe celina Xxiv 
Arrival and organization of the force -- 2.25.52. o coco sence coneeccccceccusacccsesuerses XXV 
Investigations for the fishery CensUS ........-.-- 2-22. eee c ne cee ne one-one nnn e eee XXV 
Dredging tripsiof the Fish Hawk .......2..6. 2-2-2 = os ee ccennsenanencecansewnn--0=-e== XXV 

Inthe vicinityso£ Block Wslamd. 20. sac < ese cnicseninc cic snieanan'ssceaenereaeaple nasal XXV 

To the, Gulf) Stream s-c--e eee seeeteee ene enema see ee cee nema ce aaae nose sera eae ee XXV 
Richneasiof the GulfiStream! fauna -soecae sot ececce ecco ns eee cee nsacee cee at saca eee eek, 
Observations at the Tile-fish Grounds sess. so cen. nce ccoaeai sissies sean saleseuawciniccecenen XXV 
Trip of a Noank schooner to the Tile-fish Grounds.........----.--2-2--0-----0------eeeee XXV 
Departure of the Fish Hawk for New Haven and Washington..-......-..-.-------------- XXVi 
Return of the commissioner to Washington. .........--- 2-20-22 eee c enna conan ecncnncenne XXVi 

8) VLE STEAMER (ISH: UAW Ko sc emeiscncise ise acinccsa= ale setlal= afelsalcclen == vcion = =imialeie inte ate melee mieleiereint=iatale XXVi 
Her construction and! Outfit. cot ce. maccnclec sec eciscclcs slsieicias sjnelsiain aise ale'ele(cicinic|aia'= aleinioia'sininic XXVi 
Successful trial trip and arrival at Nowport..-... 22... ..200 scans ccncne cease nnccenncccnns XXVi 
Trips to the Gulf Stream, and subsequent movements .-.....-..----------e---- eee eee e ee XXVi 
Mesirability of lengthening hers-.- 2 ssa- seem ven Selasaine alee melita semis eleeaeailai=te at550° XXV1 
Henutility ininvestigation css. sctsaececce- css cees sien eeealsa samara steam sle= an laleinilanla mma Xxvi 

OMORISHERY CENSUS OR S880) cease seaaaece ace sce hens anmaclseee mate cette se ete ce aelata tae eaters leet fete xxvii 
Continuance of the work beguntinds7geeetessesccr esses ccsenecesacecccoscasmencemenare XXVIi 
Progress of the field-work in the spring and summe® .......--.---..-----------e--2-e--- xxvii 
Arrangements for writing up the final report. :-.2 2.2002... fo ne on occ cnn cenneece== XXVil 
Retirement/of, Mr: Ktimlein from the’ work!-22.2--.c-<ate see -tescscs tess sence ee cere xxvii 
Compilation;of circulars*by Mr'Cn W:iSmileyieccec- sc 2-onsneescs tree ssc ote csetmmcees xxvii 


Progress of the work when the year closed 6o2.c%..c2s<es-2e5cb-sesscor seca ita kee wees XKVAL 


CONTENTS. vit 


D.—THE PROPAGATION OF FOOD-FISHES. 


Page 
10. WORK ACCOMPLISHED IN 1880 .------+---+--eeererceere* DoE cuccceacwicesac ecrcensesesenccecenn= Xxvii 
White-fish (Coregonus albus). 

Northville station ..---------+-2---++---*"- eooeee earn e ccm ec ceca cc ce cnwsccniccceccoscrcsens xxvii 
Purchase of white-fish eae heretolore...---------++------2002 BESS COBCUOL OTE UOBBECe me xxvii 
The Northville station secured by the Fish Commission seeeoha ce scacenss)enaecle ee = -XXVILL 
Excellence and temperature of its water .-----------------------rreererernrr tener xxviii 
Arrangements for taking white-fish Cg 28--.----------- see eee enn ee teen eerre terete XXViil 
Endeavors to secure lake-trout eggs------------ ee see eee cosas cere. deena sae man xxviii 
Taking of white-fish eggs. ----------------e0-ernsee ener nc cteerecten eer to rene ee nner es xxviii 
Total number of eggs and yield of fish .--------------------+srerrererttt erste xxviii 
Experiments in accelerating and retarding the hatching--.--.-------------+----++-+-- xxviii 
Disposition of the embryonized eggs---------------- Die co delsosecseasomeiccanesleoasns XXViil 

Acknowledgments to railroads..--.--------+-----+- We Dees seeeceas sacsuniess=~e 7am === >= XXxviii 

Investigation of the food of white-fish ....- UE ens ad toca ae oes civciasieeisetaeisn ose xxix 

The Quinnat, or California Salmon (Salmo quinnat). 

McCloud River station...--....----------2----ne nnn ne cen e ne ene renee ere rneenr ere ceere A be.ab< 
Eggs taken only to meet the demand. ...- << cco no-- 2 - aco e een nn nes en enn nen enneeene xxix 
Abundance of fish in Sacramento River due to stocking the McCloud River. .-.----- > e.db.¢ 
Mr. Stone’s trip to the East and return to the station.......-.--. 2-225 eee ee ee enone xxix 
Industry and fidelity of the Indians -...------+------+2-++-2ereerrreeer reer r neon ees xxix 
Completion of the roadway -----.+-----+----++++-2"" ee eee en aeee ne seaeeemanle=> xxix 
Taking of the salmon eggS---------++-----+ serene seeeen crete ester t seen xxix 
Construction of a telephone... .------------------22--e reese rere nner te rte xxix 

r Packing and shipping of eggs to the Mast. .----ccccc- oon ccc enewnecn ene ecenencecnscce xxix 

Point distributioneste ses saes seman enen ean oe ea nee Sis oo onan ce saan KX: 

Reference to Mr: Stone’s report....---------------- -c2e- seeeme reer sac n ee ee ener nrc scocece POO < 

The Rainbow or California Mountain Trout (Salmo irideus). 

The Crook's Creek Station --.- 2. 2--s-e--t-=-22ecerenanae deneennesanecoorcerennrs ecco c ee BOS 
Establishment of the station. .....----------200-----s serene cern renee renee DOO < 
Collection and disposition of the eggs.-------------++-------rerrterrser nner eters xXx 
Improvements in the station -.----------- BAR BSE IS BEBO OU aOR OOD GoDGEORS xxx 
The penning of trout to await the spawning Se€asON...---. ---.-+---------++22rerrrrtee xXx 

Maotlonthe trouth-ssesee--- eo see soo ereneectc nace asine tenor escola as oor ae @ XxX 

(Ave Of SPAWDIG- «20--2~2-> -- a5 -~22enenemnausonsempen-eoo a sprortcesin ease Sec c Tc ase TS XX 

The Atlantic or Penobscot Salmon (Salmo salar). 

The Penobscot River station..--.------------+-+----=0cseen error oe cermoomenncne sce ree XXXxi 
Resumption of work after an intermission ..-.------------------- 2+ ceeeee nett rrr 265.01 
Purchase and penning of fish until the spawning S@aSON- ---------------+----+-2+---- Xxxi 
The limits of the spawning S€ASON ..-------+----eereee ener nnn n ener ern Xxxi 
The total number of eggs taken..-.-------------es--seereeree rent renner renee xxxi 
The expenses and results shared with threo States ..2s.ces-s-0s-ueccenencat-a--=-s-= XXL 
Hopes concerning the results of the season's WOrk...-.-----------2---0-- eee teste ao) XXXL 
Personnellofthelstatloness ss. srs ss ecle=nni eon eee neem ool oorietsn is ccs Coa o oe xxxi 

Schoodic Salmon (Salmo salar subs. sebago). 

Grand bake Stream station .+2---<---2----=--~s<ncenmar nose oases ens s oo oS o oo Coonan ae xxxi 
Personnel of the station. --...------2----so- ase nn on sw es enn omer memer nen m nemo o ne xxxi 
Success of the season’s WOK. .-.--------+------ en en ne nnn nen treet mre ne xxxi 

Increased demand for the eggs. ..---------------- ner eee ntere nets eens meen eer re sens xxxi 

Shad (Alosa sapidissima). 

Summary of results for the year.----------+---+-see rector ee reee ee rren nes tonee renee ee 6.0.41 

Tana tions ofthe stati Ons sess seen ono see anna omen ennnse oan aloe are ie se xxxii 

Havre de Grace station -.--------------2+--cereerrr er ereetee wowsscunsenieses= Soeecesc een xxxii 

b Location and personnel of the station ...------------++----+eer reece ee enret rere xxxii 
Taking of the eggs by floating apparatus ....------------00---e ene eneene ener tenet: XXxil 
Removal of the station to another part of the tO) See ooo xxxii 
Remunerating the fishermen for the eggs .---------------+2+reerotr er roreer serene xxxii 
Accident, and premature deposit of the eggs----------+----rersre reer nee eee teen xxxii 
Movement of fish to Maine, Maryland, and Pennsylvania ....-----------+-222e 22007 xxxii 
Disposition of the equipment .-.--.--------- eee een ce) ce cesnesninnmaesvones ens >= xxxili 

Washington Navy-Yard Station ......------2------eesssenenncrnnec crores een ern xxxili 
Arrangements for, and organization of, the station ......----------------eereee errr Xxxili 
Shad and herring eggs secured. ..--------++-eenseenenernese rennet etter tere xxxili 


Movement of fish to South Carolina, Georgia, ae Kontucky ..-.----------eeeeeeereee xxxili 


VIII CONTENTS. 
Page 
10. WORK ACCOMPLISHED IN 1880—Continued. 
Shad—Continued. 
Transportation of shad...--...--..---.---- Seecoenssaseces aie eisale ina eeineiewn selene see Sane Xxxiii 
A change from small to large shipments and deposits.-........... Reece eaetace anes Xxxiii 
Requisites for a suitable car for transporting fish..........-...... AtESHOgCOogE acscces xXxxiii 
Experiments. .-.--------2-----+-------+------ ose cece nee enesenen scenes malde stalaie(cai~\s=i0 a EXXxiV 
In the use of hydrant water for hatching ..............--.-.----------- senaeusenasene Xxxiv 
For determining the smallest amount of water in which shad will live............... XXXIV 
Carp (Cyprinus carpio). 
Ponds in Washington.........--.---- weesen Sono chboscdsossscodastence we Cow aiscisae saab ekcKkl V 
Increased efficiency of the ponds........... Ba oSngcasSssosonsocS conc Soo psootancaccooce Xxxiv 
Draining by means of a rotary steam pump.-.......-...--.--..---- aS6d00 acoHeceascoc xxxiv 
Connection with the telephone system....... sa SdooraDadooanboado nososaaoocpagocdasic XXxiv 
Appropriation for improying the ponds............--------e-eee Sacccennscnccisctatece RRL, 
Construction of a reservoir. ....--......-----.-0--<.--- poecicnos anecon esosoanabsdcaase XXXIV 
Filling of the reservoir with rain-water .....-...-..- ASoodsaso ceanacians SO CRQHRSSOSGO> Xxxiv 
Drainareof the! grounds) .2--- 2. aceacecseeocoascee sass Besoadoeas aaslnoceseice sisicoccie xXxxiv 
Draining the ponds to exclude cat-fish, sun-fish, 6tC..--.2...cce- eee ccecccccccecceeeee XXIV 
Draining of the Arsenal pond.....-....--- otogeddc Shobadhcnaeaoos Se NaSocdcsoeoobes XXxXV 
Draining of the South pond........---..--.6. dbjisescutesetamseestorsoees seSuecateccees XXXV 
Distribution of carp to State commissioners -.......- Sones seas COOSODONGOSC Soonusdasaieinees XXXV 
The saibling (Salmo salvelinus) ....-..-.----2---cecccecccsceccecnccces Sencnceseeenencnces XXXV 
Presented by the Deutsche Fischeret- Verein ..-....cececccscenee soo dossode Basddondectoose XXXV 
Disposition of those which arrived alive -..... Soon cobndecsee BOS eOnssS SCO EOR COSI OS IOSOS XXxV 
The gourami (Osphromenus olfax) ...--.--.--c--00 pale Socweelstciecaicsmatsiniccemmciescieans oApbaC XXXV 
Desirability of the species ................-----208 SpenaceSnbodsasasece BAB DOAB EBSA IRE OCaS xXXV 
The ability to endure privation of water -..... ApdDO DO LeOCS Btondaa condos AapododasaoHbe eae XK 
Its most prominent characteristics........---...-.-- Be COO BSE obo Roccadtcanbsbaccbsséende XXXV 
disimethods\of reproduction «).c0-esscecseccscsncecsceteesseccces Sisiasateeie Seoecineanncioseneel xXXXV 
Water to which best adapted .---..:----2 22.0 c.cccewccceccocesne HerooddacoSncaadhos woo seo XV, 
Its nativity and transfer’to other waters .------.-.-.--.2.-----< -ocee cnnooncocccecccseess XXXVI 
Correspondence with the Society of Acclimatization concerning it...... esaieiseee eee enee Xxxvi 
Arrangements for receiving a supply from China ....--....-.-.--- BOS SUE Ra DBecuococeodad EXXxvi 
E.—ABSTRACT OF CONTENTS OF THE APPENDIX. 
1bUS FAWN TIS) SaadA6 Boop oseboacddodsoconbannsenpoecsedoasosd Sewnen seisescemendelcsmasmaciioneisetcies XXXVi 
ATA GeNerAliCONnS1d CraAvlONnS sere eon easceeanat coo enee ceca en aanteeaaceseaeciees scale cate KXXvVii 
iB. Deep-searescarch sessescacnsdeccoeeleraseceot assess Sta tsbeccesboceccccast seeciec cine -. XXXxVii 
@. The'sea-fisherles>-secocccseceeseemeccscseseaseaccesoceeasocuen on Agabeccdasesan eos oe KXKVIL 
De eHconomic Tresealchisscsace soe ssecesed] aarmeoe ee eceecine neem eteriaceae aia asic sian sales XXXVii 
KP Naturalvhistorysceseasess sees sone sesso eeaae ee eees Pate cite aeaists ans csctem marin cmcrienas xxxvii 
H. Propagation of food-fishes-<<222sel sce csccccnesce BERSOHHA Se echocodacsde ecodocaahe =2esiatl 
G.; Special-fish-culturerc-tececs teoseceeciseee seen ceanesciece ecm ncnee tan auoocddéencspean XXXVili 
He Mheroystereeseccc ses atecccectosseececussicescesenseennaceeteeeas Sdooadiasosds Sanda XXXViii 
a.; Miscellaneous! =---c-esc--ot-e eee cece sasisenecicasceeatencisesceosconesssecere eae eR eee XXXViii 
12. TABLES OF THE DISTRIBUTION OF FISH AND EGGS .....222.- 22. cceneecnccce pocaisielsisclalectninars XXxix 
13. LIsT OF RAILROADS GRANTING FACILITIES IN 1880 ......-...-..-.----2----- dasootoosdassssos xhii 


I. G. Brown Goode. PLAN OF INQUIRY INTO THE HISTORY AND PRESENT CONDITION OF THE 


IJ.—APPENDIX TO REPORT OF COMMISSIONER. 


APPENDIX A.—GENERAL. 


FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES...... Sema ee alate eRe Lait ste tinea al a eee pete a eneate eo aeeoetanns 3 
A Organization. cic-ciceece-cesdearensi aun ceeaaceiness asatoddacetheeenee wus ecamieie cae ae 5 
IB olnstructionS\.c=--.coen caccue caena cue ca cossncetae ee cecibass ca tencsam aeeemee wilearelteinnccae 5 
C.jsources of Information [2° < toc cnocesijeasnsieawenslaaaamslese= ase neice ems cieales Sewotecsasee if 
D. Scheme of Investigation............-- Aca Sejsissane eae sec sae ea cinemonceaes ceeetneeaeeaas 10 
HPAP PEN GICEB mia sieacenivic clan ane rae cies mich nee mee cites saa a cle e an ae eae aaa aatcenttalet atest 28 
Il. G. Brown Goode. THE FIRST DECADE OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION: ITS 
PLAN OF WORK AND ACCOMPLISHED RESULTS, SCIENTIFIC AND ECONOMICAL. By G. Brown 
GO0d Get iescceccss cccwccecocescsvedacawas a Sus Ge woes wc ea caetee celcoe eee ewan teticauicle cisaieaiee teats 53 


CONTENTS. IX 


APPENDIX B.—DEEP-SEA RESEARCH. . 
age. 


1. A. E. Verrill. D&scrRIPTION OF SOMF OF THE APPARATUS USED BY THE UNITED STATES 
COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIES IN DREDGING OFF THE NEW ENGLAND COAST. By A. E. 
Welt ie cccesitecstcciosuwacieaes SOceBenSc ASC IESHEOneeHsS wiccbobekcucdcicceccsscevesisseactecccseas 65 


APPENDIX C.—THE SEA FISHERIES. 


IV. C. Trolle. THE ICELAND FisHERIES. By C. Trolle, first lieutenant, Danish navy-....... 17 

V. Axel Vilhelm Ljungman. THE BOHUS-LAN SEA FISHERIES AND THEIR FUTURE. By . 
PAcel Vilhelm UNeMAMetcicclesccsecinsiseantncss ae eencawecesrecwiaccecenacemanas ssc est saewiec we 89 

VI. Axel Vilhelm Ljungman. WHAT SHOULD BE DONE BY THE GOVERNMENT WITH RE- 
GARD TO THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. By Axel Vilhelm Ljungman....-....-.. 99 


VU. 0.8. Jemsem. REPORT ON THE PRACTICAL AND SCIENTIFIC INVESTIGATIONS OF THE 
SPRING HERRING FISHERIES DURING THE YEAR 1880, SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF THE 
InTERIOR. By O.S. Jensen, curator of the Bergen Museum. .............-.---------- seen e ne 127 

VIL Lan SARDINE MISHERIES, rom Piskert Tidentlecaccscas secacctene cnocecclcacscectics conse 163 

IX. G. @. Sars. REPORT SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR ON THE PRACTICAL 
AND SCIENTIFIC INVESTIGATIONS OF THE FINMARK CAPELAN FISHERIES, MADE DURING THE 


SERING OF THE YHAR S79. By Prof.'G.'O. Sars, 22. scence evitoeasaisesseeleesecaacesensseasccee 167 
X. Newton P. Scudder. THE HALIBUT FISHERY, DAVIS’ STRAIT. By Newton P. Scudder, 
PAI Mie acranidenanciscawincissciacellse acct ses cctinesisismatsssiieecicaiiede seco cm cenens cecsenlcecslastees 189 


APPENDIX D.—ECONOMIC RESEARCH. 


XI. W. O. Atwater. REPORT OF PROGRESS OF AN INVESTIGATION OF THE CHEMICAI, COMPOSI- 
TION AND ECONOMIC VALUES OF THE FISH AND INVERTEBRATES USED FOR FOOD. UNDERTAKEN 
FOR THE UNITED STATES FISH CoMMIssion. By W.O. Atwater, Ph. D., professor of chemis- 
try, Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn........ 2-0. -.eene. nee e eee ween ce connec cence ene 231 


APPENDIX E.—NATURAL HISTORY. 


XI. G. Brown Goode. MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD FISHES. By G. Brown 
(CITI Osco Cotas S SSS BOSS HOHE TeS SEDER CSE SSN See sn0 HOSA OAlatn S05 HEH DOOSSHESGerS OLS Hera Se Cana sae 287 

XII. R. Edward Earll. THE SPANISH MACKEREL, Cybium maculatum (MitcH.) AG.; ITS 
NATURAL HISTORY AND ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION, WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE ORIGIN AND DEVEL- 


OPMENT OF THE FISHERY, Dyrk., id wand Marll: Soon saiscajoetcision asc eclee acetca(e cise in alate Qntcicet 395 
XIV. EF. Miescher-BRiisch. CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. By Dr. 
F.. Miescher-Riisch, professor of physiology at Basel. ........-..2-. cenncacncnes coccnecccscces 427 


APPENDIX F.—PROPAGATION OF FOOD-FISHES.—GENERAL CONSID- 
ERATIONS. 


XV. MI. C. Raveret-Wattel. REPORT ON THE CONDITION OF PISCICULTURE IN FOREIGN COUN- 
TRIES, FROM DOCUMENTS COLLECTED AT THE INTERNATIONAL FISHERY EXPOSITION AT BERLIN, 


1880) Bye Mic C aR averet-\ Witte laces coma nn oenerciewsewaselcecinnnls ewe ols asecisasesc-caniaceeesee 477 
XVI. J. P. J. Holtz. THE ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. By J.P. J. Koltz...........- 491 
XVII. MI. Ducastel. THE TRANSFORMATION OF SALT MARSHES INTO FISH PONDS. By M. Du- 

GR Iell occas ccd GR SEGERe GS SBN EES SE GS DEO BES ESCO SC BOR COSE CONCH ECE COO SHE HOO ORE ORTESSOReBoEeSsos 517 


XVIII. Adolf Gasch. Pond CULTIVATION ON THE KANIOW ESTATE (DISTRICT OF BIALA 
GALICA), THE PROPERTY OF HIs IMPERIAL HIGHNESS ARCHDUKE ALBRECHT OF AUSTRIA. By 


Adolf. Gasch, the .present farmer Of KaniGWwccassssecesedctsnccseascescecss nese cedecceceece ce 533 
XIX. E. Reichardt. THE INJURIOUS INFLUENCE ON PISCICULTURE OF THE RETTING WATER OF 
RLAX AND HEMP. Dy tu. ROICNALAt a ccsceatecescheccnestmocsessasensrccacecuercsasecces SASS 545 


APPENDIX G.—PROPAGATION OF FOOD-FISHES.—SPECIAL APPLICA- 
TIONS. 


XX. Frank N. Clark. REPORT OF OPERATIONS CONNECTED WITH THE PROPAGATION OF 
WHITEFISH (Coregonus albus) AT THE NORTHVILLE STATION, NORTHVILLE, MICH., FOR THE 
REASON/ORFISSU— ol. ey MrankeN Clark dm ChargOssctcscecccescsanascssitoccaescccease access 553 

XXI. Livingston Stome. REPORT OF OPERATIONS AT THE UNITED STATES SALMON-HATCH- 

ING STATION ON THE MCCLOUD RIVER, CALIFORNIA, DURING THE SEASON OF 1880. By Living- 
SLOMISLONG ee eeee see eee ania esacos eee cece cre stem cen coe tenes caeeneseabeces cut denecensoese 597 

XXII. Livingston Stone. REPORT OF OPERATIONS AT THE UNITED STATES TROUT-PONDS 

ON THE McCLOUD RIVER, CALIFORNIA, DURING THE SEASON OF 1880. By Livingston Stone.. 615 


x CONTENTS. 


sd 

Page. 

XXIU. Charles G. Atkins. REPORT ON THE PROPAGATION OF PENOBSCOT SALMON IN 
1880-81: By Charles G.Atkinsle:c0-aees casas soeescte tae ecco mene ase cee Piel aN Se 623 

XXIV. Charles G. Atkins. REPORT ON THE PROPAGATION OF SCHOODIC SALMON IN 
1S80= Siew vac banles| Gre AU INS) mele a etelaiaie(en clalateiate neiata aio ieininatelalalaimala stelneratetattelaletmet= slates lafata 633 
XXYV. REPORT ON THE PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF SHAD IN THE SPRING OF 1880.....-. 653 
XXVI. Wiax vom dem Borne. RaAIse carp. By Max von dem Borne.............-..--0+6- 673 


APPENDIX H.—THE OYSTER. 


XXVIII. Karl Wiébius. THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. By Karl Mobius, professor of 


TR GYR PEN Gd kGT) oe eae ice SouS HRS SO BOSCO oH aSHdoodddaosncéoodtboncodedsossssadhadasdaposacccncs 683 
TeAdho SCa-Nats nce ciecsennc cis soaeaaaenemanniane stecninane secs cneeeace cesses cmccmc ses J oscads 685 
2. Oysuer banks and Oysteringyonsosciesesence es desosemecascsceesaeoeenicicceee sence seas 689 
3.) Dhe reproductieniof theroyster.cosece ce eee cone elec cccanaes see tee rac in tence 692 
4. Why are oysters not found over all portions of the sea-flats ..... Bendooo ceacedonednads 696 
5. Artificial oyster-precding inurl mane jaececiscas secs scine ace see celeriene sneer sae ela sae ete 698 
6. Attempts to introduce the French system of artificial Oe eebmeedine into Great 

IBTUGAINA - a Seo esnicoidacie seem ceeaiaseaee ceciscmopiccacna sac sdcasmmemceaaiscseinc sc ccics 702 
7. Can the French system of artificial oyster-breeding be carried on in the waters of the 
Germanicosstecaceassesenaco ssh enscnenseneistlses celia snieccina ae nee ea cee eeane ial: 703 
8. Can natural oyster-beds be enlarged, and can new beds be formed, especially along 
theiGermantcoasteecqseresacciesaamecisaisiseiccise seca ceisicces seeisene ee ismisese teeter 707 
9) Growthiand fecundityiot, HhejOyStelcesecieescscies aces en scecesoscaceecccsseeetssssnes 713 
10. An oyster-bed is a biocdnose or a social community .........-.----.--seeee---- eee e ee 721 
11. Concerning the increase in the price of oysters and in the number of consumers and 
the decrease in the number of oysters..-..- SpGo t's SugoSSeSdossaSedSsschs aonseces 729 
12. The chemical constituents and flavor of oysters........-...--.22--e-ese ens cece ee eee 732 
13. :Cherobjects\and resultsiof oyster culture ~ 252). --seee see eee nei et nese eee ee 738 


XXXVI. Félix Fraiche. A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO OYSTER-CULTURE, AND THE METHODS 
OF REARING AND MULTIPLYING EDIBLE MARINE ANIMALS. By Félix Fraiche, professor of the 


natural;sciencesiand’mathematicss: sa teracs) casecteateescnece = ames cee cee nemcienismaca 753 
A. Present condition of the oyster industry upon the coast of France..-.........-..----- 753 
B. The natural history of mollusks and crustaceans ............-......----- aie eee eer 760 
C. Causes of the continued depletion of the oyster-beds and the improverishment of the 
fiSHELICSs cess sce eeee se De Red claw LON CUES gee ibrar seed Mee eget A 774 
I. Industry and present methods .............5.<2sesceccee eons Shis SubpomoooSonedesbSGoe 781 
II. Means and methods of gathering and transporting oyster-spawn ..-.-..--....------- 784 
III. Preparation of the bottoms. Construction of claires, parks, live-ponds, etc..-..-.-. 797 
EVs. Methods of working the claires <2 ces <te=cio- voces ajcnc(se sess teen csee ace betsiseelstas 807 
V;; ‘Cultivation of musselet ea soe acete eae eteiataiols ssicinace eels le meme teal srera he alan aoe ere 810 
VI. Rearing of lobsters and other crustaceans ...-....-....0.20..cecceeeenecnncenner nae 818 
XXIX. WH. Coste. REPORT ON THE OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES OF FRANCE AND ITALY. 
By M. Coste... 2.25. ccccatsecn cenecccat ees -Secln ae ete seca cee see cedins seme ce ee Sse eceeaectaee 825 
A; Artificial oyster bedslof: Lake Musaroys-). oon snc= aces ste cieee cosets ene eee 825 
B. Green oysters of Marenne...........-...... cable etek bad aaemaceneacsiees ctotisn soeemies 834 
C. Mussel wiers of the;Bay of Aiguillon ~~... 222. -kcscseec scene cnciane veces sss Sanoeuaor 845 
D. Documents relating to the Marine fisheries. .-..-. De clob amc teiseliane eae </aisiepeesinmclaonicee 857 


XXX. WE. de Bom. REPORT ON THE CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 1875, PRECEDED BY A 
REPORT TO THE MINISTER OF MARINE AND OF THE COLONIES. By M. de Bon, ‘commissary- 


general and director of administrative affairs of the ministry of marine and of the colonies... 885 
A. Report of Rear-Admiral, the Marquis of Montaignac, Minister of Marine and of the 

Colonies: “By Mi'deBonyeecsceceeessecese cece ee acerca sae settee aces seca nneer 885 

B. An account of the condition of oyster culture in 1875......--.-----------------++--+-- 887 
XXXI. G. Bouchon-Brandely. REPORT ON OYSTER CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. By 

G. Bouchon-Brandley, secretary to the College of France.....-....-..-------e-0- Bosnoceoans 9 Sli 

AS Oysterculture incltaly. << -s.csse—sec a as cmeleceiemistideiosisecle sein eciaisissisia's/an <[iainfefeete nia 907 

Be eLOWIOM teats joe c.scisicse wis seis S wealt eciceeimen cee ciecishe See ceeiemecioeer eae ae ele sii actactcier 914 

C. Peninsula of Giens ...-.... watces Seip ee sce aaeenceneeeeee Seeeedisee sie cdiescw se Salissoomciciene 917 

D5 Berre, Caronte,: Thau, Leucate, and A\gaye =e soncem a cisiciesa= secs as cles s) sie cieeenciae 923 
XXXU. J. Remaud. AN ACCOUNT OF THE PORTUGUESE AND FRENCH OYSTERS CULTIVATED IN 

TRE EDAVIOR ARCACHON, #By dieeReNaUd —ocoeecsseere soececeneeieesnee essa see ecco ecceete 931 

A. An account of the Portuguese and French oysters ...-.-------------e Socoodsenssosnt 931 

B. A new mixture to be placed upon the collectors. Be eeceation boxes2e2-cceeeeeseeee 934 

C. The Portuguese oyster from a commercial and oyster-cultural point of view. .-.------ 937 


D. Protection of claires, or oy$ter basins, by means of overhanging strips and wire 
SCLECDS...-..-0--+-20-0 wisioeicls sip meicinle cleleleioacjetjelsclote sete nerae tales w slajatetelateitietaieietete tate rater 939 


: CONTENTS. XI 
Page. 
XXXII. A. E. HMausser. OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. A REPORT PREPARED IN THE 
NAME OF THE COMMISSION OF THE COMPETITIVE EXHIBITION AT VANNES. By A. E. Hausser, 
GNPINGeL Of Toads ANd MU Mes eet ean ace smecaacisan cs ccaalemleateme/teale ductcmiaecscccce=coelcems/oncle 943 
JeBrecdiny parks ing Cueril-sasseesmebeeeenie= ae ccmccea a aasessec dees sclelcesm ares smecs oct 947 
2. Collectors; liming’: formation of breeding parks~ J. .-.--2<-2.222..2-000----e----- == 957 
3. Removal of the young oysters from the collectors; their preservation; enemies of the 
OYSTEL.-. 2. enn n nen e nnn on cee ene cece ee etn ne ween nen en cee ce ewes 972 
4 Parks fonraisin pang tate nin 2 OYSbCLSs amica\siaia soe a mleleiesicjemee oa late aie icisialie|sio'swicieislejuiveisisine 981 
5. Measures required to insure the prosperity of oyster culture..-.-..--......----------- 988 
XXXIV. RESULT OF THE INVESTIGATIONS OF THE NETHERLANDS ZOOLOGICAL STATION RELATIVE 
TO THE OYSTER AND ITS CULTIVATION AT THE END OF THE FIRST YEAR OF ITS INVESTIGATIONS. 
Appendix to the Sixth Annual Report of the Zoological Station of the Netherlands Zoological 
AN EWDOMUTOR saccade obs ane Godse bobaS paps os GUO HO BAU don baneb apecoo coco eda: caUnGsdL aaeededsbc 1001 
XXXV. P. BP. C. Woek. OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS, By Dr. P. P.C. Hoek. 1029 
XXXVI. Hi. WI. Rasch. ON THE REASON FOR AN EXTRAORDINARILY RICH PRODUCTION OF 
OYSTERS (IN A\NATURAL BASIN., ‘By Prof. HH. Rasch). .22 64. coos ccc cccesccceassacsccocas 1037 
APPENDIX J.—MISCELLANEOUS. 
XXXVI. Robert G. Dyrenforth. LIsT OF PATENTS ISSUED IN THE UNITED STATES DURING 
THE YEARS 1879 AND 1880 RELATING TO FISH, AND THE METHODS, PRODUCTS, AND APPLICATIONS 
OF THE FISHERIES. By Robert G. Dyrenforth, examiner-in-chief, United States Patent Office. 1047 


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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 


DREDGING APPARATUS. 


Page. 

Gs. — Tne COMMON GTOUPOcacssessacs ce sncsoce satasascenisessssscosmsrcewececcectcccesoeeseced 74 
Fi NOW ERIA-LLAWliscceetissacteaaanacincecelsssacinvacianaaucectocesaisceeneeasceeacsceciesscias 74 
B:—— DN COUUOL-ULAW L lisiesisemeremesneseriecectelsceaes rian eseneemencsccaccsecigreaecisecnecmerecs. 74 
Ai ——MOE- DISCO) OL LNOOLLOL-tIAWlices cance ncsiccenaacineccassssacidecseee sess socececiescteeinsits 74 
5.—Hndofidrag-rope of the otter-trawl\- <<< <3. 22. ciccceeccceaee coccisssacmoscersce cess ca--=5 74 
6. hhemake-dledPOlesasstecceassesenececetae scutes sceceeneecoes sreeeescescmaseacsee cs aice 74 
de NOhwiheol-banClOsssesossesaccscanasnioassericowecetecaecicescusiseesccicessaccsacioessescen 74 
8.—The towing-net, in use ..........-....-- Uodek wen cotn es ecanosiewes cavaeeeatccen ses cetmaceas 74 
J TNOOHeCK-StOPecssss-cessee ss selsis cece sce suaisasciontcosnaccsasascmeseseiswes deciles sclcclnsciee 74 

LOE N@lCrad O-SlOVOssaseeeceetesesees ener reranestaccete acess sees sasaeslacssecscsacenee= se 74 
Lit neveradle-siGvOvOnd ViOWiecocscstes see stecetere eset as eek a o-ocacessescncessemaaeroes 74 
12 NO PA DIC-SIOV Olecsamce sec eslecemeciesenincicis sist oscanisinisseaccisianniscnconivinctmsmcineceesiclsietels 74 
Tei SECON OL FADICIBIOVO) sce ccsecinacaescsaaeces=sieusccslemesesicscoscccotcclcceeseisececiseesace 74 
THE SWORD-FISH AND ITS RELATIVES. 
PLATE Mi— UNEISWOLd sl sccsnewer cea see eens eric cerlosscccessceniere secsessme sees cceseceocsce 386 
TH ——The Mediterranean Spear-fish.0+-s-scoes coses~ seaciesaeesesoclesesonceensccceones 386 
TIT.—The Cape spear-fish ...-..- 222.2022. 220 ee ne cee n oe enc ce en ee cone ee nee eee ee eee eeee 386 
IV.—The Western Atlantic spear-fish .......c.n00ccec ce ccccne ccee ee cone cree nec cec eens 386 
V.—The Western Atlantic spear-fish <2... 2. .ccece ccc cceccce cones cece ccccecccensccccs 386 
vel. he Omani spear-lshl cas. «sesccisceccclsess esmecesnesecaciase scene cesieeaa==casane 386 
Wik—Chelndian! Ocean spear-fsh! ta. sscccemecasce ns asieccenscccetelsecscesnsiciesicsssccce 386 
VEE — The Olde worldsail-tsh\s.ceecscinsccseisesorcessccesscccsicsensn-esesascccecws sce 386 
IX.—The Japanese sail-fish .......2-.....--20-2-2--- Be ae ce eeer esas cre an eacsiaciecetoeenee 386 
XC — HE -AMECLCAN SAll AM oosccencosoeincasaciseceaceessevesocecieesecss=s-=-e-ceesees 386 
XI.—Skoleton of Xiphtas gladius .........cccceccscnccccceccnccccsessencen snnensccanns 386 
X11.—Skeleton of Histiophorus americanus .....22+-.-cccceces ene eeeene ene nee ne eeecee 386 
XTI1.—Skeleton of Tetrapturus imperdtor.....-2.2...cceccccces cee encceen ns cece nn eeeces 386 
KTV .—Xiphias Gluadius .... 2. cece ccccceccccec sens cwccens cacnns ceces es neccenenaenccee 386 
XV.—Map showing the distribution of the sword-fish family ........--.-----.----.e2. 386 
EXGVALE—— MOUND OLS WOLG-lishieseeseeouccetacesions desiercesiscaccccoeseuiccasscconsaciconeae 386 
XGVle—WOUN POL Sallclishvescccsses ante aswaasaaees cncssst noe caccseslcesenccocehchaececcses 386 
RAVeUG VOU CLO Nall 1s Nesadccecosss sone cacscc cece. se eosamacecccnseececsnscassheeterens 386 
XoPXe——VOUNPOl Sill -fistltecscee + ses asses ssnecctecssciscccies coracsisesasncacenceccacsieoss 386 
XOXe——VOUN MOA fis eens ssecc esses chat rceceeae sect san scsananetscasceececeasteee - 386 
XOX — S WOTdOLey OUNMBWOLd-tisls--scniceae nesses cubicn ssn ssecceceaatccssccieeeessccccice 386 
XXII.—Vertebrate parasites of sword-fish --.. 22.2222. .on 2c. cee n cee see wenn ee ec ence cee 386 
XOX —S wOrd-fenerman ccsacsctsscsssstsccsecccleacecsicdscccececcsisoressaincosiewensacesio se 386 
XXIV.—Sword-fish fishing in the Mediterranean.........2-.2 seen. eeeeeeeeeeee ones wees) | 886 
SPANISH MACKEREL FISHERY.. 
PuatE I.—The Spanish mackerel (Cybiwm maculatum) ....--.----.-2.2222202cceees ceceee cocnee . 424 
I.—Different methods of setting gill-nets off Sandy Hook ....-.......-.-.-- eee. --20-- 424 
I1I.—The pound net of Northampton County, Virginia ........-..-..--ceeeee eee eee eee 424 
ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 

Gent — MO GUL ae asso saasiantaentoeancasonwccccsceincedacsesaccisdanecleccccnccusecccccanccseaainc=s 491 
2:—— MOAN Caro Or PATCNU ASN csc cose ececeres ese sn casas sea caccasecewerecesacariene=2--=- 492 
3.—Method of removing eggs from mature fish of small size..--..--..--.---2------2------- 493 
4.—Method of removing eggs from larger and stronger fish..--......---..-----------+----- 494 


D.—-lrame £0r Collecting AUNCHLVO CLES scanccciecoscntseccnincsecansccesccccccasecesceccsacees 400 


XIV LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 


Page 
WIG. 6.—Theisame, ready for use) -<- << - cceceececenececmccecesnleneccsscecerccscscecscceciescaeas - 497 
7.—The same, showing position in the water ....... 22.22. -- 0-26 - ccne ne nee n nee enc ene cenene 497 
8.—Incubating apparatus used in the Netherlands ..........-.--.---------+----- SSapeeqecoe | allt) 
9.—Frame used in connection with same-..........-. sneeaece beso ccdo Ss ocisososenososshassed 500 
10! —Larger form of same)s--- 2. .-2ses-cesecedeniaceancaneee=ve QSOS aco Shcoo doo naeScoscoadead 500 
11.—Coste’s incubating apparatus for trout eggs-........ SqeebodocSoodceactcas sissiomadsoasescs 501 
12.—Larger form of same used by the College of France.......---.-.----------+----- abecaad 501 
13.—Hatching-box for use in pure running water ........ alonosesebaododacnccbodctassestahac 502 
14:— Terracotta hatchin g-Vesselsic<cewscene eins cemeaeais cise esccelewelcie eins nie sisiasicteweeisaeineincte 502 
15;—Wackerhatching-basket.:withiloatay soecnese sacee ee teae ene ean cs <ae ein cena ane iee 502 
16:—The same, ‘withoutifloats est ocseacee cance cece cece twccanpetemaanel cscs cocsmereenccs 503 
17-—Coste’s hatching-box for both free and adhesive eggs .....-.---20-----22-eeneneeeeeee-- 508 
18.—Parasitic plant injurious to eggs --.....-.--.-----..--6- Seabee cease eee co ec acasce eam 505 
19.—Leptomitus clavatus, another destructive parasite ..... eeeseecsccue wesc dacetsiedseeweee 505 
20:—Pincers for removing bad Of ese cons esc eniecssadecee sence ensenetectonsccmccae neers me 506 
21.—Several species of diatoms very destructive to eggs ....-..---2.---2-+--------- pogsiecocd 506 
22.—Series showing the development of the embryo in the egg...........------.--2------- - 507 
23:—Onutlineiof newly-hatched fishseseecsseecesacslececiecweacesteonaceeasaeteecscicesem ccc 508 
24.—Surface view of the series of feeding-tanks for young fish used by the Netherlands 
Wish\Commissionysssssaceseansceseaceasseeesee es Boaccacbesosbcasse Gagsscdococes dédoes 509 
25.—Longitudinal section of a single feeding-tank..........-.--2-2- 0-220 scenes eee e- ene eee 510 
26.—The same scries as in Fig. 24, shown in vertical section ...-....------.s2020seeeeeeeee 5) i) 
27.—Diagram of the same series .....-.-....----------- Sac DOOeEboS Solauacecassice Weseteedeces 510 
FISH-PONDS OF THE BASSIN D’ARCACHON. 
Fic. 1.—Elevation of sluice for introducing fresh water. .-----....-2-------+-----ee 222+ --- eee --- £19 
2 —Ground-plamOfsames-ons ss eseeses snc eea see seme see seisecieceeeeteseneemaeseees se cnenee 519 
OYSTERS AND OYSTER-CULTURE IN SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN. 
Gs al — We We OL SOA-HaAtSlo---soe essence nececeacniceces seer eces BOER Bap ea aU cecOnU BS COBadEOC 685 
IN EY OREN aS 5 ae aseeabn Ss So oCe CECE CSRbOReHaGaoc ons coe SESerauSHuabadaeconHoEbaadeasoAd 686 
2.—Cross-section of a deep channel in the sea-flats; with an oyster bed ..............------ 688 
BY Oe Rey et yi san ASSIS TORI ONOCIG HESOLC AOOUb SSObuCHCo nao Hono dnedsancconboddosdansoscd 689 
4.—F ull-grown oyster with left valve removed. .-...-.--....--sescccccceceecceccn cence enone 691 
5.—Longitudinal cross-section of a seven-year old oyster .-..----.22---2-2---- cee ence eee eee 693 
6:—spermatozom OL oyster: sercccsccscsceoeles secs cosas sincectwen acc sesccmisstnecaicecinctleis cise 693 
7.—Stages of development of embryo oyster. --.---2- 22-0225 cecene eee c esc e ene cen ecenn-ecee 695 
8.—Outline figures of young oysters, natural size ........---- 0-2. ence e ene cence een nen eee 699 
9.—View of sea-flats.....-....- BeOS ROSH SABES Osseo oo RS aU Sh ceteeodboessdasesobotsaddescks seer 707 


OYSTERS AND MUSSELS AND THEIR CULTURE IN FRANCE AND ITALY. 


FIG. 


1.—A twig bearing young oysters, natural size .....-. 22.222. e none ween ce cows ce ccc eccne ee 7155 
2.—Shell of cardium covered with young oysters, natural size.......-....------e-e0---- eee 756 
3.—Embryo of oyster, much enlarged .............---- EROS OOCE SEO Soo aH e SeseoESCHtOnSaScr 763 
4.—Oysters of different ages, natural size ........-.-...--------- Sesasabe - Jonagoapognegdsoe 764 
5.—Artificial oyster rockery of Lake Fusaro, Italy. .......2---.-.---------0 cee ee cence e nee 782 
6.—Bundles of twigs suspended between upright posts of same .....2.-2--------------2---- 782 
7-——-Kascine colléct0rqcosess-2-cene= = seeeae sateen eesiceeecsiseraenincecnenasae SOSE EBODSEOOST OSC 785 
$:—Platformcollectoncspecesceeeee senses esciecnceslsetecticncse mac seecinesse anes cmeceessenti 787 
9:—Box collector; exterior VidW- ccs scec svieceulisciscenccececus dcesisensesaciecssictccoriees smear 790 
10:—Inner frames orboxcollectorsscerescesseceseswecioceeslencraciece = stascines ssccmeneemene 791 
11.—Box collector, interior view --....-...-.--.--6 BER ICAO OB OO CESAR Hino pococotasenassac 791 
12.—Tile collector, simple form---..-......-.----.- SCARCE DSU CEO EOA S DERE CHOOE SACO CanOSHOSOC 794 
13.—Double tile collector....-....-...--.. SORE Bone cO SCECOO CSCS UOHDCHIEG GEBOE SRaneHS ERO COOS 794 
14.—Tile collector, oblique form ................2--ce-e-ccnee SEE an dnadoseaobancacoocsoaa¢ - 195 
15:—Thesame; tenp1Orm =... .-cscccisesec cle sucecideceseieene=s< Seale ci datmscr ences senewenesene as 795 
16:—Kemmeren tiles cnc<oscsoses -oeuest coe csseccacieseedicaeseces ase aceoe! eR ReECHOOCOOBORSSS 796 
17.—Tile collectors, other forms.-.............---- SoCSOCeoeSAS i gelubescocssith a sseseiesecmacise 796 
18.—Claires, vertical section and bird's-eye VieW......---..eccenee- es 02 een eee e ener ene - eee 806 
19.—Mussel-culture, fisherman in his acON—...0- 52. -<enccccccessasannsscenocacccnce Bscegoas 811 
20!— ows Crawls £0F MUSsels)s =~. soNewn ca sewsceccecesseccss a ppOCAUEHabaCSaussStasesoosaesecas 813 
21.—F alse crawls, loaded with mussels..........-+----2+--0-- ssiwevee Jodo ose oe cape tees weal 814 


22.—Raft collector, used in mussel-culture...... Hbodeos Seecnes Gaboo¢aSodd oobdaS aaoeseaeesicsle 818 


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. XV 
COSTE’S OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. - 
age 
PLATE I. Fig. 1.—Bird’s-eye view of Lake Fusar0......\.cccnc--cccccnnnne cocene cece ee cecees 884 
30 2.—Artificial beds, surrounded by stakes .......-.2...-----02---- seen ee eee 884 
3.—Stakes and fagots to receive oysters .......-2-2- eee ee eee - eee ee ene n ee 884 
4.—Oyster ready to leave the mantle Bee eee oe a eeiane aioe tease isten a l\elswea sm e(aisle 884 
/5i—Thewsamey lateral VidWice sss car ceceseseece ae sca'n= sceccdessa-acinse~isse 884 
Ii. 6.—Thesame: with'cushion protruded... 2... Scio o occ Sewincwenc voeons= 884 
7 THEisAMe FANOUNOL WOW -cmescoeeseowscceseciocosiccicceesiseeccossceeginewonc 884 
j 8.—A group of oysters attached to ay SO SEgoocboDocHaduaasoduecsecEsasdsade 884 
IV. 9.—Basket for preserving Oysters.....-.-0---eeeeee-- ee econ ee cone eee eee 884 
10\—“Storape park.-< - << ceo. o one wc cececcctea se ccsccceennccccoocsedecrnasco-es 884 
We 11.—Floating apparatus for culture of mussels ........-----+-----00-------2-- 884 
12:—Bouchot fishermaniinihis 2con’. --. 5.2522. stews amncoccsececcccenserices=—= 884 
Nac 13°—Mapiof the Bayof Ateonillon ooo. ooo oe co cemidaceteewecnsicunwesicnnsan-=== 884 
Vil. 14.—Isolated stakes, covered with spat -...... 2.0.22... -cccccccecccces sence =e 884 
‘ 15.—Hook for detaching seed-mussels. .-......-- 0-20 cccecsceeee scene ee ee ee ee 884 
16.—Stakes with wicker-work filled with mussels .....-..---.- Boe bODCSaOOS005 884 
VLE: 17.—Fagots from oyster-beds of Saint Brieuc...........--------+-------------- 884 
Ix. 18.—Cardium shells covered with young Oysters..-..-.------e---0----- +--+ 884 
19.—Simple roof collector -... 2.5... -. 05.22. ccc ccccccw ence nse sn ee ss ccteneenne 884 
x 20.—Platform collector, with multiplied compartments .......---------------- 884 
xI 21i—Theidouble-roofcollectores---cs---sesccecscen ss oceecs esas alea scans sels 884 
22.—The roof collector with oblique rows overlapping. --..------------------- 884 
23.—The roof collector in alternate rows opposing......-~- Sonone 2 Sosiessueeeee 884 
XII. 24.—The hive collector, complete and closed..-...-..-- PROBS COR DAB OOD RCOCE SOG 884 
XII 25.—Movable frames of the hive collector ....-.-...-.------ Seercessoecmeesane 884 
26.—Hive collector, showing arrangement of frames........-..------------2- 884 
THE OYSTER AND ITS ENEMIES IN THE BASSIN D’ARCACHON. 

Fic. 1.—The Portuguese oyster..-.-- caccats aout weses wns a eece se nacisssis scars cncenweccecaseecen 932 
2——NEWNYIMN YP. cs rceseees sosenecaee sce enecienwe cellecnsis'e <mnlewmciem clelnsloessaniv ee Jace oceeaeaet 935 
3.—Murex tarentinus...-.--- SOS SCORES CHSC CE SOS COSS SHH soRScecdds Hosea sasscdatoosSdedsédeoan 936 
4 ——TNE|CYAD =. coesacccccerecdasecwoceciacescvccocs cSennececnesnccese cove Béineacuseecesdcadaaa 939 

OYSTER-CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 

Fic. 1.—Bonquet collector ... 222... 2c cce cee nnn cnnn ne nee cnn enc cnn sees cease cceen nese n ee eceees 959 
2 and 3.—Frames for supporting bouquet collectors on a hard bottom........---.---------- 960 
4.—Diagram of the ostracultural establishment of Crach River ........-------------------- 969 
5.—Knife for detaching young oysters from the collectors.......--------------------- ---0e 972 
6.—Pincers for cutting the tiles ...... 0.2.00 .0 222 - penn nn bone ewe ee cee cece eens ee eens scenes 972 
7.—Cages for young oysters which have been detached from the collectors ....-.---.-.---- 975 
gi ThesameysmallerisizOr cece cee cenest onennissecenseccssc so sneeieecincctsiem= in eaminnino= em 977 
Oi“ SCOOP since css cise meieni-n saineloe cia welais sien aineie me =e ieee aa isieim ninleinie's win wteleminininiein|-[n'sin[='=eimn esas 977 


a 
a cy 


REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER. 


A.—GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
1.—INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 


The present report is intended to give an account of the work of the 
United States Fish Commission during the year 1880; closing, as it 
does, the first decade of its existence. Originally organized by Con- 
gress simply for the purpose of making investigations into the condi- 
tion of the fisheries of the sea-coast and lakes, the subject of the actual 
increase of the food-fishes of the country by means of artificial propa- 
zation was added in the second year of its existence, thus establishing 
a twofold function. 

In each department the labor has increased year by year in propor- 
tion to the increasing favor shown by Congress, until, at the end of the 
decade in question, its work has become of pre-eminent magnitude 
among similar organizations throughout the world, the results, it is 
hoped, being in equal proportion. What the future may have in store 
for the Commission of course cannot be anticipated at present. Should 
its scope and importance inerease within the next ten years as it has 
in the past, it will constitute a very important element of the opera- 
tions of the Government looking towards the amelioration of the con- 
dition of the country at large. 

The most noteworthy features of the year may be indicated as follows: 

1. The production of the German carp in large numbers, and their 
distribution to the various parts of tine country. 

2. The production of shad on an inereasing scale, and their dissemi- 

nation in numerous localities where they were previously unknown. 

3. The construction of a special steamer (the Fish Hawk) to serve as 
a floating hatching-house for the production of shad, herring, striped 
bass, ete., and which is capable of being moved to any place where the 
breeding fish can be found in sufficient quantity. 

4, The introduction to the notice of the American fishermen, and the 
use on a large scale, of the gill-net with glass-ball floats, for the pur- 
pose of capturing codfish on their winter spawning-ground. 

5. The co-operation with the United States Census Bureau in obtain- 
ing the history and statistics of the North American fisheries. 

6. The preparation of the American exhibit for participation in the 
International Fisheries Exhibition at Berlin. 


S. Mis. 2 XVII 


XVIII REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


7. The use of the Fish Hawk in exploring the Gulf Stream and its 
fauna, especially in connection with the distribution of the tile-fish. 

8. The extended exploration of the fisheries of the Atlantic coast of the 
United States, of the great lakes, of the Gulf of California, and of the 
entire coast of Western America, from San Diego to Point Barrow in 
the Arctic Ocean. 

9. The collecting of complete series of the fishes of the sea-coast and 
the lakes for the National Museum, including large numbers of dupli- 
cates, especially on the shores of the Pacific, for distribution to public 
museums and educational establishments in the United States and else- 
where. 

All of these subjects will be considered more at length hereafter 
under their proper headings. 

The death of Mr. James W. Milner, which occurred on January 6, 
1880, deprived the Commission of one of its most efficient assistants. 
Mr. Milner had been associated with the work of the Commission on 
the Great Lakes, on the Potomac river, and at Gloucester almost from 
its inception. After suffering from ill-health for several months, during 
which he sought for relief in various climates, he finally succumbed, 
and terminated his short but very useful career. 


2.—PRINCIPAL STATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 


A brief statement of the principal localities at which the work of the 
United States Fish Commission was prosecuted during the year may 
serve as a suitable introduction to the more extended statement of the 
history of operations in general. 

The division of research and investigation is naturally conducted 
most extensively at the summer station which the Commission selects 
for its field work ; and Newport, as the point in question, constituted a 
center at which a large amount of labor was carried on. ‘ 

Reference has already been made-to the work done along the entire 
coast of the United States on both oceans, of the great lakes, and of the 
Gulf of Mexico, in connection withthe fishery census of 1880. On these 
lines, as well as at Newport, the investigation into the natural history 
and statistics of the fisheries, the methods of their prosecution, and the 
general natural history of such animals and plants as are related 
directly or indirectly to the wants or luxuries of man, were carried on 
to a greater or less degree. 

The stations connected with the propagation of the food-fishes were, 
as usual, quite numerous, and witnessed a great deal of labor on the 
part of the employés of the Commission. Of these the most important 
are aS follows: 

1. The hatchery on McCloud River, in California, of the California 
salmon. 

2. The ponds for breeding the California trout, situated about five 
miles above the McCloud River salmon station. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XIX 


3. The station at Northville, Mich., for hatching the white-fish taken 
in Lake Huron, Detroit River, and Lake Erie. 

4, The Bucksport station, on the Penobscot River, for procuring and 
hatching the eggs of the Penobscot or Atlantic salmon. 

5. The station at Grand Lake Stream for the land-locked salmon. 

6. The station at Druid Hill Park for hatching eggs of the Salmonide 
and for the propagation of carp. 

7. The station on Monument Lot, in Washington, for carp. 

8. The station at the Arsenal, in Washington, also for carp. 

In addition to these, which may be called permanent stations, there 
was also a Station at the navy-yard, in Washington, for hatching out 
eggs of the shad obtained from the Potomac River. 

There was also a similar station for taking and hatching shad-eggs at 
Havre de Grace, on the Susquehanna River. 

Fuller details in regard to all these subjects will be found in subse- 
quent pages of the present report. 


3.—ASSISTANCE RENDERED TO THE COMMISSION. 


The act of Congress establishing the Commission directs the Execu- 
tive Departments of the government to render all necessary and prac- 
ticable aid in carrying out its mission; and, as in previous years, it is 
my very agreeable duty to report the cordial manner in which this has 
been done. 

Navy Department.—To the Navy Department, as before, the obliga- 
tions are very great. It was not necessary this season to call upon the 
Department for a steamer such as was furnished during previous sea- 
sons in the Blue Light and the Speedwell, the Fish Hawk being suffi- 
cient for all necessary purposes. The Department did, however, in 
accordance with the law of Congress, supply the officers and crew of 
the Fish Hawk, as also two navy launches, for use specially at Havre 
de Grace and on the Potomac River. A number of flags were also 
issued to the Commission, to be used for the fitting up of the Fishery 
Exhibition at Berlin. 

War Department.—To the Signal Office of the War Department the 
Commission is indebted for the supply of a large number of water 
thermometers to the light-houses and light-ships along the coast for 
the purpose of making observations upon the temperature of the water 
and its relationship to the movements of the fish. Copies of observa- 
tions made by the regular observers of the Signal Service were also 
furnished as heretofore. 

By order of General McDowell, a detail of soldiers was also supplied 
at the McCloud station for its protection against Indians and lawless 
whites. 

Treasury Department.—The supervising surgeon of the Treasury De- 
partment, at the request of the Commission, instructed Dr. Guiteras to 
visit Tiey West and carry on some investigations into the cause of the 


xx REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


great mortality among the fishes of the Gulf of Mexico. No report, 
however, has as yet been received upon this subject. Very effective aid 
in many ways was rendered by the Light-House Board. 

Railroads.—TYhe railroads of the country have continued to render a 
very important help in facilities extended to the messengers of the 
Commission in carrying fish throughout the country. As heretofore, 
all, called upon for the service, have issued orders to conductors and 
other employés to allow the messengers of the Commission to carry 
their fish-cans in baggage cars, with free access to them; also instruct- 
ing them to allow the messengers to check empty cans as baggage to 
destination. To the Baltimore and Ohio, the Pennsylvania, and the 
Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore special acknowledgments are 
due for carrying, free of expense, a large number of packages contain- 
ing the exhibit for the Berlin Exposition. 

The railroads, also, between Boston and Bangor carried a car-load of 
shad and its accompanying messengers free of expense. 

Steamship lines.—To the foreign steamship companies the Commission 
is indebted for important service, especially to the North German 
Lloyds, which transported the entire fishery exhibit for Berlin from New 
York and from Baltimore to Bremen and back without any charge, the 
bulk amounting to nearly 12,000 cubic feet. It also, on several occa- 
sions, transported packages of eges of fish tended. for Germany and 
had them placed under the ppeorit care of the captain and steward. 

A similar courtesy in the matter of transportation of fish-eggs was 
rendered by the French Transatlantic Steamship Company, by diree- 
tion of its agent, Mr: Louis de Bebian. 

District Commission—Valuable help was received on various ocea- 
sions from the engineer department of the District Commission, espe- 
cially in connection with the laying out and construction of the carp 
ponds, of which Lieutenant Hoxie kindly accepted the direction. 


4.—COURTESIES RENDERED BY THE COMMISSION TO FOREIGN 
COUNTRIES. 

The applications from foreign countries for fish have continued to 
increase, and have always been met as far as possible. The exchange 
of courtesies between nations, looking towards their mutal benefit, 
greatly to be encouraged; and although, so far as fish are seen 
the United States has perhaps more to give than to receive, it is none 
the less incumbent upon her to do what may be possible towards im- 
proving the food resources of other portions of the world. 

Germany.—It is with Germany that the relationships in question fave 
been most extended and are practically most mutual, she giving as well 

as feceiving. In response to Herr Schuster, burgomaster at Freiberg, 
a number of eggs of the California salmon were forwarded from New 
York in apparatus of transportation specially furnished by him. A 
large number of eggs of the same species were also sent to Herr von 
Behr, president of the Deutsche Vischerei- Verein, and reached their des- 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XXI 


tination in excellent condition. Of this lot about half were presented 
by him, in the name of the Fish Commission, to the Hungarian Goy- 
ernment. 

Two hundred and fifty thousand eggs of white-fish were also sent to 
Herr von Behr, per steamer Donau, on the 25th of December. 

France.—In France the Société @Acclimatation received a number of 
egos of both land-locked salmon and California salmon. About 2,000 
of the former hatched out, and were to be placed in Lake Chauvette, 
a very deep, clear, and cold lake in Auvergne. The California salmon, 
after being hatched out, were divided among six different rivers of 
France. 

England.—England has, so far, shown very little interest in the 
American food-fishes, and, indeed, may be said to be much behind the 
greater part of continental Europe in relation to fish culture generally. 
A London company, however, made application for and received a 
number of eggs of the California salmon, which were sent to Mr. Capel, 
of the Cray Fishery, in Kent, to be hatched out. 

Netherlands.—In response to an application from the Netherlands a 
number of eggs of the California salmon were forwarded and success- 
fully hatched out. 

Guatemala.—Correspondence was carried on with Dr. Fenner in ref- 
erence to the introduction of useful food-fishes into Guatemala. None, 
however, were actually transmitted. 

Ecuador and Guadeloupe.—A similar correspondence was entertained, 
in regard to Eeuador, with Mr. Frederick Wesson, of New York, and 
with Guadeloupe through Mr. Charles Bartlett, United States consul. 
An application from this island for eggs of the brook-trout was turned 
over to Mr. Livingston Stone to be filled. 

Canada —To Canada, as in previous years, many eggs of the Cali- 
fornia saimon were forwarded, as also a number of carp. 

The minuter details of distribution of the special kinds of fish sent to 
foreign countries will be found in tbe proper portion of the present 
report. The transmissions to Europe have been greatly facilitated by 
the very liberal conduct of the French and German steamship compa- 
nies in carrying the eggs free of charge and with the utmost possible 
care. 

B.—BERLIN FISHERY EXHIBITION. 


5.—ITS ORIGIN AND SCOPE. 


In the year 1878 the Deutsche Fischerei- Verein, of Berlin, an organiza- 
tion having somewhat the same relationship to Germany that the United 
States Fish Commission has to the United States, determined, by per- 
mission of its Government, to invite the world to an international fish- 
eries exhibition. 

This was designed to include specimens of the animals and plants of 
the waters useful or injurious to man; illustrations of the apparatus bv 


XXII REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


which they were pursued and captured or obtained; the machinery of 
utilization; the raw material and the manufactured products derived 
from such objects; and the methods and appliances of the production 
and multiplication of the species, whether by artificial means or other- 
wise. To these were added various subsidiary subjects, such as the 
clothing and the social condition of the fishermen, ete. 


6.—PARTICIPATION BY THE UNITED STATES. 


While many countries promptly responded to this invitation and 
sent their cordial acceptances, no action was at first taken by the 
United States, and it was not until the winter of 1879~’80 that the sub- 
ject came actually before Congress forits consideration. At that period, 
in consequence of what was understood to be the urgent desire of the 
German Government for the participation of the United States, a bill 
was passed, becoming a law in February, making an appropriation of 
$20,000 to enable the United States Fish Commission to prepare an 
exhibit for the United States. I was notified to appear in connection 
with the subject, first, before the Secretary of State, and then before 
the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. 

Although the exhibition was to open on April 20, 1880, the bill in- 
troduced into Congress only became a law in February. 

As may readily be imagined, but a very short time was left for the 
preparation of the exhibit and the cases to contain it, packing, ship- 
ment to Berlin, installation in the buildings in that city, and a general 
participation in the exhibition. 

The law provided that the United States Fish Commissioner should 
represent the United States at Berlin, either in person, or by deputy to 
be appointed by the President, and, not being able to take part, I nomi- 
nated Mr. G. Brown Goode as said deputy. This was promptly acceded 
to; Mr. Goode received his commission from the President, and imme- 
diately commenced the work of preparation. 

Invitations were sent to the principal dealers in fishing-tackle and 
fishery supplies, to the manufacturers of articles of fish food and other 
economical substances derived directly or indirectly from fish, and gen- 
erally to all those who were supposed to have anything to contribute 
on the occasion in question. 

The large collections of a similar character prepared by the United 
States Fish Commission for exhibition at Philadelphia in 1876 were all 
available for the purpose, and were, for the most part, still packed in 
the boxes in which they had been returned from Philadelphia. 

The next step was to prepare a detailed schedule of the articles nec- 
essary to constitute a fishery exhibition, and fortunately most of the 
articles found in the collection were available for the purpose. Addi- 
tional articles were secured, especially of fish products, a field in which 
much progress had been made since the Centennial of 1876, and the 
collections were all properly packed and shipped. The cases which 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XXIII 


had been used in the Philadelphia exhibition were also available, hav- 
ing originally been made portable. These were also sent off. In great 
part, however, before shipment, the specimens were arranged in their 
intended cases and photographed, so as to show their relative position, 
and the more readily to admit of arrangement on reaching Berlin. Mr. 
Goode and his assistants, among whom may be mentioned Mr. F. W. 
True and Capt. H. C. Chester, worked day and night, sending off the 
first load on the 28th February, and the last one on the 24th March, or 
only twelve and thirty-seven days respectively after the passage of the 
act. The shipments from Washington were made by way of Baltimore, 
and those from the north were concentrated at New York, under the 
charge of Mr. E. G. Blackford, the well-known fish-dealer of New York, 
of 80 Fulton Market, at his establishment, and forwarded from that 
point. 

With unexampled liberality the great railroads between Washington, 
New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, namely, the Pennsylvania 
Railroad, the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad, and 
the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, agreed to transport these packages 
to the point of shipment and return them to Washington free of ex- 
pense. The North German Lloyd Company was equally generous, car- 
rying them from New York and Baltimore to Bremen and back free of 
cost, so that. the entire mass of nearly 12,000 cubic feet cost nothing 
whatever for transportation between Washington and Bremen. The 
charges from, Bremen to Berlin were paid for out of the appropriation. 

Mr. Goode and his party left Washington on the 16th March, he 
being accompanied by Mr. G. H. Hobbs and J. E. Rockwell, as general 
assistants; Mr. F. W. True, in charge of a portion of the exhibition; 
Mr. Fred. Mather, as an expert in fish culture; Capt. J. W. Collins, in 
charge of the ocean fishery apparatus, and Mr. Joseph Palmer, in 
charge of the models and stuffed specimens. Reduced rates of trans- 
portation were given to the party by the North German Lloyd, on the 
vessels of which company they were taken to Bremen. Owing to the 
great care in packing and precaution in shipping at the various points 
of the journey, the collections, including a large series of plaster casts 
of fishes, reached Berlin in safety, and the entire exhibit was in place 
by the 20th April, the opening day of the exhibition. 

The American display received universal attention, and was generally 
considered as by far the most interesting feature of the exhibition. Its 
various divisions were constantly thronged by admiring visitors, and 
furnished the text of many eulogistie and critical notices. 

It was originally intended to continue the exhibition for one month 
only, or until the 20th May. The interest, however, of the public was 
such that it was determined to maintain it in active existence until the 
Ist July, or nearly six weeks longer than was originally calculated upon. 

This of course necessitated an unexpected delay in the return of the 
party and the collections; and it was not until the middle of July that 


XXIV REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


Mr. Goode reached New York on his return. Most of his party came 
with him; Mr. Rockwell, alone, having been taken ill and left behind 
in London in charge of his brother. : 

The great superiority of the American exhibit, and the interest felt 
in it, were manifested by the assignment to ‘ne United States of the 
Bat prize of the Emperor William, consisting of a silver epergne of 
great artistic merit and costly character. Numerous medals of gold, 
silver, and bronze, and diplomas of honorable mention, were also issued 
to American exhibitors. 

The number of such medals would doubtless have been much greater 
but for the fact that most of the articles exhibited had been purchased 
at the expense of the Government appropriation, and being the property 
of the United States could not enter into the special competition. Such 
firms and individuals as presented what they had to show to the United 
States for the purpose in question secured a large number of prizes; 
and many more would have been obtained had the numbers of such 
liberally disposed parties been greater. 

As mentioned in a previous paragraph, the collections were shipped 
by way of Bremen to the United States, and, as already explained, 
came free of ocean or railway charges from Bremen to Washington. 
The remission of freight charges represented a contribution of many 
, thousands of dollars; and without this the appropriation made by Con- 
‘ gress for the purpose in question would have been entirely inadequate. 
The transfer from Germany of perishable articles, such as the plaster 
casts, to the United States was, unfortunately, not so satisfactory; many 
being broken and requiring a considerable amount of time for their 
» restoration. 

Much pleasant intercourse was had by the American representatives 
at Berlin with associates from other countries; and some valuable 
exchanges of specimens were made, which tend materially to enrich the 
collections of the National Museum. 

Mr. Goode, since his return, has been actively engaged‘in making up 
his report, which it is hoped will be ready for presentation to Congress 
through the State Department at an early day. 


C.—INQUIRY INTO THE HISTORY AND STATISTICS OF FOOD 
FISHES. 


7.—FIELD OPERATIONS AT NEWPORT, R. I. 


The central station, selected by the Commission for field work during 
the summer of 1880, was Newport, R. I., a point intermediate between 
Wood’s Holl and Noank, the places which had been occupied in previ- 
ous years. Quarters for the party were found in different parts of the 
city, while a wharf and factory building belonging to Mr. John A. Gris- 
wold furnished the necessary facilities for boats and for laboratory pur- 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XXV 


poses. * The building, erected for the manufacture of bullets, balls, and 
shot, furnished ample accommodations. 

Llett Washington with my party on the 8th of July; and in the course 
of a few days after arrival succeeded, with the assistance of friends 
in the city, in establishing satisfactory quarters for the season. Pro- 
fessor Verrill arrived on the 22d of July; Mr. Goode joining the party on 
the 17th, on his return from the fishery exposition at Berlin. As in 
previous. years, the superintendence of the work connected with the 
marine invertebrates was in charge of Prof. A. I. Verrill, assisted by 
Mr. J. H. Emerton as artist, and Messrs. Sanderson Smith, b. F. Coons, 
and E. A. Andrews. Mr. Richard Rathbun, a member of the National 
Museum, was also a helper in the general work; while the fishes were 
specially cared for by Messrs. H. L. Osborn and Frederick Gardiner. 

The Census branch of the Fish Commission also had its headquarters 
for the summer at Newport; the work being carried on, under the gen- 
eral direction of Mr. Goode, by Mr. Charles W. Smiley and a corps of 
assistants. Mr. T. B. Ferguson, Assistant Fish Commissioner, also had 
his headquarters at Newport. The various offices and laboratories, 
although widely separated in the city, were practically together in one 
establishment by means of connecting telephones. 

The sea service of the Commission was performed by the Fish Hawk, 
which reached Newport on the 2d of August, and was fairly at work 
about the 7th. Mr. Griswold’s wharf not being suitable, a permanent 
berth was obtained at the city wharf. Numerous trips were made dur- 
ing the season on the Fish Hawk, in the course of which all the region 
within 20 or 30 miles, including that about Block Island, was carefully 
examined. 

Towards the close of the season several trips were made in the Fish 
Hawk to the edge of the Gulf Stream, and an extraordinary amount of 
animal life of a very varied fauna, differing from what was previously 
known on the American coast, was brought to light. The first of these 
trips was made in the end of September, and the second in the begin- 
ning of October; the vessel starting out in an afternoon, running all 
night, and reaching the ground in the morning; then spending the day, 
and returning to Newport the next night. 

Vast numbers of species new to science were secured. Of mollusea 
alone, out of one hundred and seventy-five species collected, forty proved 
to be new to science. Twenty new species of deep-sea fishes were ob- 
tained. : 

The most important observations of the season in this off-shore region 
were those made upon the tile-fish, to which reference has been made 
in a previous report. The range of this valuable fish was greatly ex- 
tended, and its existence in immense numbers satisfactorily determined. 

For the purpose of investigating the tile fish and its grounds from a 
fisherman’s point of view, a Noank fishing-schooner was chartered and 
sent out with instructions to ascertain how readily the fish could be 


XXVI REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


secured by means of the trawl line. Owing, however, to a threatening 
storm the vessel did not remain Jong enough to do much work, its prin- 
cipal capture being a huge sword-fish, weighing some 700 pounds, taken 
on a small hook at a depth of 100 fathoms. 

On the 7th October the Fish Hawk took on board the apparatus and 
collections, and returned to Washington, stopping at New Haven long 
enough to leave the specimens for Professor Verrill, and at Wilming- 
ton, Del., for some repairs and apparatus. Before entering Chesapeake 
Bay a trip was made to the edge of the Gulf Stream, and additional 
collections of much interest were secured. 

My own departure from Newport, en route for Washington, took place 
on the 8th October. 


8.—THE STEAMER FISH HAWK. 


Reference was made in the report of 1879 to the appropriation by 
Congress for the construction of a fish-hatching vessel according to the 
plans prepared by Mr. C. W. Copeland, the naval architect of the Light- 
House Board. This vessel, a full and detailed description of which will 
be given in the report for 1881, was completed in the early part of 1880, 
but too late to be employed at once for her special object—the hatch- 
ing of shad. She was built, as stated, by Messrs. Pusey and Jones, of 
Wilmington, and when completed was registered at 484 tons of displace- 
ment. Her outfit included all the apparatus necessary, not only for the 
hatching of fish, but also for scientific research generally, including a 
hoisting engine of great capacity and a full equipment of dredges, 
trawls, deep-sea thermometers, ete. 

After a successful trial trip, and a subsequent completing of her 
equipment, she reached Newport on the 7th August, and was shortly 
after constantly occupied in the explorations referred to on another 
page. 

Three trips were made to the edge of the Gulf Stream south of New- 
port, as was also a fourth made off Delaware Bay. The vessel arrived 
at Washington on the 20th November, and on the 4th December went 
to St. Jerome’s Creek, at the mouth of the Potomac River, to procure 
some oysters for the ponds of the Oyster Park. In returning to Wash- 
ington she encountered ice in the Potomac River at Quantico, and was 
obliged to retrace her path and proceed to Norfolk for repairs, where 
she remained all winter. 

The experience of the season proved the vessel to be very effective 
and well adapted to her work. It was, however, thought better to 
lengthen her a few feet, so as to obtain a larger fish-hatching surface, 
and an application was accordingly made to Congress for an appropria- 
tion to carry this into effect. 

During the trip of the Fish Hawk to the Gulf Stream the great utility 
of a specially constructed vessel and of her apparatus for dredging was . 
fully tested. Her usefulness for investigation, when not engaged in 
fish-hatching, will doubtless equal expectations. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XXVII 


9.—FISHERY CENSUS OF 1880. 


In the report for 1879 an account was given of the arrangements en- 
tered into with General Francis A. Walker, Superintendent of the Tenth 
Census, for procuring an exhaustive review of the fish and fisheries of 
the United States. The plan of investigation which was there given 
in full has been steadily pursued, and a large amount of material aceu- 
mulated. 

Although Mr. Goode, who is in charge of this investigation, was very 
largely preoccupied, from February until July, by the preparation for 
the Berlin Exhibition and by his absence in Germany, the field-work 
was nevertheless continuously prosecuted by the various special agents, 
so that by October Ist the Great Lake region, the Gulf of Mexico, and 
the Pacific coast had been substantially completed. The work on the 
Atlantic coast had proved so much greater than anticipated that Messrs. 
hk. E. Earll and Capt. J. W. Collins were obliged to prolong their field 
labors and to hurry over the latter part of their work more than they 
would have preferred to do. 

Upon the return of Mr. Goode to Washington from Berlin he directed 
this investigation from Newport, as has already been intimated. Harly 
in October his headquarters were moved to Washington, and the work 
of writing up the final report was energetically entered upon, several 
of the assistants reporting at Washington for this work as fast as their 
field duties were completed, and others compiling their data at such 
places as were most convenient to them. 

Mr. Ludwig Kiimlein being obliged by his business engagements to 
withdraw from the work, his notes were placed in the hands of F, W. 
True for compilation. 

In addition to and co-ordinate with the field work, an extended line 
of inquiry had been pursued by means of circulars and lists of ques- 
tions. A very large number of replies to these having been accumu- 
lated, those of one single inquiry numbering over 30,000, the work of 
arranging and compiling them was assigned to Mr. Charles W. Smiiey, 
who, with several assistants, had had the entire charge of their issue. 
A force of from twenty to thirty clerks was detailed to his assistance 
from the Census Office by General Walker. 

By the close of the year the reports on several subjects had been 
completed ready for the press, and many others were in a satisfactory 
state of advancement. 


D.—_THE PROPAGATION OF FOOD-FISHES. 
10.—WORK ACCOMPLISHED IN 1880. 


White-fish (Coregonus albus). 
Northville Station.—For several years past the United States Fish 
Commission has ordered from Mr. Frank N. Clark, of Northville, sup- 


XXVIII REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


plies of eggs of the white-fish of the lakes, to meet requests from the 
State fish commissioners of California, Nevada, and other States, as 
also from Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. 

The growing scarcity of white-fish in the Great Lakes, and the re- 
quests by prominent Congressmen that the United States should assist 
the fish commissioners of the Lake States in their work, induced me to 
secure all the facilities of the Northville Station, and to place Mr. Frank 
N. Clark in charge of it. This took place in August, 1880. A number 
of improvements were made in the works, in order to render the station 
commensurate with the proposed scale of operations. The stock of 
brook trout and of California mountain trout belonging to Mr. Clark 
was also secured, and arrangements made for their propagation. 

One important feature of the Northville Station consists in a large 
supply of excellent spring water, quite sufficient to meet any expected 
demand. The temperature of the principal spring at its source is 47° 
Fahr., which represents far too great a degree of cold for many species 
of fish, but permits the proper temperature to be attained by a certain 
amount of exposure to the air. 

Active operations were commenced in September by a visit to certain 
islands in Lake Erie for the purpose of arranging with the fishermen 
for the privilege of taking white-fish eggs from their pounds. This 
was also done at Alpena, Mich. 

Endeavors to obtain eggs of the lake trout were considerably thwarted 
by the prejudice of the fishermen against this fish, claiming, as they do, 
that it is very destructive to the white-fish. This, however, in the opin- 
ion of Mr. Clark, is not well founded. 

The actual catching of spawning white-fish commenced in the early 
part of November and continued for about three weeks on Lake Erie, 
and nearly the same length of time at Alpena. 

The total number of eggs deposited in hatching boxes at Northville 
amounted to nearly 14,000,000, and the best of the lots taken yielded 
95 per cent. of young fish. 

Many interesting experiments were made by Mr. Clark in the course 
of his work, having special reference to the accelerating and retarding 
of the hatching of the eggs, whether by heat or by cold. These, with 
other details of the work, will be found in Mr. Clark’s report in the 
appendix. 

Of the total number of eggs taken, a little over 3,000,000 embryonized 
eggs were shipped to distant points; the Suaendie were held in the 
hatchery until their development, and were distributed by Mr. Clark, 
acting in behalf of the Commission, to the various lake waters within 
easy reach. 

Special acknowledgments are due to the Flint and Pére Marquette 

tailroad Company, the Michigan Central Railroad Company, the Lake 
Shore and Michigan Southern, and the Chicago and Northwestern, for 
gratuitous aid in moving the fish and their messengers. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XXIX 


Mr. Clark’s report, in addition to the points already referred to, con- 
tains some important observations by Professor Forbes, of Normal, II1., 
in regard to the food of the white-fish. 


The Quinnat, or California Salmon (Salmo quinnat). 


The McCloud River Station—The work of the Commission at this 
station continues, under the direction of Mr. Livingston Stone, to be 
entirely satisfactory. With an almost unlimited capacity for produe- 
tion, no more eggs are taken than are called for by the requisitions from 
State commissioners of fisheries ; including, of course, the two million 
or more annually hatched out at the station to be returned into the river 
to maintain the supply in the Sacramento. 

It is well understood that the remarkable continuance of the abun- 
dance of the Sacramento salmon is due entirely to the work of the Fish 
Commission in stocking the waters artificially, and thus making good 
the enormous drain caused by the canneries. 

Mr. Stone, in accordance with his custom, came east in the autumn 
of 1879; and as the season for active work approached returned to 
California, reaching the McCloud River on the 22d June. The water 
of the river was unusually cold for the season, showing a temperature 
of only 53°. 

Mr. Stone pays a tribute of acknowledgment to the industry and 
fidelity of the Indians living on the reservation; no class of men, per- 
haps, being better able to render the service required. 

A considerable amount of work was necessary to make perfectly safe 
roadways between the different parts of the station, the narrow mule- 
paths winding along the edge of steep precipices rendering locomotion 
extremely dangerous. 

All these difficulties were finally surmounted, anid on the 20th August 
the first ripe female salmon was taken. It was not, however, until the 
31st August that the eggs were taken in ¢ any Tae ; but front that 
date until the night of the 14th September, by which time 6,000,000 had 
been secured, the work was carried on uninterruptedly. After an inter- 
val of a few days the spawning was again resumed and 1,000,000 more 
eggs secured. 

The work of taking the eggs of the salmon was interrupted by the 
arrival of parties to put up the telephone, which proved to be of very 
great service in facilitating work. The Indians were specially inter- 
ested, and took great delight in talking to each other by means of it. 
Their poetical name for the apparatus was ‘“ Talking Spirit.” 

On the Ist October the work of packing and crating the eggs was 
begun, and in the course of three or four days 3,800,000 were packed, 
occupying 76 boxes and 388 crates. These were taken in wagons to 
Redding, Cal., and thence in a refrigerator car bound for the East. The 
car itself left ¢n the 4th October, and arrived in the usual time at Chi- 
cago, where it was turned over to Mr. Eliis, who had been sent out to 


XXX REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


that point to take charge of the eggs and distribute them to their des- 
tination. 

As usual, applications for the eggs had been received from many of 
the State fish commissioners and from private individuals in the United 
States. These were supplied as far -as possible, and 810,000 were 
hatched at the stations of the United States Fish Commission. The 
principal foreign distributions consisted of 50,000 to Canada, 100,000 
to France, 380,000 to Germany, and 200,000 to Holland. 

Full details of the work done at the McCloud River station, with 
tables of the temperature of the water, the number of fish of different 
sexes taken from time to time, etc., will be found in the appended report 
of Mr. Stone. 


The Rainbow, or California Mountain Trout (Salmo irideus). 

The Crooks Creek Station.—As stated in previous reports, Mr. Stone’s 
proposition to add the culture of California trout, Salmo irideus, to that 
of California salmon, on the McCloud River, was accepted, for which 
work suitable establishments and appliances were constructed about 5 
miles above the salmon station. 

No eggs were taken in 1879 at this new station, but between January 
12 and May 26 of 1880 about 385,000 eggs were secured and properly 
treated for transportation. Of this number 261,000 were sent, for the 
most part, to the Eastern States and about 70,000 were hatched out and 
planted in the McCloud River for the purpose of keeping up the supply. 

As soon as these operations were completed, sundry improvements to 
the establishment were made in the way of constructing stables, sheds, 
ete. The most important addition to the station was the connection 
made by telephone between it and the trout ponds, thus affording a 
ready means of communication between the two. 

Later in the summer many trout were caught and put in the ponds 
The latest advices for the yearfrom Mr. Stone announce that the ac- 
commodations at the station are very commodious, the hatching house 
having a capacity of several millions of eggs, and that the breeding 
ponds are large and convenient and now contain more than 2,000 breed- 
ing trout. These, it is hoped, will furnish a large supply of eggs in the 
future. The maintenance of these fish in the ponds throughout the 
year requires a considerable outlay of money for food, superintendence, 
ete. 

In summer the food of these trout consists of boiled refuse salmon, 
and in the winter of venison, and occasionally a steer. The trout now 
in the ponds will eat a whole deer at two feeds. 

Mr. Stone reports that the males have milt in them at two years of 
age, and that the females spawn during their third year. These periods 
are about one year in advance of the same operations in the case of the 
Salmo fontinalis. 

Herewith appended is Mr. Stone’s report, which will be found to con- 
tain some interesting details. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XXXI 


The Atlantic or Penobscot Salmon (Salmo salar). 


The Penobscot River Station.—The intermission of collecting eggs of 

the Penobscot salmon at Bucksport, Me., and producing young fish for 
distribution to the various rivers of the United States, has already been 
adverted to, and also the fact that the final success of the first experi- 
, ment induced its renewal during the season of 1880. 

The established method of buying living fish from the fishermen, and 
of transferring them to an inland pond for preservation until the spawn- 
ing season, was continued, 522 fish having been purchased—the first on 
June 10, the last on July 2. The aggregate weight was 6,787 pounds, 
or an average of about 13 pounds to each fish. 

The spawning commenced on the 25th October and ended on the 10th 
November. | 

The total number of eggs taken amounted to 2,000,000. 

As before, the expenses of the work were met by ihe United States 
in conjunction with the States of Maine, New Hampshire, and Massa- 
chusetts, the larger part of the funds being supplied by the United 
States, which, of course, received the largest proportion of eggs, its 
allotment amounting to about 1,250,000. 

These were divided as stated in the appendix to Mr. Atkins’s report, 
and will, it is hoped, produce a marked effect upon the salmon supply 
in our various rivers. 

As heretofore, the work of the station was under the direction of Mr. 
Charles G. Atkins, with Mr. H. H. Buck as foreman. 


Schoodic, or Land-locked Salmon (Salmo salar, subs. sebago). 

Grand Lake Stream Station.—The work of collecting .this fish and 
treating and distributing the eggs, as with the Atlantic salmon, continues 
in charge of Mr. Charles G. Atkins, with Mr. H. H. Buck as casita 

The results of the season’s work proved to be more successful than 
those of any previous year. A total of over 2,000 fish was taken, yield- 
ing nearly two and a half millions of eggs, or an average of 1,630 each. 
The capture of spawning fish commenced in the early part of November. 
Fuller details will be found in Mr. Atkins’s report. 

The demand for the eggs of the land-locked salmon continues to be 
very great, and a much larger number than we are likely to obtain for 
years to come could easily be disposed of. 


Shad (Alosa sapidissima). 

During the season of 1880 the stations operated were two in number, 
and located, respectively, at Havre de Grace, Md. .» and at the Washing- 
ton navy-yard. The number of fish hatched at these stations and suce- 
cessfully planted was 29,296,000. Of these 11,578,000 were transplanted 
to other waters, 9,855,000 were returned to the Potomac River, and 
7,863,000 were returned to the Susquehanna River. The details of this 
distribution will be found in the table appended to this report, and 


XXXII REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


more fully in Appendix G, Article XXV, p. 553. This production of 
nearly 30,000,000 shad is a very gratifying increase of some 14,000,000 
over 1879. 

The Albemarle Sound Station, operated last year, was not continued. 
The field, however, was well occupied by the North Carolina State com- 
mission. The work on the Potomac River, instead of being scattered at 
various stations, was concentrated at the navy-yard—an arrangement 
which became possible through the courtesy of the Commandant of the 
Yard and of the Chief of the Bureau of Yards and Docks. 

Havre de Grace Station—This station, at Spesutie Narrows, on the 
Susquehanna River, was operated conjoimtly with the Maryland com- 
mission, and under the direction of T. B. Ferguson, Maryland com- 
missioner, who placed in charge of the entire work Mr. John 8. Saunders, 
who had been employed the previous year at the Albemarle Sound 
Station. 

On the 29th of April two barges, containing the machinery and quar- 
ters for the men, were taken fot Baltimore to the Narrows. e 
taking of eggs Perameneed on the third of May and continued until 
the tenth of June, at which time the fishing ceased, in accordance with 
the Maryland laws. During that period 13,355,000 eggs were secured. 
These were obtained by means of the Feoneuaton of the fishermen, who 
allowed their fish to be stripped before being taken to market. 

The use of the floating apparatus made it possible, and very advan- 
tageous, about the 30th of May, to move the station to a point 
about five miles above where the barges were first moored. This was 
made necessary by the apparent change in the movements of the fish, 
due perhaps to an influx of salt or brackish water, which a continued 
prevalence of southerly winds forced up the river. 

The price paid the fishermen for the privilege of removing the eggs 
from the shad was slightly reduced from that paid in previous years ; 
and yet, as the production was more than twenty per cent greater than 
in 1879, there was a material gain to the fishermen. 

On the 12th of June an accident occurred, the barges being driven 
from their moorings by a severe storm of wind and rain. This caused 
a premature deposit of some 800,000 or 900,000 fish and eggs in the river, 
and delayed a proposed car-shipment ofa million of shad to the Penobscot 
and Kennebec Rivers, in Maine. 

A few days later, however, the number was made up by assistance 
from the Washington station, and the car was moved, by the courtesy 
of the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad Company and 
the connecting lines, to Bangor, where Mr. Stilwell, a commissioner of 
that State, took charge of the depositing of the fish. Another car-load 
of eggs was successfully transferred to the Nanticoke River, and 1,000,000 
young fish were deposited near Seaford, Del. A half a million of eggs 
were delivered to J. P. Creveling, a commissioner of Pennsylvania, w hich 
were deposited by him in the upper waters of the Susquehanna River. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XXXIIY 


At the close of the season a part of the equipment was moved to 
Baltimore and a part was taken to Tangier Sound to be used in ex- 
periments with reference to oyster propagation, while two barges were 
left at the station to be used the following year. . 

Washington Navy-Yard Station—A station was organized this yea 
for the first time at this point, by permission of the commandant of the 
yard, with a view to bringing the eggs from the various points at which 
they were taken upon the river to a common rendezvous, for hatching. 
Accordingly the steamer Lookout was placed in service for communicat- 
ing between the fishing grounds and the station, Mr. Frank N. Clark, 
of Northville, Mich., was placed in charge of the station, not only for 
the purpose of conducting the hatching operations, but also for making 
certain experiments in connection with this service. Messrs. W. P. 
Sauerhoff and William Hamlen took charge of the collection of the 
eggs. 

The season opened on May 4, at which date 650,000 eggs were 
secured from 400 shad, at Captain Skidmore’s fishery, Moxley’s Point. 
Four days later, these, having been successfully hatched, were deposited 
in the Potomac. On the 9th of May additional shad-eggs were ob- 
tained, and also 1,220,000 herring-eggs from the same fishing-shore, 
More than one million of these herring were hatched and returned to the 
river. Later, 180,000 herring were hatched and deposited at Cumber- 
land, Md. Shad-eggs continued to be taken nearly daily until the close 
of the season, June 27. The total number of shad handled was 11,790, 
from which 20,749,000 eggs were obtained, and 18,550,000 fish hatched. 
Of these, 14,350,000 were returned to the Potomac, and 4,200,000 were 
taken to other waters. 

On the 23d of May, Superintendent Wilkins provided a baggage-car, 
which was loaded with two million shad, which were deposited in rivers 
of South Carolina and Georgia. On June 16, a car was again sent to 
Kentucky with 700,000 young fish, which Dr. Griffith, a commissioner 
of that State, deposited in suitable waters. 

Transportation of shad.—The policy of distribution was changed. 
During previous years deposits of a few hundred thousand each were 
made in as many different streams as possible. This year fewer streams 
were stocked, but with much larger installments of fish. The success 
in shipping by car-loads was very gratifying, and leads the Commission 
to anticipate the almost exclusive use of this method hereafter. This 
has been rendered possible by the increased production of young fish, 
whereby a million of fish can be accumulated in time to forward them 
in one shipment before the yelk-sacs have been absorbed. 

Several things, however, are very essential for a car suitable to trans- 
port the fish. Among these may be named, first, arrangements for keep- 
ing a constant temperature; second, capacity for storing special carry- 
ing vessels; third, arrangements for changing the water and aeration; 
fourth, comfortable accommodations for the messengers, so that they may 

S. Mis. 29 III 


XXXIV REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


be constantly at their post of duty. A car can be specially constructed 
‘to supply these facilities, and thus greatly enhance the power of the 
‘Commission for moving young fish to remote waters. 

Experiments.—In order to determine the feasibility of hatching shad 
in hydrant water a series of cones, forty-six in number, were set up 
at the navy-yard, and were in constant use during the season. The 
water was supplied from a hydrant, and the eggs as they arrived by the 
Lookout were placed therein. The experiment proved entirely sue- 
cessful, the loss being scarcely appreciable. Experiments were also 
conducted for determining the smallest amount of water in which young 
shad could be kept, as it is often found necessary to economize water 
during their transportation. Mr. Clark found that less than one-fourth 
of the usual amount of water would answer, if suitable facilities for 
aeration were provided. 


The Garp (Cyprinus carpio). 

Ponds in Washington.—The report of the Commissioner for 1879 gives 
an account of the gradual increase in efficiency in the carp ponds in 
Washington, the production of a considerable number of fish, and their 
distribution to ditferent parts of the United States. 

Various improvements in grading and leveling have had their effect. 
For the purpose of draining the ponds more readily, or transferring the 
water from one point to another, a very efficient rotary steam pump, 
worked by a coil boiler, was constructed by the Herreshoff Manufac- 
turing Cofipany, at Bristol, R. I. Itis mounted on four wheels, weighs 
but little over a ton, and can be readily drawn by hand to any desired 
point. It is capable of elevating and discharging a stream of water 
amounting to 1,400 gallons per minute. It was put to use in the early 
part of May, and has been efliciently employed at various times during 
the year. 

The connection of the ponds with the city telephone system has placed 
the office of the Commission in close communication with the superin- 
tendent, and greatly aided in carrying on operations at that station. 

An appropriation of $5,000 was made by Congress in December, 1877, 
for the improvement of these ponds, and another of $2,200 in the spring 
of 1878. The District Commissioners kindly agreeing to take charge of 
the work, Lieutenant Hoxie prepared the plans. 

A contract was made, and the first work done was the construction 
of a dam across the outlet of the large space between the present ponds 
and the river, thus converting this into a close reservoir. Advantage 
was taken of a very low tide to close the narrow outlet, kept open until 
the last moment, and after the water had all run out. 

The pond, however, soon filled up to a considerable degree with rain- 
‘water, of much better quality than that which formerly backed into the 
pond from the mouth of the sewer. 

Several drains were laid in various parts of the grounds under the 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XXXV 


direction of the water registrar. It is hoped that the work may be en- 
tirely completed during the coming year. . 

For the purpose of assorting the fish and removing such as were not of 
an eligible quality, the different ponds were drained successively, the east- 
ernmost one being emptied on the 24th April. In addition to about 
100 carp, some weighing from eight to ten pounds, and a few tench and 
golden ides, a large number of mud-shad (Dorosoma), cat-fish, and sun- 
fish were obtained; these, in all probability, having been introduced 
through the water-pipes. 

The subsidiary pond at the Arsenal was drained on the 25d October, 
and a large number of carp obtained for distribution. 

The south pond was drained on the 8th November. ; 

The details of distribution of the carp will be found in another part 
of the report. In many cases the fish commissioners of the different 
States came to Washington to receive their supply; among others, 
Mr. B. F. Shaw, of Iowa, on the 27th May. An entire car-load was 
shipped to the fish commissioner of Missouri, at Saint Louis, on June Ist, 
and another, on the 25th October, to the commissioners of Wisconsin. 


Saibling (Salmo salvelinus). 

As areturn for the service rendered by the United States to the 
Deutsche Fischerei- Verein in the transmission of eggs of the California 
salmon and the California trout, Herr von Behr, president of the 
Verein, forwarded from Bremen 100,000 eggs of the sibling (salmo 
salvelinus) by the steamship Neckar of the North German Lloyd line, 
reaching New York on the 1st February, 1880. Only about 6,000 of 
them survived. 

At the suggestion of Mr. Livingston Stone they were sent to Mr. W. 
L. Gilbert, of Plymouth, Mass., to be hatched out. A brief note upon 
them will be found in Volume I of the Fish Commission Bulletin. 


The Gourami (Osphromenus olfar). 

In previous reports of the United States Fish Commission mention 
has been made of the gourami (Osphromenus olfax) (see Part II, page 
Ixxviil) aS a most desirable species of fish for introduction into the 
warmer portions of the United States. 

This fish belongs to the family of Labyrinthoids, and, like other allied 
Species, is able to endure deprivation of water for a considerable time, 
the peculiar arrangement of the gills holding the water like a sponge 
and remaining moist a long time. 

Its characteristics, as already explained, are extreme excellence of 
flesh, large size, and herbivorous character, although well provided 
with teeth by which it is enabled to cut and feed upon vegetables. 

It is also one of the nest-bearing species, the male preparing a depos- 
itory, weaving together water plants and grasses, for a receptacle in 
which the female lays hereggs. These eggs, as well as the young when 
hatched, are sedulously protected by the male until the latter are able 


a 


XXXVI REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


to shift for themselves, in this respect resembling the black bass. On 
this account the increase of this fish is assured even under unfavorable 
circumstances. 

The gourami thrives best in warm waters; indeed, its introduction 
into ponds or rivers the surface of which is likely to be frozen over is 
not considered desirable. A moderate degree of cold, however, can be 
resisted if the bottom of the receptacle be muddy so that the fish can 
bury themselves in the same manner as the carp. 

The gourami is a native of Cochin China, and has been transferred, 
among other localities, to portions of the Kast Indian regions, to the 
Mauritius, and to Guiana. They can be kept in very limited inclos- 
ures, and indeed are very often reared in tubs, where they are fed with 
vegetable food of any description. 

The Société @ Acclimatation of Paris has succeeded in bringing in a 
few of these fish into France; but, for some reason or other, they do 
not appear to thrive, and it is not certain that the experiment will sue- 
ceed in any part of the United States. The value of the fish, however, 
is so great as to warrant a special effort on the part of the Commission. 
On this account application was made to the Société @ Acclimatation for 
any suggestions as to the best mode of obtaining a supply and trans- 
mitting them to the United States; and the secretary, M. Raveret-Wat- 
tel, very kindly undertook to write to the agent of the society at Sai- 
gon, the capital of Cochin China, and have a small number sent by 
way of Hong-Kong to San Francisco. 

On the application of Mr. B. B. Redding, the able Fish Commissioner 
of California, Mr. Stubbs, the agent of the O. and O. 8S. 8. Company, 
plying between San Francisco and China, agreed to instruct Mr. Charles 
H. Hazwell, jr., the agent of the company at Hong-Kong, to receive and 
forward any fish that might be sent to him forthe purpose. It is hoped, 
therefore, that at the proper time some of these fish may be safely 
landed in San Francisco, where they will be taken in charge by Mr. 
Redding and probably introduced into a lake of warm water, near San 
Gabriel, Los Angeles County, abounding in vegetation and possessing 
all the other characteristics necessary for a successful experiment. 


E.—ABSTRACT OF CONTENTS OF THE APPENDIX. 
11.—ANALYSIS. 


The appendix to the present volume will be found to include a num- 
ber of formal reports of the Commission in reference to different branches 
of operations too detailed in their character to be presented in the pres- 
ent general statement of work attempted and accomplished. It also 
contains translations, for the most part, of treatises published abroad 
in regard to the general fisheries and to fish and oyster culture, having 
direct relationship to the work in the United States, and furnishing 
important hints for action on our part. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES XXXVII 


A brief notice of some of these articles may not be inexpedient. 
They are arranged under certain heads, as follows : 


A.—GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 


This includes a statement of the proposed plan of the joint inquiry of 
the United States Fish Commission and the Census of 1880 into the 
fisheries of the United States: also an account, by Mr. Goode, of the 
work accomplished during the first ten years of the United States Fish 


Commission. 
B.—DEEP-SEA RESEARCH. 


In this Professor Verrill gives an account of the apparatus used by 
the United States Fish Commission in dredging off the coast of New 
England. 

C.—THE SEA FISHERIES. 


In this appendix are given articles upon the Icelandic, Swedish, and 
Norwegian fisheries in general, and upon the methods and results of 
certain special fisheries, such as the spring herring, sardine, and the 
eapelin. 

It also has a paper by Mr. N. P. Scudder on the halibut fishery in 
Davis’s Strait. This gentleman was sent by the Commission in 1878, 
on a Gloucester halibut schooner, for the purpose of gaining information 


on the subject. 
D.—Economic RESEARCH. 


A very important communication by Prof. W. O. Atwater is here 
presented of an investigation into the chemical composition and eco- 
nomic values of the fish and invertebrates used for food. This work 
was initiated at the expense of the United States Fish Commission, and 
will be continued in the future. 


E.—NATURAL HISTORY. 


Mr. Goode presents an account of what is known of the various 
species of sword-fish in general, especially of the three belonging to 
the coast of the United States. Mr. R. E. Earll, of the United States 
Fish Commission, gives an account of his observations in regard to the 
hatching of Spanish mackerel in Chesapeake Bay. 

An elaborate contribution to the biology of the Rhine salmon, by Mr. 
Riisch, is included in this appendix. 


F.—PROPAGATION OF Foop-FISHES. 


A report by Mr. Raveret-Wattel, secretary of the Société @ Acclimata- 
tion, of Paris, upon the condition of fish-culture in foreign countries, 
especially as represented at the Berlin Fishery Exhibition, will be found 
to contain meny interesting statements on the subject. A paper by Mr. 
J.P. J.Koltz,* translated from the French, reproduces one of the earliest 


*The second edition of 1&59. 


XXXVIII REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


systematic treatises on fish-culture published in Europe. Among other 
special points it contains an account of the methods of hatching fish 
by means of floating boxes similar in general principle to the shad- 
hatching box of Mr. Seth Green. 


G.—SPECIAL FISH-CULTURE. 


This contains a series of reports of the specialists of the United States 
Fish Commission on their work during the season. Mr. Frank N. Clark, 
upon the white-fish; Mr. Livingston Stone, upon the salmon and rain- 
bow trout; Mr. Atkins, on the Penobscot and Schoodic salmons; on 
the propagation and distribution of shad. Also an article by Max von 
dem Borne, upon the carp. 


H.—THE OYSTER. 


This represents perhaps the most important portion of the appendix, 
containing, as it does, a reproduction of all the principal French and 
German treatises on the theory and practice of the artificial culture of 
the oyster. This is a subject to which the attention of the Fish Com- 
mission has lately been attracted, and which it hopes to develop as it 
has many other divisions of its work. By showing the present state 
of our knowledge on the subject in foreign countries, we shall be better 
able to take it up afresh in our own country. The principal papers in 
this appendix are by Professor Mébius, of Germany, and by Messrs. 
Coste, de Bon, Bouchon-Brandely, Renaud, and Hausser, of France, 
together with a report of the work done in the Netherlands in regard 
to the oyster and its cultivation. 


J.—MISCELLANEOUS. 


The appendix closes with a list of patents issued in the United States 
during 1879 and 1880, by Dr. Robert G. Dyrenforth, examiner-in-chief 
of the United States Patent Office. 


12.—_TABLES OF THE DISTRIBUTION OF FISH AND EGGS. 


In the following tables, numbered I to VIII, and which have been 
prepared by Mr. Charles W. Smiley, will be found the condensed record 
of the distribution of white-fish, California salmon, California trout, 
Penobscot salmon, Schoodie salmon, shad, and carp. Fuller details 
will be found in various papers of the appendix: In XX, Mr. Clark’s 
account of white-fish operations; in X XI, Mr. Stone’s account of Cali- 
fornia salmon operations; in XXII, Mr. Stone’s account of California 
trout operations; in XXIII, Mr. Atkins’ account of Penobscot salmon 
operations; in XXIV, Mr. Atkins’ account of Schoodic salmon opera- 
tions; in XXV, the account of shad operations. e 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


XXXIX 


TABLE I.—Distribution of white-fish eggs by the United States Fish Commission during 


season of 1880. 


States. 


Iowa 


Maine 
Minnesota . 
Nevada 
New Jersey 


Destination. 


| 

| B. B. Redding, San Francisco 
leBeReShaw CAD AM OSMys arses hes coos eee stemiew cits bicise se cteie's ate oteleum are 
William Griftith, Louisville 
| E. M. Stillwell, _ Bangor 
R. O. Sweeny, Saint Louis 
| Mrs. He - Fenstermaker, Eureka 


Number of 
eggs. 


500, 000 
500, 000 


TaBLeE II.—VDistribution of California salmon eggs by the United States Fish Commission 


during season of Lee. 


States. _ Destination. spleens of 
eggs. 
ANOS eee eee eeete Gien'evaMuaicay cee seein saceinct sateen Ge ene reece sec ice we cince teen 100, 600 
IRAN SASH ao eeieosor DE eign osHlesWwonthies -ctseeerccero meee aetaiel eiale oat ana ns oteeins aati eel 100, 000 
Moraylands , =n QaklandsGacrentiCounbypssser «ec ecitss same ena sree nein saise eee oie 200, 000 
DOF meas = es | Druid Hill Park, IBA RTM OTOe Re meee Oe eRe eee ee eee 200, 000 
MESS OUT = 25 </-2-\eai: Silas Woodson, Saint ANRC Ny SSS See So Gaocisgt ou Robeeatcuacacreceae 200, 000 
WOW ees secesina Js. Eoumes, Versailles; Morgan) County... 2. ..ci00e 2 asic sees tscesnl| 10, 000 
Minnesota...-...... MRAOs SIEGH yan bela peat eee see eee uence ke cin cee tins ne. ae eset 200, 6v0 
Nebraskascest) 52. Nebraska Fish Commission, South Bend, Cass County ..-.-.-......-- 400, 000 
INGwiherseyeses 20) AMES Armin Me || CALECONIAEN LY iocicteionretecichle)- elamieiee = =crsicicein al ae 300, 000 
North Carolina ....} | S.G. Worth, Mor ‘canton, INC ao eee see as altctes Lane wlcos Meas nnias 200, 000 
Sonth Carolina ....|....-- (ips Be Broth eR ER eText Cece Ie Tae Re BS ni ERI tea aia a oe 200, 000 
West Virginia..... C.S. White, Romney, care agent Green Spring Run........... ..-..- | 150, 000 
FOREIGN. 
Cand aicehs cons asae SaaWELIN Ob NIGW CAStl eX On tarlOye rises emia ne rciateniseeroisewe aicinvee Sees | 50, 000 
TANCE sosaee eee c/ac Fred. Mather, for Raveret- Wattel, Societe d’ Acclimatation, Parise secer 100, 000 
Germany... cio... | Fred. Mather, for Von Behr, Deutsche Fischeret- Verein, Berlin reesei 300, 000 
WDOe oscar secs Fred. Mather, for F. Busse, hatching ponds, Bremen.........--....--- 50, 000 
IDO. Sesejesceecs.- | Fred. Mather, for Carl Schuster, hatching ponds, Hreiburgees2 scse se 30, 000 
Holland ...<. ..! Fred. Mather, for Von Pestel, Government of the Netherlands, in 
| charge of Zoological Society OLAS terdamn ten Geeme sacs oe ise ners | 100, 000 
Wh Sanh Smocsce Fred. Mather, for C. J. Botteman, hatching ponds, Bergen-op-Zoom ..| 100, 000 
United States...... | William P. Sanerhoff, for Upper Potomac Riverss-.---s20--e-cssaee- 810, 000 
| 3, 800, 000 


TABLE IT1.— Distribution of California trout eqgs by the United States Fish Commission 


during season of 1880. 


| 

States. | Destination. Number of 

| eggs. 
@alifomin sacs sce. IRE Ot ZS bastay © Onn Gries see ee a os ee es aes es ee | 10, 000: 
ERMGNOIR: secs ete n i. ING air banksi@ Men couen taossscir J OA aeerL seas ane a eect 2, 500 
LO wy Dies ea eo tees oh eae No IBS ha wa ADAM OSAM ie bo hoe yao ame ea meri cce sce cee maemo ee 8, 500 
Maryland. cones. —- PEBMNMeronBOMDAlUIMOLeNsacer cee eee eae nad tant chine eee eee 175, 000 
Mighigan,; 222... oct WE Mfetcalivbattle Creek .aescckcsee cas ona cs ne eae teas bepmine Soteee 1, 500 
YG ee econ ere iG OE OLTMAM ME OK ACO NA sae rssty tes tcterertes aicts wists eisersre ei ate miata che istetaaete 2,500 
OMS. am shite te eRueN Clarke Md Chilis aries eee ae eee eee ee ec nee om. ees Sern rf csa 2,500 
Minnesota......... | R. O. Sweeny, SaiTELRE TL Soe coe eae ts ee wh coe eM Meer a a 2, 500 
SMIGLSS OUI 2 spate fede ess WIAGeviaGteeamannsain tl omlsn ee sese ee ais seta sao e meno seins 39, 000 
ING yellampshire aso WOU DOLE. Seana canes acer eee tales cetioce ce Werea Geese pee ic Soe ele Siow 2, 500 
Ohio eee eben. INELON SED) PECatereLOledOweces cia ne eke cae hee cae cele coat ee eeelncien cick 4, 000 
Pennsvlvania.....-. athivWweekeu Gorge stone ce cane seem sab eu ae amas menceto aces senses 4, 000 
West Virginia. .... C.S. White, Green Spring River, Baltimore & Ohio Railroad ......... 10, 000 
Wisconsin......... DWT UWICISD OL = sete ce cicteterwine sie aoe Oe oe oe es ae ies Sema tates MSS 2, 500 


262, 000 


&L 


Tapre IV! 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


during the season of 1880. 


.—Distribution of Penobscot salmon eggs by the United States Fish Commission 


Siates. 


Maine 


Maryland 


Massachusetts ..... 
Minuesoia ... 

New H: ampshire. . 
New Jersey 
North Carolina. ..-. 
Pennsylvania 
Wisconsin 


Number 


Number 
of fish. 


of lots. | Streams stocked. 
Gi sConnechicwiuslimer sacs asses nee ae ae aaa oe eee eiels 
25 | Penobscot, Saco, Kennebec, Androscoggin, Machias, Den- 
ny’s, and Pre sumpscot Rivers. 
7 | Octorara and Eik Rivers, Great Northeast Creek and 
Potomac. 
1) Mikey dengmsye IIb Vere Bee Sse 5ose coh ab ona sors Gneood we coetoccss 
6 | Saint Croix, Cannon, and Mississippi Rivers, and Prior Lake 
Pill, Wee IRD Pao e aa an coanaEeDoe ecco dddaba>scsbdneesodors- 
fey) IBYet Eh Aids) J Rye) e ne ae Soo berong mane anoueSoUandecossecaeers oS 
By ORR dopd sohyel dees aq tanncs ab oo. Dane eo aa sonpeceosuemdcocr 
CI) ShricG pti reiniyy), NAY) O nen Sdone opacesenoedoson cee Sep oSapREESac 
NO AMMEN ee aoe See doodecudebueo- vo cbouconsonabecencecr 
60 


245, 631 
529, 356 


123, 432 


48, 000 
60, 000 
395, 000 
128, 643 
11, 000 
99, 335 
1,000 


1, 641, 397 


TABLE V.—Distribution of Schoodic salmon eggs bythe United States Fish Commission 


during the season of 1830. ‘ 
Spent Number Ses Number 
States. otlots: Destination. of fish. 
aera s L28 
@alifominee qase.ac 1 BaBsRedding SanwWrancisco. Caljespes ese eee sne cena eee 25, 000 
Colorado .....--.-.-- 2) W. ae Sisty, Denver, Colo., and Thos. Morrison, Morrison, 15, 000 
Connecticut...-.---- 5 ao J ; Renton’ Windsor, Conn., and Geo. Jeliffe, Westport, 496, 500 
onn. 
TOW jets css seis seas 1; PBS RAS hayweeAnAmosa LOwalsaes assem aslo seian se ceisiseelserieeleiel= 25, 000 
MANGAS 2... Soseccaele< LP DEBALone ehllswortheans see see ee eer eeree eee meee ees 25, 000 
Kentucky, ..-....... Tl ewWiny Grittith: Wonis valle keys eeeee see ee cee elem einm cet ll= 25, 000 
MiginGeieeee Selec nee 2 | F.C. Hewey, Phillips, Me., “and E. M. Stilwell, Bangor, Me.. 64, 000 
Maryn emo se 2| T. Hughlett, Druid Hill Hatchery, Baltimore, Md Stee 55, 000 
Massachusetts ..--. 3 | B.A. Brackett, Wanchester Masse eee eeeeeese eee 310, 000 
Michipan: 2-2-5... 2|J. G. Portman, Pokagon, Mich., and M. Metcalf, Battle | 35, 000 
Creek, Mich. | 
Minnesota.........- 1.| BO. Sweeny, Saint Paul, Minn.-.-....-.-.2.2<-2<-ce-e2 -ces 25, 000 
Mississippi..-.-..---. ie COAS Johnston: Columbras Missge es: atts aeapiaya one etciaiaiete=t 2, 000 
AMASSOUT aera ciel alaial- 1 | Silas Woodson, Saint Joseph, Mo.......--...--------0---- 0+ 10, 000 
INe@VAGA Soa cbtcccie © (CAG Parkers @ arson: OiyalNeyie sacle siscien sisal ael= eee 10, 000 
New Hampshire. ... 2 | A. H. Powers, Plymouth, N. a Pe aseBekies wocmeccsete ase ad 124, 000 - 
New Jersey ..-..--- 2 crane a Trenton, N. J., and P. H. Christie, Ver- 30, 000 
ank, N. Y 

PNOWWECOTK: Sees see. eGo Blackford, Fulton Market, New iO kos sae ce eon ee 25, 000 
North Carolina..... 3°) H. H. Cary, Atlanta, Ga., and 8. G. Worth, Morganton, N.C. 35, 000 
(Qiitiey ~sobusueeecrees 1. Leppelman, Fremont, 'QHig Riese Uae nae 5, 000 
Pennsylvania ...--- 2 | Seth Weeks, Corry, Pa., and James Duffy, Marietta, Pa.--. 30, 000 
Rhode Island.......| 10 EWM Lo wiry O alley aaiwalt pe ems oe tye ee erate eee 5, 000 
Vermont) -2oe sas oer 12 tc Vb Havent Rutland’ Vitesen cere eee aan eae eee nee 5,000 ° 
ETSI = ers ea csc 13) ColeMeyMeDonald)bexin ston) Viale seme er sce ae emia 25, 000 
West Virginia...... 1 | H.B. Miller, Wheeling, MBN eY as ocaGor= Sora baGOEOCGL 25, 000 
SWASCONSIN —.0 s---- 1 | N.K. Fairbank, Chicago, MT se ce Gabe ame Qaeeeree eee te 20, 000 
AANA Se ee eisccs sce _1| W. H. Barber, Andover, New Brunswick ..-.-...--..-..---. 50, 000 
MOTAN CO esc ecicts ass ee 1 | Fred. Mather, 25 Hill street, Newark, Nidicesceeccs seco ee 40, 000 

42 1, 541, 500 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


XLI 


TaBLE VI.—Distribution of shad from May 7, 1880, to June 27, 1880, by the United States 


Tish Commission. 


States. umber Streams stocked. phe 
California ..=---.=-- AMM SA CLATMON LO leet leiae lcs ares ote tatercteleiwlaiaieteSielo(elelare.c'ale of a\a'a/areisimata = 215, 000 
Delaware 25...) 2.<: 3 | Christiana Creek, Jones Creek, Nanticoke ...........-.---- 1, 350, 000 
GeOLPIA: s5522- ss c0c0 5 | Oconee, Yellow, Chattahoochee, Flint ..-...........-.------ 1, 188, 000 
im@ianay- 2-126. Nia |RSS D We etee ie tan ciel etme ero ote reisiste wie relaieieeiele sinineraoears a aca 200, 000 
Kentuelky .-.------- 1, || Sli oss Baten Saccepedooect han bcose cds SosepeEecgEccesose 700, 000 

elaine ss ~ <i. 2c Scans 2iikennebec; Mattawamkeag yoo cace so aansta opie ue aisee cee sect 675, 000 
Maryland ....-..-.-- 30 | Susquehanna 7, 863, 000 
S44 PP OLOMAG sae acca lew cae derce ote cp ecistictes oe celta mete cee slo aiae 9, 855, 000 
Tes SES OUT bie sea = ae ami clorsinte sista ape lee seisnte Sete soi) = eicie late ntorere aoe 3, 775, 000 
SH PDUs Ha itlOpvOU CS HIO SONY, sais ac oleae iolalavete el cima a eer elarnlst = 485, 000 
Gh PE xperimentalopurpOsesis aq saan ecice eet memocie «me aie cat 670, 000 
8 | Osage, Salt, Chariton, Gasconade, Grand, Platte, 202, 200, 000 
Nodaway. 

OGY <ecegcmes songs : ill SemLbr ey foaomorasnddelcecuecengTs > soocvenbecuaddcodacadaaas 200, 000 
Pennsylvania .--.-- DO tSusquehannat: i Jsees sone ce esse eamenecen aecesae (oeetenes 450, 000 
South Carolina..-.-. 9 | Broad, Seneca, Catawba, Wateree, Lynch's Creek, Big Pe- 1, 310, 000 

deo, L. Pedee. Turned over to Butler & Huske. 
WATSON divest oo. soins Te PASP POMALLO keen eeclo ce cecites cine nwcteetee. 2 nn sesiclas aieeieraieta(clelns 160, 000 
114 29, 296, 000 


’ TABLE VII.—Distribution of German carp to individuals, from October 28, 1879, to Decem- 
ber 31, 1880, by the United States ish Commission. 


[NorE.—So few of these fish were reared in 1879 that no statement was incorporated in the annual 
report for that year in reference to their distribution, and is consequently herein included. } 


Number of applicants Number of different lo- Total number of fish 
su lidd calities into which sent to the applicant 

Raine ppiec: carp were introduced. PP ax 

1879. |. 1880. | Total. | 1879. 1880. | ‘Total. | 1879. 1880. | Total. 
aiebam JaomsockBaecderond 8 13 zi 8 u 15 180 259 439 
MICANS AS Wess seats aero (aetetel| ee waters 1 ene ae "st crevereta tote UL | Eve erctate eve 15 15 
Califommisie ss tcecce sek cis cor Di seicmies 2 Qaleosecees 2 Te leseor ace 72 
Colorado Rae e ers eactas ced 14 11 25 6 uf 13 3806 134 440 
oneouout BAUS cross ec ease Siace z 2 Bye eteis ota a 29 i ck<a lst 830 830 
CUO UE ens he Be anal Geet tag ORE ers Eos We Serie cee 50 50 
WD GLAW ALO! <ece=c is'scc cece: 4 7 11 4 4 8 160 220, 380 
District of Columbia .....-. | 2 3 5 1 2 5 70 65 135 
1 iS lero 1 iia Rese oese vie 
96 20 16 36 582 | 1,364] 1,946 
9 1 6 7 40 130 170 
19 5 12 17 114 254 368 
DI ere are wears 2 2 leet ae se 20 20 
MRAM ATS < satsicisise s:=js Scio oa: 1 11 12 1 if 8 16 104 120 
aeontnoky Sosshieeessestscss 8 ae ak} 5 51 56 i24 | 2,018 2, 142 
WAIN OW ae w ctamicte oh cio ceissenllonc se sce CO eerie ce 4 Co ane 75 75 
Biers land Se ioe Se eee 73 280 353 47 116 163 1, 734 | 10, 228 11, 962 
2 TAR q 
Pen eee Ty an Regie ah, eee ail PN ont ee 
IMANNES OU, secon sens cene ==. eScor ae 6 63 | Sae5 ee 6 6:/Ssastee2 90 90 

Mississippi Sabie species secs 7 57 | 64 5 21 26 170 1, 309 1, 47 
aeabur Soot oeSondecoonac 11 a 34 6 14 20 214 330 544 
MODUS ccleaner cae seater alu ieincrotere p 2) ac Secs 2 OY ee ce see 40 40 
New Hampshire...-..-..-.- ies AE 3 il beeacnse 3 Bal Beemer 60 60 
ING AU Ch eee ee eee | 2 | 65 67 2 28 30 80 | 1,235 1, 315 
IG, Mg RBar cemaaeeceeed 18 97 115 13 64 77 390 1, 707 2, 097 
een Caroling ssseecieca= = -)|= cote = ri 22 DOR aren see 12 ONES eee 482 482 
NOs cee see we ss se | 62 66 2 43 45 88 1, 462 1, 550 
peoaey vans Bie soe <2 6 & 69 5 48 53 144 | 1,031 i ate 
Obey Sandie sere 3. oe | 4 5 20 283 03 
South Carolina | 19 18 Le  aeec 11 BT ae oe | 386 
Tennessee | 80 4 33 37 205 1,184 1, 389 
eres : . eeeecece | 9 123 19 30 49 776 1, 868 2, 644 
ermon Oe ee Aoaees 6 Cel Eaeeeec 120 120 
Ua ee | 159 10 72 g2| 185 | 2,692 | 2,877 
tN WA PANIA cone aoe 2 21 23 | 2 14 16 70 688 758 
BRCONSU tet Shes <2 =j2)4 asset =n 11 5) eee ae 11 De erate secccete 203 203 
LEAS A pee eee o73 | 1,374 | 1,647/ 181| 717) 898 | 6,203 | 31,443 | 37, 646 


XLII REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES 


TABLE VIII.—Distribution of German carp to State commissioners and agents for propa- 
gation or distribution, and which are not included in the foregoing table. 


State. | i879 1880. | Total 
ele 
PANE DARING PRR ee ny ce eer aeme wel men coe SecA cuiae ate aanmm meets se uma eames Pee ee | 400 400 
(Ofilive eahtteees Salssee cee ae re CSe es SSS rebrs Gm hoes Sarr SriSne DOC B EC BaOE a SU merce | 228 
Colorado -. 476 
MD Glaiware sie se Sorc cic stele acre eictcicls ya eas aha Shan pe Se ravel oon cpe arate ts tate isfaimtais epee tele Nee icksrecioraiciors 225 | 695 920 
IONDHIOS 5 - #545 556G05 codeine spoSsbd cheep sosoS onde edot st as coeedd depse aoc acoenbEl bos scade | 800 | 800 
INGRIEE'S)- So sacb gsdodbesor er seSSbcrnousssuseosbagr setntediniddoscactaosacensceciokelscocosts 100 | 100 
INGE AY SacHescbood convent oes ercobe omooes Soe Sb Secon soc cossocenesdeses dost alfaseccoso) 1, 000 1, 000 
Wiki bid SES Sa sachin cepamcmnedes sees op oes conned Senee socoande poec smd Scaerelosnsecge ; 38,000 | 38,000 
Michigan. ..-...- SA bedssene naneeooesscSescopocsace seeded psedoesooeseoosbaper 40 | 800 | 840 
IM AIINVANOUER 8s be eooeoondosoodnoseosscoed stpsdceopodnte prototrtttsestrt esc SGA eee | 500 | 5u0 
SMIGRRIRGI DD cose oe te aactancs 5. oe Pe ee «saa Ml apie ead CIR et Gk SBS a | 750] 300) - 1,050 
IWESSOULIE ee octane cise aes Grgeudonl povosectoscs dé sao bccan ode ogerchonsabede spas | 1,500 |; 1,000! 2,500 
BN GLE ane: Ee 5 RRA O NORE OOE Se EES OH Aa SS o SAGE SA GSn hor SeC RUUD Opie! BrEces 200 200 
ING WRVOLK oacce es ceciec sce mtine fet mis ct cinco tecigeesiet ieee bet cee cusce aoe fdisiats| Bis Bice erece 1,300 | 1,300 
Taye da OFe6 fo) Whee eee See eee HARP eRe Ano GSE SOPRA OOS AOCECAGHOAbAdaCcoaD adel Setacesc 200 | 200 
OMe Bon. se ce cee eae brseccteaae Sais s sete ishpeea Mareen ae ae lated ole oaee loners eiies aloe a cteeie| 2,500 | 2,500 
South Carolinacc®..c. sesh hike eee ae Mah coleae Cece ene een ae 1,000 | 750 |. 1,750 
MOXOS...» sarars a(beic'cjo viele a's aeiaia Sate eases te mien id niko miajetere bie erase seiclese Slots iefesein Sioitierers ereiete) [aes ive .| 5,000 | 5, 000 
Waieains-sospecbsoecucErs. Gonncaoroub cuosud cOogde cobe de déceae Coease adooon deat OOOH eet oer | 1,000 


Mo talliss | Aves Meet seeite nm ote amie Aa eee ee ere slr hee cates tome stars «4,748 | 19,021 | 23, 764 


13.—LIST OF RAILROADS GRANTING FACILITIES IN 1880. 


During the present year a still larger number of railroads have ac- 
corded the facilities for carrying fish in baggage cars and for stopping 
trains at bridges so as to deposit young fish. The list of railroads is 
given herewith, and the most hearty acknowledgment of their interest 
and co-operation is hereby made. 


Alabama Great Southern Railroad Company. Charles P. Ball, general superintend- 
ent, Chattanooga, Tenn. 

Alabama Central Railroad Company. W. L. Lanier, president, Selma, Ala, 

Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fé Railroad. George O. Manchester assistant general 
manager, Topeka, Kans. 

Atchison and Nebraska Railroad. George H. Nettleton, general manager, Kansas 
City, Mo. 

Atlantic, Mississippi and Ohio Railroad Company. N. M. Osborne, secretary, Peters- 
burg, Va. 

Atlanta and Charlotte Air-Line Railway. C.J. Foreacre, general manager, Atlanta, 
Ga. 

Atlanta and West Point Railroad. A. J. Orme, general passenger agent, Atlanta, Ga. 

Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company. E. K. Hyndman, superintendent Pittsburgh 
division; C. H. Hudson, superintendent Trans-Ohio division ; W. M. Clements, mas- 

ter of transportation. 

Boston and New York Air-Line Railroad Company. J. H. Franklin, superintendent, 
New Haven, Conn. 

Boston and AJbany Railroad. C. O. Russell, superintendent, Springfield, Mass. 

Boston and Providence Railroad Company. <A. A. Folsom, superintendent, Boston, 
Mass. 

Carolina Central Railroad. W. Q. Johnson, general superintendent, Wilmington, N.C. 

Central Railroad of New Jersey. James Moore, general superintendent and engineer, 
Elizabeth, N. J.; F. S. Lathrop, receiver. 


Central Railroad and Banking Company of Georgia. William Rogers, general super- 


intendent, Savannah, Ga. 
Central Pacific Railroad Company. F. H. Goodman, general passenger and ticket 
agent, San Francisco, Cal.; A. N. Towne, general superintendent. 


} 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XLIII 


Central Vermont Railroad Company. J. W. Hobart, general superintendent, Saint 
Albans, Vt. 

Charlotte, Columbia and Augusta Railroad Company. I. R. Macmurdo, general pas- 
senger agent, Richmond, Va. 

‘Chesapeake and Ohio Railway Company. William S. Dunn, engineer and superin- 
tendent, Richmond, Va. 

Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad Company. A. Kimball, general superin- 
tendent, Davenport, Iowa. 

Chicago and Alton Railroad. J.C. MeMullin, general manager, Chicago, III. 

Chicago, Saint Louis and New Orleans Railroad Company. W. H. Osborn} president; 
J. C. Clarke, vice-president and general manager, New York. 

Chicago and Northwestern Railway. M. Hughitt, general manager, Chicago, Il. 

Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad Company. T. J. Potter, assistant general 
manager, Chicago, Ill. 

Chicago, Milwaukee and Saint Paul Railway Company. W. C. Van Horne, generat 
superintendent, Milwaukee, Wis. 

Chicago, Saint Paul and Minneapolis Railroad, North Wisconsin Railroad. E. W. 
Winter, general superintendent, Saint Paul, Minn. 

Cincinnati, Hamilton and Dayton; Dayton and Michigan; Cincinnati, Hamilton and 
Indianapolis; and Cincinnati, Richmond and Chicago Railroads. L. Williams, 
general superintendent, Cincinnati, Ohio. 

Cincinnati Southern Railway. S. Woodward, superintendent, Cincinnati,' Ohio. 

Cincinnati, Sandusky and Cleveland Railroad. Charles Howard, superintendent, 
Springfield, Ohio. 

Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati and Indianapolis Railway Company. E. B. Thomas, 
general manager, Cleveland, Ohio. 

Cleveland, Mount Vernon and Columbus Railroad Company. G. A. Jones, superin- 
tendent, Mount Vernon, Ohio. 

Connecticut Valley Railroad Company. Samuel Babcock, agent for trustee and 
superintendent, Hartford, Conn. 

Connecticut River Railroad. J. Mulligan, superintendent, Springfield, Mass. 

Connecticut Central Railroad. D. D. Warren, president, Springfield, Mass. 

Delaware and Chesapeake Railway. O.S. Sanford, superintendent, Easton, Maryland. 

Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad. Samuel Sloan, president, New York. 

East Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia Railroad. John F. O’Brien, chief engineer and 
superintendent, Knoxville, Tenn. 

European and North American Railroad. F, W. Cram, superintendent, Bangor, Me. 

Fitchburg Railroad Company. John Adams, general superintendent, Boston, Mass. 

Flint and Pere Marquette Railway. Sanford Keeler, superintendent, East Saginaw, 
Mich.; H. C. Potter, receiver. 

Fort Wayne and Jackson Railroad Company. M. D. Woodford, general superintend. 
ent, Jackson, Mich. 

Galveston, Harrisburg and San Antonio Railroad Company. T. W. Peirce, president, 
Boston, Mass. James Converse, general superintendent. 

Galveston, Houston and Henderson Railroad. H. M. Hoxie, vice-president and mana- 
ger, Galveston, Tex. 

‘Georgia Railroad Company. E.‘°R. Dorsey, general freight and passenger agent, 
Augusta, Ga. 

Gulf, Western Texas and Pacific Railroad. M. D. Monserrate, general superintendent, 
Cuero, Tex. 

Hannibal and Saint Joseph Railroad Company. W. R. Woodward, superintendent, 
Hannibal, Mo. 

Houston and Texas Central Railroad. G. Jordan, vice-president, Houston, Tex. 

Indianapolis and Saint Louis Railroad Company. E. B. McClure, general superin- 
tendent, Indianapolis, Ind. 


XLIV REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


Illinois Central Railroad Company. Joseph F. Tucker, traffic manager, Chicago, Il. 

International and Great Northern Railroad. H. M. Hoxie, general superintendent, 
Palestine, Tex. 

Jacksonville, Pensacola and Mobile Railroad. Edgar Vliet, master of transportation, 
Tallahassee, Fla. 

Kansas Pacific Railway. 8. T. Smith, receiver and general superintendent, Kansas 
City, Mo. 

Kansas City, Lawrence and Southern Railroad Company. T. F. Oakes, general super- 
intendent, Kansas City, Mo. 

Kansas City, Saint Joseph and Council Bluffs Railroad. I. F. Barnard, general super- 
intendent, Saint Joseph, Mo. 

Keokuk and Saint Louis Line. H. B. Blood, general freight and passenger agent, 
Keokuk, Iowa. 

Little Rock and Fort Smith Railway. Theodore Hartman, general superintendent, 
Little Rock, Ark. 

Long Island Railroad. Thomas R. Sharp, receiver, Long Island City, N. Y. 

Louisville, Cincinnati and Lexington Railway Company. William Mahl, general 
superintendent, Louisville, Ky. 

Louisville and Nashville Railroad. D. W. C. Rowland, general superintendent, 
Louisville, Ky. 

Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railroad. Charles Paine, general superintendent, 
Cleveland, Ohio. 

Montgomery and Eufaula Railroad. Lyman Wells, treasurer, Montgomery, Ala. 

Macon and Brunswick Railroad. George W. Adams, general superintendent, 
Macon, Ga. 

Marietta and Cincinnati Railroad. J. H. Stewart, superintendent, Cincinnati, Ohio. 

Memphis and Little Rock Railroad. Rudolph Fink, general manager, Little Rock. 
Ark. 

Memphis and Charleston Railroad Company. John A. Grant, general superintendent, 
Memphis, Tenn. 

Missouri Pacific Railway. A. A. Talmage, general superintendent, Saint Louis, Mo. 

Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railway. C. M. Sheafe, superintendent of transporta- 
tion, Sedalia, Mo. 

Mississippi and Tennessee Railroad. M. Burk, general superintendent, Memphis, Tenn. 

Mobile and Montgomery Railway Company. Edmund L. Tyler, vice-president and 
superintendent, Montgomery, Ala. 

Mobile and Ohio Railroad. <A. L. Rives, general manager, Mobile, Ala. 

Morgan’s Louisiana and Texas Railroad. Charles A. Whitney, manager, New Or- 
leans, La. 

Nashville, Chattanooga and Saint Louis Railway. J. W. Thomas, general superin- 
tendent, Nashville, Tenn. 

New York, Lake Erie and Western Railroad. E.S. Bowen, general superintendent, 
New York. 

New York and New England Railroad Company. J. H. Wilson, vice-president, Bos- 
ton, Mass. 

New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad Company. E. M. Reed, vice- president, 
New York. 

New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio Railroad. P. D. Cooper, general superintendent, 
Cleveland, Ohio. 

Northern Central Railway Company, Baltimore and Potomac Railroad, and Alexan- 
dria and Fredericksburgh Railway. L. P. Farmer, general passenger agent, Phila- 
delphia, Pa. 

Northeastern Railroad Company. A. F. Ravenel, president, Charleston, 8. C. 

Ohio and Mississippi Railway Company. W. W, Peabody, general superintendent, 
Cincinnati, Ohio. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. XLV 


Old Colony Railroad Company. J. R. Kendrick, superintendent, Boston, Mass. 

Pennsylvania Company. J. D. Layng, general manager, Pittsburgh, Pa. 

Pennsylvania Railroad Company. L. P. Farmer, general passenger agent, Philadel- 
phia, Pa. 

Petersburgh Railroad Company. RK. G. Pegram, receiver, Petersburg, Va. 

Pittsburgh, Cincinnati and Saint Louis Railway Company. D.W. Caldwell, general 
manager, Columbus, Ohio. 

Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad. H. F. Kenny, sup:rintendent, 
Philadelphia, Pa. 

Richmond and Danville Railroad Company. I. R. Macmurdo, generii passenger 
agent, Richmond, Va.° 

Richmond and Petersburg Railroad Company. Theo. D. Kline, general superintend- 
ent, Richmond, Va. 

Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad Company. E. T. D. Myers, gen- 
eral superintendent, Richmond, Va. 

Savannah, Griffin and North Alabama Railroad. Wm. M. Wadley, President, Savan- 
nah, Ga. 

Savannah and Memphis Railroad Company. W. 8. Greene, general superintendent, 
Opelika, Ala. 

Savannah and Charleston Railroad Company. C.S. Gadsden, engineer and superin- 
tendent, Charleston, S. C. 

Savannah, Florida and Western Railway Company. H. 8, Haines, gencral superin- 
tendent, Savannah, Ga. 

Seaboard and Roanoke Railroad Company; Raleigh and Gaston Railroad Company ; 
Raleigh and Augusta Air Line Railroad Company; Baltimore Steam Packet Com- 
pany; Albemarle Steam Navigation Company. John M. Robinson, president, Balti- 
more, Md. 

Selma, Rome and Dalton Railroad. Norman Webb, general superintendent, Selma, 
Ala. 

Southwestern Railroad of Georgia. W. G. Raoul, superintendent, Macon, Ga. 

South Carolina Railroad. John B. Peck, general superintendent, Charleston, 8S. C. 

Saint Louis and San Francisco Railway. C. W. Rogers, general manager, Saint 
Louis, Mo. 

Saint Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern Railway. A. W. Soper, general superin- 
tendent, Saint Louis, Mo. 

Saint Joseph and Denver City Railroad. L. D. Tuthill, general manager, Saint 
Joseph, Mo.; William Bond, receiver. 

Saint Paul, Minneapolis and Manitoba Railway. Jas. J. Hill, general manager, Saint 
Paul, Minn. 

Texas and Pacific Railway Company. Jno, Noble, general superintendent, Mar- 
shall, Tex. 

Texas and New Orleans Railroad. J. F. Crosby, vice-president and general manager, 
Houston, Tex. 

Union Pacific Railway. S. H. H. Clark, general manager, Omaha, Nebr. F. L. Kim- 
ball, general passenger agent. 

Vandalia Line; Terre Haute and Indianapolis Railroad Company. John E. Simpson, 
general manager, Saint Louis, Mo. 

‘Vicksburg and Meridian Railroad Company. E. F. Raworth, general superintend- 
ent, Vicksburg, Miss. 

Wabash, Saint Louis and Pacific Railway. Jno. C. Gault, general manager, Saint 
Louis, Mo. 

Washington City, Virginia Midland and Great Southern Railroad. Peyton Randolph, 
general superintendent, Alexandria, Va.; John S. Barbour, receiver. 

Western and Atlantic Railroad Company. William MacRae, general manager, At- 
lanta, Ga. 


XLVI REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


Western North Carolina Railroad. Jas. W. Wilson, president, Morganton, N. C. 

Western Railroad of Alabama. Ceeil Gabbett, general manager, Montgomery, Ala. 

West Jersey Railroad Company, passenger department. L. P. Farmer, general pas- 
senger agent, Philadelphia, Pa. 

Western Maryland Railroad Company. J. M. Hood, general manager, Baltimore, Md. 

Wilmington and Weldon, and Wilmington, Columbia and Augusta Railroads. A. 
Pope, general passenger agent, Wilmington, N. C. 

“ ‘sconsin Central Railroad Company. F.N. Finney, general manager, Milwaukee, 
Wis. 


APPENDIX A. 


GN eA Ti. 


I.—PLAN OF INQUIRY INTO THE HISTORY AND PRESENT CON- 
DITION OF THE FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES,* 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


Page 
ORGANIZATION Ee ee ates tials ales iatele sas elo ein we wince teeae telecine cawcuslstoeeise sae as 3 
INSTRUCTIONS .. 2 = 2222 ces ees oo en ee tenn e coc cee cates cane cece ee cece ne nnn 3 
As Dutiestofthe: field: assistants 2. 1c ss. cn at owes cen ccs cuss cnn sne cea. 3 
B. Postage, mail arrangements, &¢..-- 2.1.2. 202s cone eee e es eons woe ones 4 
Oy Dba Oe ObMIRES) 8 SESS Se RSs po Sood AOSSOS bo RCO ODE CO CBSO SSSECScmAUCEESS 4 
DPAcsionigens:- Ol districts... .---<\- =. acess seclae secs haem ls sasaee crcesces = 4 
SOURCES OF INFORMATION -s0.-112e'coce oecn ce dene soos odaaee'acete st secSacteee 5 
Ate COPnespondenCOresaasetas ccs eaicisisele cacisaia estan wiles cleelcacie en c'slec tsa aet 5 
eC ANVASSIM Opener cclenes nce criss casts Senos a= ameiyaaaalaa cea scomacne es 6 
Ceheports orlarve markets sesece eas «sees ace eel asst osiescees cesar een cece 6 
DC USLOM=HOUSe TeLUINS ese eee scecneacise samslce wel s)se seine Satelsacan =a Uf 
AS PECLALAMVESII CATIONS se nesete seis ciclnwiteie scnelewsicee soa ceicices oma sae os 7 
Hae Materialealrendy-accumulatedmsssccdcees sce es oss see te cesace eae see eece uf 
Gh Camnlbinot eens kaGcokasacbe pees eneuoo heen COmeP OBE aD rcoeEneeabedee tf 
SCHEMEZONSENWE STIG ATION s ssereiccsisteseel sae aacisine sae casino a eeielaclealn (samme 8 
One raW ANAL RINieemeitee Somes a cce sete se a coe ce eect ee sate cacecee dase 8 
ieoNatural history, of marine) products .22- c-.=cacie-c) cccees oss ceoss~ esos 8 
Manner Of GisCussloOnenereporty. secs 5.5 cs osc ccs cine eles ches sain ee 8 
IM eGNOGtOfaNVOGUIOATION) «oss sly cmcsel-= = Danese neciencinciewede cen asa 8 
PP a ishing CYOUn Ostia. t -nns Sse cenetote wha) = tee sows ce enslsecs eae sme 13 
Manner of @IsCussiON IN! TEPOlb occ sce eminljeclaceews secccecececccse se56 13 
MGECHOCUOLADVESLICALION (con te eeeice samme iat = mee enes 0b cee a scclsnenlecnie 13 
Mie eEShermenvandgishin Oy GOWNS) 1-6 clesiclece, o)5> <icisic ion) vos wininiwieleje=n =e, coals 14 
Manner of discussion in report .....----.. ecnn OCH DAEs Sacacsdeoods 14 
A. Generali statisties 2. s..522205.-2: ti icehoebidisinds kame en iemeepiaes 14 
B. Social, vital, and other statistics. ...-...---..---------------- 14 
IModoohainvestitauong-s =n se seeose cece cease osieeaei-e-me fae anal arenes 15 
IV. Apparatus and methods of capture..---..-..- tS oe a ee 16 
Method of discussion and investigation -........ 2.2 se-eee een eee nnn 16 
A. Apparatus in’ general use 2... 2 coca. cence wooeee ceases corse * 16 
Shore andiboatuishinoree 220s. sat oaccseeclosesteiice smceccieseeee 17 
Stationary apparatus........-.--.-. Boacnad naccoosude Saadacsene 17 
Pounds and traps: Gill-nets: Seines...... ........2+ --0- cece 18 
Fish-pots and eel-pots.....---..- fa eee ne Mie Ae Sas a 18 
Personalvequipmentrssecs-os> osece -eeeicice cise celeste cecloecelceee 18 
Baits: Ovstenandclamaisheryenes cssect oe ce cesses cies ones 19 
B. Manufacture and trade in the apparatus of the fisheries. ...-... 19 
i} Methodsiof the fishery a-+..--<j-e6 -<soss)-sse)- ce cies caidciecisesee 19 
Weebroductoiphe disheriesia see ee ceaceste eta mce ccna donee ide ode cmcaes 21 
Moethodofdiscussionvinwepottieccopc scpisee - scac cence eeciciecciesc lost. 21 
MG EHOdIOLI Nn Vest ALONE. cael eecciien = eclece fess come siecle sc\aeole lorie 21 


* The pamphlet hcre reprinted was prepared by G. Brown Goode and was published by the Census 
Bureau with the following title-page: {7-040]| U. S. Fish Commission end Census of 1880.{ ~ | 
(44) | Plan of inquiry | into the History and Present Condition | of the| Fisheries of the Unite:l 
States | — | Washington: | Government Printing Office. | 1879. 8vo. pp. 54 (2 blank pee); 


4 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


Pag 

SCHEME OF INVESTIGATION—Continued. mt 
VI. Preparation, care, and manufacture of fishery products.........--..... 23 
Method of treatment intrepori.. 22 223.4) 5.22 b ces peta ane - Se eee 23 
Method of investigation (-\.-. 222-2524 eeseeele - cles - EE Paes 24 
Wall Economy, ofihe fishenleses sass siee eee eee ste cunttenrenaacese 24 
Method oftreatmentan Tepontiee-seaeaee rete ea eee eee 24 
A. Fishery capital and capitalists 25:22. ...-2.\-..%-seeseeenene. 24 
ib. uabor invthe fishenesmec ce. -eeeer see eee ea] aaa ee eerie 24 
Cy Commerce of the fisheriese=-eperesee eee assis eee eee eee 25 
Method ofinvesticationy os sccesteeeeer ere ee cere se ose eee Eee 25 
WilillesProtectiontand culture): 2. mse erin oso sener eee ee eee eee eee eee eee 25 
Method of'treatment in report. ---- .- 23 | se eetsere Seba sete be se eee 25 
Method of investigation... <2 ge eheeeeem anise iaee peeteree 26 
IAPPENDIX Ay soso ons bees ere pire meri ene eee eee eee ae coe 26 
Instructions for making out accounts ---------- -- eases dene cesecienne 26 
APPENDIX B......... FEROS Sa OOD COU Bob uan no Sood unatbo gasses Haoncedcen SoeGe ae 27 
Statistics of the fishery marine —_.- 225 225)2 joe bea yee Soe er 27 
Statistics of the fishing vessels of the United States ..........-.....-.---- 28 
Questions relative to the cod and the cod fisheries :.-...---.---....-...---. 29 
Questions relative to the mackerel and the mackerel fisheries -..........-. 34 
Questions relative to the alewife and the alewife fisheries. ...-.....-....-. 38 
Questions relative to the smelt and the smelt fisheries ..............-.---. 43 
APPENDIXGC (io .055)Sayeae ete Seine e Uaioe e ass Se nie ne eee eee oe «ar eel Ae eee 47 

List of seaboard counties, with statement of seaboard enone and post- 

offices within three miles of tide-water.-0- 20 selon ee ei feseieeelse 47 


U.S. COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIES, AND CENSUS OF 1880. 


SPENCER F’. BAIRD, Commissioner of Fisheries. 
FRANCIS A. WALKER, Superintendent of Census. 
G. BROWN GOODE, Assistant in charge of Fishery Investigation. 

At the request of the Superintendent of the Census, the U. S. Com- 
mission of Fish and Fisheries has undertaken the task of preparing a 
report on the fishery industry of the United States, which will be printed 
as a part of the general report of the Superintendent of the Census of 
1880. The accompanying preliminary schedule has been prepared for 
the instruction of the assistants who shall take part in the investigation. 
It is arranged in the form of an analysis, and is intended to show the 
scope of the proposed investigation. It is necessarily far from complete; 
many of the headings might be expanded much more fully if it were 
thought necessary. The work of canvassing the fishing towns will be 
placed in the hands of trained investigators, who will be expected to 
devise methods of their own, suited to the field which they are working 
up. The headings are intended as suggestions. Every suggestion 
should be considered with reference to every community under investi- 
gation, and where there is an opportunity of gaining information upon 
any subject it should be followed up in as great detail as possible. In 
many cases, however, one or more classes of suggestions will be found 
inapplicable, and may be omitted. The scheme has been made as com- 


[3] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 5 


prehensive as possible; and it is the intention that the report shall 
take into consideration every subject which is connected with the his- 
tory, prosecution, and maintenance of the fisheries. 


ORGANIZATION. 


The plan of organization provides for the employment of the following 
assistants. 

Superintendent of the Investigation. 

Disbursing Agent. 


Assistant canvassing Gulf Coast. } 
«“ «“ Atlantic Coast. | 
oe - Great Lakes. | Fieta assistants. 
ee - Pacific Coast. | 
My In Oyster investigation. 5 


Assistant in charge of Correspondence. } 

es Be ‘* Natural History work. | 

fe “4 % Computation. \ Office assistants. 
Copyist. 
Stenographic clerk. 


Also, the employment of experts to make reports on special subjects 
of local extent, as, for instance, the trade statistics of certain large cities 
or individual branches of the fishery. 


INSTRUCTIONS. 
A.—OF THE FIELD ASSISTANT. 


1. To visit every settlement in the district assigned to him. 

2. To consider each general heading in the accompanying schedule 
with reference to that particular settlement. 

3. To eliminate those subjects which cannot have reference to the set- 
tlement under consideration. 

4, To obtain every possible item of information relating to those 
branches of fishery or fishery manufactures there prosecuted in the 
present or past. Hints as to the best means of obtaining information 
on these topies are given below. 

5. To make the investigation complete for each town or community, 
and to forward the full notes to headquarters as soon as convenient; 
the notes should be very full, and should be written up in the field. 
Partial memoranda, taken with a view to future elaboration, are unsat- 
isfactory and generally unreliable. The advantage of frequent commu- 
nication with headquarters is too evident to require recommendation. 

6. To keep a journal of daily work, giving the incidents of the trip, 


6 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


the names, in-every case, of persons interviewed, etc. This may sub- 
sequently be expanded into a report of the reconnaissance, to be pub- 
lished by its author as a contribution to the history of the fisheries. 
His full notes will, of course, be available for use in working up his 
report. 

7. To report to headquarters every change of location, giving time ot 
departure by last mail before leaving a place and time of arrival by 
first mail after reaching next station. This is obviously desirable for 
convenience of communication from headquarters. 

8. For his own sake to keep a careful record of expenditures, and to 
render accounts in accordance with the regulations of the Treasury De- 
partment, a copy of which is given below. 

9. To pay as much attention to collecting marine animals as is con- 
sistent with the other work, in accordance with special instructions to 
be given to each assistant; to obtain samples of all fishery products, 
fishery apparatus, models of peculiar fishing boats, ete., for the fishery 
_ collections of the National Museum; and also to investigate shell heaps, 
mounds, ete., for aboriginal remains, and to collect such whenever it is 
possible eon too much delay. 

10. To obtain the names of all intelligent ramon interested in the: 
fisheries, to be inserted in the Directory, for use in future correspond- 
ence. 


B.—PostaGE, MAIL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 


Letters sent from headquarters or addressed to the Commissioner of 
Fisheries may be inclosed in envelopes with printed frank. Other offi- 
cial letters must have official stamp attached. Letters relating to this 
investigation should be marked (indorsed on the envelope) F. C. & CO. 


— 


C.—EXPENDITURES. 


The manner of keeping accounts is described in Appendix A. All 
accounts must be presented on the blank forms of the Census Office. 


ooo 


D.— ASSIGNMENT OF DISTRICTS. 


Each assistant will be furnished with a list of the settlements to be 
visited by him, and with a set of maps on which to record the position 
of weirs, ship-yards, factories, etc. For the Northern Atlantic Coast 
the last edition of the Coast Pilot will be used; for other regions the 
charts prepared by the U. 8. Coast Survey. 


[5] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. ( 


SOURCES OF INFORMATION. 


The general plan of the work proposed may be summarized as follows: 
A.—CORRESPONDENCE. 


The Directory, prepared for the use of the Commission, now records 
the name of every post-office within three miles of the sea-coast, and 
gives the names of several hundred persons, fishery-capitalists, manu- 
facturers, skippers, fishermen, collectors of customs, postmasters, and 
light-house keepers. All of these have signified their willingness to 
correspond with the Commission, and most of them have already com- 
municated answers to the various circulars sent out. In Appendix C is 
given a list of seaboard counties, with statement of number of seaboard 
' townships and post-offices within three miles of tide-water. 

This directory should be expanded in its scope so as to include the 
river and lake townships. An effort should be made to secure one reli- 
able correspondent in each town. The postmasters who have not yet 
responded should be again addressed, the appeal being strengthened 
by a special recommendation from the Postmaster-General. In some 
instances it may be desirable to secure as a correspondent one of the 
clergymen of the place. This can easily be done through the conference 
members. <A new circular (No. 41) will at once be sent out to every 
post-office on any considerable body of water. This propounds six 
questions, viz. : 

1. Are there any fishing-vessels Seal in your township ? 

2. Are there any pounds, traps, or weirs? 

*3. Are there any professional fishermen ? 

4, Are the fish-markets supplied in part or wholly from fisheries in 
your vicinity? 

5. If not, whence is obtained the supply? 

6. Will you answer other questions on this subject? « 

A short circular like this will elicit may answers which would not be 
called out by a longer one. By this means the list of correspondents 
will be much increased. A still more important end to be gained is the 
elimination of a larger number of localities, and a great contraction in 
the number of towns with which it would be desirable to carry on fur- 
ther correspondence. A negative answer to questions 1 and 2 with ref- 
erence to any town will practically throw it out of consideration. It is 
manifestly impracticable to treat unprofessional pond and river fishing 
otherwise than in a general way and by estimate. 

After the answers to the preliminary circular have been received and 
digested, a rough classification of towns by the kind of fishing carried 
on should be made, and other circulars should be sent out, for the pur- 
pose of ascertaining what points it is desirable to aeestaate further by 
letter or by a personal canvass. 


3 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 
B.—CANVASSING. 


In many instances, especially in out-of the-way inland towns, or where 
a capable, willing correspondent is found, it will not be necessary to 
send a canvasser. All needful information may be gained by corre- 
spondence. The process of elimination, already referred to, will probably 
throw out three-fourths of the towns named in the directory. This will 
save much time and expense in the work of canvassing, it being quite 
unnecessary to send a canvasser to places where there are known to be 
no fisheries. 

There are, however, certain stretches of coast which will require much 
careful investigation by men acquainted with fishermen and the natural 
history of fishes. These are— 

1. The coast of Maine, with its peculiar system of semi-professional 
fishing, and its varied river and harbor fisheries. 

2. The coast of Massachusetts, with its extensive commercial fisheries. 

3. The coast of Southern New England and New York, with its pounds 
and weirs, and its New York market fishery. 

4, The coast of the Middle States, to Cape May. 

5. The Gulf Coast. 

6. The Great Lakes. 

7. The salmon fisheries of the Pacific Coast. 

Much has already been accomplished with 2, 3, and 6; the most press- 
ing needs are with 1 and 5. It is strongly recommended that work in 
these districts be begun at once. 

The cheapest and most satisfactory manner of traversing these dis- 
tricts is by small vessels, which can be chartered at very reasonable 
rates. 

The other districts may be undertaken in the progress of the work. 


C.—REPORTS OF LARGE MARKETS. 


Daily reports of the fresh-fish trade of New York are obtained from 
the bookkeepers of the eighteen firms represented in the New York 
Fishmongers’ Association, and similar reports are received from Boston 
and Washington. This system of gathering information, which is prov- 
ing so satisfactory in these cities, should be extended. Reporters should 
be secured in other centers of distribution, and particularly in— 

Boston (salt-fish trade), 
Portland, Me., 

New London, Conn., 

Providence, R. L., 

New York (oyster trade), 

Philadelphia (oyster trade), 

Baltimore (oyster trade), 

Norfolk and vicinity (oyster trade), 

Charleston, 8. C., 


{7] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 9 


Chicago (general fish trade), 
San Francisco, 
and other cities. 


D.—CUSTOM-HOUSE RETURNS. 


Much valuable information will be obtained from the new system of 
circulars requiring information on specified points from vessels in the 
off-shore fisheries. These were put in use in September, 1878, and in 
1880 their results will be available for a period of two years. 

A fuller schedule of questions has been prepared for the use of collect- 
ors of customs in gathering statistics of the shore fisheries. It is to be 
hoped that this will be adopted; its use will add largely to the store of 
information regarding the products of the fisheries. 


E.—SPECIAL INVESTIGATIONS. 


Certain branches of trade which are in the hands of a distinct class of 
men are well worthy of special investigation. Chief among these is the 
oyster trade, which absorbs more capital than all the other branches of 
the fisheries, and which has never been thoroughly studied. A special 
canvasser should devote several months to the oyster trade. 

The sponge trade also deserves a study of two or three months by a 
competent investigator. The subject of the whale fishery has been ex- 
hausted in some of its phases, but requires much additional study. 

The menhaden fishery and its relations to agriculture also deserve 
further attention. 


F.—MATERIAL ALREADY ACCUMULATED. 


_ The Fish Commission has in its possession 20,000 or 30,000 pages of 
manuscript, which may be directly utilized in this investigation, since 
these represent work accomplished in the various lines of investigation 
already spoken of. 

Several circulars have already been sent out relating to the general 
subject of the fisheries, the fishery marine, and the special history of the 
cod, herring, mackerel, manhaden, mullet, etc. The answers to these 
circulars are now awaiting collation. 


G.—CoMPILATION. 


Much has already been done toward compiling as fully as possible a 
statistical history of the fisheries. The reports of the Treasury Depart- 
ment, of the Bureau of Statistics and Navigation, and of the various 
special commissions and experts who have studied the fisheries, are to 
be utilized to the fullest extent, as well as all published accounts of the 
American fisheries from the earliest times. 


10 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


SCHEME OF INVESTIGATION. 
GENERAL ANALYSIS. 


I. Natural history of marine products (the objects of the fisheries). 
II. The fishing-grounds (places of prosecution of the fisheries). 
III. The fishermen and fishing towns (the men engaged in the fish- 
eries.) | 
IV. Apparatus and methods of capture (manner of prosecution of the 
fisheries). 
V. Products of the fisheries (first results of the fisheries). 
VI. Preparation, care of, and manufucture of fishery products (elabo- 
ration of results. 
VII. Economy of the fisheries (financial organization and methods). 
VIII. Protection and culture (oversight by government). 


Notrre.—The following headings are arranged with reference to the 
manner in which they will be discussed in the final report. At the end 
of each section are given suggestions regarding methods of investiga- 
tion and subjects which are particularly important. 


I—NATURAL HISTORY OF MARINE PRODUCTS. 
MANNER OF DISCUSSION IN REPORT. 


Each species in the following groups which is in demand for, or avail- 
able for, food or other economic uses, should be considered separately. 
An outline engraving may be given for the sake of identification, and 
the popular names in use in different parts of North America. <A brief 
abstract should be given of the important facts in its natural history, 
telling what is known of (a) its geographical distribution; (b) size; (¢) 
abundance; (d) migrations, if such occur; (e) food and rate of growth; 
(f) mode of reproduction; (g) economic value and uses: 

Seals. 

Whales. 

Turtles. 

Fishes. ? 
Lobsters, crabs, shrimps, ecrevisses, &c. 
Oysters, clams, mussels, &c. 

Sponges. 

Marine plants. 

Inorganic products of the sea. 

These being products of the sea and properly to be considered in a 
treatise upon the fisheries. 


METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 


When opportunities occur, the stomachs and genitalia of marine ani- 
mals should be examined, to ascertain the nature of their food and the 


[9] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 11 


times of reproduction. Instructions will be given regarding points of 
special interest which require investigation. Collections of marine ani- 
mals, particularly fishes, should be made, when occasion offers, especially 
in the markets of the Southern Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico, and Pacific 
coast. In Appendix B are given schedules of questions regarding the 
habits of various groups of fishes. "When practicable, it will be well to 
interview persons acquainted with the habits of fishes and methods of 
the fisheries, and write down their views and experiences. For this 
purpose a supply of these circulars will be included in each outfit. 

A list of the common food-fishes of North America is here inserted 
for convenience of reference and to be used in checking the species 
observed in the markets : 


Fishes (Eastern Coast), 


File Fish (Balistes capriscus). 

American Sole (Achirus lineatus). 

Flat Fish (Pseudopleuronectes americanus). 
Smooth Flounder (Pleuronectes glaber). 

Rusty Flounder (Limanda ferruginea). 

Pole Flounder (Glyptocephalus cynoglossus). 

~ Plaice (Hippoglossoides platessoides),. 

Sand Flounder (Lophopsetta maculata). 
Turbot Flounder (Pseudorhombus dentatus). 
Four-spotted Flounder (Pseudorhombus oblongus). 
Halibut (Hippoglossus americanus). 
Newfoundland “ Turbot” (Platysomatichthys hippoglossoides). 
Pollock (Pollachius carbonarius). 

Cod (Gadus morrhua). 

Tom-cod or Frost Fish (Microgadus tomcodus). 
Haddock (Melanogrammus aeglefinus). 

Hake (Phycis chuss). 

Squirrel Hake (Phycis tenuis). 

Cusk (Brosmius brosme). 

Whiting or Silver Hake (Merlucius bilinearis). 
Rose-fish or Red Perch (Sebastes marinus). 
Tautog or Black Fish (Zautoga onitis). 
Chogset or Cunner (Zautogolabrus adspersus). 
Sword Fish (Xiphias gladius). 

Spear Fish (Zetrapturus albidus). 

Sail Fish (Histiophorus americanus). 

Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). 

Chub Mackerel (Scomber colias). 

Bonito (Sarda pelamys). 

Tunny or Horse Mackerel (Orcynus secundi-dorsalis). 
Little Tunny (Orcynus alliteratus). 

Spanish Mackerel (Cybiwm maculatum). 


12 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


Cero (Cybium caballa). 

Striped Cero or Florida King-fish (Cybiwm regale). 

Crevalle (Carangus hippos and Paratractus pisquetus). 
Pompano (Trachynotus carolinus). 

Short Pompano (Trachynotus ovatus). 

Long-fin Pompano (Trachynotus glaucus). 

African Pompano (Trachynotus goreensis). 

Butter-fish (Poronotus triacanthus). 

Tile (Lopholatilus chameleonticeps). 

Squeteague (Cynoscion regalis). 

Spotted Squeteague or Sea Trout (Cynoscion carolinensis). 
Silver Squeteague (Cynoscion nothus). 

Drum (Pogonias chromis). 

Spot (Liostomus philadelphicus). 

_ Silver Perch or Yellow-tail (Bairdiella argyroleuca), 

Red Fish or Spotted Bass (Sciaenops ocellatus). 

King Fish (Menticirrus nebulosus). 

Southern Whiting (Menticirrus alburnus). 

Croaker (Micropogon undulatus). 

Sailor’s Choice (Lagodon rhomboides). 

Sheeps-head (Archosargus probatocephalus). 

Scuppaug or Porgy (Stenotomus argyrops). 

Grunts or Hog-fish (Hamulon arcuatum, &c.). 

Gray Snapper (Lutjanus caxis). 

Red Snapper (Lutjanus Blackfordi). 

Mangrove Snapper (Lutjanus stearnsii and Rhomboplites aurorubens). 
Grouper (Epinephelus morio). 

Spotted Grouper (Lpinephelus Drummond-Hayi). 

Black Grouper (Epinephelus nigritus). 

Jew Fish (Promicrops guasa). 

Sea Bass or Southern Black-fish (Centropristris atrarius). 
Squirrel (Diplectrum fasciculare). 

Striped Bass or Rock Fish (Roccus lineatus). 
‘White Perch (Morone americana). 

Moon Fish (Parephippus quadratus and P. faber). 
Triple-tail (Lobotes swrinamensis). 

Blue Fish (Pomatomus saltatriz). 

Striped Mullet (Mugil albula). 

White Mullet (Mugil braziliensis). 
Silver-Sides or Friar (Chirostoma notatum). 
Silver Gar Fish (Belone longirostris, B. hians, B.latimanus and B. notata). 
Skipper (Scombresox saurus). 

Mummichogs or Killey-fish (Hydrargyra majalis, &c.). 

Capelin (Mallotus villosus). 

Smelt (Osmerus mordax). 

Salmon (Salmo salar). 


Be 


[11] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 13 


Trout (Salvelinus fontinalis). 

Tarpum (Megalops cyprinoides). 

Menhaden or Pogy (Brevoortia tyrannus). 

Shad (Alosa sapidissima). 

Alewife, Branch Herring, or Gaspereau (Pomolobus vernalis). 
- Blue-back or Glut Herring (Pomolobus aestivalis). 
Tailor Herring (Pomolobus mediocris). 

Herring (Clupea harengus). 

Mud Shad (Dorosoma Cepedianum). 

Anchovy (Engraulis vittatus, &e.). 

Sea Eel or Conger (Conger oceanica). 

Eel (Anguilla bostoniensis). 

Sturgeon (Acipenser sturio, &c.). 

Lamprey Eel (Petromyzon marinus). 


Fishes (fresh water). 


Burbot or Lawyer (Lota maculosa). 

Fresh-water Drum (Haploidonotus grunniens). 

Small-mouthed Black Bass (Micropterus achigan). 

Large-mouthed Black Bass (Micropterus pallidus). 

Rock Bass (Ambloplites rupestris). 

Sacramento “ Perch” (Archoplites interruptus). 

Sun-fish (Hupomotis aureus). 

Black-eared Sun-fish (Lepiopomus auritus). 

“Bream” of Southern States (Hupomotis, Lepiopomus, Enneacanthus, 
Chaenobryttus, numerous species). 

Strawberry or Grass Bass (Pomoxys nigromaculatus and P. annularis.) 

Yellow Perch (Perca fluviatilis). 

Yellow Pike-perch (Stizostedium vitreum). 

Gray Pike-perch or Sauger (Stizostediwm canadense). 

Striped Bass or Rock-fish (Roccus lineatus). 

White Bass (Roccus chrysops). 

Short-striped Bass (Morone interrupta). 

Lake Pike (Hsox lucius). 

Pickerel (Hsox reticulatus, EH. americanus, EH. cypho, &c.) 

Masquallonge (sox nobilior). 

Eastern Salmon (Salmo salar). 

Land-locked Salmon (Salmo salar, subsp. sebago). 

Brook Trout (of eastern slope) (Salvelinus fontinalis). 

Brook Trout (of western slope) (Salmo iridea). 

Black-spotted Trout (Salmo Clarkit). 

Oquassa Trout (Salmo oquassa). 

Smelt (Osmerus viridescens). 

Salmon Trout or Mackinaw Trout (Cristivomer namaycush). 

Siscowet (Cristivomer siscowet). 

Missouri Trout (Salmo Levwisi). 


14 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


White Fish (Coregonus clupeiformis). 

Lake Herring or Cisco (Argyrosomus tullibee and A. artedi). 

Black Fin of Lake Michigan (Argyrosomus nigripinnis). 

Michigan Grayling (Thymallus tricolor). 

Mountain Grayling (Thymallus montanus). 

Standard Bearer (Thymallus signifer). 

Shad (Alosa sapidissima). 

Glut Herring (Pomolobus aestivalis). 

Inland Alewife (Pomolobus chrysochloris). 

Branch Herring, Alewife or Gaspereau (Pomolobus vernalis). 

Tailor Herring or Hickory Shad (Pomolobus mediocris). 

Suckers (of eastern slope) (Catostomus teres, &c., Myxostoma aureola, &c.). 

Suckers (of western slope) (Catostomus occidentalis, &c.). 

Fall Fish (Semotilus rhotheus). 

Chubs (of eastern slope) (Semotilus corporalis, &c.) 

Chubs (of western slope) (Lavinia exilicauda, Algansea, sp., &c.). 

“ Pike” or “Salmon Trout” of California (Ptychocheilus grandis, &c., 
Pogonichthys inequilobus, &e.). 

Dace (Ceratichthys biguttatus, &c.) 

Buffalo Fish (Ichthyobus bubalus). 

Shiner (Notemigonus americanus). 

Carp (Carpiodes cyprinus, &c.). 

Catfishes (Amiurus catus, A. nigricans, &e., Icthaelurus cerulescens, 
&¢., and many other siluroid fishes). 

Sturgeon of the lakes (Acipenser rubicundus). 

Shovel-nose Sturgeon (Scaphirhynchops platyrhynchus). 

Kastern Sturgeon (Acipenser sturio, etc.). 


. Fishes (Western Coast). 


Flounders (Platichthys stellatus, Lepidopsetta wmbrosa, &c.). 

“Soles” (Parophrys vetulus, Psettichthys melanostictus, &c.). 

Halibut (Uropsetta californiana, Hippoglossus, sp., &c.). 

Tom-cod (Microgadus proximus). | 

Cod of Alaska (Gadus macrocephalus). 

Rock Fish or ‘Rock Cod” (Sebastomus rosaceus and species of Sebasto- 
somus, Sebastichthys, &c.). 

Rock Trout (Chirus constellatus). 

“Cod” of San Francisco (Ophiodon elongatus). 

Black Fish or “Sheeps-head” (Pimelometopon pulcha 

‘‘Perch” (numerous species of Hmbiotoca, Holconotus, &c.). 

“ Bass” (Atractoscion nobilis). 

Cognard or Little Bass (Genyonemus lineatus). 

- San Francisco “Smelt” (Atherinopsis californiensis). 

Pacific Smelt (Osmerus elongatus). 

Salmon (Oncorhynchus quinnat, &c.). 

Oulachan (Osmerus pacificus). 


[13] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 15 


Sardine or Pilchard (Pomolobus ceruleus). 

Herring (Clupea mirabilis). 

Sturgeon (Acipenser acutirostris, &c.). 

Columbia River Sturgeon (Acipenser transmontanus). 


II.—FISHING GROUNDS. 
MANNER OF DISCUSSION IN REPORT. 


Ona general map should be indicated the geographical distribution 
of all animals, &c., which are sought by fishermen; also the location of 
the principal fishing grounds. On charts of minor scale should be indi- 
cated in detail the location of all 

Off-shore fishing banks and shoals. 

In-shore fishing grounds and ledges. 

Seining flats and reaches. 

Stations for gill and fixed nets. 

Locations of weirs, traps, and pounds. 

Seal rookeries. 

Lobster crawls. 

Oyster and clam beds. 

Sponge reefs. 

Moss ledges (for “ Irish moss ”), 

Each important fishing ground should be described with reference to 
its topography and climate, location, area, depth of water, character of 
bottom, temperature of water, currents, character of invertebrate 


life, ete. 
METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 


As has already been stated, maps of the coast will be supplied, drawn 
on a scale sufficiently large to admit of marking in the various kinds of 
fishing grounds mentioned above. 

Each fishing station should be carefully designated on the map, with 
its local name, notes on depth of water, and on the kind of fish and in- 
vertebrates commonly to be found there. The names of those species 
best taken there should be underscored. 

Temperature observations are daily being taken at about thirty sta- 
tions on the ae principally light-ships and signal-service stations. 
Where convenient it will be well to take surface and bottom tempera- 
tures on any good fishing grounds, the date, time of day, state of the 
clouds and tide being carefully noted. For this purpose a thermometer 
will be furnished. 

When a person engaged in taking observations on temperature is 
encountered he should be encouraged and his attention called to the 
importance of keeping the records of the movements of fishes in the last 
column of the blank (No. 35) furnished them. 


16 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


IIL—FISHERMEN AND FISHING TOWNS. 
MANNER OF DISCUSSION IN REPORT. 
A.— General statistics. 


For each of the seaboard, lake, or river townships of the United States, 
the following statement should be obtained, to be summed up for each 
State, and for each river, lake, or stretch of coast: 


Total population.* 

Number of professional fishermen. 

Number of semi-professional fishermen. 

Number of fitters and owners (fishery capitalists). 

Number of clerks and others employed in curing fish and pre- 
paring them for market, or in factories of oil, gnano, &c. 

Number of sail-makers and riggers and caulkers. 

Number of seine-makers. 

Number of salt-dealers and employés. 

Number of ship-carpenters and ship-smiths. 

Number of shop-keepers dependent on fishermen. 

Number of fishermen’s widows and orphans. 

Number of families dependent upon fishermen. 


B.—Social, vital, and other statisties. 


To be worked out as fully as convenient in each community of He 

men of considerable size. 
Nationality; ancestry; how many fishermen of foreign birth. 
Hereditary profession. 
Health, diseases—at sea, on shore. 
Disasters, past and present years—numerical statements. 
Longevity of fishermen and fishermen’s wives. 
Age of marriage. 
Fertility. 
Effects of seasons of plenty on birth rate. 
Dwellings. 
Character of food—at sea, on shore. 
Manner of living. 
Education. 
Amusements—at sea, on shore. 
Religious proclivities; morals. 
Manner of providing for bereaved families. 
Financial profits of active fishermen. ' 

In a town engaged in manufacturing fish, fish-oil, &c. (e. g. Boothbay 
or Lubec, Me.), the same investigation to be prosecuted. 


* This will be ascertained by the enumerators in the census. 


[15] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 17 


MODE OF INVESTIGATION. 


Each of these topics suggests a line of research which would be more 
or less instructive in different communities. 

The manner of working up these points must be left to the discretion 
and ingenuity of the investigator. In many instances it will be quite 
impossible to gain definite information; in others much that is valuable 
may be obtained which is not even hinted at above. The headings 
are simply suggestions. This line of investigation cannot be too fully fol- 
lowed up. 

In working up this division, as well as those which follow (viz: divis- 
ions IV, V, VI, and VII), much may be learned by the methods men- 
tioned below. 

A.—By interviewing as many practical fishermen as possible. 

B.—By interviewing fishery capitalists, owners and fitters of vessels. 
When there is any chance of success, they should be asked to allow an 
inspection of their books, for the purpose of 6btaining accurate statis- 
tics of trade in present and past years. Bookkeepers and clerks may 
be paid for services in searching records. It is not the object of the in- 
vestigation to pry into the secrets of private business, and pledges may 
be given that information obtained from persons engaged in business 
will be kept secret, and used only in preparing the general statistics of 
the industry. 

C.—By interviewing the “oldest inhabitants,” retired fishermen, sea- 
captains, &c., and obtaining from them reminiscences of former meth- 
ods, seasons of abundance, &c. The value of information thus obtained 
cannot be overestimated. Especial attention should be given to it. 
The following subjects are especially to be studied in this manner: 

1. The introduction of new methods of fishing, with dates. 

2. The early history of all branches of the fishery prosecuted in that 
vicinity. 

3. Supposed increase and decrease of abundance of fishes. 

4. Changes in size and model of fishing-vessels. 

D.—By interviewing the local clergymen and physicians with refer- 
ence to vital and social statistics of fishing population. In the case of 
clergymen, those who have been for the longest time permanent resi- 
dents of the community should be visited as well as those who, from 
more recent acquaintance, may have clearer and stronger impressions. 

E.—By obtaining what information may be available from the store- 
keepers patronized by the fishing population. 

F.—By gaining access, as often as possible, to files of local papers 
preserved in the offices or in town libraries. This method cannot be too 
strongly commended. A week or two might be well spent in ransacking 
the back numbers of local papers of any fishing town. 

S. Mis. 29—-2 


18 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


IV.—APPARATUS AND METHODS OF CAPTURE. 
METHOD OF DISCUSSION AND INVESTIGATION. 


NotE.—In this division it seems scarcely practicable to separate the 
method of treatment and method of investigation. They are therefore 
discussed together. 


A.—Apparatus in general use. 


Special apparatus to be described under the head of methods of the 

fisheries, with reference to its manner of application. 
Vessels and boats: 

A description of each kind of vessel or boat, with diagrams illustrat- 
ing peculiarities of rigging or outfit, positions of ice-houses, baits, bins, 
wells, “‘slaughter-houses,” &c. The different kinds of vessels may be 
illustrated by engravings. 

Whaling ships and schooners. 
Sealing schooners. 

Cod vessels. 

Halibut vessels. 

Mackerel vessels. 

Oyster vessels. 

Block Island boats. 
Menhaden steamers, &c. 

Circular No. 10 and blank No. 11, which are reproduced in Appendix 
B, should be used in every fishing port, and should be thoroughly 
worked out. These require— 

1. Name of vessel. 

2. Description of rig. 

3. Tonnage. (This may be ascertained from the custom-house regis- 
ters of all vessels of over ten tons; so need not be filled in at the time.) 
. Date of building. 

5. Place of building. 

6. Number of crew. 

7. What fishery engaged in. What kind of outfit. 

8. Mode of fishing pursued at different periods. 

9. Disposition made of the fish. 

A set of these will be furnished with every outfit. Sketches should 
be made of any peculiar vessel or boats and of the arrangements on 
deck and below deck. 

Also answer the following questions: 

10. During how many months of the year, and what months, are 
these vessels laid up? Are they engaged in other service part of the 
year ? 

11. State the seasons at which any of them are engaged in special 
kinds of fishing. 


pe 


[17] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 19 


12. What baits do they use at different seasons? Where and how 
are they obtained? 

13. What is the average length of a trip in the case of vessels on the 
high seas? Specify for each kind of fishery. 


SHORE AND BOAT FISHING. 


Answer the following questions for each town: 

1. How many small fishing-boats of less than ten tons burden? 

2. How many men engaged in boat fishery in summer from dories, 
rowboats, sailboats ? 

3. How many in winter ? 

4. How many, besides those professionally engaged in fishing, make 
part of their living by fishing? 

5. How far from the shore do they fish? 

6. Are hand-lines or trawls used? Describe methods of anchoring, 
bait, trawls. 

7. What kinds of fish are chiefly taken? State for different seasons. 

8. Estimate the average daily, in the season, and annual catch of a 
man fishing with hand-lines. 

9. Make the same estimate for a man fishing with trawl-line. 


STATIONARY APPARATUS. 


Attention should be paid to the various kinds of stationary apparatus: 
Traps. 
Weirs. 
Pounds. 
Gill-nets. 
Seines. 
Slides. 
Baskets, &e. 

These should be described in detail, illustrated with drawings, and 
with accounts of the methods of working. The local peculiarities of 
setting and hauling them should be described also. 

Material of construction. 
Relation to bars, tides, &c. 

Mark the location of each pound, weir, or trap on a chart; also make 
a diagram of the shape and location of some of the most characteristic, 
giving— 

1. Dimensions of bowls. 

, 2. Length of leader. 
3. Material and manner of construction. 


Depth of water where they are constructed ; dependence on tides, &c. 


20 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


Answer these questions: 


oP oboe 


POUNDS AND TRAPS. 


. How many pounds and traps are there in the township ? 

. How many and during what months are they kept down ? 
. How many men are required to work each one ? 

. What are the principal kinds of fish taken? 

. Estimate the average annual catch. 


Estimate the average daily catch. Usual hours of the day for 


removing the fish. 


i 


How many fyke-nets are in use, and how many men are employed 


in this branch of the fishery ? 


8. 


GILL-NETS. 


How many gill-nets are in use? Are they drift-nets or stationary 


nets? 


9. 
10. 
105 
12. 
13. 
14. 


15. 
16. 
ite 
18. 
ih), 
20. 
21. 
large hauls. 


bo 


bo bo kb bo 
Ww Co 


b 
cS Or 


What is the usual length and depth? 

What is the size of mesh? 

How many and during what months are they used? 
What kinds of fish are taken in them? 

How many nets are usually set by one boat? 

Estimate the average catch to a boat—daily and annually 


SEINES. 


How many drag-seines are in use? | 

What is their length and depth? 

What is the size of mesh? 

How many men are required to man a seine? 

During what months are they used ? 

What kinds of fish are taken in them ? 

Estimate the average annual catch of a seine. Give instances of 


FISH-POTS AND EEL-POTS. 


. Are any fish-pots or baskets in use? 

. Are any eel-pots in use? 

. Are any lobster-pots in use? 

. What baits are used? 

. State how many men are engaged in each of these branches of 


fishing; how many pots they use, and what is their average annual catch. 


PERSONAL EQUIPMENT. 


The peculiar costume and personal appliances of fishermen in different 
parts of the country. 


[19] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 21 
BAITS. 


The whole question of bait, its obtaining, its preservation, and its 
use. 
. OYSTER AND CLAM FISHERY. 


. Are there oyster or clam banks in the vicinity? 
. Have there ever been any? 

. Mark their locations on the chart. 

. How many men are employed in this fishery? 

. How many boats? 

. What disposition is made of them, &c.? 

. Describe boats and implements in use. 


HAA oF WY 


B.—Manufacture and trade in the apparatus of the fisheries. 


Boat factories. 
Ship yards. (Source of lumber.) 
Marine railways. Spar yards. 
Rigging and sail lofts. 
Anchor foundries. 
Ship and boat fitting factories. 
Canvas factories. 
Cordage factories. 
Line and net factories. 
Hook factories. 
Shipsmiths. 
Block factories. 
Manufacture of rubber boots, &c. 
Manufacture of oil-clothing. 
For each of these classes of articles the following facts should be 
noted: 
Location of each factory. 
Centers of consumption and drift of trade. 
Capital invested. . 
Men employed. 
In case only part of the articles manufactured are consumed in the 
fisheries, a proportionate estimate should be obtained. 
The salt trade, its statistics and history. Early manufacture of salt 
for use in the fisheries. History. 
Search should be made for any traces of ancient salt-works. 


C.—Methods of the fishery. 


Under this head should be described in detail the methods at the 
present time employed in the various branches of the fishery, with de- 
tailed accounts of the peculiar apparatus employed and the manner of 


22 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


its use. Among many other branches, the following may be mentioned 
as typical (these need not be touched except at special request): 
The Whale Fishery. 
The Antarctic Seal and Sea-Elephant Fishery. 
The Alaska Seal Fishery. 
The Off-Shore Halibut Fishery. 
The Greenland and Grand Bank Halibut Fishery. 
The Flounder Fishery. 
The Block Island and Noman’s Land Cod Fishery. 
The George’s Bank Cod Fishery. 
The Grand Bank Cod Fishery (baiting). 
Do. do. (shacking). 
The New England Boat Cod Fishery. 
The Hake Fishery. 
The New York Market Fleet. 
The Boston Market Fleet. 
The San Francisco Market Fleet. 
The Charleston Market Fleet. 
The Alaska. and Siberian Cod Fishery. 
The Sword-Fish Fishery. 
The Mackerel Fishery (seining). 
Do. do. (gilling). 
Do. do. (jigging). — 
The Bluefish Fishery. 
The Bonito Fishery. 
The Scup Fishery. 
The Striped Bass Fishery. 
The Sea-Bass Fishery. 
The Red-Snapper Fishery. 
The Smelt Fishery. 
The White-fish Fishery. 
The Eastern Salmon Fishery. 
The West-coast Salmon Fishery. 
The Menhaden Fishery. 
The Shad and Alewife Fishery. 
The Herring Fishery. 
The Eel Fishery. 
The Mullet Fishery. 
The Eastern River Sturgeon Fishery. 
The Lake Sturgeon Fishery. 
The Eastern Weir and Pound Fishery. 
The New England Coast Line-Fishery. 
The Middle States Coast Line-Fishery. 
The South Atlantic Coast Line-Fishery. 
The Gulf Line-Fishery. 
The Havana Market Fishery. 


[21] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 93 


The Eastern Fresh-water Fishery. 
The Western Fresh-water Fishery. 
The Great Lakes General Fishery. 
The Green Turtle Fishery. 

The Lobster Fishery. 

The Crab Fishery. 

The Prawn and Shrimp Fishery. 
The Oyster Fishery and Oyster Culture. 
The Long Neck Clam Fishery. 
The Little Neck Clam Fishery. 
The Bait Clam Fishery. 

The Scollop Fishery. 

The Squid Fishery. 

The Sponge Fishery. 

The Irish Moss Trade. 

The Sea-Sand Trade. 


V.—PRODUCT OF THE FISHERIES. 
METHOD OF DISCUSSION IN REPORT. 


Annual yield to be specified by separate articles and in total, with 
estimated values for the year 1880. 

To be specified also by districts, with estimated values. 

Yield in past years, returns to be made as complete as possible, and 
also to be supplemented by authentic accounts of productiveness of 
particular localities in past years. 

(Here might be considered the question of decrease or increase of 
abundance of individual species.) 

(In this chapter may be included much historical matter.) 

Comparisons of yield of fisheries of the United States with those of 
other countries. 

METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 


These returns are already provided for in the case of New York, Bos- 
ton, and Washington. In every other settlement the study of the markets 
is the most important thing, especially if there be any shipments of fish to 
other points. The New York market blanks (20) or the New England 
market blanks (31) should be used in making up estimates of the annual 
produgt, and the opinions and estimates of several capable men should 
be obtained. Intelligent estimates may be safely founded upon (1) the 
study of the number of men or boats employed in each fishery ; (2) the 
number of months the fishing continues; and (3) the estimated average 
daily catch. No point should be left until this estimate of the annual pro- 
duct of the local fisheries has been obtained. In some instances the fol- 
lowing table may be more convenient. 


2d . REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


[22] 


Please mark after each kind, in the columns prepared for the pur- 
pose, your estimate of the total annual catch, stating definitely whether 
the estimate is in numbers of fish or barrels; also stating whether the 


estimate is founded upon records. 


Amountin 
numbers. 


Amount in 
pounds. 


Amountin 
barrels. 


~ TRIM SIN Ga ooo eee bnbe Den noe: pore cerenercarncooncocetéSadsoapacsote 


PROm-CO(OL TOS t his Di sesame emiat ce soe eeceeieei seis er ae stastere iter 
NTA OCI Sepace tec ciecieinie vie lane eens ce ceinisceeistoncinetseeacieemces 
TEMNL GO ees can Bee poousa essa ate sadnocbos soso acoonsodenaaaconastcSée 
Hak asecen= assis siiocewic sotmoe loses ete seericises seineiee ebleeeeenoeee 
Crs ase ae bos cosccie cane Som eiicieesewe oman alatsmecemetame eter ere 
AWahatin MOPS Ver Hake) sen sic secede since alelae ete seaeineatsniseiacists 
Redfish or INE ee ds EY SoGaooons coscuducccosoSoatnoospasccsd 
FROG EMHIS DY Wr COSSD) eee oisinom sieeiate sisteete ste ein micieei tenia clerein siete etaieteree 
RRanto corel ackeMish\scsccsacs selsmemea cea eemnecetriccminee emer 
Chogset OLViGunneL = = ceca ccnccuicaccecssctoeseecneeees BAeG amet 
Perch (Wi COaBt) S-Sasad ie ae Sas eccaie -esicsaniseleens nemissemm asic cece 
RSWOLG CHOIS Nieae iatetcjere ine iaicicieiele cicicie oiler ENS a etetuichasiomteim asians avinte ae cleisininctete 
Mackerel. .....--.------2- +--+ sees ec eec ee cece ee eee ee cece ee teens 


Glu R oko Se gaccn Sec cb S OR DSSS SeqoecO5 puaade 6oG00 acandesqansseddS 
(rev alle te semiacce iatere ne arotes a esters stale ereiniclnoy ee aiatsniceineiste ome cictseiemeeiee 
SpanishuMackereland|Ceroie-cc-ce sos eeeecsee eee ee aeons 
Lt nye Ae eee oesonon es ecUeSaabobaSEooU Teneo quedcUoocasHonDopescor 
Dollar-tish or Butter fish sale Siar aoe eae miata a ara] craineieesamietele ere ieee 
Squeteacue or Wieakfish..— os 55-ccecmece tec cscee meme ciseasenecccee 
Red or Channel Bass (S. States) toh ohne S38 Saree oleate s octets wats Ste 
IDO eect paeeaee Moo eCeeReeanCe See eecice meena acer csice 
King Fish and Whiting ---..- ice 
Spot and Croaker (S. States) .. 5 
DHEODSHCAM ete ersema tere antejee) aisle sisiee ei cieeseiicmmisteeincieceininet meine eine 
Po orgy, Scup or Scuppaug..-....------.ss-se eee e ee eee eee eee e ee eeee 
Sailonis Choice (SeiStabes) rac sec ae ene e eee ee eee eee 
Grunts:and Red-mouths(S. States) 5-055: -- sc. ceeecctammacececce 
Seaior Rock Bass or Black-fish (South) <cc.o oocsscccese cacnescees 
Red Snapper (SsStates)' <..s2cb ise hassoe veces cceeea tose sewers 
SinpedBassiorsRock=fish) 2. ss s-<-j-ceseseee cene ce clemen cee enennee 
Black#Bassy hes ist tess on Soe tie ee ese Sb oad babe cheeses 


PWihiteyPerchiin 2 s25 Jcccececcesecnse cee cnsstneccuses tocetuesetees 
MellowsPerch yeas sjcccn enw cece winch eciescaecemieseccn: tee ceceeee ne cere 
BIKGVBSLCH! sass cee cab ees sale Aces Ga dese ene ERE EE oeeoaaenener 
ue vist, Skip-Jack, Horse-Mackerel, or Tailor............-.-.- 

WLS tee Ne wtetowiniticnae he wee eae cae sae ite oe lee ed eae 
ickerel ybike Muskalonge)s- 2. < 2 sca.cs sce -seeeeicioesen Sepbencesas 
Smelt or Nrost Fish seis :e0.ctotucn see Stet Rae See eg 
Salm ONE wea. cateiesiccccsacemedest oe cocsenwe Echinacea aoe 
DOA TOVOULS: eames sae cise be see cee eee Ae ce Ree aE eee eee 
WWahite- Wish (lakes) iscctccem news cate con cae ee eee ee ae 
MiAkOrDnOU bien cue semis sce sec tacos enlace eee a 
meenbaden, Mossbunker, Porgy, or White-Fish 
¢ BO ei etatate ka tetevera/alaiaih oinin/a/n\elelmis'aa elntelelelajnrjaiatieinietar alate araiaia tamale ae TE eae 
PME WATOIOL RIVeLIELOLTING jasvacusoctemocec es. cceee mechs cece eeneeee 
Hn glishior SeasHerrin gee cc once isece cee een o et eee ea eeeaeeee eee 
Tailor Herring, Hickory or Sea Shad 
Bal Carp, Buffalo Fish 


eet tee ewes eww wan cece ees ecec ec cccccececc es eaceae wascce 


[23] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 25 


VI—PREPARATION, CARE, AND MANUFACTURE OF FISH- 
ERY PRODUCTS. 


METHOD OF TREATMENT IN REPORT. 


Here should be described the methods of the various devices for util- 
izing fish after they are caught, with statistics of capital, men employed, 
etc., as fully in detail as possible. Some of the methods are as follows: 
Food.—Uses : 

Preservation of living fish— 
Well-smacks. 
Cars and live-boxes. Fish and lobster. 
Fish-ponds. 
Refrigeration— 
The trade in iced fish. 
Sun-drying— 
Kench-curing codfish. 
Pickle-curing codfish. 
Preparation of boneless fish. 
Preparation of desiccated fish. 
Smoke-drying— 
Herring-smoking. - 
' Halibut-smoking. 
Sturgeon-smoking, etc. 
Brine-salting — 
Mackerel-curing. 
Whitefish-curing. 
Swordfish-curing. 
Bluefish-curing, etc. 
Pickling— : 
Pickling eels, herring, salmon, ete. 
Canning— 
Canning sardines, ete. 
Canning salmon. 
Canning codfish-balls, ete. 
Canning oysters, cooked and raw. 
Canning lobsters. 
Canning clams. 
Canning crabs, anchovies. 
Use in the arts: 
Leather and fur-dressing. Seal-skins. 
Whalebone preparation. 
Isinglass manufacture. 
Ambergris. 
Murexides. 
Carbazotates. 
Fish guano. Menhaden guano. 


26 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


Oil rendering. 
Whale-oil and its applications. 
Menhaden oil. 
Cod-liver oil. 
Other fish-oil. 


METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 


Every manufacturing establishment should be visited, and as fully 
described as may be possible. When practicable, statistics of the busi- 
ness should be obtained. Secrecy may be promised when necessary. 
Where the parties interested in manufacturing are unwilling to impart 
information, estimates should be obtained from their neighbors. 

Answer specifically these questions: 

1. What are the principal markets for the fish? 

2. Are there establishments for canning fish? Are there establish- 
ments for canning lobsters? Are there establishments for canning 
oysters? . : 

3. Are tbere establishments for smoking? 

. Are there establishments for oil manufacturing ? 

. Are there establishments for guano manufacture? 

. Are there establishments for isinglass manufacture ? 

. Enumerate these, and obtain statistics as fully as possible. 

. Are the roes of cod saved for use as bait or to be exported? If so, 
get statistics. 


AD OF 


ie) 


VIL—ECONOMY OF THE FISHERIES. 
METHOD OF TREATMENT IN REPORT. 


The following questions to be considered in all their bearings for each 
report. They should be worked out very fully. 


A.—Fishery capital and capitalists. 


Building vessels or purchase. 
Capital invested in vessels: 
In gear or outfit ; 
In stores for trip or season. 
Manner of insurance: 
Relations to crew; 
Manner of ‘‘lay” or copartnership system. 
Disposition of fish: ¢ 
Whether sold fresh or cured by the owners of vessels. 


B.—Labor in the fisheries. 


Relations of crew to “ fitters-out.” 
Shares in the “lay” or copartnership. 


[25] PLAN OF ‘INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. ral 


Wages; where “lay” system is notin use. 

Relations of captain to employer ; to vessel; to crew. 

Share of crew in catch of fish. 

Chance of crew for promotion. 

Relation of fishermen’s family to shoresmen; are goods advanced on 
credit ? 

These questions to be worked out for each community. 


C.—Commerce of the fisheries. 


Market prices, past and present. 

Lines of traffic and centers of consumption for individual articles. 
(This subject will be covered by Circular No. 42, relating to interior fish 
trade and consumption of fish.) 

Exports of fishery products. 

Imports of fishery products. 

Duties. ’ 

(Here may be considered the past commercial history of the fisheries, 
utilizing the vast amount of statistical material already tabulated.) 

Answer specifically these questions: 

1. How many capitalists, owners, or fitters are there in the township 
or port, as the case may be ? 

2. Are the vessels owned wholly or in part by any of the crew ? 

3. Describe the ‘‘ lay” or business arrangements by which the fisher- 
men are remunerated and the vessels fitted out. 

4, Are the fish to be cured by the owner, or are they sold to firms 
making a special business of curing fish? 

5. How many wharves are there where fish are cured or salted? Men- 
tion them by name. 

6. How many wharves or establishments where fish are iced for im- 
mediate shipment ? 

7. Describe the usual method of insurance of vessels. 


METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 


Each of the topics suggested above should be investigated. Both 
capitalists and employés of all grades should be consulted, and their 
views given as fully as practicable. The subjects mentioned in Section 
C will be studied by the office assistants. 


VIII.—PROTECTION AND CULTURE. 


METHOD OF TREATMENT IN REPORT. 


A.—Fishery laws, past and present; their effect. 

B.—Bounties; their history and results. Drawbacks on salt, &c. 

C.—Flsheries treaties and their results. Seizure of fishing vessels. 

D.—Public fish-culture; its results, its present status, and its pros- 
pects. 


28 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 
METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 


The Sections B and C should be inquired into with much care and 
reported on very fully. 


A. PB.P END Exe. 
INSTRUCTIONS FOR MAKING OUT ACCOUNTS. 


It is desirable, in order to avoid confusion in and rejectment of ac- 
counts, that the following suggestions be adhered to: 

1. Vouchers must be signed in ink, and by the person in whose name 
the account is made—not “per” any agent or clerk—and the amount 
expressed both in writing and figures. 

2. In the case of partnerships, the name of the firm, nothing more, 
should be signed by one of its members. - 

3. When an account is made out in the name of an incorporated com- 
pany it should be signed by one of its officers with his official character 
in the company appended. 

4. Signatures by mark must be witnessed. If John Smith has a bill 
and he is unable to write his name, it should be written for him, and 
then he should place his mark—thus: John + Smith, his mark. Wit- 
ness: David O’Neill. 

5. Accounts for traveling expenses should give the places of depart- 
ure and destination, supported by subvouchers, such as hotel bills, &c. 
Each day’s expenses should be mentioned under its date. 

6. Hotel bills should give the dates of arrival and departure and the 
rate per day. Thus a person arriving before breakfast June 20, and 
leaving after dinner June 24, will have been at the hotel four and a half 
days, which, at $3 per day, would amount to $13.50, and should so ex- 
press it in the account. 

7. Laundry bills and baths will not be allowed. 

8. Vouchers for supplies must be in detail, showing the nature, quan- 
tities, and rate, as well as the amount, namely : 5 pounds nails, at 5 cents, 
25 cts. 

9. Accounts for service must give the dates, stating whether inclusive 
or not, on which such service was performed, and the rate of pay, thus: 
A man employed from June 28 to July 10, inclusive, would have served 
13 days, which, at $1.50 per day, would amount to $19.50. 

10. Accounts involving subvouchers, some or all of which, for good 
reasons, cannot be furnished, must be signed by the party, and then 
taken to a notary public or justice of the peace and sworn to as being 
correct and for the purpose indicated. ' 

The seal of the officer before whom an account is sworn should be 
affixed. 


[27] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 29 


ie eee DL x2 B. 


The following circulars previously issued by the Fish Commission are 
appended for the information of persons receiving this prospectus: 


(10.) 
STATISTICS OF THE FISHERY MARINE. 
CIRCULAR. 


In the absence of any law requiring the registry of fishing-vessels, 
the statistics of the coast and deep-sea fisheries of the United States are 
very incomplete, and it is found impossible to gain any definite idea of 
their extent and value. The present registry-lists, although including 
all vessels of more than five tons burden, do not indicate the manner 
in which they are employed. 

It is very desirable to obtain full lists of the jfishing-vessels of the 
United States, with tonnage, number of men employed, and information 
regarding their movements which shall be of service in estimating the 
extent of the various fisheries in these waters; also, similar lists of ves- 
sels engaged in the whale and seal fisheries, in the lobster and oyster 
trade, and in the fish-carrying trade. 

I therefore beg leave to call attention to the accompanying blank 
tables which have been prepared for this census. They may be filled 
out as fully as is practicable, although tonnage, date, place of building, 
and name of master are of less importance than the other data desired, 
and should be mailed to the U. S. Commission of Fish and Fisheries, 
Washington, D.C. The method of registry is illustrated by the table 
on the opposite page. 

The information thus obtained will be embodied in a report to Con- 
gress, in which full credit will be given to all contributors. 

SPENCER F. BAIRD, 
Commissioner. 
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, Washington, D. C. 


[28] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


30 


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[29] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 31 
(28. ) 


QUESTIONS RELATIVE TO THE COD AND THE COD 
FISHERIES.* 


OFFICE OF U. S. COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIES, 
Washington, D. C. 

The most important of the marine food-fishes of Eastern North Amer- 
ica is the Cod (Gadus morrhua). The fresh fish are extensively sold in 
Northern markets, while salted .and dried they form a staple of great 
commercial importance. 

It is considered very desirable to obtain a full account of the habits, 
migrations, &c., of this fish, as well as complete statistics of its capture 
and eicrcial relations. The statistics of the fisheries of Labrador 
and the Grand Banks of Newfoundland are particularly desired. I beg 
leave to call attention to the inclosed table of questions, and to request 
answers to as many as practicable, to be addressed to the U. 8S. Commis- 
sion of Fish and Fisheries, Washington, D. C. This circular may also 
apply to the codfish of the Pacific coast of North America. Replies 
should be made on foolscap paper, if equally convenient, and written on 
one side only of the page. 

The information thus obtained will be embodied in a report to Con- 
gress, in which full credit will be given to all contributors. 

Many very full and satisfactory communications have already been 
received in response to a former circular containing questions about the 
cod fisheries. Thanking those who have already responded for their 
efficient aid, I beg to call their attention to this revised series of ques- 
tions, and to ask that they will read them attentively and add any new 
suggestions which may occur to them. Attention is especially requested 
to the questions relating to migrations and schooling (18-32, inclusive), 
and very especially to No. 29, which is introduced to elicit information 
regarding the large schools which have appeared on our coast during the 
autumn and winter of 1877. 

I would also request new answers to questions 62-90, inclusive. The 
former circular failed to draw out all the information desired upon the 
statistics of the fisheries. 

SPENCER F. BAIRD, 
Commissioner. 
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, Washington, D. C. 


A.—WName. 


1. Is the cod ever known by any other name ? 
2. Are there names for special varieties of the cod? 


*These questions may also apply to the other fishes of the cod family, the haddock, 
pollock, hake, and cusk, and to the halibut and flounder, also scup, sea-bass, and 
tautog. 


32 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [80] 


50. Is there any marked change in the shape or color of either sex 
during the breeding season; or any peculiar development of or on any 
portion of the body, as the mouth, fins, scales, &e.? 

51. Are there any special or unusual habits during the spawning 
season ? 

52. At what age does the male begin to breed; and at what age the — 


female? ' 
YOUNG FISH. 


53. What was the size of the smallest codfish you ever saw ? 
54. At what season do the young fish appear? 

55. What is their food? 

56. Are their habits like those of the old fish? 


G.— Enemies, fatalities, &. 
DISEASES. 


57. Are diseased or deformed codfish ever seen? 
58. Can you describe them ? 
59. Have dead fish ever been seen in any quantity ? 


PARASITES. 


60. Are crabs, worms, lampreys, or other living animals found at- 
tached to the outside or on the gills of these fish? 


ENEMIES. 


61. Do other animals, such as whales, seals, birds, and other fish at- 
tack or prey upon the cod; can you mention any instances ? 


H.—The fisheries. 
IN-SHORE FISHERIES. 


62. At what season of the year and for how many months are cod 
taken so near to your shore that the fishermen can be at home every 
night ? 

63. What are the favorite grounds, what is the depth of water, and 
what the nature of the bottom? 

64. How many men are engaged in this fishery, and when not so en- 
gaged how are they employed ? 

65. How many boats, and what kind? 

66. How many men do they carry ? 

67. What kind of gear is used? If trawls or long lines, describe 
length of line, of gaugings, and of buoy-lines; number and kind of 
hooks, anchors, and buoys, and manner and time of setting. If hand- 
lines, describe lines, hooks, and leads. 

68. What bait is used; is it different at different seasons; how and 
where do they get it; how much does it cost? 


[31] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 33 
SCHOOLING. 


25. Do cod associate in schools, or are they independent? Answer 
for the whole year or for particular seasons. 

26. Are there different schools in your waters at different seasons? 

°7. Are there different schools in different places? 

28. Do males, females, and young associate together in the same 
schools? 

29. Have any schools of unusual size been observed at,any time, par- 
ticularly in the winter of 1877; if so, at what time did they come and 
go? Were there any peculiarities in their shape or movements? Were 
any hooks of a peculiar character found in them which would indicate 
where they came from ? 

30. Are the movements of the schools affected by the presence of 
food, or other fish preying upon them ? 

31. Are they affected by the ebb and flow of the tide? 

352. Do eod at any time refuse to take the hook; if so, why? 


ABUNDANCE. 


33. Are cod as abundant now as they were five, ten, twenty, and 
thirty years ago? 

34. If not, how do you account for their decrease ? 

30. Have their haunts and habits been changed by the influence of 
man? 

36. Have their numbers been decreased by overfishing ? 

37. Will the mother fish take the hook freely ? 

38. Is the trawl more destructive tharf the hand-line; if so, why? 

39. Do you regard the practice of throwing gurry overboard as in- 
jurious to the cod fishery ? 


E.— Food. 


40. What do the cod feed upon ? 

41. What is found in their stomachs ? 

42. Are they ever seen feeding at the surface; if so, can you describe 
their movements ? 

45. Is their food different in different seasons and localities ? 


T’.— Reproduction. 
SPAWNING HABITS. 


44, Where do the cod spawn, and when ? 

45. Have you ever seen the operation ? 

46. What is the depth of water in the spawning-grounds ? 

47. Do the eggs sink to the bottom, or float ? 

48. What is their color and size? (Compare with sizes of shot.) 

49. Do the eggs and the milt ever run from the fish after it is caught ? 
S. Mis. 29-———3 


34 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [32] 
B.— Characteristics. 


SIZE. 


oo 


. What is the average length and weight of the cod? 

. What is the weight of the largest individuals? 

. Are the longest always the heaviest ? 

. Is there any difference in the size of males and females ? 

. Can you estimate the annual rate of growth? 

. What is the length of a cod one year old, two years old, &¢.? 


on, 


on 


SHAPE AND COLOR. 


9. Are there differences in different fish in the shape and color of 

body, fins, head, nape, and other parts? 

10. Can you describe these differences? 

11. Do these differences depend upon age, sex, season, habits, food, 
or kind of bottom ? 

12. Do the fish taken at different seasons or in different places yary 
in shape and color. 

13. Are there names for these different kinds or schools ? 


C.— Distribution. 


14. Are there any places on your coast where the cod are not found? 
15. How far from thé shore, and in how @eep water do they occur? 
16. How close to the shore, and in how shallow water? 
17. Are they ever known to’ enter brackish water at the mouths of 
rivers ? 
D.—Movements, de. 


MIGRATIONS. 


18. Do the cod remain with you throughout the year, or are they ab- 
sent for a time? 

19. If they remain throughout the year, are they to be found always 
in the same places, or do they approach and recede from the shore with 
the change of seasons ? 

20. If they approach and recede from the shore, when do these move- 
ments occur, how long a time do they occupy, and how far do they ex- 
tend ? 

21. Can you explain the cause of these movements ? 

22. If they are entirely absent at certain seasons, please state care- 
fully at what time they go, how long they are absent, and when they 
return. ; 

23. Where are they supposed to go, and for what purpose? 

24, By what route do they leave the shore and return? 


[33] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 35 


69. What is the average annual and daily catch to aman? 

70. Is this greater or less than in former years ? 

71. What would be a large catch for one man now and twenty years 
ago? 

72. Are seines ever used in your vicinity to eatch cod? 


OFF-SHORE FISHERIES. 


73. How many vessels from your vicinity are engaged in the off-shore 
and bank fisheries; what is their tonnage, rig, and cost? Can you give 
their names ? 

74. How are they owned and fitted out; what proportion of cost of 
outfit is borne by owner, captain, and crew, and what share of the re- 
turns? Describe the kind of “lay” customary. 

75. How many men do they carry? Are there any officers besides 
the captain? What proportion of the fishermen are foreigners? Are 
the men paid wages? | 

76. What banks do they frequent, and at what seasons? 

77. What is the average length of a voyage, and how many voyages 
in a year? 

78. At what depth do they fish? 

79. Do they use hand-lines or trawls? Describe the length of these, 
and the manner of rigging and setting. 

80. What bait do they use at different seasons; where and how do 
they get it? If they buy it, how much does it cost? How much do 
they take on a trip, and how do they stow it? How long do the differ- 
ent kinds of bait last? . 

81. How much salt and ice do they carry? Where do these articles 
come from; how much do they cost? 

82. What would be small average and large returns for a vessel for a 
voyage, and fora year? Estimate in the same way fora single fisherman. 

83. Is the number of vessels engaged in this fishery greater or less 
than it was five, ten, twenty, thirty, and forty years ago? 


I.— Products and fisheries. 


84, What quantity of fresh cod is annually brought to your place? 
What is its average price? What proportion is brought in vessels 
engaged in the off-shore fisheries? 

85. What quantity of cod is iced for shipment to other places?) Where 
is it sent to? 

86. What are the principal markets for salt cod? Do the owners of 
the vessels dry them, or are they dried by merchants who buy them 
from the vessels? What is the usual, price of salt cod; does it vary 
much? 

87. Are any packed in drums or casks? 

88. Are the livers saved? Describe the process of making oil; how 
much is usually obtained by one vessel during a voyage or year? 


36 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [34] 


89. Are the roes saved? What quantity? Are any exported? To 
whom are they sold? What are they worth? 

90. Are the tongues, sounds or bladders, and napes saved? What 
are they worth? To whom are they sold? 


NAME AND ADDRESS OF OBSERVER: 


DATE OF STATEMENT: 


(32.) 


QUESTIONS RELATIVE TO THE MACKEREL AND THE 
MACKEREL FISHERIES.* 


OFFICE OF U. S. COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIES, 
, Washington, D. C. 

One of the most important of the marine food-fishes of the North 
Atlantic is the mackerel (Scomber scombrus). The fresh fish are exten- 
sively sold in Northern markets, while salted they form a staple of great 
commercial importance. 

It is considered very desirable to obtain a full account of the habits 
and migratious of this fish, as well as complete statistics of its capture 
and commercial relations. The statistics of the fisheries of the Gulf of 
Saint Lawrence are particularly desired. I beg leave to call attention to 
the inclosed table of questions, and to request answers to as many as 
practicable, to be addressed to the United States Commission of Fish 
and Fisheries, Washington, D. C. Replies should be made on foolscap 
paper, if equally convenient, and written on one side only of the page. 

The information thus obtained will be embodied in a report to Con- 
gress, in which full credit will be given to all contributors. 

Many very full and satisfactory communications have already been 
received in response to a former circular containing questions about 
the mackerel fisheries. Thanking those who have already responded 
for their efficient aid, | beg to call their attention to this revised series 
of questions, and to ask that they will read them attentively and add 
any new suggestion which may occur to them. Attention is especially 
requested to the questions relating to migrations and schooling. 

I would also request new answers to questions 61-78, inclusive. The 
former circular failed to draw out all the information desired upon the 
statistics of the fisheries. 

SPENCER F. BAIRD, 
Commissioner. 
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, Washington, D. C. 


*These same questions may apply to the swordfish, bluefish, weakfish or squeteague, 
and the other sea fishes which visit our coast in summer. 


[35] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. on 
A.—Name. 


1. Are there names for any special varieties and schools of mackerel ? 
2. What names are used fort he young mackerel at different stages of 


growth? 
B.— Characteristics. 


SIZE. 


3. What is the length and weight of the largest mackerel ? 

4, Are the mackerel now caught larger or smaller than those of five, 
ten, or fifteen years ago? 

5. Is there any difference in the size of males and females? 


SHAPE AND COLOR. 


6. Are there differences in different fish, in the shape and color of 
body, head, fins, and other parts? Can you describe them? 

7. Have you ever observed a film over the eyes of the mackerel? If 
so, at what season of the year? Does it make them blind? Why do 
you think so? 


: C.— Migrations and movements. 
Ld 


8. At what date did the mackerel appear in your vicinity in 1878? 
Was this earlier or later than usual ? 

9. At what date were the first mackerel taken by the southern fleet 
in 1878? Was this earlier or later than usual? 

10. At what date did the mackerel disappear in 1878? Was this 
earlier or later than usual ? 

11. Have mackerel ever been taken in winter in your vicinity? Can 
you give dates and circumstances ? 

12. Where do mackerel go in winter? For what purpose ? 

13. When the mackerel appear in the spring, do they come at once or 
in separate schools? How long are the intervals between the schools? 
Are the first largest ? . 

14. Do the schools swim high or low? Do they make a ripple on the 
water? Do they attract birds? If so, what kinds? Do they attract 
other fish, porpoises, or whales? 

15. By what route do they come in to the coast, and what are their 
subsequent movements ? 

16. Is their appearance on the coast regular and certain, or do they 
ever fail for one or more seasons at a time, and then return in greater 
abundance? If so, what is the reason? 

17. Are their movements affected by the ebb and flow of the tide? 

18. What are the favorite localities of these fish ? 

19. What depth of water is preferred by these fish, and how low do 
they swim ? 

20. How far from the shore have they been seen? 


38 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [36] 


21. How close to the shore and in how shallow water ? 

22. Do they ever enter brackish water at the mouths of rivers ? 

23. Does the temperature of the water appear to affect them ? 

24, Are there different schools in your waters at different seasons of 
the year? 

25. Are the fish in the same school usually of the same size? 

26. Are the movements of the schools affected by the presence of 
other fish preying on them ? 

27. When do the fish leave the coast, and is this done by degrees or 
in a body ? 

28. By what route do they leave the coast. 

29. How far south have you known mackerel to occur? 


D.—Abundance. 


30. Have mackerel decreased or increased in abundance within the 
past ten years ? 

31. Does their extensive capture affect their abundance ? 

32. When small mackerel are abundant in any given year can you 
predict a supply of large ones in a year or two? Can you give any in- 
stances ? : a 

o3. Has the weather of any given summer any influence on the abun- 
dance of the fish in the following year. 

34, Can you mention any years in which the mackerel were remark- 


ably abundant ? 
H.—Food. 


35. What do mackerel feed upon ? 

36. Are they ever seen feeding at the surface? Ifso, can you describe 
their movements ? 

37. Is their food different in different seasons and localities ? 

38. Does their food ever burn their stomachs after their capture, and 
prevent their keeping when iced or salted? What kind of food has this 
effect? 

V’.— Reproduction. 


SPAWNING HABITS. 


39. Where do mackerel spawn, and when? 

40. How long does the breeding season continue ? 

41. What is the depth of water on the spawning grounds? 

42. Do the eggs sink to the bottom, or float? 

43. What is their color and size? (Compare with sizes of shot.) 

44, Have you ever seen the eggs and milt running from the fish after 
they were caught? Where ar? under what circumstances ? 

45, Are there any changes in shape or special habits during the breed- 
ing season ? 


[37] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 39 


G.— Enemies, fatalities, de. 


DISEASES. 


46. Are diseased, deformed, or “logy” mackerel ever seen? 
47. Are dead fish ever seen in considerable numbers? 


PARASITES. 


48. Are crabs, worms, lampreys, and other living animals ever found 
attached to the mackerel? 
ENEMIES. 


49. Do other animals, such as whales, seals, birds, and other fishes 
attack or prey upon the mackerel? Can you mention any instances? 


H.—The fisheries. ~ 
OFF-SHORE FISHERY. 


50. How many vessels from your vicinity went mackereling in the 
summer of 1878? Can you give their names? 

51. How are they employed this winter? 

52. How many of them joined the southern mackerel fleet in the spring ? 

53. How many went to the Gulf of Saint Lawrence? 

54. How many carried purse-seines? 

55. When did the first vessel start for the gulf and when did it return ? 


IN-SHORE FISHERY. 


56. How many men are employed in your vicinity in fishing for mack- 
erel with small boats? 
57. How many mackerel gill-nets are employed in your vicinity? Can 
you give their dimensions and size? 
58. How many weirs or pounds in your vicinity catch mackerel ? Can 
you name their owners? 
APPARATUS. 


59. By whom and when was the purse-seine introduced on vessels from 
your port? 

60. By whom and when was the mackerel-jig introduced ? 

61. By whom and when was the gill-net introduced? 

62. Are mackerel-gaffs ever used by your fishermen? 


Il.—Products of the fisheries. 


63. Do the véssels from your port carry mackerel, fresh, to market at 
any season of the year? If so, at what season and to what place? 

64. Are any mackerel iced in your vicinity for shipment to other 
places ? 


40 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [38] 


65. Are there inspection laws in force in your State and at your pore? 

66. 'To what markets are your salted fish carried ? 

67. Can you estimate the quantity of mackerel taken by boat-fishermen 
in your vicinity for home consumption ? 


NAME OF CORRESPONDENT: 
ADDRESS: 


DATE OF COMMUNICATION: 


(29.) 


QUESTIONS RELATIVE TO THE ALEWIFE AND THE 
ALEWIFE FISHERIES.* 


OFFICE OF U.S. COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIES, 

Washington, D. C. 
* Among the most valuable of the fish of the eastern coast of North 
America is the Pomolobus pseudo-harengus or fresh-water herring, which 
enters the mouths of rivers early in the spring, a little in advance of the 
shad, and ascends the waters to a greater or less extent, usually known 
as the herring south of Long Island. It is called alewife throughout 
the greater portion of New England, and gaspereau in the British Prov- 
inces. 

For the purpose of eliciting such information as may be procurable 
relative to the alewife the present circular has been prepared by Mr. 
Charles G. Atkins, of the United States Fish Commission, who has been 
charged with the preparation of a report on the subject, to be based in 
great measure on the answers to be received. 

Replies should be made, when possible, on foolscap paper, and writ- 
ten on one side only of the leaf. The questions need not be repeated, 
but reference made merely to their number, respectively. 

Replies should be addressed to United States Fish Commission, Wash- 
ington, D. C. 

SPENCER F. BAIRD, 


Commissioner. 
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, Washington, D. C. 


Questions relative to the alewife, river herrmg, or gaspereau (Pomo- 
lobus pseudo-harengus). 


A.—Name and varieties. 


_1. By which name is the fish known in your neighborhood? 
2. Does there appear to be more than one variety? Ifso, what names 


*These same questions may be applied to the shad and other fishes of the herring 
family, also to the mullet and striped bass. 


[39] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. AY 


are given to the different kinds, and how do they differ from each other? 
Which is the principal or most abundant variety ? 
3. Which variety shall you have in mind in your answers to the fol- 
lowing questions ? 
B.— Characteristics. 


4, What is their average size (both length and weight), or how many 
to a barrel or bushel? 

5. Are they all about of the same size? If not, how much dothey vary ? 

6. Do those of the same “school” or “run” vary in size? 

7. What is their color when seen in the water? 


C.— Abundance. 


8. How abundant are they compared with other fish? 
9. Have they increased or decreased in numbers since ten, twenty, or 
thirty years ago? If so, to what extent? 
10. If either, what is supposed to have been the cause? 


D.— Movements. 


11. At what date do the alewives first appear in the spring? 

12. When are they plentiest? 

13. When do they disappear? 

14, Are they present during the whole time from their first appearance 
to their final disappearance, or are there separate ‘‘runs” with intervals 
between? 

15. If separate ‘‘runs,” are the fish of the separate “runs” alike in ap- 
pearance, size, and behavior? If not, state the difference. 

16. Is the water of the district of which you speak salt, fresh, or brack- 
ish? 

17. How far do they ascend such rivers (naming the rivers) as you 
are acquainted with? : 

18. Do they ascend to any lakes and ponds (if so, name them), or run 
into any brooks? 

19. Have their movements up the rivers and streams been interfered 
with by dams or in any other way, or can they now ascend as far as they 
were ever accustomed to do? 

20. Has there been any change in their habits in any other respect? 

21. At what date do old fish leave the fresh waters? 

22. Do they appear to go right off to sea, or do they linger awhile 
about the shores? 

23. How far out to sea are they ever found? 

24, Are they ever found in the stomachs of cod, hake, pollock, or other 
fish caught at sea? If you can mention any instances, state where and 
when the fish were caught. 

25. Are they ever taken in seines or gill-nets along with mackerel, men- 
haden, or other fish? If so, mention instances of date, distance, &c. 


42 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [40] 


26. Where do they spend the winter? 

27. In entering a bay or the mouth of a large river at the beginning 
of the season, where do they first strike the shore? At the point near- 
est the sea or farther up? 

28. Is it known from what direction they arrive when first coming in 
from sea, or which way they go when returning to it? 

29. Do they swim near the surface or bottom? 

30. What effect have the weather and tides on their movements? 

31. Do they appear to move about by night the same as by day? 

32. Have any observations been made as to the temperature of the 
water at the time they arrive or during their stay, or at the time they 
ascend fresh-water streams? Will you not, if possible, make such ob- 
servations? 

E.— Food. 


33. Do you know any facts about the food of this fish? 
34. Do they feed while ascending the rivers or while descending ? 
35, Are they generally feeding while in your vicinity? 


F.— Reproduction and growth. 


36. How do the male alewives differ from the females? 

37. Which sex is plentiest, take the season through? 

38. Do both sexes come along together in the spring and ascend the 
fresh-water streams together? If not, which is first, and how much dif. - 
ference in time? 

39. Are any of them found in the spring without spawn or milt? If so, 
how do they compare in size and condition with those that have spawn 
and milt? 

‘40. Where and at what date do alewives lay their eggs? Mention 
any facts known to you relative to the act of reproduction. 

41. Can you tell anything about the kind of ground selected by them 
for this purpose and their mode of laying their eggs; whether ane eggs 
stick to plants or stones, and how soon they hatch? 

42. Do they ever lay their eggs in brackish water, and do such eggs 
prosper? 

43, About what date are the young hatched ? 

44. When do they begin to go down toward the sea? 

45. How large are they then? : 

46. Do these young fish swim in schools or singly, near the shore or 
near mid-stream, at the surface or below it? 

47. How fast do they travel? 

48. If you have observed at any particular place, state the date at 
which the young alewives pass that place, and the size of the first and 
of the last. 

49, State any other facts about the behavior of the young fish. 

50. How large are they when they reach the sea? 


[41 | PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 43 


51. Do they go right off to sea and disappear at once, or do they lin- 
ger about the shores? 

52. What is the very latest date at which they are seen on the shore, 
and their size at that time? Can you furnish a few specimens in 
alcohol? 

53. How large do they get to be in a year? 

54. Do they come back to the bays and rivers when a year old, or at 
any time before they are full grown? 

55. In how many years do they attain full size? Give all the facts 
on whiecb your opinion is based. 


G.—Enemies, fatalities, &e. 


56. Have you observed or heard of any epidemic or other disease 
afflicting them? 

57. Do they ever die in large numbers without apparent cause? 

58. Are deformed fish ever seen? 

59. Are crabs, lice, worms, lampreys, or other living animals found 
attached to any part of these fish? 

60. What fishes and other animals prey upon the alewife? 


H.—Capture. 


61. By what mode are these fish caught in your vicinity? 

62. Give all the facts you can about the different modes of fishing— 
how the different nets, traps, pounds, &e., are constructed, and how they 
are worked; the date when they begin to operate, and when they close 
operations. 

63. How many of each of these implements are in use in the district 
over which your knowledge extends? State definitely the limits of the 
district included, and give the number of implements exactly if you can. 

64. Is the number of such implements greater or less than it was 5, 
10, 20, or 30 years ago. 

65. Are any of these implements used exclusively or mainly for the 

capture of alewives? 

66. What other kinds of fish do the same implements catch? 

67. Name the kinds of fish, if any, which are considered by the fisher- 
men of more importance to them than the alewife, that is, which bring 
them in more money. 

68. Make au estimate, as exact as possible, of the number of alewives 
caught in each of these modes of fishing; how many to each weir, pound, 
net, &c., in a season. 

69. What is the total catch for the whole district included within the 
limits given in answer to question 63? 

70. What are the local regulations or restrictions in regard to the 
capture of these fish, the persons authorized to take them, the number 
allowed, &c.? 


ay REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [42] 


l.—Curing and marketing. 


71. What proportion of the alewives caught are consumed by the 
fishermen and their families? 

72. Where is the surplus marketed ? 

73. What proportion are sold fresh, salted, or smoked? Give the 
proportion sold in each way, or better still, if you can, the exact quan- 
tity sold in each way, and the purposes to which applied, especially the 
quantity used as bait. 

74. Describe the process of salting and smoking, and in what sort of 
packages they are sent to market. — 

75. Where are these marketed fish finally sold to consumers? 

76. What are the prices obtained by the fishermen for fresh, salted, 
and smoked fish? 

77. What are the prices paid by the consumers in different districts? 

78. Are alewives used to any extent for manure, or any other purpose 
except food for man? 

79. If there is a fishery for alewives in your neighborhood managed 
by a town or other municipality, state the rules governing the catching 
and distribution of the fish. 

J.—Sources of information. 

80. To what extent are the above statements drawn from your per- 
sonal experience and observation? Please to state what opportunities 
vou have had for observation. 

81. Can you name any persons who have made a study of the habits 
of these fish, or collected statistics in reference to them, or any fisher- 
men who have kept records of their catch? If so, please furnish their 
address. 

82. Are there any published statements that bear on this subject? 

NAME OF OBSERVER: . 

OCCUPATION: 

P. O. ADDRESS: 

DATE OF STATEMENT: 

Here furnish the names and addresses of any persons in your neigh- 
borhood engaged in the capture and curing of this fish. 


(30.) 


QUESTIONS RELATIVE TO THE SMELT AND THE SMELT 
FISHERIES.* 


OFFICE OF U.S. COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 
Washington, D. C. 
The American smelt, of which there are perhaps several species (the 
best known being the Osmerus viridescens), is a fish of considerable 


*These same questions may also be applied to the varjous species related to the 
alewife, the salmon, lake trout, whitefish, &c. 


[43] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 45 


importance in the fisheries of the United States and of the British 
Provinces. It is sometimes called frost-fisb, from the fact that it makes 
its appearance in cold weather; but it must not be confounded with 
another fish known as the Tom-cod (AMicrogadus tomcodus), which resem- 
bles the true cod. 

The determination of the different species and varieties of this fish, 
their geographical distribution, habits, statistics, &c., is considered very 
desirable, and answers to the following questions, prepared by Mr. 
Charles G. Atkins, will greatly aid in accomplishing this object. 

The transmission to the Smithsonian Institution at Wasbington, from 
numerous points, of a few perfect specimens of both sexes, preserved in 
alcohol, will be of much importance in solving the problem. 

Answers to the queries should be addressed to the United States 
Fish Commission, Washington, D. C. 

SPENCER F. BAIRD, 
. Commissioner. 

SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, Washington, D. C. 


A.—Name and varieties. 


1. Is the smelt known in your vicinity by any other name? 

2. Does there appear to be more than one variety of smelt in your 
neighborhood? If so, how do the several varieties differ from each 
other, and which is the principal one? 

3. Which variety shall you have reference to in the following state- 


ment ? 
B.— Characteristics. 


4. What is the average length and weight of the smelts caught in your 
neighborhood? State whether your answer to this question is founded 
on an actual weighing and measuring of the fish, or upon an estimate. 

5. What is the greatest size of the smelts nowadays caught in your 
neighborhood. 

6. Are the fish as large as they were years ago? If not, how much 
difference is there? 

C.—Abundance. 


7. How abundant are the smelts in comparison with other fish ? 
8. Are they as abundant now as they were five, ten, twenty, or thirty 
years ago. 
9. If they have increased or decreased, how do you account for it? 
10. Have their haunts and habits been changed by the influence of 
man? 
11. Have their numbers been decreased by overfishing ? 
D.—Migrations and movements. 


12. Are smelts caught in your neighborhood at all seasons of the 
year? If not, state as definitely as you can the portions of the year 
when they are caught. 


46 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [44] 


13. Is the water there salt, fresh, or brackish? ' 

14. Do the smelts in your neighborhood appear to be moving in any 
general direction? If so, which way are they going ? 

15. Do they seem to belong to one general body, or are there succes- 
sive runs of them, as though they belonged to separate schools? If the 
latter, is there any difference in the appearance of the different schools ? 

16. What fresh-water rivers and streams that you can name do smelts 
ascend, and how far? And at what dates? 

17. Do they ever ascend to lakes and ponds ? 

18. Have their movements up the rivers been interfered with by dams 
or in any other way, or can they now ascend as far as they were ever 
accustomed to do? 

19. Has there been any other change in their range ? 

20. How far out to sea do smelts go? 

21. Ave they ever caught in seines along with mackerel, menhaden, or 
other fish? Ifso, mention any instances you know of, and state where 
they occurred. 

22. Are smelts ever found in the stomachs of cod, hake, pollock, or 
other fish canght at sea? If you can mention any instances, state where 
and when the fish were caught. 

25. Have any observations been made on the temperature of the water 
atthe time when smelts are present in your neighborhood? If not, can 
you not make and report them? 

24. When they leave your neighborhood where do they go? 

25. What effect have the tides and weather on their movements 2? 

26. Do they appear to move about by night the same as by day? 

27. State any further facts you may know about the movements of 
smelts, such as the direction they appear to come from when they arrive 
in your neighborhood, which way they go when they leave, how fast 
they travel, whether they swim near the surface or bottom, in schools 
or singly, &e. 

K.— Food. 


28. What do smelts feed on? 
. Do they feed at the time of spawning? 


I'.— Reproduction and growth. 


30. How do the male smelts differ from the females ? 

ol. Which sex is the plentiest the season through ? 

32. Do the sexes always go in company or does one of them precede 
the other, especially at the time when they ascend the streams or visit 
their spawning places ? 

33. Are barren smelts, that is, containing neither spawn nor milf, 
ever found ? 

34. Where and at what date do smelts lay their eggs? 


35, Can you tell anything about the kind of ground selected by them 


[45] PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 47 


for this purpose, and their mode of laying theireggs? Are these loose, 
or do they adhere to each other and to sticks, stones, earth, &e.? 

36. When are the young hatched? How long is this after the eggs 
are laid ? é 

37. Do the young begin to go down to the sea as soon as hatched, or 
do they stay in the streams awhile, and how long? 

38. Do they go off to sea while growing up, or stay about the shores ? 

39. How fast do the young smelts grow? Give, if you can, their 
length at hatching, and at one, two, three, and sixth months, and one 
year old. 

40. Do the young move about singly or in schools? 

41. Are they found in company with the old fish or not? 


G.—LHnemies, fatalities, &e. 


42. Are smelts ever afflicted with epidemics or otlier diseases ? 

43. Are they ever found dead in any considerable numbers without 
apparent cause ? 

44, Are erabs, lice, worms, lampreys, or other living animals ever 
found attached to the outside or on the gills @f smelts ? 

45. What fishes or other animals have been known to prey upon 
smelts? Can you mention instances ? 


H.—Capture. 


46. By what mode ure smelts caught in your vicinity ? 

47. Give all the facts you can about the different modes of fishing, 
how the different nets, traps, pounds, &c., are constructed and how they 
are worked; and at what date each sort of implement comes in use, and 
how long it is used each year. 

48, How many of each of these implements are in regular use in the 
district over which your knowledge extends? State definitely the limits 
of the district included, and give the number of the implements exactly 
if you can; butif this is impracticable, make the best estimate or gen- 
eral statement you can. 

49, If they are taken at all by hook and line, state in what months 
this is done, whether on the ice or otherwise, whether in brackish water 
or fresh. 

50. How many persons, if any, follow smelt fishing with hook and 
line as a regular occupation ? 

51. Do they fish under tents or huts, or in the open air? 

52. What sort of places are most favorable for hook and _line fishing ? 
Depth and character of water, character of bottom, &e. 

53. Describe the hooks and lines. 

54. What bait is used ? 

55. What time of day and of tide are most favorable ? 

_56. What other kinds of fish °are taken on hooks along with the 
smelts ? 


48 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [46] 


57. Is hook and line fishing as productive as it used to be, and what 
number or weight would be an average day’s result ? 

58. If hook and line fishing for smelts has been abandoned with you, 
or has become less productive than formerly, state how long ago it was 
abandoned or when the yield began to fail, and give reasons therefor if 
you can. 

59. If any of the weirs, pounds, nets, seines, &c., mentioned by you 
as being used in the smelt fishing catch other fish, please to state which 
kinds ef implements, and what other kinds of tish they catch, and which 
are the most important. 

60. Can you make an estimate of the number of smelts caught, or the 
number of pounds’ weight, by each sort of implement mentioned, in a 
year, and the total annual catch of the district you are speaking about, 
within the same limits as given by you in the answer to question num- 


ber 48 ? 
I.—Markets and consumption. 


61. What proportion of the smelts caught are sold and what propor- 
tion consumed by the fishermen ? 

62. To what market or anarkets are those sold mostly Sent ? 

63. How are they prepared for market ? 

64. In what sort of packages are they sent ? 

65. What prices do they bring? How do these prices compare with 
those of former years ? 

66. To what extent are smelts used as bait for other fish ? 


J.—Sources of information. 


67. To what extent is the above information drawn from your personal 
experience and observation? Please to state what opportunities you 
have had for observation. 

68. Can you name any persons who have made a study of the habits 
of smelts or collected any statistics in reference to them, or any fishermen 
who have kept records of their business ? 

69. Are there any published statements that bear on this subject ? 

NAME OF OBSERVER: 

OCCUPATION : 

P. O. ADDRESS: 

DATE OF STATEMENT: 


feta 


PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. 


49 


Ae PEN DT X °C. 


LIST OF SEABOARD COUNTIES, WITH 


STATEMENT OF 


NUMBER OF SEABOARD TOWNSHIPS AND POST-OFFICES 
WITHIN THREE MILES OF TIDE-WATER. 


| 


Z.|¢ 
R= 5 
o oD 
State. County. FE aS 
s ~ Ey 
A 
: = < 
EMigiinl Geser ere oe see eee nc mseiccteciewcclsciel Wrashinotoncicss.. sca sence ne nee aos 24 32 
Mlancocksetesecnce cen eee eee ee eee ee 32 62 
WidldOes soa ceeas ses sccea oc eeu eeteees 9 19 
WGN OKs ssee oasis ee sie sek en seaaeeeee 13 16 
Din Colne cies ose oe ee ee eee 18 80 
c Savadahootaserecsccessse jess ssee tes 10 14 
@umpberland:: oecc cece Conner ccmese 10 ot 
MOT cease Maoatea se Seine a ne cee cmeaeee 8 | 21 
124 | 295 
INewallam pShirOrc s-Mercssseee ence Seal PROCKIN PURINE es oe so ase ane ac cea sce 11 Peay 
Strafford? 226 -seeoscsiaosstece cee oseeee 4 6 
15; 23 
IMBSSACHUBEULSE, cece macleiciccmiees vacancies mir INSSOX a de tite aae ceases seine docian cosets | 20 39 
Mid GIOBEX hrc sete comic eels Sees see 6 6 
Suitolics seen cet oc. casmecccas on oee coe. al il 
INOTIO eet wcrcie dans scltetisdo tee enc ccee 6 18 
Plymouth nescactenacee saan 11 27 
Barnsta plese. caes-m= Pease te tee ce 14 59 
MNiani tN CK Otte: coe ae satioae cae cia eece scien 1 1 
DD nlkes®: 44 woos codssctocst wosieemiece aucist 5 if 
BLIBLOl craic acceler en ac see ecieciseeie as 11 | 22 
75 | 180 
mhoderslandis282 cs sascae 2 see eedecssosess ase PNGW DOLE cess secon asics sceicioai se caiceee 7 9 
IBrIstolit.! -accccsoseasee sebeseeae costo 3 5 
IPROVIGENCO:~scsc thee ee eee teens cee eeee 5 13 
WONG Se asi 2 wae eoectes pees oe cc ekigs nee 2 9 
Washing (onecsaaagesctsteosese iscsi 4 | 19 
histo | eles 
MONNGCHCUt Ie sacs sc vecece nes s-sensecceo cans INowsONdON Ree tec cocaceteces cemeee ey eto 26 
IMid dIESGKe eer occa ce nae cteteoaceeee 8 15 
ING WHHL OVEN es - fec ao owechceeke cn eceseues 7 18 
BRIT CLUE te. cane ee sige ciate cn esicte 9 27 
34 86 
PeeweVirmer ret ete e toes ak fe as sn Sredfisics oe oc Sines eR Eme et eee 9| 78 
Queenss: ss cisseees coc ces e ceca 6 51 
KIA CARE cess cis Serle SE Se ee ee eee 6 10 
iWiestchesterscus: o2 scaahocctesene ees i 16 
RICHMONGG=.see tes eee tee eee 5 15 
33| 170 
ING WAU OISCYe sc she cssteniccen ce pesciscecusecee Cumberland)s.c2 52022 ser coe ceins eee sees Saket a Sean 
DalOmyes ese tase reac arose eee a¢ 4 7 
Glowcester tees. sete sess coe cece 2 3 
nh be 26 
Loerie Re ee ne ING WieaShloceeeee sects See eae ae eheccc - oe 
Kent revecs sescce at euce seeek wos cecanes 5 10 
SUSSOK30 oe ees Sate ee nmasoce cick eicicee 23 
20 49 
S. Mis. 29 4 


50 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [48] 


APPENDIX C.—List of seabord counties, §-c.—Continued. 


con 


oo oD 
&s | 38 
State. County. FE Be 
+» 
° a 3 I 
A Ay 
Maryland ...-....-++-- ees ewaseiniee vwencits= a= IW) GTOPRUOR es no-one nen en enec se a- near 6 9 
Somersetineececasecscicciciececerinicaceasce 9 15 
WWACOMMOO) cp etin date cence cdecictan aoe 5 9 
DOLCHeSLOl nsas ea es es casiaiseesawccseieeers 14 26 
Warolin@maecccerts tos eeinee aleeinsii= (= /e1sei= 2, qT 
Nalbotiet toc nc ccscsuscecesceccsseuc cisics 5 13 
MECN AMNGeccisccsesseecco cs scccc css 4 6 
BUN SBS SO OOSO IO ONOOOE0 SSOP SOS ECOCS 5 16 
Ceollsatees se cescecceeesicceimecemee cies q 19 
iMarford So) tccosece sees ssccuocemeonecns 3 18 
ij Baltimore c oss cia= = -aleerm eis alnaa 4 8 
AMNGHATUNGS]: (<< <:<isis via e/ais/sm cele cineicloiel= z 21 
Callyettte eens ac mctieccic cee acieiosem acer iseias 3 9 
Saint Wary!s <2. ccc cceeeceecceencesane 6 20 
Prince George's\-..6.--..0s+-s-5cc5 6. 5 14 
Cates este cece sesccsencctiseeccecars 9 20 
94 230 
rr 
Wirginiaics.scaslcanceeseeecemeciiema ac eeiate AecOMavKe = --sces cesses deocmacienseset : 25 
Northampton -. 13 
Fairfax .::.--.-. 4 
Prince William ; qT 
Stafford .......- 3 5 
King George ...-... ; 13 
Westmoreland 4 14 
. Richmond.....-..- 5 qT 
WiGsOKiee eer esaciecee ene omecemcmeascmctcieia oe il 
Northumberland ..........-..-------- 5 
Lancaster 
Middlesex af 
Matthews . 5 
Gagucesten sos. cesneceesce a -e so cele 7 
King and Queen. .......-J....-.22022-- 4 4 
ingawWalliam <pesccnecceeesesecrios cscs c 5 
ENGWHIRON BSc occ s ois 3 s\cictainoeeiceisis oosisiselnie| emia Z 2 
SAMOS! City c.. ca casas csc cee ecaesineceseeecees 3 
Charles City, -ses-csccsceoo= sm oasncieeseiaasecees 4 
IPrINCE\GeOrgeleacecccas secs amelie case cies eis fo 4 
iliby a7 asdouduspoconocencocoucondoncanod loscescoas 4 
MOD eee icca cesta cece nicccicisnacicesiatets| ciattrsteats 83 
IWIN WICK ws coe cenuice neste ntiwce ce ciseac|nateateiere 1 
Hhizabech Citys s-ccs-scccein sn cwermesa| eee 3 
Mate Grawaghts.c-c-+scscocena eae sccm el eaaaeer 2 
IN@HSONIONA 2 cone cccc.cnlewiseccs cess eric bi seeecae 4 
< ENTOM LOM ites croc eicpciseleicts cic eteeimieis See eivseces | meena qT 
PrinGesstANNe cess cciccccececssccinse soe pemeea se 6 
Alexandriatecssc cesses c cece ee eoee eo eeltee nace 1 
Saatcee es 189 
MrorthiOuroling .+.sc<su-<<%.csucceeeeeeme Girtltneke bx. --<osesels or Mec ieeee | 8 
CaInden ate c hac caeene eacioscteenceecas| sence | 6 
LEE TPOLGN € GaSe coup sbapqudnsocenGoced |psouonce 2 
LEG GUNN EN Noo eecopar osogoceoubsececd™ kooconac 5 
Chowald 24d200 sade cheb ca asnec ccmisias -\na|Goeacies 3 
Gates ii ciccececlece alclnicisncincticletelseecios| yaiseniaere 2 
Hertford. t os. ce sosne ceccen ore cowececlenceeees 4 
IBOVLiO ee ee cciecis = serene cece jctereisinis dieeieinyelel imme cararays 6 
td is BAS oe uate eae ntcpets correo cia aerators 7 
Gahine ton sas. ecco cceesos cate saceee ls cecal’ 
Yee NS 8 Seen Comoe ecbboo cn dacudeadgnosd lsoncode: : 
28 IC 33 sagoo nono cuesSadchesceticosaaq|Hoaoosas 10 
IBOAUTONG). cui oeceea eae esos ee eee lsseeee es 14 
Pitter ie joscmeta ws cse ee ecco heseiesiaeye 5 
IPAMTCO i se5,o55 sce sce weboes ose ceeiece asl mection ats 4 
Craven: 0s coc cecvencc cece scteneeaccene sedis 5 
DONGS! 2ossvaccce swawscscens cosceeie seme lemmas 3 
Cartereth tooo. cece cooatecememeinceenlmaecerise 8 
Onslows. oie ccent ct ee Eee leee esses 9 
Pendere sie. cece sone co ceuleccoesicemens |meociise ae 9 
IN@WAHANOV.er oes coerce con qececeseemelsaiseness 2 
IMBLUNSWICK cc. <0 <= oaslecee seca e eee) semiseisinc q 
Columbus 32 ois scwnssccssce astseeees meceites = 8 


. 


[49] 


PLAN OF INQUIRY FOR FISHERY CENSUS. aL 
APPENDIX C.—List of seaboard counties, §-c.—Continued. 
ra o o 
Bu | 8x 
a3 | as 
State. County. 5 E g g 
on on 
iS) -) 


MIOTIA a cercainacs amnee poacccdadicnensesinacic se 


ee 


IMGRSIASEDD!'c0s0si o2ccc te ecns'scleastecicccstines 


Louisiana 


eee ee ee er es 


ee 


ee es 


~ 
Roan. 


Bee en eee ee eee ee cement ewes eniseuscces 


& 


es 


eee eee ee eee ed ee 


eee eee eee eee ee 


eee ee 


eee ee ee 


See ee ee eee ee oe 


eee ee ee ee 


RO COD CO Nt 


8 


sence eee 


| 
| 


See eee ee ee es Pr 


COWRA ROR RH RWW NOON IS 


Washington 
Walton 


8 


aH 


ba | 


ee 


oem ees cows cee wes cece ee we eesces|secceee= 


Saint Bernard 
Plaquemines 
Jefferson 


eee eee ees ee 


Re OOO RR De RR ee 


SRAM TPAIOR tee a oe eas an ric eee oa paanisiece - 
Livingston 
Ascension 
Saint John Baptist 
MAM AMNOR Sos eces oa ecceeees oe eesc ea 
Saint Charles 
Terre Bonne 


eer re ee eee eee eee eee 


52 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [50] 


APPENDIX C.—List of seqboard counties, §c.—Continued. 


State. | County. 


Townships, 
number 
Post-offices, 
number 


FOUISIANA sees cetcesisimeins set accee ons aeeeas Cameron! s2a8- 02 22. $s ooo eaeccae secon eee 
Caldasiows-ts2-cecane cies oaraccoeecioen seem cine 


REKAS ye ee ea come ne cies Se east aeCeeReEee Oran Obs societ cole er eiriatelo wis niclnwic/a/elnleiaieiaiel Seeereteiee 
LEMON SOM eee clsciencisiseiecincls s(oicicas wietel| Sareea 
CHAMP CLSianiseme'= oc cm aaiccjenelawsiccicescet|esees cee 
Galvestony: saccccissasce des cencnenecisceulnenaneee 
TBS PAZ OTD eters are cleloelsccintee cm oie wie wis efeis cisic| clejsaetee te 
Matacordaeceamsmeresemeeacsice=lmejisec|—seeecet 
Calhoumiee ss fee oncn ce cisecisceacistian eee cckceee 


INOS Se Se kbar econo coasosocposmcapoenud bepadece 
Teh HW GY) oe bea see nsec ema aaosonsbasenedd|scc aoade 
CamMmeronencta = eeenuscssccenseaiseesmeenl|seeecces 


| ee | 


California....... Soscecnees seen see se ceene ee Sani Dieco\s.s socaccwiasccccioceeseseecalmecenmee 
hOSspAMPClES seems etna Se aaaecee 
Menta tas 2s s2.c orisha stais stigerelt ecnsicteisiesleetareniee 
Santa Barbara: ssSeccecs cc concen etemstell = ccc cer 
San cbnis Obispdtesaa-cccse ces <oi-= seer eerie 
WIM? Soesssoonccsécuasoncocsneesvd|ios- Sasee 
Santa Onn secs cen sec semise cee ceccccise ae see 
Santa Clara. c-ostoacccnr coe cess Seen eer eeee 
San Mateder cesses seas eaieicieis cine sions niela ereieeeteicte 
SanvhranGisC0e seo csiete ce cieciacisieieialsteeieioal tee ee eee 
AN AMERS eee cciescecamcistenceicletetasrstee | eae ete 


re 
NWEKROANE ARK LAK QwHaany 


Solanoies st icsonsc ccmavesiccine cceencices oe | 


Hum bold tisscecccsece cs scence eeeseeel cone 


Clatsopies onsets ceisieaeeromcesicccinecce 
Columbian. ssocccesccueotcectes emaaeee 
Multnomah. sa. 2seciscactecetswaicmeimicon ctcigetece 
WiPSCO) Eh ccc ocecmocemecncciese ce aoe 


Washington Territory......-.2.--..--.ceceee Walla Walla 1 
RVI KI Gate so ceceore cee miaceniae 3 

Skamaniaiccecccceee ones 2 

Clarke) zaccsqcceccassseces 4 

Cowlitg 2 yoo. viesiqncteeicee er tossaces 7 

Wahkiakum 4 

Pacifici. oeeceeess ee Reece s 8 

@hehalis. 30. (32252 2c Ses jottameslcereretal eae 2 

Clallam 30.0 208 5 ee ee eee ee eeeeicsct 3 

Jeflerson ooo cost cecmceece aoeesece leew ee 3 
5 

9 

4 

5 

4 

3 

4 

4 


San, dinansssce.c ce eee ecco Seal Bese 
Wihateoms | ied cisco scare cus totepoeieeeee ee reese cetera atete 
THAN 324 ee ee see Se cea ee ee eee etter le ote 


Total number of townships and districts from Maine to Maryland inclusive. .---- 427) | ace 
Total number of post-offices.-.-...-..-. Joceece cee ec cere cece es cee ec eects eceee fecee eee: 1, 885 


1j.—THE FIRST DECADE OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COM- 
MISSION: ITS PLAN OF WORK AND ACCOMPLISHED RESULTS, 
SCIENTIFIC AND ECONOMICAL. 


[Read at the Boston meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of 
Science, August, 1880. ] 


By G. BROWN GOODE. 


There are nine departments of the government devoted, in part or 
wholly, to researches in pure and applied science—the Geological 
Survey; the Coast and Geodetic Survey; the Naval Observatory ; 
the National Museum; the Department of Agriculture; the Entomolog- 
ical Commission; the Tenth Census, with its special agencies for the 
study of the natural resources of the country; the Smithsonian Bureau of 
. Ethnology, and the Commission of Fish and Fisheries. The Smithso- 

nian Institution, established upon an independent foundation, should 
also be mentioned, as well as the Medical Museum of the Army, and 
the various laboratories under the control of the Army and Navy 
Departments. 

The Geological Survey is not now carrying on any of the schemes of 
zoological and botanical investigation engaged in by its predecessors. 

The work of the Entomological Commission and that of the Census, 
though of extreme importance, are limited in scope and duration, while 
that of the Agricultural Department is necessarily, for the most part, 
economical, 

The work of the National Museum is chiefly confined to the study of 
collections made by government surveys or individual collectors and 
sent in to be reported upon. 

The work of the Fish Commission, in one of its aspects, may perhaps 
_ be regarded as the most prominent of the present efforts of the govern- 

‘ment in aid of aggressive biological research. 

On the 9th of February, 1874, Congress passed a joint resolution 
which authorized the appointment of a Commissioner of Fish and Fish- 
eries. The duties of the Commissioner were thus defined: ‘To prose- 
cute investigations on the subject (of the diminution of valuable fishes) 
with the view of ascertaing whether any and what diminution in the 
number of the food-fishes of the coast and the lakes of the United States 
has taken place; and, if so, to what causes the same is due; and also 


whether any and what protective, prohibitory, or precautionary meas- 
[1] 53 


54 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER’ OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24 


ures should be adopted in the premises, and to report upon the same to 
Congress.” 

The resolution establishing the office of Commissioner of Fish and 
Fisheries required that the person to be appointed should be a civil 
officer of the government, of proved scientific and practical acquaintance 
with the fishes of the coast, to serve without additional salary. The 
choice was thus practically limited to a single man, for whom, in fact, 
the office had been created. Professor S. I’. Baird, at that time Assistant 
Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, was appointed and entered at 
once upon his duties. 

The summer of 1880 marks the tenth season of active work since its 
inception in 1871. The Fish Commission now fills a place tenfold more 
extensive and useful than at first. The present essay aims to show, in 
a general way, what it has done, is doing, and expects to do—its pur- 
poses, its methods, its results. 

The work is naturally divided into three sections: 

1. The systematic investigation of the waters of the United States 
and the biological and physical problems which they present. The 
scientific studies of the Commission are based upon a liberal and philo- 
sophical interpretation of the law. In making his original plans the 
Commissioner insisted that to study only the food-fishes would be of 
little importance, and that useful conclusions must needs rest upon a 
broad foundation of investigations purely scientific in character. The 
life-history of species of economie value should be understood from be- 
ginning to end, but no less requisite is it to know the histories of the 
animals and plants upon which they feed or upon which their food is 
nourished ; the histories of their enemies and friends, and the friends 
and foes of their enemies and friends, as well as the currents, temper- 
atures, and other physical phenomena of the waters in relation to migra- 
tion, reproduction, and growth. The necessary accompaniment to this 
division isthe amassing of material for research to be stored in the National 
ang other museums for future use. ; 

. The investigation of the methods of fisheries, past and present, 
ae the statistics of production and commerce of fishery products. Man 
being one of the chief destroyers of fish, his influence upon their abun- 
dance must be studied. Fishery methods and apparatus must be ex- 
amined and compared with those of other lands, that the use of those 
which threaten the destruction of useful fisheries may be discouraged, 
and that those which are inefficient may be replaced by others more 
serviceable. Statistics of industry and trade must be secured for the 
use of Congress in making treaties or imposing tariffs, to show to pro- 
ducers the best markets, and to consumers where and with what their 
needs may be supplied. 

3. The introduction and multiplication of useful food-fishes through- 
out the country, especially in waters under the jurisdiction of the general 
government, or those common to several States, none of which might 


[3] FIRST DECADE OF UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 55 


feel willing to make expenditures for the benefit of the others. This 
work, which was not contemplated when the Commission was established 
was first undertaken at the instance of the American Fish-Cultural As- 
sociation, whose representatives induced Congress to make a special 
appropriation for the purpose. This appropriation has since been re- 
newed every year on a more bountiful scale, and the propagation of fish 
is at present by far the most extensive branch of the work of the Com- 
mission, both in respect to number of men employed and quantity of 
money expended. 

Although activity in this direction may be regarded in the light of 
applied rather than pure scientific work, it is particularly important to 
the biologist, since it affords opportunities for investigating many new 
problems in physiology and embryology. 

The origin of the Commission, its purposes, and methods of organiza- 
tion, having been described, it now remains to review the accomplished 
results of its work. In many departments, especially that of direct re- 
search, most efficient services have been rendered by volunteers; in 
fact, a large share of what has been accomplished in biological and phy- 
sical exploration is the result of unpaid labor on the part of some of the 
most skillful American specialists. Although it would be interesting to 
review the peculiar features of the work of each investigator, the limits 
of this paper will not allow me even to mention them all by name. 

Since the important fisheries center in New England, the coast of this 
district has been the seat of the most active operations in marine re- 
search. For ten years, the Commissioner, with a party of specialists, 
has devoted the summer season to work at the shore, at various stations 
along the coast, from Connecticut to Nova Scotia. 

A suitable place having been selected, a temporary laboratory is fitted 
up with the necessary appliances for collection and study. In this are 
placed from ten to twenty tables, each occupied by an investigator, either 
an officer of the Commission, or a volunteer. From 1878 to 1879, impor- 
tant aid was rendered by the Secretary of the Navy, who detailed for 
this service a steamer to be used in dredging and trawling, and this year 
the steamer built expressly for the Commission is employed in the same 
manner.* 


*The number of dredging and trawling stations on record is as follows: 


TERESI 02 62) ge a a ae A OO 345 
1872. Eastport, 200 by hand, 35 by steamer. .......- 222-22 e222. eee ee ene cone 235 
Peso EONEL ANC geilaee cee ecieins mises crete eee Ceicieceemnie oN ae inel sock cee mee mene 149 
SpA mNO AN Kee ce eran skelsamee siesta honee aki A coms wemiale cok ste miccbeiosoule te eks 223 
Svea OOC REEL OL nas sarter ee he iota sion Sane See aa eo tas ced ack le ehid es 169 
ISS2 Thy TRUDE BANS Aa ee Or CEE aca es ES Ie oS ee Be a ---++)} 

LEAVERS ae See SSS GSES Bae EE IG TAC Cee PS Taint em \ 278 
ikerks), (GHROINCERI 66 Gs09 oueer osc Aa OCe ae SDC HE irre Nr 8 Alaa en ee 
LSE LO VANCOLOW Mies ctte <= eee = See ae lse yee Feey ti oem occ ceecitee 2 eee J 
Motalin TOUNG NOMVCTS=.cciccss socc s eee - ease sc sass Nee Metre ele, «28.0 aie 1,500 


The number of seine hauls is about 600. 


56 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


The regular routine of operations at a summer station includes all the 
various forms of activity known to naturalists—collecting along the 
shore, seining upon the beaches, setting traps for animals not otherwise 
to be obtained, and scraping with dredge and trawl the bottom of the 
sea, at depths as great as can be reached by a steamer in a trip of three 
days. In the laboratory are carried on the usual structural and systematic 
studies; the preparation of museum specimens and of reports. Since 
the organization of the Commission, the deep-sea work and the investi- 
gation of invertebrate animals has been under the charge of Professor 
Verrill, who had, for many years before the Commission was established, 
been studying independently the invertebrate fauna of New England. 

In addition to what has been done at the summer station, more or less 
exhaustive investigations have been carried on by smaller parties on 
many parts of the coast and-interior waters. The fauna of the Grand 
Banks, and other off-shore fishing grounds, has been partly explored. 
In 1872, 1873, and 1874 dredging was carried on from the Coast Survey 
steamer Bache, by Professor Packard and Mr. Cooke, Professor Smith, 
Mr. Harger, and Mr. Rathbun. In 1879 Mr. H. L. Osborn spent three 
months in a cod-schooner collecting material on the Grand Banks, and 
Mr. N. P. Scudder as long a time on the halibut grounds of Davis’ 
Straits. 

A most remarkable series of contributions have been received from 
the fishermen of Cape Ann. When the Fish Commission had its head- 
quarters at Gloucester, in 1878, a general interest in the zodlogical work 
sprang up among the crews of the fishing vessels, and since that time 
they have been vying with each other in efforts to find new animals. 
Their activity has been stimulated by the publication of lists of their 
donations in the local papers, and the number of separate lots of speci- 
mens received, to the present time, exceeds eight hundred. Many of 
these lots are lagge, consisting of collecting-tanks full of aleoholie speci- 
mens. At least thirty fishing vessels now carry collecting-tanks, on 
every trip, and many of the fishermen, with characteristic superstition, 
have the idea that it insures good luck to have a tank on board, and 
will not go to sea without one. The number of specimens acquired in 
this manner is at least fifty or sixty thousand, most of them belonging 
to species unattainable. Hach halibut vessel sets, twice daily, lines 
from 10 to 14 miles in length, with hooks upon them 6 feet apart, in 
water 1,200 to 1,800 feet in depth, and the quantity of living forms 
brought up in this manner, and which had never hitherto been saved, 
is very astonishing. Over thirty species of fishes have thus been added 
to the fauna of North America, and Professor A. E. Verrill informs me 
that the number of new and extra limital forms thus placed upon the list 
of invertebrates cannot be less than fifty. 

A permanent collector, Mr. Vinal N. Edwards, has been employed at 
Wood’s Holl and vicinity since 1871, and many remarkable forms have. 
also been discovered by him. 


[5] FIRST DECADE OF UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 57 


No dredging has yet been attempted by the Commission south of 
Long Island, though much has been done in shore work, especially 
among the fishes, by special agents and friends of the Commission, and 
by the parties stationed here and there in the work of fish-culture. Mr.E. 
G. Blackford, of Fulton Market, New York, by carefully watching the 
market slabs, has added at least ten species of fishes to the fauna of the 
United States. Mr. Fred. Mather is studying the fish of Long Island and 
the Sound. Dr. Yarrow, Mr. Earll, and others, have collected from Cape 
May to Key West. The Gulf States coast was explored last winter by 
a party conducted by Mr. Silas Stearns, who spent nine months in study- 
ing the food and thecensus. The entire Pacific coast has been scoured by 
Professor Jordan for the Commission and the census, and the ichthyol- 
ogy of that region has been enriched by the discovery of sixty species 
new to the fauna, forty of them being new to science. <A similar inves- 
tigation on the great lakes has been carried over a period of several 
years by Mr. J. W. Milner and Mr. L. Kumlien. The ichthyology of 
the rivers of the country has received much attention from the many 
experts employed by the Commission in fish-cultural work. 

In addition to these local studies may be mentioned the general ex- 
plorations such as are now being carried on, for the oyster by Mr. Ernest 
Ingersoll and Mr. John A. Ryder, for the. shad by Colonel M. McDonald, 
for the smelt and the Atlantic salmon by Mr. C. G. Atkins, and the 
Quinnat salmon by Mr. Livingston Stone. 

A partialindication of what has been accomplished may be found in 
the number of species added to the various faunal lists. Take, for in- 
stance, the cephalopod mollusks of New England. In Professor Ver- 
rill’s recently published monographs, twenty species are mentioned, thir- 
teen of which are new to science. Ten years ago only three were 
known. 


I am indebted to Professor Verrill for the following estimate of the 
number of species added within the past ten years to the fauna of New 
England, mainly by the agency of the Commission: 


| 2. Fs E 
2 i) 

AS os & 

Sq c=) E 

Ey s S 

<q A 
ONSIACOM Deen oe car ee is cams ame teeicee can oa cence cinteee cite tnrs cinctioe aie tainos sas 105 193 298 
ESVCTOP OM OMe metesie wwe nielejacis dees acielem = lalalime cicin see eoclas s\n siciswisic.- uv sislaiciciwn'sin(einie 5 10 15 
PMC A Seem etc eee mater cinecwocine as clonouuaies eens on aniertsemsacle ceases ms nisiasie 67 238 305 
BRS TINOR ee ae nc sees we vale ce cgecs Oe conics Beets cm bec ee ccue ceecisabesblioccocceccecs 39 100, 139 
INC R ena res soos cence sede macle cece anomeric ele Sere eioa tee wesc es tecsiceaelas 317 109 426 
HiCNINOGOLIMNGD + oe a sacer cs ceroes cicceecose cence coc ccienn eccteecice cco cesesivins oe 47 41 88 
PANOZ acta hacia sien tae cece cue ec tem ceamere ete mne awed scle cicis ena sieies 20 35 55 
NTICALS its seer ae isacc ck Sank etl dclns ceo sek ae cone cee ose beets n Sere accesses 26 25 51 
OMY ZOW = xinict-\a einen cerssic sin's cide siclicisesic os se acenipag esse annie cecilccbeececesaste<s 56 91 147 
MAC MIODOUR menace tos cee tones scar lat tease ceemecee aeececscloe déeccsals sues 5 0 5 
PHOU SOS ea ete ie namie omer ane conmaine sen cast tcotpccnsinceaaccsencctwacels 10 80 90 
PANUGs2) GY) LIES Perarerals eect ca ete alate at tale ota ee a ie ena sinha hens ololctddwiaqulsdeceisieid fF 102 78 180 


Lota simi TOUuNnG NUMbEPS. 2.252 Mss oe ectos seus eee cec ce vere scenes shee 800 | 1,000 1, 800 


58 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


It is but just to say that many of these species were obtained by Pro- 
fessor Verrill in the course of his independent lan in Maine 
and Connecticut previous to 1871.* 

A similiar estimate for the fishes indicates the discovery of at least 
one hundred species on the eastern Atlantic coast within ten years; half of 
these are new to science. Forty species have been added to the fauna 
north of Cape Cod; sixteen of these are new and have been found with- 
in three years; seventeen have been described as new from the Gulf of 
Mexico; sixty and more have been added upon the western coast. The 
results of the summers’ campaigns are worked in winter by the special- 
istsof the National Museum, and under the direction of Professor Verrill, 
in New Haven. 

One of the important features of the work is the preparation of life- 
histories of the useful marine animals of the country, and great quan- 
tities of material have been accumulated relating to almost every spe- 
cies. A portion of this has been published, more or less complete bio- 
graphical monographs having been printed on the bluefish, the scup, 
the menhaden, the salmon, and the whitefish, and others are nearly 
ready. 

Another monograph which may be seen to in this connection is 
that of Mr. Alexander Starbuck on the whale fishery, giving its history 
from the earliest settlement of North America. 

The temperature of the water, in its relation to the movements of fish, 
has from the first received special attention. Observations are made 
regularly during the summer work, and at the various hatching stations. 
At the instance of the Commissioner, an extensive series of observations 
have for several years been made under the direction of the Chief Sig- 
nal Officer of the Army, at light-houses, light-ships, life-saving and sig- 
nal stations, carefully chosen, along the whole coast. This year thirty 
or more fishing schooners and steamers are carrying thermometers to 
record temperatures upon the fishing grounds, a journal of the move- 
ments of the fish being kept at the same time. One practical result of 
the study of these observations has been the demonstration of the cause 
of the failure of the menhaden fisheries on the coast of Maine in 1879— | 
a failure on account of which nearly 2,000 persons were thrown out of 
employment. 

Another important series of investigations carried on by Commander 
Beardsley, of the Navy, shows the error of the ordinary manner of 
using the Casella-Miller deep-sea thermometer; still another series, made 
by Dr. Kidder, of the Navy, and to be carried out in future, had for its 
object the determination of the temperature of the blood of marine ani- 
mals. 

Observations have also been made by Mr. Milner upon the influence 


*A few days after the reading of this paper a new fauna was discovered about one 
hundred miles southeast of Newport, and several hundred numbers might now be ad- 
ded to this enumeration. 


[7] FIRST DECADE OF UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 59 


of a change from sea water into fresh water and from fresh water into 
sea water upon the young of different fishes. 

Mr. H. J. Rice carried on a series of studies upon the effect of cold 
in retarding the development of incubating fish eggs. 

A series of analyses have been made by Professor W. O. Atwater to 
determine the chemical composition and nutritive value of fish as com- 
pared with other articles of food. This investigation is still in progress. 

In connection with the work of fish culture much attention has been 
paid toembryology. The breeding times and habits of nearly all of our 
fishes have been studied, and their relations to water temperatures. 
The embrvological history of a number of species, such as the cod, shad, 
alewife, salmon, smelt, Spanish mackerel, striped bass, white perch, and 
the oyster, have been obtained under the auspices of the Commission 
by Messrs. Brooks, Ryder, Scheffer, Rice, and others. 

The introduction of new species, in water in which they were pre- 
viously unknown, is of special interest to the student of geographical 
distribution. Through the agency of the Commission, the German carp 
has already been placed in nearly every State and Territory, although 
the work of distribution has only just begun, and the tench (Tinca vul- 
garis) and the golden orfe (Idus melanotus) have been acclimated; the 
shad has been successfully planted in the Mississippi Valley and on the 
coast of California, and the California salmon in the rivers of the At- 
Iantic slope. The marena, or lake whitefish, of Europe, has been in- 
troduced into a lake of Wisconsin. It is not my purpose to speak of the 
great success in restocking with shad and salmon several rivers in 
which the supply was almost exhausted, and in planting the Schoo- 
dic salmon in numerous lakes. By an act of international courtesy, 
California salmon have been successfully introduced into New Zealand 
and Germany. The propagation work has increased in importance from 
year to year, as may be seen by the constant increase in the amount of 
the annual appropriation. A review of the results of the labors of the 
Commission, in increasing the food supply of the country, may be found 
in the annual reports; the rude appliances of fish culture in use ten 
years ago have given way to scientifically devised apparatus, by which 
millions of eggs are hatched where thousands were, and the demonstra- 
tion of the possibility of stocking rivers and lakes to any desired extent 
has been greatly strengthened. This work was for six years most effi- 
ciently directed by the late Mr. James W. Milner, and is now in charge 
of Maj. T. B. Ferguson, also commissioner for the State of Maryland, 
by whom has been devised the machinery for propagation on a gigan- 
tic scale, by the aid of steam, which is now so successfully in use, revo- 
lutionizing the art of fish culture. 

The investigation of the statistics and history of the fisheries has per- 
haps assumed greater proportions than was at first contemplated. One 
of the immediate causes of the establishment of the Commission was 
the dissension between the line and net fishermen of Southern New Eng- 


60 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


g 

Jand with reference to laws for the protection of the deteriorating fish- 
eries of thatregion. The first work of Professor Baird, as Commissioner, 
was to investigate the causes of this deterioration, and the report of that 
year’s work includes much statistical material. In the same year a 
zoological and statistical survey of the great lakes was accomplished, 
and various circulars were sent out in contemplation of the preparation 
of monographic reports upon the special branches of the fisheries, some 
of which have already been published. 

In 1877, the Commissioner and his staff were summoned to Halifax to 
Serve as witnesses and experts before the Halifax Fishery Commission, 
then charged with the settlement of the amount of compensation to be 
paid by the United States for the privilege of participating in the fish- 
eries of the Provinces. The information at that time available concern- 
ing the fisheries was found to be so slight and imperfect that a plan for 
systematic investigation of the subject was arranged and partially un- 
dertaken. The work was carried on for two seasons with some financial 
aid from the Department of State. In 1879 an arrangement was made 
with the Superintendent of the Tenth Census, who agreed to bear a part 
of the expense of carrying out the scheme in full. Some thirty trained 
experts are now engaged in the preparation of a statistical report on 
the present state and the past history of the fisheries of the United 
States. This will be finished next year, but the subject will hereafter 
be continued in monographs upon separate branches of the fisheries, such 
as the halibut fishery, the mackerel fishery, the shad fishery, the cod 
fishery, the herring fishery, the smelt fishery, and various others of less 
importance. 

Hundreds, and even thousands, of specimens of, a single species are’ 
often obtained. After those for the National Museum have been se- 
lected, a great number of duplicates remain. These are identified, 
labeled, and made into sets for exchange with other museums, and for 
distribution to schools and small museums. This is in accordance with 
the time-honored usage of the Smithsonian Institution, and is regarded 
as an important branch of the work. Several specialists are employed 
solely in making up these sets, and in gathering material required for 
their completion. Within three years fifty sets of fishes in alcohol, in- 
cluding at least ten thousand specimens, have been sent out, and fifty 
sets of invertebrates, embracing one hundred and seventy-five species 
and two hundred and fifty thousand specimens. One hundred smaller 
sets of representative forms intended for educational purposes, to be 
given to schools and academies, are now being prepared. 

The arrangement of the invertebrate duplicates is in the charge of 
Mr. Richard Rathbun ; of the fishes, in that of Dr. T. H. Bean. 

Facilities have also been given to many institutions for making col- 
lections on their own behalf. 

Six annual reports have,been published, with an aggregate of 5,650 
pages. These cover the period from 1871 to.1878. Many papers relat- 


[9] FIRST DECADE OF UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 61 


ing to the work have been published elsewhere—particularly descrip- 
tions of new species and results of special faunal exploration. 


AN EPITOME OF THE HISTORY OF THE COMMISSION. 
, 1871. 


The Commissioner, with a party of zodlogists, established the first 
summer station at Wood’s Holl, Mass., other assistants being engaged 
in a similar work at Cape Hatteras and the Great Lakes. He also per- 
sonally investigated the alleged decrease of the fisheries in southern 
New England, taking the testimony of numerous witnesses. 


‘ 1872. 


This year the summer station was at Eastport, Me., particular atten- 
tion being paid to the herring fisheries. The survey of the Great Lakes 
was continued. Dredging, under the direction of Professor Packard, 
was begun on the off-shore banks, At the instance of the American 
Fish-Cultural Association, Congress requested the Commissioner to take 
charge of the work of multiplying valuable food-fishes throughout the 
country. Work was begun on the shad, salmon, and whitefish, and the 
eggs of the European salmon were imported. 


1873. 


The summer headquarters were fixed at Portland, Me. The oppor- 
tunities for research were greatly increased by the aid of the Secretary 
. of the Navy, who granted the use of an eighty-ton steamer. 

Explorations insthe outer waters between Mount Desert and Cape Cod 
were carried on in the United States Coast Survey steamer Bache. Ope- 
rations in fish culture were carried on upon an extensive scale. 


“1874-1875, 


In 1874 the zodlogical work centered at Noank, Conn. The attempt 
was nade to introduce shad into Europe. In 1875 the station was for 
a second time at Wood’s Holl, where a permanent seaside laboratory, 
with aquaria, was now established. The number of investigations this 
year was about twenty. The increase in the propagation work was pro- 
portionately much larger. 

@ 1876. 

This year the Commissioner was unable to take the fishes and useful 
invertebrates in behalf of the Commission field for fishery investiga- 
tions, having been instructed to exhibit, in connection with the Phila- 
delphia International Exhibition, the methods of fish culture and the 
American fisheries. Much, however, was accomplished by single in- 
vestigators in various localities. The propagation work continued. 
This year the first carp were introduced from Germany. 


62 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 
1877. 


The field of investigation was resumed at Salem, Mass., and later at 
Halifax, N.S. A larger steamer of 300 tons made deep-sea research 
possible. The Commissioner and his staff served as experts before the 
Halifax Fishery Commission. The propagating work was on the in- 
crease, and the government carp ponds were established in Wash- 
ington. 


° 


1878—1879. 


In 1878 the summer station was at Gloucester, Mass.; in 1879 at Pro- 
vincetown. These centers of the fishing interests were selected that 
more attention might be devoted to studying the history, statistics, and 
methods of the sea fisheries; a plan for the systematic investigation 
which seemed yearly more necessary in view of the dissensions between 
the Governments of the United States and Great Britain. In 1879 a 
combination was formed with the Superintendent of the Tenth Census, 
by which the Commissioner was enabled to carry more rapidly forward 
this branch of the work. Specialists were dispatched to all parts of 
the country to study the biological, statistical, and practical aspects of 
the fisheries. In 1878 the breeding of cod and haddock was accom- 
plished at Gloucester. In 1879 the propagation of the oyster was accom- 
plished, by co-operation with the Maryland commission, under the diree- 
tion of Major Ferguson, and the distribution of the carp throughout the 


country was begun. 
1880. 


The summer station is at Newport, R. I. The Fish Hawk, a steamer 
of 484 tons, constructed expressly for the work of the Commission, lies 
at the wharf, fow equipped for scientific research, later to be employed 
in the propagation of sea fish such as the cod and the mackerel. Over 
fifty investigators are in the field in the service of the Commission. The 
season was opened by the participation of the commission in the Inter- 
national Exhibition at Berlin. The first-honor prize, the gift of the 
Emperor of Germany, was awarded to Professor Baird, not alone as an 
acknowledgment that the display of the United States was the most 
perfect and most imposing, but as a personal tribute to one who, in the 
words of the President of the Deutscher Fischerei Verein, is regarded 
in Europe as the first fisheulturist in phe world. 


APPENDIX B. 


DEHEP-SHA RESHARCH. 


III.—DESCRIPTION OF SOME OF THE APPARATUS USED BY THE 
UNITED STATES COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIES IN 
DREDGING OFF THE NEW ENGLAND COAST. 


By A. E. VERRILL. 


[Prepared by request of Professor S. F. Baird, Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries. ] 


Since the organization of the United States Fish Commission, in 1871, 
dredging has been carried on extensively by it every summer, except 
that of 1876, in connection with the investigation of.the marine fisheries. 
In addition to the ordinary form of the naturalists’s dredge, which has, 
with minor modifications, been in constant use, several other forms of 
apparatus, some of them novel, have been used. The ‘“ beam-trawl” 
and “ otter-trawl” have proved very efficient in this work, wherever the 
character of the bottom would admit of their use. By their use fishes 
in large numbers are always secured, and also very large quantities of 
crustacea, echinoderms, sponges, &c. For use on rough and stony bot- 
toms, an improved form of ‘ tangles,” to be used without the dredge, was 
devised by the writer as early as 1571, and has done good service. In 
order to secure those creatures which burrow so deeply beneath the mud 
or sand as to be beyond the reach of the common dredge, which usually 
merely scrapes over the surface of the mud, or penetrates it but slightly, 
a “rake dredge” was constructed in 1871. This has proved very use- 
ful indeed for securing certain bivalve-shells, rare holothurians, and 
many annelids, &e., that might not have been obtained by the ordinary 
dredges. Owing to the enormous quantity of material brought up, es- 
pecially by the trawls and rake-dredges, it became necessary to devise 
new forms of sieves, by means of which large quantities of mud or sand 
could be washed out rapidly, and the specimens properly cared for at 
once, without incumbering the deck. This necessity led to the inven- 
tion of the “cradle sieve” in 1872, and subsequently, in 1878, of the large 
“table-sieve.” The latter has proved to be one of the greatest improve- 
ments yet devised, giving great satisfaction to the officers and crew of 
the steamer, as well as to the naturalists, for it keeps a large proportion 
of the mud off the deck, and wonderfully facilitates the work of assort- 
ing and preserving a large haul of specimens. 

Some other pieces of apparatus will also be mentioned below. 


. THE DREDGE. 
a Figure 1. 
The common dredges used by the Fish Commission are mostly of two 
sizes. The larger size is the one ordinarily used on the steamer; the 
[1] S. Mis. 29 5 65 


66 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2 | 


smaller one is intended for use with a sail-boat, especially if it has to be 
hauled in by hand. They differ only in size. An intermediate size has 
also been used to some extent. The rectangular frame has the side- 
pieces considerably flaring and moderately sharp. The net is of the 
stoutest twine procurable, with 4 inch meshes, except toward the end, 
where the meshes are smaller. In many cases we have used the cyl- 
indrical form of net, the open lower end to be tied up when used. We 
have found the latter form most convenient for the large dredge. The 
net is protected by a bag of stout canvas, open at bottom, surrounding 
the net and extending somewhat beyond it. Whenever it has been found 
necessary to use any means to prevent the net from turning or twisting, 
a stout wooden stick lashed across the end of the net and canvas bag has 
proved sufficient. Tor weights, both for dredges and trawls, we haye 
recently used a set made in 1877, of cast iron, each weighing about 40 
pounds. They have,the form of a cylinder flattened on one side and at 
each end, and with a hole in each end for lashings. The number needed 
will depend upon the strength of tide, drift of vessel, depth, &c., to be 
ascertained only by practice. 
The following are the dimensions of the dredges now in use: 


Larger | Smaller 
size. size. 


encthyvofmiramecoutsile sce. sees ee see soe eee ee ee ee ee oe 24 18.5 
Breadth of frame; across trontece . each see eke ee ee ee poteceeesisse 8.75 8 
Bread thiol firamexacross bac lee see eee ee Pe eee en eee ee 7. 50 7 
Length, arms 6205 nso hes i serosa, ee ee Re PRT TED BOR DAN SRL al 18 15 
PAMELCTIOL AIS 52 becra Soe ries eee eee et eee ne eo ene en eee 0. 75 0. 50 
Diamieteriot ondipicceswoLt ramos. eeceee cee te ce eee eee eee een ee 0.75 0. 60 
Thickness of side pieces, at back 5 0. 50 0. 50 
Wadthvof side’piecest ita: 0. s oes eee 2. 50 2 
Sizo of holes for fastening net 0. 36 0. 36 
Depthvor Me tenses nae ee eee ae renee Heeeee cece 36 27 


The dredges and other iron instruments are painted with asphalt 
black, or, still better, coated (“galvanized”) with zine, to prevent rusting. 
One arm of the dredge is attached to the drag-rope (@) by a smaller repe 
(e), to diminish the danger of losing the dredge on rocky bottoms. 


THE BEAM-TRAWL. 


Figure 2. 


The beam-trawls used by the Fish Commission have varied in size 
and somewhat in construction. Some have been made with a wooden 
beam, others have had a piece of large iron gas-pipe for a beam. The 
sizes most used have the beam 11, 15, and 18 feet in length, respectively. 
The wooden beam appears to be preferable to iron, and may be of ash 
or any other strong wood. The principal improvements made upon the 
original English pattern by us consist in making the runners considerably 
wider and higher, so as to admit larger specimens under the beam, and 
and in making the “pockets” by putting in a separate piece of netting, 
instead of fastening the upper and lower sides together directly. 


[3] VERRILL—DREDGING APPARATUS OF U. 8. FISH COMMISSION. 6 


The largest size used by the Commission has the runners about 27 
inches high, made of flat iron, about 34 inches broad and #? of an inch 
thick; the beam is of hard wood, 18 feet long and about 6 inches in 
diameter; the net about 45 feet long. The net should be of very strong 
twine, the meshes about 24 inches in the upper part, but not more than 
4 inch toward the end. It is open at the lower end, and must be tied 
up securely when used. 

The rope for the “ bridle” is about 4 inches in circumference. ‘Those 
of smaller size have had the runners of relatively narrower and thinner 
iron, but it appears to be better to give increased weight to the runners, 
so that less weight will be required on the drag-rope. Moreover, the 
increased weight of the runners has a tendency to prevent the trawl 
fgom overturning in going down, an accident that occasionally happens 
where the currents are strong, or when the drag-rope is new and inclined 
to twist. The unusual breadth of the “shoe” of the runners is of ad- 
vantage in preventing the runners from sinking too deeply into the mud. 
The leaded bottom line should recede in the middle 8 to 10 feet. 


THE OTTER-TRAWL. 
Figures 3, 4, 5. 


The otter-trawls first used by the Fish Commission were imported from 
England, but those now in use were made in this country,* to order, after 
the English pattern. 

The side pieces (a, a, Fig. 3) consist of pieces of thick hard-wood plank, 
bound all around with flat bar-iron, $ inch thick. The rings (d, e, Fig. 4) 
to which the bridle-ropes are attached are of 32-inch iron, and should be 
attached to the wooden side-pieces by strong ropes, arranged as shown 
in Fig. 4. The bridle-rope is 4 inches in circumference. The dimen- 
sions of the otter-trawl now in use are as follows: 


fen sth Ore WwoOuen SIGe-PIECeS ~~...) a. sepsis ad) 1h 35 inches. 
Breadth of wooden side-pieces...-.-.-.....).08. 22025. cae Dan 8 
Thickness of wooden side-pieces. ....-. Be Stl Pict eiet oes: DOO IE 
Thickness of iron runners ....... FEY are Mom TA ESe 0x5: ie 
Width of iron runners...... geptosreeiseryt <4): {nia tiae o8s eon Whe 
Diameter of rings for bridle, inside ...-. SOEs ete rs DT 
Memon LODES (7,14; Hiss) emits) |2abicpan is i olade im Sub afte AD ve 
Heneith Of TOMES, (0,05 1G. 4)i2 2. Ltr se ltos debra Jeet eure s* 
Menethior ropes. 0) ds Bios 4). 20. .72)) > sis hte = tpt sete m4) FS 
‘RIG ULTERG EST 21 fe Re eS ea Eee eae en eae rere ae 40) feet. 
Breadth of net at mouth, when extended ...:. .......... poets 
inieadun Of side-pieces Of Net... 2 se oo ee Db 
emus: bridie-ropes, Gach half 2.2... -s.<<<ives ten 84. « 
& 


The leaded rope (d, d, ig. 3) should be longer than the upper rope (¢, ¢), 
so as to recede considerably behind the latter when in use. The figure 


* By the American Net and Twine Company, Boston, Mass. 


68 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


is faulty in this respect. The rope (c, c) forming the upper side of the 
aperture of the net is provided with cork buoys, in order to keep the 
mouth of the net distended. The drag-rope is connected with the bridle 
by means of a stout swivel (a, Fig. 5) so as to allow the rope to twist 
without overturning the trawl. 


THE RAKE-DREDGE. 
Figure 6. 


This instrument was devised in 1871 by the writer* for the special 
purpose of obtaining deep-burrowing species of bivalves, annelids, holo- 
thurians, crustacea, &c. It can be used only on muddy or sandy bot- 
toms, and, of course, requires considerable foree to draw it through 
compact mud or sand. In its original form, which is still in use, it con- 
sists of a strong A-shaped frame, made of flat bar-iron, and so bolted 
together that it can be folded up compactly when not in use, or for con- 
venience in transportation. ‘The rakes consist of two flat bars of iron, 
furnished with strong iron teeth (steel would, perhaps, be better) about 
a foot in length, with thin sharp edges and sharp point. The two rake- 
bars, when in use, are placed back to back and bolted to the ends of the 
side-pieces of the A-shaped frame. The cross-bar of the A projects be- 
yond the side-pieces, and has a hole at each end, by which the arms of 
the dredge-frame are attached, so that the dredge follows the rake at a 
distance of about two feet. The net-frame for this instrument is made 
entirely of round iron, and as light as is consistent with the stiffness 
necessary to support the bagful of mud when being hoisted on deck. 
The length of the frame should be equal to or somewhat exceed that of 
the rake-bars. In the one now used by the Commission it was originally 
considerably larger, but owing to the too great weight of the load of 
mud it brought up it has been made smaller, so that it is now of about 
the same length as the rake-bars. 

The net is similar to that of the common dredge, but deeper and with 
somewhat larger meshes, in order that a part of the mud may pass 
through more rapidly. The vast numbers of annelid tubes, often encount- 
ered in using the rake-dredge, frequently clog the net so as to prevent 
even the fine mud from passing through the meshes. As this form of 
dredge can only be used on smooth bottoms there is not so much need 
of a canvas protection as in the case of the common dredge, and we 
have often dispensed with it, but the net will doubtless last longer if 
protected with the canvas bag. 


* Descriptions and figures (from drawings of Mr. J. H. Emerton, furnished by the 
Fish Commission) of the ‘-rake-dredge,” ‘‘ wheel-tangles,” ‘‘cradle-sieve,” and other 
apparatus used by the Fish Commission were published in 1873, in the New York Tri- 
bune, by Mr. William C. Wyckoff. These were republished the same year in the Tri- 
bune Extra, No. 10, scientific series. They have also been described in several other 
articles. The writer also published a description of the rake-dredge, &c., in an article 
on ‘‘ Deep-sea Dredging” in Johnson’s Cyclopedia, Vol. I, 1875. 


[5] VERRILL—DREDGING APPARATUS OF U. 8. FISH COMMISSION. 69 


The dimensions of the rake-dredges of this pattern, used by the Fish 
Commission, are as follows: 


Inches. 
Side-pieces of the A-shaped frame, length .......... UD vos Dillons 30 
Side-pieces of the A-shaped frame, width........-...--..22-s.-.s%% 2 
Side-pieces of the A-shaped frame, thickness ..........6.--.5..-0 Z 
Side-pieces of the A-shaped frame, hole for ring........-......... 3 
Side-pieces of the A-shaped frame, hole for bolts............. hee 
@ross-Dar of the A-shaped frame, leneth. .- . a... 5. -cce ee ween ccs 42 
@ross-bar ot mie A-shaped frame, width), ... 2. co... 2s Seceke nals <lts 23 
@ross-bar of the A-shaped frame, thickness.... -..-. +--+... 024-6 2 
rice Hemen ay elomeatiie na howe leas. irae nine en tS dst ieaes 36 
Rake-bars (d), width... -).--- +--+ :ee 22s) ee ee cree ee eee ee eee 24 
Rake-bars (d), thickness .............- a Play PEE HOA ak cn Baar 3 
Mere imOe ed ce LOMO bye > acts ty aisle heh sic isiay> SP) jaiehe, Since Slate pate lovaa lorie et eys nS 
Maram teRelce vevyMGL Ul 52 cteve- are ck Apinles ON he alin'sl Wis Thacais fh wave lela gee eaeee 14 
Piet igtake at WICKMeESS es sc inhe tacks ao She kale aia ale 2 Le Oo abe ieee 3 
PrP REO TEAS oLO NE CLA UAObEL stage sreatierern. (ss oat shal (slolepeyy ele aa ater oS 
PN oMOMUrae TOPE SIZGsOl IPONe a. seer ts Cakes Jelsjab so aee ste,© 3 
Omelette! (7), MOM UM ake iets sci) ees Nee ALy of) RI th ye OBR 38 
Dredge-frame, breadth .-........-.- SE ne re eer Se. Poh fe en t 
eR Cetra e, MOMS Gl OL ARIS ie = ake \< aictols y's oa Sis, Sep e'te sain fel syne 20 
Dredge-frame, size of iron (round) ..........----- Be ROTA Pract tee I Ma) 
2 COpOB Gy S12) we U2) Nes Pes Casares oa oleh eS Ts Bete ten tone ONCE one REOPRR IPE a ie a Bot bP 48 


These dimensions might be improved by making the teeth 10 inches 
long and at least one-half of an inch thick, if of soft iron, and they 
should have a forward curvature. The head, passing through the bar, 
should be square and about three-quarters of an inch thick. They might 
be fewer and farther apart without detriment, say, five teeth on a bar 3 
feet long, leaving the spaces about 6 inches each. The use of steel, of 
low temper, would be better still. The round iron for the dredge- 
frame should be at least five-eighths of an inch in diameter for the size 
of net given. 

During the present season another form of rake-dredge has been de- 
vised by Capt. H. C. Chester, of our party, and used with excellent suc- 
cess. In this the teeth are attached directly to the two sides of a strong 
and heavy rectangular iron frame, much like the frame of an ordinary 
dredge of large size. The teeth are curved well forward and about 10 
inches long. The rake-frame is followed by a lighter net-frame, of the 
same size as in the one previously described. 


THE TANGLES. 
Figure 7. 
The original form of tangles, constructed by the writer for the United 


States Fish Commission, in 1871, consisted of a bar of iron to which sev- 
eral small iron chains were attached, each about 14 feet in length. 


70 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


Along these chains, at intervals of about three feet, the bundles of un- 
raveled hemp rope were attached, as shown in the figure. The bar of 
iron carrying the chains was attached to the cross-bar of the A-shaped 
frame forming part of the rake-dredge, the rake-bars being removed. 
In 1873 a farther improvement was made by the writer. This consisted 
in supporting each end of the chain-bar in the center of a stont iron hoop 
or wheel, by bolting it to a central cross-bar, firmly bolted to the inner 
side of the wheel. The wheels are not intended to revolve, but merely 
to serve as runners and supports for the iron bar, in order to keep it off 
the bottom and diminish the chances of its getting caught among the 
rocks, as well as to keep it from breaking and destroying the specimens 
before the tangles themselves can touch them. An oval or elliptical 
form for these runners would answer the same purpose, but the circular 
form was adopted as the simplest, and perhaps the least liable to become 
caught among the rocks. 

In practice we have found the tangle-frame hitherto used too light for 
use on the larger vessel now employed, for when rocks are encountered 
the chain-bar often comes up badly bent. In constructing new ones, I 
should recommend a round or square bar of iron at least twice as heavy 
as the one we have hitherto used. Our present size was first devised 
for use on a steam-launch. It was also used on the Blue Light, a tug of 
80 tons, with good success. The chains proved to be unnecessarily long, 
and are now shortened. We have used tangles of this form with profit 
on the roughest cod-fishing ledges off the coast of Maine and Massachu- 
setts, where the dredge could not be used with safety. 

It is particularly useful in capturing star-fishes and sea-urchins, which 
frequent rocky bottoms. Several years ago the writer suggested the use 
of tangles of this or some similar form to capture star-fishes on oyster- 
beds, where they so often prove very destructive. 


Dimensions of tangles. 


Dae Improved 

Present form. design. 
Diameter of wheels outside ........-...--..--- Bodbqaacobsshsnbdusanadadesce 12inches ...| 14 inches. 
Breadth! of rim of wheels) - h\..css< cin sas onlo see c eee oe epicle siasocee ae cles meaiacie 2inches....| 24 inches. 
‘Ehickness'of rim‘of Wheels. co sckasecs ct eeeis sce om cco ceoeiniseucecleeeeentece 4 inch.....- | inch. 
Width of: cross-bariof. wheels <i cctecws cede ease ce pees Heidseseiocelns aaseenneaee 2inches....| 24 inches. 
suhieknesstofcross-bar Of wheels)-cesceeteeccere seb eane tas ee tee eeE eee nee finch ese. inch. 
Mencth Of Chain-bar . ss: :1jacjsc ceed Serco a se hee ee oe see eee oe ee eee ... | 60 inches. 
Wdiihvot chain-bar << 5_).0. 5245 5a vanes sb ee eee ona re cee eee See eee ieee | 24 inches. 
Thickness of chain-bar .....- ? 1 inch. 
Size of rings for drag-rope- -.| 4 inches. 
Size of iron of rings ....- § inch. 
Size of iron of chains...- % inch. 
Length of iron chains. ..- ) 10 feet. 
ihren sthiofehempitangles' =... cscs wecece) sence secene teseee 2.5 fe 3 feet. 


The drag rope for the tangles should be very strong, to resist the fre- 
quent and sudden strains, when using them on rough bottoms. 


[7] VERRILL—DREDGING APPARATUS OF U.S. FISH COMMISSION. 71 
TOWING-NETS. 
Figure 8. 


The rings of the towing-nets generally used by the Fish Commission 
are made of 4-inch brass wire, with three loops of brass wire securely 
soldered to the ring, at equal intervals. Other modes of attaching the 
lines are equally good, and often used by us. The nets are usually made 
of rather open and strong “embroidery canvas.” Sometimes, for special 
purposes, coarse: Swiss muslin is used, when they are to be drawn by a 
row-boat. ‘Crinoline” is also suitable for these nets. The nets should 
be made deep and rather “full.” We have not found any special ad- 
vantage in attaching a bottle with its neck in the bottom of the net, as 
recommended by some writers. We have used several sizes of rings, 
varying from 8 to 14 inches in diameter. The smallest sizes can alone 
be used when a steamer or vessel has much headway. 


THE CHECK-STOP. 
Figure 9. 


This arrangement was devised by Capt. L. A. Beardslee, for use on 
the “Blue Light,” in 1873. Its purpose is to put the strain of the drag- 
rope (B) upon a weaker rope (C), which may be broken so easily, in case 
the dredge or trawl catches upon rocks, as not to cause damage to the 
apparatus, and at the same time to give sufficient warning to allow the 
slack of the drag-rope to be paid out before the headway of the vessel 
can be stopped. It has proved to bea very useful and simple expedient 
for these purposes. The figure shows the arrangement so well that no 
further description is necessary. 


THE CRADLE SIEVE. 
Figures 10, 11. 


This form of sieve was devised by the writer in 1872. It was so 
constructed as to afford the means of rapidly washing out the large 
quantities of mud often brought up by the dredge and rake-dredge, 
and at the same time to keep the mud and water off the deck as much 
as possible. It consists of two wooden end-pieces, in shape forming 
rather more than half a cirele, united by two narrow, wooden, side- 
pieces set into the end pieces so as to leave a flush surface. The 
outside covering consists of two thicknesses of wire netting; the inner 
one with meshes of {5 inch or less, the outer one of stout galvanized-iron 
wire, with 3-inch meshes. The outer netting is only to afford support and 
protection to the inner one. The outer netting is nailed to the edges of 
the wooden end-pieces, and to the side-pieces, and is farther secured by 
a strip of hoop-iron nailed over the edges all around. The inner lining 
of fine wire netting is tacked to the wooden ends and side-pieces, on the 
inside, so that it can easily be renewed when worn out. <A strip of wood 


72 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


nailed across the bottom, from end to end, affords additional strength 
and protection from injury. Two stout iron straps fastened across each 
end-piece by strong screws, and terminating above the edge in rings, 
furnish the means of suspending this sieve against the side of the vessel, 
outside the rail. The mud is then placed in it, often filling it more than 
half full, and a gentle stream of water from the force-pump is turned 
upon it. In this way several bushels of mud may be washed out in a 
few minutes, with little trouble. Another sieve, with straight wooden 
sides about 6 or 8 inches high, just large enough to set partially into 
the frame of the cradle-sieve and rest upon wooden cleats provided for 
that purpose, has been sometimes used by us in connection with the 
cradle-sieve. Its bottom is made of strong, galvanized-wire netting, 
with meshes of 4 inch. It serves to separate the coarser specimens and 
stones from the smaller and more delicate species. 

In our own work the table-sieve, described below, has, to a consider- 
able extent, superseded the cradle-sieve. The latter is still used, how- 
ever, when there is only a moderate quantity of mud, or when the table- 
sieve is already full of unassorted specimens. 


Dimensions of cradle-sieve. 


Inches. 
1 Beh a4 9 § Memmi ont SHO See etn LA NOON PT RST 7 iva eM CBI 36 
Se Gh oe Sesh Sx reine ied oe Manet ake oe ark i oy ce ae eas 21S ode 18 
Depths: 22 ony lecie: fe heal Jods ch AES a Ces can ees 0 dy 2 12 
Width of side pieces .......... A SELL TCR SEL Wan Fer Sah garners 4 
Mhickness of side: pieces and ends /<4.a 23 es aan ee eee 1 


During the past season a much larger cradle-sieve has been con- 
structed, with an intermediate frame, covered with wire netting with 
Z-inch meshes. The upper sieve has flaring sides, 1 foot wide, but the 
ends are upright. 


THE TABLE-SIEVE. 
Figures 12, 13. 


This piece of apparatus is the result of several successive improve- 
ments. In fundamental principle, it is like the cradle-sieve, much en- 
larged and raised on legs; but the form is entirely different. The sieve 
foundation consists of a large, rectangular, wooden frame (C, Fig. 12), 
with wide side-pieces (made of inch boards) supported on stout legs, at a 
convenient height. The bottom of this frame consists of stout, galvan- 
ized-wire netting, with 4 or 3 inch meshes. Below this is a funnel- 
shaped, stout, canvas bag (S), which terminates in a large canvas tube (t). 
This serves to conduct the waste water to the seuppers. <A light frame 
of wood (B) is made to fit loosely inside of the main frame, and its under 
surface is covered with fine wire netting of ;4-inch meshes. This con- 
stitutes the real bottom of the sieve, the coarse netting below serving 
only as a support for it. It is fastened to a movable frame, so that it 


[9] VERRILL—DREDGING APPARATUS OF U. S. FISH COMMISSION. 73 


can be taken out and its contents emptied upon the assorting table. 
This also allows the wire netting to be more easily renewed when it 
becomes worn. The upper or coarse sieve (A) is made with wide, flaring 
or hopper-shaped, wooden sides, upon which, at about the middle, there 
are cleats (c, c) that rest upon the edges of the main frame. The bottom 
of the “‘ hopper” is formed of strong galvanized-wire netting, of ?-inch 
meshes (Fig. 13, b, 0). 
Dimensions of table-sieve. 


Inches. 
Main frame, height to upper edge .... . ca IR ay Sag TM oo. Rl par 30 
Ler Mera ES BIT h rare) cee verse Ne Siete chew arereys email tae eal aftestsaeGfala)a 66 
MBit AIS MUTE Leis a gtd oot smh ciay ake eee eee ae ae wee 38 
Mainotrame:widthof side Pi€CeS!..:0.\05 232 As heed ese se slna ae 11 
Main frame, thickness of side pieces’. '...-.....-.-2.5. 2-s.60%----- 1 
Mopper trame,.width of side-piecegs. .2is2\/ie3, 2h akis doas ese ew eee es 13 
sion persirames lene th atsDOttom. is Sete ac a eacle sd arasie sadn 2 oe e 56 
Hopper frame, length at top ......-.... Ege, Sucnaectes Sy Gd circ See ee 66 
Hopper trame, sareadtncat: DObUOMA aAI\. she cs acpee ote S07. 8 Boe ee 27 
Oper iramMe-breadchvat LOP. 2c... ec e sels ce Soe Bae iin eee eat fore Sor 


This form of sieve, in its primary form, was invented by Capt. H. C. 
Chester and the writer, in 1877, but it was soon afterwards much im- 
proved by the addition of the canvas bag and pipe beneath it, which 
were devised by Mr. J. A. Smith, the executive officer of the Speedwell. 

The original use of this sieve was to receive the contents of the trawl, 
instead of emptying it on deck, as had been done previously, but its 
advantages were soon found to be so great that it has also been used 
for washing the contents of the dredges whenever the quantity of mud 
was considerable. The legs are made of unequal lengths to correspond 
with the curvature of the deck. 


EXPLANATION OF THE FIGURES. 
{All the figures are from drawings by Mr. J. H. Emerton.) 


Fig. 1.—The common dredge: a, a, the iron frame; b, b, outline of the net; ¢, c, the 
canvas bag; d, the drag-rope; e, light rope for the attachment of one 
arm. 

Fig, 2.—The beam-trawl: a, a, the beam to which the upper edge of the net is at 
tached ; b, 6, the runners supporting the ends of the beam; ¢, c, the leaded 
line attached to lower edge of net; d, the net; e¢, e, ‘‘ pockets” in the net to 
prevent the escape of fish. 

Fig. 3.—The otter-trawl, showing the mouth of net and side pieces arranged for use : 
a, a, the wooden side-pieces attached to bridle-ropes b, b, by means of four- 
short ropes i, i and 0, 0, of which the pair marked 0, 0 are the shorter; 
d, d, the leaded bottom line; ¢, c, the top line of the dredge-mouth, with 
cork buoys (this should have been drawn shorter and less curved backward 
than the bottom line). 

Fig. 4.—Wooden side-piece of the otter-trawl to show the arrangement of the ropes: 
d, e, rings for the attaehment of the bridle; c, ring for the attachment of 


74 


Fig. 
Fig. 
Fia. 
FIG. 
Fia. 
Fig. 


Fig. 
FIG. 


Fic. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


the cork-line of the net; b, ring for the attachment of the leaded line ; 
a, a, lower edge of the side-piece. 
5.—End of drag-rope (d) attached to bridle (b) of the otter-trawl by means of 
the swivel (a). 7 
6.—The rake-dredge : a, a, the dredge-frame; }, b, outline of net; c, ¢, canvas-bag 
to protect the net; d, the rake-bars. 
7.—The wheel-tangles: a, the iron cross bar; b, 6, the circular runners, or 
wheels, supporting the cross-bar; ¢, ¢, c, the chains to which the hempen 
tangles are attached. 
8.—The towing-net, in use. 
9.—The check-stop: A, A, the davit; B, the drag-rope; C, the check-stop ap- 
plied to the drag-rope ; D, D, side of vessel. 
10.—The cradle-sieve, suspended outside the rail, as when in use. 
11.—The cradle-sieve, end view. 
12.—The table-sieve: A, the ‘‘ hopper” removed ; ¢, c, one of the cleats on which 
it rests; B, the inner frame carrying the fine sieve; C, the main frame ; 
8, the canvas-bag, beneath; ¢, the canvas waste-pipe. 
13.—Section of table-sieve; a, a, the hopper in position; b, b, the coarse sieve at 


bottom of hopper; c, c, the sides of main frame; d, d, the fine sieve; e¢, e,- 


coarse wire netting on main frame; s, 3, canvas bag; t, t, waste-pipe; J, l, 
legs of sieve. 


PLATE I. 


Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Verrill. Dredging Apparatus. 


‘O8N IOJ poSuvarie sooord-opis puv you Jo YQNoW SurMoys ‘[MV1-10}IO OY TL—'e “DIY 
Id-opt! Joy TAOS || A 


‘[MvIpUvog of L—s SLT 


‘oS porp WOMIMIOD OY L—'T “LT 


ON 


QQ, SSI 


‘ 


PLATE Ii. 


g 
z 
4 
é 
ee 
A 
E 
J 
3 
onl 
o) 
4 
oi 
bp 
£ 
o 
By 
es 


Fic. 4.—Wooden Side-piece of the otter-trawl. 


Fic. 5.—End of drag-rope. 


‘The Whe ]-tanvles. 


° 
‘ 


Fic. 7. 


Fic. 6.—The Rake-dredge. 


es - 


PLATE ITI. 


Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Verrill. Dredging Apparatus. 


Hf 


a SS 
a a (anes — EEE lk ee ite — 


: S ALE x 


Fic. 8.—The Towing-net in use. 


Fic. 9.—The Check-stop. 


ryzaeuerameani 


EF 
AH mmasasistscerencse saat / 


Fic. 11.—The Cradle-sieve, end view. 


Fic. 10.—The Cradle-sieve. 


Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Verrill. Dredging Apparatus. PLATE IV. 


SSS 


Fic. 12.—The Table-sieve with hopper removed. 


Fic. 13.—The Table-sieve, sectional view. 


Ay 


nis pao ae wg olan = 


APPENDIX C. 


THEH SEA FISHERIKS. 


75 


Tree a) 
3 e : 

1y CTs a 

; fabs of nr 

. \ Pra - 

«ee 


x 2 
av ileus Came 


eer DY | 


IV.—THE ICELAND FISHERIES,* 


By C. TROLLE, First Lieutenant, Danish Navy. 


[From Nordisk Tidsskritt for Fiskeri, vol. vii, part 3, Copenhagen, 1822.] 

During my visit to Iceland, in 1880, with the schooner Ingolf, my 
attention was directed to the rich fisheries carried on by foreigners in 
Ieeland waters, and to the comparatively small benefit which the coun- 
try itself derived from the wealth of the.sea. In order to draw the 
attention of the government to this unnatural state of affairs, I prepared 
a report on the herring fisheries carried on in the eastern fiords of Ice- 
land by Norwegians, which I had occasion to observe in person. In 
consequence of this report the ministry for Iceland (in December, 1880) 
commissioned me to investigate the Iceland fisheries and gather such 
information regarding them as might be of importance for their future 
development, and also to make suggestions as to the best way of fur- 
thering the interests of these fisheries. 

After having obtained a leave of absence for this purpose, I bought 
and fitted out a yacht of 88 tons during the present year, and with this 
vessel participated in the Iceland fisheries, in which way I gained a 
practical knowledge of their condition. 

At the request of many ship-owners in this country (Denmark) I pub- 
lish the results of my investigations, in view of the possible participation 
in the Iceland fisheries by Danish vessels, and also for the purpose of 
comparing the Iceland fisheries with our North Sea fisheries, which lat- 
ter might yield much larger profits than they do at present. 

A glance at the map shows us that the location of Iceland between 
extensive banks in the Northern Atlantic (which is famous for its wealth 
of fish), with its long line of coast and its numerous well protected 
fiords, indicates the fisheries as the most natural source of income to 
this aan Foreign nations have known how to derive profit from the 
wealth of fish on the Iceland banks, but unfortunately this knowledge 
is confined to foreigners. Whilst English, French, Norwegian, and 
German vessels visit Iceland in large numbers, the Icelanders keep up 
the old boat-method ; excepting, perhaps, a few merchant vessels in the 
western fiords eiiplay ed in the fisheries for a few months during sum- 
mer whilst waiting for cargo. The Iceland bank fisheries only yield 
profit to Danes and Icelanders in very few cases. 


* Fiskerierne ved Island. Translated from the Danish by HERMAN JACOBSON. 


[1] 77 


78 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES [2] 


° 

_And still we enjoy this great advantage over foreigners, that we can 
deposit and prepare the fish in Iceland and furnish a much more valua- 
ble and durable article than foreigners, who, moreover, have to travel 
about 250 (Danish) miles before they reach the fishing station. The 
reason why the Icelanders, who are by nature directed towards the sea 
as their principal source of income, are not benefited thereby as they 
might be, is the circumstance that they are not able to procure larger 
sea-going vessels. These are, as will be seen from the following, an 
essential condition, if the Iceland fisheries are to flourish; and when it 
becomes known what great advantages would accrue to the country from 
such vessels, it is to be hoped that the government will carry out my 
proposition and help the Icelanders by advancing a sum of money 
without charging interest, and thus relieve the lack of capital which 
makes itself painfully felt. It cannot be wondered at that such a lack 
of capital exists, if we bear in mind the fact that for centuries Iceland 
has labored under the most unfavorable financial conditions. It is im- 
possible to overcome the baneful influences of monopolies and protection 
in a few short years. 

It is very strange, however, that Danish capital has not long since 
been invested in so profitable an undertaking as the Iceland bank 
fisheries. Here is a vast field, which unfortunately has been allowed to 
lie fallow too long, and which ought to be reclaimed as soon as practi- 
cable. 

I know full well that Danish merchant vessels have from time to time 
attempted codfishing in the Iceland waters, andthat the result has been, 
that these fisheries ‘‘barely pay expenses.” But these vessels have 
carried cargo both going and coming. The cargo has been the main object, 
and the fisheries only a matter of secondary importance, since only 
about six weeks can be devoted to them from the time the cargo is 
unloaded until a new cargo is taken. It is self-evident that it. will not_ 
pay to fit out a vessel for fishing for so short a period, and, moreover, go 
to the expense of buying provisions and salt in Iceland. That the 
fisheries will pay, when made the principal object, [have found out this 
year, when I undertook my expedition without any regard to cargo. 
This does not imply, however, that it does not pay to take cargo, if 
only about five months—say from May to September, inclusive—can be 
entirely devoted to the fisheries. 

I shall now speak separately of the two principal fisheries which are 
carried on near Iceland, viz, the cod fisheries and the herring fisheries. 
The reason why I shall not devote any time to other fisheries is simply 
this, that I have not, during this year, made any observations regard- 
ing them, and, moreover, none of them are of very great importance, 


1.—THE COD FISHERIES. 


These fisheries are the principal source of revenue to the Icelanders. 
To show how little use is made of this source of income, owing to the 


[3] THE ICELAND FISHERIES. 79 


fact that only open boats and very imperfect apparatus is employed, I 
shall quote a portion of the report on fisheries in the district of Myra and 
Bargarfiorda, made by the governor of said district, and then compare 
this report with the result of my expedition, taking into consideration 
the circumstances that this expedition was my first attempt in this diree- 
tion, and would therefore not, in all probability, be accompanied by as 
favorable results as might be looked for from a second attempt. 

The governor says in his report: 

“The only place in this district where the fisheries may be said to 
form the principal source of income of the inhabitants is Akranes the 
outer point of which, the Akraneslage, stretches far out into the Lase 
Bay. The following remarks will, therefore, apply exclusively to that 
locality. 

“Asa general rule the fishing season at Akranes commences about 
March 1, and is divided into three periods, according to the seasons of 
the year, the first period comprising the winter fisheries, March 1-May 
12, the second the spring fisheries, May 12-June 24, and the third the 
autumn fisheries, November 1-December 23. This division of the fish- 
eries entirely agrees with that of the neighboring districts of Ajésar and 
Gullbruiga; it has probably been known for many years, and is also 
given in the Iceland Almanac. 

“From the information which I have been able to gather, the following 
vessels were last winter engaged in the Akranes winter fisheries: 5 boats 
with 8 oars (7 to 9 men); 22 boats with 6 oars (5 to 7 men); 10 boats 
with 4 oars (4 to5 men). After the 21st of April, 50 boats, with 2 to 
3 men each. 

“It may safely be assumed that the Akranes winter fisheries have, on 
the whole, employed about 350 men, and the spring fisheries 400 men. 
About half this number belonged to Akranes, whilst the other half 
came from the neighboring inland districts, as the farmers are in the 
habit of sending some of their farm hands to the coast during winter 
and spring. With the beginning of the spring fisheries (May 12) the 
use of the large boats with 8 oars ceases, whilst the other boats, with 
4 to six oars, continue to be used, and the number of small boats (with 
2 to 3 men each) is somewhat increased. All the boats, both large and 
small, belong to Akranes. Larger vessels have not been used, the fish- 
eries being carried on entirely with the above-mentioned open boats, 
which have neither name nor number. 

“The number of fish of all kinds caught by the Akranes fishermen 
during last winter’s and spring’s fishing season amounted to 250,000, 
valued at about 50,000 crowns ($13,400). 

«very time the boats come on shore, the fish are immediately divided 
among the crews of the different boats in the following manner: in 
boats with 8, 6, or 4 oars the owner receives two shares to every share 
given to each of the crew, whilst in the small boats the owner’s share 
is equal to that received by each one of the crew. At Akranes it is the 


89 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


rule that each person prepares the fish which fall to his share. This 
preparation generally consists in cleaning and salting the fish and bring- 
ing them to market as “Klip-Fisk.” The smaller portion of the fish caught 
are prepared as “ flat fish” and are sold for home consumption. Of all 
the fish caught at Akranes two-thirds are sold to Akranes merchants 
and one-third to Reykjavik merchants. 

‘In two other places in this district (Alptanes and Hraunhreppar) fish- 
eries are carried on in spring, but not to any great extent, as they 
only form a leisure occupation of the inhabitants, who are principally 
engaged in sheep-raising and in agricultural pursuits; and I have con- 
sequently not deemed these fisheries important enough to make a re- 
port on them. 

“T must, in conclusion, express my conviction, which is shared by all 
persons acquainted with the condition of our country, that the manner 
in which the Iceland fisheries have beep carried on for a long time 
(and are still carried on) needs a radical reform, and that, therefore, it 
would be desirable to take the necessary steps for bringing about this 
much needed change as soon as possible.” 

As regards my own expedition I have to report as follows: After 
having fitted out my vessel, I left Copenhagen on the 8th April without 
a cargo; the crew (including myself) numbered six persons. Reached 
the Ferd Islands April 14, and remained there till April 21; hired ten 
Fer6 fishermen. The reason why I staid so long at the Ferd Islands 
was, that the fishermen of these islands, who only use English cutters 
in their bank fisheries, did not have much confidence in the sea-going 
capacity of my vessel, at least as far as its use for the fisheries was con- 
-cerned. Instead of engaging these fishermen on the share plan, which 
is by far the best, as it makes them take some interest in their work, 
and as it does not necessitate the constant and wearisome superintend- 
ence of the owner, I was obliged to have them on the following condi- 
tions : 

During the hand-line fisheries: 15 crowns ($4.02) per month; 6 crowns 
($1.60) per 100 standard cod (upwards of 2 feet in length); 14 crowns 
($0.40) per 100 cod below the standard length (16 to 22 inches). 

During the long-line fisheries: One-third of the total yield, divided 
among the whole crew. 

In both cases the fishermen are found. 

The fears entertained by the ero fishermen were not well founded, 
‘as my vessel did just as well as the French fishing schooners, although 
not quite as well as the English cutters, which are narrow and pointed. 

My Danish men were paid in the manner customary in Denmark, and 
receive, moreover, 2 crowns ($0.53) for every 100 standard cod, and 1 
crown ($0.26) for every 100 cod below the standard size. During the 
long-line fisheries, however, they preferred to work on the share plan. 

Touched Cape Reykjanes on the morning of April 27, and cast anchor 
-on the banks off Cape Skagen during the forenoon of the same day. 

From April 27 to July 1 we fished with hand-lines along the Vester 


[5] THE ICELAND FISHERIES. 81 


and Nordland coast. The weather, especially during May, was very 
stormy and unfavorable, so that the fisheries were frequently inter- 
rupted. 

From May 28 to May 31, staid in the Isa Fiord, where we laid up the 
first batch of fish, to be prepared as “‘klip-fish.”. Continued hand-line 
fishing till June 26. June 26 and 27, staid in the Omundar Fiord, and 
June 28 to 30, the second batch of fish was laid up at Isa Fiord, where 
we had made an arrangement with a merchant to prepare our fish. 

Left July 1, and went, in a northerly direction, to Osterlandet to en- 
gage in the long-line fisheries, which are here carried on by a number 
of Feré fishermen. Fished on the way whenever there was a calm. 
Reached Reyder Fiord July 15, and commenced long-line fishing the same 
day. 

In order to avoid any misunderstanding, it must be stated that boat- 
fishing from a ship, as the central station, cannot be compared with the 
Icelander’s boat-fisheries from the shore. 

From July 15 to September 20 we fished with long lines in the mouth 
of the Reyder Fiord. Left Iceland September 24, touched at the Ferd 
Islands September 30, staid there till October 7, and arrived in Copen- 
hagen October 14. The total result of our five months’ fisheries was 
about 52,000 codfish, which were sold, either salted or prepared in other 
ways, for 11,700 crowns ($3,135.60). This year we only salted codfish, 
and did not prepare any other fish. The net revenue from our expedi- 
tion was about 2,500 crowns ($670), and as my vessel represented a 
capital of about 10,000 crowns ($2,680), this would be about 25 per cent. 
on the capital invested ; subtracting 10 per cent. for amortization, this 
would leave a net surplus of 15 per cent. for the first year; and this, in 
spite of the circumstances that the sailing of our vessel was consider- 
ably delayed by the exceptionally severe winter, that she took no cargo, 
and that the fishermen had been engaged under peculiarly unfavorable 
conditions. 

By way of comparison,-I will mention that a schooner from Isa Fiord 
with a crew of 18 men realized a net surplus of over 3,000 crowns ($304) 
during fisheries which only extended over a period of 25 months. 

The individual earnings of each man on my vessel averaged 50 crowns 
($13.40) per month. If we compare the result of my expedition with the 
above-mentioned report from Akranes, it will be seen that 350 men in 2$ 
months, 400 men in 14 months, or, which would be the same, 400 men in 
34 months, have during the present year, with 87 boats, only caught 
250,000 fish of all kinds, with a total value of 50,000 crowns ($13,400). 

The total income of every participant (not counting off the repairing, 
&e., of boats and apparatus) would, therefore, only be about 35 crowns 
($9.38) per month, without board and lodging, whilst on my vessel every 
man on an average earned 50 crowns ($13.40) per month, besides being: 
found. 

If, however, we distribute the above-mentioned 400 men over 26 sea- 


going vessels with a crew of 15 men each, and two such vessels with a 
S. Mis. 29-———6 


82 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


crew of 10 each, these would during the same time, i. e., 3$ months, have 
caught: 26 vessels with 15 men, in 34 months, 946,400 fish; 2 vessels 
with 10 men, in 34 months, 24,500 fish—total, 970,900 fish, representing 
a value of 218,400 crowns ($58,531.20); in other words, all the condi- 
tions being equal, the result of the fisheries is four times as large when 
larger sea-going vessels are employed than with open boats, and the 
pecuniary result is over 43 times as large. 

No more convincing proof could be furnished of the superiority of 
larger sea-going vessels for deep-sea fisheries, over open boats; but 
there are still other circumstances which speak strongly in favor of 
larger sea-going vessels: 

1, The Icelanders lose a great deal of time by being obliged to row 
several miles before reaching their fishing stations, and then having to 
row home again the same distance, whilst larger vessels can stay on the 
fishing banks for months. 

2. Storms and waves often interrupt the fisheries, not to speak of the 
great danger to which open boats are exposed on the high sea, where a 
sudden storm may often compel the fishermen to cast nearly all the fish 
they have caught overboard in order to save their lives. On a sea- 
going vessel, however, the fisheries are not exposed to as many dangers. 
Regular rest, strengthening food and dry clothes, make the fishermen 
better fitted for work, than sleepless nights, poor food (or none at all), 
and wet clothes, such as fall to the share of the open-boat fishermen. 

3. The fish can be much better prepared on larger vessels, where they 
are immediately killed, cleaned, and salted, and can thus be made into 
a much more valuable article than is possible in the open boats. The 
Icelanders never kill their fish in their boats; but often let them lie for 
one or several days, so that the blood coagulates, the fish turn dark in 
the brine, become less durable, and of course much less valuable. The 
best and fattest fish, moreover, are found far away from the coast, and 
every one, acquainted with the herring fisheries, knows that the so-called 
“vacht-fish” fetch a much higher price than “ boat-fish.” 

It is not necessary to give further reasons against the use of open 
boats for deep-sea fishing, ¢. e., when the boats are stationed near the 
shore. The comparisons given above will be amply sufficient to prove 
this: That the result of the fisheries, all other things being even, is 
four times as large when sea-going vessels are employed as with open 
boats. The former have, moreover, the great advantage, that with them 
fishing can be carried on all the year round, whenever the weather per- 
mits, as the schools can be followed up when they leave the coast. 

The above-mentioned 400 men from Akranes and Opland would, e. g., 
in seven months’ great fisheries and two months’ boat fisheries, reach 
the following results: 


; Fish. 

26 sea-going vessels, at 15 men (March 1 to October 1).........----. .----. 1, 892, 800 
1 sea-going vessel with 10 men (March 1 to October 1) .......---..-...---- 49, 00U 
87 boats (4 to 5 men each), November 1 to December 1........--..-------- 130, 000 


[7] THE ICELAND FISHERIES. 83 


Valued at 470,000 crowns ($125,960), whilst the same number of men, 
in 54 months’ boat fisheries would only catch about 400,000 fish, valued 
at 83,000 crowns ($22,244), therefore not one-fifth of the revenue they 
might earn, if they used sea-going vessels. 

In comparing the exportation of fish from Iceland during the last 
year, which was a good fish year, with the average yield of the cod fish- 
eries carried on in Iceland waters by Frenchmen, it will become still 
more apparent that the Icelanders do not utilize this great source of 
revenue near as much as they might do. 

According to the official reports, France annually sends about 230 
vessels, most of them schooners and luggers of 100 tons burthen each, 
to engage in the Iceland fisheries. The crews number 400 in all, or on 
an average 17 men per vessel. The fisheries are generally carried on 
from March to September all round the island, beginning on the south- 
ern and western banks and finishing the season on the eastern banks. 

The annual yield amounts to about 12,500 tons or 25,000,000 pounds, 
representing in France a capital of about 5,500,000 crowns ($1, 474,000), 
or 24,000 crowns ($6,432) per vessel. 

The exportation of fish from Iceland during 1880 was as follows: 


Pounds. 
PROMS UIT ee ee cee eee ses tage ck Pocteto aie aio Suton cep oak ntciae eo eioteoeecsten sis 8, 238, 000 
MopMenmark:22. <2. cceiecsces ARE Sea ng BLE 6 NOON ee On ER eae es Sa Se el AD Re Ned 8 4, 758, 000 
Mopemr lands. ce cceraaascaicaincwccss cues sslccos eonceneosa sce Pee Aree 2, 920, 000 
UO tall eeee anes cece sae tamietawn oak bowieac skate wab eles Cees seee 15, 916, 000 


Calculating the home consumption at 6,400,000 pounds, Iceland’s share 
of the cod fisheries in 1880 would be 22,316,000 pounds, representing a 
value of 3,500,000 crowns ($938,000), t. €., 2,684,000 pounds less than the 
average yield of the French cod fisheries near Iceland. ‘The small town 
of Dunkirk in France, which every year sends 105 fishing-vessels to 
Iceland, receives as many fish from the Iceland banks as the total 
amount of fish exported in 1878, viz, about 11,800,000 pounds. 

If sea-going vessels were introduced by the Icelanders, matters would 
soon be changed, and the yield of their fisheries would be five times as 
large. Supposing that this development of the fisheries extended over 
the entire island, Iceland would be enabled to export six times as many 
fish as she does now, provided that the home consumption remained the 
same. 

The yield of the fisheries would be five times as large: Therefored x 
22,316,000 pounds, 111,580,000 pounds; subtract home consumption, 
6,400,000 pounds, would leave for exportation 105,180,000 pounds, whilst 
in 1880 the exportation only amounted to 15,916,000 pounds. 

Taking the average price of fish, the quantity exported would repre- 
sent the comfortable capital of about 16,000,000 crowns ($4,288,300), or 
about the same as Denmark’s exportation of agricultural products in 
1879. 

Just as Denmark is intended by nature for an agricultural country, 


§4 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


so is Iceland to be a fishery country; and the sea is to be the vast field 
where she can reap rich harvests even without sowing. 

It need hardly be pointed out how much the financial condition of 
- Iceland would be improved by such a development of the fisheries, and 
what indirect advantages would therefrom accrue to Denmark. Wehave 
in Denmark hundreds.of vessels which are well adapted to the Iceland 
bank fisheries, and which might in these fisheries make more money 
than by the carrying trade, in which they will be thrown more and more 
into the shade by steamships. 


2.—THE HERRING FISHERIES. 


These have never been a great source of revenue to the Icelanders. 
Herring have been caught, in stationary nets, for bait and for daily use 
in the household, but as far as known they have never been prepared 
as an article of trade. This is partly owing to the circumstance that a 
rational method of fishing, which is an essential condition of the devel- 
opment of fisheries into a profitable industry, is unknown in Iceland, 
and partly to the lack of capital. 

The attention of the Norwegians has meanwhile been drawn to the 
large schools of herring which visit the Iceland waters, and which, at 
certain seasons of the year, enter the fiords. During the last few years 
Norwegian fishermen have derived an income from a source which ought 
to have enriched Iceland. 

The first expeditions were sent out from Mandal in Norway to Seydis 
Fiord in Iceland, in 1868. 

The very imperfect method of fishing, however, in connection with a 
certain lack of energy shown by the persons participating in this expe- 
dition, caused the results to be less than they might otherwise have 
been. I shall briefly describe the method employed: 

By means of heavy nets with narrow meshes the schools of herring 
are surrounded when they go into the fiords in autumn. These nets are 
from 50 to 150 fathoms long, 14 to 17 fathoms deep, and have generally 
114 meshes to thefathom. Along the buoy-line, pieces of cork, each 8 
inches long, are fastened every yard; whilst along the foot-line there is 
a stone of 6 pounds’ weight to every fathom. Such a net is worked by 
abotit 16 men, 2 large boats in which the nets are piled up, and 5 to 6 
‘small boats, 2 of which are furnished with a small capstan. 

The foreman or “boss,” supplied with a sounding-line and a telescope, 
generally rows out into the fiord every afternoon, accompanied by the 
net-boat and 4 small boats. Whenever he has discovered a school of 
herring (either by means of the sounding-line, which is let down till 
within a few feet from the bottom, so that he can feel the school when it 
pushes against the line; or by means of the telescope; or, finally, by 
seeing the commotion caused near the surface by the herring) he gives 
a sign to the net-boat to indicate in what direction the net is to be set 
so as to inclose the herring. One of the boats with a capstan takes the 


[9] THE ICELAND FISHERIES. 85 


rope of the net, rows quickly towards the shore, casts anchor, joins the 
rope to the capstan, and commences to haul in the net; the net-boat 
meanwhile surrounds the school in a semi-circle, as far as the net will 
stretch, then rows towards the shore with the other rope and acts in the 
same manner as the capstan-boat. In order to hold up the buoy-line 
more floats are attached to it, and when both ends of the net are close 
to the shore the herring are surrounded without any hope of escape. 

It is evident, however, that this method of catching fish depends 
altogether too much on accidental circumstances to give a safe and in 
any way calculable result. The proper home of the herring is the sea, 
and only every now and then do they go into shallow water for the pur- 
pose of spawning. The spawning process, however, may also go on in 
the deep sea, but only in exceptional cases when the temperature of the 
water in the fiordsis too low. 

The first condition for the Norwegian to catch herring is, therefore, 
that the herring come near the coast; secondly, that his attention is 
drawn to them, 7. e., that he either feels or sees them before the net is 
cast. Both these indications may mislead; and, although the Norwe- 
gians have of late years furnished the proof that by the above-mentioned 
method of catching fish the capital invested may be doubled, I would 
not advise any one but a capitalist to follow this method, for under un- 
favorable circumstances one may have to wait for years until the money 
invested pays any interest. 

A much more rational method of fishing is that pursued by the Dutch 
and Scotch, viz, the drag-net method, as thereby one makes himself 
independent of the migrations of the herring and follows them to their 
home—the sea. With good sea-going vessels, cutters and luggers, the 
Dutch and Scotch fishermen go over a vast extent of sea with their drag- 
nets. 

The Norwegian Association for the Advancement of the Fisheries has 
become fully convinced of the great importance of the drag-net method ‘ 
and has sent Norwegian fishermen to the Netherlands and to Scotland 
to become acquainted with their methods of fishing. 

To return to the Iceland herring fisheries in their present condition, 
I will quote the following from the official report of the Bergen Board of 
Trade: 

“Three expeditions left Bergen for Iceland in 1880, one with two nets, 
fitted out by Mr. I. E. Lemhkuhl, one by the Bergen-Mandal Company, 
with one net, and one by a joint-stock company in Bergen, with one net. 

“The first-mentioned expedition comprised one vessel of about 950 
tons burden, with a crew of 16 men, which sailed for Iceland in the be- 
ginning of June, with materials for erecting a large salting-house; five 
nets with everything belonging to them; a large net-boat, and several 
small boats. Soon after the first vessel another one sailed taking out 
about 2,000 tons salt, one large net-boat, and other materials. In July 
these vessels were followed by a steamer and a yacht, with a crew of 12 


86 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


men, both vessels carrying a cargo consisting of kegs, salt, &c.; three 
nets, boats, &c. Later during the season the steamer plied regularly 
between Iceland and Bergen, continuing her trips till the end of Octo- 
ber, whilst the two sailing-vessels staid in Iceland, where they were 
were used as lodging-vessels, until the fishermen returned from the fish- 
eries in November. The crews of these vessels, 28 men in all, had to 
do every kind of work, and act as sailors, fishermen, salters, carpenters, 
wheelwrights, &c. The captain and the foreman of the fisheries and of 
the saiting, received respectively 48, 56, and 64 crowns ($12.86, $15 
and $17.15) a month, and the rest of the men 20 to 24 crowns ($5.36 
to $6.43); all of them were found. Besides this, every man received 
for every ton of herring shipped from Iceland to Bergen 1 Gre (a little 
more than 4 cent) additional on every four crowns of their monthly 
wages; the foremen thus got 12, 14, and 15 Gre, and fhe rest of the men 
5 to 6 bre additional on every ton of herring. The entire quantity of 
herring caught by this expedition was 5,952 tons. 

“The Bergen-Mandal expedition comprised two vessels with 18 men, 
and was furnished with building materials, 5 nets, 2 large net-boats. 
This expedition was managed in exactly the same manner as the one 
described above. It also employed a steamer to carry the fish (9,500 
tons) to Norway. 

‘The Southern Bergen expedition comprised two large vessels of 1,700 
to 1,800 tons each, 20 men, 1 net, 2 net-boats, &c., but did not carry any 
material for erecting buildings. The nets and net-boats were not owned 
by the same parties as the vessels, but there was an agreement between 
them, that all the fish caught should be taken by the vessels at 8 
crowns ($2.14) per standard ton, half of which was to go to the owners 
of the nets and the other half to the men, to be evenly divided among 
them. ‘The crews of the vessels received in addition 8 crowns ($2.14) 
per month, and had to find themselves. 

“This expedition, which caught about 4,500 tons of herring, took all 
its apparatus, boats, &c., back to Norway, partly in their own and partly 
in hired vessels, whilst the other expeditions left their boats in Iceland 
till the next year.” 

If we calculate the cost of fitting out an expedition of this kind at 
20,000 crowns ($5,300), and the average yield in 1880 at 4,000 tons per 
‘expedition, we find that, counting the ton at 20 crowns ($5.36), the net 
result must have been at least 40,000 crowns ($10,600), 7. e., 200 per cent. 

A joint-stock company which commenced work last year with a cap- 
ital of 20,000 crowns ($5,300) made 125 per cent. Every share of 1,000 
crowns ($268) paid 1,250 crowns. Of the 20 shares 10 were taken in 
Norway and 10 in Iceland. | 

The total quantity of herring caught by the Norwegians near Ice- 
-Jand in 1880 is estimated at 100,000 tons, valued at 2,000,000 crowns 


($536,000). 


[11] THE ICELAND FISHERIES. 87 


By directing the attention of my countrymen to the above facts, I 
hope to stir them up a little to take a more active interest in the deep- 
sea fisheries, as a large portion of our merchant marine might be much 
more profitably engaged in the fisheries than in the carrying trade. It 
would doubtless be advantageous if in that case 5 to 10 ship-owners 
would form a sort of joint-stock company, as Various advantages could 
thereby be secured, especially with regard to the sale of the products 
of the fisheries. Considering the difficulties involved in the carrying 
out of such an undertaking, I have proposed to the government to ap- 
point an officer in the capacity of official adviser who could give all the 
advice needed. 

In conclusion, I would ask our North Sea fishermen to seriously con- 
sider if the introduction into their fisheries of larger sea-going vessels 
would not prove.as much of a benefit to them as to the Icelanders 

Open boats for deep-sea fisheries will hardly answer the purpose any- 
where, and if the proposed harbor should be established on the west 
coast of Jutland there would be a very strong inducement to derive as 
much benefit from our deep-sea fisheries as other nations from theirs ; 
as they certainly are, when carried on in the proper manner, a rich source 
of revenue and consequent national prosperity. 


V.—THE BOHUS-LAN SEA FISHERIES AND THEIR FUTURE. 


By AXEL VILHELM LJUNGMAN. 


[From ‘4 ftonbladet,” Nos. 6 and 43, January 9 and February 21, 1882. ]* 


Bohus-lin doubtless occupies the front rank among all the Swedish 
provinces, both as regards the development and extent which the fish- 
ing industries have reached there, and the great fame which one of 
its fisheries—the great periodical herring fishery—has justly obtained. 
But as, of late years, the Bohus-lin sea fisheries have decreased, whilst 
on the other hand a new great-herring period seems about to begin 
after an interval of nearly seventy years, it will not seem strange if we 
invite the attention of the public to some facts regarding the Bohus- 
lin sea fisheries and their future, and to those measures which we con- 
sider necessary for their proper development. In order, however, to 
understand the latest and most important phase in this development, 
and in order to make some calculations regarding the periodical her- 
ring fisheries, and the peculiar course and economical importance of 
these fisheries, it will be necessary to give a brief historical review of the 
more important facts relative to the herring periods. As there are no 
accurate data regarding our periodical herring fisheries till the latter 
half of the sixteenth century, it will be necessary to complete the review 
of the herring periods by means of the knowledge which we possess re- 
garding the herring fisheries on the west coast of Norway during the 
middle ages. It is well known to what an extent, especially in olden 
times, the herring fisheries contributed to the material well-being of 
the nation, and how ruinous was their cessation. In reviewing all that 
we know certainly relative to the great herring fisheries on the coasts 
of Bohus-lin and Western Norway, we shall soon find that the herring 
fisheries never flourished on both these coasts at one and the same 
time, but that they had begun, or at least were about to begin, on the 
one coast when they had ceased or were about to cease on the other. 

The oldest notice we find of the Bohus-lin herring fisheries is a pro- 
hibition by Olof the Saint, in 1017, of the exportation of herring from 
Viken to Vestergétland, contained in the “Chronicles of the kings.” 
The herring must, therefore, have come near the coast of Bohus-lin at 
that time; and as the same chronicles tell us that there was much suf- 


*«° Bohus ldns hafsfiske och dess framtid.”—Translated from the Swedish, by HERMAN 
JACOBSON, 


| 89 


90 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


fering in Norway during the reign of the sons of @unhild (961-970), 
owing, among other things, to the failure of the fisheries, it is reasonable 
to suppose that by these fisheries we are to understand those which at 
the time were the most important for Norway—the so-called spring- 
herring fisheries; and also that the Bohus-lin herring period began 
soon after, and continued till the end of the reign of Olof the Saint. 

During the first decade of the twelfth century, and especially during 
the reign of Sigurd Jorsalafar (1100-1130), we find that in Southern 
Viken there was an unusual development of all the material interests, 
and more especially at Konungahella, because it was the most impor. 
tant commercial place of the entire north. As, shortly before the de- 
struction of Konungahella by the Vinds, in August, 1135, a number of 
merchants emigrated from there to Bergen, it would not seem out of 
the way to suppose that the herring fisheries contributed their share to 
the flourishing condition of Konuwngahella, and that the cessation of 
the herring fisheries on the coast of Bohus-lin and their beginning on the 
western coast of Norway formed the real cause—not mentioned in the 
chronicles—of the emigration above referred to. Unless this was really 
the cause, it would seem difficult to understand why this emigration 
took place to Bergen and not to Tonsberg, Oslo, or Sarpsborg, whose 
trade resembled that of Aonungahella much more than that of Bergen. 
Supposing this to be correct, this herring period would have begun 
during the last decade of the eleventh century. 

Southern Viken shows us a still more striking revival of the herring 
fisheries during the first half of the thirteenth century, after a most de- 
vastating civil war of nearly a hundred years’ duration. From Hakan 
' Hakonsson’s Saga (chapter 333) we know that during the long reign of 
this famous king, Marstrand and other desert islands near the coast were 
cultivated; that the Ocker Islands were colonized and received a church 
of their own; that the convent of Tonsberg was moved to Dragsmark, and 
that Gullholnm was colonized. Although the last-mentioned measures 
may have been taken to furnish a convenient commercial highway from 
Norway to Lake Venern, which might take the place of the insufficiently 
protected former highway by Konungahella; the rapid increase of popu- 
lation in the Ocker Islands, necessitating a special church, certainly in- 
dicates rich herring fisheries, principally carried on near the central and 
southern coasts, as no place on the northern coast is mentioned. Dur- 
ing the latter part of King Hakan “the Olds” reign (from 1250) no more 
herring came to the coast of Bohus-lin, so that during the second half — 
of summer the Bohus-liin people were in the habit of going down the 
sound to participate in the Skane herring fisheries. This herring period 
of the first half of the thirteenth century has, by Axel Boeck, and others 
following in his footsteps, been incorrectly considered the same as the 
great Bohus-lin herring fisheries of the fourteenth century. 

From well-authenticated documents we know that the herring which 
during the first half of the fourteenth century had ceased to come to 


[3] BOHUS-LAN SEA FISHERIES AND THEIR FUTURE. 91 


the Norwegian coast near Bergen, again came to the coast of Bohus- 
lin in large numbers; but the exact location where the fisheries were 
carried on is not known, although there are indications that about this 
very time Marstrand was in an exceptionally flourishing condition. 
During this herring period the government allowed the Hanse. cities to 
participate in these rich fisheries, which privilege, however, was very 
probably abruptly ended by the great plague. 

About the middle of the fifteenth century herring again visited our 
coasts in large numbers, and it is well known that from this time the 
herring fisheries began on the coast of Vestergdtland, where the gov- 
ernment levied a tax on the fishermen. The great herring fisheries had 
now become an important source of revenue to the government. Dur- 
ing this period Marstrand was incorporated as a city (1442), and its 
church was completed (1460). As the Hanse cities petitioned the gov- 
ernment to have their privileges renewed, it is probable that they like- 
wise participated in these fisheries. 

From the middle of the sixteenth century herring again came to the 
coast of Bohus liin in very large numbers near Marstrand, and as far as 
the Homborg Sound. These fisheries continued till about the year 
1556, which was not many years before the northern or spring-herring 
fisheries near the western coast of Norway came to an end, as the his- 
torian Peder Claussién Friis, who is well acquainted with this herring 
period, expressly says in his history. From printed documents in the 
Norwegian archives it appears that in 1561 the herring fisheries were 
principally carried on near Marstrand in 1564 (when they began Sep- 
tember 6), also at three stations on the island of Orust— Rokersvik, 
Mollésund and Svanesund, and in 1565, in nearly the same localities, 
Hermensund and Mollésund being mentioned as important herring 
places. _ In 1572, when the fisheries commenced somewhat later in au- 
tumn, a superintendent of customs was appointed at Marstrand, and cus- 
toms officers were stationed in various places on the island of Orust. 
In 1576, when the fisheries did not begin till some time in November, 
large numbers of herring made their appearance north of Marstrand. 
It may be presumed that principally towards the close of the herring 
period, fisheries were also carried on near Vette and near the Hval 
Isiands on the coast of Norway ; but in those localities they do not seem 
to have reached a sufficient degree of importance to cause the govern- 
ment to establish a customs station for the purpose of deriving revenue 
from these fisheries, which began to decline about 1580 and ceased en- 
tirely in 1590. During this period the herring were almost exclusively 
caught with seines and stationary nets, which began to be introduced 
towards the end of the period, but were strictly prohibited in 1583. As 
a general rule these herring were smaller and leaner than the Norwe- 
gian so-called “spring herring,” but the sum of 40 marks had to be 
‘paid for the privilege of salting them. The so-called ‘round salted” 
herring (herring salted while bloody in flat-bottomed vessels) were 
only prepared for home consumption or for exportation to Sweden. 


& 


92 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES, [4] 


Foreigners were allowed to participate in these fisheries by special 
grant from the King, tor which, however, they had to pay a certain sum, 
just like the natives. Peter Clausson, the historian, testifies to the impor- 
tance of these fisheries by saying in his work that “several thousand 
vessels and boats from Denmark and Holstein, as well as from the west- 
ern and northern portions of Norway, came there to fish, besides those 
belonging to the place. Thereby thousands of people from neighboring 
countries have been induced to settle there. They have built them- 
selves houses and cottages, where they live with their wives and chil- 
dren and make a good living through the fisheries. Noblemen, mer- 
chants, and farmers have here erected many large and beautiful houses 
two to three stories high; some of them so large that enormous quan- 
tities of herring can be hung up todry. Thus the coast for 8 to 9 miles 
is lined with many thousand of houses and cottages, and many people 
live all along the fiords and inlets and on every island along this coast, 
as far as the herring extend their migrations. Here are annually seen 
many thousand ships ftom Germany, Denmark, Holland, England, Scot- 
land, and France, which come to buy herring; all of them are amply 
supplied, and take the herring to far-off countries to serve as food for 
men.” 

In the beginning of the second half of the seventeenth century large 
numbers of herring seem again to have approached our coasts. When, 
in 1658, Bohus-lin was united with Sweden, and the herring fisheries 
attracted the attention of the authorities, regulations were issued in 1666 
for these fisheries, in which it was said, among other things, that the 
preparation of herring should only be carried on in Gottenburg, Kalf- 
sund, Marstrand, Mollésund, Gullholmen, and Lysekil, which clearly indi- 
cates that, at that time, the herring principally visited the central and 
southern coasts. About the year 1670 the herring ceased to come to 
the southern coast, but continued to visit the central coast till the end 
of that herring period, which was about 1680, or, according to some, in 
1697. Nothing is known regarding fisheries on the northern coast dur- 
ing this period, but it is probable that herring also came there. The 
herring fisheries, which were greatly disturbed by the political condi- 
tion of the country, were also, during this period, carried on with nets. 

About the middle of the eighteenth century the herring again came 
to the coast of Bohus-lin in large numbers. In a report on the fisheries 
from the year 1758 we read the following: ‘In 1747 and 1748 the her- 
ring again commenced to visit the northern coast of Bohus-lin in large 
numbers. <A few years later they went as far south as Marstrand, and 
from 1752 on they made their appearance at Gottenburg.” In the report 
of the Royal Fish Commission, dated April 22, 1761, we read: “ From 
the year 1750 the herring had their station on the southern coast, be- 
tween Gotienburg and Marstrand, and about 3 to 4 miles north of the 
last-mentioned city.” In the report of the same commission of 1764 we 
read that “in autumn the herring were generally found on both sides of 
Marstrand. Some years they appeared in large numbers near Gottenburg 


° 


[5] BOHUS-LAN SEA FISHERIES AND THEIR FUTURE. 93 


and also on the Halland coast. In autumn and towards winter they 
went a little nearer to the northern end of the Guilmarsfiord and the 
Norwegian frontier.” In a pamphlet published in 1765 we read “of the 
necessity of having superintendents of fisheries appointed in the dis- 
tricts of Gottenburg and Bohbus-lin.” The herring must, therefore, have 
staid on the southern and central coasts, which also appears from vari- 
ous laws and reports published about that time. In the report of the 
Royal Commission of Fisheries of January 15, 1770, it is said that “the 
herring fisheries continued, without interruption, on the coast of Bohus- 
lin for twenty years; the only observable change being that they ap- 
peared more plentiful on the northern portion of the coast during the 
latter part of this period than during the first part.” The compara- 
tively insignificant fisheries on the northern coast during the first years 
of the period are hardly mentioned in any reports from that period, but 
from 1750 or 1752 we find more frequent data regarding the fisheries. 
According to the so-called “ oil-refuse act” (Trangrums-akten), the her- 
ring seem at that time to have made the Gottenburg coast their principal 
place of sojourn, whilst later in the period they were not seen there so 
frequently. In 1773 the herring were reported to have made their ap- 
pearance and to have been caught, late dn autumn, or rather in the 
beginning of winter, as far north as Strémstad, and from 1778, also, near 
the Hval Islands, on the coast of Norway. From the above-mentioned 
“ Trangrums-akten,” passed in 1784, it also appears that the principal oil 
refineries were, during the seventh and in the beginning of the eighth 
decade of the eighteenth century, found in the neighborhood of Udde- 
valla and Marstrand, on the central portion of the coast of Bohus-liin. 
A report of 1788 says, that about that time the herring were found prin- 
cipally near the Hllés and Llgé fiords, also on the central portion of the 
coast. In the same report we read that at that time the herring fisheries® 
began about the end of October, when the most northerly points where 
herring were caught were Gullholmen and Iysekil; and that the fish- 
eries generally commenced near Marstrand, Kidédesholmerna, and in the 
neighborhood of the Brunskdrsfiord, where the largest number of her- 
ring were caught; and that as winter approached the herring went 
farther north and were caught in large numbers near Grafvarne, Hun- 
nebostrand, Fliské, and towards the end of the season near Salté, which 
is about one mile south of Stromstad. The same conditions continued 
till the end of the herring period, in the winter of 1808. 

In order to fully understand the importance of the experience gained 
from the last great herring period (1748--1808), it will be necessary to 
State, first, that the fisheries commenced, in 1753, September 29; 1757, 
September 3; 1762, August 16; 1766, September 9 ; 1769, October 3; 1773, 
October 14; 1778, November 4; 1781, October 24; 1783, November 3; and 
thereafter gradually later and later, till finally they did not commerce 
till the middle of December; and, second, that in 1755 the fisheries 
yielded 75,000 tons of herring, in 1760 upwards of 200,000, about the 
year 1785 1,000,000 tons, and in 1795, when the fisheries were at their 


94 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


greatest height, nearly 2,000,000 tons;* from that year, however, the 
quantity of fish caught rapidly decreased. The reason why so few fish 
were caught in the beginning of the fisheries was, simply, that there 
was a lack of experienced fishermen and improved apparatus, and also a 
lack of a proper market; but not, by any means, that fewer fish came near 
the coast. An experienced fisherman, who had taken an active part in 
the fisheries ever since 1754, says in 1809: “ After the year 1767 the 
number of herring on our coast was not as large as prior to that year, 
but our fishermen have gained more experience ; we have better nets, 
boats, and salting-houses, and more men to take part in the fisheries, so 
that as many herring were caught and prepared as were needed, till 
the latter part of the herring period, when the approach of winter greatly 
interfered with the fisheries.” From trustworthy sources we learn that, 
during that portion of the herring period when the fisheries were at 
their greatest height, the herring came near the coast in such enor- 
mous numbers that those which were caught only represented a very 
small portion of the total number of fish on the coast; and that each 
season the fisheries came to an end, not because there was a lack of 
herring, but because no one could be found who was willing to pay 
anything for them, all demands having been fully satisfied. From the 
fishery report of 1788 we learn that, in 1787, there were on the coast of 
Bohus-liin 338 salting-houses; 429 oil-refineries with a total of 1,812 vats, 
which used 13,662 tons of fresh fish every time oil was made, or 40,986 
tons per day; 358 large nets; 2,100 herring-boats, &c. It is evident that 
these fisheries were very profitable. Granberg says, in his “ History of 
Gottenburg,” that the city of Gottenburg owed its flourishing condition, 
during the latter part of the eighteenth century, ‘to its East India 
trade and the herring fisheries.” According to the same author, the expor- 
tation of herring and oil gave a new impetus to commerce, and exercised 
a beneficial influence on all branches of trade and industry. The large 
sums of money which flowed into the country aided in furthering the 
development of many different industries, and that this had really 
been the case became still more evident when the source of wealth be- 
came exhausted with the close of the herring period. ‘To give a better 
idea of the flourishing condition of Bohus-liin when the fisheries were 
at their height, and of the misery and suffering caused by the decline 
of the fisheries, we will quote the following from a work on the Bohus- 
lin fisheries by Rev. O. Lundbecks: ‘“Any one who knew the coast of Bo- 


*It should be remembered that the Swedish ton holds 209.4 liters, and that the her- 
ring are measured in flat vessels, which were filled to repletion; and that during 
’ that summer people commenced to calculate how many fresh fish were required for a 
ton of oil, for large masses of herring were used for that purpose. By way of 
comparison we will mention that the total yield of the Scotch fisheries in 1880 was 
1,473,000 crans, of about 170.2 liters each (of which 1,201,105 crans fall to the share 
of the east coast, and 272,495 to that of the west coast). 
tIn the beginning of the period both floating and stationary nets were employed, 
but as the fish caught were not of the most valuable kind, they were soon replaced by 
common seines, which paid much better. 


[7] BOHUS-LAN SEA FISHERIES AND THEIR FUTURE. 95 


hus-lin twenty-five years ago (this was written in 1831), and were to see 
it again at the present time would hardly be able to refrain from shed- 
ding tears. Twenty-five years ago our coast presented a lovely picture. 
- Massive and costly walls and bulwarks supporting extensive salt-houses 
and oil-refineries rose from the very sea; further inland could be seen 
spacious warehouses and busy workshops, and on the brow of the hills 
handsome residences and small but comfortable houses for the fisher- 
men and mechanics. The shore swarmed with people, and the sea was 
crowded with white sails. Every night the coast presented a magnifi- 
cent scene, when the many thousand lights were reflected in the waves. 
Everywhere there was life and bustle, and the revenues were counted 
by tons of gold. Now, nothing remains of all this splendor but bare 
ruins. Here and there is seen a dilapidated cottage, which awakens the 
same feelings in the visitor as a neglected cemetery. Would that the 
former times so ardently sighed and prayed for by many thousands of 
people might soon return!” 

With the beginning of the winter 1877~'78, the genwine sea-herring, 
which had been observed near Skagen since the autumn of 1875, again 
came to the coast of Bohus-lan in large numbers; and as last year they 
began to come earlier and go further south than during the previous 
year, it seems evident that the old and well-known eycle repeats itself. 

It remains to briefly indicate those measures which should be taken 
in order to derive the greatest possible benefit from that source of wealth 
which the return of the herring to our coast has opened, and to further 
the development of other sea fisheries in connection with that of the 
herring. 

As regards the method of preparing herring, the selection of the 
proper place for the necessary establishments is of great importance. 
The experience gained during the former herring periods indicates — 
clearly that the central portion of the coast (the coast from Marstrand 
to Soten) offers on the whole the most favorable locations for such estab- 
lishments during the entire herring period; whilst the southern coast 
is most favorable during that part of the period when the herring come 
early during the year, and are particularly well suited for salting. The . 
northern coast, where the herring come towards the end of the year, 
and where they frequently stay longest, is therefore very well suited for 
Selling fresh herring for immediate consumption. As the herring, how- 
ever, during the greater portion of the period when they éome late in 
the year, do not come regularly every year to the Gottenburg coast, and 
as only those herring which are caught towards the close of autumn 
can be bought at a price which allows of their being used on a large 
seale for the manufacture of oil, glue, manure, &c., it is evident that 
the central coast is best suited for such establishments, and next to it 
the northern coast, where the herring come later, and are, on the whole, 
somewhat leaner. 

As regards the different ways of preparing herring, it needs no proof 
that it will be most advantageous to utilize the herring in every pos- 


96 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


sible way, as thereby the chance of selling them in different markets 
will be largely increased. This is a very important consideration, as it 
is well known from former herring periods that the number of fish 
caught is limited by no other reason than that there is no ready market 
for them. Moreover, in such large fisheries it frequently happens that 
large masses of herring are brought on shore which cannot be consumed 
in a fresh condition, and which, from some cause or other, are not suited 
for salting or smoking. Such herring could possibly be sold if prepared 
in a different way—that is, steamed, and then passed through a machine 
which separates the firm en the ‘soft portions. From the latter oil, 
_artificial butter, glue, and from the former fish-flour, guano, &c., can 
be manufactured. During the last fishing period all that was done was 
to separate the fat by boiling the herring—all the rest of the fish was 
thrown away; and it is not long since a more improved method of pre- 
paring the ‘“menhaden” (a kind of herring found on the coasts of 
America) has been adopted in the northeastern part of America. Dur- 
ing those years, when the fisheries of the last herring period were at their 
height, 30,000 to 60,000 barrels of oil were produced every year (15 to 
20 large barrelsful of herring being required to make one barrel of oil). 

As a ready sale of fish, and of the products of the fisheries, is an 
essential condition for an increase in the number of fish caught, it will 
be necessary to extend the market for our herring. In this connection 
it should be remembered that an increase in the sale of fish will cause 
a greater development of the entire fish industry by making it possible 
to introduce improved methods, to use better materials, and inducing 
more persons to engage in this industry. The sale of our herring could 
be greatly increased if the government would take the proper steps for 
spreading a knowledge of the different methods of preparing herring, 
and of the herring trade in general; and would see to it that the salt- 
ing of herring is properly regulated and superintended. It would also 
prove a great benefit if the means of communication could be increased 
and improved, and especially a better connection be established between 
the outer coast and the railroad system of the interior; this being one 
of the most efficient means of developing deep-sea fisheries Widely 
different as are the opinions regarding the various methods of improving 
and developing the deep-sea fisheries, there is no difference, or rather 
there has been none for the last 20 or 30 years, as to the vast impor- 
tance of railroads to the sea fisheries. All the foreign fish commissions 
have, without exception, testified to the vast benefits accruing to the 
sea fisheries from the introduction of railroads, as it thereby becomes 
possible to carry fresh fish a very considerable distance, and as it tends 
to increase the material well-being of the entire coast population by 
building up all the industries, and by furthering the commercial inter- 
course of the coast with the rest of the country. 

The railroads have already proved a great benefit to the Bohus-lin 
herring fisheries by opening up new markets, and have at the same 
time enabled the greater portion of our poor throughout the country to 


[9] BOHUS-LAN SEA FISHERIES AND THEIR FUTURE. 97 


obtain at a cheap price a wholesome article of animal food. The im- 
portance of the railroads to the herring fisheries increases in the de- 
gree as people accustom themselves to use herring in the household 
and as the railroads open up new districts. As the herring are prin- 
cipally obtained on the central and northern coasts of Bohus-lin dur- 
ing the cool season, when they can, of course, best be transported fresh, 
the lack of suitable railroad connections and a good outer harbor in 
each of these portions of the coast render it necessary at present to 
send them all the way to Gottenburg (a journey sometimes occupying 
several days), in order to ship them to other places in the country by 
rail. The herring, therefore, are liable to be spoiled, and, even under 
the most favorable circumstances, their prices will be raised and their 
usefulness as a cheap and wholesome article of food for the masses will 
be considerably diminished. 

Contrary to the opinion here expressed that the herring fisheries 
might be improved principally by opening up new markets for their 
products and improving the means of communication, leaving the rest 
to follow the natural course of their development, some people have 
advanced the opinion that now, at the very beginning of the herring 
period, before suitable markets for our goods have been found, and be- 
fore we have a body of.men trained and experienced in all that per- 
tains to the herring fisheries and the herring trade, we should use 
new and expensive apparatus—drag-nets after the Scotch and Dutch 
model. But as drag-net fisheries in the open sea require a larger capi- 
tal than we can afford at the present time, and demand skill and ex- 
perience in preparing herring as well as a ready sale of the fish at a 
price which will cover the expenses incurred in procuring new appa- 
ratus, and as, moreover (as we know from the last fishing period), such 
fisheries cannot compete with the seine fisheries (more especially at 
this time, when the herring period is just beginning and the herring ap- 
proach the coast earlier in the season), it will need no further proof to 
show how impractical are these opinions. At any rate, there is time 
enough to introduce drag-net fisheries on a large scale during that part 
of the herring period when the herring come to the coast later in the 
Season; when only fish of a poorer quality are caught in the seines; 
when more capital has accumulated; when our people have become 
more skilled in preparing herring,* and when new markets have been 
opened for the products of our fisheries. Nor would it be wise, at the 
present time at least, to excite the competition of foreign nations, as the 
consequences of such a step might be detrimental to the prospects of 
our fisheries. The drag-net fisheries in the open sea are free to all, and 


*The introduction of the Scotch fishing methods and apparatus demands as careful 
a preparation of the herring as that in vogue in Scotland, if the herring caught in 
drag-nets are to bring a reasonable price; for fresh herring can with us only be sold 
in comparatively small quantities at such a price as to pay the extra expense incurred 
in buying new and expensive fishing apparatus. 


S. Mis. 29 7 


98 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


Sweden has no suitable places to form a basis for these fisheries in the 
Kattegat and the Skagerack. It should be our aim to make the herring 
fisheries in our seas, as was the case during the last herring period, an 
exclusively Swedish industry, and to prevent foreigners from enjoying 
those natural advantages which by right belong to us. 

Any measures intended to further the sea fisheries should therefore 
not only aim at remedying those evils which made themselves felt dur- 
ing the former herring periods, but at bringing to the utmost degree 
of development all the great sea fisheries, all of which may be reached 
by improved means of communication, and by concentrating the fishing 
industries in certain favorably situated places on the coast. The cre- 
ation of a regular fish trade, and of a body of experienced fishermen 
and salters, &c., will only be possible in places where the very location 
points to the sea fisheries as the most natural and profitable industry, 
such as Bergen, Yarmouth, Grimsley, &e., for only in such places can 
capitalists be found who take enough interest in the matter to invest 
their money in the fishing industries. Through such a concentration 
of the fishing industries the Bohus-liin fisheries would become more 
thoroughly Swedish and would supply the Swedish nation with a cheap 
and wholesome article of food; whilst, if nothing is done to promote 
the fishing interests, there is great danger that the Swedish deep-sea 
fishermen (as is already the case to some extent with the Aalesund fish- 
eries) will cease to be independent fishermen, and become the servants 
of foreigners, from whom we would thus continue to import the greater 
portion of the fish which we consume. The salting of fish caught in 
the deep-sea fisheries which has been much neglected during the last 
ten years, should again be taken up energetically, and the endeavors 
made with such good success in the years 1857-1865 should be repeated 
and applied to the sea fisheries, more especially if the proposed new 
railroads make it possible to carry both fresh and slightly salted fish 
to any part of the country. 

From these brief indications it will be evident that all that our Bohus- 
lan fisheries need in order to be brought to their proper height, is, above 
everything, increased means of communication by railroads connecting 
ing the various important harbors on our coast, and by a line connecting 
this coast railroad with the railroad system of the kingdom. 

Such measures, if properly carried out, will infuse new life not only 
into the Bohus-lin sea fisheries, but also into all our industries, and will 
moreover vastly increase the business of all our railroads, and soon re- 
pay all the money invested. 

Whatever opinions one may entertain as to the importance of our 
Bobuslin fisheries, and their value to our whole country, it will, under 
all circumstances, be very desirable that the indifference our people 
manifest at present to this great industry should be overcome, and that 
they should be induced, by every possible means, to take an active in- 
terest in this matter. 


VI.—WHAT SHOULD BE DONE BY THE GOVERNMENT WITH 
REGARD TO THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 


A MEMORIAL ADDRESSED TO THE COUNCIL OF STATE AND THE HEAD | 
OF THE ROYAL CIVIL DEPARTMENT. 


By AXEL VILHELM LJUNGMAN. 


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My JbMG OR ONS! oad SGooboR Do00 Con Buna pH aoe conmOuED EEDEUBEGa” SaeEaseuose: 3 
See VAL kin vol. Can CLOUSHPIACES soc ore re s:0i5 isi =p nel ane wie ciara a sais wise sine ctenies 4 
APLLEMOVAN Cran eCLOUSTOCKS, OCC onic janseleceriecoccmnlcinse ass cae oes Sesiseseens 4 
5. Introduction of a different system of weights and measures.......---..---- 5 
6; Preparation of the herring for the market... 2.00.02. 22.252 22s thes Sock wees 6 
7. Regular postal service between the fishing stations and principal cities. ..-. 8 
8. More telegraph stations along the coast... .-.--...--:....220 eeecee eter eoee 8 
Daebetter allroad COUNeChlON saQ.-.cis so -reciie a dicice os tices soe neo aicieeianee 10 
AM eC SOCIAENeO MA ULONS Mm eteetsinr aiatetsinjerciciecicin sistent isle ni oe pacle Soe ess rience 17 
APPENDIX J.—Attempts to fish with drag-nets* ........---. IBRUN MERU 21 
(1.) The importance of such attempts for science and trade.......--.-..----- 21 
(2.), The proper way to carry out such attempts .. ........---.2---25 2-2 -e ee 22 
(3.) The introduction of drag-nets in the herring fisheries in the Skagerack.. 23 
(4.) The use of drag-nets during a possible future great herring period ...----. 24 
' APPENDIX II.—Sanitary regulations during the herring fisheries..........-...- 26 


THE DUTY OF THE GOVERNMENT WITH REGARD TO THE 
GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES.t 


{A memorial addressed to the Department of the Interior by Axel Vilhelm Ljungman. ] 


As the course of the so-called “landing” of the herring near the coast 
of Bobus-lin agrees in every particular with the experience of former 
herring periods, and our knowledge of the development of the great 
Bohus-liin fisheries during former centuries, we are justified in looking 
forward with a tolerable degree of certainty to the growth of these 
fisheries and their continuance for thirty or forty years; and as both 


*The drag-net so frequently referred to in the following pages is probably the form 
of gill-net so extensively used in Holland, Germany, and Scotland.—EDITOR. 
tOm offentliga dtgdrder med hdnsyn till det | rika bohusldnska sillfisket. | En vérdsam pro- 
memoria | till | statsradet och chefen for Kongl. civil-departementet. | Af | Axel Vilh. Ljung 
man. | Gottenburg, 1882. Translated from the Swedish by HERMAN JACOBSON. 
[1] 99 


100 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


the experience of our former herring periods and the great herring 
fisheries in foreign countries have shown in the most incontrovertible 
manner that the herring fisheries may be greatly furthered and bene- 
fited by administrative measures, and that the aid and intervention of 
the government are absolutely necessary, if a great branch of industry 
such as these fisheries is to be raised to its proper height, especially in 
places like Bohus-lin where the beginning, development, and close of 
‘the fisheries are (as. to time) comprised in comparatively narrow limits, 
I consider it proper to describe those measures which are required in 
order to further the fisheries; although it will, of course, be impossible, 
owing to the extent and the peculiar difficulties of the work, to give, in 
the near future, a detailed description of the scientific investigations 
regarding the herring and the herring fisheries, which, with government 
aid, I have carried on without many interruptions since the beginning 
of July, 1873. It must be borne in mind that even those investiga- 
tions which, with much greater aid from the government, have been 
carried onin Norway since 1861, and in Germany since 1871, have not yet 
been brought to a close, even after the purely theoretical and practical 
difficulties connected with the sea fisheries had been overcome; although 
the object in view was more limited, a greater number of persons were 
engaged in the investigations, and the difficulties were not so great. 

Since there is good reason to believe that the present herring period 
will not last longer than forty years, and as it is well known how 
slowly such an industry develops, when left entirely to itself, and how 
hard it is to correct existing abuses, especially in places like Bohus-lin, 
where these herring periods come at very irregular intervals and as- 
sume a different character according to the different natural conditions, 
it is all the more necessary to direct the efforts from the very beginning 
into the proper channel, which will develop the fisheries to the greatest 
possible degree, and which will cause the least trouble and inconvenience 
both during the fishing period and toward and after its close. 

The measures that should be taken should relate to the fisheries, and 
the transportation, preparation, and sale of fish. 

As regards the fisheries, it is of the utmost importance that they should 
commence as soon as possible after the fish have come near the coast 
(have “landed”). For this reason fishing with drag-nets should be car- 
ried on on a comparatively limited scale, with government aid, so as to 
ascertain whether the herring have really approached the coast; a 
fact which is of course of the greatest importance both for fishermen 
and scientists (see my memorial on experiments with drag-nets of Feb- 
ruary 12,1878). As an implement for carrying on the herring fisheries 
on a large scale these nets should not be encouraged, at least not beyond 
the use which has been made of them during this and the past century. 
These nets are economicaily the least advantageous of all implements 
used in the herring fisheries, and should therefore only be employed 
where no other convenient implement can be obtained, especially as 


[3] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 101 


Sweden does not possess any places in the Skagerack and Northern Kat- 
tegat which are convenient for fishing with drag-nets. These nets are 
particularly ill adapted to periodical fisheries, such as those of Bohus- 
lin, as they, in proportion to the number of fish caught, require a much 
larger number of fishermen, whom it is difficult to supply with a suit- 
able living at the close of the fishing period. Drag-net fisheries on a 
comparatively small scale, however, for catching a more valuable kind 
of herring for smoking or to be sold fresh, carried on with such boats 
as can be found and with smaller cheap nets, prior to the beginning of 
the ordinary net fisheries in autumn, might possibly be more profitable, 
without involving the same difficulties. But for catching herring be- 
yond the outer coast it might prove highly valuable to have some experi- 
ments made with the purse seine (so highly prized by the Americans), 
an implement which, in contradistinction to the drag-net, is adapted to 
fishing both on the outer coast and in the narrow fiords, and to the catch- 
ing of a larger number of fish of different sizes. The introduction of 
these purse seines would, moreover, prove a great benefit by supplying 
the fishermen with fish suitable for bait. The use of the purse seine 
would make the transition to other fisheries at the end of a fishing period 
much easier than would be the case with the drag-net. In North 
America, of whose great fisheries we can learn so much, drag-nets are 
not used at all, whilst purse seines and seines are constantly used with 
the best results. 

Our rich coast fisheries in our fiords and inlets need proper regula- 
tion and an efficient coast-police, which would soon cause them to flourish 
more than ever before. 

Not only the herring fisheries on our outer coast, but our entire sea 
fisheries and navigation on the coast of Bohus-liin stand in urgent need 
of anumber of light-houses placed in suitable localities. The places which 
more than others need light-houses are (1) the northern entrance to Ud- 
devalla near the Islandsberg Cape, (2) the entrance to Kungshamn, (3) 
to Grebbestad- Krossekirrshamn, and (4) to the harbors inthe Koster fiord. 
To make the entrance to the last-named fiord passable at night-time, it 
would, however, be necessary not only to place a light-house at a suit- 
able point near the central portion of the fiord, but the so-called ‘ Kos- 
ter lights” should be moved to the southernmost point of the Koster coast, 
i. e., to Ramskdr. This measure has been talked of for a long time, and is 
urgently needed. The Koster fiord is not particularly adapted to her- 
ring fisheries during the dark season of the year, long after they have 
come to a close in the southern part of Bohus-lan, but numerous mer- 
chant vessels pass there on their way to and from Norway. Other light- 
houses than those mentioned may become necessary in time to come, 
but for the present those which have been enumerated will suffice. 

As the fishermen have to follow the herring from place to place in 
their wanderings, and as the fish have to be transported to the places 
where they are prepared, or to the markets, the intercourse between 


102 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


the different stations along the coast becomes a matter of great import- 
ance, and there is a great lack of proper means to indicate shallow and 
dangerous places.!. The coast of Bobus-lan has been treated in a very 
step-motherly manner in this respect, as compared with the east coast of 
Sweden. This mistake should be corrected, all the more as a new and 
very considerable branch of industry will be largely benefited thereby. 
For this intercourse along the coast it will, moreover, be necessary 
that several routes for ships should be plainly marked, and that two 
canals should be constructed, to avoid the necessity of sailing along an 
extensive stretch of coast exposed to the full fury of the sea. An in- 
vestigation of this matter was made last summer at the expense of 
the province, and an estimate drawn up of the extent and cost of 
the work.? The most dangerous places are (1) near Tjurpannan, (2) 
near Soten, and (3) the coast near the Hjerteré and Marstrands fiords, 
The two first-mentioned places require the canalization of considerable 
portions of land; whilst—as will be shown below—the requirements of 
the northern coast (mentioned under No. 3) will be most satisfactorily 
met by the construction of a railroad from Uddevalla to Grebbestad- 
Krossekirr, with a branch line to the southern end of the Sanndis fiord, 
in case the proposed canal between the last-mentioned place and Kros- 
sekdrrshamn should not be constructed. Both the canals referred to 
above should, in order to meet all requirements, be at least 12 or 15 feet 
deep, and broad enough to allow two steamers to pass each other with- 
out inconvenience. They would therefore involve a very considerable 
expense, without satisfying half the demands of Northern Bohus-lin for 
better means of communication. It is moreover feared that, on account 
of the strong current, sailing vessels could but rarely pass through 
them. The dredging of the inner route between the Bottna and Joreds 
jiords, however, should be done at once, as it will only involve a com- 
paratively small expense, would connect the southernmost part of the 
northern coast with the terminus of the above-mentioned railroad, and 
could be taken both by steamers and sailing vessels. As regards the 
avoiding of the last-mentioned portions of the coast, this could easily 
be accomplished by dredging and widening the existing channel inside 
the Hjerteré fiord,? and by dredging the sound between Tjérnskalf and. 
Tjornshufvud. As the last-mentioned work would make one of the best 
outer harbors of Bohus-lan, Kalfvehamn, accessible from the south, the 
sound referred to should be made at least 15 feet deep. This subject 
was discussed several years ago; all the preliminary investigations were 
made, when the whole project fell through, because it was feared that 
the new channel would offer special facilities for smuggling. As the 
herring fisheries, both during the last century and during the present 
fishing period, were most productive south of Soten, and as all herring 


"180 « Géteborg’s och Bohus lins Landstings Handlingar,” 1879, No. 15; 1880, No. 14. 
2See the same, 1878, No. 9, p. 10; No. 15, p. 3-4; No. 30, p. 4: 1880, No. 24, p. 1. 
3See the same, 1880, No. 15. 


[5] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 103 


vessels and steamers coming from the north or going north would be 
greatly benefited by having an uninterrupted channel past the western 
coast of Tjérn, and as the movements of the fishermen in following the 
herring in their migration from one side of Tjorn to the other would be 
greatly facilitated, the importance of the work, which, moreover, would 
not be very expensive, will readily be seen. Besides this work, some 
other plans have been proposed, such as the dredging of the Bjorn 
Sound as far as itsnortherninlet to Uddevalla, as well as an inner chan- 
nel along the Koster fiord, south of Strémstad, but all these plans are 
not of so great importance to the fisheries. The proposed improvements 
will prove a benefit not only to the herring fisheries and to navigation, 
but also to the coast defence. 

In order to facilitate the sale of fresh and prepared herring, both at 
home and abroad, it is of great importance to get a legally fixed stand- 
ard for measuring herring, as the present unsettled condition of tiiese 
measures causes much inconvenience. During the great herring fish- 
eries of the eighteenth century, matters were better in this respect. 
According to the regulations then in force, the standard ton of fresh 
herring must hold 164.9 liters. In 1786 this standard was changed to 
209.4 liters, for no other cause than to benefit the owners of salting estab- 
lishments. This last-mentioned measure was nominally in use till 1865, 
although it had long since given way to the greatly varying measures 
peculiar to the different portions of the coast. In Scotland, where at 
present the herring fisheries have reached the highest degree of devel- 
opment, the ton of fresh herring (called “cran”) must contain ‘ 45 
gallons old wine measure,” or 374 imperial gallons, i. e., about 170% liters. 
In Norway the fresh herring are at present measured with the same 
ton as grain, which (according to the law of April 25, 1863, § 17) must 
contain 140 liters. With us, in Bohus-liin, there are at present three 
tons which are in general use, viz, one of 125.6 liters, one of 157 liters, 
and the ton used by the Gottenburg herring merchants of 209.4 liters 
These different measures have frequently caused mistakes and diffi- 
culties, which certainly are of no benefit to the trade. As by a “ ton 
of fresh herring” we understand the average quantity of fresh her- 
ring which are required to make a ton of prepared herring, the ton 
containing 157 liters would probably be the most convenient; but as 
the metric system is soon to be introduced, a ton of fresh herring con- 
taining 150 or perhaps i60 liters would be preferable, particularly in 
view of the considerable exportation of fresh herring to Norway, Den- 
mark, and Germany. <A ton containing 160 liters comes nearest to the 
so-called “six cubic feet ton” known all over the county. Its intro- 
duction Would, therefore, not offer any special difficulties. For con- 
venience sake, it would also be well to again introduce the gauged 
measures for measuring fresh herring, which were in use during the 
eighteenth century. 

Nothing can be of greater importance for furthering the herring trade 


104 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


than the preparation of the herring for the market, as thereby the fish- 
erman is enabled to get a higher price for his fish, and the trader finds 
a better market for his goods. The object in view can best be reached 
by regulating the methods of preparing herring so as to obtain a 
uniform article marked with the government mark. For this purpose 
a complete knowledge of all the approved methods should be more gen- 
erally spread. . Such regulations regarding the salting of herring are 
in force in Holland and Scotland, and have contributed their share 
towards the development of the herring trade, by producing a uniform 
article which gradually has found its way into many foreign markets, 
where it is highly esteemed. Since 1859, however, the gratuitous mark- 
ing by the government officials of every ton of herring has been 
abolished, and it is now made optional with every salter whether by 
paying a small tax he will have his tons stamped with the government 
maftk. Experience has shown that the official marking of the goods is 
an incalculable benefit to the trade; and, though optional, it is quite 
general. The opposition, which every now and then has been raised 
against this system by some of the large Scotch salters, has not found 
favor either with the public or with the Fishery Commission, and the 
official marking therefore continues in use to this very day, as a strange 
exception from free trade principles in the land of their birth. It is 
evident, however, that the system of marking would never have come 
into such extensive use if it had not in the beginning been introduced 
by extraordinary measures, and had thus brought about a uniform 
preparation of the Scotch herring, which, in consequence, are highly 
prized in nearly all the markets of Kurope. In Holland, whose herring 
have for centuries enjoyed a world-wide reputation, and where the salt- 
ing is in the hands of a few firms, the official marking of the herring, 
after having been obligatory for a long time, has recently (1878) been 
entirely abolished, which, possibly, was caused, in part at least, by the 
circumstance that the herring on the east coast of Scotland, where 
most of the Dutch herring are caught, became inferior in quality. As, 
especially in the beginning of a herring period, when a new herring is 
first brought into the market it may cause incalculable injury to the 
future of the trade if it gets the reputation of being an inferior article 
(because a lost reputation is very difficult to regain); and as the experi- 
ence of our former herring periods proves in the most unmistakable 
manner that the herring best suited for salting are obtained a few 
years after the beginning of the period, it becomes our imperative 
duty to derive the greatest possible benefit from the experience of for- 
eign countries, especially Scotland, and to take those administrative 
measures relative to the preparation of herring which will enable us 
to produce as soon after the beginning of the period as possible an 
article of uniform and generally recognized excellence. Even if during 
the latter part of the period the natural quality of the herring should 
become inferior, as has been the case on the east coast of Scotland, the 
reputation once gained would carry us safely to the end of the period. 


[7] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 105 


The question which should be decided as soon as possible is the fix- 
ing by law of the cubic measure of a ton of herring, so that the buyer 
may at least know how much the ton contains which he has bought, for 
the uncertainty, which at present prevails in this respect, is most in- 
jurious to the trade. Our old ton contained 125.6 liters; but since 1843 
the Norwegian ton, with a capacity of 115.8 liters is also frequently 
used in Sweden, and as the decree of 1865 relative to weights and meas- 
ures fixed no legal limit of the ton of herring even the Scotch ton of 
121 liters capacity is often employed with us. Under these cireum- 
stanees it would be best to adopt that ton, which is the favorite measure 
in foreign markets, 7. ¢., the Scotch ton, all the more as it stands midways 
between the Norwegian and the old Swedish tons. But, as the metric 
system of measures will doubtless soon be introduced in Sweden, and 
as for this reason it will be most convenient if the number of liters 
contained in a ton isa product of ten, it would be best to make the 
capacity of the ton 120 liters, as this would come very near to the Scotch 
ton, and would be the right medium between the two extremes. There 
is some prospect that this ton (of 120 liters capacity) may in the future 
become the international measure for herring. (See my treatise on 
the subject in Nordisk Tidsskrift for Fiskeri, vi, p. 328, in Deutsche 
Fischerei, Zeitung, 1881, No. 35, p. 282, and in Fisker Bladet, Frederiks- 
hald, 1881, No. 4.) Even if this hope should not he realized, much 
would be gained if at least Norway and Sweden could agree upon a 
common ton for herring, so that, in case of necessity, the salters of one 
nation could make use of the tons of the other nation. If we do not 
get a certain fixed measure for herring, and if our salters cannot have 
tons marked by the government officials, there is great danger that 
complaints will come from foreign markets that our tons are too small, 
or that they greatly vary in size, which of course will not raise the 
reputation of the Swedish herring. As it is evident that a new regu- 
lation regarding a certain legally fixed capacity of the tons cannot be 
made until sufficient time has elapsed to use up the old tons, it will be 
seen that the matter brooks no delay. 

As our great Bohus-lin herring fisheries, in all probability, will not 
continue for a very long period, it would seem eminently proper and useful 
that the government should cause to be prepared a popular guide, giv- 
ing a full description of everything relating to the great herring indus- 
try in all its branches, for that portion of our people most interested in 
_ this subject, and unable to obtain or read foreign works, and who, con- 
sidering the shortness of the herring period, cannot afford to lose any 
time in experimenting. Such a work should contain drawings of the 
buildings and apparatus used, and should be written in such a style as 
to prove useful, even to a common fisherman. It ought to be clear and 
concise, and based exclusively on the best and most reliable authorities. 
In order to derive the greatest possible profit from the fisheries, salting 


106 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


and smoking ought not to be the only way in which herring are pre- 
pared; but every method in which herring can be prepared for the 
market should be taken into consideration. Not only the refuse result- 
ing from the various ways of preparing herring, but also fish which 
from some cause or other are not fit for food, or which owing to their 
superabundance cannot find a market anywhere, ought to be made use 
of. A work like the one referred to above should therefore also describe 
the different methods of making oil, guano, &c. It is not sufficient, 
however, to learn from the experience of other countries, but technical 
and chemical investigations should be made at the expense of thesgov- 
ernment, so as to extend our experience in this comparatively new field 
of knowledge, and to discover new methods of utilizing the herring. 
Millions of dollars might in this way be saved to our country. It has 
already become evident that the fisheries will have to be limited, owing 
to the lack of a ready market for our produets. The first and foremost 
object should therefore be, not how to increase the fisheries by the intro- 
duction of new implements and methods, but how to extend our markets. 
Competent persons, possessed of the necessary experience, should there- 
fore be enabled to study the whole question in all its bearings, and be 
specially commissioned to aid by their experience in raising the herring 
industry to its proper height. 

As the coast of Bohus-lin, through this new industry, becomes eco- 
nomically of greater importance than hitherto, a more rapid and regular 
postal service becomes a necessity. At present the greater portion of 
the Bohus-liin coast receives mails only twice a week, so that letters 
and papers are old when they reach the addresses; which, of course, 
must have an injurious influence on a growing and constantly extend- 
ing trade. 

The experience of Norway and Scotland has demonstrated in the 
most unmistakable manner, that the herring fisheries urgently require 
a sufficient number of telegraph stations along the coast. Connection 
by telegraph between the best harbors on the coast of Bohus lin and 
the telegraph net of the kingdom is a positive necessity, both for sup- 
plying the fishermen and traders with the latest news as to the weather 
and the fisheries by telegram, and for general business purposes. The 
police telegraph plays an important part in superintending the fisher- 
ies and in keeping good order on the coast; and no fisheries can flour- 
ish without it. Telegrams relating to the fisheries furnish the fishermen 
and the captains of the herring vessels with much needed information 
regarding the places where the herring make their appearance or to 
which they have migrated, and regarding the prices, which are princi- 
pally governed by the quality and quantity of the fish caught, and are 
therefore invaluable to the traders in making their calculations. Tele- 
grams relating to the weather will prove of the greatest usefulness to 
both fishermen and traders by enabling them to estimate their chances 
of success. It will hardly need any proof, that a sufficient number of 


[9] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. LOT 


telegraph stations for sending and receiving simple business telegrams 
of every kind, are absolutely indispensable to the fishermen, the cap- 
tains of vessels, and to tradesmen. In the northern portion of the coast 
there are telegraph stations at Strémstad and Fjellbacka; between these 
two places a new telegraph station should be established at Grebbestad, 
which has become a place of considerable importance as the terminus 
of the proposed new railroad as a port of call for steamships, and as 
a business and watering place. From Grebbestad there should be a tel- 
ephone connection to Hafstenssund, which is an important station tor 
pilots and steamships. In the southern portion of the northern coast 
a new telegraph station should be established at the fishing and steam- 
ship station of Bovallstrand, between Fjellbacka and Sotehufvud, at the 
mouth of the important Bottna jfiord. In the central portion of the 
coast there are telegraph stations at Lysekil, Uddevalla, and Marstrand. 
North of Lysekil a new telegraph station is needed at Kungshamn, 
which is surrounded by quite a number of important fishing stations ; 
is one of the best outer harbors of the province; has a pilot station 
and a light-house, and is passed by all the steamers and sailing vessels 
plying along our coast. The telegraph line to Kungshamn could easiest 
be constructed by continuing the line to Bovallstrand in a southerly 
direction past the fishing station of Hunnebostrand. On the portion of 
the coast between Lysekil and Marstrand, which according to the tes- 
timony of seven centuries has always been the principal seat of the 
herring fisheries, several new stations (4 or 5) are needed, owing to the 
circumstance that the coast-line is broken by the two great islands of 
Orost and Tjérn. For the coast belonging to these islands the follow- 
ing lines of telegraphs would be required: From Uddevalla in a westerly 
direction to the steamship station of Sund-Sandvik, from which place a 
submarine telegraph should go across the narrow sound to the island 
of Vindé, which is connected with Orost; thence the line should be 
continued:in a southerly direction (if possible near to the steamship 
and trading station and watering place Hendn) tothe tavern of Vrdland 
(from which place Toggestad could be reached by a short telephone line); 
at Vrdland the line should branch out in two directions, the western 
passing the post office of Horleby and the Ihleberg station and continu- 
ing to the northern end of Boxviks inlet (whence a private telegraph or 
telephone line might be constructed to the important trading place 
Nosund), and beyond, past the fishing station of Hallen* to the town 
of Mollésund, which of late years has become a place of considerable 
importance as a steamship and fishing station. The eastern branch 
should go from Vrdland in a southerly direction past Varekil and. 
Skopesund to Tjérn, and reach its terminus at Kalfvehamn, which 
is the center of many important fishing stations. In this neighbor- 


4Tf the railroad from Uddevalla to Ellés should not be built, a telegraph or telephone 
line should be constructed from Hallen to Ellés, running in a nor. herly direction past 
the fishing station of Hdllviksstrand, 


108 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


hood there were located, during the great fisheries of the last cen- 
tury, a very considerable number of salting and smoking establish- 
‘ments, among them the largest and best known of the entire province 
(see Handlingar rorande sillfisket, Stockholm, 1843, p. 4). In the north- 
western portion of the coast there should of course be a telegraph sta- 
tion at the terminus (either Hilds or Fiskebdckskil) of the proposed rail- 
road from Uddevalla. On the inner coast there should be a telegraph 
station at Stenungssund, which is an important place both as a fishing 
station and as a watering place. <A telegraph or telephone station 
could, with very little expense, be established at Tjufkil, whence a sub- 
marine cable goes to Marstrand. In the southern portion of the coast 
there are telegraph stations at Gottenburg and on the islands of Brdnné 
and Vinga. For the benefit of the herring fisheries a new telegraph 
station should be established at Juthamn, on the southwestern point of 
the island of Hisingen, which is most favorably located for the herring 
fisheries and the herring trade; lies on the high road for all the steam- 
ers plying along this coast; is the center of a large number of fishing 
stations, and is moreover the terminus of a proposed railroad from 
Gottenburg. The southern part of the south coast has easy access to 
Marstrand or Tjufkil, and the southern part can easily be reached from 
the Lrdnné station. Of the eight new telegraph stations which have 
been proposed in the above, four will probably soon be established, 
viz: Grebbestad, Kungshamn, Mollésund, and Juthamn. 

Of the greatest importance, however, not only for our herring and 
other sea fisheries, but for the welfare of our coast and our whole prov- 
ince will be the establishment of railroad connections between some of 
the most favorably located outer harbors and the railroad system of 
the country. The experience of other countries has clearly shown the 
beneficial influenee of railroads on the sea fisheries; and in proof of this 
assertion we quote the following from one of the most recent and best 
English works on the fisheries, which shows of what great importance 
railroad connections are considered to be, in their relation to the sea 
fisheries. Holdsworth, a man of great experience, after having given a 
brief review of the British fisheries for the last twenty or thirty years, 
says: “The main cause of the great change in our fisheries is the ex- 
tension of our railroad system. At present the cost of carrying fish a 
hundred miles is very trifling, and the railroads, whose lines run along 
the coast, or which from the interior of the county extend to places on 
the coast where fish are landed, have had the good sense to encourage 
the transportation of fish in every possible way, because they saw that 
thereby aregular and profitable carrying trade might be built up. The 
means thus obtained, of bringing a large quantity of fish, whilst they 
are still fresh, into many different markets, and in a condition which 
years ago would have been considered an impossibility, encouraged the 


° BRITISH INDUSTRIES: Sea fisheries by EL. W. H. Holdsworth; Salmon fisheries, by 
Archibald Young. London, 1877, pp. 4, 5. 


[11] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 109 


fishermen to ply their trade with renewed energy. The change has not 
been less noticeable because it has been brought about gradually ; for 
in every case where a railroad has reached the coast the fisheries have in- 
creased, the fishermen have got better pay for their day’s work, and a hitherto 
unknown impetus has been given to the fishing industries.” Instances are 
not wanting where rich sea fisheries have sprung up on coasts, where 
they were formerly unknown, simply by the construction of a railroad to 
a harbor which hitherto had had no connection with the interior of the 
country, or where the condition of the fishermen was miserable to the 
last degree, simply because they could not sell the fish they caught, 
E owing to the lack of proper means of communication. This whole sub- 
ject is well understood in other countries, and in the large and compar- 
atively sparsely settled Dominion of Canada the sea fisheries, which are 
animportant source of revenue to that country, have been very materially 
aided by the construction of railroads, which were needed for the trans- 
portation of fish. The fish commissioners of other countries have in the 
most urgent manner pointed out the great importance of railroads to 
the development of the sea fisheries. Quite recently the Danish fish 
commission has recommended the construction of a number of short 
lines of railroad, which will doubtless—especially if the Swedish rail- 
roads proposed below are not built—cause the larger portion of the great 
Skagerack sea fisheries to pass into the hands of the Danes. The con- 
struction of railroads is a much more efficient means of furthering the 
development of the fisheries than the system of premiums, which was so 
common with us during the eighteenth century and in Scotland during 
the first thirty years of the present century. It should, moreover, not 
be forgotten (and this assertion hardly needs proof) that the increase of 
any fisheries presupposes a corresponding demand for fish and other 
products of the fisheries, and that a higher price for fish will, more than 
anything else, encourage the fishermen in their work, and will enable 
them toemploy improved (and more expensive) apparatus and methods. 
There is not the slightest doubt that the yield of the Bohus-lin fisheries 
could be doubled and trebled, and that the condition of our coast pop- 
ulation would be vastly improved in every respect, if there was proper 
railroad connection with the interior of the country. The Bohus-lin sea 
fisheries would thereby prove of national benefit, and would be able to 
supply the greater portion of Sweden with good and cheap fish. At 
present Sweden imports fish and products of the fisheries tothe amount 
of many millions of crowns per annum. All the fish required by our 
country could be supplied by the Bohus-lan fishermen, and if there 
were proper railroad connection between the interior and the coast of 
Bohus-lin the fish would reach our population in a fresh and healthy 
condition. Withoutsuch railroad connections there is great danger that 
not only our sea fisheries but also our fish trade will, in great part at 
least, pass into the hands of foreigners. It will not do to say that 
Bohus-lin, with its comparatively good water communication, needs no 


110 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


railroads, for experience has sufficiently proved that the former can 
never replace the latter; for which reason railroad lines have been 
constructed to most of the fishing stations on the east coast of Scotland, 
a country which, especially in the northern portions, is but sparsely 
populated and by no means wealthy; and this has been done in spite 
of the fact that navigation there is never (as is the case with us) im- 
peded by ice. The Scotch sea fisheries have, through these railroads, 
increased in the most wonderful manner; and they must certainly be 
considered as the principal cause of the present flourishing condition 
of these fisheries. The first and foremost condition of the well-being 
of the sea fisheries is a well-regulated fish trade, implying a rapid and 
regular sale of the fish soon after they are caught. 

Among the benefits which the herring fisheries in particular will de- 
rive from short lines of railroads connecting the outer harbors with the 
railroad system of the country, we must mention the consequent compe- 
tition, which will keep the price of fresh fish at a profitable height, the 
decrease of the steamship traffic, which is calculated to more or less dis- 
turb the coast fisheries, and the greater ease with which the coast can 
receive the products of agriculture and forestry from the interior of the 
country. As the population of the interior learns to use the herring as 
a regular article of food, the transportation of fresh fish from the coast 
to the cities and towns of the interior will increase correspondingly. 
Such railroads will also serve to concentrate the herring industry and 
cause every kind of business to flourish at the fishing stations; there 
will be better order at these places, more chances than formerly for 
the fishermen to earn a living during that part of the year when there 
is no fishing; and every industry connected with the fisheries, and trade 
and navigation in general, will flourish more, and whenever the fishing 
period comes to an end the railroads will, more than anything else, 
tend to compensate the population for the losses which such an event 
will cause. 

As the experience of former fishing periods has shown that rich her- 
ring fisheries are apt to injure to some extent the agricultural interests 
of our province, it will be evident that this could be, to a considerable: 
degree at least, counteracted by constructing the lines of railroad in 
such direction as will prove useful to agriculture, which, after all, is the 
principal source of revenue not only of our province, but also of the 
entire kingdom. Another benefit would accrue to our people if these 
lines of railroad were constructed in such a manner as to unite as much 
as possible the widely-separated districts of our province, and to create 
a livelier intercourse not only between these districts, but also between 
the province of Bohus-liin and the rest of Sweden. <All these objects 
would be reached by the construction of the railroads proposed, all of 
which should have the same gauge as the other Swedish railroads. 

The proposed lines of railroad would also prove a benefit to the in- 
terior of Sweden by furnishing a way for importing the products of for- 


[13] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. ng ID 


eign countries, and exporting Swedish products directly to and from the 
interior by way of well-located outer harbors. These railroads would, 
especially if the gauge of the line Uddevalla- Venersborg-Herrljunga is 
changed to the normal Swedish gauge, prove of immense benefit not 
only to trade industry, but also for the defense of the country by greatly 
facilitating the connection between Sweden and Norway west of Lake 
Venern. 

In examining the different plans, special attention should be paid to 
the length of the proposed lines of railroad, the technical conditions, the 
cost of construction, the prospects of answering the purpose in view, 
and of paying, to the requirements of the sea fisheries, the coast, the 
province, and the whole country, and finally to the construction of such 
lines as will most successfully work together with the rest of the rail- 
roads of the country. In determining the termini of such lines of rail- 
road regard should be had to the location of the harbors, as to their 
nearness to a large number of fishing stations, to already existing rail- 
roads, to the number of fish consumers at home, to their being unob- 
structed by ice during winter, to their capacity, entrance, &c. The ex- 
perience of other countries, especially Great Britain, teaches us that the 
trade in fresh sea fish demands outer harbors, connected with the rest 
of the country by railroads, whose water (even at the surface) is so 
salty all the year round that large sea fish, as well as lobsters and oysters, 
may be kept alive in inclosed waters. It is well known that Gottenburg 
and the harbors near the mouth of the Géta River are just as inconven- 
iently located for this branch of the fish trade as London and its outer 
harbors on the Thames. The same applies, though in a less degree, to 
Stromstad and Uddevalla. Taking all these conditions into considera- 
tion, it will be seen that the two lines of railroad which will best an- 
swer all reasonable purposes are the following: 

(1.) Aline from Uddevalla, past Herrestad and Qvistrum, to Grebbestad- 
Krossekdérr (with a branch line to the southern point of the Sannds fiord 
in case the projected canal between that point and Kyrossekdrrshamn is 
not constructed) ; and 
' (2.) A branch line from Herrestad either to Fiskebdkskil or (and this 
would be preferable) to Hlés. 

The first line would be about 60 to 65 kilometers in length, and the 
last 32 to 35; therefore, both together, about 100 kilometers, a length 
which cannot be considered excessive, in view of the fact that Bohus- 
lin, one of the most densely-populated provinces of the country in pro- 
portion to its extent, and at the same time one of the most fertile, has 
so far had but little benefit from the most important means of commu- 
nication of our times, the length of the Bohus-liin railroads being less 
than that of any other provinces of the kingdom, with the exception of 
Norrbotten and Vesterbotten. The Economical Association of Bohus-liin 
has furnished the means_for a preliminary survey of both lines. 

The terminus near the sea of the first-mentioned line (@rebbestad-Krosse- 


112 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


kérrshamn) has by competent authorities (see the pamphlet, ‘‘ Om den 
stora bergslagsbanan,” Stockholm, 1870, p. 45 to 47) been determined as 
follows: ‘Requested by the commission for the proposed railroad Falun- 
Krossekérr to give an opinion as to the most suitable terminus on the 
coast of said railroad, we have carefully examined the most recent maps 
of this coast prepared by the Coast Survey, the hydrographic descrip- 
tions of the same, and other documents relating to the subject, and give 
it as our opinion that the harbor of Grebbestad and the harbor of Kvrosse- 
kdrr, close to it, the latter a winter harbor for those vessels which dur- 
ing the period when the former harbor is full of ice cannot come close 
to the coast, are the most suitable points for the purpose in view.” 


The reasons for our opinion are as follows: 


“The harbor of Grebbestad is completely sheltered from the sea; its 
depth varies between 4 fathoms in the inner to 11 fathoms in the outer 
portion; it is of easy access from the sea from the north, west, and south, 
and can, if light-houses are erected in suitable places, be safely entered 
and navigated even at night-time; it is so near to the sea that there is 
perfectly safe anchorage half a nautical mile from the outer coast, and 
that the innermost portion of said harbor is hardly more thar one nau- 
tical mile from the outer coast-line; it is very spacious and has conven- 
ient anchorage for a large number of vessels, which here are thoroughly 
protected from the fury of the sea; it offers every facility for construet- 
ing extensive embankments, close to which the largest vessels may safely 
ride at anchor; and it possesses all the above-mentioned advantages to 
a higher degree than any other harbor on that coast. The harbor of 
Grebbestad is located on the south and southeastern side of the peninsula, 
on whose western side is the harbor of Krossekdrr, the distance between 
the two being hardly more than halfa nautical mile. United by acanal, 
sheltered from the sea, these two harbors may practically be considered 
as one, and the entrance to them from the sea is only half a nautical mile 
distant. This entrance will be perfectly safe by placing buoys and marks 
in proper places. From reports by the commission for the Falun-Krosse- 
kérr railroad and the naval officers of the squadron which visited this 
coast last summer it appears that even during severe winter weather 
the Krossekdrr harbor remains entirely free from ice. This is a great ad- 
vantage, for during the period when the Grebbestad harbor is frozen the 
near Krossekidrr harbor may be used as a winter harbor for the compara- 
tively small number of vessels which during the winter months keep up 
trade connections with the North Sea. 

“The Krossekdrr harbor offers nearly the same advantages of depth 
and protection from the sea; but it is smaller, and can, therefore, not 
give shelter to as many vessels, although, in our opinion, its capacity 
is amply sufficient for any vessels that may enter it during winter, 

“Tf compared with the harbor of Strémstad, we find that the harbor 
of Grebbestad has the advantages of being of easier access from the sea 


[15] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 113 


and being larger, so that, for the additional reason that the neighbor- 
ing harbor of Krossckdrr remains free from ice, we must decidedly give 
the preference to the harbors of Grebbestad and Krossekdrr above that 
of Strémstad. 
“Stockholm, January 9, 1871. 
TH. ARVIDSSON. 
FING. v. SYDOW.” 


The importance of the railroad Uddevalla-Grebbestad-Krossekarr to 
northern portion of Bohus-liin will appear from the following extract from 
the report adopted by the Bohus-lin Economical Association at its last 
annual meeting: ‘“‘A glance at the map will show at once that the coast 
of Bohus-lin is divided in two portions by the Soten inlet, which is en- 
tirely open towards the sea; the northern of which, owing to its insuf- 
ficient means of communication, is in its development far behind the 
southern. On the coast north of the Soten inlet Grebbestad is undoubt- 
edly the most central and convenient place for the terminus of a rail- 
road, and a railroad extending to that harbor was already under con- 
templation when the construction of the Bergslagernas railroad was first 
discussed. Grebbestad has a most convenient and advantageous loca- 
tion not only with regard to navigation, but also with regard to the 
seq fisheries; and there is no doubt that if the contemplated railroad 
is constructed, Grebbestad will become a great center for the fish trade. 
Northwest of Grebbestad is Koster; southwest, Vader; and west, the 
so-called Pers-grounds, all places which are exceedingly rich in fish, and 
which are specially adapted to winter fishing, to bank-fishing, and to. 
great sea-fisheries, all of which could here be carried on to great advan- 
tage, provided they would receive the much-needed impetus which a 
railroad would give. A railroad from Grebbestad to Uddevalla, besides 
connecting the central point of the northern coast with the railroad 
system of the country, would benefit not only the coast, but also the 
entire northern portion of the province of Bohus-lin, as it would bring 
into closer connection all the widely-separated divisions of the province. 
The proposed railroad, the greater portion of which has been surveyed 
at the expense of the association, would be identical (for a considerable 
portion) with a line which doubtless will sooner or later have to be con- 
structed along the entire length of the province, and from which short 
branch lines in both directions could easily be constructed.” It must 
also be taken into consideration that, in all probability, the northern 
coast of Bohus-liin, after having become properly connected with the 
natural center of the province, will develop its herring fisheries more 
than is possible now, owing to its remoteness from the principal city of 
the province. 

As regards the end-points of the other line which has been proposed, 
viz, either Fiskebdckskil or Ellés, both located in the western district of 
Orost, it mast be remarked that there are no other suitable harbors near 

S. Mis. 29-8 


114 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


the starting-point of the line at Uddevalla, where connection should be 
made with the railroad system of the country; and that the above-men- 
tioned harbors, as will be seen from the Coast Survey maps, possess in the 
highest degree all those advantages which are required. Nor is there 
any outer harbor on the central coast of Bohus-lin to which a railroad 
might be constructed, which, in point of space, depth, accessiblility, &c., 
could compete with them (with the possible exception of Krdaksunds har- 
bor, in the western district of Orost, which, however, is farther from Udde- 
valla. Both harbors being desirable, mere excellence cannot decide which 
of the two shall be chosen. The harbor of Hllés, which is one of the most 
spacious harbors in the kingdom, offers special advantages, because if 
the railroad terminates there it would not only become of great impor- 
tance in a military point of view in connection with our system of coast 
defenses, but it would also get all the local trade of the populous and 
fertile island of Orost. The two above-mentioned harbors are centrally 
located both as regards the middle portion of the coast of Bohus-lan, 
and the entire coast of the province. They are surrounded by the most 
important fishing stations of the province, and are located near a por- 
tion of the sea which for seven centuries has during the herring period 
been justly considered as one of the most important fishing waters. 
They are particularly adapted to act as outer harbors for a great por- 
tion of central Sweden, both for the import and export trade. In yiew 
of the fact that the watering places on the coast of Bohus-lin are annu- 
ally visited by a large number of people, and that many steamships ply 
along this coast, the connecting of one of these outer harbors with the 
railroad system of the country will prove another inestimable advantage. 
None of the other lines of railroad which have been proposed offer any 
such advantages, both as regards the sea fisheries and navigation and 
trade, as a line ending either at Ellés or Piskebdckskil, and we must re- 
peat it, that the construction of such a line is absolutely necessary if the sea 
Jisheries on the middle portion of the Bohus-lin coast are to reach the high- 
est possible degree of profitableness. 

As regards other measures tending to encourage the herring industry 
we must mention, in conclusion, the great necessity for some sort of 
manual giving all the different methods of preparing herring. Many 
a person is afraid to go into the herring industry, simply because he 
fears that his ignorance of suitable methods of preparing herring will 
cause losses, and in the light of the experience of the year 1878 such a 
fear is not entirely unfounded. Although the compiling and publish- 
ing of such a manual may be attended with many difficulties, the idea 
ought certainly to be carried out as soon as possible. The official 
reports of our consuls in foreign countries, and extracts from the reports 
of other governments, would furnish much valuable material. Special 
attention should be paid to everything in such reports which is calculated 
to throw light on the reasons why many of our competitors succeed in 
keeping Swedish herring out of foreign markets. Reports on the her- 


[17] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 115 


ring fisheries and the herring trade should from time to time be published 
in a number of our newspapers having a large circulation. This should 
be done at government expense, and there is no reason to doubt that 
the effect would be very beneficial to our herring industries. Proper 
measures should be taken by our authorities to prevent the exportation 
to foreign countries of an inferior article, for a few mistakes in this 
direction may prove fatal to the.entire export trade. The herring trade 
will also be greatly encouraged by furnishing our outer harbor with all 
the conveniences belonging to first-class ports, and by granting certain 
customs privileges to ships bringing articles necessary for the herring 
industry, or taking the products of these industries to foreign countries. 
The desire for such privileges has been repeatedly expressed even dur- 
ing the eighteenth century. 

Any measures taken by the government should aim at lessening the 
disadvantages which accompany the fisheries, and which make them- 
selves felt at the close of the fishing period. This object will, amongst 
the rest, be reached by (1) developing the fishing industry in such a 
direction as to combine the most profitable financial results with the 
least possible sinking of capital, and to limit the number of persons 
engaged in said industry; (2) by concentrating this industry as much 
as practicable in a small number of favorably located ports; (3) by 
limiting the sale of liquor during the fishing season, and by issuing all 
the necessary rules and regulations, and by entrusting the maintenance 
of law and order to an efficient coast police; (4) by extending and 
encouraging the activity of churches and schools; (5) by establishing 
savings banks, insurance and other beneficial associations; (6) by encour- 
aging, as\much as possible, the various industries connected with the 
herring fisheries, e. g. the other sea fisheries and navigation; (7) by 
establishing new and better means of communication, and by encour- 
aging agriculture and all industries throughout the province. It is 
well known from former herring periods how much the slow financial 
development of the province was disturbed by the rich herring fisheries, 
and that drunkenness and immorality, fostered by the great ease with 
which money was made during the fishing season, finally caused poverty 
and suffering among the lower and middle classes of our coast popula- 
tion, who had become unfit for any other occupation. Agriculture 
suffered seriously, as labor, which was urgently needed, was drawn 
away to the fisheries during the very time of the year when it could 
hardly be dispensed with for agricultural purposes. The government 
should, therefore, use ail the means in its power to prevent, or at least 
to lessen, the injurious effects of these disadvantages which are insep- 
arably connected with the fisheries. 

It is evident that much will be gained by limiting as far as possible 
the number of persons engaged in the herring industry. It will, under 
all circumstances, be hurtful to the best interests of a people, if a large 
number of persons scattered along a great extent of coast are dependent 


116 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


for their living on, so to speak, accidental and sudden work. This dis- 
advantage makes itself peculiarly felt in a country like ours, where the 
fishermen cannot, when the Bohus-lin fisheries come to an end, move 
to another part of the kingdom and there follow their accustomed avo- 
cation; and where we do not find a population well acquainted with 
the fisheries moving with them from place to place; but where, at the 
beginning of every fishing period, new hands have to be trained. That 
under these circumstances the employment of seines offers great advan- 
tages over drag-nets will not be astonishing. <A single fact will prove 
this assertion, viz, that about 6,000 Bohus-lin seine fishers could, dur- 
ing the most favorable portion of the last herring period, catch more 
fish during one fishery than 47,000 Scotch drag-net fishers during the 
fisheries of an entire year. The value of the Scotch fishing vessels for 
the year 1880 was officially reported at £556,946, and that of the drag- 
nets at £619,012, making a total of £1,175,958; whilst the boats and 
the apparatus of our Bohus-lin fishermen during the same period were 
hardly worth more than about £40,000 to £50,000. As our fisheries 
positively come to an end after a certain number of years, it is highly 
important that the number of men who, by such an event, are suddenly 
deprived of their means of earning a living should be as limited as pos- 
sible; and that the capital invested in boats, apparatus, &c., should be 
as small as possible. In judging of this matter, one should not be led 
astray by the childish and utopian proposition, showing anything but 
knowledge of the subject, that our fishermen should, after generally adopt- 
ing the drag-nets for fishing on our coast, follow the herring in their mi- 
grations, and, if necessary, be ready at once to engage in the so-called 
great fisheries in the North Sea according to the Dutch method. The 
above-mentioned nets, which require boats specially adapted to them, 
are not suited to our circumstances and our remote location.  -Wher- 
ever they have been introduced, sometimes at a great expense, eé. g., in 
other parts of Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and Germany, they have not 
led to any desirable results as far as the herring fisheries are concerned. 
From this reason it will be advantageous if the sale of fresh fish in our 
own country could be encouraged as much as possible; and if the re- 
maining portion of the fish could be prepared for the market by employ- 
ing as few persons as possible in this process. Our herring industry 
during the eighteenth century had a great advantage in this respect 
over that of the sixteenth century; for the manufacture of oil required 
a much smaller number of persons than the salting and smoking of the 
herring. Another inconvenience is occasioned by the circumstance 
that since Bohus-liin has been united with Sweden we have no longer a 
sufficiently large population which is thoroughly acquainted with the 
process of salting herring. This is another reason for making the 
chemical and technical investigations above referred to, viz, that of 
finding out the most approved methods of deriving the proper benefit 
from the large quantity of herring caught, by preparing them in other . 
ways besides salting. 


{19] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 117 


As has been said, the herring industry would be greatly benefited if 
it could be concentrated in a limited number of favorably located ports, 
which would gradually assume the importance of cities or towns, as 
has been the case in Scotland, where in this manner many of the in- 
conveniences were avoided which followed our great fisheries in the six- 
teenth and eighteenth centuries. The advantages of such a concentra- 
tion, both as regards the keeping of good order in the fishing stations, 
and the gradual building up of industries connected with or springing 
from the herring fisheries, which at the close of a herring period will 
furnish a means of gaining a living to our coast population, is so self-evi- 
dent that it does not need further proof. It is not so clear, however, in 
what way such a concentration shall be brought about. To do so by 
forcible means, as in olden times, is at present out of the question; a good 
deal, however, might be accomplished by granting special rights and 
privileges to the most favorably located ports, and by introducing vari- 
ous improvements, such as establishing telegraph stations, building 
embankments, improving the harbors, reducing the customs duties, &c. 
The most important means of reaching the object in view, but which of 
course will only apply to a small number of places, is the construction 
of railroads connecting such parts with the rest of the country, espe- 
cially if thereby a regular trade in fresh fish can be builtup. Itis more 
than a mere conjecture that a town will spring up at such a port, and 
that, if it is judiciously selected, the fishing industries of that whole 
neighborhood will be concentrated there. In selecting a place for build- 
ing salt-houses and other establishments needed for the herring industry, 
care Should be had to find a place where there are telegraph post, steam- 
ship, railroad, and custom-house stations, and suitable dwellings for the 
workmen, from the same reason that people move into cities to follow 
various trades and industries, in spite of the fact that ground costs a 
great deal more there than in the country. If the herring industries 
could be concentrated in the way indicated above, and if new towns 
could be made to rise on our coast, the present herring period would 
leave a lasting memento behind it, and would be forever memorable in 
the history of Bohus-lin. 

It will be evident that so vast and so peculiar an industry as our peri- 
odical herring fisheries cannot be properly regulated by our existing 
laws, which all apply to normal and not to extraordinary conditions, 
Exceptional cases demand exceptional legislation; amongst the rest 
with regard to the vice of drunkenness, which during the last herring 
period prevailed to such an alarming extent. There is urgent need to 
limit the right of selling liquor on the coast during the fishing season. 
Proper regulations as regards the maintenance of good order, the ap- 
pointment of vigilant and energetic police officers and inspectors, will, 
as the fisheries continue to grow in importance, also prove of incalcula- 
ble benefit. 

No one will deny that the influence of churches and schools is indis- 


118 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. — [20] 


pensable to the proper development of our coast; and this influence 
will be heightened by concentrating the herring industry in a compara- 
tively small number of favorably located ports, where churches and 
schools would give to the young growing up during the great fishing 
period an education which would fit them to successfully grapple with 
the difficulties which will doubtless confront them at the close of the 
herring period. The school of navigation at Stromstad, a place which 
has never played an important part in the history of our herring fish- 
eries, should be moved to a more central location—central not only with 
regard to its geographical location on our coast, but also with regard to 
the herring fisheries. The high school for farmers at Tyft, founded and 
’ richly endowed by the late mayor of Lund, Mr. L. Billstrém, and which 
is located near to one of the principal places where herring fisheries are 
carried on, might easily arrange its course of instruction in such a man- 
ner as to give to our coast population a suitable education beyond that 
which they receive in the elementary and intermediate schools. The 
establishment of technical schools where the young people could be in- 
structed in various trades should also be encouraged. 

Savings banks and loan institutions, where the fishermen could de- 
posit their savings, and where they could borrow the necessary money 
for fitting out boats and buying apparatus, would also prove highly 
beneficial, as they would tend to free the fishermen from the cruel 
clutches of usurers. The founding of life insurance and mutual benefit 
associations among our coast population would aid in avoiding much 
trouble, and would make the future brighter and more promising to our 
fishermen. In order that such institutions may do the greatest possi- 
ble good, it would be well for the government to publish in pamphlet 
form an account of their working in other countries. 

One of the principal causes of the misfortunes which followed the 
close of our last great herring period, must be found in the circum- 
stance that the persons engaged in the herring fisheries made these fish- 
eries the only and exclusive source of their living; and when the herring 
left our coast, and our fishermen could not follow them, the natural 
consequence was great and general suffering among the coast popula- 
tion. One of the first duties of the hour is, therefore, to prevent the re- 
currence of such misfortunes at the end of the present herring period, 
and in the above various hints have been given as to the best way in 
which this should be done. We must once more point out in this con- 
nection the great importance of the railroads which have been proposed, 
as thereby an undoubted impetus will be given to the deep sea fisheries, 
whose continuance at all times, at least on the middle and northern 
coast, is sufficiently guaranteed. If by a judicious concentration of the 
herring industry new towns are established on the coast, many other 
industries will spring up, through which the fishermen can earn a liv- 
ing during that part of the year when the herring are away from the 
coast, and which at the close of a herring period will in some manner 


[21] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 119 


compensate them for the losses which such an event will cause even 
under the most favorable circumstances. 

It is well known that during the herring periods agriculture was 
sadly neglected in Bohus-lin; but this undoubted evil would be greatly 
lessened, if not altogether remedied, by opening new ways of communica- 
tion, which would benefit not only the fisheries but also the agricultural 
interests, and by concentrating the herring industry in a limited num- 
ber of towns, which would become good markets for agricultural pro- 
duce. As agriculture advances, it will be better able than hitherto to 
compete with the herring fisheries in engaging labor. Much of the re- 
fuse from the herring industry could be utilized in agriculture to a much 
higher degree than is the case at the present time; and a great deal 
might be accomplished in this direction if the government would make 
investigations and experiments relative to this matter, and publish the 
results. 

The importance of the above considerations should not be underrated for 
the reason that none of those evils which beset the fisheries during the last 
century have as yet made their appearance; for they can hardly be loooked 
for until the herring fisheries have in the course of years reached a high 
degree of development. 

As in the above I have only mentioned such measures whose bene- 
ficial influence cannot be doubted, and which would prove beneficial! to 
other industries after the close of the herring period, I feel convinced 
that they will receive the attention which they deserve. 

Tjérn, December 12, 1881. 

AXEL VILHELM LJUNGMAN. 


APPENDIX. 
ip 
ATTEMPTS TO CATCH HERRING WITH DRAG-NETS. 


To the Council of State and the Chief of the Department of the Interior : 
In reply to a request by telegram of the 9th instant, to give my opin- 
ion as to the desirability and practicability of attempts to catch herring 
in the Skagerack with drag-nets, with the view of increasing our knowl- 
edge of the herring, and as to the benefit such attempts would confer 
onthe Bohus-liin herring fisheries, I have the honor to report as follows :® 
(1.) The importance to science and industry of attempts with drag-nets.— 


6The great haste with which this report had to be drawn up, under the most unfa- 
vorable circumstances, must serve as an excuse for its fragmentary character. The 
same subje@ has been treated more fully in the article in the Gottenburg Handels-och 
Sjofarts-Tidning, referred to below. 


120 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


Attempts with drag-nets in the Skagerack have several times been 
proposed and actually made, partly with the view of thereby increas- 
ing our knowledge of the course and migrations of the herrings, and 
partly to ascertain whether the number of herring was large enough 
to warrant the establishment of drag-net fisheries. Owing to the lim- 
ited extent of these experiments and the unsatisfactory apparatus with 
which they had to be made, they have not led to the desired result. It 
will however, even in spite of these failures, hardly need any proof 
that such experiments, made with drag-nets and other fishing appa- 
ratus, are indispensable for gaining a more satisfactory knowledge of 
the nature of the herring and more especially of its course and migra- 
tion. In view of the great expectations which have been raised by the 
rich herring fisheries of the present winter, and in view of the hopes 
that they may prove the beginning of another great herring period, 
such experiments should be made on a large scale, in order, first, to gain 
some more certain knowledge relative to the future migrations of the 
herring from our coasts,’ and to the portion of the sea which they visit 
after leaving our coasts, more especially whether they go into the North 
Sea; and second, to ascertain late in summer or in autumn whether a large 
number of herring are approaching our coast. This second object is of 
course the more important of the two to our fishermen, as they need to 
be apprised of such an event in good time; and as it occurs later in the 
season, it will allow of making all the necessary preparations; attempts 
with drag-nets might also finally lead to the establishment of drag-net 
fisheries, if it should be proved that such fisheries can be carried on to 
advantage. 

(2.) Haperiments with drag-nets.—With regard to the experiments with 
drag-nets, special attention should be given to time and place of such 
experiments, to the quality of the boats and nets, and to their extent 
and probable benefit to science. 

As to the time when such experiments should be made, spring and 
early summer will not yield many practical results. During spring our 
own coast herring spawn near the coast, and in the early part of sum- 
mer mackerel fisheries are carried on with drag-nets. The latter part 
of summer and autumn, on the other hand, will doubtless, as far as 
the Skagerack is concerned, be the most suitable time for searching 
after herring. If, moreover, the present winter fisheries should prove 
the beginning of another great herring period, the approach of the her- 
ring would have to be looked for, at the latest, about the end of No- 
_vember. During winter, herring are most plentiful off our coast, and 
sometimes in close proximity to it; but the winter season with its dark- 
ness, its frequent fogs and violent storms and the consequent dangers 
to navigation, will render drag-net fisheries in the Skagerack (at least 


7The herrings which at present are still found near the coast in large numbers 
may, after ashort time, go out to sea again. 


{23] © THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 121 


on a large scale) difficult, and probably practically impossible. It must 
be remembered that drag-net fisheries must be carried on at night, as 
during daytime the herring do not go into the nets. 

As regards the proper place for such experiments, it would not be ad- 
visable to confine oneself to that portion of the Skagerack which is near- 
est to the coast of Bohus-lan ; but these experiments should be extended 
to more distant portions of the Skagerack and to the adjoining portions 
of the North Sea and the Kattegat. 

As regards the quality of the boats and nets, our Bohus-lin macke- 
rel boats will be well adapted to the purpose’ during the mild season, 
whilst for winter stronger and more comfortable boats, such as are 
used by the Yarmouth fishermen, are required. Suitable nets can be 
ordered in England. The proposition, which has been made several 
times, to employ Swedish drag-nets and boats from our southern prov- 
inces (Skdne and Blekinge) shows an utter ignorance of the subject. The 
net must correspond to the capacity of the boat; and the open boats 
used by our Skane and Blekinge fishermen, adapted as they are to the 
waters where they are used, are too weak for the Skagerack with its 
waves and violent storms. 

As regards the extent and the benefit to science of the experiments 
with drag-nets, it is evident that, if they are to yield any valuable 
results, they must be made by a number of boats, properly superintended 
and continued for a number of years. The experiments made with 
Dutch, Scotch, and German herring boats, with the view of gaining a 
more extended knowledge of the herring and its habits, have shown 
very clearly that no great results may be looked for from experiments 
made with one or only afew boats, manned with sailors who are entirely 
unacquainted with the peculiarities of the Skagerack. In order to gain 
more rapid results and to save labor, as also to better superintend the 
experiments, a Steamship would be exceedingly useful. 

(3.) The introduction of drag-nets as one of the apparatus for catching 
herring in the Skagerack.—lf drag-net fisheries in the open sea are to 
be made profitable there is required (1) that an even and good kind of 
herring, which, both fresh and prepared, can fetch a sufficient price to 
pay the great expenses of such fisheries, shall come regularly and plenti- 
fully during a considerable portion of the year; (2) that the fishermen 


*Herring fisheries carried on in the open sea during winter with drag-nets have 
not flourished in any place where they were introduced. See O. N. LOBERG: Nor- 
ges Fiskerier, Christiania, 1864, p. 36.—Report by the Commissioners of the Fishery Board, 
Scotland, of their proceedings in the year ended December 31, 1880, Ediuburgh, 1881, p. 4; 
“The winter herring fishery did not contribute much to the returns of the year. A 
herring fishery can never be prosecuted at that season upon the outer coasts of Scot- 
land, except at intervals, the frequent severity of the weather preventing it.” 

®As also for the fisheries in the few fiords on our coast where it can be done. See 
C. U. Exstrim: Praktisk afhandling om limpligaste sdttet att fiska sill, torsk, ldnga, 
makrill, hummer och ostron ;” Stockholm, 1845, pp. 98, 99, and A. V. LruNGMAN: ‘‘ Prelimi- 
ndr berittelse for 1873-74, dfver de betrdffande sillen och sillfisket vid Sveriges vestkust an- 
atilda undersikningarna. Upsala, 1874, pp. 68, 69. 


122 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


should be men of skill and experience; (3) that the conditions as to 
season, weather, current, &c., should be favorable; and (4) that the fish 
can at all times find a ready market. 

As regards the first condition, it is hardly probable that it can be 
fulfilled except during a new great herring period, for herring of a 
really superior quality have, so far, at least, only been noticed in com- 
paratively small numbers near our coast; the second condition will 
doubtless be fulfilled gradually, if the herring come in large numbers 
and the fisheries consequently become more extensive. The conditions 
as to season, weather, current, &c., will hardly be favorable with us, as 
at present the herring approach our coast in large numbers during the 
winter season.'© As regards a ready market, there would be no great 
difficulty, as the Swedish-Norwegian railroads, and, in a still higher 
degree, the Jutland railroads offer considerable facilities for bringing the 
herring into the markets of Norway, Denmark, and Germany, both 
fresh and slightly salted; and as a really good and well prepared article 
will, though gradually, gain for itself the place which it deserves. Under 
the present circumstances, however, when herring of really superior 
quality are comparatively scarce on our coast, the general introduction 
of the drag-net in our fisheries will (as I have said in my preliminary 
report on the scientific investigations of 187374) hardly be advisable." 

(4.) The employment of drag-nets during a possible herring period.—If, 
however, our so-called “old” north-sea herrings should again, as in 
former times, visit the Skagerack for a longer period, it will be evident 
that the first and foremost condition of successful drag-net fisheries—viz, 
large numbers of herring coming near the coast—would be fulfilled. But 
this by no means implies that these fisheries (with drag-nets) would be 
profitable or desirable for Sweden. On our coast other apparatus will al- 
ways be more or Jess employed, and will yield the by far greater portion 
of all the herring caught in our waters, and, therefore principally deter- 
mine the price of Bohus-lin herring in the market, and the method to be 
pursued in our herring fisheries and industries. Swedish drag-net fish- 
ers will probably find ruinous rivals in the seine fishers,’ as the expenses 


10This would of course be different if, as was the case during the great herring periods 
of the sixteenth and the eighteenth centuries, the herring came near the coast at the 
end of summer, or in the beginning of autumn, in which case they would also be of 
much better quality. 

See A. V. LJUNGMAN: Om sillsaltning och sillhandel in the Gottenburg Handels- 
och Sjéfarts-Tidning, December 9, 1881. 

2 Which for the present aims at bringing into the market a cheap herring, and pro- 
ducts prepared from such cheap herring. See the Gottenburg Handels-och Sjéfarts- 
Tidning, January 14, 1879. 

13 This also happened during the great fisheries of the eighteenth century, as experi- 
ments with drag-nets on a large scale, though subsidized by the government, did not 
yield a sufficient result to warrant their continuance. The experiments in the Kat- 
tegat were made in autumn, and the principal station for the herring vessels was at 
Kiringo.—See Den Svinska Mercurius, February, 1756, pp. 454-457, 459-460; also Nya 
Handlingar of Kongl. Wetenskaps-och Witterhets-Samhillet, Goteborg, Gottenburg, 1808, 
p. 46. 


[25] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 123 


of these latter are very small as compared with those of the drag-net 
fishers, leaving out of the question the fact that they will have to com- 
bat much greater difficulties and dangers.“ As, moreover, the open sea 
is free to all, drag-net fisheries, if once introduced in the Kattegat, would 
soon be carried on also by the fishermen of other nationalities, who, in most 
cases, could do this under more favorable circumstances than we. Den- 
mark is much more favorably located in this respect than Bohus-lan, and 
those nations whose herring already enjoy a high reputation in the 
great markets of the world, and who have the most experienced and 
skilled fishermen, will certainly, if drag-net fisheries are introduced in 
the Skagerack, soon outstrip us in the race. They will suffer much less 
than our own drag-net fishermen from competition with the herring 
caught near the coast, which, as far as our Bohus-lin fisheries are con- 
cerned, will (during a herring period) naturally determine the yeputa- 
tion of the herring.’ The Bohus-lin herring, no matter whether they 
are caught with nets or seines, will most assuredly only gain the repu- 
tation of a second-rate article; for if the fisheries on our coast yield an 
exceptionally large number of herring, people will not be careful in pre- 
paring them; and with coast-fisheries like ours the exportation of badly 
salted and prepared herring would hardly occur in any large quantities 
or for any length of time,!® as our herring would very soon lose their 
reputation, all the more as the other nations who participated in these 
fisheries with us would doubtless find it to their advantage to decry 
our goods. 

The meeting in the Skagerack of numerous fishermen of different 
nationalities would also in many other respects cause unpleasantness, 
and if during stormy weather many of the foreign fishermen should be 
compelled to seek shelter in the harbors on our coast it would often be 
extremely difficult to maintain good order. 

Drag-net fisheries would also have this disadvantage for Sweden that 
they would draw a large number of persons from other and far more 
important trades, which would thereby suffer. During the most produc- 
tive periods of our last great herring fisheries of the eighteenth century 
about 6,000 seine fishers caught a much larger number of herring per 
annum than more than 45,000 catch in Scotland at the present time. 

The outfit of the seine fishers is moreover much less expensive. As 
regards the supposed injurious character of the different apparatus, just 
as great, if not greater, objections could be raised against the drag-nets 
as against the large seines. 

The supposed advantages of drag-net fisheries over seine fisheries—viz, 


4See A. V. LJuNGMAN: Silljfiskefrdgan in the Gottenburg Handels-och Sjéfarts-Tid- 
ning, 1879, No. 10. 

%The experience gained during the winter herring-fisheries on the west coast of 
Norway goes to confirm this. 

16See O. N. LésBeRG: Norges Fiskerier, Christiania, 1864, pp. 51-52, 54-55, 63, 65; 
A. V. LaunGMaN: “ Sillfiskefrdgan in the Gottenburg Handels-och Sjéfarts-Tidning,” 
1879, Nos. 10 and 11, January 14 and 15. 


124 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


that they are calculated to educate good seamen, and thereby benefit 
navigation and supply experienced sailors for the navy—are certainly 
exaggerated; and, as the experience of Norway and Great Britain fully 
proves, are by no means real. 


Tjérn, February 12, 1878. 
AXEL VILHELM LJUNGMAN. 


IT. 


THE CARE OF THE SICK ON THE COAST OF BOHUS-LAN DURING THE 
HERRING FISHERIES. 


To the, Committee of the Gottenburg and Bohus-lin provincial parliament 
for regulating the care of the sick in these provinces : 


In view of a notice from the committee, in the papers, the undersigned 
ventures to lay before the members of said committee a plan (in briefest 
outline) for regulating the care of the sick onthe coast of Bohus-lin, more 
especially during the expected great herring fisheries. 

The large number of persons who, during great periodical herring 
fisheries, gather in that portion of the coast where the fisheries are car- 
ried on, the majority of whom are strangers unaccustomed to the mode 
of life and climate of our coast during the cold season, are therefore 
more liable to diseases than the natives. This circumstance certainly 
deserves the attention of our sanitary authorities. It should be borne 
in mind that the number of strangers who visited our coast for a greater 
or less period during the most productive season of the last great — 
herring fisheries is supposed to have been about 50,000 (see Handlingar 
rordnde sillfisket + bohuslinska skdrgdrden, Stockholm, 1843, p. 11). In 
Norway, where, till within about ten years, there have been similar 
large herring fisheries, special physicians were appointed to attend the 
sick on the coast, and sick-houses or hospitals were established at va- 
rious points along the coast. But as the Bohus-lin herring fisheries 
(as far as we can judge from former fishing periods) are mainly car- 
ried on in a much more limited stretch of coast which is more densely 
populated, and where the fisheries therefore are much more concen- 
trated than is the case on the west coast of Norway, the care of the 
sick during the fisheries could with us be easily combined with the 
permanent and general care of the sick on our coast. This might be 
done in the following manner: In the first place, the physicians in the 
sea-ports of the province and in the town of Lysekil should attend to the 
sick in the neighborhood of these places, and new district physicians 
should be appointed for Zjérn and the southwestern coast of Orost, and 
stationed near Kyrkesund (or Hallsbdck). These should only be in- 
creased by one or at most two extra physicians during the fishing sea- 
son, who might be stationed in suitable places on the coast, or on the 


[27] THE GREAT BOHUS-LAN HERRING FISHERIES. 125 


guard vessels which are generally ordered to these waters during that 
season. In the second place, new sick-houses, or at the less important 
fishing stations so-called sick-rooms," should be established, where the 
sick find better care than in their accidental and often narrow and 
inconvenient dwellings. Such sick-houses should be established in 
(1) Grebbestad, (2) Lysekil, (3) Kyrkesund, and (4) Marstrand.™ If 
the fisheries, as was the case during the greater portion of the last her- 
ring period, should principally be carried on on the southern and central 
portions of our coast, a sick-house would be required, at least during the 
fishing season, in some place on our southern coast; the most suit- 
able place for such a sick-house, or at least for a physician during the 
fishing season, would be Kal/sund, or, if a railroad should be constructed 
to the southwestern coast of Hisingen, someplace on that coast.2. The 
sick-bays or rooms in the above-mentioned places could easily be at- 
tended to by the resident physicians for a comparatively small compen- 
sation. 

As the herring fisheries, however, are as yet so little developed, and 
as their future is uncertain, in the beginning only the adoption of such 
measures can come into question as would be of decided benefit and are 
positively demanded by the circumstances. Among such measures we 
must here mention the appointment of a district physician, to be sta- 
tioned at Kyrkesund, and the establishment of sick-rooms near Grebbes- 
tad, Lysekil, Kyrkesund; even the general demand for sick-houses would 
thereby be fully met for a long time to come. An essential condition 
for the carrying out of these measures will be that the expenses are 
kept within reasonable limits, and that the physicians stationed in the 
_respective districts would attend the sick-rooms, so that there would be 
no necessity for appointing special physicians. If, however, the most 
northerly of the proposed sick-rooms should be established, e. g., in 
Fjellbacka or some other place far from any resident district physician, 
it might be necessary to appoint an extra physician. Under all circum- 
stances, however, it should be considered whether the establishing of 
the three above-mentioned sick-rooms would be more advantageous and 
would benefit a larger extent of coast than a larger sick-house with a 
special resident physician in some place between Uddevalla and Strém- 
stad. 

As regards the appointment of an extra district-physician for Tjérn 
and the southwestern coast of Orost (i. e. a district having a population 


17 See C. GRILL: Om sjukvdrden pad landsbygen, Hedemora, 1869. 

18 In case one or severat railroads should be constructed, at whose terminal points 
on the coast the fisheries would naturally be concentrated, these points would also 
be the most suitable places for establishing sick-houses or sick-rooms, or for stationing 
physicians. 

It is to be regretted that, in view of the possibility of great herring fisheries in 
the near future, the quarantine buildings at Kdnsé have not been transferred to the 
coast of Hisingen, as they would have made excellent hospitals during the fishing 
season. 


126 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [28] 


of about 12,000), it would be well to bear in mind how difficult, not to 
say impossible, it would be for one physician alone to attend to the 
wants of so large a district in the proper manner. The experience of 
former physicians stationed in this district tells us that this is well- 
nigh impossible. The neighboring districts have, for this very reason, 
been recently subdivided into smaller districts, and this may very soon 
also become necessary for the district comprising Orost and Tjérn.” 

Tjérn, April 28, 1879. 

AXEL VILHELM LJUNGMAN. 
20In subdividing the provincial district of Orost and Tjérn it becomes indispensable 


that one of the physicians should live near the sea on either island, so that he is just 
as easy of access by sea to the coast population as by land to the inland population. 


VIJ.—REPORT ON THE PRACTICAL AND SCIENTIFIC INVESTI- 
GATIONS OF THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES DURING 
THE YEAR 1880, SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF THE 
INTERIOR, 


By O. S. JENSEN, 
Curator of the Bergen Museum.* 


Having been commissioned by the Department of the Interior to 
make a practical and scientific investigation of the spring herring fish- 
eries, I left Bergen on the 11th of February for Haugesund, and on the 
13th of February arrived at the fishing station of Udsire. Here I re- 
mained till the 9th of March, when I went to Réver to continue some 
investigations of the spawning of the herring. After a short stay at 
Akrehavn and Skudesnees, where I had an opportunity to gather (from 
some experienced fishermen) further information relative to the occur- 
rence and nature of the spring herring during recent years, I returned 
to Bergen on the 20th of March. 

As [I had occasion to be present during the latter portion only of the 
spring herring fisheries, and as during the greater part of my stay the 
weather was unusually stormy, my investigations had necessarily to be 
more imperfect than they would otherwise have been. ‘The seine fish- 
eries, which have been in operation for some years, and which present 
features of special interest to the investigator of the spring herring 
fisheries, were over when I arrived. No fish whatever were caught in 
seines during my stay at the fishing stations, and fishing was only car- 
ried on with stationary nets. During the last two years these fisheries 
have begun to revive, which is a welcome sign that the spring herring 
will again follow their usual course along our coasts. These old fish- 
eries, therefore, promise again to be of considerable importance in our 
own times. <A historical investigation of the occurrence of the her- 
ring, during the last ten years, also brings to light other phenomena, 
indicating that a new period of spring herring fisheries is about to be 
ushered in. 

Since Dr. A. Boeck published his classic work, Om Silden og Silde-jis- 
kerierne (The herring and herring fisheries), in 1871, no work of import- 


*Indberetning | til | Departementet for det Indre | om de i 1880 udforte, | praktisk videns- 
kabelige Underségelser over Vaarsildfisket | af | O. S. Jensen, | Conservator ved Bergens 
Museum. | Christiania, | 1881.—Translated by HERMAN JACOBSON. 127 

[1] 


128 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


ance, at least of a scientific nature, has been published, during the last 
few years, on the history of the spring herring fisheries. Dr. Boeck and 
Prof. G. O. Sars have written articles on certain special features of these 
fisheries, but these articles are far from exhausting their subjects, and, 
moreover, these two scientists have not had occasion to observe these 
features in connection with phenomena which only became known dur- 
ing the last few years, and which enable us to understand the former 
correctly. The herring, during the last ten years and even till quite 
recently, have exhibited the most remarkable changes, which are not 
isolated, but form a continuous development, one stage of which is closely 
connected with the other. These changes have been very rapid, and 
it is only to be regretted that they have not been made the subject of 
scientific investigations. By examining the numerous reports relative 
to the course of the fisheries during the fishing season, and by convers- 
ing with experienced fishermen, whose recollection of all the circum- 
stances was still vivid, I was, however, enabled to obtain a tolerably — 
correct idea of the history of the last ten years’ fisheries, and I shall in 
this report endeavor to present to the reader its most important feat- 
ures. Till the year 1874 I chiefly based my observations on the reports 
of the superintendents of fisheries, which form a most valuable source of 
reliable and unbiased information. One would think that oral reports 
from different parts of the coast would be likewise reliable with regard 
to phenomena which have occurred at 2 comparatively, ¥, ent period 
of time, and relating to a subject w) e a as g experince, ald have 
led the fishermen to examine into civs.,, iz, the greaigr,,or less de- 
gree of maturity in herring, their size, weight, &c. These last-men- 
tioned sources, however, I have used with great caution, and shall for 
the present only refer to them in a general way. 

The development of the spring herring, above referred to, has not yet 
reached its terminal stage. As this development is still going on, it 
may be expected that several of the phenomena which have characterized 
its early stages will occur again, and that therefore by a closer exami- 
nation of sach phenomena more light may be thrown upon the early part 
of this development. 

The very remarkable occurrence of herring in unusually large masses 
during the first years of the last decade has a parallel in the herring 
fisheries of each year. I here refer to the “new herring,” or mixed her- 
ring, which appeared in enormous numbers prior to the arrival of the 
spring herring in 1870, but which also appeared during the following 
years, and whose schools chiefly consisted of so-called “straalsild,” ray 
herring, or “ blodsild,” blood herring. It is a well-known fact that 
these herring appear regularly every year in small numbers, im- 
mediately before the arrival of the spring herring. Here, therefore, 
there still seems to be a chance to make direct observations relative te 
the more important phenomena of the herring fisheries of the last few 
years. 


(3] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 129 


The dependence of the herring on the temperature of the sea, which is a 
most important item in the daily life of the herring, has already formed 
the subject of investigations by Boeck, and it was my intention to con- 
tinue these investigations begun by him. With a Negretti & Zambra’s 
«deep-water thermometer, which, through Professor Mohn’s kindness, was 
loaned me by the Meteorological Institute, I took a number of observa- 
tions of the temperature, but unfortunately these were made too late 
in the season to throw much.light on the course of the herring during 
the present fishing period. These observations, however, furnish results 
relative to the temperature of the sea at different depths, which are 
important for us to know in connection with this whole herring question, 
and which became specially interesting when compared with Boeck’s 
earlier observations. 

The observations of the temperature, and other meteorological inves: 
tigations, made near the coast and with reference to the more or less 
mature spring herring, are of course as yet an incomplete work, and 
the most important question connected with the herring problem, the 
cause of the disappearance of the herring from our coast for years 
at a time, is probably still far from a satisfactory solution. In order to 
ascertain whether the temperatures and currents of the sea are really 
the principal causes of this phenomenon, these meteorological conditions, 
and their influence on the course of the herring, should be observed 


outsideo 98 s-awning ©2a:c> or during summer, when the herring 
are out 1 ©» Upen sea. | vestigation still belongs to the future. 


We do not ven know foi . ¢tain where the herring have their summer 
stations, but only suppose that we know the places where in all proba- 
bility they must be looked for (see Sars’s reports, especially the one for 
1873). The first and most important thing to do would beto go through 
these places with seines, which perhaps would not be very difficult. If 
such an expedition were made whenever a change should take place in 


_ the spring herring fisheries, we would get a good deal nearer to a solu- 


tion of the above-mentioned most important question—the periodical 
disappearance of the herring from our coast. \ 

I shall now proceed to give a brief review of the observations made 
this year, and in doing so I shall have to speak first of the history of 
the spring herring fisheries in recent times, and in connection therewith 
of the present condition of the spring herring; and secondly I shall 
have to add some remarks on the temperature of the sea during the 
fishing season. 

By unceasing and most meritorious labor Boeck has succeeded in 
showing a certain regularity in those changes to which the fisheries 
are subject during a so-called “herring period.”* According to Boeck’s 
investigations, this irregularity principally consists in the circumstance 
that during the first part of a “herring period” the fisheries gradually 


*Although this term is not entirely justified, I will nevertheless employ it in this 
report, as from very good causes it has became quite generally adopted. 


S. Mis. 29 9 


130 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


commence earlier every year, whilst towards the end of the period they 
gradually begin later. With regard to localities, the herring fisheries 
move in a certain direction, thus, e. g—according to Boeck—in Bohus- 
liin and in our southern spring-herring district, in a northerly direction, 
till they reach a point where the fisheries cease. 

Similar changes of a regular character have not only been observed on 
our coast, but also on the coast of Scotland. According to Mr. Winth« r* 
the herring fisheries in the Sound were, durmg the herring period that 
ended in 1875, gradually extended later into the season. In the Great 
Belt a gradual northward movement of the herring has been observed.t 
In France a similar phenomenon is said to have been observed during 
the sardine fisheries, and it therefore seems that these phenomena are 
of a more general character. 

In our southern spring-herring district the following changes as to the 
time of commencement of the fisheries have been observed: In 1808, 
therefore, in the beginning of our last herring period, the fisheries at 
Skudesnes commenced on the 6th February. During the following years 
they gradually commenced earlier, in 1814 on the Ist of February, in 1815 
on the 31st of January, in 1817 on January 30th, and from that time 
on they began in January—the dates varying somewhat—for a long 
number of years. During the years 1844 to 1847 the fisheries commenced 
partly in January and partly in December. From 1848 the first herring 
were regularly caught in December, and this lasted till 1859. From 
1860 the herring again commenced to arrive in January, and in 1869 
the spring-herring fisheries proper did not commence till the 3d February. 
As regards locality, it was observed that during the latter part of the 
“herring period” the herring left their southern spawning places near 
Skudesnes and the Hviting Islands, and gradually moved farther north, 
so that towards the end of the period the principal fisheries were carried 
on near Karmoe. 

The year 1869 was distinguished by the late arrival of the herring, 
and by the fishing stations being far north, as well as by other peculiar 
features. T'rom 1860, when the herring fisheries for the first time dur- 


ing the “ period” commenced late in the season, considerable masses of 
herring came near the coast, and for several years the fisheries were very. 


good. Even as late as 1868 there were exceedingly successful spring 
herring fisheries in the southern district, about 500,000 barrels of fish 
being caught. <A significant change, however, took place in 1869. 
Lieutenant Heyerdahl, the superintendent of the southern district, says: 
“Tt was very generally noticed in the our district that the schools of 
herring were not of the same size as in former years this must have 


*Tidsskrift for Fiskeri, new series, iii, 1. 

tIn the Sound there can hardly be any such movement, as it contains only one favor- 
able spawning place. 

tSee Boeck: Om Silden og Silde-fiskerierne, and the reports of the different superin- 
tendenta. 


[5] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 131 


been the actual fact, unless one supposes that the largest school of 
herring approached the coast in places where there was no one to ob- 
serve them. Even at Udsire, which is a favorite resort of the herring, 
the schools were much smaller than usual.” In reviewing these fisheries 
at the present time, we find that these observations were entirely cor- 
rect. The quality of the herring during that year also goes to corrobo- 
rate them, for during these fisheries an unusual number of small herring 
were caught with the spring herring. Generally these small herring 
only make their appearance after or near the close of the fishing season, 
-and their appearance is always considered as a sign that the schools of 
spring herring are decreasing in size, and are disappearing from the 
coast. This mingling of small herring with the spring herring during 
the fishing season of 1869 has its parallel in the Bohus-lan fishing period, 
which came to a close in 1808, the last years of which likewise distin- 
guished themselves by the frequent mingling of small herring with the 
larger herring. 

From the reports of the superintendents we learn that, in 1869, the 
schools of herring were often followed by large numbers of coal-fish, 
which were often noticed in the very middle of such schools. This was 
the case not only in the southern, but also in the northern district. 
Fishing was very uneven during this year. 

The superintendent of the northern district reports that, in 1869, the 
number of herring which approached the coast was hardly less than 
in former years, and that no small herring were found among the spring 
herring. Soon afterwards, however, the same phenomena undoubtedly 
began to show themselves in the northern district, although they were 
not as closely observed as in the southern district, where the year 1869 
marks the end of the rich spring herring fisheries. Whilst in 1869 
355,000 barrels of fish were caught in the southern district, the spring- 
herring fisheries proper only yielded 55,000 barrels in 1870. Although 
this last-mentioned number is probably too low (see report of the super- 
- intendent for 1871), the fact remains that the yield was much smaller 

than in 1869. In 1870 the first school of herring, composed purely of 
spring herring, were observed on the 20th January, but fishing did not 
commence till the 10th of February, some of this delay, it is true, having 
been caused by unusually stormy weather and heavy seas. The fish- 
eries during this season were short and irregular, and the same was the 
case during the three following years, when only an average quantity of 
14,000 to 15,000 barrels was caught. ‘The herring made their appearance 
sometimes in January and sometimes in February, but it was impossible 
‘to fix the exact date of the arrival of the spring herring, as they were 
very much mixed with ‘new herring,” from which it was difficult to 
distinguish them. (With regard to these herring more will be said.) 
In 1874 the southern spring-herring district only yielded the very 
small quantity of 3,000 barrels. During this and the preceding years 
it was proved in the most convincing manner that the cause of this sud- 


132 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. ~— ~ [6] - 


den and rapid decrease could not possibly be found im any meteorologi- 
cal change which took place near the coast, and which might have pre- 
vented the usual number of herring approaching; but that there was, 
on the whole, no indication that any considerable number of herring 
had come near the coast. In the beginning of the ‘“‘ period” the pros- 
pect seemed very favorable, but these hopes soon vanisted. Thus, in 
1873 and 1874 only few herring were noticed near the coast during the 
months of January and February, when generally the more important 
spring-herring fisheries are going on. The same experience was met with 
at the outermost station of Udsire. As in 1869, so also in 1870, the 
schools of herring were accompanied by an unusually large number of 
coal-fish and cod, both in the southern and in the northern district. The 
same phenomenon was observed in a still more noticeable degree in 
1871, both during and after the fishing season. At present I have no 
data to show to what degree this was observed during the following 
two years. In 1874, however, the superintendent reports that but few 
cod were observed; the schools of herring had also decreased in size 
to such an extent that the cod, the inveterate enemy of the herring, 
had no special inducement to follow the schools. It has been supposed 
that an extraordinary increase in the number of the enemies.of the her- 
ring might be the cause of their disappearance. But there is not suf- 
ficient cause to justify this supposition, and it would at any rate be too 
hasty a conclusion to give this as the principal cause of ae disappear- 
ance of the herring from our coasts. 

The mingling of small herring with the spring herring rapidly as- 
sumed larger dimensions. In 1871 it was considered doubtful whether 
any genuine spring herring were caught; and many experienced fish- 
ermen expressed it as their solemn conviction that no genuine spring 
herring had approached the coast in the southern district during that 
year. From the report of the superintendent it also appears that the 
number of small herring was larger than at any previous time; and 
this was the case both in the northern part of the district, near Bran- 
desund, and in the southern part, near Rover. The average size of the 
Rover herring was determined by ‘standard barrels,” each of which 
held 620 to 680 herring. In 1872 such a barrel comfortably held 660 to 
720 herring, and there is no longer any talk of unmixed spring herring. 
But during all these years, even from the season of 1869-70, other phe- 
nomena were observed, which were followed by an increase of spring 
herring. Of these phenomena I shall have occasion to speak later. 

In the northern district the spring herring approached the coast grad- 
ually, just as in the southern district, towards the end of the last ‘‘her- 
ring period.” From the reports of the superintendents, it appears that 
in 1852, 1853, and 1854 the first herring were caught in December; in 
1855 on the 8th of January; in 1856 on the 15th of January; in 1857 on 
the 13th of January; during the two following years again on the 15th 
of January; in 1860 on the 19th of January, and later always after the 
19th of January. 


[7] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 133- 


As I have already observed, there was hardly any decrease in the 
size of the schools of herring in the northern district, not even at Sdnd- 
more. The total yield in the northern district was 255,000 barrels, and: 
at Séndmore 70,000 barrels. 

In 1870, when the fisheries were short and irregular, the yield went 
down as low as 80,000 barrels in the northern district, whilst at Sond- 
more it probably amounted to 25,000 barrels. The superintendent says 
in his report for 1870: “The meteorological conditions were on the 
whole more favorable than is generally the case, and the almost total 
failure of the fisheries must therefore be ascribed to the small number 
of herring which had approached the coast, although sea birds and 
whales, which are considered sure indicators of the occurrence of her- 
ring, Showed themselves in the same numbers as during previous years.” 

A change was also noticed in the quality of the herring. At Sdénd- 
fiord the herring seem not to have been of such even and good quality 
as at Nordfiord and Séndmoére. I gather these facts partly from the 
reports of the superintendents and partly from other sources to which 
Thad access. It is a significant fact that the mingling of different 
kinds of herring took its beginning in the southern part of the district. 

In 1871 it was reported that the herring were of the least even quality 
near Bueland, the southernmost of our more important fishing stations. 
In the northern part of the district and near Séndmére the herring were 
of the usual good quality. In the northern district 61,000 barrels of fish 
were caught, and at Séndmére 8,000. The yield, however, was smaller 
than it would otherwise have been, on account of storms, the severe cold 
of winter which set in exceptionally early, and other unfavorable cir- 
cumstances. 

What had been already indicated by the uneven size of the herring 
during the preceding years took place in 1872. There were hardly any 
fisheries in the whole southern portion of the northern district as far 
as Bremanger, on the very coast where formerly there had been the 
best fishing in the whole district It also appears that the number of 
herring caught near Froe Island, southwest of Bremanger, was remark- 
ably small, and that the fish were nearly all of small size. In 1871 the 
average number of herring caught near Froe Island was 504 per 
“standard barrel,” whilst in 1872 it was 522. In the other portion of 
the northern district the yield was 62,000 barrels, and near Sdéndmore 
115,000, an unusually good yield for these northern latitudes, princi- 
pally owing to the exceptionally favorable weather. These facts show 
‘that great masses of herring still come to these coasts. In spite, how- 
ever, of the approach of such masses of herring, there seemed to be 
some indications that the same fate awaited these fisheries as the south- 
ern ones, the average number of herring per “standard barrel” being 
540, whilst in 1871 it was 530. This was first observed at Séndfiord, 
therefore at the southernmost point of the district. Herring of the 
same size as those caught in former years could only be counted on 


134 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


with any degree of certainty in the northernmost portion of this coast, 
viz, at Sindmédre. 

In 1873 the average number of herring per standard barrel near Frét 
Tsland was 540. But few herring were caught near that station, and 
no school of any consequence seemed to have approached the coast. The 
prospects south of Bremanger, which during the preceding year had 
been tolerably good, seem certainly to have been far less favorable. 
At Nordfiord the yield was only about 24,000 barrels, although it must 
be taken into consideration that the: conditions were particulary un- 
favorable; no decided decrease in the number of herring could, how- 
ever, be observed. The indications seemed to be that the herring 
would be smaller in size. At Sdndmdére no change in the size of the her- 
ring could be noticed; the yield at this last-mentioned place was only 
6,000 barrels, owing exclusively, however, to the stormy weather. 

In 1874 there was no fishing south of Bremanger or near this island, 
except at Nordfiord. The yield at the latter place was very insignifi- 
cant, viz: only 5,000 barrels. There was a very marked decrease in the 
number ef herring, and their size was very uneven, but on the whole 
smaller than in former years. Now, at last, there were likewise indica- 
tions that the fisheries would come to an end near Séndmodre. In spite 
of the most favorable weather only 8,000 barrels of fish were caught at 
this station, and the herring were decidedly smaller, the average num- 
ber per ‘“‘standard barrel” being 570 to 580 (against 532 in 1872). ’ 

In 1875 there was no fishing whatever north of Bremanger in the Nord- 
jiord. Near Séndmdre it was reported that 3,000 to 4,000 barrels were 
caught to the northwest of Stat. This year must be considered as the 
closing year of the spring-herring fisheries. 

The above brief review of the decline of the spring-herring fisheries 
shows conclusively that also in the northern district and near Séndmore 
the herring disappeared gradually in the direction from south to north, 
the schools decreasing in size from year to year. In the southern dis- 
trict the herring went in a northerly direction, even before the schools 
began to decrease in size. 

The same regular and gradual decrease could be observed not only in 
each individual fishing-district, but all along the coast where the spring- 
herring fisheries were going on. The herring first disappeared in the 
southern district, then in the northern, and finally at Séndmore. After 
the decrease in the size of the schools had set in, it was slower in the 
northern district and at Séndmére. For a considerable time large num- 
bers of herring continued to come near these coasts, and disappeared 
all of a sudden. The average size of the herring also continued to be 
larger,* and their quality was on the whole better. These phenomenon 


*The fact that the herring in the northern district and at Séndmére were larger than 
those of the southern district, not only during the period when they decreased in num- 
bers, but as a generalrule, is—according to Léberg—caused by the circumstance that in 
the first mentioned districts nets with larger meshes are used (See LOBERG: Norges 
Fiskerier, 1864, p. 47). This assertion, however, needs further examination. 


[9] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 135 


must of course be in some way connected with each other, and doubt- 
less depend on the circumstance that the herring go farther north. 

As to time, the spring herring came—as has been said above—later 
and later towards the end of the period; and this phenomenon was the 
same in both districts. Another circumstance, relative to the spring 
fisheries along our entire coast, likewise deserves to be mentioned here, 
when the spring herring commenced to come later and later in the sea- 
son, they were first seen in the southern district, then in the northern, 
and finally, somewhat later at Séndmére, which order of time probably 
depends on the geographical location of the different districts, and cor- 
responds to the order of place which the spring herring observed when 
gradually disappearing from our coasts. 

With regard to the great herring fisheries we can, to some extent at 
least, observe the same regularity as in the spring-herring fisheries.* 
It is a well known fact that the great herring commenced to appear 
near our coasts in 1861, when large schools of them were observed off 
the northern and western coasts of the Lofoden Islands and Vesteraalen. 
In the beginning, however, they kept at a distance of several miles from 
the coast, and only approached it in rare cases to within a distance, 
which enabled the fishermen to catch some. Gradually they were mov- 
ing farther south. In 1863 they appeared north of Helgeland, near 
Threnen ou the Island of Lwrd, and to some extent also near the Myk 
Islands and near Rédd. In 1864 they were observed south of Helgeland, 
near the outer islands of Heré and Vegé, and also—according to reports 
from merchants and fishermen of Christiansund—still farther south 
near Sulen, Halten and Hitteren, and at Nordmore, near Smelen, Talqs6, 
Grip, and Stemmet.t At Nordmore there was excellent seine feign: and 
large hauls were made; but unfortunately many of these fish were lost 
again during a most a nlen storm, which actually resembled a hurri- 
cane. The great herring during the following years continued to make 
their appearance far south, which fact is also mentioned in the reports 
on the fisheries of Norway, published by the Department of the Interior. 
_ During these years the whole coast of Norway from Karmoé to Finmark 
was literally surrounded by herring. South of Helgeland, however, no 
great herring fisheries of any importance were carried on. According 
to the reports published by the Department of the Interior, which speak 
of the occurrence of great herring near Vigten, in the district of Nam- 

dalen, they seem to have disappeared from those localities at the same 
time when they moved farther north into the great-herring district 
}froper. Lae: the years 1863 and 1869 there were fisheries as far north 


ao = = a ae So ee: See — 


* My success of ‘ofocmation for the following review of the great eee fisheries 
have been the reports published every year and every fifth year by the governors, and 
by the Department of the Interior. 

t See also the report for the five $-ars 1361 to 1865, by the governor of Romsdalen, ac- 
cording to which the herring in 1864 and 1865 appeared near Nordmére and near Loms- 
dalen. Nothing is said, however, in this report among what class these herring should 
de counted (with reerd te the size of the herring, see Boeck’s report for 1873, p. 8). 


136 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


as Finmark, but their yield was only about 2,000 barrels per year. 
Later than 1869 there were no fisheries in these high latitudes. The 
great herring-fisheries proper were carried on near the coasts of the dis- 
tricts of Nordland and Tromsé where the largest number of great her- 
rings approach the coast. After having reached the coast about the 
same time near Senjenin Tromsé and near Vesteralen, the great schools of 
herring passed the southern point of the Lofoden Islands, going in a 
southerly direction to the Skibbaads Reefs inSouthern Helgeland. Smaller 
schools went further east to the Gildeskaal Reefs near Sydsalten. One 
year after the other the great herring returned to exactly the same 
localities, and the time of their arrival was exceedingly regular. Later 
the herring went farther north; the Helgeland fisheries came to an end, 
and the great masses of herring turned farther north from the southern 
point of the Lofoden Islands in the direction of the Vestfiord, not a few, 
of them going as far north as Finmark. . 

The more important data as to time and place of these remarkable 
migrations are as follows: 

In 1868 and 1869 the hitherto insignificant Gildeskaal fisheries began 
to improve, especially at the fishing-stations of Fuglover and Fleinver. 
In 1869 an enormous mass of herring came to Fleinver, and large num- 
bers also came to Puglover. 

In 1870 herring not only came in large masses to Fuglover, where 
the fisheries were very good, but also farther north to the Helliy Reefs. 
in the district of Bodé, where formerly no great herring had been 
caught. Owing to various unfortunate circumstances not many fish, 
however, were caught, the yield being only about 2,000 barrels. Even 
during that year (1870), therefore, a change could be noticed in the 
migrations of the great schools of herring, many of them going as far 
north as the Vestfiord. 

In 1871 enormous masses of herring came near the Gildeskaal coast, 
so that in some places the sounds were absolutely filled with herring. 
Herring also came to the Hellig Reefs, and to Blixver and Landegade, 
and other places in the same district; the yield was 56,000 barrels. 

In 1872 large numbers of herring again came to the Gildeskaal coast, 
and to many places on the coast of the Bodé district. Near the Helge- 
land Reefs, however, where there had been the most extensive fisheries, 
but few fish were caught; this applied especially to the three southern- 
most reefs viz: Skibbaadsveer, Aasver, and Lovunden. The total yield 
was only 24,450 barrels, agaiust 294,200 in 1871, when, it is true, the 
fisheries were exceptionally productive. Farthernorth, near Rédd, inthe 
Helgeland district, the yield was 10,500 barrels. 

In 1873 but few herring came to the coast of Helgeland, excepting, 
however, the northernmost portion near Meld, and the fisheries proved 
an almost total failure at Shibbaadsveer, Aasvowr, and Lovunden (total 
yield 4,600 barrels), and at Rédé (yield 1,000 barrels). At Melo the 
herring approached the coast several times, but even here a decrease 


4 


[11] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 137 


could be noticed (9,850 barrels, against 17,275 during the preceding 
year). At Gildeskaal and Bodo large masses of herring were yet found, 
but their arrival was somewhat irregular; and it seems that especially 
at Gildeskaal the herring sought other reefs than formerly. During 
this year the herring went farther north into the Vestfiord, and an 
unusually large number was found along the entire coast of Salten and 
far in the Tysfiord. 

In 1874, the last year when great-herring fisheries were carried on, 
only a few small schools made their appearance near Helgeland. Near 
Melo only 1,22 barrels of fish were caught. Also at Gildeskaal in Sal- 
ten the herring failed to put in an appearance, and but very few came 
to the Bodo district, whilst towards the Vestfiord, in the Stegen and 
Hammero districts, large numbers came near the coast. 

As regards the more northerly localities, large numbers of herring: 
had regularly approaehed the coast near Vesteraalen. In 1871 and the 
following years they came also to the Lofoden Islands, in particularly 
large numbers during 1871 and 1872, without, however, making the 
fisheries in these localities specially productive. 

In the Tromsé district large numbers of herring likewise approached 
the coast, but one year they came quite near the coast, and the next 
they kept at a considerable distance from it, which of course made the 
the fisheries very irregular. 

In Finmark there were no fisheries since 1869. Prof. G. O. Sars fur- 
nishes the interesting item of information, that considerable numbers 
of herring were seen in 1873, even near the coast of East Finmark. 

It is not known with any degree of certainty how much the herring de- 
creased in number in the northern portions of the great herring district 
proper (the districts of Nordland and Tromso) during the last year of 
their occurrence in those parts. At Salten a much larger number of 
herring was caught in 1874 than in 1873; but this circumstance was 
caused partly by the exceptionally favorable weather, and partly by 
the fact that the fishermen in 1874 were not as well prepared for fishing 
on a large seale as in 1873. At Vesteraalen about the same number of 
fish was caught in 1874 as in 1875, and the fisheries of both years were 
considered good. In the Tromsé district the fisheries of 1873 were more 
productive than in any previous year, the yield being 168,000 barrels. 
In 1874 the yield was much smaller, viz; 70,000 barrels ; but even this. 
fact does not furnish any absolutely satisfactory evidence of a decrease 
in the number of herring. 

In 1875 the fisheries were a total failure everywhere, and there was. 
hardly any indication at all of any great herring having approached 
the coast. The rumors which were current during the year that the 
herring showed themselves in the Nordland district proved to be un- 
founded, or at any rate grossly exaggerated. In the Tromso district 
birds were noticed to hover over the sea, and “it is therefore probabie,” 


-_ 


138 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. — [12] 


says the governor in his report, ‘that there were great herring near 
the coast,” but ¥n no case did they approach it very closely. 

In 1876 no great herring were found in any portion of the Nordland 
eoast. Farther north, in the district of Tromso, it is said that a small 
percentage of great herring were found among the fat herring. | 

The great herring fisheries, therefore, came to an end, after a gradual 
disappearance of the great masses of herring in a direction from north to 
south, in a similar manner as the spring-herring fisheries. 

It is peculiar that the great herring did not, like the spring herring, 
confine themselves to the northermost of their old accustomed landing- 
places, but sought new places, going north towards the Vestfiord. In 
the occurrence of great herring near the coast of Finmark in 1873, 
we probably find a phenomenon of a similar character. One would 
think that the great herring also, particularly in 1875, after having 
left the coasts of Nordland and Tromsé, would have appeared later in 
larger numbers near the coast of Finmark, but it is expressly reported 
(see Norges Statistik) that in 1875 and the following years no herring 
came near the coast of Finmark. 

In 1871, and also later, the great herring went farther up the inland 
fiords than they had ever done before, and this must be considered as 
avery marked and remarkable change in the occurrence of the herring, 
which hitherto had been extremely regular. I will here only note the 
fact that during the following year, 1872, the Helgeland fisheries com- 
menced to decline. The migration of the herring in the direction, of 
the Vestfiord, taken in connection with the circumstance that the her- 
ring went higher up the inland fiords seems to point to a changed con- 
dition of the coast waters towards the close of the great herring fish- 
eries. 

With regard to the quality of the herring, it was reported that the 
great herring caught near Helgeland in 1873 were mixed with smaller 
kinds of herring resembling spring herring, which was considered as 
an indication that the masses of great herring were disappearing. I 
have no exact information as to the degree to which the herring were 
mixed. In the northern districts, where the herring did not decrease 
so much in number, the size of the great herring seems not to have 
undergone any considerable change. Altogether there was less change 
both as to number and size in the great herring, till they disappeared 
entirely, than in the spring herring. 

From information found in the reports of the governors regarding the 
time when the great herring arrived at the different fishing stations, 
it appears that the time of arrival did not undergo any considerable 
change, and there is no indication whatever that towards the end of the 
fishing period it took place later in the year. In this respect, therefore, 
the great herring differs from the spring herring. The conditions under 
which the great herring lived certainly differed from those of the 
spring herring, which, as well as in other ways, is shown by the fact 


[13] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 139 


that they arrived on the coast much sooner; on the coast of Tromsé and 
Vesteraalen as early as October and September, and at Salten and Hel- 
geland in November and the first half of December. The exact cause 
of the difference above referred to is unknown, and it is impossible to 
decide whether any special significance is to be attributed to it. 

‘There is another circumstance, relating to the time when the great 
herring fisheries were carried on, which I must mention, although I do 
not consider it as of primary importance. 

The great herring which began to appear on the coast in 1861 came 
therefore towards the end of the spring-herring period 1807, 1875, and 
they disappeared about the same time as the spring herring. As re- 
gards the former spring-herring period, 1698-1787, I am unable to tell 
when the great herring disappeared from the coast; but according to 
reports from the Nordland district in the royal Danish archives, it 
appears that there were great-herring fisheries during the latter half 
of the century, especially during the years 1760-1770, therefore like- 
wise during the latter part of the herring period.* 

It is possible that this appearance of the great herring far north 
and towards the end of the herring periods is a regular occurrence. 
The striking phenomenon that both spring herring and great herring 
disappeared from the coast at the same time also encourages the sup- 
position that their occurrence is subject to common laws of nature. 
During the Jast herring period, regarding which we possess fuller and 
more definite data, the disappearance of the great herring not only 
took place at the same time as that of the spring herring, but the time 
of their first appearance in 1861, towards the end of October and there- 
fore comparatively early, coincided with a decisive turning point in the 
history of the spring-herring fisheries; for about that time the spring 
herring commenced to come to the coast later and later in the season. 
This may be an accidental coincidence, but perhaps it has some deeper 
significance. During the latter portion of the spring-herring period, 
counting in about the last 20 years, a remarkable change was observed 
in the quality of the spring herring. They decreased in size, and at 
the same time they are said to have approached the coast in a more 
mature condition.t It seems as if the spring herring about this time 
approached the coast under less favorable conditions, since they could 
not reach their former size. The great herring, which thereupon came 
very unexpectedly (it was thought in Nordland that the great herring 
did not properly belong to these waters, but had only accidentally found 
their way there), altogether resembled the spring herring (Boeck’s re- 
port, 1873). The only difference was that they were somewhat larger 
and less mature when they arrived near the coast. ace therefore dis- 


ae . it w es 
*See the report of Governor Vorsé for the five years 1866-1870. It Ww eecid be very 
desirable to get some further information regarding these old great-herring fisheries; 
but, so far, I have had no opportunity to obtain such information. 
tThe decrease in the size of the herring I have often heard spoken of. See, also, 
“Dindustrie de la péche en Norwége,” par H. B., 1376. 


140 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


tinguished themselves in those very respects in which the spring her- 
ring underwent a change. The great herring, moreover, were much 
fatter than the spring herring. They evidently lived under more 
favorable conditions. Should this be an indication of a more intimate 
connection between the occurrence of the spring herring and that of the 
great herring? We are justified in asking this yuestion; but we can- 
not enter further upon this subject, because we still lack more reliable 
information. The changes through which the spring herring passed 
need much more accurate investigation. That the great herring only 
showed themselves several years after these changes had taken place: 
forms no serious objection to the supposition that there is an intimate 
connection between the two kinds of herring. All that can be said is. 
that the great herring did not show themselves near the coast till that 
time 

After this brief review of the great-herring fisheries we will return to: 
the first year when there were indications that the spring-herring fish- 
eries would come to an end with a view of describing a very remarkable 
occurrence of herring about that time, in connection with the spring- 
herring fisheries which have now again begun to spring up on our coasts.. 

In 1869, as in the preceding year, the spring-herring fisheries com- 
menced very late, we may say not till the 3d of February. But accord- 
ing to the reports of the superintendents a few spring herring mixed 
with fat herring were caught near Udsire as early as the 9th of Jan- 
uary. The reports give no further details as to the quality of the her- 
ring. In a newspaper article, published about that time, we read as- 
follows: “It seems now to be absolutely certain, that the birds which 
have recently been seen in the Udsirefiord have accompanied large 
shoals of small herring (probably young spring herring) of the same 
size as the ‘Christiania herring,’ mixed with fat herring, some of which 
contained roe and milt like other spring herring.” These herring also 
showed themselves in other places besides Udsire. Thus the superin- 
tendents report that herring of different kinds were noticed near the 
southwestern point of Karmdé, and the newspaper article above referred 
to also contains the following: ‘‘Such small herring, mixed with fat 
herring, have also appeared about New Year in large numbers in sey- 
eral places, especially in the Skjoldsfiord and Forresfiord, in which lat- 
ter inlet a great many were caught.” 

Both the fact that the herring were mixed and the time when they 
appeared, seem to indicate that these herring were “mixed herring” or 
‘new herring,” which began to. appear in 1869, at the very time when 
the changes in the occurrence of the spring herring above referred to 
began to show themselves. The description of the herring suits the 
“new herring” in every particular. Nobody, however, thought it worth 
his while to examine further into this matter. During the following 
year these herring appeared in enormous numbers. 

A considerable time prior to the beginning of the spring-herring fish- 


Cad 


{ 
[15] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 141 


eries people were surprised to see large masses of the so-cal'ed “ new 
herring” or “mixed herring.” Some were caught as early as the mid- 
dle of December; towards the middle of January, they again began to 
disappear; some, however, remained till the end of January or the be. 
ginning of February, and, even under date of the 11th of February, it 
was reported in the Karmesundsposten (a paper) that small quantities 
of ‘‘new herring” had been seen in the bays, both north and south of 
Karmé. The “new herring” like the spring herring immediately came 
in near the coast from the high sea in large schools, and were princi- 
pally caught in seines. They came simultaneously in many places 
along a considerable extent of coast. They were found everywhere, in 
the southern, northern, and central spring-herring districts. They even 
showed themselves as far south as Hgersund, but especially on the heights 
of Bergen, the largest masses being noticed a little to the west and south- 
west of that city, on the west coast of the Sartor Island. The yield dur- 
ing that year amounted to about 150,000 barrels, which was very little 
when compared with the large masses of herring off the coast. 

The “new herring” differed greatly in size and quality, and they 
were therefore called ‘mixed herring.” I prefer, however, to call them 
‘“‘new herring,” as the name “mixed herring” is apt to confuse, since 
those spring herring and small herring which are often caught together 
towards the close of the year’s spring-herring fisheries, are frequently 
called ‘‘ mixed herring.” 

When the “new herring” came near the shore, their schools were 
found to consist of ‘blood herring,” some spring herring, herring of 
the size of the Nordland great herring, and finally some summer or fat 
herring. The occurrence of summer herring is, to a great extent at 
least, caused by the circumstance that the schools had fallen in with 
them near the coast and in the mouths of the fiords and had mingled 
with them. Whenever there were any considerable fisheries near the 
mouths of the fiords the superintendents’ reports say that there were 
large numbers of “fat herring” mixed with the other herring. Only 
in exceptional cases spring herring were noticed in the schools, and 
‘had probably found their way there from the great masses of spring 
herring. They were not fully matured, but the same is said to have 
‘been the case during this year with most of the spring herring.* It 
must be supposed that those herring which in size resemble the Nordland 
great herring, and which also were not fully matured, were nothing 
but spring herring, many of which reach the same size as the great 
herring. During the following year, however, still larger herring were 
caught; and it is not impossible that these herring which arrived off the 
coast very early in the season, together with the great mass of ‘‘new 
herring,” came from farther north, where such large herring have their 
home. But even these must under all circumstances have been mixed. 

The largest and most important portion of the schools of ‘‘ new her- 


* BoECK: Om Silden og Sildefiskerierne, p. 111. 


142 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


ring” was doubtless composed of so-called ‘ray herring” or ‘blood her- 
ring.” As to this fact most fishermen agree in their reports, and quite 
frequently they call the ‘‘new herring” simply “ray herring” or ‘blood 
herring.” 

By “ray herring” or ‘blood herring” we mean smaller herring which, 
in small numbers, make their appearance every year, just prior to the 
arrival of the spring herring. Boeck* says that the “blood herring” 
are very lean; that they have hardly any trace of sexual organs, and no 
fat whatever. He supposes that ‘ possibly they are stragglers from the 
spring-herring schools of the previous year, which on account of not 
having ready access to food have not been able to feed enough to have 
their sexual organs fully developed.” Sars, referring to Boeck’s state- 
ment, considers them as barren herring. In the Bergen Museum we 
now have several (12) specimens of herring, labeled “ray herring” or 
“blood herring,” caught during the years 1864 and 1865. It was of 
course exceedingly interesting tome toexamine these specimens. Not 
one of them could be said to “ have hardly any trace of sexual organs,” 
and none were without these organs; both the roe and the milt were 
distinctly seen and in course of development, though not yet fully 
matured. With most of the small specimens, measuring 27.5 to 28 
centimeters in length, the roe and milt were still in a very early stage 
of development, in the transition period from stage II to stage III, as 
Heinke terms them;{ the largest breadth of the ovary was 6 to 9 milli- 
meters; in some of the other specimens the sexual organs had been 
further developed; thus in one fish, measuring 27.5 centimeters inlength, 
the greatest breadth of the milt was 17 to 18 millimeters ; and in another 
one, measuring 26.5 centimeters in length, the greatest breadth of the 
ovary was 16 millimeters, corresponding to Heinke’s stage III. In larger 
specimens the roe and milt were still farther developed. All these - 
herring were doubtless what are called ‘‘ray-herring” or ‘ blood her- 
ring.”t Most of these specimens came from the Bergen Fishery Ex- 
position of 1865. They were labeled “ray-herring,” &c., by experienced 
men, and were placed on exhibition as representatives of these kinds of 
herring. From this I am led to suppose, that as far as the roe and milt 
are concerned, the “‘ray-herring” differ from the common mature spring 
herring by a more or less unfinished development of these organs 3 
and this opinion is confirmed by many fishermen whom I consulted on 
the subject. To mention one case: Regarding those ‘‘ray-herring” which 
formed part of the schools of ‘new herring,” a report from Stavanger, 
under date of January 9, 1873, says that specimens of the ‘“ new: her- 


* BoECK: Om Silden og Sildefiskerierne, p. 23. 

t Die Varietdten des Herings, 1877, p. 69. 

t These names are given to the herring according to the greater or less development 
of the roe and milt, and according to the Jeanness or fatness of the herring. By 
‘*blood herring” the fishermen understand the leanest herring whose roe and milt 
are ina very early stage of their development. They are called ‘‘ray-herring” after 
they have gone to sea. 


ia?) THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 143 


ring” caught at Hishen, when brought to Stavanger, were found to be 
“ ray-herring,” and had both roe and milt, though not fully matured. 
When fishermen, as is often the case, tell you that the “ ray-herring” 
have no roe or milt, such expressions are caused by the circumstance 
that the roe and milt, as a.general rule, are but little developed, and do 
not strike the eye when the herring are opened. As far as Boeck’s 
description is concerned, it is not certain whether it is based on accurate 
personal observations. 

In saying that in the ‘“ray-herring” the roe and milt are not fully 
developed, we do not imply that these organs never reach maturity, 
but we only desire to convey the idea that these fish are not yet ready 
for spawning when they approach the coast. 

The size of the herring in the schools of ‘new herring” varies, accord- 
ing to the reports of the superintendents, from that of the Nordland 
great berring to a very small herring. According to the unanimous. 
testimony of the fishermen, the smallest specimens measured 6 to ii 
inches in length. Occasionally some were found which only measured 
5 inches. By far the greater number did not reach the size of spring 
herring, or were, at most, of the size of small spring herring. 

The “new herring,” and among them especially the “‘ray-herring,” 
were, during the season 186970, very lean and thin, with a compara- 
tively large head, and seemed (probably only on account of their lean- 
ness) to have coarser bones than the spring herring. Some of the “ray- 
herring” were excessively lean, and had on each side a row of dark 
stripes running upwards from the belly. 

The size and quality of the “new herring” varied greatly from time 
to time. At first it seemed ‘as if a continuous improvement could be 
seen in them, but later—about the middle of January—it is again 
reported that the herring were again small, and varied very much in 
size. The “new herring” were very different in different places. It 
is thus specially reported that near the northern fishing stations (par- 
ticularly near Floré) they were larger and of a better quality than farther 
south. This applied especially to those herring which were caught 
early in the season, and which by experienced fishermen were considered 
to be as large as the Nordland great herring. 

I have no data as to how the “new herring” compared with those 
smali herring which in 1869 began to appear among the schools of 
spring herring, aud I am therefore not prepared to pass an opinion on 
this subject. Their occurrence is probably connected with that of the 
“new herring, and possibly it resembled that of the ‘new herring.” 
A remarkable difference vas noticed in the time of arrival. As has 
already been remarked, the new herring kept near the coast till the 
end of January, and even far into February, 1870. During the follow- 
ing years it was very generally reported that “new herring” arrived 
during the spring-herring fisheries, and it seems as if no distinction 
was made between them and the small herring. Some of the “new 

, 


144 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


herring” have during these years doubtless been taken for small her- 
ring mixed with the spring herring. 

Professor Sars has advanced an opinion regarding the cause of the 
unexpected and numerous occurrence of the ‘new herring” which cor- 
responds with his well-known theory as to the cause of the disappear- 
ance and reappearance of the herrings on our coast during the so-called 
‘herring periods.” Professor Sars’s theory is certainly ingenious and 
contains ideas which well deserve to be further examined; but as regards 
the “new herring” Sars does not seem to have been so fortunate. It 
must be remembered, however, that it is only the experience gained 
during the last few years which has enabled us to form more correct 
opinions regarding this whole question, and that there are still questions 
of the most vital importance which have not yet been satisfactorily 
answered. 

In accordance with his theory Sars explains the occurrence of the 
‘new herring” in a similar manner, as in former timesg Léberg and 
Boeck have explained the arrival of the ray-herring prior to the be- 
ginning of the spring-herring fisheries. Sars is of opinion that the ““new 
herring” are principally “ray-herring,” 7. e., barren herring and partly 
young, and therefore not fully matured fish, both of which come nearer 
the coast than the spring herring. When theenormous schoolsof spring 
herring arrive, they drive the ‘new herring” towards the coast, and 
this would easily explain the early arrival of the “ new herring.” The 
fact that the ‘“‘new herring” appeared in such large numbers and were 
mixed with other herring, finds—accoyrding to Sars—its natural expla- 
nation in the fact that the great mass of the spring herring during 
this time have been compelled by meteorological causes to keep at an 
unusually great distance from the spawning places, and had therefore 
to pass over a much greater distance than otherwise would have been 
the case. The scattered schools of herring have thereupon been forced 
to give way by the irresistible advance of the great masses of spring 
_herring, and have by them been driven towards the shore. 

When Sars examined the herring fisheries the season of the year pre- 
vented him from personally observing the ‘new herring,” and he had 
to rely on the information furnished by other persons. He supposes 
that only a comparatively small portion of the ‘‘new herring” were 
fully matured. For this very reason, and because the so-called ‘her- 
ring food ”—small crustaceans, &c., is very scarce at the time when the 
‘‘new herring” come near the coast, Sars is compelled to look for some 
external cause which would force the herring to go near the coast. 
This theory of Sars’s is, as we have seen, not correct. By far the larger 
number of the ‘‘new herring” were ‘ray-herring,” which were not bar- 
ren, but had both roe and milt in different stages of development. It 
may be important to keep these facts in mind in endeavoring to ex- 
plain the arrival of the ‘“‘new herring.” It will not do to ignore the 
reproductite instinct, because the ‘new herring” doubtless contained 


[19] . THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 145 


roe and milt, and the generative organs in some of the fish were devel- 
oped to a considerable degree; nor is the occurrence of the “new her-: 
rings” in our coast waters exceptional, as similar herring also approach 
other coasts, where there are no spring-herring fisheries, and where 
there are no enormous masses of herring to drive them towards the 
coast. ° 

I therefore considered Sars’s theory somewhat doubtful. Ljungman 
has raised another, and very weighty, objection to this theory, by re- 
marking that Sars has not explained by his theory why such a driving 
towards the coast of enormous masses of “new herring” has not also 
taken place during the preceding “herring period.” 

Some explanation of this, however, is found in Sars’s report for 1872, 
where he says: ‘Formerly no attention was paid to the new herring, 
because they were very much mixed with older herring, whilst during 
the last few years they have been less mixed, because the great mass 
of older herring coming from the sea spawned in the outermost spawn- 
ing places.” But this explanation pre-supposes, as the fishermen state, 
that the ‘new herring” were fatter than the spring herring, but some- 
what smaller, and had spawned much earlier. These statements, how- 
ever, are—as will be seen from Sars’s next report—rather unreliable, and 
are, as far as the time of spawning is concerned, based on a mistake. 
Sars’s theory cannot, therefore, be maintained. The genuine ‘new her- 
ring” which principally made their appearance during the season 1869- 
70, could, according to the unanimous testimony of the fishermen, be 
easily recognized both by their leanness and by their small size, as well 
as by the circumstance that with most of them the roe and milt were 
but little developed. Later, the “new herring” began to change their 
size, appearance, &c., finally ceased to be “new herring,” and to all in- 
tents and purposes assumed the nature of our spring herring. Only 
a very small number of the original “new herring” were observed, and 
their appearance was s0 striking that they could immediately be re- 
cognized. Fishermen are very quick in detecting any difference in fish, 
and it is hardly probable that they would have entirely overlooked the 
inferior kind of herring, such as the “new herring” then really were. 
According to Sars’s theory one would expect that the schools of spring 
herring which arrived first, would be particularly mixed with the smaller 
“new herring,” but in these very schools the spring herring were un- 
usually large and little mixed with other herring. 

Ljungman’s objection, therefore, is still valid. Especially from 1860 
on, the ‘‘new herring” should have been very numerous and mixed, 
prior to the commencement of the spring-herring fisheries, as from that 
year the herring began to approach the coast later in the season, and 
therefore, according to Sars’s theory, probably stayed at a considerable 
distance from the coast. But even then no unusually large masses of 
“new herring” were noticed. After they had appeared sporadically 


in 1869, they suddenly appeared in enormous masses in 1869~70. 
S. Mis. 29-10 


146 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. - [20] 


On the other hand, the spring herring have, during the last few 
years, arrived earlier in the season, and some mixed herring have 
been noticed, which was more unexpected now than during the years 
preceding 1870. Nor has there been any indication during the last few 
years of large masses of herring, or so-called ‘ herring-mountains,” 
such as were observed in olden times. 

Altogether it does not seem probable that, after 1869, any unusually 
large masses of spring herring came near the coast. It has always 
been an open question whether the spring herring, during those years 
when they did not visit their usual spawning places, had actually left 
our waters entirely, or whether these same masses of spring herring 
spawned at a greater distance from the coast, hoping to return to their 
former spawning places when the conditions should again become fa- 
vorable. The history of the last decade is of great importance for the 
final solution of this problem. In the beginning of the decade the 
prospects were very bright; large layers of roe were said to have been 
noticed on the bottom of the sea, and it was reported that there were 
large masses of herring far out in the deep waters. These reports 
were afterwards acknowledged to have been exaggerated. (See super- 
intendent’s report for 1872.) These favorable indications, however, soon 
began to disappear, and even at the outermost fishing station of Udsire 
there were, after 1873, no indications whatever of the presence of large 
masses of herring. On the other hand, there was a significant indica- 
tion of a decrease in the masses of herring, viz, the mixing of small 
herring among the schools, which became apparent as early as 1869, 
when the fisheries began to decline, and increased from year to year 
until the fisheries came to an end. In the enormous masses of her- 
ring, or the so-called “herring-mountains,” the herring are generally of 
the same size. When the fisheries again began to flourish, after 1876, it 
was not the former masses of great spring herring which returned, but 
comparatively small schools of herring which, as a general rule, were 
small, and which have gradually increased both in number and size, 
but have so far not formed regular ‘“ herring-mountains.” (These her- 
ring must be supposed to be descended from the “ new herring”; con- 
cerning this see farther on.) No one can deny that the former masses 
of spring herring have disappeared. It cannot be supposed that they 
were driven away by smaller herring; but they would have disap- 
peared, even if these smaller herring had never shown themselves. 

For these reasons I cannot agree with Sars in his theory regarding 
the ‘new herring.” 

I shall now continue my review of the history of the “new herring” 
after the season of 1869-1870, the principal events of which are as fol- 
lows: 

As I have mentioned before, the ‘‘new herring” in 1869-1870, visited 
a considerable extent of coast, and this continued to be the case during 
the following seasons. In 1870-1871 they spread still farther, espe- 


f21} THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 147 


cially towards the south, where they appeared on the entire coast from 
Tananger (west of Stavanger) as far as Cape Lindesnes and remained 
there, although at a considerable distance from the coast, for several 
weeks. During the following years they were very generally observed 
jn the south near EHgersund, Soggendal and Flekkefiord; they were also 
seen along the Bergen coast as well as in the northern district. This 
scattering and the irregularity which these herring exhibited in their 
visits to different points on the coast, are highly characteristic of the 
“new herring.” On the whole they made their appearance in a man- 
ner entirely different from that of the spring herring, and it actually 
seemed as if they did not feel at home anywhere. 

With regard to the number of the “new herring” there was a 
sudden change after the season of 1869-1870. The approach of great 
masses of ‘‘new herring” about New Year, 1870 (which year is termed 
the ‘‘new herring year” by the fishermen) was certainly brought about by 
extraordinary causes (strange to say, unusual masses of herring also 
made their appearance during that year in Bohus-lén). During the 
season of 1870-1871 only small numbers of herring approached the coast, 
and this was also more or less the case during the following years. The 
numbers of ‘new herring,” however, were somewhat larger than ap- 
pears from the reports, for they were near the coast earlier, during the 
spring herring fisheries proper and far into February, all of which has 
been passed by in silence in the reports. 

The most remarkable change, however, was noticed in the quality of 
the ‘“‘new herring.” During the following years they became larger 
and of a more even size, and the number of fish with more fully devel- 
oped roe and milt had inereased considerably. The roe, however, was 
invariably fine grained—not fit for spawning. During this time new 
but smaller schools of the original new herring seem to have ap- 
proached the coast; for quite a number of herring of that king were 
caught. Thus during the season of 1872-’73, the “new herring” 
caught west and north of Bergen were again mixed, as had been the 
case in 1869~70. The average number per standard barrel was, ac- 
cording to the reports of the superintendents, about 730. Later the 
“new herring” in these schools have probably developed in a similar 
manner as the other ‘‘ new herring.” 

Through this development the ‘new herring® became spring her- 
ring and are the very same fish which, duiing the last few years, have 
approached our coasts and have become an object for the fisheries. 

The fishermen very generally maintaiu that the spring herring which 
are caught in our days, are a different kind from the former spring her- 
ring, and mention several features in which they are said to differ. 
Their eggs are said to be smaller than those of the former spring her- 
ring; they are certainly fatter, have finer meat, and thinner bones. 
Some fishermen also say that the shape of the body is comparatively 
higher and shorter, that the head is smaller, and that the eggs are of a 


148 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


lighter color, whilst those of the former spring herring had a more 
brownish hue. Finally, it is sometimes said that the present spring 
herring have smaller scales* and that they adhere more firmly to the 
body of the fish. 

Most of these features are actually of very little significance, and, in 
distinguishing one kind of herring from the other, they have no scien- 
tific value whatever. But as they are mentioned so frequently, I shall 
refer to them at greater length. 

The smaller size of the eggs means, as will be seen at a glance, noth- 
ing more nor less than that they are not yet fully developed; in other 
words, that the present spring herring do not arrive on our coasts in 
as advanced a stage of maturity as the former ones. Quite frequently 
it is positively asserted that even the eggs of the mature herring, 
which arrive later, in February, have not the same size as those of the 
old spring herring. But this is simply a mistake. In comparing the 
eggs of old spring herring—preserved in spirits of wine—with those of 
the present spring herring, I have been unable to discover the slight- 
est difference in size. In his well-known work, Om Silden og Sildefis- 
kerierne, Boeck says that the fully matured eggs of the spring herring 
measure 1.50 millimeters m diameter; and this is found, if observed 
with the naked eye, to be the exact measure of the eggs of the present 
spring herring. In small specimens of the present spring herring, 
measuring only 28 centimeters in length, I have found the diameter of 
the eggs to vary from 1.31 to 1.48 millimeters. When eggs, however, 
measure only 1.31 millimeters in diameter, the difference is so small 
that it can hardly be observed without a manifying glass, and, there- 
fore, by no means agrees with the statements of the fishermen. 

The greater quantity of fat in the present herring of course depends 
to a great extent, or almost exclusively, on the fact that these fish are 
not yet ready for spawning; and the fatness again explains in a most 
natural manner the circumstance that in the present herring the bones 
are thinner than in the old ones. In a fat herring the bones are not so 
distinctly felt as in a lean one, when cut with a knife, and they conse- 
quently appear to be thinner and finer. That there is much chance for 
making mistakes through this very cause is shown by the fact that the 
fatness of the great herring gave rise to the assertion that they did 
not have a certain rowof fine bones along the sides, the so-called ‘side- 
ribs,” and that thereby they were distinguished pot the spring her- 
rings. (Boeck’s report, 1873.) 

The fine quality of the meat in our present spring herring must like- 
wise be ascribed to the circumstance that these fish are not yet ready 
to spawn, and that, as is always the case prior to the spawning period, 
the meat is firm and solid. During and after the spawning period the 
meat becomes looser and of an inferior quality. 


*See the reports on the old Bohus-ldn herrings (A. LIUNGMAN: Preliminer Berdttelse 
for 1873-1874). 


[23] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 149 


I have measured the length of body, length of head, and the distance 
between the fins, in some specimens of the former spring herring pre- 
served in the Bergen Museum, and I have also examined the number of 
rays in the fins, and compared all these data with those of our present 
mature spring herring. As regards the height of the body, if com- 
pared with its length, it is difficult to arrive at an absolutely correct 
result if the only specimens of which measurements can be taken are 
preserved in spirits of wine. These measurements prove this, however, 
that no such change has taken place as is maintained by the fishermen. 
I am inclined to suppose that a difference can only be noticed between 
the former spring herring and those of our present spring herring which 
are not yet ready to spawn, and this difference is only caused by their 
greater fatness, which makes the body appear comparatively higher 
and shorter. As soon as the spring herring of the present season 
spawned they were, as many fishermen were compelled to acknowledge, 
just as long and lean as the former spring herring. It is well known 
that in fat herring the head seems smaller than in lean ones, but in 
our present spring herring it was by no means smaller than in the old 
spring herring. As regards the distance between the fins and the num- 
ber of rays in each fin, I could not discover any regular difference. A 
comparative table, which will be of special interest with regard to the 
location of the fins, will be published at some future time. The num- 
ber of rays, both in the present and in the former spring herring, does 
not correspond entirely with Nilsson’s (and Boeck’s) statement, and, as 
‘might be expected, it varies greatly in the different fish. The dorsal 
fin does not have 18, but generally 19 rays, and their number even varies 
from 17 to 20. The anal fin had generally 18 to 19 rays, and in one 
20, whilst in another case it had as low as 14, which, of course, was an 
exceptional case. The pectoral fins had 16 to 17 rays, and the ven- 
tral fins had generally 9 bunches of rays, which is the usual number in 

‘all herring. When the Danish naturalist Kroyer wrote his description 
of the herring he had before him a specimen of the former Norwegian 
spring herring, and in counting the bunches of rays doubtless had ref- 
erence to this kind of herring, and he likewise counted 9 bunches of 
rays in the ventral fins. The circumstance that Nilsson counted 10 
bunches of rays in a former Norwegian spring herring was doubtless 
caused by his having before him specimens which accidentally had that 
number. In only one specimen of the former spring herring did I find 
10 bunches of rays. One specimen of our present spring herring showed 
a strange anomaly, the right ventral fin having 9 and the left 8 bunches 
of rays. One specimen of the great herring had 8 bunches of rays in’ 
each ventral fin. 

As regards the difference in the color of the eggs (in fish which are 
ready to spawn), it is impossible at the present time to draw any com- 
parison, as the eggs of the former spring herring have of course lost 
their original color by being kept in spirits of wine; and as, so far as 


150 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


I know, we possess no picture of these eggs. The statements of the 
fishermen relative to the coler of the eggs seem but little credible. But 
the color of the eggs has, under any circumstances, very little to do with 
the answering of the question, whether the present spring herring are 
the same kind of spring herring as the former ones. I may as well 
say here that the color of the eggs, which is produced by the outer 
shell, differs considerably in the different mature individuals of the 
present kind of spring herring, without any reference to the size of 
the fish. The color is generally light brown, sometimes darker, some- 
times lighter, and occasionally so light that the brown color can hardly 
be distinguished. The color of the eggs doubtless varied in the same 
manner in the former spring herring. In other localities a difference 
of color has likewise been observed in the eggs of one and the same 
kind of herring. 

But few fishermen knew anything of a difference in the character of 
the scales. Some of the specimens of the former spring herring which 
have been preserved in spirits of wine have a more or less well-pre- 
served coat of scales; one specimen, especially, which through the kind- 
ness of Professor Hsmark was loaned to me from the University Museum, 
showed all its scales in a fine state of preservation. In order, however, 
to make this comparison really valuable, I ought to have had speci- 
mens of our present spring herring of the same size as the old ones, and 
also a larger number of these last-mentioned fish. The statements of 
the fishermen relative to the size of the scales seem very doubtful. 

Of all the differences mentioned by the fishermen, only one remains 
to be accounted for, viz: The difference in the development of the roe 
and milt. In our present spring herring the roe and milt are not as 
fully developed, when the fish arrive in our coast waters, as in the 
former ones. The difference, however, is not very great. When our 
present spring herring first became an object of the fisheries (in 1876) 
their roe and milt were, according to the statements of the fishermen, 
still less developed than they are now. 

In the “new herring” the roe and milt were not fully developed 
either, or at any rate there was a great difference between the different 
individuals as regards their degree of development. In some other 
respects the present herring resemble the “new herring.” Like these 
they arrive on the coast very early in the season—differing in this re- 
spect very much from the old spring herring—so that fishing com- 
mences already in the beginning of January. Our present spring her- 
ring also show the same tendency to spread as the “new herring,” and 
finally they were, when the fisheries first commenced, of very different 
size, and, on the whole, somewhat smaller than they are now. Our 
present spring herring are, doubtless, the descendants of the “new 
herring.” In this way all the points of resemblance between the two 
can easily be explained. 

During the season 1869-1870 the “‘new herring” were, as a general 


[25] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. Tot 


T 

rule, not as large as our present spring herring at the time when they 
first made their appearance, and their roe and milt were not as fully de- 
veloped. All the reports from the season 1870-1871 say that the “ new 
herring” were somewhat larger than during the preceding season. 
From the season 1871-1872 it is reported that they were of a more even 
size. During the season 1873-1874 the number of spawners and milters, 
or fish with more fully developed milt and roe, was considerably larger; 
the same observation was, by the way, also made during the season 
1871-1872 regarding the small number of ‘new herring” which were 
caught during that season. The quality of the fish began to be better, 
and they are now spoken of as “ fat and fine new herring.” Many re- 
ports of the same nature come to us from the following years. ‘Such 
a new herring,” it was said, “ can hardly be distinguished from a spring 
herring.” Finally, people did not know whether to call them “new her- 
ring” or spring herring. Just as the “new herring” had developed 
gradually, thus the present spring herring have done the same till this 
year. The present spring herring seem to be nothing else but a con- 
tinuation of the ‘‘new herring,” and there is no doubt in my mind that 
they are the descendants of the latter. After 1870 ‘“‘new herring” were 
but rarely found in our coast waters. The same was also the case with 
our present spring herring, when they first made their appearance, and 
only gradually they became more numerous. ‘ New herring” of an in- 
ferior quality were caught, as has been said above, together with more 
fully developed “new herring,” and they probably have since passed 
through the same stages of development, and at the proper time turned 
into our present spring herring. 

If you ask the fishermen when the present spring herring first began 
to show themselves, they generally say that this took place about four 
or five years ago. Some maintain that it took place as early as 1874, 
and others even say that they saw such herring in 1870. From what 
has been said, this difference in the statements is easily explained by 
the very gradual development of our present spring herring. Some of 
the so-called ‘“ blood herring” which formed part of the “new herring,” 
were, during the season 1869-’70, already so fully developed that they 
strongly resembled our present spring herring. The opinion, very pre- 
valent among fishermen, that the present spring herring came to our 
coast waters four to five years ago is evidently based on the fact that 
they were not till then (1876) recognized as spring herring, and that the 
fisheries proper cannot be said to have commenced till that year. 

In a very interesting treatise on the herring in the Sound and the 
Belts, Georg Winther* speaks of a similar development of the herring as 
that observed in our waters. He says that towards the close of a ‘‘her- 
ring period” a smaller kind of herring make their appearance at the 
time when the former herring disappear, and that these small herring 
soon reach the size of the former herring. Their number increases very 


* “ Tidsskrift for Fiskeri,” new series, iii. 


152 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


rapidly, just as has been the case with us during the last few years. 
According to Winther the new herring simply take the places occupied 
by the former herring, and their rapid growth is owing to the favorable 
conditions under which they live. This does not altogether apply to 
our “new herring,” as they arrived in our coast waters much sooner 
than the spring herring, which, according to Sars, indicates that they 
lived nearer the coast than the great masses of spring herring, most of 
which had, at that time, already left our coasts. Even our present 
spring herring come much earlier than the former ones. 

The important question, therefore, arises: ‘‘ Where do the new herring 
come from, which during the season 1869~70 suddenly appeared in 
large masses?” It might be supposed that the smaller “new herring” 
were only the younger generations of spring herring, which, after the 
masses of old spring herring had disappeared, from some unknown 
cause occupied their spawning-places, and in a few years grew into new 
masses of old spring herring. This supposition is, to some extent, jus- 
tified, but it is doubtful whether its principle is applicable in all cases. 
In solving this question, a more thorough examination of the so-called 
‘“ray-herring,” which come to our coasts every year, might prove use- 
ful. In making a preliminary comparison between several specimens 
of the same size of the “ray herring” and those herring which, ac- 
cording to Sars, must be considered as fish in the earlier stages of the 
former spring herring, I could discover no difference except in the 
varying degree of leanness and fatness. 

Our present schools of spring herring are composed of ‘‘new herring” 
and of remnants of the former masses of spring herring. These were 
mixed with quite a large number of small herring. If these small her- 
ring bear more of the character of the ‘‘new herring,” it will come to 
almost the same thing to say that our present herring are descended 
from the “‘new herring,” or from small herring mixed with the spring 
herring. 

It has already been mentioned that our present spring herring have 
gone through further stages of development. 

After the new herring had developed in the manner above described, 
the present spring herring may be said to have begun their existence 
as such; but still they did not come up to the old spring herring in 
size or maturity, and moreover they only occurred in small numbers. 

As regards their size, it still varied somewhat, like that of the “new 
herring ;” and it must also be taken into consideration that they were 
still mixed with remnants of the former masses of spring herring. 

During the last few years the herring have become larger and of a 
more even size; but even the year before last they are said to have been 
smaller than the old spring herring. From all the reports, it appears 
that this year the herring which arrived first were exceptionally large 
and of even size. I measured numerous herring caught in the seines. 
The smallest measured about 27 centimeters in length, large specimens 


[27] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 153 


even measured 34, but these were not very frequent. Asa general rule 
the spring herring measured 31 to 33 centimeters, which must be con- 
sidered a very good length. It must, however, be remembered, that 
these measurements apply to herring caught in nets, on the size of the 
meshes of which the size of the herring caught in them will more or 
less depend. In order to determine the exact size of the herring, we 
would have to measure herring caught in seines, but during my stay 
in the fishing district no fish were so caught. Iam therefore not yet 
prepared to say to what extent the present herring have in general 
reached the size of the former spring herring. 

According to the statements of the fishermen, both the roe and the 
milt had also become further developed. I possess, however, no reliable 
information on this point. It is certain that our present spring herring 
at the time of their arrival near our coasts are not as fully prepared for 
spawning as the old spring herring; they are not ready to spawn till 
the latter portion of their stay near the coast; this has particularly 
been observed during the season of 1879-80, when most of the herring 
spawned in February. Herring which I examined on the 11th and 12th 
February of the present year had loose roe and milt. During these 
very days, and possibly somewhat earlier, the herring had begun to 
spawn. 

Later in the season there were constant indications of spawning; the 
nets were full of roe, the water was colored by the milt, and herring, 
when caught, emitted roe or milt upon the slightest pressure. On the 
20th of February herring were caught which had almost done spawn- 
ing. 

Whilst but few herring showed themselves near the coast during the 
first years after 1870, when the transition from ‘‘new herring” to 
spring herring commenced, they gradually began to increase in num- 
ber from that time. So far, however, no herring mountains, like those 
which were common in olden times, have been*observed. The yield 
‘per annum of the fisheries has been as follows during the period 1876, 
1880: in 1876 it was 9,500 barrels, in 1877 about 25,000, in 1878 about 
32,000, in 1879 about 63,400,* and in 1880 only 30,000, this last low 
figure being caused, not by any decrease in the number of fish, but prin- 
cipally by the long-continued stormy weather, which prevented the fish- 
ermen from going to sea. 

Only in the southern districts have the fisheries been of any account. 
Near Skudeses there was considerable seine fishing, and it will be in- 
teresting to see whether the herring will again visit this southern point, 
which, in their northward migration, they left during the last ‘herring 
period.” 

It is acharacteristic peculiarity of our present spring herring caused, 


*According to J. WM. Nymann’s report made to the government of the Stavanger dis- 
trict. From the newspaper reports it appears that of this number 8,000 barrels were 
caught near Sdndmére. ; 


154 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [28] 


of course, by their not yet being ready to spawn, that for a long time 
after their arrival in our waters they will stay near the surface of the 
sea. They sport about in the coast waters in a similiar manner (as 
Sars supposes) to the spring herring in the open sea, outside of the 
spawning season. 

Whilst the herring thus swim about on the surface, they are eagerly 
pursued by whales, which divide the large masses of herring into 
smaller schools, and scatter them in every direction. The occurrence 
of these whales is a phenomenon peculiar to our present spring-herring 
fisheries.* They come in large numbers, so that in the beginning the 
fishermen would not venture out for fear of these immense animals. 
During the old spring-herring fisheries but little was seen of these 
whales. On the other hand the large herriag whales, which were quite 
common during the old spring-herring fisheries, are not so frequent now, 
probably because of the circumstance that these two kinds of whales 
are bitter enemies. Our present whales, the so-called stourhval, will 
attack the large herring whale and tear large pieces of fat from its 
sides, for which reason it is frequently called whale hound (hvalhund), 
or fat biter (spekhugger). While the so-called stowr whales follow the 
schools of herring and feed on them, the herring whales have but little 
to fear; still they seem to avoid them, and I have often heard the fish- 
ermen remark that the great herring whales act as if they were afraid 
of the stowr, or great whales, and keep at some distance from them. 

As soon as the masses of spring herring, which has especially been 
the case during the last two years, are ready to spawn, that is in Feb- 
ruary, all this is very much changed. The herring then go deeper and 
seek the bottom for the purpose of spawning; and the great whales dis- 
appear from the scene. The cause of this repeated disappearance must 
be found in the fact that it is too difficult for the great whales to follow 
the herring into deeper waters, or at least that, wher the herring go 
deep, these whales do not find it so easy to satisfy their greedy appe- 
tite. The fishermen corroborate this fact, and say that they have had 
oceasion to observe that the great whales are very unsuccessful in their 
chase of the herring when these have gone into deep water. While 
the great whales are gone the herring whales have again made their 
appearance in as large numbers as during the old great-herring fisheries. 

The spring herring present in the month of January were pursued by 
a large number of great whales, which is precisely what happened dur- 
ing the great-herring fisheries in Nordland ; neither was the great her- 
ring ready to spawn. It must, however, also be recollected that great 


*It is not certain to what species these whales belong. Two kinds are probably 
designated by this name (stourhval): Orca gladiator, la Cep., and Orca Eschrichtii, 
Stp. In January, 1876, a large number of whales were caught near Udsire, one of which 
Mr. Collet (from the description given by Light-house Keeper Lyde) supposes to have 
been the Orca Eschrichtii, and not the Orca gladiator. (See Nyt Magazin for Natur- 
videnskaberne, 1877, vol. xxii, p. 139.) 


[29] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 155 


whales are certainly more numerous northward. On the other hand, 
during the previous spring-herring fishing, scarcely any great whales 
were seen, because the earlier spring herring were gravid the whole 
time and followed the same course as the spring herring at the present 
time, in the month of February. 

Another peculiarity of the present spring herring which is not yet 
prepared to spawn is this, that they stay farther out without making 
any attempt to come near the coast. This year, for instance, there was 
hardly any seine fishing until the herring had become ready for spawn- 
ing, and fishing commenced with nets which were set during the night. 
The same was the case last year and the year before last, when fishing 
was carried on with floating nets $ to 2 (Norwegian) miles from the coast. 

It has been supposed that by chasing the herring the great whales 
would prevent them from coming near the coast, as it has several times 
been observed that these whales keep nearer the Jand than the ‘“her- 
ring whales.” This is easily explained, however, by the well-known 
fact that the “herring whales” are afraid of the great whales, and 
therefore keep at a greater distance from the coast. It is, of course, 
not impossible for the great whales to drive the schools of herring 
away from the coast; but, in chasing the herring about without any 
particular aim, one would suppose that they would occasionally also 
drive them towards the coast. This does not therefore appear to be a 
satisfactory cause of this phenomenon. 

It is likewise an open question whether the immature condition can 
be adduced as a satisfactory reason for the fact that the herring keep 
at some distance from the coast. 

During the last two years even the mature spring herring have not 
shown any special inclination to come near the coast, and the fisheries 
have been almost exclusively confined to the little island of Udsire, two 
(Norwegian) miles out at sea, west of Karmé. Here the persecutions 
by the great whales cannot come into consideration, for only very few 
of these were seen in the Udsire waters, and their presence could not 
possibly have disturbed the herring. Last year we had frost during 
the fishing season, and, judging from the experience of former years, it 
was supposed that the low temperature was the reason why the her- 
ring would not come near the coast. This year we had very mild 
weather, and still the herring did not come near the coast. It is well 
known now, however, that it is not absolutely necessary for the herring 
to come near the coast for the purpose of spawning. The spring herring, 
it is true, have, as a rule, sought the coast when they wanted to spawn. 
But, as the spring herring now come in smaller numbers, and as only 
those fish are ready to spawn which arrive late in the season, it may, 
of course, easily happen that the spring herring stay in the outer spawn- 
ing places. If, during the coming years, the spring herring gradually 
reach their maturity earlier in the season and increase in number, the 
schools which arrive first will, as usual, come to the coast of Udsire, 


156 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [30] 


whilst the schools which follow later will seek other spawning places 
nearer the mainland.* 

In going through various stages of development our present spring 
herring have evidently come to resemble the former spring herring 
' very strongly. As to size, there is hardly any difference. This, taken 
in connection with the steady character of the development, which gives 
cause for the hope that it may continue, seems to augur well for the fu- 
ture and justifies the expectation that we shall again have as large 
spring-herring fisheries as in olden times. 

After having given the above brief sketch of the spring-herring fish- 
eries during the last few years, we must cast a retrospective glance at 
certain prominent features in this history, and institute a comparison 
between them and certain features of the old spring-herring fisheries at 
the time when they, too, after having been on the decline for a number 
of years, again began to flourish. 

The decline of our fisheries extended from 1869-1875, when the num- 
of herring was smallest and the fisheries were at their lowest ebb. 
But after 1875 the fisheries gradually began to recover, as there was 
a steady increase in the number of herring. There has, therefore, not 
been any very considerable interval between the former “herring period” 
and the qne which—to judge from all appearances—is about to begin, 
but one “herring period” has been closely followed by another. Yea, 
more. Those herring which during the last few years have come near 
our coasts aS new spring herring, had already come once before, near 
New Year, 1870, and probably they had also come in 1869, therefore 
before the former “herring period” had come to a close. 

Here there seems to be a difference from olden times, when there was 
an interval of years between the end of one “herring period” and the 
beginning of another (twenty years between the last two “herring 
periods”). 

Our present spring herring, moreover, come early in the year, having 
been caught as early as the first part of January, whilst in the begin- 
ning of the last “herring period” fishing commenced very late, which— 
according to Boeck’s observations—seems to be the rule at the begin- 
ning of a new “herring period.” 

This difference, however, is probably a difference only in appearance, 
but not in reality. In former times fishing in the open sea with floating 
nets was unknown, as it has only come into use during the last few 
years. No exertions were made to seek the herring in distant parts of 
the coast. To go to Udsire, to catch herring, seemed too much of a 
venture. If matters in this respect were now as they were then, our 


*The great whales will then disappear. Any attempt to exterminate them (even 
if successful) would result only in a very doubtful advantage. The fishermen them- 
selves, as a general rule, are of opinion that the so-called ‘ Aater,” i. e., schools of 
herring which, chased by the great whales, come near the surface of the sea, are 
easily discovered, and are therefore easily caught, must be considered as a decided 
benefit to the fisheries. 


[31] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 157 


present fisheries would not be of any great importance, and at any 
rate, there would have been a much longer interval between the last 
and the present “herring period.” Jjungman already remarks, that a 
glance at the fishing-apparatus in use, which is only suitable for our 
rocky and broken coast, will explain the fact that our “herring periods” 
are so well defined, whilst in other countries, such as Scotland and in 
North America, where fishing is carried on with purse-nets or floating 
nets, their beginning and their end can hardly be noticed. It is also a 
well-known fact, that during the long interval (1787-1807) between the 
two preceding ‘“ herring periods,” herring were found near our coast. 
. Thus Boeck reports that in 1803 they showed themselves in large num- 
bers near the coast of Bergen; but few, if any were caught, as they 
came so unexpectedly. The Udsire fishermen say that the year 1808 
was by no means the first year when herring came to their coast, but 
that they were noticed out at sea during several of the preceding years; 
but people at that time did not think of going to sea even that short 
distance, to catch herring. 

As regards the time of arrival, there has so far at least, been an actual 
and. marked difference between the present and the former spring-her- 
ring fisheries. 

It must also be borne in mind that the time during which the pres- 
ent fisheries have been going on, very probably does not correspond 
with the time which is designated as the beginning of the former her- 
ring period, but rather with certain years of the interval, when there 
was no fishing.* 

Below I have given a list of different degrees of temperature of the 
water near the surface and at different depths. As I only had occasion 
to make observations of the temperature towards the end of the fishing 
season, and as the fisheries were unfortunately disturbed a great deal 
by stormy weather, it was impossible for me, this year, to observe the 
influence of the temperature on the daily course of the herring. These 
observations, however, will prove of interest even as they are. 

Boeck took the following observations of the temperature during the 
spring-herring fisheries: While at the surface the temperature varied 
from 0°.5 to 5° C., according to the state of the wind, the difference at 
a depth of 10 fathoms (almost 19 meters) was only 1° C., that is, the tem- 
perature varied from 3° to 4° C., and at a depth of 30 fathoms (565 me- 
ters) the temperature remained stationary at 4° C., no matter how much 
the meteorological conditions varied. 


*The fisheries even now do not commence till February, about the same time when 
they commenced in the beginning of the former “ herring period.” Iam not at pres- 
ent prepared to say whether this circumstance has any weight in explaining the dif- 
ference in the time of arrival of the herring. (See BoEcK, Om Silden og Sildefiskerierne, 
p. 109; it is certain that in the beginning of the former ‘herring period” the herring 
arrived near the coast some time before the fisheries commenced. Thus Boeck says 
that in 1814, 1815, and 1816 the whales arrived on the 23d January, which, however, 
is a late date.) . 


158 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [82] 


This year the temperature at the surface varied from 29.5 to 6° C., 
while the temperature at the surface varied from 39.5 to 69 C. The tem- 
perature at a greater depth varied as follows: At a depth of 38 to 42 
meters, from 4°.2 to 69.9 C.; at 51 to 53 meters from 4°.8 to 79.3 C.; at 62 
to 66 meters, from 4°.7 to 5°.5 C.; at 76 meters, from 5°.1 to 6° C.; and 
at 119 to 123 meters, from 6°.5 to 69.7 C. Ata depth of 132 meters the 
temperature was found to be 69.9 C., and at 189 meters 79.1 C.—(See 
table of temperature.) 

In the first place, therefore, the temperature has varied much more 
than Boeck reported, viz, 24° C., at a depth of 51 to 53 meters, and, in 
the second place, it has this year been higher than any which Boeck has 
given. 

In his work “Om Silden og Sildefiskerierne,” Boeck speaks of a peculiar 
phenomenon observed in the sea between Hangesund and Udsire, viz, 
that the water near Réver, at a certain depth, about 20 fathoms, seemed 
to be so cold that its temperature was only about 3° C., whilst farther 
out, not far from Udsire, where there was a pretty strong current from 
south to north, it was much warmer, viz, over 4° C. Boeck was pre- 
vented by sickness from making further observations of this strange 
phenomenon. If further observations should show this statement to be 
correct, Boeck thinks that this warm current must be a branch of the 
Gulf Stream, and he inclines to the opinion that in these waters the her- 
ring follow such a branch of the Gulf Stream towards the coast, partic- 
ularly as the herring always approach the coast between Udsire and 
Rover, where the warm current, mentioned by him, is found. Near Ro- 
ver, Boeck found the so-called ‘ whale food” (Clione limacina Phipps), 
an animal generally occurring much farther north, near Finmark, and 
which was once discovered by Prof. G. O. Sars, near the Lofoden Isl- 
ands (at Skroven). In the polar seas it is found in enormous masses. 
Boeck supposes that this clione was carried south by a cold polar cur- 
rent flowing nearer the coast than the Gulf Stream. 

During my visit to the fishing stations, I one day—the 9th March— 
when the weather was calm, carefully examined the temperature of the 
water from Udsire to Rover (and on the 11th of March, as far as Han- 
gesund), both at the depths given by Boeck, in other depths, and near 
the surface. The result of these observations is given in a list below. 
At adepth of about 20 fathoms (38 meters), between Udsire and Urter, 
the temperature varied from 4°.3 to 4°.5 C.; on the side of Urter towards 
téver, the temperature was 4°.4 C., at a depth of 32 meters (bottom); 
a little (one-eighth Norwegian mile) farther out, towards Rover, it was 
4°.2 at a depth of 38 meters; one-fourth Norwegian mile distant from 
Urter, in the direction of Rover, it was, at the same depth, 49.5 C.; and 
from there to Réver and Hangesund it varied from 49.5 C. to 49.4 C. 

I must say that, in my opinion, my observations have not corroborated 
Boeck’s statement, not even as to the temperature taken at the same 


[33] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 


159 


depths as his observations, and much less with regard to temperature 


observed at different depths. 


As the above report may also be of interest to foreign readers, I shall 
give below the latitude of most of the places mentioned in it: 


Southern spring-herring district: Latitude, 58° 55’ to 60°. 
Northern spring-herring district: Latitude, 60° 47’ to 629° 
The more important subdivisions of the northern district: 


(Stat). 
Sondfiord: 


Latitude, 61° 15’ to 61° 55’; and Nordfiord: Latitude, 61° 55’ to 62°13/, 
North of Stat, in the southern part of Sdéndmére, the so-called Sénd- 


more fisheries are carried on. 
Latitude, ° 


BEARDS Ni COM Sete perarete hectic a aa) er nae se, Shciers felel assem va wero Meters oaks 66 
LSSGTREUSIN ceed yc al te Sper gS SRP Se ee aeeek Ma a a 60 24 
| ES]IFTOS USS ee 0 up ge Pa AP gh a OF AT 
Raat OPP eters Nes Nanc Ah een Se pint loi atee Shakers 67 17 
= STCAATITVD | BRSITTT (0 Diatey AR es TI BAS, 28k ae i a 59 54 
Pee MDM OC bye ciate he citeinc eee cee ces cele eude eek 2 betes c esws 61 51 
eee Ane ees nee ee Eke URN aT ee ea eo eh Ley are LY 
eS MN aera tteiene et eaten ete rere etoete ohne cree o ieee 6 58 27 
“ELC ST lla Beier aa peed ler aoe a ge a 67 10 
TORT ts srelatalht Sk a I, a tl Cg a ae a eR 61 354 
Le EERSTE U1 (0 bo eg gl PS et i 58 10 
RV OCU An ait ee te ee oie coetin a elle eee 61 47 
RDO ele Meets ee main ace ole Salas sige cless e Seitn eat oS wide 4 oc 67 4 
BoCEN Ka ee eee eile urclsoe wae oe Pt a Pare ee aeges a ee 67 5 
CEN Dee 2 ae ee ee ee ea eta ee ose ciater 63 14 
LEVENITSSOT 5 5 Sat la Pica Ee ee SGD ne TREE eee aaa ee 64 10 
Hammer6 (see Stegen and amined) Svat Dare et ee 
Hee CE SUINGUR: Wi haere ie ete ee CNS eyes one ese cisiape-dinuctMtancyta\s 59 25 
CSUENPER GE SY Ge Ie SO oR AE Os en a nee eee RS 67 24 
MONO gle Si fetes Gen. ye Have ele swe rte nia eae the ies an eave ote 66 
LS) RGY | OURS TAILS ee he >a aes nae AE Le foes 2 ay ap Re 59 44 
Raee OR te cfr tere ey ae Bata Siete Cee o Sic Cue n came ce 63 30 
Stu SOCINO, Grate Ropes ck ee Sele ciate came teen oes 59 4 
LV ETBET COSY coat athe RE age Re CR 59 8—59 25 
POC COU a aren tec ea tee tenet eae ee te 67 24 
MPLES TIES arya a Ses Ye totae eae RO shee See kn le 57 59 
Mowalen aid: Vesterdalen: 2.2 22 oe. -oswsc ved eee ese ces 67 20 — 69 19 
MR CEMMUNIN CLOT Gent PS we eM gd Se cs a al cio ehelers 66 22 
SEND gine tN i Soi eee aes SaaS ae | a 66 50 
MRIPRICRIET Ot ree pee ee lee Ar Ree TS oo lca cub 66 45 
JTS) Se ee RPE orse teehee rere nie als CO Poe sae 66 40 
LLU NT EED ek PRR) el el ane ae ee ta cai SH AEG EE A apa RAS 59 26 
‘S200 0) 0. econ eee et ereterer ane coorre loons oid Gene 60 20 
SCC ie Beare cect eee ee 69 20 
Sy DEG SALE IS An bo ER mvhulernes 66 7 


160 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [34] 


Latitude, Or ibe 


Skudesnes ..-.....-... ct ee eee BTS eo Be saeco) 
BIMOLOD. cc ciiyerae ne eee ete See sae Se Ae eo na 
Boezendal corr. <<. site erate tlm shatters ai leterels eet Rares 58 19 
Stavanger. .+... +...’ Ee Snore sere Soh Sains oa Pee OS 
Steen and ELAmMMere G7). cm loan eee ele ee 67 40 — 68 15 
Stemmet .......- TORR hee esac as ae si sieue wey crore (Oe 
SSMUGUE 2. < </e icin bid whet e Cepia aes Sete eet eal aera asee Gpih 
SEPOTICN je << acs sie BR ee ode ob 554 Soon os) BSSAB EOS 66 30 
(ystiord, mouth of .....------.- Ste raie asin efi tebe aeons 68 15 
POSING {..55% 5) - Be eon bora ee UAE oeee 59 19 
“VOTES gk eS AS RE ee BP Sit die oictecise clash aioe see SOO TAO 


WIGStEraAlen wad c< cic octeghcietle eis toeee eek on tate. s05 "a0 Gomes 
WA CEON io/ac cinch e titeh «te eneemeenia Aten seen eee eet OL EDD 


Tabie of deep-water iemperature. Observations taken with Negretti and Zambra thermometer, 
No. 43233. 


1880. Scale of temperature. Wind. 
eae & 
8 |s g 
Location. Om ines 3. S 
‘=| 3 iJ) A ~ 2 4 5 
Day. Hour gq |aea| 6s | 38 E | |e 
- ° S 28 +t 45) o o 
alesisi8*| 2 Isiail 
1 & rs H a cs) 9 | ‘a | o 
o | 4 8 | 8 A S|/2]8 
Alea | 5 jo A |RI|Fla& 
Feb. 23 | 10-11 a. m...| Udsire (north side) .......-.- 0} 3.5/0.4] 31] W.SW PW 3 
93" | aokes Ryusei te Oto ee een sem EPIRA PORE G lesa nana Pal uf 
Oat lasnese GOreenae|sacees CO eeauacncosabcbastoase CG | Gy | as I ee BO eos sacar ee) 3 
257M Ors ams eae alice. miae COeaccscreenecscecceesee 0; 6 |—0.3|) 57|W.NW.| 3] 5 4 
74S eee Cope selene Gh Ween ceceaocsaouacc sade AON 659i \——Or34l? 16.165 s ccc 3] 5 4 
DON emacs G (tase eonocr (UN Bem opescesaoecansodscd 51 VeBinl—One ele Lepls,|osjoesicieats 3 5 4 
28 (9510 acmceatlecce ce do ee ee (|| Ze S| Sa GEG een esoeae 5|*4| 6 
28 See. Oa eae Bansen! OiasocoadndandsocdecneDS 23] 4.25|—0.3' || 3.:9)|-0-2.25.2./.'5 | 4 6 
Mar. 3 | 2-3p.m....| 4 ie north of Udsire ...-..-- 0} 4.4 /-0.3]) 41 SW. 2 | t4 4 
Rael eee GN) SHS RBC eecl eiaatincoacdobocodoconddS 62); 5.5/—0.3:} 5.2/...2.....- Vee 4 
Slee mstr: dovs-* aoe ab SResisoneoocCSUCHOSOOE TE GRY) RBI GRCw RG acooes 2| 4 4 
Billeta sere GOs bs2|eocses GO eecnpeochocoaSnSee Sac 132 C5 9sI—Os ayn Oulscsemecrice 2) 4 4 
5 | 10-12 a.m.-..| 1 milenorth of Udsire (Klek- 0| 4.5 —0.3] 4.2 SS) Zeek 3 
ken fishing station). 
Bales ani dors. 1 mile north of Udsire (Klwk- | 189 {| 7.1 —0.2| 6.9 |.........- PF AN ih 3 
ken fishing station). 
9 | 9-9.30 a.m ..| Udsire (north side) ---....--.- 0} 4.4/0.3! 4.1 SW 2| 4 3 
 Weacrepe CO esses lescnes dO ee sees aeeele aeteeaiatat 88 | 4.5 |—0.3 | 4.2 }.......... 2) 4 82 
ON eaeae Crea lameeme CV ieeerianem ocisboacsoaanc 76 | 5.4 '—0.3 Deke Steers emiee 2; 4 3 
9 | 10.30 a.m 4 mule aN: of Udsire........ CON ne: |e fal ier: Bo ee Se 2| 4 3 
(1) cee (IS a IseeagcU (IRIE SOR She GaoonseSaccs 38 | 4.4 |—0.3 Ui il Aaa 25a lees 
Ou eee Ay caona boeeee a MARCOS LOSES BeELOCCOCE WG e0: Le —Ol oe B ene seetecle 2| 4 3 
OM ese iG dose eee 1 Ree een eS paberte 123) ORG u=——Osay Gnd ile seemesice ya 3. 
iy || ables ees § mile NW. of Udsire........ OU 454 |—<OF Sue Aes eae es 244 3 
Dil cceae? dolitee | |eemarc 0 consent epee eee 38143103) 4.) 2a. 2) 4118 
2) bles 7NgeASeq Beads 28 telnet e sic aiieicis senna 1G) toe al ——O soa eres Omen atcal= cals 2| 4 3 
i eeseee Ge) aed eancsdl (ae escoeeaes aHoppace oon 123 6.3 —0.3 Ome Woseccccicet Qa. 3 
9 | 12a.m...... 4 ahs ‘SE. ofiUrtereescas-see ae Bee | oe Ae Ee aoc aas 2] 4 3 
Ol paecc Cece lpeboce (tt Greco pnnaDacbeaesooces 88.) 4.3 \—0.3 |- 4: -|.--..--..- 2) 4 3 
OU eaass doen |eseeer On sae secaniences ceeee 7G) (552) \——Ol SrA .9) lee ecceies > 2) 4 3 
OUSopsm sa... Urter Keoutioy cet S106) Sa5 ae OH), 144 — OSS le Aol ees ewmn'e 2) 4 3 
Ce eseoe GQy Ao AS hBS ocd Wiese rsa neereEe rm nc: 23) 1/455) — Ons a Roun mae aol a ciae 2| 4 3 
9 | 3.30 p. m...- ‘Urter ees side) -...... 32)! 4547 \—O oneal ooo woe 2| 4 3 
9 | 44.30 p. m..| 4 mile NW. of Urter......... 0) 4:3) |—O73) |) 4 ailee sc... 2| 4 3 
9) Gere celssee GS) Jaseodsps kad dboodedne 38 | 4.2 1—0.3 | 3.9 ).......... 24 a 


* Hail storms. t Rain. 


[35] THE SPRING HERRING FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 161 
Table of deep-water temperature, §c—Continued. 
1880. | Scale of temperature. Wind. 
aa ie é 
s/s FI 
Location. 2 | ep Wikou. oS 
BUCO ee |ptea@ : ; 
Day. Honr. Ame weise esr | Ss qa ppulihery 
=“ os + = 3 o io) 
a |Be| 3 | 3° S o/s | 
~ me i [5) = o 
sie | 8 /§ Pe eas 
A lA oto A BIE | a 
Mar. 9 wees m..| mile NW. of Urter....-.-.- 0; 4.4 0.3) 4.1 2| 4 3 
ae eee ao 38| 4.5 |-0.3] 4.2 Deas es 
Tee ee 66| 4.7 |-0.3]| 4.4 PAN? wl G3 
@mile: NW? of Urter 0} 4.4/0.3] 4.1 2| 4) 08 
ee 38] 4.5 |—0.3| 4.2 2 | .4\" a8 
Sete seats ats 76) 5.8 |—0.3| 5.5 2] 4 3 
qoutes SW. of Rover ........ 0| 44/03) 4.1 2) 4 3 
ee oe ona c= Ole wiacioe ema s siniacisjeices'seys 38] 4.4/0.3] 4.1 20) 34 3 
Bel ee a Fae BrioccesooooeETHess 76; 6 |—0.3 5.7 2) 4 3 
Roverarbor.-sseseccscseas 0) 4.3/0.3] 4 2| 4 3 
aepool bessse GO eesok Deere eee es 73| 4.2 |—0.3 Bee pe Semionc ear? 4 3 
Réveer (east side) .-....-.---. 0} 4.3 /—0.3] 4 SE. 1 10 2 
eon Poncse CSRS idea casccrcee BO ae OCS A leo neeasoe|) mal 0 2 
Seecr OO. ssauscancccdasesscoese 53 Ar Sh —Ol3) 1) 145,00 tewsctaaaes 1 0 2 
Bed) |GEAOGS GO! S22 e352 sees ses escct NGill Daa l——ONS NO 4cls soc cesees |e 0 2 
Ses of Haugesund Beet Onl) 4503} 023 ia 4.12) | oo ccs cee i 0 2 
Sate ni-| eens COlre sama wacitien jem esis eas B87 4, 4053) VACA ccc cocccele La! 20 2 
Near ances dl ae Scene eee On <4 a3 F ONS h ail 2 cie soso a'n'| oe Leal yO 2 
Soceclesamiee COs teases eceascsesee BB ara OCS aad coeaceane|l ok 0 2 
Sees |soanas GOlscsaceeesoesase Seveses 900) <4. 65\—0! Sale 428i ses oo ecec|! il 0 2 
S. Mis. 29 11 ° 


VIII.—THE SARDINE FISHERIES.* °° 


There will be but few of our readers who do not know the fish called 
“ Sardine,” or at least but few who have never seen a sardine-box. 
Empty sardine-boxes are met everywhere, even among people who have 
never tasted a sardine. These small boxes, made of thin tin, are used 
in many different ways, and people will keep them for various purposes. 
For the benefit of those of our readers who do not know the sardine or 
sardel, we would state that they are a kind of herring which somewhat 
resembles our common sprat, and which in large numbers is caught in 
the Mediterranean and on the west coast of France. Frenchmen first 
commenced to put up these small herring in oil and to export them to 
other countries as a great delicacy, thereby deriving a considerable 
revenue from their sardine fisheries. It may interest our readers to 
learn something respecting these fisheries, and we therefore give the 
following information, principally derived from a French journal. 

The importance of the sardine fisheries will become evident from the 
fact that they employ 25,000 to 30,000 fishermen during seven months 
in the year; the number of boats employed in these fisheries is also 
very. large, as a boat’s crew is composed of 4 men and 1 boy. The prep- 
aration of the sardines requires a similar number of persons. In 1875 
a single fishing village prepared 2,650,000 pounds sardines in oil and 
as many pounds of salt sardines, called in the interior of France fresh 
sardines. 

The fishing-boats are 20 feet long, with square sterns, and sharp 
sheer forward, which makes them fast sailers, but crank. They have 
two masts leaning slightly backward, and two square lugger-sails of 
considerable size, so that the slightest breeze carries them through the 
waves. | 

The nets have no weights below. They are 30 to 45 yards long and 
9 to 12 yards deep, are made of very fine twine, and have such narrow 
meshes that the sardines can get their heads in and be caught by the 
gills. The buoy-line has cork floats, which keep the net near the sur- 
face of the water. Every net has its own peculiar nickname, ‘Tool 
them,” “‘Greedy-guts,” &c., by which names they are invariably known 
among the fishermen. 

In the sardine fisheries the bait is of much greater importance than 


*Sardinfisket in Fiskeri Tidende, No. 11, March 14, 1882.—Translated from the Danish 
by HERMAN JACOBSON. 
[1] 163 


164 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


the net. As bait codfish roe is used, which mostly comes from Norway, 
and is salted down in barrels. Norway annually exports about 35,000 
tons of codfish roe, at an average price of 36 crowns ($9.64) per ton. 
When the roe is to be used as bait it is soaked and stirred in water and 
mixed with sand, so as to make it sink quicker when thrown into the 
sea. 

Various signs indicate the approach of the sardines. Floating bunches 
of algw are a good indication. The experienced fishermen can also rec- 
ognize the approach of the sardines by the peculiar odor caused by the 
oil flowing from the sardines when they are devoured by fish of prey. 
But birds are a particularly certain indication of the approach of the 
sardines. When the cormorant scarcely touches the water with its bill 
it is a sign that the sardines are near the surface of the water, and when 
the terns descend straight, with their wings close to the body, the sar- 
dines are deeper in the water. 

The sails are now taken in and the nets are set, whilst the roe is 
thrown into the sea by the first mate. If he is successful in making the 
sardines rise (move from the deep water toward the surface), a greenish 
shimmer is noticed in the furrows of the waves. The roe is then cast 
out more plentifully, and numberless schools of fish may be seen near 
the nets. The sardines move rapidly backwards and forwards and make 
a rush at the bait, fighting for it among themselves, and are thus caught 
by the treacherous net, which gradually grows heavy from the weight 
of the fish. The nets are now hauled in, the fish are taken out of the 
meshes and thrown into the hold, and the boat returns to the shore. 

In former times it was no rare occurrence for a boat to catch’ in a 
single trip 12, 15, and even 20,000 sardines. Nowadays they rarely 
catch more than 5,000 to 6,000 sardines in a single trip. The yield of 
the fisheries varies not only from one year to the other, but also be- 
tween different points of the coast, even if close together. No special 
reason can be assigned for this. People have endeavored to explain 
this phenomenon by accidental changes in the current of warm water 
which comes from the equator and runs all along the northwest coast 
of France. Migratory fish like this warm current and follow it in all 
its changes of direction. It is not astonishing that the fish do not ap- 
proach the coast in large numbers when strong winds continue to blow 
from one direction for any length of time and force the current to as- 
sume another course, thus making the water near the coast cold instead 
of warm. 

The sardine-fishers generally return between six and ten o’clock in 
the morning. The scene at that time is very animated. When the 
time approaches for the fishermen’s return, people hasten towards the 
coast from all directions, and whilst the crowd gathers on the shore 
the sardine fleet appears on the horizon like a swarm of giant birds, 
whose white and brown wings glide along the surface of the waters. 


[3] THE SARDINE FISHERIES. 165 


The boats come as near the shore as the depth of the water will allow. 
At the moment when they are about to cast anchor the scene is par- 
ticularly lively. Hundreds of boats containing fish-dealers of both 
sexes and agents of the factories are engaged in an eager race to reach 
the fishing boats. Some people roll up their pants or gather up their 
dresses and boldly step into the water, whilst others take a complete 
bath. 

After the price has been fixed the fish are gathered in baskets which 
hold about 500 fish each. The bearers generally dip the baskets a few 
times in the water so as to make the fish look fresh, and carry them up 
to the shore, where they are salted if destined to be eaten immediately. 
During the fishing season sardines take the place of money and are not 
refused by any one. Carriers and other laborers are paid in sardines, 
and it is said to be a common sight to see a child go into a store, buy 
some candy, and pay for it with two or three sardines. 

Some factories have their own fishing-vessels, others have a contract 
with some fishermen to supply them regularly with sardines, whilst 
some only buy their fish whenever they need them. These factories only 
take sardines which are very fresh, and which have not been salted in 
the least. As soon as the fish are received at the factory they are im- 
mediately prepared; women cut off the heads of the fish, clean them, 
and lay them side by side on flat stones, which are thinly covered with 
salt. This is called the “first drying.” Whilstthefish lie on these stones 
for some time, enormous boilers with the finest olive-oil are placed over 
the fire, and as soon as the oil boils the sardines are put, by layers, in 
wire baskets. These baskets are dipped into the boiling oil, and are 
then placed on frames to let the oil drip off. When the fish have be- 
come tolerably dry, they are taken into the drying-rooms, where they 
are exposed to the sea air, and where they remain a longer or shorter 
time, according to the condition ofthe atmosphere. They are thereupon 
sorted, the largest being used for select sardines. 

The packing is done very carefully ; after the sardines are put in the 
boxes, they are placed under an oil tank where fresh oil is constantly 
filledin. Atlast the lidis closed. This must be done very carefully, as 
the slightest break or hole, invisible to the naked eye, is apt to spoil the 
contents of abox. To ascertain that the boxes are properly closed, they 
are for a few seconds put in boiling water. Those boxes which are not 
well closed will bulge out; and in that case they are cut open, the fish 
are taken out and placed in another box. After the boxes have received 
the factory mark they are ready for the market. 


[X.—REPORT SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTE- 
RIOR ON THE PRACTICAL AND SCIENTIFIC INVESTIGATIONS 
OF THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES, MADE DURING THE 
SPRING OF THE YEAR 1879," 


By Prorerssor G. O. Sars, 


In accordance with a plan made some time ago, it was my intention 
this year to give special attention to the so-called capelan-fisheries, 
which I had not yet investigated, and which on account of their vary- 
ing character, seemed to deserve a closer examination. The loud com- 
plaints raised during the last few years regarding the injurious influence 
on the capelan-fisheries of Mr. Foyn’s whale fisheries, especially in the 
Varanger-fiord, compelled me to some extent to change my original plan. 
Instead of traveling over the entire capelan-district, as had been my 
original intention, the above-mentioned cause induced me to confine my 
investigations for this year to the Varanger-fiord, which has been, and 
is still, the principal scene of the whale-fisheries. 

In order to be present at the beginning of the capelan-fisheries, I went 
north as early as the 28th of March, and arrived at Vadsoe on the 11th of 
April. At that date there had not yet been any fisheries of importance, 
and no capelan had entered the Varanger-fiord. Considerable masses of 
capelan, however, had approached the coast of Western Finmark and 
the fishing-stations near the North Cape, where the fisheries were already 
in full operation. Capelan had also been noticed near the eastern fish- 
ing-stations as far as Vardoe. On the 15th of April the first capelan en- 
tered the Vadsoe sound, and a few boat-loads were captured. But on the 
following day most of the capelan had disappeared, and after this only 
approached the coast in small numbers. I, nevertheless, succeeded 
during these days in making a number of important observations of 
the capelan, and expected at a later period to have ample opportu- 
nity to complete these observations. This expectation, however, was 
doomed to disappointment. The great mass of capelan did not go any 
nearer this coast this year than Kiberg, from which place they seemed 
to have taken their course across the mouth of the fiord towards the 
Fisher Island on the coast of Russia, whilst only a few scattered schools 
entered the Varanger-fiord. Those who had previously expressed the 


* “ Tndberetning | til | Departementet for det Indre | fra | Professor, Dr. G. O. Sars | om 
de af ham i Vaaren 1879, anstillede praktish-videnskabelige | Underségelser over | Lodde- 
Jisket | ved Finmarken.” | Christiania, 1879.—Transtated by HERMAN JACOBSON. 

[1] 167 


168 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


opinion that Foyn’s whale-fisheries had injured the capelan-fisheries, 
saw in this circumstance a further corroboration of their views, whether 
justly or not [ shall endeavor to explain below. 

As no capelan schools of any importance entered the Varanger-fiord, 
I intended to change my place of observation to one of the outer fishing 
stations, either Kiberg or Vardoe. But, unfortunately, I contracted a 
severe cold, accompanied by acute bronchitis, soon after my arrival at 
Vadsoe, probably owing to the severity of this northern climate. Iwas 
therefore compelled to stay where I was, and was prevented from mak- 
ing any further observations during the first half of my stay. After I 
had recovered from my indisposition, I visited two other points on the 
Varanger-fiord, viz, Bugones and Mortensnes. In both of these places 
I made observations and gathered information relative to the capelan- 
fisheries during this and the preceding years. Complaints were heard 
everywhere about the scarcity of bait; but whenever bait was obtained 
there was good fishing, and even exceptionably good fishing, until the 
24th of June. | . 

Foyn’s whale-fisheries did not commence till May (those of the Iar- 
fiord Company had commenced somewhat sooner), and were principally 
carried on in the outer portion of the fiord, off the coast of Kiberg and 
Vardoe and off the coast of Russia. The whales which were brought 
in were carefully examined, and information was obtained regarding the 
circumstances under which they were caught. 

On the 9th of July I left Vadsoe for the south, and arrived at Christiania 
on the 20th of the same month. 

I shall in the following state in detail the results of my observations, 
both as regards the capelan-fisheries in general, and the supposed influ- 
ence on them of the whale fisheries; but I must at the very outset di- 
rect attention to the fact that I do not consider my observations on this 
subject as completed. Many and complicated couditions have to be ex- 
amined, and even, under the most favorable circumstances, a year’s time 
would hardly be sufficient to complete this investigation. A beginning 
has at any rate been made this year, and, although there are a number 
of gaps in my investigation, I think that even now I am prepared to 
speak, with a tolerable degree of certainty, on several important and 
hitherto neglected conditions of the capelan-fisheries, as well as on the 
much discussed whale question. 


. A. 
ON THE CAPELAN-FISHERIES IN GENERAL. 


It is well known that the name “ capelan fisheries” is the technical 
term employed by the fishermen to designate the codfisheries, carried 
on during the spring months (April-June) on the coast of Finmark, 
and which are dependent on the occurrence of a smaller kind of fish, the 
capelan (Osmerus arcticus), which approaches these coasts in large num- 


[3] THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES. 169 


bers for the purpose of spawning. At this season the capelan consti- 
tutes the food of the cod, and is therefore almost exclusively employed 
as bait. The cod-fisheries therefore essentially depend on a regular 
and numerous approach of the capelan to the different fishing-stations. 
I have already had occasion to make a brief statement regarding the 
capelan, and the so-called capelan-cod, in my report on the practical and 

~ gcientific investigations made during the last polar expedition ; and the 
investigations of the capelan-fisheries made by me during the present 
year have not caused me to change any of the opinions expressed in said 
report. 

As [have said in that report, I have reason to suppose—and I base 
this supposition on the extensive physical and biological investigations 
made in the Polar Sea—that the proper home of the capelan is the sea 
between Spitzbergen, Greenland, Iceland, and Jan Mayens, especially 
that portion of it, which forms the immediate boundary of the polar cur- 
rent. This, however, does not imply that the capelan is not likewise 
found in other parts of the Polar Sea. Here it seems, for the greater 
part of the year, to lead a roving (pelagian) life, like the herring, which 
it resembles closely, not only as to its form, but also in its propagation 
and mode of life, aithough it belongs to an entirely different family. 
Towards spring the mature individuals gather in large schools and go 
south towards the northern coasts of Europe and America, in order to 
spawn. During this time it is pursued by whales wnd different fish of 
prey, the principal one of which is the cod. It is so well known that 
the capelan is found near Greenland and Iceland, that I did not deem 
it necessary to mention this fact in my report. On the other hand I 
thought that it was not generally known that large schools of capelan 
visit the coast of Labrador and the northern and eastern coasts of 
Newfoundland, where they cause codfisheries of exactly the same char- 
acter as those of Finmark to spring into existence. I have therefore 
deemed it proper to direct attention to this interesting fact in my report 
above referred to, after having obtained not only satisfactory informa- 
tion regarding these fisheries, but also specimens of capelan from New- 
foundland. 

The only place on our coast where the capelan come in large num- 
bers is the coast of Finmark. Farther south only small and scattered 
schools or stragglers, which seem to have lost their way, have been ob- 
served; even as far south, however, as the Christiania fiord. As the 
capelan-district proper we must designate the portion of the sea ex- 
tending from the Lapland Sea in the west to the Varanger-fiord and 
Vardoe in the east, more particularly the northern coast of Russia from 
the Varanger-fiord to the fishing-stations near the mouth of the White 
Sea (the so-called Murman coast). The capelan, as a general rule, make 
their appearance simultaneously at the different fishing-stations on the 
north coast of Finmark. In the Varanger-fiord, and on the coast of 
Russia, however, they invariably come somewhat later. The capelan 
do not always appear in the same number along this entire extent of 


170 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


coast, but it has often been observed that when they appear in excep- 
tionally large numbers in one place their number was smaller in 
other places, or they even staid away altogether from some places. 
With regard to this matter, a comparison between the capelan-fisher- 
ies of East and West Finmark will be found interesting, as showing 
that during some years their character has been entirely reversed. 
With the view of further illustrating this fact, I shall give below some 
statistics showing the quantities of fish captured in the two districts 
above referred to during a period of twenty-one years: 


Statistics of the Finmark capelan-fisheries, 1856-1876.” 


According to the governors’ h hheries were in— 
eco g to g ors’ reports the fisheries e Entire plallettbe 
PN Finmark  cape- 

West Finmark. East Finmark. lan-fisheries. 
S56) (GOOd cscacsaecocceseesisscevesiocsc==s Remarkably good j2-..ss--0ssccceuse i] 
Soa eG OOluesesae ees cant seam enccccessnces Tolerably good -....-% s--cess--cscees 3 
1858 | Almost a failure ..................-- Good at Vardoe ; otherwise poor.... ? 
1859 | Good . soe eeeesaros =| PRAtN Er DOOD ee cmcmesecisctessee means § 
1860 | Exc eptionally good.. Sodoondnacosgedée Rather poor. o--csssacsee reese secs q 
TSG lMlPexcellentucctascccesecsintescasces wc ANnconsidcrableveccsosses see sse eee e 6 millions. 
TSG MG OOM eas coset cer stetac tices comee. GOOG ve a cincins dace toxcisncitcaseentieeeas 9 millions. 
EGS HI PEOOleeoeset secre c cece o cee cenwaaea. GOOG). snot ccs wecncnsee csecene cece 5 millions. 
NSCATIVeL ye POOL os seese ec esecicescenccs= == Exceptionally good.........-....-.-- 10 millions. 
TSGba Vel yaNOOMaeste esc cene~esoee cases Exceptionally good.........---.-.... 11 millions. 
S66) P2eO INN ONS aececisecrc sss cece ccs =.ar0 LOSS emi iONSyesereeseeesleceeeeeeseeEe 13 millions. 
TSETH 2a mMilliOnS set acsaceecle so -cwecce cece Tid millions) .-cccccscescceusceeecens 13. 6 millions. 
1868) (POs MINMNON asec cscacecesce sss. 11. 18 millions 12. 5 millions. 
1869 | 2.03 millions... ae 7.45 millions 9. 48 millions. 
1870 | 3.12 millions. . 9. 05 millions .| 12.17 millions. 
1871 | 5.07 millions. . 6.45 millions .-| 11.52 millions. 
1872 | 3.42 millions... ---| 6.05 millions 9.47 millions. 
1873 | 6.83 millions....... 9. 36 millions 16.19 milliens. 
TSi4aiGavo millions eeces ese ec care seccar~ ce VOMGL millions eee see cee coos eter. 17. 56 millions. 
TS7os|Poqgo MILMIONSssoe eee cece e ce emeetoe ee 1567 9imillionstesceceseeeeea coon esas 19. 72 millions. 
STOR Last simillions: c. Joe ceccec cacicesswae 1V12imillions ss oeceses cece ose cecoes 5. 25 millions. 


*For the years prior to 1866 no exact figures were given by the governors. The data 
given for those years were furnished by the Statistical Bureau, and are sufficient to 
show the difference between the fisheries of the two districts. From 1867 on, the 
figures are taken from the governors’ fish reports published in ‘‘ Norges Officielle Sta- 
tistik,” and are entirely reliable. 

From the following data, kindly furnished by Mr. Nordvie, from a 
Russian work, by Danilewsky on the fisheries of the Murman coast, it will 
be seen that the capelan-fisheries have also on the coast of Russia been 
very changeable: 

1828 was a good fishing year. 

1829 was not so good. 

1830, poor (good in Norway). 

1831, very poor. 

1832-1836, not very good. 

1837, good. 

1839, poor in the west, good in the east. 

1840, an excellent fishing year. 

1841, poor. 

1842-1843, good. 

1844, poor. 

1845, good halibut, but poor cod-fisheries. 


[5] THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES. ues 


1846, good fishing west of Tsypnavolok. 

1847-1848, average fisheries. 

1849, poor. 

1850, poor. 

1851-1857, exceptionally good. 

1858-1859, not as good as formerly. 

1860, good in the beginning ; afterwards poor. 

1867, the best fisheries within man’s memory. 

1868, the same. 

I shall below give a number of statistical data regarding the capelan- 
fisheries in the Varanger-fiord, showing that there, too, the capelan-fish- 
eries have varied considerably from year to year. The approach of the 
capelan is noticed at a considerable distance from the shore by the 
columns of steam rising from the pursuing whales, and by enormous 
numbers of birds, mostly kitti-wakes (Larus tridactylus). At the same 
time, or somewhat later, the so-called capelan cod begins to appear in 
large numbers, voraciously devouring the capelan. These codfish differ 
from the common winter codfish by their brighter color, their larger 
livers, and their sexual organs, which are but little developed. Their 
size varies a good deal, much more so than is the case with the common 
cod (Gadus morrhua). The schools of capelan evidently consist of in- 
dividuals of very: different age, from the so-called “smaagjed” (small 
pike) to old codfish. The enormous numbers in which they appear ex- 
clude the idea that these schools are only those fish which live near 
the coast or in the waters immediately outside the respective coast. 
They evidently contain fish which have gathered from a wide extent of 
sea, and the opinion seems very plausible that they have gathered by 
degrees during the migrations of the capelan schools towards the coast. 
The important discovery, made during our last expedition, of the widely 
extended Polar Sea barrier, taken in connection with the direct observa- 
tions of the frequent occurrence of cod near the Bear Island, has led me 
to the opinion—mentioned in my report above referred to, and further 
corroborated in this report—that both the Loffoden-cod and the capelan- 
cod have their home near said barrier; and up to the present time I have 
seen no reason to change this opinion. By direct comparison I have 
convinced myself that the Finmark capelan-cod is the same fish as the 
cod found near the Bear Island and Spitzbergen; and I have already, in 
the report referred to, mentioned an interesting observation which seems 
directly to prove the identity of the two fish. 

The spawning-season of the capelan, like that of other fish, extends 
over a tolerably long period, the schools which arrive first spawning much 
earlier than those which arrive later. The earliest date when I noticed 
spawning this year was during the first days in May. Among a num- 
ber of specimens captured in the Busse sound, near Vardoe, on the 5th of 
May, and sent to me for examination, were several which had almost 
done spawning, and in the stomach of a few I found recently-emitted 
roe. At the fishing-station north of Vardoe spawning probably com- 


172 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


menced even earlier. In the Varanger-fiord and on the coast of Russia 
the fish seem to spawn latest. As late as the last days of June I ob- 
tained at Vadsoe, from the stomachs of coal-fish, capelan with fully-ma- 
tured roe, which, however, was not yet ready for spawning. As a gen- 
eral rule the spawning-process occurs on sandy bottom, at a depth of 4 
to 20 fathoms. It is probable, however, that it can also proceed on rocky 
bottom, and at a greater depth; but we are still without reliable data 
on this question. As soon as the roe has been emitted, and has become 
impregnated, the capelan again go out to sea, and the schools of cod 
disappear in proportion as the capelan leave the coast in order to seek 
their accustomed hunting grounds. It happens quite frequently, how- 
ever, that some schools of capelan stay at the bottom of the deep fiords 
till autumn and winter, just as the spring herring are sometimes known 
todo. This seems to have happened with tolerable regularity in the 
innermost and most sheltered portion of the Varanger-fiord, the so-called 
Meskefiord, where, during certain years, the capelan have been observed 
to remain under the ice in considerable numbers. These so-called winter- 
capelan, which must be considered as stragglers which have lost their 
way out to sea, are very lean and lank, but are nevertheless greedily 
pursued by cod and other fish of prey, in the stomachs of which they 
are frequently found. These are probably the capelan, which, on going 
out to sea, are occasionally seen near Vardoe as early as January. 

It is hardly probable that the capelan schools, after having spawned, 
take exactly the same route when they leave the coast as when they came. 
There are many indications that the capelan when they leave the coast, 
at any rate near Hast Finmark, go out to sea in an easterly direction. 
On the coast of Russia the route of the capelan can be traced in an 
easterly direction as far as the fishing-stations near the mouth of the 
White Sea. Farther east there are no capelan fisheries. But the oc- 
currence of capelan observed later in summer on the west coast of 
Nova Zembla makes it probable that at any rate a portion of the capelan 
schools take this route, afterwards following the boundary of the Polar 
current in a westerly direction, past the Bear Island, and thus reach- 
ing their proper home, the sea between Greenland and Spitzbergen. 


B. 


‘ 


ZOOLOGICAL, ANATOMICAL, ANL EMBRYOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS 
RELATIVE TO THE CAPELAN. 


Of the investigations made in this direction I shall, in this report, 
only give those points which relate to the spawning and mode of life of 
the capelan while near the coast. 

According to its whole build the capelan is a genuine pelagian fish, 
and both in its internal and external organ.zation shows a great simi- 
larity with the herring; although it is generally in accordance with cer- 


[7] THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES. 173 


tain zoological characteristics, especially the so-called “‘fat-fin” on the 
back—classed with the salmonoids. It is a peculiarity of the capelan 
that there is a very sharply marked external difference between the 
sexes, which has caused the adoption of separate designations for the’ 
male and female. In these northern latitudes the female is generally 
called “ herring-capelan” or “roe-capelan,” and the male “‘ faxe”-capelan. 
Both generally come near the coast at the same time, but sometimes 
the number of “herring-capelan” is larger, and at other times smaller 
than that of the “favre ”-capelan. On opening individuals caught in 
the beginning of the fishing-season, one will, without exception, find 
the sexual organs completely developed. The greater portion of the 
abdominal cavity of the “herring-capelan” is filled with rather coarse- 
grained reddish-yellow roe, which, on closer examination, appears to be 
inclosed in a single thin-skinned bag, lying to the left of the intestinal 
duct. The right roe-bag, on the other hand, is never fully developed, 
the capelan in this respect differing from other fish. In the “‘fazxe”- 
capelan both the ribbon-shaped milt-bags are found, but the right one 
is invariably smaller (hardly half the size of the left). By exercising 
a gentle pressure on the abdomen, both milt and roe are easily extracted, 
and can then be more closely examined. As soon as the roe is emitted 
it sinks to the ground, and by means of a peculiar slime, which coagu- 
lates in the water, it adheres to any object on the bottom of the sea 
with such a tenacity that it requires some force to tear it off. Some- 
times the roe gathers in large lumps or cakes, one grain of roe adhering 
to the other. The milt also sinks to the bottom and is absorbed by the 
roe, which thereby becomes impregnated. Soon after the roe has been 
emitted, the first preparatory process of development begins, as a por- 
tion of the yolk (the germ) becomes separated from the other portion 
(the food portion), and, differing in this from the roe of the cod, collects 
near the upper end of the egg. This is followed by the first “‘furrow- 
ing process,” whereupon the fetus begins to develop in the usual man- 
ner. I have not yet had an opportunity of ascertaining how long it 
takes the fetus to reach its full development, but it is probable that the 
time varies according to the temperature of the water. 

The young fry of the capelan was first observed near Vadsoeon the 17th 
of June after a fresh breeze from the east, with a strong landward current. 
These small fish had evidently been recently hatched, as none of those 
which were captured measured more than 8 to 10 millimeters in length; 
but it is certain that the hatching-places were at some distance east of 
the coast, as this year no roe was observed on the bottom, neither at 
Vadsoe nor at two other points on the Varanger-fiord which I had occasion 
to visit. The fry at this stage of their development are as transparent 
as clear water, and have a very thin body encased in a single clear skin, 
and a shapeless, broad head with two large eyes glittering like silver. 
They were observed in large numbers swimming about near the surface 
of the water, and were easily caught with a fine muslin net. At this 


174 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


period of its life the capelan is extremely tender, and even when treated 
in the most careful manner dies soon after it has been taken out of the 
water. Later in the season the young fish were repeatedly observed as 
far up the fiord as Morteusnes. Towards the end of my stay in these 
parts the capelan formed the principal bait for codfish, and were found 
in enormous numbers, together with small crustaceus and other pelagian 
animals. The codfish which were captured had the stomach almost in- 
variably full of a jelly-like substance, which, on closer examination, 
proved to be young capelan, with but few other fish among them. The 
largest specimens caught with the fine net had at that time reached the 
length of 23 millimeters, and all the fins were completely developed, so 
that with absolute certainty they could be recognized as genuine young 
capelan. 

An examination of the contents of the stomach and intestines of the 
grown capelan showed that it feeds exclusively on pelagian animals. At 
the furthest end of the intestinal duct remnants of themists and other 
characteristic animal forms of the arctic seas could be distinguished. 
In the stomach itself there were found various copepods of the species 
Calanide, some pelagian worms (sagitta),and occasionally Thysanopoda; 
therefore only such animals as had been observed in the fiord at the 
same time as the capelan. 


C. 


THE APPROACH OF THE CAPELAN TO THE COAST AND THE CONDI- 
TIONS WHICH SEEM TO EXERCISE AN INFLUENCE ON THE SAME. 


The capelan approach the coast in dense schools, and often seem to 
move with great rapidity, swiftly passing islands and capes, and rushing 
into bays and sounds and out again. When the roe and milt are ready 
for spawning this process commences in the first. suitable place, and 
seems to go on very fast. If the capelan does not immediately find a 
suitable place it roams about, sometimes near the coast and at other 
times farther from it, until it finds such a place. , 

It is a fact well known among fishermen that the weather has a con- 
siderable influence on the approach of the capelan. When there is a 
high sea and a strong wind blowing landward the capelan do not seek 
the sandy bays, but keep in deep water, where they probably spawn. 
When the wind, however, blows from the land, and the sea is calm, 
this is considered favorable to the approach of the capelan. The tem- 
perature of the sea is likewise important. Like most other fish, the cape- 
lan is very sensitive in the matter of sudden changes of temperature, 
and therefore endeavors, as much as possible, to keep in water of a 
tolerably uniform temperature. As long as the schools keep in the 
open sea they will not, during their migrations, be exposed to any very 
sudden changes, but when they come nearer the coast this will be differ- 
ent. Here they often meet with different currents of greatly varying 


[9] THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES. 175 


temperature, and this cannot but have a considerable influence on their 
approach to the coast. The water of the deep Finmark fiord is gen- 
erally very cool in spring, owing to the severe cold of the winter, and 
near the surface its temperature is often several degrees lower than in 
the open sea immediately outside the fiords. This difference of tem- 
perature, traces of which are found for a long time in the deep por- 
tions of the water, gradually disappears with the increasing warmth of 
summer. But as the heat of summer comes early one year and late 
another, the period when the temperature of the surface is the same in 
the fiords as in the open sea varies considerably from year to year, and 
this circumstance cannot fail to influence the character and location of 
the capelan-fisheries. It will therefore easily be understood why un- 
usually cold weather during the early part of summer is considered as 
very unfavorable for the entrance of the capelan into the fiords. 
Although the capelan are, during their approach to the coast, pur- 
sued by numerous enemies, both whales, fish, and birds of prey, this 
seems to have much less influence on the course of the capelan schools 
than the above-mentioned physical conditions. The capelan, on the 
whole, seems to be rather a lazy fish, and, especially when gathered in 
large schools, by no means shy. On this point I have made several 
observations; the first on my way north in the Sanfiord near Nordkyn. 
While the steamer stopped to unload goods a number of capelan were 
observed quietly swimming by the side of the steamer. When the ma- 
chinery again began to work and the steamer resumed its motion, it 
did not seem to affect them in the least, some of them even kept close 
to the stern without changing their course in the slightest, in conse- 
quence of which some were struck by the propeller and were thrown 
upward in a half-dead condition. It is well known that the method 
formerly employed for obtaining bait was very simple, and consisted in 
dipping the capelan out of the water with a sort of purse net. <Al- 
though of late years small seines have been used for this purpose, the 
above-mentioned primitive method is still successfully employed in 
many places, and I have once seen how two boat-loads of capelan were 
obtained at Vadsoe in this manner, although the schools were by no 
means large. This shows that the capelan is not at all shy. Its worst 
enemy is the coal-fish. This greedy fish of prey, by its peculiar method 
of chasing the capelan, often succeeds in scattering the schools, and 
in disturbing the approach of the capelan to the coast. Neither the 
so-called “ capelan cod,” nor whales, nor birds seem to produce this effect. 


D. 


THE CAPELAN-FISHERIES IN THE VARANGER-FIORD. 


As has already been mentioned, the capelan-fisheries are as a general 
Tule not very steady, the principal fisheries being one year in West Fin- 
mark and another year in East Finmark. The Varanger-fiord cape- 


176 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


lan-fisheries seem to be still more uncertain. In going over the different 
fish-reports, and examining the condition of the fisheries in previous years, 
I found ample proof of this assertion, and there have even been years 
when the Varanger-fiord fisheries proved an entire failure, the capelan 
either staying away altogether or not advancing beyond Sibergnas, 
where the Varanger-fiord proper commences. According to the official 
reports this has been the case during the years 1869, 1871, and 1876, and 
the present year must also be classed among the years when the cape- 
lan only enter the Varanger-fiord in small and scattered schools. Old 
fishermen say that in former times there were also years when no cape- 
lan came near the coast. Even if such is the case, however, some fish- 
ing is going on, as the “ capelan-cod,” before leaving the coast, likes to 
follow the raised portion of the bottom as far as possible. I had occa- 
sion during the present year to observe this circumstance. Although 
the great mass of capelan which, after passing Vardoe, approached 
the coast, evidently took their course from Kiberg across the mouth of 
the fiord towards the coast of Russia (where they were observed soon 
afterwards), a considerable number nevertheless entered the Varanger- 
fiord at Vadsoe, but more especially at Bugénes, where on certain days, 
when bait (herring) could be obtained, there was very good fishing 
(about 14 tons of liver per boat). But the lack of bait brought the fish- 
eries toa stand-still, and it is probable that a large number of cod would 
during this year have been caught in the Varanger district if there had 
been asufiicient quantity of bait. It is greatly tobe deplored that, after 
the experience of former years, no measures were taken to supply this 
urgent want, A swift steamer, which could have supplied the fisheries 
in the fiord with bait from Vardoe or the nearest fishing-stations having 
plenty of capelan, would doubtless have proved an inestimable advant- 
age. I have no doubt that even with preserved capelan or herring 
(packed in ice or slightly salted) large numbers of cod might have been 
eaught. It is stated that attempts made in this direction in former years 
have proved unsuccessful, but in making these statements no regard 
seems to have been had for the peculiar circumstances under which 
these attempts were made. When the sea is full of capelan, it is quite 
natural that the cod prefers the fresh capelan to preserved fish. In 
years like the present, however, when but few, if any, capelan are found 
near the fishing-stations, the cod will doubtless take to the bait, even if 
it is not fresh fish.* I myself have seen a large quantity of cod caught 
near Bugdnes with herring which were so old and soft that they could 
hardly be fastened to the hooks, which shows that the cod was not over 
nice in the matter of food. As lines are almost exclusively used in the 
Varanger-fiord cod-fisheries (not hand-lines as at most of the other fish- 
ing-stations), it cannot be considered a misfortune, but rather the con- 
trary, that there are so few capelan during the fishing-season, as it 


*It is well known that in the Loffoden fisheries salt herring are almost exclusively 
used for line fishing. 


[11] THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES. 177 


would be much more difficult to catch the cod with lines when the sea 
was full of capelan. 

As a peculiarity of this year’s fisheries in the Varanger-fiord it must 
be mentioned that during the whole season the cod went very deep, so° 
that the first good hauls were made near the edge of the outer bottom- 
elevation. I think that I can explain this by purely physical and 
meteorological causes, of which more below. 

In answer to the question what caused the capelan this vear to stay 
away from its usual spawning places in the Varanger-fiord most fisher- 
men will say that the whale-fisheries were the only cause of this. No 
facts, however, are given on which to build this opinion, and I believe, 
and expect to show in the following, that I am able to mention a much 
more plausible cause, which will also explain the failures of former 
years, when there were no whale-fisheries. 

I give below some statistical data, taken from the fish-reports re- 
printed in ‘* Norges Officielle Statistik,” relative to the capelan-fisheries in 
the Varanger-fiord during the last few years, from which it will be seen 
that there has not been a uniform decrease of the capelan-fisheries since 
the begining of the whale-fisheries, as is maintained by some persons, 
but that the fisheries have varied considerably from year to year. 


Statistics showing the number of fish caught in the Varanger-district during 
the period 1868-1878.* 


BaP ee ies ced eRe Ns Baas ld het no ca ander ae 3, 160, 000 
“ESOL gS 2 PR ee cies cn nye Ee 446, 000 
MI Arba A Annee OD 6 ks aecaitic Ringe 1, 192, 000 
Tsay er ce SEE Ae Oe ae a i 797, 900 
ie ea a 82 aes eS et srs 431, 200 
LOR PONS ESE OS NES en Sr einer Cn 900, 000 
‘SL ES SEE, cs CIR nee” SI 208 ne RR nO nee 1, 187, 000 
“1S eee eT dee Oe eS 961, 000 
SP OGG ea i HOE ey gta BUN e Panett hg te 476, 000 
7 eS SANS CORDON SSE 8 Seam nana 1, 120, 000 
Be Ae MUN IR cea tees cial es abe aretha teas nel ct 569, 000 
B. 


ON THE SUPPOSED FNFLUENCE OF THE WHALE-FISHERIES ON THE 
CAPELAN-FISHERIES IN THE VARANGER-FIORD. 


As this question "is for the time being of vital importance to the in- 
habitants of the coast, I have given special attention to it, and have, 
after the best of my ability, during my stay at Vadsoe sought to examine 
all the points which seem to have any bearing on this question. It is 
the general opinion in these parts, as is well known, that the whale- 
fisheries exercise an exceedingly hurtful influence on the capelan-fisher- 


3 * The figures for the last two years have been kindly furnished by the Statistical 
ureau. 


S. Mis. 29-———12 


178 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


ies, and that the failure of the Varanger-fiord fisheries during the last 
few vears is principally owing to the growing development of the whale- 
fisheries. No satisfactory proof of this opinion, however, has as yet 
been given, and the bill introduced in the Folkething (Norwegian Parlia- 
ment) during its last session to limit the whale-fisheries, did not, there- 
fore, pass. My private opinion has always been that no such hurtful 
influence can be ascribed to the whale-fisheries, and I have freely stated 
this opinion to the department on former occasions. But, as at that 
time I had not yet personally observed the capelan-tisheries, and as the 
whale-fisheries were carried on in a somewhat different manner from 
what they are now, I thought it desirable to make another thorough in- 
vestigation of the whole matter, in which I could engage with entire 
impartiality, as I did not consider myself bound to abide by any opinion 
previously expressed by me, and was not hampered by any considera- 
tions of a personal nature. 

In examining this matter the following points seem to me to be of 
special importance; and from my present experience I shall endeavor 
to answer each one of them as best I can: 

(1.) What justifies the supposition that the whales chase the capelan 
from the sea towards the coast? 

(2.) Does the whale, during good capelan-fishing, cause the capelan 
to stay for a considerable time in shallow bays and sounds? 

(3.) Which kinds of whales come near the coast during the capelan- 
fisheries, and which of these must be considered as the capelan-whale 
proper? 

(4.) Can any considerable decrease be noticed in the number of whales 
at the present time, and can it be supposed that, as these fisheries are 
carried on at present, the whales will be exterminated in the near future? 

(5.) Will an actual decrease or the extermination of the whales have 
any influence on the character of the capelan-fisheries ? 

(G.) Do the whale-steamers, while cruising near the coast, scare away 
the capelan schools, and disturb their approach to the coast? 

(7.) In how far can there be any direct conflict between the whale 
and other fisheries? 

(8.) Is it probable that the refuse from the captured whales fills the 
sea with impure matter to such a degree as to drive the capelan away 
from places where whales are slaughtered? 

(9.) Does impure matter from the same source gather at the bottom 
of the sea and make it unfit for the development of the roe of the cape- 
lan? 

(10.) What physicaland meteorological causes can be supposed to have 
an influence on the entering of the capelan into the Varanger-fiord? 

In the following I shall endeavor to answer each one of these ques- 
tions under its respective number: 

(1.) It is a very old opinion, as is well known, that the approach to 
the coast of the capelan and herring is solely caused by the whales, 


[13] THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES. 179 


and that nature had appointed these gigantic animals to gather the 
scattered schools of herring and capelan from the different parts of 
the ocean and chase them towards certain portions of the coast in 
order that man might get his share of the wealth of the sea. For this 
reason a sort of veneration was, in olden times, shown for whales, which 
were considered the special servants of Providence. Our time is less 
fanciful in its interpretation of natural phenomena, and we hesitate 
somewhat to assign to the whale the part of a disinterested benefactor 
of mankind. It has been shown with a sufficient degree of certainty 
that both the spring herring and the capelan approach the coast at 
certain seasons of the year from a natural instinct, in order to spawn 
in suitable places, and that the whales simply follow the schools of her- 
ring and capelan, because they supply them with food. Although it 
might be supposed that no educated person could any longer entertain 
the antiquated notion above referred to, the opinion seems still to be 
very generally spread among fishermen that the presence of the whale 
during thecapelan-fisheries is of great significance and benefit. Though 
the more enlightened fishermen will grant that, even if the whales staid 
away, the capelan must come near the coast for the purpose of spawn- 
ing, they still think that it is owing to the whales that the capelan 
spawn so near to the coast, and that there are successful fisheries. Ex- 
perience, however, does by no means bear out this opinion. There have 
been years when large whales were seen out at sea and no capelan 
approached the coast, and at other times there have been instances (as 
in the Varanger-fiord) when the capelan came quite near the coast with- 
out a single whale making its appearance outside. 

(2.) Ithas been maintained that during the rich Varanger-fiord capelan- 
fisheries the whales formed a sort of cordon outside the bays and sounds, 
thus forcing the capelan towards the coast against their will, and pre- 
venting them from returning to the deep waters. In all such cases, 
however, it has been ascertained that the capelan spawned in the 
above-mentioned bays and sounds, and also, that, after the spawning- 
process was finished, the capelan went out to sea again, without any 
regard to the whales. It is evident, therefore, that we should consider 
this matter ina somewhat different light, viz, that the schools of capelan 
have chosen their spawning-places from their own instinct and entirely 
independent of the whales, and that the whales have simply followed 
the schools, as is their wont, and that when the capelan schools stopped 
in certain places the whales likewise stopped somewhere in the neigh- | 
borhood, so as to be able to take their meals regularly. In rejecting 
the last-mentioned and entirely natural explanation and showing a pref- 
erence for the old idea, that the whales bring the capelan to the coast 
and distribute them among the different fishing-stations, people only 
furnish another proof of how difficult it is to tear loose from old and 
deeply-rooted prejudices. This idea, as has been said above, is evidently 
based on a complete misunderstanding of the mutual relations between 


180 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


the capelan and the whale. There are no reliable facts to show that 
the approach of the capelan schools is influenced to any great degree 
either by the pursuing whales or by the cod, or by flocks of birds; but 
there is every reason to suppose that only physical and meteorological 
conditions determine the course of the capelan while near the shore. 

(3.) The species of whales which follows the schools of capelan seems 
to be almost exclusively the so-called “ Fin-whale,” which I have found 
to be identical with the Balenoptera musculus, the same which generally 
makes its appearance during the spring-herring fisheries. The so-called 
‘‘bIne-whale,” on the other hand, makes its appearance later, hardly 
before the middle of May, and does not live on capelan, but on pelagian 
animals of a lower class, particularly small crustaceans. Ihave already 
had occasion to show that this species of whales, which forms the prin- 
cipal object of Foyn’s fisheries, has absolutely nothing to do with the 
capelan, and the investigations made by me during the present year 
fully corroborate this statement. Of other whales, the Megaptera beops 
occasionally makes its appearance, but only later in spring. Shortly 
before setting out on my return journey I had occasion to examine a 
specimen of this kind which had been captured by Foyn’s men. A 
thorough examination of the contents of its stomach showed that this 
species of whale, like the “ blue-whale,” lives exclusively on lower pela- 
gian animals, especially small crustaceans. Finally, a fourth species 
of whales is known in these regions, the so-called 4 coal-fish-whale,” 
which takes its name from the circumstance that it does not appear in 
any considerable number until the approach of the coal-fish. As this 
whale only reaches a comparatively small size, it is not caught. Ihave, 
however, obtained a tolerably close view of it at sea, which convinced 
me that it is the so-called “ Vadge-whale,” well known on our western 
coast. It lives principally on small herring, but it must be supposed 
that in these northern latitudes it also, to some extent, feeds on cap- 
elan. The three last-mentioned species of whales are seen near the 
coast, and in the Varanger-fiord, long after the capelan have disap- 
peared. The “ Fin-whale,” on the other hand, leaves the coast with the 
capelan, and also arrives with it. It must, therefore, be considered as 
the ‘“‘capelan-whale” proper. Although, as has been said above, the 
‘“‘blue-whale” forms the principal object of TFoyn’s fisheries, several 
‘‘Fin-whales” have been caught during the last few years, as the whale- 
fisheries commence before the “blue-whale” comes near the coast. 
During the present year, as far as known, 15 “ Fin-whales” have been 
caught by Foyn’s men. The stomachs of those which I examined were 
completely filled with capelan, and some were even found in the mouth, 
the whale evidently not having had time to swallow them. 

(4.) To the question, ‘Can a considerable decrease in the number of 
whales be noticed on the coast of Finmark?” my experience compels 
me to return a negative answer. The schools of capelan are still followed 
by numerous whales, and the reports on the capelan-fisheries, year after 


® 


[15] THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES. 181 


year, speak of the large number of whales and birds, just as in former 
times. As regards the complaint that there has been a decrease in the 
number of whales in the Varanger-fiord, we must take inte consideration | 
the circumstance that the whale only visits these places where it can 
obtain sufficient food. As it is a fact that of late years the capelan 
have not entered the Varanger-fiord in any considerable number, it is 
but a natural consequence of this fact that the whales in this fiord are 
not as numerous as in former years. If any species of whales may be 
supposed to have decreased on account of the present whale-fisheries 
this would be the “ blue-whale,” but the rich hauls made during the last 
few years do not seem to indicate any such decrease. As the whale- 
fisheries are carried on at present, it is hardly probable that there will 
be any noticeable decrease in the number of whales in the near future. 
If the whale-fisheries, however, should be further developed, and new 
whaling-stations be established on this coast, such an occurrence is 
within the range of possibility. In this case it weuld be advisable to 
take suitable measures for preserving a source of income, which doubt- 
less in the future will yield a still greater gain, in proportion as the pre- 
paration and improvement of the raw material becomes more perfect 
and better apparatus is employed. 

(5.) There are instances en record, unfortunately, which show that it 
is possible for man to exterminate an entire species ofanimals. Although 
it seems hardly possible that this should ever be the case with the whales, 
whose home and place of refuge is the whole vast ocean, it is quite pos- 
sible that, by being too eagerly pursued for a long number of years, their 
number may decrease, and that finally they may be more or less driven 
away from certain coasts. It is not easy to say what would be the con- 
sequences of such an occurrence. It is my opinion, however, that as far 
as the fisheries are concerned these consequences would not be as serious 
as some people are inclined to think. Whilst it is certainly donbtfual 
whether the whales to any great extent chase the eapelan and herring 
towards the shore, it is absolutely certain that enormeus quantities of 
these fish are destroyed by the whales. The “ Fin-whales” must actually 
be considered as hurtful animals. The “biue-whale,” on the other hand, 
lives almost exclusively on small crustaceans, which are of considerable 
importance to the fisheries, as they form the principal bait for the cod. 
The probable consequence of the disappearance of the whales would be 
an increase in the number of eapelan, and an improvement in the cod- 
fisheries, on account of the larger number of small crustaceans; in other 
words, there is reason to suppose that instead of being injured, the 
fisheries would be benefited. It would, however, be wrong to encourage, 
from this point of view, a war of extermination against the whales. 
Although these animals do not play the peculiar part which the super- 
stition of former years has assigned them, they doubtless have their place 
in the great household of nature by contributing their share towards 
maintaining that equilibrium which is necessary for the fauna of the sea, 


182 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


if it is to preserve its present character. Any violent disturbance of* 
this equilibrium will, under all circumstances, be fraught with danger, 
as we do not know what further consequences it may produce. The de- 
sire to preserve the whale-fisheries for our descendants ought likewise 
to prevent people from engaging in a useless war of extermination 
against these animals. 

(6.) As during the last few years the whale-fisheries have been carried 
on at a time when capelan-fishing was in full activity, the question 
arises whether the whaling-ships are liable during their cruises to scare 

the schools of capelan. Some people think that the noise made by the 
' propeller of a steamer is capable, even at a considerable distance, of 
frightening capelan and herring and driving them away from the coast. 
This, however, is merely a supposition, and has never been proved by 
facts. Various observations (see also those mentioned by me above), on 
the contrary, seem to show that at any rate the capelan is in no wise 
affected by this kind of noise. It is another question, whether the 
noise of the cannon, which are fired off by the whaling-vessels, can 
frighten the capelan. It cannot be denied that the capelan, like all 
fish, is strangely affected by any sudden noises of this kind. One can 
easily convince himself by actual experiment that even a slight noise, 
such as the falling down of an oar in the boat, &c., is noticed by the 
schools of capelan which are in the immediate neighborhood, and that, 
on hearing the noise, they make a sudden movement, which causes their 
shining sides to appear in the water. One may, however, at the same 
time, convince himself that this movement is purely temporary, and 
that, as soon as the noise has subsided, the schools of capelan quietly 
pursue their course. As the cannon shots which are fired by the whaling- 
vessels are by no means ot the character of a continuous cannonade, but 
are only fired at long intervals, it cannot be supposed that the course of 
the capelan is in any way influenced thereby, especially when these shots, 
as is mostly the case, are fired at a considerable distance from the coast. 
It cannot be denied, however, that if these shots should be fired close 
to the shore, and right among the schools of capelan whilst they are 
engaged in spawning, the spawning-process might be endangered, and 
the capelan frightened to such a degree as to make their capture much 
more difficult. It would be still worse if a wounded whale should in its 
agony rush among the schools of capelan, dragging the steamer after 
it. Such cases will probably be of rare occurrence, but are said to have 
happened, and must under any circumstances be considered as extremely 
unfavorable to the capelan-fisheries. Some complaints on this point 
have been raised during the present year, and I have had occasion 
during my stay at Vadsoe to become acquainted with the nature of these 
complaints, and I must say that, although they were doubtless exag- 
gerated, there was certainly some foundation for them. Iam, therefore, 
prepared to grant that it will be a benefit to confine the whale-fisheries 
within certain limits. 


[17] THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES. 183 


(7.) The greatest danger which, in my opinion, threatens the capelan- 
fisheries from the whale-fisheries is that there may possibly be a conflict: 
between these two interests. If this should really ever be the case it 
will be time enough to take measures for assigning certain limits to each 
fishery, so as to preclude the possibility of a collision. But, strange to 
say, very few complaints have been raised relative to this (in my opinion) 
very important point, and from what I heard during my stay at the 
fishing-stations, there has so far been very little cause for such com- 
plaints. There seem to have been a few cases where the lines of the 
capelan-fishers have been disturbed by the whale-fisheries, but in such 
cases Mr. Foyn has invariably reimbursed the fishermen for their loss 
in such a liberal manner as to make their gain exceed their loss. It is, 
however, within the range of possibility that, if the whale-fisheries 
should be further developed, the conflict between the two interests might 
become more serious. Another point should be taken into consideration 
—the possible danger to the lives of the fishermen, if the whale-fisheries 
should be prosecuted on a more extensive scale in the usual fishing- 
places, which are crowded with boats and implements. When a whale, 
which has been shot but is not yet dead, rushes furiously along with the 
steamer in tow, it cannot possibly make way for the boats which acci- - 
dentally cross its path; nor will it be possible for the crews of such boats 
who are engaged in hauling in their lines and nets to escape the approach- 
ing danger. It is evident that accidents could thus easily happen, and in 
such cases neither Mr. Foyn nor any one else could make up for the 
losses sustained. For these reasons I would be inclined to favor a reason- 
able limitation of the whale-fisheries, promising greater safety to appa- 
ratus and human life; and it is my idea that this could best be dene by 
drawing a certain line at some distance from the coast, within which 
no whale could be shot during the fishing-season. If this line were 
drawn one half mile (Norwegian) from the coast the whale-fisheries would 
not be inconvenienced, and the other fisheries could be carried on with 
greater safety, and the danger, to some extent well founded, that under 
certain circumstances the whale-fisheries might drive away the schools of 
capelan, would be removed. 

There are a few more points regarding the whale-fisheries which have 
attracted attention during the last few years, and to which I will refer, 
because during my stay at the fishing-stations I have made them the 
subject of special investigations. 

(8.) The fear has been expressed that the refuse from the captured 
whales might fill the sea with fatty and impure substances to such an 
extent as to prevent the capelan entering the Varanger-fiord, since the 
capelan seemed to avoid the places where whaling-establishments are 
located. As regards this last-mentioned point, I must say that experi- 
ence does not prove its correctness. Whenever capelan have visited the 
Varanger-fiord, and this has more or Jess always been the case, they have 
gone to their accustomed places, and the Vadsoe Sound has always been 


184 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


one of the best points fer the capelan-fisheries; it has even been noticed 
that the schools of capelan seemed to prefer that portion of the sound 
which bordered on Mr. oyn’s establishment. On the south side of the 
fiord the bay into which the Jacobs River empties has always been the 
best place for the capelan-fisheries, and is still considered so, although 
the whaling-establishment of the larfiord Company is quite near. As 
regards the refuse, it is true that the Iarfiord Company only uses the 
oil and the whalebone, while Foyn’s establishment utilizes everything 
except the entrails. These are taken outside of the fiord and thrown 
into the water to be carried away by wind and waves; they continue 
to float near the surface until they are either scattered or sink to the 
bottom after the fatty substances have disappeared. During my excur. 
sions I have several times had occasion to see such refuse. These half- 
decayed substances do not emit the most pleasant odor, and it is any- 
thing but agreeable for the inhabitants of Vadsoe to have the current, 
as will sometimes happen, carry such matter into the immediate neigh- 
borhood of the town. But the poisoning of the water of the Varanger- 
fiord is entirely out of the question. Another disagreeable conse- 
quence is this, that during the slaughtering of the whales at Foyn’s 
establishment a quantity of oil and fat is carried across the sound to 
Vadsoe by wind and current, and adheres to the piers, which suffer much 
from this cause, and are destroyed in a comparatively short time. One 
can easily convince himself of the presence of these oily substances, 
which are of course confined to the surface of the water whenever there 
is a fresh sea-breeze. It can then be noticed that the water in the imme- 
diate neighborhood of Foyn’s establishment does not show the slightest 
ripple, but remains as smooth as a mirror, just as if there was no wind, 
and at the same time boats may be seen passing by at a short distance, 
their sails filled by the breeze. It must, however, be said that’ this 
phenomenon is only noticed in the Vadsoe Sound, and that the sea out- 
side of the sound preserves its usual appearance. It is hardly probable 
that the fatty substances floating about on the surface of the water 
should drive the capelan away, and experience has shown that the 
capelan have entered the Vadsoe Sound in spite of the existence of this 
fatty matter. In slaughtering the captured whales a large quantity of 
blood likewise flows into the sea, but as it is heavier than the sea-water 
it is not carried as far as the oil; and I have never seen blood in the 
water except in the immediate neighborhood of Foyn’s establishment, 
where the sea certainly at times resembles a pool of blood. The ques- 
tion has also been asked whether the close proximity of Foyn’s estab- 
lishment to the town of Vadsoe could in any way affect its sanitary con- 
dition. Although this question, properly speaking, did not belong to 
the subject which I intended to investigate, I nevertheless thought that 
it might be useful to gather some information on this point from the 
resident physician, Dr. Hartman, who has assured me that there had 


[19] THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES. 185 


not been any change for the worse in the sanitary condition of the town 
since the beginning of the whale-fisheries. 

(9.) The idea has al8o been advanced that the réfase from the cap- 
tured whales might fill the bottom of the sea with impurities to such an 
extent as to make it unfit for the development of the roe of the capelan. 
This idea, however, does not rest on any actual observation, but is merely 
a supposition. Ihave made this thesubjectof mostcareful and thorough 
investigation, the result of which by no means corroborates that sup- 
position. Immediately on my arrival at Vadsoe, therefore, prior to the 
beginning of this year’s whale-fisheries, | made a careful examination of 
the sound, both near the town and near Foyn’s establishment. I found 
nothing of a peculiar character, except that close to the above-men- 
tioned establishment there was an unusual quantity of those small green 
alg which are used a good deal to keep the water in aquaria in a fresh 
condition. In the deep cavities between the stones there was a thin 
layer of fine mud; otherwise the bottom everywhere consisted of pure 
white sand, which in some places was coarser than in others. After the 
whale-fisheries had been going on for some time I again examined the 
sound on different occasions. Near Foyn’s establishment stinking mud 
had, in some places, accumulated on the sand, and this mud was evidently 
composed of refuse-matter from the slaughtered whales; but at a very 

‘short distance from the shore this mud began to disappear, and farther 
out in the sound the bottom was exactly of the same character as when 
I first examined it, and I could not discover the slightest impurities. I 
even go so far as to say that, in spite of the whale-fisheries, the harbor 
of Vadsoe has a cleaner bottom than most other harbors on the coast of 
Finmark. Both at Vardoe and at Hammerfest and many other places 
I have on former occasions examined the nature of the bottom, and have 
invariably found a more or less extensive layer of dark mud covering 
the sand, composed principally of fish-refuse and other decayed organic 
matter. The Vadsoe harbor, however, is remarkably free from this mud. 
This seems to be owing to the steady and often very strong current 
which flows through the sound, and which does not allow any organic 
substances floating in the water to sink to the bottom. Farther out not 
the slightest trace of impurity can be discovered on the bottom of the 
fiord. As a general rule the upper layer is sand, then comes rock with 
a rich algve-vegetation, and below this a clay bottom. Nothing anom- 
alous could be observed in the composition of this clay; and both it 
and the sandy and rocky bottom were swarming with different aquatic 
animals which seemed to thrive remarkably well. Although I am not 
able to report any direct observations on the development of the cape- 
lan-roe in these regions, for the simple reason that this year the cape- 
lan did not spawn in the Varanger-fiord, I feel convinced that the 
nature of the bottom will not prevent the capelan from spawning either 
here or anywhere else. It is true that the entrails of the whales, after 
having floated in the water for some time, finally sink to the bottom; 


186 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


but when this takes place the organic substances have for the greater 
part been destroyed, and the numerous aquatic animals living on the 
bottom do the rest of the work. I once had occasion to examine some 
of the remnants of the entrails of a whale which were accidentally 
brought up by the bottom-scraper in the fiord near Vadsoe. It looked 
like a mass of wool rolled together, as only the thin and tough sinews 
had been left, all the flesh and fat having disappeared. There was no 
unusual odor from these remnants. Itis my opinion that but very little 
time is required to reduce the entrails to this condition. It is a well- 
known fact that in the arctic regions large animals, the walrus or polar 
bear for instance, are completely skeletonized by sinking them to the 
bottom and letting them lie there for a few days. There are a number 
of small marine animals, especially amphipods, which make their ap- 
pearance in enormous masses, and do the work of skeletonizing very 
thoroughly, and which are everywhere to be considered as diligent sani- 
tary police, clearing off from the bottom all decaying organic matter. 
In the Varanger-fiord these small animals are found in enormous masses. 
In the Vadsoe Sound alone I discovered 20 different kinds of amphi- 
pods, and these have on the whole been found to be identical with those 
usually found in the arctic seas. 

(10.) In conclusion, if I am asked what I suppose to be the cause of 
the last years’ poor fisheries in the Varanger-fiord, I must—referring to 
my investigations of this matter, and to what I have said regarding it 
above—express it aS my conviction that the principal causes are of a 
physical and meteorological nature, and that the whale-fisheries have 
much less to do with it than is generally supposed. Although it cannot 
be denied that under certain circumstances these fisheries may disturb 
the course of the capelan and their distribution over the different fishing- 
stations, there is nothing to justify the supposition that the capelan 
have ever been driven away from the coast thereby, or have been pre- 
vented from reaching their accustomed spawning places.* During the 
present year the capelan-fisheries in the Varanger-fiord were not very 
successful, as hardly any capelan entered the fiord, and public opinion 
very generally ascribed this to the whale-fisheries, no one ever thinking 
of other possible causes. As such a cause I have mentioned meteorolo- 
gical conditions, and my experience in this respect is fully borne out by 
that of the fishermen. If we inquire into the meteorological conditions 
of the present year we find that the whole spring and early summer till the 
24th of June were unusually cold andraw. The temperature of the sea 


*One of the complaints raised during my stay at Vadsoe was that a single cannon 
shot fired near Great L’kkero from the steamer of the Iarfiord Company caused the schools 
of capelan and the whales to leave this neighborhood, not to return again; but it may 
well be asked why the same was not the case at Vardoe and Kiberg, in the immediate 
neighborhood of which shots were fired repeatedly. It was evidently a mere accident 
that the capelan disappeared at the same, or nearly the same, time when the above- 
mentioned shot was fired; and there is every reason to suppose that the same would 
havehappened if no shot had been fired. 


[21] THE FINMARK CAPELAN-FISHERIES. 187 


water in the Varanger-fiord was consequently very low, and remained in 
the neighborhood of +2° C. till the end of the fisheries. During the 
nights the temperature was often several degrees lower, and the surface 
water at times consequently still colder. I have not the slightest doubt 
that thereby the schools of capelan were to a great extent prevented 
from entering the Varanger-fiord. I also think that this unusually low 
temperature of the upper portion of the water is the reason why the 
capelan-cod went into such deep waters, and did not visit the banks 
as is their wont, and also why there was such a scarcity of small crusta- 
ceans. Even if one should not be inclined to aseribe so decided an in- 
fluence on the course of the capelan to the meteorological conditions as 
I do, I pevertheless believe that every one will agree with me that it 
will not do to be led by an old prejudice, and make the whale-tisheries 
solely responsible for the poor fisheries in the Varanger-fiord, without 
taking into consideration meteorological and other conditions, which very 
probably have had a good deal to do with it. 

I have in the above given a plain review of the opinions to which the 
investigations made by me during the present year have led me. If 
these opinions differ somewhat from those generally entertained in these 
regions, I can honestly confess that this is not caused by any pre-con- 
ceived prejudice on my part. On the contrary, it has been my desire as 
much as possible to meet the views of the inhabitants of these parts 
half-way; and I have therefore investigated all the complaints made 
against the whale-fisheries as conscientiously as possible. As a scien- 
tist I am obliged to confine myself strictly to the facts in the case, and 
I have found that these facts do not favor the popular opinion. If, in 
spite of this, I have declared my willingness to favor a reasonable limita- 
tion of the whale-fisheries, this has principally been done from reasons 
entirely different from those which have generally been advanced; my 
idea as to this proposed limitation, and the manner in which it.had best 
be carried out, also differs greatly trom that proposed in former years. 


X.—THE HALIBUT FISHERY.—DAVIS’ STRAIT.* 


By NEwTon P. ScuppEr, A. M. 


P ANALYSIS. 

Page, 

AL——GENERAT, DISCUSSION OF THE: FISHERY 522250. 50.2oece cc cccs sos dec case seus y 

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* The following _article is the result of a trip taken, in 1879, upon a Gloucester fishing 
vessel, Professor Baird, convinced that it would be one of the best methods of col- 
lecting information respecting the sea-fisheries, sent representatives of the United 
States Fish Commission upon some of the regular fishing trips of the Gloucester ves- 
sels, to note and report everything of interest. With this object in view, the writer 
was sent on the fishing vessel Bunker Hill, Capt. John McDonald, bound to Davis’ 
Strait for halibut. 

It was decided that, since the Davis’ Strait fishery formed a fishery by itself, it 
would be better to write its history up to the present time than to confine this report 
to the trip of the Bunker Hill. 

The writer acknowledges with pleasure his indebtedness to Mr. R. E. Earll, then in 
charge of the Fish Commission station at Gloucester, for his kindness in arranging for 
comfortable quarters and outfit; to Mr. A. Howard Clark, for notes of statements of 
fishermen and others relating to this fishery, and to Capt. J. W. Collins for many val- 
uable suggestions. Nor would he forget to mention with gratitude the kindness and 
aid of the fishermen with whom he was brought into so intimate contact. The captain 
offered every advantage in his power, consistent with the interest of the fishery, and 
the rest were equally generous. There is probably no class of men more generous and 
self-denying than the Gloucester fishermen, and recent events only confirm this state- 
ment. 


(1) 


190 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


A.—GENERAL DISCUSSION OF THE FISHERY. 
1.—OUTLINE HISTORY. 


Reports of the abundance of halibut off the west coast of Greenland 
were first brought to Massachusetts by Provincetown whalers. The 
first trip to Greenland after these fish was made in 1866 by the schooner 
John Atwood. She sailed June 29 and returned October 14, stocking 
$5,500. Capt. G. P. Pomeroy, of New London, went as navigator, and 
Capt. Averill L. York, of Gloucester, as fishing master. Though she 
failed to fill her hold, only because of her late arrival upon the fishing 
banks, no enthusiasm was excited in this fishery until Capt. John 
McQuinn, in 1870, brought from Greenland a trip of flitched halibut, 
worth over $19,000. Each of the two or three succeeding years, five or 
six vessels, with hopes of having like success, were fitted out for the 
same place. But, for some reason or other, the fish were not caught in 
very extravagant quantities, and a fall in the price of the fish rendered 
such a long trip financially rather uncertain. Besides, as there was no 
reliable chart of Davis’ Strait and the coast of Greenland, the fishermen 
hesitated considerably before undertaking a voyage to such a precipi- 
tous and barren coast; and no one can blame them. Ounce give them a 
good chart of the coast and harbors of Western Greenland, and their 
greatest difficulty will be removed. No reliable survey and chart of 
Greenland have been made. 

Notwithstanding the need of large and accurate charts and the im- 
mense distance of two thousand miles, so great are the probabilities of 
making a profitable catch, that thirty-one trips have been made from 
Gloucester to Davis’ Strait after halibut. The following is a tabular 
view of the vessels and captains engaged in the Greenland fishery from 
its beginning to the present time, showing the year and weight of 
flitches for each trip. This gives a total of 3,283,765 pounds of salt 
halibut brought to Gloucester from Greenland, or an average of 113,233 
pounds for the vessels that returned in safety. 


| 
>, 

Year. Vessel. Captain. I poate of 
WS66\Fe oa. «cess ohn AtGwood:.c2 ss<t ee ee ee ee George Pomeroyea-e-iscesce ceases 60, 000 
TT!) Gagaoreeod sans Caleb Haton.....2.3. 522s acca aes JohneMic@ minnie es seceeece cians e 134, 400 
187 Opec ss = Caleb Baton ~. 22.25.2502) s.- Soe Johni McQuinn c------2-- = = 2 cee 177, 800 
Aaa acoso sees 2 oe membring Chief 5-5 ars ence eer Jobn McQuinn ...--- SpbEde needs | 
USGA iwatetastainlate arala'- DalebeHaton: - 222.2 -c<saeiee ene Jeremiah MOpPKINGe ss. 625 2-25. . 
ITY Base = GoAeeeae River Queen (lost)...........-----|, George Robiene Cu ete seats. 4 429, 200 
Giles see = Nae nie ‘Rhorwaldsen’. 2. i.2 2) ..ccse sees - 2|ne AMES Pam Gomes = eietrers = ar /= =i J 
Silene totes. Walliam SsBaker! 2. 2-22. shosssee AlbionvPcarsOeescec. sec nese ceo ee 156, 800 
STL soteeeece ear Miary aE. 5. 22-85 Se Seciseeeeecnes Rasmus Madsen 2-2------5--2-5- 30, 000 
IPAS aAoa nosaa oer Aaronpburmhamer 2. ac.sccsecee Charles: J eawsonee e-toc closer 112, 000 
TPs Lb Sen a mhorwaldsen sess. sche sacmenecs Henry ‘Hamilton !----- 25.2. .-2-<- 145, 600 
Oi 2s ceeeteisresc DWallliamiS: Bakeni-n.f \oshca- estes Albion; Pearse iketreces saeesccceeee 145, 600 
TTP reaaessbdadeane Membrino Chief... 255...) seek John: McQummnes esas sees eee 154, 400 
OTe cece cestitassc Carrie JONneReis:2iidsesce-le2 seen es! Sohn Gusikilllesseets sheen seek eee 112, 000 
S72 cosas ee eeerise RO alebnatoNteet ccs casset co aceon Jeremiah Hopkins..-.......--.---- 134, 400 
NOG Was Rae A Seaberice AsgronsBurmbhamy. si. sc ce sso selon. - Charles'de Mawsonteesecce ese eee 91, 000 
S73 ieee cceee toe iWilliamS: Baker so-ccaseesesecees Albion) Pearse) secseceeceseanes asi 75, 700 


[3] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS STRAIT. 191 


é Pounds of 
Year. Vessel. Captain. fish. 

Caleb, Matonis-cccsescese aa sieceeic Jeremiah Hopkins ..............-- 62, 500 
‘AlbertiClarencelts-css-esene ---- == JOHMIGUSKING WS. ete tscssncesecces 51, 000 
INDITSecundusie--tessstsseels Charles J. Lawson ......------.---- 163, 000 
centr ye WalSOMMs ser asim serece oe eerie SANTIS S AIMNISC Meee etera is ae steele ninlaiaeie 91, 000 
Grace Mears. casesec. oes eo ---—-|, Randall) MeDonald...<.-2--2- 5.0.2 60, 000 
Cunardii(lost)tscccssc-cceeseco-ss 22 GarretuiG alvin toss en see cc ese beeen scbiccnie sees 
Bellerophoneeecusen sso 2- see Mhomasiscottice-p-2 s5c2eee see bee 60, 000 
Herman/yBabson! << s4.2--<s.--505- Charles) 3: Wawson®. --so-cccc.-s0 5. 140, 000 
BunkerHal seas eee Sse esa Ses John McDonald’... s2 -22se% <2 41 140, 000 
Mianyp Hie cesastscactasiscieicersisiet strainers Rasmus Madsen .......--.--..-... 75, 000 
Many i! eterna Rasmus Madsen ...---.-- ee 70, 000 

Ss yes Babson . ..-----| Charles J. Lawson ..-- 168, 400 
ys |S Mlarya ites? ce: tenis atesee se cee Rasmus Madson ...... 2 84, 890 
E Benker 16 50S ere Saar soun WMicDonaldyosesee- ose sone se 179, 575 
Totalisee oc miacx tells fechas cemeellaiasi ainisioalts Ss alatecee Sele eiiees a wigaciet 3, 283, 765 
AVerage fOr VESsels T6tOININ Gs ||. <i elecsis05<5ccecminies sjemnwiceisiecicsss 113, 233 


Two vessels were lost, but one of these, the Cunard, after starting 
for home, went to the Grand Banks and was lost there, leaving only one 
lost in the Greenland fishery. The River Queen eaten failed to reach 
home because too little care had been taken in properly arranging the 
salted fish, thus throwing the vessel considerably out of trim. The last 
seen of her she was rather low in the bow, and sailing before a northeast 
gale, on her way home. 


2.— GENERAL SUMMARY. 


If one compares this fishery with that of the Grand Banks there is 
much in its favor. The water is not so deep, and fogs are not so frequent 
as on the Grand Banks. Good harbors are available in case of storms, 
which are not common. The.climate is excellent, neither very cold nor 
very warm. The continual light permits fishing at all times of the day, 
and does away with much of the risk of the dories losing sight of the 
vessels. One great objection is the long distance from home, and lack of 
opportunities of hearing from the outside world. The fish, however, are 
plentiful, and, if the fishermen only had accurate charts of the banks of 
the west coast of Greenland and of the harbors of Sukkertoppen and 
Holsteinborg, the long distance would be little thought of, as they would 
then be quite sure of a profitable catch. The harbor of Holsteinborg 
is usually open by the middle of May and perhaps fishing could be com- 
menced by the 1st of June, but the ice, brought by the current down the 
east coast of Greenland, besides blocking up the more southern harbors, 
will probably render the passage north too dangerous before the middle 
of June. On this account and because of the change in the weather about 
the 20th of August, the fishing here will have to be done in July and 
August. 

Besides the halibut, the common cod is also caught on the trawls of 
the fishermen, but not in sufficient numbers to warrant their being salted. 
The proportion of cod to halibut is about 1 to 15. The Eskimo fish for 
both in the bays and harbors, and the cod may be more plentiful there, 
but they are likewise smaller. 


192 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


The fine salmon of the coast might afford profitable fishing. This opin- 
ion is founded upon the quantity of these fish the natives catch with 
their rude appliances, and sell for $4 to $8 a barrel to the Danish trade 
agents. If the American fishermen were acquainted with the deep fiords, 
and should engage in this fishery with all the modern improvements for 
seine fishing, they would probably meet with great success. There is, 
however, this probable limit: the fish are caught mostly in June and 
July when they visit the mouths of the fresh-water creeks. After this 
they become scarce, but, if the fishermen do not succeed in securing a 
cargo of salmon, they have at least a month, after the salmon season is 
over, during which they can set their trawls for halibut. 

The average of 113,233 pounds of salt halibut for a trip is a good 
average, but does not represent fully what the fishery may become in 
the future. For, several of the trips were made the conclusion of cod- 
fishing trips to the Grand Banks, and the vessels were already partly 
filled with cod, leaving not enough room for a full cargo of halibut. 
Thus the Mary E., in 1871, ’79, ’80, and ’81, fished first on Flemish 
Cap, and from there went to Greenland. In 1871 she did not reach the 
Davis Strait fishing-ground until August 20, and left off fishing August 
28, but during these eight days she secured 30,000 pounds of halibut. 
In 1879 the Herman Babson had on board 60,000 pounds of codfish, 
which she brought from the Grand Banks. If we omit from our calcu- 
lations the Mary E., which is comparatively a small vessel, the above 
average will be increased to nearly 121,000 pounds for each trip. 

Again, since the fishermen first visited Davis’ Strait, the methods 
of fishing in that region have altered considerably, principally because 
the first fishermen were unacquainted with the fishing banks, and were 
afraid to remain on them whenever the wind showed signs of increasing 
toa gale. Because of this, visits to the harbor were frequent, and much 
time was lost in regaining the banks after the blow was over. The cus- 
tom now is to remain on the banks as much as possible, and to fish at 
every opportunity, and, had this method been employed from the start, 
the average would have been considerably larger. 

The success of the Bunker Hill, in 1881, proves this beyond a doubt. 
This vessel, though not arriving upon the banks until July 11, com- 
menced fishing before going into the harbor, and by persistent effort, in 
spite of unfavorable weather, secured the largest fare of any vessel since 
the beginning of the fishery. 

In the future, competition among the fishermen will become greater, 
knowledge of harbors and fishing banks more definite and wide-spread, 
improved methods of fishing will be introduced, and, as the demand for 
the fish and the confidence of the fishermen increase, the Greenland 
halibut fishery will grow until it may even rival in importance the sum- 
mer fishery of the Grand Banks. 


[5] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS’ STRAIT. 193 


B.—FISHING GROUNDS. 
3.—LOCATION AND CHARACTER. 


The fishing banks are fifteen to forty miles from the coast and, if we 
can rely upon the Danish charts, extend from Disko Bay to within 3° 
of Cape Farewell; for these charts give soundings all along the coast 
between these two points. Extensive as the banks may be, only a small 
part of them, the part about Holsteinborg and Cape Amalia, has been 
tried by American fishermen. That the fish are to be found throughout 
their whole extent is more than probable; for the species is identical 
with that taken on the Grand Banks, and we would naturally infer it 
would be found inall favorable situations within the limits of its dis- 
tribution. It is also reported that Capt. Rasmus Madson, commonly 
known as “Captain Hamilton,” who has been to Greenland several 
times, set his trawls for these fish farther to the south (probably off of 
Godthaab) and found them very abundant, but was unable to secure 
many on account of the numerous ground-sharks playing the mischief 
with his trawls. 

At Cape Amalia are the favorite fishing-grounds of the natives, and 
a few of the Gloucester vessels have visited them, but, as the fishing 
there is mostly by anchoripvg in the harbor and sending the dories a dis-., 
tance of two or three miles, this place does not offer many inducements 
to our fishermen. The best luck has attended the vessels fishing off 
and to the south of Holsteinborg. 

Previous to 1872 the fishing-grounds were 4 or 5 miles off Holstein- 
borg. That year, however, some of the fleet went 30 miles off this 
settlement, and since that time most of the fishing has been done on 
this latter ground. 

In 1879, the fishing in July was on this ground, but in August better 
fishing was secured on a new ground 20 miles south of this. In 1881 
the best fishing was found in the vicinity of Victori Island, some 15 
_ miles from shore, in water from 14 to 28 fathoms deep. 

Between the old ground off Holsteinborg and Victori ground there is 
a gully over 150 fathoms deep and 15 or 20 miles wide, and there is 
probably another gully south of Victori ground. 

The depth of water on the banks is from 15 to 90 fathoms and, on 
this account, the fishing is much easier than in the deep water of the 
Grand Banks. At the inner edge the banks have a sudden slope, leav- 
ing a long submarine valley, the depth of which I did not ascertain, 
between them and the mainland. The surface of the banks is varied, 
though generally rocky, with here and there sandy and clayey spots. 

The character of the fauna varies considerably and often abruptly in 
places a little distance apart, as the following extract from my diary of 
the 25th of July will show: ‘The fish caught to-day and two preceding 

S. Mis. 29 13 


194 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


days have not been taken on all sides of the vessel, but in one partic- 
ular spot, where the bottom is more attractive than elsewhere. This spot 
is covered by tunicata called ‘sea-lemons’ and ‘sea-pumpkins.’ The 
moment the trawls strike the bottom covered by the stems of hydrozoa, 
by the crew called ‘trees,’ the fish are no longer found in any quantity.”* 

It will readily be seen from the preceding remarks that a careful survey 
of the banks, with the view of dertermining their limits, character, and 
fauna, could not fail of being of great use to the fishing interest, to 
say nothing of its immense importance, from a natural history and geo- 
ligical point of view. 

4,—CLIMATE. 


The climate on the banks for July and August is, on the whole, very 
favorable for fishing. In the tables thaf follow I have omitted observa- 
tions made in the harbor, in order to avoid confusing the two climates 
together, for there is considerable difference. The climate on the banks 
is more constant in temperature and absence of rain, but more variable 
in respect to wind. 

The temperature is very constant. The lowest observed was 36° Fahr. 
and the highest 52° Fahr. The extremes of surface temperatures were 
383° and 434° Fahr. There were no sudden changes, as the tables will 
show. The temperature was thus very favorable for work, though per- 
haps a little chilly in foggy weather, but nevertheless much better than 
the sweltering heat of summer in our own latitude. Themen even found, 
on sunny days, a temperature of 48° Fahr. uncomfortably warm for 
work. ‘n chilly daysa fire was kept in the cabin, so that all could keep 
comfortable when not working. 

A reference to the tables of the condition of the sky will show that we 
had very little rain on the banks. Clouds were common and fogs not 
rare, but it only rained four or five times, and then mostly in the shape 
of fine, misty rain, lasting at the longest only four or five hours. 

The tables of the wind need explanation. The directions expressed are 
those of the compass, which here varies about 70°; for not knowing the 
exact variation, I thought this the best way of expressing them. The esti- 
mations of the velocity is much of it guess-work, founded on remembrance 
of former estimates and comparisons of the wind’s velocity made by my- 
self, and, on this account, not much reliance can be placed on them except 
for the relative velocities of the winds observed. The hardest blow was 
August 14, on which day I have put the velocity down as between forty- 
five and fifty-five miles, and am well satisfied it could not have been any 
ereater. Between this and a perfect calm I have used six numbers to 
designate as many different velocities: 2 for air just perceptible; 5 for 
a breeze of three to ten miles an hour; 13 for a breeze of ten to fifteen 
miles an hour; 20 for a breeze of fifteen to twenty-five miles an hour; 30 


*T regard the occurance of the tunicata and hydrozoa as not immediately, if at all, 
casual, but rather concomitant, for I tailed to find traces of either in the stomachs of 
the fish. 


[7] TH HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS STRAIT. 195 


for a breeze of twenty-five to thirty-five miles anhour; 40 for a breeze of 
thirty-five to forty-five miles an hour; and 50 for a breeze of forty-five 
to fifty-five miles an hour. 

The temperature, sky, and winds were quite different in the harbor. 
The land on all but the sea side of the harbor rises abruptly and not 
only protects it from the winds, but also permits the sun to warm the 
surface of land and water more than in an exposed place. The thermom- 
eter is, therefore, more variable than in the strait, and the wind is seldom 
felt. The mountains, by causing the condensation of the vapors of the 
sea breezes, make fogs and showers frequent. 

I have also given tables of the height of the barometer, made from an 
aneroid belonging to the captain. This was hung up in the cabin and I 
noticed considerable variation in the instrument whenever a fire was 
built there. When this variation was very marked, I have indicated 
the same in the tables by an asterisk. . 

The season of 1879 was, however, uncommonly mild for Davis’ Strait, 
and ‘the weather that summer more favorable for fishing than it has been 
since. In 1880 the Herman Babson was started for Greenland, but was 
turned back in 52° N. lat. by immense quantities of icebergs and field 
ice. The Mary E. succeeded in getting through by going farther to the 
eastward. 

In 1881 the three vessels that went to Davis’ Strait skirted the ice 
200 to 300 miles before succeeding in getting through, and, even after 
reaching the fishing-grounds, they were obliged several times during the 
summer to change their positions on account of drifting bergs. 

This ice is carried by the currents down the east coast of Greenland, 
and thence across to the Strait of Belle Isle, and the fishermen will 
probably encounter more or less of it every year. 


[8] 


REPORT OF.COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


196 


*1OqILY, Ul OpvUl SMOTZVAIOSqO ON 


; 
Lacelte 
: L 
: meer 
ores |PaF 
"1% 
sos ‘| Ame 
fo} te} fo} fe} O° fe} fe) ° fe) fo} fo} ° ° ° fo) ° fe} ° ° fo} ° ° to} ° 
l= Lo} co -1 for) alae ow iw} - —_ od © oo ~ a oo ~ w iw) | 
iB Papo | a ee |e ee. jo) JS g Seales tor sae 28 FS rS Pp P P P EB 
Berle: : 8 5 8 5 5. 
B 5 B B Bee eB BSB eB Bes) Brg eres |e ee yaa = B E F B E E z 
ie 


[oatqisod [[v—oyvos yroyuorqey 03 Aq possordxq] . 


‘ATOL UOT AVOLVAAdWNAL AHL AO ATAVL 


197 


DAVIS’ STRAIT. 


THE HALIBUT FISHERY 


“Avids WIT JOM 1939 MO MIET_T, f 


“TALI PUL YIOT OYJ WO OOS Oq JOU P[NOD AI Os IOJaMIOWIIOY} JO YUOIZ UL pos] sporieg } 


*IOGIVY Ul OpeUl SMOIYVAIOSGO ON 


‘ski 8,uns Jo woofer Aq pov» 


° ° ° ° te} fe} ° ° ° ° ° ° fe} ° ° 
alate yiltee oN ee NEL e He | Se S 2 FS FS S mE 
| Bec eI ei | Sel Baise, 7H cl R oc. EAs eae ON ea eed ae 
; = 

co 


[oaqisod [[v—orvos yropuoiqey oy} M possordxg]) 


“LSODNV UOL GUNALVAAdNAL AHL AO AIAVL 


[10] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES, 


198 


‘Yo SuvsyO “y “YBVOIOAQ *O 


*LOGIVT, WL OPVUL SMOTJVAIOSYO ON 


*uroopx) “3 *poyaeyop ‘spnorg "0 aad chs a “Aqstor ‘<ze_ Ur 


‘ATOL UO AMS AHL AO NOILIGNOO AHL ONIMONS HIAVL 


199 


DAVIS’ STRAIT. 


THE HALIBUT FISHERY 


‘1OqIvY UI opeUl SUOTPVAIOSqO ON 


‘Yo Surivelg *y *q8VO10AQ ‘0 “£m00Ty) “3 *poyoryop ‘spno[g 2 uIey “1 “Azey ‘Ww 
eee eee eee ieee ies UL sec c ee le ee we elon wee lee wenn! caeee 9 coeeee ea ial tiie hae we ceee "9 
teres ee eee eee eee ee ee) ee ee ee ee ee ee eee eee) eee ene ee ee ele ee eee) ee eee "UL q q es er 9 "9 
eee! eine (eee ieee ieee "9 ees eee ees eee ed ee ce | ") oeceee Sie | Gees saleteece 
ee ee eed ed nary “a eed ees eed eens ears “q Seininia =|} c St= maninl ialasa slat |i2se,e\n'ein | Ge jareiate “q 
a Re ed ee Dr Oe De eed De ee ee ee ee “9 
we eeeelee eee eg) ttt ttt lsc ccc else eeee xl ee ee ee ees “q Sees eee q Serra ene: “q 
es ee ee ee “q Sees es ee es eed q Sees eee esis ee “aq “q 
ee ee ee as sg ee ee ee "2 ee ees eee eer Bs) eeeeee 
eee Bees eee eed ey aE EcO Se ee ee ees “q Bee eas ees ees “q seecee 
ees ees es fees ears “4 Sees Sees ee ees as “q See ees Sees eee er “q ececee 
ees Pees fee ey eee ed eee O ees ee ee ees rary To See Ieeeeeed eee eee ar “q a cecee 
sclcleine||/ao «cose ew eces|\cemewe| one ams “q Bee (eee eee (eee ies eee “q Sie cas cle wwacc| cece | emcees | cccves|lacesss 
eg ee ae et deg en Og ee ee ee Io 
ASIST OC PIOEIE "I sm eces| wcwene 0 Rey eed eres eee ies eras 7) Rees Pees eee See ees ee “oO 
ees eee ees eee ees *O ee ee ee ee nary ‘oO Bee ees ees eee er eee ‘O 
Se ee ees ‘4 ees ee es “q eee) eee ee ees ee “qd ecceee 
ees ee ee eee UL (stisina) ocisieicis tase iclscicie||=i-i=/5 "9 Bees ees eee ‘0 seeeee i) 

. oe) . 
Oo 
oO 
‘0 
‘Oo 
act 


“Soy MOL, “A 


“LSODOV AOL AMS AHL AO NOILIGNOO HA ONIMOHS ZIAVL 


“A530 *F 


‘A¥s ong *q 


200 


duly 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


[12] 


TABLE SHOWING THE DIRECTIONS AND RELA 


45 
a 
op . . . . . . . . 5 = 
Pe yi boe se) alee a ae g g ed e 
I 3 elie ales 3 ; ; 
= en ee ames he) | ris oP eure | 
Spbeeacdisneseacs eeeocel BAA RA EE bos |socecn sessaqnoce Sastonceoe a ign ae Gee 
Lert ed Coa ee Be sea Reroea eaecearte ere oeanan Herae oN 
SE. SSE. SSE. SW. SW. 
pice chrieragi ltrs stv isis ck a =p) pene 8 2 2 2 5 5 
( eeSocsscloosaco Bose ecad laced lssaced|GosoaddSod bacacosdoslaadasHatlleasssosoes 0 
§ SE. E. 
BEE BEET BERe sem ee Baee| seed ocr Bear cee san Hebereaccd ssmerccocr estocge 5 5 
WSW. } { WNW 
20 ee ee es 20 
podoaood lsAacbopd Moooda Saleone 0 0 Bapddaiac|pscndocena |bsococdaac 
Fecec aed besscocdle EO Fe Paes sey aera fig ce peace tee hese pe ac 
0 0 $43 os tie ie ao tear enh whee eee LL ee oe f 
sw st 
Lewesaicn | namesens |Geeaeal seen lece sles cal seated ee coeeite wale eimeeete 5 eee on 
ENE. } 
Oenne 5 BE baer) Hen oH Lee 8c] Pepe neeane Bemeent 94 aaaccrae beaerecad Beccoccicac 
Jeecuemel score ceelsececeloceclewee 20 20 SPY Leree 13 senteesee 
SG beep d5 baccobod Secced base Ba ssad locadaal boasadscnal lboosoducudllbosnscodlshucopooae 0 
BSCS EON Bee BOs Secor Sacd Saag bios ESaSaa beodoeprcd Sdeesursce leccocor 0 0 
aN el Pe i Pesala ae (Oe fea Salt Soe Ra 0 (ial Sua 2 ens 
N. NNW.| NNW. | NNW. 
DE \zacomeigeel || Tee me | coaster fa] domes | emer | mason | Ramada | es coke 5 13 13 13 13 
NW. NW. NW. 
Sewewrecie| Coomeaneleoenac| seat |e os| See eeeeee 0 0 g 3 9 
NE NE NE. } ENE. 
Se § 5 13 13 wee eeee 5 
S. by W.| S. by W. : ¢| S. by W 
UME PAPAPR Reeg byelBce |b §| 8.by PWR shy 
sale cciaiec||-accicciee| (sais acl sisinielameel noes seine | ese ecisesieesseciacctos estes es 0 0 
Calm by 0. Just perceptible, by 2. 3 to 10 miles, by 5. 


No observations 


[13] . THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS STRAIT. 201 
TIVE VELOCITIES OF THE WIND FOR JULY. 
| I 

3 5 8 A F F 8 F A 8 A a 

S a a ee a ay a oy A a me eS 

Z 4 a | 68 = ted © fe oe) oO = S| 
ae He (Al | SN 8) i» 5.2) CR eg HR ea on (Oh Dn MR) RTD A 
E.byN.| NE. | NE. | NE. | NE. | NE. | NE. } 

20 20 20 | 20 20 20 20 SS | | aa Tibia a AN | Mati te ah | Saale 

ENE. | ENE 
2c aie a dn ‘ 3 i ede PRCT nee Ir Dee He elke) MER esl eens ie SE 

NNE. | NNE, | NNE. | NNE. | ENE. | ENE 

13 13 13 20 20 JOO Se ae ale aap oe aed es iene ey ile a oem hl Lan ae 
sw. | sw. | sw. | Sw. | sw. | sw. | sw. WNW.) 

5 5 5 i 5 5 2 es PAN PS DO, Seder gl cit otal be ech ek 

NE. } NE. NNE. i 
wees ; fs ay f Te eas a SPARS Daal Eero etc deen eee 
; sw. | sw. | sw. | Sw. ‘ F ENE. 
; 5 5 5 5 Sarat y cl heme lee bask oa Soe acai amp paca ty eect oa j 5 
f NE. | NE. | NNE.| NNE.| NE. ; f Sw. } 

Sears Scag eg ae, © 13 13 13 1 13 g bp rate nS} Spade te mee a 
WNW } 5 { ESE. } 

SANS |e ae Plone aneeree rel er Sieniad le aigne ete ea Cee sean ee ance ee 
“WNw. |WNW.| WNW.| WNw.| WwW. |W. |wW.byS| WwW. | Ww. 3 Cit he 

5 5 5 5 13 13 13 20 a ae Siew ag ae an 
score CEOs CR eee ol Rae oe eran Sal oie ha ee rahe a § Meee Wes aual ado a eee 
NE. | NE. | NE. | NE. | NE. | NE. | NE. } NE. i ENE. 

ake} 5 5 ae 5 5 13 ay x a Bo) AASV Sens 
ee j se eee pees oe eee ve ae el co eee 
en es eereree : Pp se Nini aaa (Spee PA een: Ce 
Ret ore ER Ra oI hee neg ea edocs toe Neale | 

ASSESS BEREEEeS Baneeee sa ae wh | deca faa ea cae os fa rs 

0 i. Aebce. { i RA Bs bea eon re eee earth ponies A201 ON 

0 0 0 0 Oe Seca] Mecewistee |Sa ace oatllo ot once s dememec|s cacweenlceececnm 
NE. | NE. NE. | N. N. | NNE. } 

5 sad) bs Syren a 5 13 13 Tee Soy Ger coe oan eee eee at 
WNw. | NNw.| NNw.| Nw. | NW. 

A E : Bi a sae ee cer oy aa 
aw pee caton iE. Sie eee Paneer aereme on perrerrn eevee el fey oc. 
ENE. | NE. | NE. } ‘ 

u A Pe ccc fetter el NOP” gl caged acs antae| seem ticle heen eee 
' en eee 0 0 Fi ee Ase al aan: On AN aE Be i ANY FIC 

0 0 0 al eae pee Nap ee Bea rga parereen peepee eee Fe 


10 to 15 miles, by 13. 
made in harbor. 


15 to 25 miles, by 20. 


25 to 35 miles, by 30. 


202 


| Midnight. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


[14] 


TABLE SHOWING THE DIRECTIONS AND RELA 


5 5 
a 3 
ite) © 
iS Ae { 
eet: 0 ; 
el nel 
wg wav 
AON te | See 
ee aren ete oa 
mies 
Weare 30 
af] XNB 
ENE 
oo le 
wie oe ; WEw 
se {| Sr 
ee ee 
oe lea 
a | ae 
raat ; hy 
aes ; NE. 
20 


Just perceptible, by 2. 


8 to 10 miles, by 5. 


A A 
3 3 
oO a 
§ WSW 
in AAS 20 
SSE. Ss. 
5 5 
; Sw. 
Se 3 
Qi ea sisters 3 
WSW W. 
5 5 
; WdbyS 
assets 5 
; Sw. 
ets ve 30 


sat ween 


10 to 15 miles, by 13. 


No observations 


[15] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS’ STRAIT. 208 


TIVE VELOCITIES OF THE WIND FOR AUGUST. 


eh a | f |) é aa 
Zi a a ia a 4 5 < heme a S =| 
Sw | Sw. | Sw. | Sw. | SW.| Sw. | SW. | Sw. |); s |3 aed ae alae 
13 5 5 2 2 2 2 Q | Gcecrec|ecececesesee eens 
arr a] eo nnteen 0 0 0 Opal erate ens os eee 
_ 0 oe a E 3 a: Ri PASSA Penh ctr Bae 2S 
NNw. | N N. N. NE. 
13 1B 13 13 3 serees|sseceees Ope [esse ; 2 } weetee|sceesces[seeesene 
ae ; 0 ab a Pde eee rT Rese ek aly en Us JL a |e cl Free th 
(i RR os riage ar PCM a Meanie (aetna (ae ; aes i Rees ree | Seo Gal eee eae 
CSE) il gerrene™ ele ahs heaton eeiMe SC Ne amare OP cee le RIS Neier dl ie 
§ at } § mm ted WEN foes i ; ne aoa eo Vat) elle tog Ae 
ef ee an | a et ree aa | an Bets 2a ave es oc | oe oe 
3 eocece| cia wee ene) coccaas|oocscucee|seaeae 13° wewocses|s ec acceeel|eeesrccesl(sccecceace'seaseeee 
{ BNE. otraey REE EEeay | Peer esremeney ENE. ae t veseee[eeeees 5 10 } wetene|sserceee 
lone ; cho ee pelo eat Sl oa ee el eta poe el roca oe 
} o. He es | oedema Se } if 3 Uae) oe sates Norte dee ae 
ja } Fs old pay seep Oc Woe ed PR ; ae BS ee Pe et oR | eRe DR REP bec Ie 
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A LS 3 
BRR ie Pia! eS) Vcd tetas NCU Se eae cae ae 
nc cl a eR om a Lee Pare ANCES UE Recliad cr leer oc 1. aehas eames 
js } pet taenea | eee Vi aR ene eee {| ac } bv ites canal wk! Soll eel eee 
} ; 5 ae eee ee eee RES ; 0" ; Ree Cree reeerees heer aa 
TRS ees ere es ar peer eae ; ey Pst Neen re pierre a caus 
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; oe 3 Ee cate Ae ain ae Ds | a ; ey ; bet oe anne oa eee easel ates |e 
tno ; Pe) NEN c08) OR ee | fee Weare eae ; a. Bee oe Navara? | 2 cese| pp Se eer eee 
i . } ar EU eens eee ae | ae A ; we ; pete wipes te bls we 8 519, ool eee 
nh te an RE a (ei eet Due NG ee ee net eee 
vag } Spare (pies ee a hd at ara ellen ; ae : gore | Bes «2 RI ete sats Sl tee em 
NNE i § NE. 4 
i. eal Se eee es ey otis aI RE aX, Galt ce ee 
Pie ie rescee ltrs Salpeter ates ngeily ee sta amr ee oem meme Are 
 15to25 miles, by 20.  25t035miles,by 30.  35to45miles,by 40. 45 to 55 miles, by 50. 


made in harbor. 


[16] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


204 


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206 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 
5.—TIDES AND CURRENTS. 


I had hoped to construct tables that would give definite figures re- 
garding the tides, but, on account of the frequent changes of position 
and the remarkable complexity of the currents, near the edge of the 
banks, this was impossible. The first peculiarity one would be likely 
to notice, is that the tide runs up the strait much longer and with 
greater velocity than in the opposite direction. In fact, some days 
there was no tide at all down the strait, but corresponding to it would 
be nearly slack water for seven or eight hours. The tide also, instead 
of changing every six hours, would only do so twice a day. The obser- 
vations made August 4, will show this. The velocity is expressed in 
the number of feet a chip floated in a minute, and the directions are 
those of the compass. As this varies about 70° toward the west, it will 
be seen that all the directions given are up rather than down, the strait. 


TIDE AUGUST 4. 


6a.m.}7a.m.| 8a.m. |9a.m. {10 a.m./11 a.m./12m.|}1 p.m. |2p.m.| 3 p.m. |4p.m./5p.m./6 p.m. 


NE. NE. |NE.xE.| ENE His ilicwsee- BaXiOnlseecice SSE. |SE.xS.|SE.xS.| SE. 
Slight. Goode Moderate. ee feet. pes feet.|246 feet.|..-..- 168 feet. liseos 135 feet.|96 feet.|90 feet.|60 feet. 


The greater velocity of the tide running north compared with that 
going south, is probably due to the existence of a current on the east 
side of the strait running up the coast of Greenland. The slack water, 
of six or seven hours ata time, would then be when the current and 
tide just balanced each other. The few icebergs we saw while fish- 
ing came from the south. The harbors of Holsteinborg and Sukkertop- 
pen are open much earlier than the more southern ones, owing to the 
ice that is brought round Cape Farewell, blocking up these latter. The 
existence of this southern ice will be a great barrier to the utilization 
of the southern fishing banks, making those about Sukkertoppen and 
Holsteinborg the ones most accessible. 

The combining of the tide and current often renders fishing impos- 
sible five or six hours at a time, but, as the slack water is usually cor- 
respondingly long, the loss of time need not be very great, for, by care- 
ful observation, the fishermen can time themselves so as to sleep while 
the tide is strong and fish when it is slack water. -It must be remem- 
bered, that in this latitude it is light enough in July to work all night 
without inconvenience. 

The tides and currents are not, however, as simple as the preceding 
remarks would seem to imply. Often a changing of eur position a few 
miles would bring us into a different combination of currents. The 
banks occasion variations in currents a few miles apart. The whole 
coast of Greenland is indented by deep fiords, three or more miles . 
broad, and fifty to a hundred miles long; and the tides running out of 


these with great force have an influence miles from their mouths. 
e 


[19] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS’ STRAIT. 207 


Temperature of the water, at every ten fathoms, on the Fishing Banks, off the west coast of 
Greenland, latitude 66° +. Time, July and August. 


July 6. Latitude 66° 25’. Taken between 3 and 4 p. m., during the slack, after the 


tide had been running north. 
° Fahr 


MomperatUre: Of Alls. ctlnlee saan sce. en~= sels= - = =o a6 anyon ne nein ~ weiss seiewa's o--- GO 
Memperature Of BURACE =. soc co a3 cie= wren we ee cle sieie\njinlee we ananassae COE 
Temperature of 10 fathoms .... 2.2. -. -. 2s en e- we os on we ee ne eo cece en ee ene oes ONE 
Womperature of 20;fumhOMst. 52 2.222252 126... e be Seeeie c= b- wn oa ecteeien nie se OOg 
Temperature of 30 fathoms ......---------- +--+ oe oe ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee eee ee ee SOE 
Temperature of 40 fathoms, bottom ......-.---- -. -- ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee BOF 


July 7. Same place and time of day. 


PeMpAlAl WIG On All. ciecwiew oem concise lecininiseinn ociemienies gr'memniceae es am om'o= ee Ue 
Mommperature Gf suriacOso0. a. os esse ms fo soe am cae Se cep aeewise wens vane sey OU 
Momperavure of 10 tathonis)cescesssetites 4lee os ts Sane woah oe ose eno mest Ong 
Temperature of 20 fathoms .. ....0.-- 2-5. 2B es oe ones enn eo eetee conn ne oo =e BOF 


Temperature of 30 fathoms -. ....-.------------ 2+ eee e ee eee eee eee eee ee 354 
Temperature of 40 fathoms, bottom ..--...----.-.-- lis, apis Se cmemae weeomsesee 354 
August 2, Taken between 7.30 and 8 p. m. 

° Fahr, 
Temperature Of air ..-. .----. 2-22 eee eee cee cee ee cee eee ee eee eee cee eee 44 
Temperature of surface -... .----- .----- eo eee eee n enn cone e cee eee cee 42} 
Temperature of 10 fathoms .....---------- Sie Hine wo afosiw ulne/sieiwis sisve'sps eielalslsieleae 394 
Temperature of 20 fathoms .....--..-------------- Oe Seis casiceae wa asciraeels 38% 
Temperature of 30 fathoms .......--- .----- ---- eee eee cee nee eee eee ee eee e eee 38 


Temperature of 37 fathoms, bottom .. ...- ..---. ---- +--+ --2 2 ene e ee cen ene enee SVG 


August 5. Taken between 7 and 7.30a,m. Tide very slack. 


° Fahr. 
Temperature of air .... ~.-- 2.0. 22 eee eee eee cee cee cee cee eens cece cen eee 464 
Temperature of surface... . ---. .22 22 ene cone eens cee ee cen ne cone eee ceee 41+ 
em peratUlerOL 1G PatNOMS cocoa sc 226 valenn- Goose peeecepes ondnrate tar eamy 38} 
Temperature of 20 fathoms ....-. -.-- ---- - 2-2-2 = 2-2 cee e eons eons tees ccee ewes 384 
Temperature of 30 fathoms .... .-.-.. ---- eee ne o-oo ene cece eee e eee 38 
Temperature of 35 fathoms, bottom ......---. .----6 -- 2-22 ee eee eee eee eee ee 37 


August 8 Taken 6 p.m. The time of slack different in places a few miles apart; 
likewise the force and direction of the current. 


° Fahbr 
Temperature Of aif... 1.2. cee cee conn eens nee cone cece ee ee cece ec ee cone ene= 454 
Temperature of surface. .---...---- 02-222 ene e cee eee tenes cee e ee eee eee ees 43} 
Temperature of 10 fathoms .....--. .--- ------ 2-2 + eens eee ee eee eee ee eee 41 
Temperature of 20 fathoms ....-. ...--. 2022+ oo 2+ eee ene ce eens eee ee cee eee 38t 
Temperature of 24 fathoms, bottom ......---.----.----- +---++ +--+ 22-22 eee 37$ 


August 20. Taken between 8 and 8.30 p.m. Slight surface tide. About 40 miles 
W.S.W. ftom Holsteinborg. 


© Fabr 
Temperature Of air...2 2.222. wee nee eons coe e cece cece e cone cone on coc c ee cones 44 
Temperature Of SUTLACE - <5. <2.1.0- wwe cine bons seine eno e cee nice es wes sinn cise seneee 43 
Temperature of 10 fathoms ......-..---- Bee cimiceesiiencjisc-c coos oe scsi eriar 41% 
Temperature of 20 fathoms .. ...- 2... 2-2-0 0e cocaine woes coos cone co cces coceee 394 
Temperature of 25 fathoms, bottom .......----. -----. ------ 2+ --- 2 eee eee eee 38% 


The preceding observations, though few, will show very well the 
temperature of the water on the banks at various depths. 


208 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 
6.—HARBORS. 


The harbors of greatest use to the fishermen will be those of Holstein- 
borg and Sukkertoppen. Of the latter I can say nothing, except that 
itis reported, by those who have been there, as a good harbor. Holstein- 
borg, surrounded on three sides by the mainland and on the other by 
several islands, is completely protected from the rough water, and is 
only exposed to the wind on the side towards the strait, from which 
quarter there is scarcely ever a violent blow.. The harbor is large, and 
has a depth of 10 to 25 fathoms. The harbors mentioned are ninety miles 
apart, and as the best fishing we had was about half way between the 
two, we could easily have run into one of them, whichever way the wind 
might have been. 

Previous to the summer of 1879, which was considered very mild, the 
fishing vessels went into harbor at least, three times a month. This 
was due to the S. W. and N. E. winds, which, combined with the strong 
tides and comparatively shallow water, would soon raise a “nasty sea.” 
These blows, though perhaps not extremely dangerous, would frequently 
occasion loss if an attempt was made to ride them out, either by the 
breaking of some part of the rigging, or, if the deck was filled with fish 
when the wind came, by the loss of a part or all of these. 

Nor are winds and waves the only things causing the vessels to seek 
the harbor. It is frequently very convenient to leave some things on 
shore, so as to have more room in the vessel. Thus the Bunker Hill 
left barrels of pickled fins on shore, and Captain Lawson left there, until 
ready to return home, quite a cargo of codfish he had brought from the 
Grand Banks, but which was in his way while fishing. New supplies 
of water must also be secured. The harbor of Holsteinborg usually is 
open by the middle of May, and perhaps fishing could be commenced by 
the first of June, but the ice that is brought down the east coast of Green- 
land, besides blocking up the more southern harbors, will probably 
render the passage north too dangerous before the middle of June. On 
this account, and because the change in the weather about the 20th of 
August, the fishing here will have to be done in July and August. 


C.—FISHING. 


7.—TIME OF YEAR FOR FISHING. 


The time for fishing in these waters is July and August. There is no 
doubt but that the fish will bite both earlier and later than this, but these 
are the best months, and August is better than July. Besides abund- 
ance of fish, other considerations, such as climate and the passage to the 
strait and home again, tend to limit the time to these months. The fish 
caught in August were in much better condition, and had a much larger 
proportion of females than those caught in July. This may, however, 
have been due to the fact that the fishing was done on an entirely dif- 


[21] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS’ STRAIT. 209 


ferent part of the bank in August than the preceding month, and also 
to a difference in the food of the fish. 


8.—APPARATUS AND METHODS. 


The fishing is done by means of trawls. A trawlis composed of several 
parts. first, there is the “ground line,” which is anchored at each end, 
and lies on the bottom. The hooks are attached to lines 5 feet long, 
called gangings, which are in turn fastened to the ground line at every 2 
fathoms, sometimes at every 25. To mark the position of each end of 
the trawl, a line extends from the anchor at the end of the ground line 
to a buoy on the surface of the water. 

The main or ground line is about a quarter of an inch in diameter, 
and is made up of parts, 50 fathoms long. Each of these parts has one 
end fastened, so that it will not unsavel, while the other has a loop 
spliced in it. The end not spliced is tied by a knot, that is both strong 
and secure, but still easily untied, to the loop end of the next part. 
The trawls can thus, by using more or less of these 50-athom pieces, be 
made of any desired length, but, when not in use, six of these parts are 
usually kept fastened together, and are then called a tub or skate of 
trawl, according to the manner of keeping them. In fishing for cod and 
haddock, and formerly in the halibut fishery also, they were kept coiled 
up in tubs; whence the name “tub of trawl,” meaning 300 fathoms of 
trawl. But now, in the latter industry, they are kept in what are called 
skates. 

A skate is a piece of canvas about a foot and a half square, having 
two pieces of rope, 6 feet or so in length, so fastened across it that an 
end projects from each corner. Upon this canvas the 300 fathoms of 
trawl are coiled and firmly secured by the ropes, tied together above. 

The phrases “tub of trawl” and “skate of trawl” are often synony- 
mous. Thus on the Bunker Hill, though no tubs were used to keep the 
trawls in, it was quite common to hear the fishermen speak of setting 
two or more “tubs of trawl.” 

The buoys used on this trip were of two kinds: the “boat buoys” and 
“keg buoys.” The boat buoys were blocks of wood, three feet long, 
cut in the shape of a round-bottomed row-boat, and coated with tar. 
The buoy line is attached by means of a swivel to the under part of the 
buoy, just in front of the middle. Back of the middle is bored a hole 
from top to bottom, through which passes the flag-pole. This pole fits 
in loosely so that it turns freely and can be taken out for easy packing 
in the dory. In order that it may not slip too far through’ the hole, a 
piece of leather is nailed round the pole above the hole, and, to keep it 
upright, a weight is attached to its lower end. The flag is a small can- 
vas painted black. These buoys are not, however, so serviceable as the 
keg buoys, which are small water-tight kegs, holding a little over a 
quarter of a barrel. Through the keg runs the flag-pole, tightly wedged 
in to prevent leakage and strongly fastened by stout lines to prevent 

S. Mis. 29 14 


210) REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


its coming out. To this is fastened the flag above, and the buoy line 
below. The great advantage of these last over the other kind of buoy 
is their greater buoyancy; for the boat buoys were continually being 
carried under by the force of the tide, so much so that it was frequently 
necessary to use two of them in place of one. On the other hand, the 
keg buoys were liable to burst, an accident rendering them fit only for 
the fire. Unfortunately only ten keg buoys were brought on this trip; 
not enough for each dory to have one at each end of its trawl. The 
matter was settled by using one of these for the outer end of the trawl, 
while one or two of the boat buoys were used at the inner end. 

The typical manner of setting a trawl is in a straight line, across 
the direction of the tide; for if the fish swim, either with or against the 
current, a greater number will cross the ground line lying in this diree- 
tion than in any other. Two menéare necessary for the operation. One 
man sits in the bow of the boat, rowing slowly in the required direction, 
while the other, in the stern, sets the trawl, by first throwing out the 
inner buoy, with its attached buoy line, to be followed by the inner 
anchor. This, in turn, is succeeded by the ground line, outside anchor, 
buoy line, and keg buoy. The length of a trawl varies, according to cir- 
cumstances, from one to four skates, ¢. ¢., from 300 to 1,200 fathoms. 


As already stated, two men in a dory were necessary for setting a 


trawl, and, as there were six dories, three for each side of the vessel, 
twelve of the crew were required for the fishing, while the captain and 
cook made the whole number fourteen. Each dory had by lot a partic- 
ular position assigned to it, and according to this was its relative place 
of setting the trawl. The vessel at anchor would naturally have her 
bow toward the tide, and thus the middle dory, on each side, by setting 
in a line perpendicular to the length of the vessel, would set exactly 
across the tide, the most favorable direction. In order not to be too 
close together, the dories in front of the middle ones would set in lines 
running a little forward, while the stern dories would set in lines run- 
ning a little backward. This, the typical manner of setting, is varied, 
of course, by many circumstances, as winds, tides, position of vessel, or 
the narrow spots to which the fish may be confined. 

_ Before speaking of the hauling of the trawls, it will be best to consider 
the arrangements about the dories and the baiting. Before starting, the 
crew, according as the disposition of the men inclined them, had become 
divided up into pairs for dory mates, but not until we were well on our 
way were lots drawn to decide upon their respective dories. Previous to 
the drawing of these lots, the dories, which were entirely without internal 
arrangements, such as seats, &c., were kept amidships, three on each side 
of the vessel, firmly lashed, upside down, one within the other, to the deck. 
The dories were numbered from one to six, and six slips of paper were 
prepared, each having one of these numbers on it. These, being thrown 
into a hat, were drawn by one from each pair of dory mates, each having 
the dory with the number corresponding to the one on his slip. Boards 


[23] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS STRAIT. 211 


had been brought for making seats, and, as might have been expected, 
different degrees of proficiency were displayed by the men in working 
them up. The men in each dory are expected to do everything per- 
taining to their own boat, such as taking care of dory, baiting, setting, 
hauling and keeping the trawls in good condition. 

Two barrels of pickled menhaden were taken to use for the first bait- 
ing, or until enough fresh bait had been caught for this purpose. After- 
ward the cod and smaller halibut were employed, and, when these were 
not enough, the napes of the larger halibut were used. The bait is cut up 
into strips about six inches long and an inch square at the end. The 
cutting of this is done mainly on the roof of the cabin, by large heavy 
knives. Thick planks had been nailed on top of the cabin for this pur- 
pose, and the men of each dory had their places for chopping (for the 
cutting is more of a chopping than anything else) chosen by lot. There 
not being room on the cabin for all the men, those of the forward dories 
used boards laid across the large flitching tubs, for cutting their bait. 

After enough bait is cut, the skate of trawl is placed on the cabin, 
and, being untied, the skate is taken away from the coil and spread out on 
the deck below. The fisherman then commences at the top of the trawl 
and, baiting the hooks as he proceeds, recoils it again on the skate below. 
The baited hooks are thrown into the center of the coil. Both the chop- 
ping of bait and the baiting are lively times, and wonderful stories are 
told about the speed with which some fishermen can perform these oper- 
ations. There is however, a limit to the speed with which these can be 
done well, and those who boast most of their quickness are, ten to one, 
not the best fishermen. 

The skates, baited and tied up, are ready for the water, and, if the set 
is to be made immediately, they are placed in the stern of the dories. 
When the weather is favorable, it takes about fifty minutes to set four 
skates to a dory, but, when either tide or wind is strong, more time is 
necessary. Two to four hours are allowed from the time of setting to 
the time of hauling. 

This last is usually commenced from the outer end, so that the men 
may work toward the vessel and have less distance to row should they 
be so fortunate, as to secure a load of fish. When the buoy is reached, 
the oars are taken in and laid one side, where they will be the least in 
the way; a roller, whose wheel is four to six inches in diameter, with 
two or three grooves on its rim, is fastened to the side of the dory near 
the bow; the buoy is taken in, unfastened from the line, and placed in 
the stern of the boat, and the hauling commences. The roller is almost 
indispensable. The line is hauled over this by the man in the bow, who 
does the hauling, and is then passed on to the man in the stern, to be by 
him coiled up and put with the buoy in the stern. (The stern is sepa- 
rated from the rest of the boat by a cross-partition of boards.) 

After the buoy line and anchor have been taken into the boat, comes 
the fishy part of the haul. The hooks, whether with or without fish, are 


212 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


not hauled into the dory by the man in the bow, but are kept over the 
side until they, as they are carried along by the ground line, reach the 
other end of the boat, and are there freed either of poor bait or of fish. 
The bait is easily shaken off by striking the hook against the gunwale of 
the boat, but the fish are not as easily managed. The large size of the 
fish necessitates the use of something besides the fishing hooks for pull- 
ing them into the dory. Accordingly, large iron barbless hooks, with 
a loop on the end away from the hook for the hand to grasp, are used 
for this purpose. 

But the fish must also be killed or stunned before taken into the boat, 
or otherwise considerable inconvenience, to say nothing of danger, might 
be occasioned by their lively flapping. Jor this reason killers are used. 
The “killer,” which is also employed for unhooking the fish, is a hard- 
wood club, about 24 feet long. The larger or striking end is round, while 
the other, or handle part, is flattened a little and has a notched end. 

When the fish comes to the stern of the dory, the fisherman hooks 
him in the eye, or some firm part of the head, with the large iron hook, 
and, after stunning him by hitting him several heavy blows over the 
snout with the killer, hauls him into the boat. Frequently the fish has 
swallowed the hook, and its extraction, were it not for the killer, would 
be a problem involving much catting and loss of time. The flattened 
and notched end of this instrument is run down the gullet of the fish 
and, after the line is secured to the other end so as to prevent slipping, 
the club is turned until, by the coiling of the line, the hollow of the hook 
fits into the notched end. Then, by a sudden push downward and a 
jerk upward, the hook is loosened and hauled out. 

The work continues on in this manner, the man in the bow doing the 
hauling, while his mate attends to the coiling of the line, shaking off old 
bait, and taking the fish into the boat, until either the boat is full, or else« 
all the trawl is hauled. In the latter case a return is made to the vessel. 
Should, however, the boat be filled before the hauling is completed, and 
any of the fishermen be through with the hauling of their trawls, an 
oar is raised as a signal for a dory to come and take the fish already 
caught, that the hauling may be interrupted as little as possible. If, 
on the other hand, all of the fishermen are busy when the boat-load is 
secured, the ground line is buoyed at the end of one of the 50-fathom 
pieces, while the load is carried to the vessel. Relieved of their load, 
the men return to the buoy they have just left and continue the hauling. 

Sometimes the trawl is caught in the rocks, so that it is necessary to 
break it and commence at the inside buoy for the hauling of the re- 
mainder. Should it be caught and broken the second time, there is 
great danger of losing the part that is still in the water, unless it can be 
caught by the grapple. The grapple is a chain with an iron bar at one 
end and having, at several places along its length, circles of iron points, 
three or four inches long, directed away from the end to which the bar 
is attached. It is used in the following manner: Three men go in the 


[25] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS’ STRAIT. 213 


dory, two to row and one to attend to the grapple. This, fastened to a 
line by the end toward which the iron points are directed, is let down 
until the iron bar drags upon the bottom, but not so low as to permit 
the whole chain to drag. The men row back and forth over the spot 
where they think the trawl is, and, if they are right in their calcula- 
tions, it is hard to see how they can fail to grapple it. 

The fish are taken from the dories by the large iron hooks, already 
mentioned as being used in the small boats. When a load of fish is 
brought to the side of the vessel, one of the fishermen holds the stern 
and another the bow painter, while the man in the stern hooks the fish 
and hands them up to his dory mate, standing on deck ready to haul 
them on board. 

The last set was made August 27, and was done while the vessel was 
under sail. Comparatively little fishing had been done since the 20th, 
for the wind had prevented the setting of the trawls, though the hand 
line showed that the fish had not departed. The captain accordingly 
decided to run into harbor and prepare for going home, but, finding the 
wind near the shore rather gentle and the water smooth, thought best 
to see how the fish would bite near the mouth of the harbor. As this 
was the first time we had set under sail, | was curious to see how it was 
managed. 

The dories set in turns. First one is towed astern, while the outside 
buoy and buoy line are being thrown overboard, then it is set adrift and 
the rest of the trawl set at right angles to the direction the vessel is 
sailing. The rest of the dories go through with the same operation in 
suecession, by which time the first dory has finished setting and is taken 
in tow by the vessel. Some of the dories are left fastened to the buoy 
line to mark the place of the trawls while the vessel sails back and forth 
an hour or two, until the time of hauling comes. The hauling is done in 
the usual manner. This manner of setting is used quite frequently on 

e the banks of Newfoundland to find out whether the fish are abundant. 
If the fish are found in considerable numbers, the anchor is dropped, and 
the trawls run out again in the regular way. Only eighteen fish were 
caught this haul, so we turned the bow towards the harbor. 


9.—DRESSING AND SALTING. 


After all the trawls have been hauled, the men usually attend to the 
dressing of the fish. For this operation, the men had prepared four leg- 
less tables, about 6 feet long and 3 feet wide, which, in use, were inclined 
against the side of the vessel in such a manner that one end rested upon 
the gunwale while the other remained on deck. Two men worked at a 
table, one on each side. 

The knives employed were of different shapes and sizes, but the one 
seemingly the most in favor has the blade about 8 inches long, an inch 
and a half wide, and not so thick but that it had a good spring to it. 
All were sharp pointed and most of them of good material. 


214 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


Tron hooks similar to, but smaller than, those used for taking the fish 
out of the dories into the vessel, are used for fastening the fish upon the 
table. To the loop end of the hook a short rope, having a cross-piece 
of wood, is fastened. The fish is hooked in the small of the tail, and, 
being drawn up on the inclined table, is secured there, head downwards, 
by placing the rope in a notch cut in the top edge of the table, the cross- 
piece of wood preventing its slipping back. 

It will be remembered that the halibut is shaped somewhat like our 
common flounder, or flat fish. The backbone, with its spines lying in 
the same plane with the body, leaves, on each side, a thick layer of bone- 
less flesh. These layers, called jflitches, are what the men are after, 
After the flaps of the dorsal and ventral fins have been cut off close to 
the body, a cut, deep enough to reach the plane of the backbone and 
extending from the head to the tail, is made, about 2 inches from and 
parallel to the dorsal line of the body, followed by a similar cut from the 
gills to the tail, but on the ventral edge of the body. These two are 
then connected at the head by a cut parallel to a gill plate and at the 
tail end by a straight cross-cut. For the better handling of the flitch, a 
slit, large enough to admit the hand, is made at eachend. The flitch is 
then grasped at the posterior part with one hand, and, as it is raised by 

_this hand, is cut free from the backbone with the other. The fish is then 
turned over and the other flitch taken off in the same manner. 

The cuts made parallel to the dorsal and ventral edges of the body, 
being 2 inches or more from these, leave strips of flesh and fat attached 
to the inner bones of the fins, which, when pickled, bring a good price 
under the name of halibut fins. Accordingly, after the flitches, these 
strips are cut off and pickled. The rest of the fish, consisting of the 
bones, head, and viscera, is then thrown overboard and another one is 
placed on the table. 

After the flitches are cut from the fish, they are thrown into large tubs 
called flitching-tubs, to be there rinsed free from blood and dirt, pre- 
vious to being salted in the hold. It is one man’s duty to attend to the 
washing of the flitches and to the passing them below, while three men 
are salting. The hold is divided up by plank partitions into six large 
bins, three on a side, in some of which the salt is kept until used by the 
salting of the fish in the others. One man carefully places the flitches in 
layers, one above the other; a second man, with a scoop like the grocers 
use for flour and sugar, covers them with the salt, while a third shovels 
the salt within reach of the second. The Bunker Hill left Gloucester with 
270 hogsheads of salt, and out of this salted 9,000 fish, amounting to 
140,000 pounds of flitches, having used a little over nine-tenths of the 
whole quantity. This salt came from Cadiz, Spain, and cost $1.50 per 
hogshead, or $405 for the whole. 


10.—TABULAR VIEW OF SUMMER WORK. 


The following tables represent in a concise form the times of setting 
and hauling of the trawls, the number of fish caught at each haul, together 


[27] THE HALIBUT FISHERY-—DAVIS’ STRAIT. 215 


with the depth of water, tides, weather, &c., while the trawls were in the 
water. Ihave taken the time when the men left the vessel for setting and 
hauling to represent the time of these operations. To set four skates 
of trawl usually took a little less than one hour, while for hauling the 
same, especially if there were many fish, required threé, and often four 
hours. 

Since the outer end of the trawl was set last and hauled first, this 
would remain in the water less time than that represented by the tables, 
while the inner end, set first but hauled last, would be in the water much 
longer. Yet, as a rule, more fish were caught on the outer than on the 

inner end. Many things are unfavorable for the trawls remaining long 
in the water. In the first place, if the fish are present they will soon 
hook themselves, and more time than is necessary for this is, of course, 
wasted. Then, again, the tide, fish, or both combined, are apt to entan- 
gle the trawls in the rocks, if these are left too long in the water. Besides, 
the voracity of the little shrimp would soon leave gothing but the bones 
of the halibut for the disappointed fishermen, were they allowed many 
hours to satisfy their appetites. So plentiful are these little creatures 
in some:places that they could be scraped off the fish by the handfuls, 
and, when the trawls had remained in the water two or three hours, they 
had left the branchiostegals hanging loosely, besides making a general 
assault on the whole body. 

There were three days of fishing before the 5th of July (the date first 
mentioned in the table) of which I have no minute notes, and have there- 
fore omitted mentioning them inthetable. The fish caught during these 
days, together with those caught on the hand-line from the side of the 
vessel, would certainly make the whole number taken during the trip 
over nine thousand. Sixty-six hauls are recorded in the table, by which 
8,616 fish were taken, averaging 139 for each haul. The smallest num- 
ber taken at a single set was four, the depth being 27 fathoms, and the 
largest number was 497, the depth being between 25 to 30 fathoms. The 
depths expressed, owing to the irregularities of the banks and the extent 
of surface covered by the trawls, are, of course, only approximate, but 
whenever this was measured, I have used the depth where the vessel 
was anchored in preference to the rough calculations of the fishermen, 
for I have found them, in this respect, a little inclined to overestimate. 
It will be observed that the depth in August was less than in July. 


Table for July and August, representing the times of setting and hauling trawls, fish taken, 
depth of water and remarks on weather, tides, §c. 


Date. Set. Hauled. Fish. | Depth. Remarks. 
= == - — 
Fath. 
July 5 | 2.80 p.m...| 4.05 p.m... 48 | 40 | Wind S.W. Cloudy, with slight mist. Tide 
| slackening from running N. Shifted position. 
5 | 8.15 p. m...| 11.40 p. m.. 96 40 | Wind W.N.W. and increasing. Cloudy. 
6 | 2:50 p. m--:)) 5.26 p.m. -- 144 40 | Wind N.E. Hazy. Tide slackening from run- 
ning N. 
6 | 7.45 p. m-.-.-| 10.05 p. m-. 24 40 
Me3.10p. mi -2|'6.D5-psm---|) | 90 40 | Wind 8.W. and nearly calm toward the end.- 
Partly cloudy. ide slackening. Shifted 


position. 


216 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


[28] 


Table for July and August, representing the times of setting and hauling trawls, §:c.—Cont’d. 


Date. | Set. 


| 
July 8 | 4.05 p. m.-- 
9 | 3.45 p.m. 
10 | 5.50 p. m.- 
11 | 7.20 a. m.. 
Jl | 2.50 p. m. 
12 | 6a.m..-- 
12 | 3.45 p. m.. 
13 | 8.30 a. m.. 
14 | 6.40 a. m.- 
14 | 4p.m..-- 
15 | 1-20 p.m. - 
15 | 7.55 p. m. 
16 | 2.30 p. m.. 
18 | 11.85 a.m 
19 | 12.55 p. m 
23 | 7.15 a. m- 
23 | 2.50 p. m- 
24 | 8.30 a. m. 
24 | 4.15 p. m-. 
ZOO: TNs mem 
25 | 4.05 p. m- 
26 | 6.45 a.m. 
27 612. M\-i-- 
27 | 12.45 p. m 
28 | 5.30 a. m.. 
31 } 5.10 a. m.. 
Aug. |) | Noon)s-2- 
DW Osa0spsin=- 
2 | 5.15 a. m- 
2 | 1.15 p. m.. 
2 | 5.45 p.m. 
3 | 1.45 p. m.. 
4 | 1.15 p. m. 
4) 7.15 p.m. 
5 | 2.30 p. m- 
6| 3a.m.... 
6 | 3.20 p. m. - 
Ta aslo dee. 
WW -2.15\p em. 
8 | 2.15 p. m.. 
9 | 2.40 p.m. 
10 | 3p.m.... 
11 | 4.15 a.m. 
11 | 1.10 p. m. 
| 


Hauled. | Fish. | Depth. Remarks. 
Fath. 

6.45 p.m... 56 50 | Wind N.E. Rain. Tide slackening from run- 
ning N. Fish small. + hifted position. 

6.30 p. m--- 352. | 50 | Calm at first, wind rising {rom E.S.E. Clordy. 
Tide quite strong, but slackening from run- 
ning N.N.E. 

8.45 p. m.-- 95 50 | Wind W.S.W. Raining. Tide slackening from 
running N. Shifted position. 

10:20 a. m.. 66 (2) Calm. Sky clear. Tide:lack. 

Gips me 48 (2) Calm. Sky clear. Tido vunning slight toward 

| the S.S.W. Shifted position. 
== | 1L0la. mes. 158 | 50-60 | Calm. Skyclear. Tidenot strong; running N. 
6.30 p. m-.-- 282 50-60 | Windslight,S.W. Skyclear. Tideslackening. 
11.45 a. m.- 157 50-60 | Wind slight, W.N.W. Sky clear. Tide run- 
\ | ning W. 
(2) | 12 50-60 
SA iapediees are 37 (2) Wind gentle, N.E. Foggy. 

4.15 p. m 93 55-60 | Wind N.I. Foggy. 

eae ans Seer 65 55-60 | Wind N.W. and E.N.E. Foggy. 

6ipsmess == 14 55-60 | Wind N.E. Sky clear. Shifted position. 

2.10 p. m 4 27 | Wind S.W. Clearing from fog. Tide quite 
eee: Shifted position. Three skates to a 
dory. 

2.15 p. m--- 54 40 | Wind S.W. Cloudy. After hauling ran into 
Holsteinborg Harbor. 

10.45 a. m-. 148 35-40 | Calm. Cloudy. ‘ide running strong toward 
N. Two skates to a dory. 

5.40 p.m 389 35-40 | Calm. Cloudy. Tide slackening from running 
N. Four skates to a dory. 

12.25 p. m 328 35-40 | Calm. Cloudy. Tide running strong to the 
N.E. Four skates to a dory. 

Opume==-e~ 127 35-40 | Calm. Cloudy. ‘Lhreatening fog from the W. 
Tide strong toward the W. Two skates. 

--| 9.20 a. m 305 35-40 | Calm. Cloudy. ‘Tide moderate at setting, 
strong at hauling. Four skates to a dory. 

7.45 p. m--- 257 35-40 | Wind gentle, N.E.and N. Cloudy. Tide strong. 
Four skates to a dory. 

10:45:28. nie. 162 35-40 | Wind gentle, N. Misting. Tide running 
strong to N.E. Shifted position. 

S2\| 9:30%a.:m = < 24 55-60 | Calm. Cloudy. Tide running northward. 
Four skates toa dory. On edge of bank. 

3.40 p. m..- 25 55-60 | Calm. Cloudy and misting. Tide slackening. 
Two skates to a dory. On edge of bank. 
Shifted position. 

8.40 a. m. fi; (2) Wind slight, N.E. Low fog; clearabove. Tide 
moderate. Two skates to a dory. Shifted 
position. 

Sas eet 76 40-45 | Wind moderate, S.W. Cloudy, with rain. Tide 
strong, running N.E. Two skates to a dory. 

3a 2.805p>, 1M: 138 | 40 | Two skates to a dory. 

15 po Mo. 61 | 40 .| Two skates to a dory. 

7.15 a, m 39 40 | WindS.W. Raining. Tidestrong. Twoskates 

f toadory. Shifted position. 

4.15 p. m- 113 40 | Wind slight, S.W. Raining. Tide slackening. 

| Two skates to a dory. 

8.45 p. m.. 48 40 | Windslight,S.W. Raining. Tide commencing 
torun. Twoskates toadory. Sbifted posi- 
tion. 

| 4.45 p.m. 305 40 | Wind moderating, W. Cloudy. Tide strong, 
but slackening. Four skates to a dory. 

4.30 p. m.- 289 40 | Calm. Skyclear. Tide slackening, running E. 
Four skates to a dory. 

1p. meee 18 40 | Shifted position. 

Gs Mee ee 274 | 35 | Wind gentle, N. Clear, with few clouds. Tide 
slackening. Four skates to a dory. 

Je |os40)'2. 1. | 84 35 | Wind very slight, E. Sky clear. Tide nearly 
| slack when hauled. Two skates to a dory. 
(?) 172 (2) Calm. Cloudy. Tide slackening. Fourskates 
| to a dory. 

OK emer, tere | 251 | 25-30 | Calm. Clondy. Tide commencing to run 
strong. Two skates to a dory. 

Gipmlss et 407 | 25-30 | Calm. Nearly clear. Tide slackening. Feur 

f skates to a dory. 

Oops eee 497 | 25-30 | Calm. Cloudy. 

5.30 p. m 430 25-30 wand slight from the W. Hazy, followed by 
og. 

ze (2) | 234 25-30 | Wind moderate, W.S.W. Cloudy. ‘Tide slack- 
ening. Four skates to a dory. 

eae ieee 61 25-30 | Wind moderate, S.W. Two skates to a dory. 

Sipe desea 53 25-30 | Wind W., moderating. Cloudy. Shifted posi- 


tion. 


[29] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS STRAIT. 217 


Table for July and August, representing the times of setting and hauling trawls, §-c.—Cont’d, 


Date. Set. Hauled. Fish. | Depth. Remarks. 
Fath. 
Aug. 12 | 4.50 p. m...| 7.30 p.m... 254 35 | Wind gentle, E.N.E. Clear. Tideslack. Two 
skates to a dory. 
05) 4 a.meecc.- 6.45 a.m... 60 35 | Wind N.W., freshening. Cloudy. One skate 
to a dory. 
15 | 4.45 a. m...| 7 p.m....-. 63 35 | Calm. Clearing, followed by blue sky. Two 
skates to a dory. 
16 | 6.30 a. m...| 8.10 a. m... 102 35 | Wind gentle, N.E. Sky clear. Tide strong, 


running to windward. Twoskates to adory. 
Shifted position. 

16 | 2.30 p. m.-.| 4.45 p.m... 112 30 | Wind gentle, N.E. Hazy. Tide moderate, 
running to the east. One skate toa dory. 
Fish large. 


165 KG psmleee a2 8.30 p.m... 111 30 | Wind moderate, N.E. Clear. Tide running to 
windward. Two skates to a dory. 

D7) |Gipomecss-- 8.10 p. m... 112 30 | Wind moderate, N.E. Clondy. Tide slack. 
Three skates to adory. Shifted position, 

1S) |e 1Ovacme. || NOON os... 200 30 | Wind light, E.N.E., becoming calm. Cloudy. 


Tide strong. Three skates toa dory. Fish 
excellent. Holsteinborg. 


20 | 4.35 a. m-...| 7.45 p.m... 68 25 | Wind gentle, N.E. by E. Clear. Tide running 
strong, 8.S.W. Three skates to a dory. 

205.30) a7 m'...-|) 10'as m2 3. 74 25 | Wind moderate, N.E. Clear, followed by fog. 
Tide strong to windward. ‘Three skates to a 
dory. 

21 | 4.30 p. m-...| 7.30 p.m... 81 25 | Wind moderate, N.E. Foggy. Tide slacken- 
ing. Shifted position. 

24 | 1la.m..... 2.40 p.m... 123 30 | Wind moderating, N.E. Clouds broken. Tide 
running to windward. Shifted position. 

PARAM a (e) Rae: Yon oo ears (2) WS Se ctesiaeee Set under sail on the inner ground, near the 


mouth of Holsteinborg Harbor. 


Total x. S| antisite. nee 8, 616 


Average time between setting and hauling in July, 3 hours. 

Average time between setting aud hauling in August, 2 hours, 53 minutes. 
Average depth of water in July, 45.5 fathoms. 

Average depth of water in August, 33 fathoms. 


Nimiberiofetishicaus: hbange MLy cece seg sete ae loo ccinicisinie aalaeisle ecie an p acifomie sewiniins tei 3, 764 + 
NM berondishicanehtinrAueusti-cc 22st eect Aaeog- secmete cece cencssosccdectecacesseh eases’ 4, 852 
AR OCAM Pee ctatat Sate ass tte Soe eainia bet acatoes ce tee Aaa ceicebicles Secameoeeceelnesaet Sicncscecseeess 8, 616 + 


11.—_ NATURAL HISTORY OF THE HALIBUT SO FAR AS IT AFFECTS 
THE FISHING. 


In the preceding tables, under the head of ‘‘remarks,” quite frequently 
occurs the phrase “ Shifted position,” which signifies, in this connection, 
a little more than mere changing of the position of the vessel; it implies 
that the fish, for some reason, are no longer to be caught where they 
may have been, up to that time, quite abundant. Are the fish of a roy- 
ing disposition, or do the individuals remain within restricted limits? 
I shall not attempt to decide, but will merely mention some facts which 
may have a bearing on the question. 

The fishermen seldom expect to cateh many fish near the vessel after 
the first flitching. Ifyouask for an explanation of this, they will tell you 
that the “gurry” drives the halibut away. By “egurry,” they mean the 
refuse of the fish, that is thrown overboard at the time of flitching. There 
is only a single case, that I know of, which would seem opposed to this 
explanation. It isthat of a large halibut which had eaten the head, back- 
bone, and viscera of a fish that had been fliteched. It cannot be that the 
flesh of their own species is distasteful to the halibut, for thisis what the 


218 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [30] 


fishermen use for bait, nor can it be that they mistake the white gleam of 
the flesh for sharks, for the sharks caught here were of a very dark color. 
Whether we know the cause or not, it is none the less true that the fish 
cease to bite near the vessel, after the first flitching, whereas, if this oper- 
ation is delayed, or the tide, at the time of it, is strong enough to carry 
the “gurry” away a considerable distance, the fish continue to bite freely. 
Considering, then, that the “ gurry” has this effect, what is the result of 
remaining in one spot several days? Evidently the mass of “ gurry” will 
increase, and, being drifted by the tides, will cause the vessel to be the 
center of an ever-increasing spot, where the halibut will not bite. It is 
thus necessary, either to set the trawls at a greater distance from the 
vessel, or else to move this to a new spot. The latter method, of course, 
is the easier. 

On the 23d, 24th, and 25th of July, over 1,500 fish were taken from a 
limited spot, at some distance from the vessel, where the gurry did 
not reach, because the tide ran in the opposite direction, but there 
appeared little if any decrease in the numbers. The spot could be 
easily distinguished from the rest of the bottom, by the absence of the 
tree-like stems of Hydrozoa. On the 26th, only two of the dories suc- 
ceeded in setting on this spot, and these two got fish while the others 
failed. The attempt to bring the vessel nearer failed so utterly that the 
trawls did not touch the spot again; 1,700 fish had been caught in four 
days, on a spot not a mile square. I am inclined to think that as fast 
as some were caught their places were filled by new arrivals, and were 
it not for the gurry, a vessel once anchored in a favorable position would 
not have to move until a load had been secured. 

But, it will be asked, will this gurry permanently injure the fishing? 
Probably not. There are many carnivorous animals, besides the little 
shrimp already spoken of, which would soon eat up everything except 
the bones of the fish, and it is hard to see what harm these can do. Never- 
theless, there does seem to be some effect produced by the fishing of one 
year upon the abundance of the fish in the same place the succeeding 
years; for the fishermen complain that the halibut off the coasts of New 
England, Nova Scotia, and New Foundland must be sought in deeper and 
deeper water year after year. If this be so, it is hard of explanation. 
For if we consider the halibut as of a roving disposition, why should 
they ‘shun their former haunts because they have been fished on, or if, on 
the other hand, they are not rovers, how can they, considering this great 
fecundity, be so easily exterminated, as their disappearance from these 
haunts would imply ? 

This fecundity must be very great. In a fish about six feet in length 
I calculated the ovary had 2,782,425 eggs. This was done by counting 
how many eggs there were in a straight row an inch long and from this 
finding how many there were in a cubic inch. The number of cubic. 
inches in one of the boxes in which the codfish hooks came was caleu- 


lated and the box filled with eggs. These eggs were then weighed. 


[31] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS’ STRAIT. 219 


The whole mass of eggs was next put on the scales and their weight 
divided by the weight of one cubic inch, to ascertain the number of 
cubic inches of eggs. This result, multiplied by the number of eggs in 
one cubic inch, would give the number of eggs in the whole ovary. Con- 
sidering that the number given is some too large, I cannot conceive 
how any error so great, as to make the number less than two millions, 
could have crept in. Ido not know whether all these eggs would have 
been laid at one time, or not, but, as they appeared to be nearly of 
the same size, I judge that such would probably have been the case. 

There was no way of determining accurately at what stage of the tide 
the fish were the most voracious, but they appeared to take the bait 
best the latter part of the stronger tide, for it was then that the hand- 
line was most successful, and the men expected the best luck with 
the trawls. 

Though the fish are of the same species as those caught on the Grand 
Banks, nothing was found in them, in the shape of hooks or food, indi- 
cative of a migration from any other place. 

August 5 I made several observations upon the temperature of the 
rectum of the halibut, when they were first taken by the hand-line, and 
found, with one exception, the temperature to be 39° Fahr. These ob- 
servations were made within an hour or two of the time the temperature 
of the bottom was taken. The exception referred to was where one hali- 
but showed a temperature of 394° Fahr., half a degree higher than the 
others. 

The food of the fish was different for different places and times. 
. Where we first fished it was composed of crabs and other crustacea, with 
now and then a fish of the genus Cyclopterus. But, when we shifted to 
a spot twenty miles or so south of this, we found some of the species of 
erustacea had disappeared, and the principal source of food was a small 
fish called “lant.” There was also a great difference in the condition of 
the fish in these two places; those of the last place being far better and 
more vigorous. The males were above 6 to 1 female in the first place, 
whereas the females in the latter place predominated greatly over the 
males. I take the following from my diary of August 8 to show the 
difference in the two places: 

‘The fish on this bank have none of the large shrimp in their stomachs 
that were found in the stomachs of the halibut on the other bank. ‘Here 
they have mostly lant, there mostly shrimp. None of tie common cod 
have as yet beencaught.” <A few were caught after this. “Sharks and 
cat-fish are likewise very few. There are no walruses or seals, few 
whales, and many birds. The birds are not as hungry as on the other 
bank, and it is harder to shoot them, for they do not fly very near.” 


N.W. mag. from Holsteinborg, July. W.S.W. mag. from Holsteinborg, Aug. 
Food, principally crustacea. Food, principally lant. 

6 males to 1 female, 1 male to 7 females. 

Fish poor. Fish fat and vigorous. 


Fish in spots. Fish more evenly distributed. 


920 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [32] 


The halibut do not always swim near the bottom. Isaw one leap out of 
the water where the depth was 40 fathoms, and have caught them on the 
hand-line when this was only half-way down. Several have followed 
the bait to the surface, and one even followed the thermometer up twice 
in succession. Feathers were pulled out of the mouth of one, and the 
skeleton of a gull, Larus tridactylus, was found in the stomach of another. 


D.—FISHERMEN. 


In the proceding pages I have considered the halibut from a fisher- 
man’s standpoint, and have attempted to give a clear idea of the meth- 
ods of capture, and will, in the rest of this report, pay particular atten- 
tion to the fishermen themselves. 


12._GENERAL CHARACTER OF VESSEL, CREW, AND FINANCIAL AR- 
RANGEMENT. 


The Bunker Hill is a two-masted schooner, of 100 tons burden. This 
is large for a fishing vessel, as the majority of the Gloucester vessels are 
less than 75 tons burden, and I believe there are only a few fishing 
vessels in that place as large as the Bunker Hill. The crew, including 
the captain and cook, consisted of fourteen men, and was considered 
one of the best that ever sailed from Gloucester. They certainly were 
well acquainted with their business, and, as for disposition, there was no 
sign of a quarrel during the whole summer. ‘This last is especially re- 
markable, because of the absence on board of the fishing vessels of the 
traditionally severe ship discipline. The captain, unless the cook can be 
so called, was the only officer on board. The cabin was open alike to 
all, and as the bunks, with the exception of the captain’s and my own, 
were chosen by lot, each one of the crew, providing he was sober when 
the lots were drawn, had as good a chance as his neighbor of securing 
sleeping quarters there. 

The explanation of this general freedom is probably to be found in the 
co-operative nature of the trip, the financial plan of which was about as 
follows: The owners of the vessel were to receive 46 per cent. of the 
net stock and furnished, besides the vessel, food, salt, and fishing tackle, 
while 50 per cent. of the net stock, after deducting the cost of tarring 
the rigging, refilling medicine chest, pilotage, ete., was to be divided 
into fourteen equal parts, according to the number of the crew, one part 
going to each. The captain was to receive, besides one of the fourteen 
parts, the remaining 4 per cent.* The arrangement was thus, in some 
sense, a partnership, the owners furnishing the capital and the fisher- 
men the labor, the profits to be shared in certain proportions. This 
general arrangement is not universal; for on some fishing vessels the 
men are paid a stipulated sum for the trip, the owners running the risk 


*The captain’s share is usually four cent. of the net stock, but it may vary either 
one way or the other. 


[33] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS’ STRAIT. 221 


of profit or loss, while on others the crews are composed of both hired 
men and shares-men. 


13,—EVERY-DAY LIFE, SUPERSTITIONS, ETC. 


At a quarter past six, Monday evening, the 9th of June, the steam-tug, 
Sarah I. Wetherell, pulled the Bunker Hill off from the wharf, so that 
her sails might catch the wind favorably. We had expected to start 
several hours earlier, but the little unexpected delays common to such 
occasions had prevented. Even as it was, on counting up hands, two 
were found missing; so that, while we tacked back and forth at the 
mouth of the harbor, waiting, a dory was sent to find the delinquents. 
Two hours passed before the return of the dory, and our number was 
complete; but during this time the wind had died out, rendering it 
doubtful whether we would succeed in leaving the harbor that evening. 
Nine o’clock, however, saw us outside of the harbor, headed in the direc- 
tion of Nova Scotia. 

A general feeling of excitement prevailed, strengthened in part by in- 
dulgence in the strong stuff; but as only a quart of the fiend was brought 
on board, outside of the crew and the Fish Commission tanks, all were 
soon sober and ready for work. 

The captain had his berth, and one had been assigned to me, but 
the rest of the crew had as yet no settled sleeping place. The bunks to 
be chosen were in the cabin and forecastle. The cabin had two double- 
berths on each side, but as the starboard (right hand) ones were reserved 
for the captain and myself, only two of the berths were vacant. As 
the berths were large there was room in the two larboard (left hand) 
ones for four, making six to sleep in the cabin. The forecastle was ar- 
ranged with berths on each side, and a table in the center, in front of 
the foremast, where we took our meals. One of the nen was too much 
overcome, by something he had taken, to choose his sleeping-quarters 
at the same time the rest did, and naturally the worst bunk in the ves- 
sel fell to him. This was more, or rather less, than he could endure; so 
he took up his quarters back of the cabin, under the wheel, and, with the 
exception of the dampness of the place, had quite a comfortable bunk. 
This added one more to the occupants of the cabin, leaving eight to sleep 
in the forecastle. Each nfan furnished his own bed and bedding. 

This evening we had our first meal on board. The crew took their 
meals in two sets, the first of seven, and the second of eight, and this 
division was made in such a manner as the least to interfere with the fish- 
ing arrangements. As already seen, the dorymates had to attend to the 
fishing arrangements of their own dory. Now, many of these things, 
such as renewing hooks, baiting, &c., could be attended to by one man 
at a time, and less time would be lost if only one went to meals while 
the other kept on working, than if both went together. On this account, 
the division of the men at meals was made, with one exception, caused 
by my presence, in such a manner that only one man to a dory would 


Pay REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [34] 


eat at a time. As for the captain and cook, who were exempted from 
fishing, the captain ate with the first set, while the cook waited until the 
second. 

Another important matter attended to this evening was the setting of 
the watches. On leaving the wharf at Gloucester, the captain had taken 
the helm and kept it until we were well out of the harbor and on our 
course, when the watches were divided. ‘Two men stand on watch at a 
time. Each watch is two hours long, and each man is at the wheel half 
of this time and forward the other half. The captain and cook, having 
no watching to do, this falls upon the other twelve of the crew, who each 
have, out of the twenty-four, four hours of watching, two of which are 
spent at the wheel. In order to prevent each man’s watch coming the’ 
same hour each succeeding day, one man, each day, omits his watch. 
and by this means all the watches are pushed backward every twenty- 
four hours. The man who omits his watch is the one who, otherwise, 
would have his wheel between six and seven in the evening. 


12-lp.m.ja 4b (e¢ 
1-2 p.m. \ b d 


2-3 p.m.(c jd je 

3-4 p. m. d ' e ¥, 

4-5 p.m.je (f fg 

5-6 p. m. if Vg \ h 

; 6-7 p.m.(h (t (9 
7-8 p.m.ti ij Ve 

8-9 p.m.4j7 fk gl 

9-10 p.m. Uk l \ a 

10-11 p.m.jl ja §b 
11-12 p.m. i @ Vb { C 


Thus, for instance, in the table just given, if /’s wheel was between 5 
and 6 p.m., g’s wheel would naturally come between 6 and 7, but g omits 
his watch and h, taking his place, has the wheel an hour earlier than the 
preceding day. The next day g has the wheel, between 5 and 6, and h 
omitting, 7 takes the wheel from 6 to 7. 

The watches were arranged so that dorymates watched together every 
other day. Thus in the table, suppose that e and f are dorymates. The 
first day e and f watch together, the second day f and g, while the third 
day eand f are together again. Hach watch dalled the next watch. The 
order of the watches was decided in the following manner: A hat was 
held crown down, one man from each dory putting a finger upon the 
border of the opening, while one of the others, commencing at random, 
counted the fingers in succession, until he reached the number nine. 
Finger number nine being withdrawn, the counting commenced again 
with one and continued to nine, which was also withdrawn. © This con- 
tinued until no fingers were in the hat. The owner of the first finger 
withdrawn, together with his dorymate, had the first watch, the owner 
of second finger withdrawn, with his dorymate, the second watch, and 
so on through the whole. — 


[35] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS’ STRAIT. 223 


I have said that the watches were two hours long, and this was true 
while we were on the passage out and back, but not so the intervening 
time; for, while we were anchored in the strait no watch was kept, 
because there was little or no danger. When, however, we shifted posi- 
tion and were expecting to anchor in a very few hours, the time would 
be divided into twelve equal parts, each man taking one part at the 
wheel. Thus once or twice the wheels were only ten or fifteen minutes 
long. 

The passage from Gloucester to Holsteinborg lasted twenty days 
and was along the coast of Nova Scotia through the Gut of Canso, 
northward in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, within sight of the western 

‘coasts of Cape Breton and Newfoundland, and thence by means of the 

Strait of Belle Isle, into the Atlantic and Davis Strait. The pleasanter 
days were occupied by the crew in fixing the dories and fishing tackle. 
Iam not able to give a minute account of the events on the way up, 
because prolonged seasickness prevented the taking of many notes, but 
will give some extracts from my diary that may throw light upon the 
work and character of the men. i 

Friday, June 20, ’79.— The crew act very much like bees. Yesterday, 
a warm, pleasant, sunny day, they were all activity; to-day, cold and 
rainy, they were in their bunks most of the time from breakfast until 
dinner, and during the rest of the time, with few exceptions, have done 
little or nothing.” 

Though this was true, it was not on account of any disposition to 
shirk work, but rather because of there being only enough to do to 
occupy them on pleasant days; for, after the fishing commenced, they 
showed themselves to be good steady workers. 

The duties devolving upon them, while on the way north, were the sail- 
ing of the vessel, fixing the dories, and rigging the trawls. The first was 
of course attended to principally by the different watches, leaving much 
time for the others. The fixing of the dories did not take very much time, 
as it only consisted in making thole-pins, three seats, and two vertical par- 
titions for each boat and winding the oars with oakum to prevent them 

‘from wearing out. The vertical partitions, like the seats, were movable 

and were used to divide the dory into three parts. Typically, the stern 
apartment held the trawls, the central one the fish, while the bow was 
reserved for the anchors, but whenever the fish were numerous they 
were put wherever room could be found for them. 

The rigging of the trawls, however, kept the men busy much longer 
than fixing the dories. Four skates had to be rigged for each dory, 
and all of these were of new material, excepting a large part of the 
lines to which the hooks are fastened. These short lines, called gang- 
ings, had been for two years kept in bundles, with the hooks protected 
from moisture by a canvas or rubber covering. These must, of course, 
be examined, in order to test the strength of each ganging, and to free 
the hooks from rust. Besides this, most of the hooks had to be taken 


224 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [36] 


from the line and refastened. ‘This last operation is called “ganging 
the hooks.” 

The gangings finished, the ground-line next occupies the fisherman’s 
attention. This being composed, as already stated, of fifty-fathom 
pieces requires, that each of these pieces should have a loop spliced in 
one end, while the other is fastened by what the sailors call a “wall,” so 
that it will not untwist. The loops and walls finished and six of the 
fifty-fathom pieces tied together, the ground-line is ready for the attach- 
ment of the gangings, which are then fastened to it at every two fathoms. 
Besides the ground-lines and gangings, the buoys, buoy-lines, and an- 
chors had to be made ready, but as these have already been mentioned, 
they will need no further notice here. In doing these things, the men 
would sometimes be in the cabin, forecastle, or on deck, just as conven- 
ience and faney inclined them. 

June 19.—I have the following short note: ‘‘The men are very kind 
and obliging, and although they may be very rough in their language 
toward each other, they are ready to help one another out of trouble.” 
I, at no time during the trip, felt in the least like altering the above. 

Saturday, June 14.—** I would like to put down some of the conversa- 
tion of the crew, but there is too much profanity and vileness mixed with 
it to allow of its appearing on paper.” ‘This, I am sorry to say, was true 
to the end of the trip, but it did not appear that they meant all that they 
said, but spoke from habit. Such expressions as “A d n nice thing” 
were common, where the objectional word increased the emphasis of the 
word nice. A few words upon the peculiarities of their oaths would be 
interesting but not proper. Leaving out the profanity, the conversa- 
tion consisted principally of stories of past experiences on land and 
water. Some of the men had been regular sailors, and, having visited 
many parts of the earth, their opinions were interesting if not always 
correct. For instance, one of them, among other sage remarks, asserted 
that guano is not composed largely of bird excrement, but is nothing 
but foul air. 

The only difference between Sunday and any other day in the week 
was that no nail must be driven on that day, for they said that would 
‘‘nailthe trip.” Their superstitions area little curious. The old notion 
that any enterprise commenced on Friday would be unlucky has, in a 
great measure, disappeared, on account of the fishermen having read in 
the papers a long lst of great events that had happened on Friday. 
The objection to hammering on Sunday was so strong that the captain 
delayed fixing a part of the rigging from Sunday until Monday on this 
account. 

There is one superstition about which they are exceedingly particu- 
lar, They will never leave a hatch upside down. I was in the cabin 
fixing the fire, and had taken up the hatch in the floor to get at the 
coal, which was kept in the bottom of the vessel, beneath the cabin 
floor. The hatch I had placed in sucha manner against the side of the 


[37] THE HALIBUT FISHERY—DAVIS STRAIT. 225 


cabin, that, if it had fallen down, it would have been bottom side up. 
One of the fishermen, whom I had always regarded as very sensible, 
seeing the hatch in that position, said to me, “‘ Mr. Scudder, don’t leave 
the hatch that way,” and when I asked him why, he explained, that if 
it should slip down it would be upside down, which would bring ill luck 
upon the whole trip. I replied, ‘‘Let’s try it,” and knocked the hatch 
down on the floor bottom up. Ido not remember of ever having been 
more surprised than I was to see him jump to turn the hatch over. He 
then said, “I don’t Know what the captain would say if he saw that.” 
One of the fishermen told of a captain he was with who swore terribly at 
him because he pushed a dory off from the vessel with the bow of the 
dory toward the sun. I found, however, some difficulty in getting the 
men to acknowledge their belief in many superstiti$ns, and I should not 
have found out those I have mentioned, had not the incidents spoken 
of called them into action. I think, as a whole, they were, for sea-going 
men, remarkably free from superstition. 

The food during the trip was excellent of its kind. Fresh meat and 
vegetables were, from the nature of the case, out of the question, but 
the salt meat could not have been better, and fresh halibut and cod, 
while the fishing continued, were ever available. There was no milk of 
any kind, and no canned vegetables. Only enough potatoes were taken 
to last afew days. A little variety was noticed in the meals on Sunday, 
for on this day the cook added baked beans and brown bread to the 
bill of fare. Pea soup was common. ‘Tea was prepared for each meal, 
and coffee for breakfast, and occasionally also for dinner, but both of 
these had to be taken without milk. Rice pudding and the famous dish 
of “duff” appeared occasionally. Neither were we without our mince 
pies, for the cook made some very fair ones out of dried apples and salt 
meat. Sugar, butter, and molasses were only wanting the last two weeks. 
The water of Greenland was excellent, as well as that taken from Glou- 
cester. The food was nicely cooked, and many a housekeeper would 
be proud could she make such bread and cook such dishes as we had, 
with similar materials. Though the food was good and healthy, con- 
densed milk and canned vegetables would have been a great addition. 

The most regular meal was dinner, which came about noon. The 
other meals were more or less interfered with by the fishing, but while 
we were on the passage out and back breakfast came about 6 a. m. and 
supper about 5 p. m. 

With the exception of the captain, all the fishermen used tobacco, both 
by chewing and smoking, and when, toward the end of the trip, tobacco 
became scarce, some would save their quids for smoking, after drying. 
Smoking must come before and after every important operation. 

There was no severe sickness during the trip. One of the crew had 
what appeared to be the quinsy sore throat, which prevented him taking 
an active part in the fishing for several days. The captain seemed 
threatened with consumption and was confined to his bunk a day or 

- §. Mis. 29 15 


226 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [38] 


two. All were more or less troubled with running sores on hands and 
wrists, which soon healed after the fishing was over. These were prob- 
ably caused by the fish slime, as several of the men showed me scars 
of similar sores they had had on former trips. I had two such sores, 
caused by fish slime getting into slight cuts, and lasting over two 
months, but which healed rapidly while coming home. 

The course taken coming home was the reverse of that going. Those 
who have been to Greenland after halibut several years, say that after 
August 20 the weather will permit of but little fishing. Our captain, 
however, having some salt left, decided to remain a little longer, so we 
did not start for home until the 28th of August. Then followed the active 
preparations for going home. The first thing was the bringing on board 
the barrels of fins, arfd the careful heading up of these. Next came the 
repacking of the flitches. After flitches have been packed ten or twelve 
days, for the first time, they are usually repacked in a more compact 
form and a little more salt added. During the fishing the packing had 
been mostly forward of midships, so that the bow of the vessel was low 
down in the water, and to trim the vessel better the flitches were re- 
packed farther back. The trawls were also unrigged and packed away 
in the hold, but the cleaning of the vessel was left until we were south 
of the Strait of Belle Isle. 

The decks being cleared, and the dories lashed in their places amid- 
ships, we started for home August 28. For the first few days the wind 
favored us, but before reachimg Belle Isle died out, and most of the 
time after that was unfavorable in direction or a dead ealn. 

Getting south of the Strait of Belle Isle we found the climate much 
different from that in Davis’ Strait. The captain had brought a bushel 
or so of very fine black sand from Holsteinborg, and this was now used 
to scrub the vessel clean of fish slime, that had been collecting ever since 
the fishing commenced. The crew likewise took a general wash, many 
of them having their hair eut by one of the crew, who was quite proficient 
in that way. Vessel and crew both seemed transformed. 

The passage home was uneventful, the crew being unemployed the 
greater part of the time. Some read, others walked the deck smoked if 
they could get tobacco, and lay in their bunks. Most of the food gave 
out, until toward the last nothing but salt meat and bread were left. 
We reached Gloucester the 17th of September. 


4 


Page 
Aaron Burnham, schooner ........---.--- 2 
Acknowledgements ..... eesc sera sopSbae 1 
Albert Clarence, schooner.....--------- ae 3 
FANAIVBIS occ cance sar esinane esc ene= PeConES al 
Apparatus used in fishing.............--- 21 
ADIGA OTIC -coacelencniicisewncelinnr im a(-si- 37 
August, climate of..--..-.... 3, 6, 9, 11, 14, 15, 17, 38 
PSHCAUCHUAN | Somcwisc cos ane n= = 29 
fishing in, the best...........-..-- 5, 21, 31 
Starvgormnome sc. -sccnecss oce-oe 38 
temperature of water..-.-.-..---- 19 
Average weight of flitches fofallthetrips 2,3, 4 
THAR os Saber ee eS ene arse ae 23, 24, 31 
TSE 2: 6 8 es ee ee Be 23, 33 
IBAA ISHN 5 - oc sco snlsincismacme'sseuleeenel= 4, 5,18 
IBATOMOtEY <i .oc-oc esses cccsecccccescccces re nals 
TERAITG) See Ba RES CEHISooCoHEHanateoosecesscor 37 
IReddinGecsececeoe mac saseeosanacciee cose sas 33 
Malle isles Sorat Ofscssscceeacicen ee ceoucie'= 7, 35, 38 
Bellerophon, schooner.............2.---.- 3 
IBOMUUS eon cs cer cee a snescccaicis ns eieeicis sis 32, 33 
BITS cca Soccte cease atoeesiccsace estos Sine2 
Boat-buoys, (See Buoys.) 
OU occ ccelisaemecisinaswiniecetaisicecsecccacns 38 | 
ISGUUOMa eres ecto ecoccsiesesasceccsnests 5,6 
POUL menawecrecces incense ctanicesammionscea 37 
Breakfast. (See Meals.) 
Bunker Hill, schooner..... 1, 3, 4, 20, 21, 26, 32, 33, 38 
Bunks. (See Berths.) 
Ovens vescsccsas ses sseesececsoaecs 21, 22, 23, 36 
PSOVS esac eres ses c ae enasecieco cos = 21, 22, 23, 36 
HUUClE eee cet cesae corer wassacse ae cena se 37 
Ga pines cite ee ee 6, 7, 32, 33, 36 
Caleb Eaton, schooner..........-.-..----- 2 
MURMAOHGMUOL ctescecscsecccccessnccssasc 35 
GANOPAMIDNA ssc cssccemaaeeecelascsslesicne 5 
RURDEPBLOUONE so ssscs es snccecenseosinsice swine 35 
Be AN EMHATOW Cll. vicniscsveinecseeiens = sins aac 5, 18 
AeA UAIR incite sean ec ann cemsenee's scien 22, 32, 34, 37 
Captains, list of those who have been to 
Ronen lan cetacs osiccue a sicess ones smiace ams 2-3 
Carrie Jones, schooner « ...........-.-..-- 2 
euiisii@eeenee cess tsetseccseastcotsescc. 31 
RAMUS CCCiOlcvsccmsccscecceces ce asic a 2, 3,6 
Chewing of tobacco ..... seseecscensosise: 37 
Clarke MT vA OTOWSIO ss sccceccovcecencce 1 
(CUO Ae ae aes eae aeeesai 3, 6-17 
Clouds. (SeeSky.) 
ESUalene occ cassie csens asc ences = 36 
SrodetishPenseeee secs ne te sees 3, 4, 20, 23, 31, 37 
Cod-fishery, tubs used for keeping trawls. 21 
WL COM meee ce on cae ua eeseeissccicenaateas 37 
Collins, Capt. J. W..--- Pere CRS aRee eas Ee 1 
COTDTESS) Saat COS eCe BO CEEC ERECT Er oone 6,18 
Competition, in future -.....<...-2.--.5. 4 
RSCG tHO =o. sosoccce nccaccwclsacscocucs 22, 32, 34, 37 


a 
Page. 
Crew, character of ..... Suisesieneseceuesainsipinee.iae 
conversation of ..........2.... SEE 36. 
OCCUDAUIONS Ol sccccaccoseosasccces - 35,36 
Cunard. SChoOnen wecsccccecesiacccecisieosion 3 
CULTCNUSies co malec tne ssiccccenlenececesciess <= 18 
Cyclopterus, food of halibut ...........-.- 3u 
Depth of waters. - os jcissncnmnaiee cas ce pice 3, 5, 20, 29 
Dinner. (See Meals.) 
Disciplines... aaqecis Seaeiceiniak sisleraissisie sie’ 32 
DDISKOVBRY 2 osece sees cesseeiceene sews siete & 
Distance from home an objection....-.--.. 3 
MONMCS¥.2 ea sh eo natens casas eeeaeee 3, 22, 23, 33, 35 
DOory-Mates) -.- ao... ceeecccccwesecennsees 22, 33, 34 
Dressing the halibut <. 6. < cscs nceccsecccee 25 
Ditters acest sictine se wnacetecccamecioee's 37 
Mant evirn ecb esenceise ancl ceo scme Pees a 
Eggs, number in ovary of halibut ........ 30-31 
SAM Ole = osiceieecc oiawie scam eicinin le oaaaela acai 3,4, 5 
IMBTOWMATOCSbracacswiescacenceciasiiosemciione 4 
MaunaolL PANKSie sec cies - ce essere <a lem 5 
Mecundity of Nalibut)-.c-.20 ssecccccsccr cs 30-35 
Financial arrangement .............------ 32 
HUNS PIC KICN: scuwewedieinc sass acleneiecemla= 20, 26, 38 
Fiords of the coast of Greenland..... eeaee 4,18 
| Fire in cabin ......----------220 -e2eee eee 6,7 
Fish. (See Halibut.) 
Fishermen. (See Crew.) 
RISKING sake ceeceeccicceseceecme. 3, 4, 5, 18, 20, 3 
WIShinowDANKS  cescccesedecenccceon see. seis 4,1& 
Plag On) DUO... 2... cenccesnenncccecss-- oe 2t 
Plag-pole....... ceccas csesescncescccecesce 25 
MlamishiGape scssccissonacwsw en aiseseasenee & 
INTCUCS faa aes cee naw oe n canna AeSepac cc 26, 38 
TCHin ees oan eneaane eee es asanelees ae ees 26 
WMtChING-KNIVER <sccsecicceeusieeqesce=-—-= 25 
Flitching-tables .. 2... 2. oss cccececcene= 25 
MUTCHIN GGUS) ciasesle awe cece seme —c 23, 26 
FOO See cise aoe eencc ans clea ceeejeianialee 3, & 
MoodlOLr Crew. --oscececcetecs +a seuseaeec == 37, 32 
OOM OLMOLIDUD cesseicccccoaccccss nee eee 21, 38 
OLECASIIO ls. - a ate coc va ceemaciakawinslswaticien= 33, 86 
GanPinv'S) onset cscecmceaccenwnccesesmswee 21, 35, 36 
General discussion of the fishery.....-.-. 2 
General SnM Mayes. << cejcccceccesces coe == 2 
GOGtHRAD nao sente since ccscucessmisicaciciers S 
Grace L. Fears, schooner. ................ 3 
GrandsbankSeareccest cess serene ona sacees 3, 4, 5, 20: 
Grapplo esse oes oeewenscen = scccseccesecicen= 24 
Groundstine voce conc seecccascacceescene -- 21,36 
Grounds, fishing. (See Banks.) 
Gull. (See Birds.) 
Grulltesin be cichee totes cscs Seon shoecasic ses 5 
GUD yes ss ces pa wae tos coe cecloseuivie- sien a= 29 
GuskiliCaptadObn 252 icc co ceccwessce 2 
Haddock-fishery, tubs used for trawls-. --. 23 
Halibut . ...2, 3, 4, 20, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 29, 31, 32, 36, 37 
227 


928 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


Page. 
Hamilton, ‘‘ Captain,” not James...------ 5 
Hamilton, Capt. James....-..------------ 2 
Harbors secs cs ceerecssceeel-n-s==-ccsee 3, 4, 6, 18, 20 
Hatch, superstition relating to -.-.-- Sowee 36 
Hauling the trawls...... SHOR ASE A OBOSEHOC - 23,04 
Henry Wilson, schooner...--------+------ 3 
Herman Babson, schooner....-.---------- 3,4,7 
Holsteinborg...-.-----.----------- 8, 5, 18, 20, 35, 38 
TeIYAKGY 3225 oa poesoacecoeSUUeC Sores oOor 21, 23, 33, 35 
Hooks, landing......--.--------++--+--+-- 24 
Hopkins, Capt. Jeremiah. ...-.--.--------- 2 
Hydrozoa ..-.-------+--+-20s22- ees eee eee 6, 30 
TRG sence oneC Da BD EC CONOUN OS a eae OEtoonG 3, 7, 18, 20 
John Atwood, schooner ......-.---+------ 2 
July, climate of ......------------ 6, 10, 12, 13, 16, 29 
fishing in-.......-.-.- pconsencceasos 3, 4,5 
light in........-------22ee-eee ee eee 18 
temperature of water. .-...--------- 19 
June, fishing in ........-..--------------- 3,4 
passage north in ....-.------------- 20 
Keg-Duoys ..--. 02 eee ee eee e ee ence ce enenee 21 
IRGGrS secaccwieecncclncocecclccecsicem=mccme 24 
Kmives, Daltie.~<.niccccsececqseneeescmesees 23 
AitCMin ge cece esaacstesn= sence 25 
Wantiecsc<s SA ERE S ROSE COP OECCOUSNOOMOACOES 31 
Lawson, Capt. Charles........----------- 2, 20 
Wife, CVELY-CaY. 2-025 5 .ccccenescceconsccar 33 
igh tess enieiscsisa cece ress = secs cecnnsne 3,18 
Lots drawn for dories ....-.-.------------ 22 
McDonald, Capt. John .........---------- 1,3 
McQuinn, Capt. John .......-.-..-------- 2 
Madson, Capt. Rasmus.........---------- 2, 3, 5 
Mary E., schooner. ......ccsc~ceese0-sene0 258; 43.7 
May, harbor open in .....0.--2--«--++-<-- 3, 20 
IMedlsw@ee- cle case ss petcGcecccucceesreence 33, 37 
Membrino Chief, schooner....-.---------- 2 
Menhaden used for bait .....-..---------- 23 
Methods of'fishing .....-.sccccce-s= ace Meat 
IMialictetxe csteis cnccioseteieiteceerr ess csc sine 37 
IMOIBSSES lonesasclsiscsclocecinaccccsecsescesc= 37 
Napes of halibut used for bait.-.........- 23 
PNewOun GANG’. .cccece scone soeeo=sacecnce 30, 35 
NTO tee cw conten ca ctasccwesenewecenae 18 
INGVAIS COMMAS ecacec snciea2o<ser eeese = cman 30, 35 
Nulli Secundus, schooner. ......-..ee0---- 3 
WATS sea cicietsisisiciclsisiwicwicie| scien ciple sa'sioeivwicinele 35 
Oa Spee aaa ccixiscwanmacisccsnncceccsicsss ss 36 
Occupations of Crew: .acc.<-sece-ceccee sc 3Dul 
Outline of history ...-... Be cee maseeeeciacs 2 
Passage to Greenland ......-........-.--- 20, 35 
PASS CUNO Olresicine cacisias «einisie sisinsioawisiaic’s 38 
Pearse, Capt. Albion ............ SAP AC Ee 2 
Pea-soup ....---.---- se eeee cneeee wecceeee- 37 
PIGS MINN CO pesciceensiaa'a casa enie so niasia scealcle 37 
ZOMerOyay Cap te Guy Pia cesacoce snes Seneta cis 2 
Potatoes .- 2.20. cccnceveccesceonse ssiereeets 37 
Profanity ...... { coOubdoCuuEHebobecenoogscc® 36 
IRQ cece ada cesoesonn peuecdoespaee anodes 6,10, 11 
Rectum of halibut, fen erature of........ 31 
RiGePUdGING sessse secs secccein'n a= eese- oe 37 
PRIS Kaeiae Nocicne ncisc's selsinsissinciciesis.s\aioclneiee 3 


[40] 


Page. 
River Queen, schooner ...........-- AHSACO 2,3 
Robinson, Capt. George ..... aecaaaneeacue 2 
RROMCI sae eee ee teens scosenqeodoogss 23 
Sailing the vessel ..........--cccccecccces 35 
Saint Lawrence, Gulf of-....... seeees os 35 
Salmone--c-2s-e=- senna reece acpanaSa coos 4 
Salt, price and quantity ..... seceed Snoeece 26 
Saltimeatisc- cer see aeelasese cin Sorbecscscce 37 
Salting cod\--. << --.<= nousccSccoe Seeaae = 3 
Salting halibut ........ cee -ceencnenseee - 25,26 
Sarah E. Wetherell, steam tug ..-........ 33 
Sea-lemons ......-..-cce-cceeee aeaTecoa 6 
Sea-pumpkins .......---------- snesee weece 6 
Seine fishing <<< <c-0 ss cccceeteuseso=s= 4 
Setting trawls. ..........-.-« Scamanncecectac aoa 
Sharkspeoeecce ace ssen ss ennneicnine Booscsa 30, 31 
Shrimp scccocen ee ercce~anceacecenenscios 27, 31 
BICKNESS accra ee ss cee eenccest Socaane cc 37 
SKatesi-ece-csacaae . sasecchauecsoe aoeeae 21, 23, 35 
Sky, condition of....-.. 6 coedacecne cocescen GO 1OMEE 
Slack-watepccecss o--ecieecesccescn ss s6 es 18 
Slime, fish, effect on hands spGoconeqnesoat 38 
SMOKING ese s-sesesenceenscnc=assiceeis 37 
Soundings (see Depth) .---.-.------------ 5 
NOLES Se ac eeias ce eeeesea cies nen soscceccem= 38 
Start for Greenland .............ccceocen> 33 
Stonms!ocncicirccaceceseicclccseceiccecleeleiainie= 3 
SUCAi noe oe caecicerasaecienecsiccsninasivemeiu= 37 
Sukkertoppen harbor ......------------- 3, 18, 20 
Summer work, tabular view of ...----..-- 26 
SUNGAY 2a. 2 cic sccsinsslecacnevicepicieselseicasinn 36, 37 
Superstitions. ......-..-.--------0---- cent GBStS6 
Surfaceiolbanksicsc.ccsccss saceeesee seems 5. 
Survey of banks........-----eeeeee--eeee- 6 
Tables, explanation of. ......-..+-+-.--++ 6, 7, 26, 27 
Tabular view of summer work ....------- 26 
Teaipeces- as Sooatnecna ses acemececericnaese 37 
Temperature .. c= 05. scccecccessses cee 6, 7, 8, 9, 19 
Thermometer, height of......-.------+- oe 7,8 
Mhonwaldsensssscsec shoe scccecwencen Soc08 2 
CI GSi etree ciao 0 BR GDS Sacieaaise me se) Gee 
TODACCORs ce rice cesses secicaosm~lca state 37 
Trade agents, Danish ......-.-------.---- 4 
Trawlstensssteesteeeemeeeente seat ape rOD 21, 27, 35, 38 
Trip Arsh cc. vcs seliniels ciainleteicialeieeismie=inele 2 
Tub or skate of trawl) s22--cccccoccccccece 21 
TuniGata: Scesereere ee ean cas cee ae erties 6 
Wnhookingfishos.so.ec-ccervenn =~ snonsone 24 
United States Fish Commission ....-.-..- 1 
Vegetables .... 2-220 -250--cece cece sccece 37 
Vessel. (See Bunker Hill. ) 
Vessels that have been toGreenland ....- 2,3 
Victori Island and fishing ground........ 5 
Watches ).....ceccoseacen= welenine iene = isle 34, 35 
Water, depth of ...... eaeate eaten Feoaneoco, Chur) 
Water, temperature of ...-.--.----+------ 19 
Water, drinking. ......-..---020-20--e-cce 20, 37 
Weather. (See Climate.) 
William S. Baker, schooner .....--------- 2 
Wild) svt osa.ccsesees ceoeeeeeeoreee 4, 6, 13, 14, 15, 20 


— ee wal 


_ APPENDIX. D. 


ECONOMIC RESEARCH. 


229 


XIL—REPORT OF PROGRESS OF AN INVESTIGATION OF THE 
CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND ECONOMIC VALUES OF FISH 
AND INVERTEBRATES USED FOR FOOD. 


UNDERTAKEN FOR THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMIS- 
SION. 


Bye Wi! Ov Atwater, Pa. D:, 
Professor of Chemistry, Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn. 


Sir: Herewith I have the honor to transmit a report of progress of 
the investigation of the chemical composition and economic values of 
fish and marine invertebrates used for food, which has been in process 
for some time past in this laboratory, under the awspices of the Smith- 
sonian Institution and the United States Fish Commission. 

This report includes analyses of fifty-one samples of fish and twenty- 
five of oysters, lobsters, and other invertebrates. It is divided into 
three parts. 

Part I gives account of analyses of fish, including description of sam- 
ples, tabular statements of results, and methods of analyses. 

Part Il gives similar data regarding invertebrates. The investiga- 
tion it describes was undertaken at my suggestion by my assistants, 
Messrs. Woods and Beamer, who have also shared in the investigations 
of fish, and who report those upon invertebrates. 

Part III summarizes the more immediately practical results of the 
work, especially in its relations to the nutritive values of the samples 
analyzed, the detailed account of the more abstract investigations being 
reserved for another occasion. 

Permit me to say that I regard this as only the beginning of a much 
needed research. Work in this line, rightly conducted, may, unques- 
tionably grow into an inquiry of the greatest value. 

To obtain the best results the investigation should, it seems to me, 
be pushed in two directions, namely, toward the study of— 

1. The chemical constitution of the tissues and fluids of the bodies of 
the animals. 

2. Their economic values, especially for food. 


The more abstract study of the chemical composition of the substances 
[1] 231 


232 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


is of less immediate interest to any except the chemist and physiologist; 
but, if successfully carried out, its results will have most important 
bearings upon the more practical questions referred to. We must know 
more of the chemical constitution of the compounds that oceur in our 
foods and of their functions in nutrition before we can, with satis- 
factory accuracy, estimate their values and proper uses for food. At 
the same time, an approximate estimate of the nutritive values, and one 
commensurate with our present knowledge of the ingredients of foods and 
their functions, can be based upon analyses somewhat less detailed, even, 
than most of those here given. The analyses already made, though 
insufficient to permit as reliable generalizations as are to be desired, do, 
nevertheless, help toward an estimate of the composition and values of 
a number of our more common species of edible fish and invertebrates. 

Some of the results herewith reported are striking and unexpected. 
Among the different sorts of fish which the New York and Middletown 
markets furnished for my table, a sample of flounder contained only 5 
per cent. of dry edible solids, actual nutrients, the rest being water and 
refuse; while one of salmon yielded 33 per cent. of nutritive substance. 
The proportion of nutrients in salmon was nearly one-third larger than 
it would be in an ordinary slice of beef-steak ; that in flounder not one- 
fourth as large. 

Taking the fish at retail prices in Middletown markets, the total 
nutrients in stripede bass came to about $2.50 per pound; while in 
Connecticut River shad, whose price, thanks to our fish commissions, 
was very low, we bought the same nutrients at 44 cents per pound. 
In good beef they were costing about $1 per pound. 

It makes very little difference to the man with five thousand dollars 
a year whether he pays fifty cents or five dollars a pound for the albu- 
minoids in his food; but it does make a difference to the man who must 
pay his rent and support his family on five hundred dollars a year. The 
economical housewife who hesitates in the dry-goods store before taking 
a piece of calico at eleven cents a yard when she can get another that 
may do as good service for ten, goes to the market and unknowingly 
pays, perhaps, a dollar for a given amount of food, when she might have 
got the same materials in forms equally nutritious and wholesome, for 
fifty cents. 

The large amount of attention devoted to this kind of investigation 
in Europe has brought results capable of being successfully popular- 
ized. In Germany, tables giving the chemical composition and nutri- 
tive valuations of foods are becoming current among even the common 
people. An attempt toward a similar application of the results of the 
present work is given in tabular form in Part III. 

The details of the analytical work herewith reported have been per- 
formed for the most part by my friends and assistants, Messrs. W. H. 
Jordan, B.8., G. P. Merrill, B.S., C. D. Woods, B. S., and M. Beamer, 
C. E., for whose skillful aid I desire to express my thanks. 


[3] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 233 


I wish also to acknowledge the generous contribution by Mr. A. R. 
Crittenden, of the firm of Wilcox, Crittenden & Co., of this city, of $100 
towards the expenses of the analysis of fish. 

Further and especial thanks are due to Mr. E. G. Blackford, Fish Com- 
missioner of the State of New York, fora gift of the same amount ($100) 
towards defraying the expenses of the investigation of the invertebrates, 
as well as for the furnishing of samples and valuable information. 

In conclusion, permit me to express my appreciation of the pecuniary 
and other aid which has been courteously afforded by yourself, and 
which has rendered the investigation possible. 

Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
WwW. O. ATWATER, 
Chemical Laboratory, Wesleyan University, 


Middletown, Conn., July 1, 1881. 
Prof. SPENCER F, BAIRD, 


Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 
and United States Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries. 


PARTY. I. 
ANALYSES OF FISH. 


DESCRIPTION OF SAMPLES OF FISH ANALYZED. 


Nos. I, XIII, XV, and XVI were purchased at fish markets in Middle- 
town, in the months of March, April, May, and June, 1879; the other 
samples were procured as stated below. 


No. I. Halibut (Hippoglossus americanus). 

The sample was from the posterior fialf of the body. The price was 
15 cents per pound. The proportions of flesh, edible portion, refuse, and 
loss in cleaning (see “ Methods of Analysis”) were as given in Table I. 


No. IJ. Flounder (Pleuronectes americanus). 

The entrails of the fish had been removed. Price 10 cents per pound. 
The following figures show the proportions of edible portion, waste, &c., 
in each sample and in both together. The figures for the two together 
are also given in Table I. 


A B Both 
Grams. Grams. Grams 
Weight of edible portion, flesh. .--.-..--------------- 239 715 954 
Weight of refuse, head, bones, skin, &¢..------------ SoD" 961 1, 316 
Loss in preparing for analysis........-------+---++-+-- 19 19 | 38 
Total weight of sample in grams..-.--..--------------- 613 1, 695 2, 308 
Total weight of sample in pounds and ounces ...----- 11b. 5. 6 02. 31bs.11.80z. | 5 lbs.1.4 02. 


No. III. Cod (Gadus morrhua). 
The head and entrails of the fish had been removed. Price 10 cents 


234 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


per pound. Proportions of flesh, refuse, &c., as per Table I. Total 


weight of one dressed fish, 2,780 grams=6 pounds 2.1 ounces. 


No. IV. Eels (salt water) (Anguilla rostrata). 

Dressed, 7. e. skin, head, and entrails removed. Price 15 cents per 
pound. The proportions of flesh, refuse, &c., in Table I are those of 
eleven fish, which were not weighed separately. The total weight was 
1,365 grams=3 pounds 0.3 ounces. 


No. V. Alewives (Pomolobus vernalis). 

Caught in the Connecticut River. Price 12 cents per dozen. Twelve 
whole fish weighed 2,566 grams=) pounds 1.5 ounces. The cost per 
pound was thus 24 cents. The proportions of flesh and refuse in four 
of the fish were as per figures in Table I, in which table are given cor- 
responding data for samples which follow. 

No. VI. Shad (Alosa sapidissima). 

From the Hudson River. Price 20 cents per pound. Two whole fish 
weighed 1,925 grams=4 pounds 3.9 ounces. 
No. VIL. Striped Bass (Roccus lineatus). 

From Connecticut River. Price 20 cents per pound. One whole fish 
weighed 2,055 grams=4 pounds 8.5 ounces. 
No. VIII. Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). 

Price 15 cents each. Four whole fish weighed 1,280 grams=2 pounds 
13.1 ounces, which would make the price about 20 cents per pound. 

No. 1X. Halibut (Hippoglossus americanus). 

Section of fatter portion of body. Price 15 cents per pound. 

No. X. Shad (Alosa sapidissima). 

From Connecticut River. Price 8 cents per pound. One whole fish 
weighed 1,595 grams=3 pounds 3 ounces. 
No. XI. Cod (Gadus morrhua). 

Price, 8 cents per pound. One fish, dressed, 7. e., with head and 
entrails removed, weighed 2,532 grams=5 pounds 9.3 ounces. 
No. XII. Biue Fish (Pomatomus saltatriz). 

Price 10 cents per pound. One fish, entrails removed, weighed 1,400 
grams=5 pounds 1.3 ounces. 

No. XIII. Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). 

Price 18 cents per pound. Two whole fish weighed 8,982 grams=19 
pounds 12.1 ounces. 

No. XIV. Salmon (Salmo salar). 

Sample furnished by Mr. E. G. Blackford, 74, 75, 76, and 80 Fulton 
Market, 134 Beekman street, and 223 Front street, New York City. 
From Maine. One fish, entrails removed, weighed 4,764.3 grams=10 
pounds 8 ounces. 

No. XV. Porgy (Stenotomus argyrops). . 

Four whole fish weighed 1,290.5 grams=2 pounds 13.5 ounces. 


{5] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR Foop. 235 


No. XVI. Haddock (Melanogrammus aeglefinus). 
Price 8 cents per pound. One fish, with entrails removed, weighed 
1,900 grams=4 pounds 3 ounces. 


No. XVII. Salmon Trout, called also ‘“ Mackinaw Trout” (Salvelinus 
namaycush). 

Received November 7, 1879, from Mr. Blackford, Fulton Market, New 
York. In letter of November 6, Mr. Blackford describes the samples as 
follows: “‘Salmon trout (Christivomer namaycush) weighs 8 pounds 3 
ounces. Caught in Lake Ontario November 5. This is very plenty in 
market at this season of the year. You will probably find spawn in it.” 
The sample, a whole fish, weighed on receipt 3,630.4 grams=8 pounds, 
and had evidently shrunk slightly by loss of water and otherwise in 
coming. It contained considerable spawn, which, as in other cases, was 
rejected, with entrails, bone, skin, &c., in preparing for analysis. 

No. XVIII. White Fish (Coregonus clupeiformis). 

Received November 7, 1879, from Mr. Blackford, who says in accom- 
panying letter: ‘* White fish (Coregonus clupeiformis) weighs 2 pounds 
15 ounces, caught at Alburgh Springs, Vt, from Lake Champlain. Is 
the great food fish of the lakes, and is in its finest condition at the 
present season.” Total weight of one whole fish as received, 1,313 grams 
=2 pounds 14.3 ounces, showing, as usual, slight shrinkage in transport 
and handling. 


No. XIX. Striped Bass (Roccus lineatus). 

Received November 7, 1879, from Mr. Blackford, who described it as 
“Striped bass; weighs 2 pounds 9 ounces; caught at Bridgehampton, 
Long Island, November 5. They are very plenty at this season and in 
their best condition.” Total weight of one whole fish, 1,098.5 grams=2 
pounds 6.7 ounces. 

No. XX. Red Snapper (Lutjanus Blackfordit). 

+Sample received from Mr. Blackford November 28, 1879, “ caught in 
Fernandina, Fla.” Total weight of one whole fish, 3,507.5 grams=7 
pounds 15 ounces. 

No. XXI. Haddock (Melanogrammus eglefinus). 
' Sample received from Mr. Blackford November 28, 1879, “caught off 
Rockaway, Long Island.” Total weight of one fish from which entrails 
had been removed, 2,402 grams=5 pounds 4.7 ounces. 
No. XXII. Flounder (Paralichthys dentatus.) 

Sample received from Mr. Blackford March 9, 1880. “ The fish was 
caught at Amagansett, Long Island.” The sample was rather old, and 
the flesh very soft. It emitted some odor and assumed a pasty appear- 
ance in drying. It is worthy of note in this connection that the per- 
centage of “gelatin” in this sample is large. Total weight of one whole 
fish, 1,257.5 grams=2 pounds 12 ounces. 

No. XXIII. Smelt (Osmerus mordaz). 
Received March 9, 1880, from Mr. Blackford, from Hackensack River, 


236 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


New Jersey. Seventy-three whole fish weighed 1,023 grams. = 2 pounds 
4 ounces. 


No. XXIV. Spotted Brook Trout (Salvelinus fontinalis). 
Sample received from Mr. Blackford, March 16, 1880, ‘‘Cultiv wea 
Trout.” Six whole fish weighed 1,295 grams = 2 toni 13.7 ounces. 


No. XXV. Boned Codfish. 

Per label on box, ‘Packed and warranted by Henry Meigs & Co., 
Boston, Mass.,” ‘Snow flake” brand. Purchased April 8, 1880, in Mid- 
letown, in5 pound packages; price 50 cents each, or 10 cents per pound, 
The following statements were printed on the box: ‘This package con- 
tains pure codfish, and that the best that could be cured. Great care is 
taken in the selection, curing, and packing, and the fish is recommended 
to the consumer for its economy, convenience, cleanliness, and quality. 
In the fall of 1876 we introduced boned codfish in small boxes. * * * 
We have been experimenting with paper, and we have now to offer a 
paper box that is in every way water and air tight. The package is 
thus always neat, the contents clean, and there no longer escapes the 
fish odor, that to many is so offensive.” 

No. XX VI. Red Snapper (Lutjanus Blackfordii). 

From the eastern coast of Florida. Sample received from Mr. Black- 
ford April 20,1880. Entrails removed. Weight of sample,5,4{9 grams 
= 1° pounds 1.9 ounces. 

No. XX VII. California Salmon (Oncorhynchcus chouicha). 

From Sacramento River, California. Received from Mr. Blackford, 
April 20, 1880. Edible portion of the anterior part of body. The fish 
was evidently not very fresh. It emitted some odor, and in drying 
swelled a great deal, and became pasty. 

No. XXVIII. Smoked Halibut. 

Purchased in Middletown, Conn., April 29,1880. Part of one side of 
fish, including skin and a few small bones. Total weight of sample, 1,616 
grams. = 5 pounds 9 ounces. 

No. XXIX. Canned Salmon (Oncorhynchcus chouicha, probably). 

Put up by G. W. Hume & Co., San Francisco, Cal. One can, said to_ 
contain 2 pounds, cost 45 cents. Weight of entire sample, 8,700 grams = 
1 pound 14.7 ounces, which would make actual cost of the contents of 
can about 20 cents per pound. The sample had a good deal of oil. 
Solids and oil were crushed together in a mortar; the oil was readily 
absorbed, so that the sample was easily worked. 

No. XXX. Fresh Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). 

Caught off Cape May, N. J. Received from Mr. Blackford, May 11, 
1880. Total weight of four whole fish, 2,594 grams = 5 pounds 11.5 
ounces. 

No, XXXI. Porgies (Stenotomus argyrops). 

From Rhode Island. Received from Mr. Blackford, May 11, 1880. 

The fish were whole. Total weight, 2,847 grams = 6 aeamnle 4.4 ales: 


{7} CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 237 


, 


No. XXXII. Shad (Alosa sapidissima). 

From Connecticut River. Purchased May 19, in Middletown, Conn. 
Price 10 cents per pound. Total weight of one whole fish, 1,750 grams = 
3 pounds 14 ounces. 

No. X XXIII. Smoked Herring (Clupea harengus). 

Purchased May 19, 1880, in Middletown, Conn. 
whole fish, 4,547 grams = 10 pounds 0.4 ounces. 
No. XXXIV. Salt Codfish.: 

Sample purchased in Middletown, Conn., November 16, 1880, of Mr. 
S. T. Camp, who states that the fish is the kind known to the trade as 
“channel fish,” and were caught in the deep water near George’s Banks. 
The fish as commonly sold (head and entrails removed, salted and dried) 
cost 7 cents per pound. One fish weighed 4,156 grains = 9 pounds 2.2 
ounces. 

Nos. XX XV a and XXXV b. Spent or foul salmon (Salmo salar), males. 


Nos. XXXVI a and XXXVI b. Spent or foul salmon (Salmo salar), 
females. 

Received November 18, 1880, from Government salmon breeding es- 
tablishment, through the courtesy of Mr. Charles G. Atkins, Bucksport, 
Me. In accompanying letter Mr. Atkins suggests that though “ spent” 
salmon [the eggs having been removed by stripping] they were in better 
condition than those that have spawned naturally. From measurements 
made by Mr. H. L. Osborn, assistant in natural history in Wesleyan 
University, I select the following as of interest in comparing the dimen- 
sions and weights of these with salmon in good condition: 


Total weight of six 


XXXV a XXXV b| XXXVIa@a | XXXVIb 
Greatest height of body..........-- millimeters 156 154 163 166 
Least height of body .--.....-.-...--.--- do 60 58 63 64 
Greatest width of body.-......-......... do) =3241 58 57 66 67 
Girth at tip of pectoral fin............... dOz sce 360 355 380 400 
Girth at anterior endof dorsal.......--.. Gomes 380 365 390 395 
GIEEDVOV ER ANUS) 22 jai: soon. cascades sesned Ons eo. 290 285 340 315 
Girth at posterior end of adipose fin. ....do..-.-- 200 190 200 210 
Length to tip of middle caudal ray ...--. Oe <2 25< 826 830 915 896 
Leneth to base of middle caudal ray..... dor seer: 750 750 835 813 
The proportions of flesh, refuse, &c., were: 
XXXV a. XXXV b. | XXXVI a.| XXXVI Db. 
Hdible portions ase secs k ows ch + mcs ines este ss grams.. 2, 345. 7 2, 381.1 2, 693. 0 3, 040. 2 
Waste, entrails, skin, bone, &c.......-...-. do.. 1, 998. 4 1715.0 2, 487.5 1, 955. 9 
Loss in cleaning eee eee anjaee seem ae do. 28.3 7.0 21.3 
Pintalweleht Geaste dees coasuese coves do. 4,372.4 |  4,110.3|  5,187.5| 5,017.4 
Total Reet in pounds and ounces ........ 9 lbs. 10.2 02. | 9lbs.10z. |111bs.70z. | 11 Ibs. Loz. 


Portions of Nos. XXXVa and XXXV b were sampled together and 
analyzed as No. XXXV. The same was done with Nos. XXXVI a 


and b, which were analyzed as No. XXXVI. 


238 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER GF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8 } 


No. XXXVII. Salt Codfish. 

Sample purchased of Mr. S. T. Camp, Middletown, Conn., November 
29, 1880, who states that the fish is of the kind known to the trade as 
“boat fish,” and was caught near the shore, in the vicinity of Nantucket. 
Total weight of two whole fish, 2.813 grams =6 pounds 3.2 ounces. 

No. XXXVIII. Black Fish (Lautoga onitis). 

From Stonington, Conn., received December 1, 1880, from Mr. Black- 

ford. Weights of two whole fish as follows: 


a b. 
BC DLO MOLGLON sca cia so maisicti= o's <selee sine = ealas sea ee eee aie ae grams.. 546. 5 322. 0 
Liv Didembee, Bane ep SenUCpenasEecd ones Gac Saonses oconsnosaooseaer ae do... 716.8 441.9 
1 DSi aleraibiet BnRodnnqprnoneaEadrc roDossobaaco Seo do serOEr Oe So domes 23.7 ane | 
Wiholesfish) 2.5.12 2.0: 2sisn,css Stss- Stee eee ee eee eee Rie acm asset do>=- 1, 287.0 775. 0 
Whole fish in pounds ‘and ounces;--2---eee-e se eee eee aa eee | 2]bs. 13.4 oz. 1 lb. 11. 4 oz. 


No. XX XIX. Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). 

From Cape Cod, Mass., sample received from Mr. Blackford, Dec. 1, 
1880. One whole fish weighed 337 grams = 11.9 ounces. 

Nos. XLa and XLb. Land-locked Salmon (Salmo salar), var. sebago, 
males. 

Nos. XLI a and XLIb. Land-locked Salmon (Salmo salar), var. sebago, 
females. 

From Schoodic salmon-breeding establishment, Grand Lake Stream, 
Maine. Sample received December 1, 1880, from Charles G. Atkins, 
who says, in letter dated Grand Lake Stream, Maine, November 27, 
1880, “I send * * * * four male land-locked salmon and four fe- 
males, whose eggs have been taken from them by the artificial process. 
They are as near speut fish as we can get, but I think they are in better 
condition than those that have spawned naturally.” The following 
measurements and weights indicate the size of the fish and proportions 
of flesh and refuse: 


XL a. XL b. XL c. XL d. 
Greatest length............- Lac oee millimeters. . 520 | 500 510 500 
Girth at tip of pectoraliin sce esenecere dOsseee se 285 250 265 260 
Girth at anterior base of dorsal fin...... Gigs ar | 292 255 278 270 
Girth¥atanus 42258) & 22 cee aen cece ctenee dojaeenee 216 175 220 195 
Madiblemmoriion= 220 tanc oceans nc -ceeenee grams. . 745.1 | 623. 8 754. 3 | 761.8 
AWiastementrails:, 0. i.occsccceee cost ae do... 767.5 594. 8 741.9 648. 8 
TOOTS TEN IGEN Dh Tati eee ene ee do... LAs | 11.6 10.4 8.9 
Motalpwelelitiress= aoe Sense ee eect ceeee dowzs| 1, 530.0 | 1, 230. 2 1, 506. 6 1, 419.5 
Total weight i in pounds and ounces-...-..........| 3 lbs. 5.90z. 21bs. 11.4 02. | 3 lbs. 5. 10z. 3 lbs. 202. 
| 
XLI a. XLI b. XLI ¢. XLI d. 
| 
Greatest length... 222225. .0---2 2 =: millimeters. . 480 460 450 | 450 
Girth at tip of Pecuoral dines... co= see doweeoeee 230 220 210 210 
Girth at anterior base of dorsal fin...... doweet 2 240 225 210 | “200° 
Ginthvatranuseeee esses sore ucen canoe dou. | 177 175 168 | 160 
Mdibloypoxrtionys- ses ccs) eosin ani rises e grams.. 562. 1 494.7 402.1 | 442.9 
Waste wentrallsiccc) she. see sas oe ee cw eete do... 471.3 401.7 391.1 409.4 
Mossincleaning, 2-2. scehsesscessscice eo se ae se do. ..| 19.6 6.7 9.3 11.4 
Total weichbh ere cessse erestceseeeeeeeene do. . .| 1, 053. 0 903.1 802. 5 | 863. 7 
Total weight i in pounds and ounces ............-. | 2!bs. 5.10z.} 11b. 15. 80z. |1 Ib. 12.3. oz. 1 Ib. 14. 5. 02. 
ee 


[9] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 239 


Nos. XLa, XLb, XLe, XL d, were sampled together and analyzed as 


No. XL. The same was done with XLIa, b, c, and d, which were ana- 
lyzed as XLI. 


No. XLII. Salt Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). 

Bought February 23, 1881, in Middletown, Conn., price 124 cents per 
pound, described as ‘No.1 mackerel”. Caught probably in September 
or October, as the barrel from which sample was taken was marked as 
inspected at Chatham, Mass.,in October. Weight of three fish at store a 
trifle short of 2 pounds; as received at laboratory, 857.8 grams = 1 pound 
14.3 ounces. As the fish had considerable adhering salt and brine, they 
were rinsed in cold water and dried between folds of paper and with a 
linen towel. The weight of the three fish thus treated was 781.4 grams. 
Accordingly the three fish had (857.8—781.4 =) 76.4 grams or about 9 
per cent. of adhering salt, brine, &c. Or, taking weight at store at 890 
grams, the adhering brine, &c., would be 109 grams, or about one-eighth— 
124 per cent. That is, one-eighth of the weight paid for at the store 
was brine, salt, &c., which would be rinsed off in preparing the fish for 
cooking. Such statements as this are of course of no importance except 
as data for calculating how much nutritive material is obtained ina 
given amount of the fish as bought. 

XLUI. Spanish Mackerel (Cybium maculatum). 

Sample received from Mr. Blackford, March 1, 1881. It was rather 
“ soft”, though entirely free from offensive odor. One whole fish weighed 
1,513 grams=3 pounds 5.3 ounces. 

XLIV. White Perch (Morone americana), 

Sample received from Mr. Blackford, March 1, 1881. The fish con- 
tained considerable spawn. The proportions of flesh and refuse in two 
whole fish were: 


a | b 
PH GTDC POL GION Se nla sa crelaicicice seine aelelmrn aim elaiecioin tai ste tenia latte grams.. 128.7 142.7 
OTT SOW ee nea crn me Saas nee aes Rice we Gta islarseis mi stanele cinia eToleme epamiciersleraelee OOzsss 208. 0 279. 0- 
GOSS MINING CAMINO) Neale sk laicsieiaieiseiniais sete <yors asie aoe ian aieaie nial es ee dos-~. 6.7 5.0 
Motaliweioht 2. ch2t deccancte ces coe tace cose sismacecemee sascicccice do.. 343. 4 426.7 
EDO LAL W GION Ue dere cee cmin also clos —eteacie ss SSR eee Es Shoe cera ounces. 12.1 15. 0 


XLV. Muskallonge (Hsow nobilior). 

From Saint Lawrence River. Received March 4, 1881, from Mr. Black- 
ford, who says that it “is not often found in our markets.” One whole 
fish weighed*4,118 grams=9 pounds 1.2 ounces. 

XLVI. White Perch (Morone americana). 

Received March 8, 1881, from Mr. Blackford. Proportions of flesh 

and refuse in four whole fish as follows: 


| a b | c | d 
els POLWONE Hewas seis taek sel ee sss cen tas seen Sccess sachs re 78.7 | 110.6 78. 0 | 71.9 
DUS ee eee eee cae tela a Bee ek ae Aas Saoween eSaemoaee eee 129.2 | 196.5] 127.2 125.5 
ossyimoloaning seepeee: meee e tenet ce ea ee aoe kmeoa cece cena do. Til 4.6 3531) 3.3 
Total Weight -.-. 2.02. ----22-- 222 nn nnnn ne ene ecseoe ee ee do.. 215.0 | 311.7] 208.5 200.7 
Total weig FE Ria et pe Be ene eta a a ounces. 7.6 11.0 7 7.0 


240 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


XLVII. Herring (Clupea harengus). 
Sample received from Mr. Blackford, March 8, 1881. Proportions of 
flesh and waste in four samples, as follows: 


a. b. c. d. 
Hdible portion........------------- -----+- 2-22 eee e etree pre -| 186.5 | 163.0 | 121.5 131.5 
Refuse .--- 2-22.22 2-0-2 - cee ene eene ee ene e erent e set eecee: do... 142.0 | 129.0 83. 0 143. 2 
OHS CLEAMMN Go see calsiciicisin ae lnacs fem acetal sm=m(emielw n[> =Inlnlalaln a do =e. 5.9 10. 2 5.5 9.5 
Total weight ..........--- BS OSS SUC SoU MaOS EDO aS aeencnt do....| 284.4 | 302.2 | 210.0 284. 2 
Total weight. .......--------- ------- 22s ecee ene n neces ounces..| 10.0 10. 6 Tel 10.0 


XLVIII. Sheeps-head (Archosargus probatocephalus). 

From Florida. Received from Mr. Blackford, March 10, 1881. One 
fish, entrails removed, weighed 1,974 grams=4 pounds 5.6 ounces. 
XLIX. Turbot (Platysomatichthys hippoglossoides). 

From Newfoundland. Received from Mr. Blackford, March 10, 1881. 
The fish had been frozen and partly thawed. One whole fish weighed 
2,497 grams=5 pounds 8 ounces. 

LI. Yellow Pike-perch (Stizostedium vitreum). 

Received from Mr. Blackford, March 17, 1881. The proportions of 
flesh and waste in two whole fish, of which the heavier had considerable 
immature spawn, were as follows: 


a b. 
Idi DL GW POCO serine canine la alot = wleicin elaine) wivinicle ele cies =in\n/aieiclisinlaiainle.==ie meee grams... 232. 5 230. 2 
SGA SCIP eerie sore nic ele sis is sisroicis ee sislaleicisicie setdaieome sacle tee ware ee eineee dozens 369. 2 273.5 
AROSSUNICLGOATIN Oy asad s ersisine aijseine cite ois = cine a Se oeismie cre la(aletsie el siele oanmerels dotee: 9.8 | 7.5 
Motaliweighti cs sent cde ss cae sels iser ceiseecee enc sclaclebasisesisemtctet do. <: 611.5 511.2 
Total weight in pounds:and ounces. 2. -.:02.0.. - sccccwaceceenconssescas 1b. 5.60z.} 11b.20z. 


LIII. Black Bass (Mieropterus salmoides ?). 


Received March 17, 1881, from Mr. Blackford. One whole fish weighed 
1,676 grams=3 pounds 11.1 ounces. 


DESCRIPTION OF TABLES. 


The main results of the investigation are expressed in the tables which 
follow. : 

Table I states the results of analyses of fifty-one samples of fish, in 
the terms commonly current in such investigations. 

Table II recapitulates the analyses of Table I in such way as to set 
forth more fully the actual composition of the samples analyzed. , 

Table III recapitulates the composition of several samples on a some- 
what different basis, the essential difference being in the method of esti-. 
mating the amounts of albuminoids. 

Table IV gives a brief résumé of the composition of the samples in 
forms more convenient for reference. 


[11] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 241 


In Part III of this report is a table giving the nutritive valuations of 
the fish reported herewith and of the invertebrates, oysters, clams, 
lobsters, &c., reported beyond. 


Apr il; 


Under “Kinds of fish and portions taken for analysis” are given the 
names and the localities, when the latter are known. The full details 
may be found under “ Descriptions of Samples” above. The meaning 
of the figures in the first three columns will need no explanation ; the 
rest are explained under “ Methods of Analysis,” beyond. 


Ht WYN 25 6 De 


Table IL recapitulates the analyses of fish. The second column 
shows the percentages of flesh, edible portion, in each sample as actu- 
ally received at the laboratory for analysis; some of these included 
the whole fish, others were dressed. As explained under “ Methods of 
Analysis” these figures represent the proportions of edible material which 
we were able to separate from the skin, bones, &c., after the entrails 
had been removed. Thus the sample of halibut, No. IX, which was a 
section of the fatter part of the body, ‘halibut steak,” gave 554 per cent. 
of flesh, the residual 11} per cent. being skin and bone; while a sample 
of flounder, No. X XII, yielded only 32 per cent. of edible substance, the 
remaining 68 per cent. consisting of entrails, skin, bone, and other 
waste. The proportion of waste in this flounder, which was whole, was 
naturally larger than in the other, No. H, from which the entrails had 
been removed, and which gave 414 per cent. of flesh, and 583 per cent. 
of refuse. 

The remaining figures in Table IT give the composition of the flesh 
computed first upon the dry substance, then upon the whole flesh includ- 
ing both dry substance and water. Explanations may be. found under 
“Methods of Analysis.” The albuminoids in this table are computed 
by multiplying the nitrogen by 6.25, as is generally customary, at pres- 
ent, in analyses of animal and vegetable food-products. As will be 
seen in the column “Albuminoids + Flats + Ash,” under “Summary,” 
the computation brings, generally, too large results; that is, a footing of 
over 100 per cent. In some cases, however, it falls short. The variations 
in the results at first led me to fear inaccuracy of the work, but the 
greatest possible pains has not availed to make them more uniform; 
they seem, therefore, to indicate wide variations in the nitrogen com- 
pounds themselves. Iam inclined to think that one reason why the per- 
centages of albuminoids here given are higher than have been obtained 
in many cases elsewhere, is to be found in the especial care that has 
been taken here in determining the nitrogen, which, when made by the 
soda-lime method, as is usually done, often came out too low. 

The percentages of ingredients in both dry substance and flesh have 

S. Mis. 29 16 


242 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


been re-caleulated to make the footings 100 per cent.; the original and 
the altered figures being given under “Summary.” 

Further explanations, with recapitulations of the figures in this and 
thie following tables, may be found in Part III of this report. 


TABLE III. 


As is explained in ‘Methods of Analysis,” some attempts have been 
made toward what might be called a complete analysis of the flesh. The 
figures are recapitulated in this table. The “Extractive matters” in- 
clude, as stated, all the materials dissolved out by cold water, and not 
coagulated by boiling; “Albumen,” the portion of the cold water extract 
coagulated by boiling; ‘Gelatin,” the portion soluble in hot water; Fats, 
the portion soluble in ether; and “Insoluble protein,” the residue in- 
soluble in water and in ether, The footings generally exceed 100 per 
cent., perhaps from incomplete separation of water or fats from some of 
the ingredients, as stated under “ Methods of Analysis,” though care was 
taken to get them as pure as practicable. 


TABLE “EV: 


This table gives a general résumé of such of the results as are most 
important for estimating the nutritive values of the samples. The fig- 
ures, except those in the last column, ‘Total edible solids,” are taken 
from Table II. 

METHODS OF ANALYSIS. 


PREPARATION OF SAMPLES FOR ANALYSIS. 


Separation of edible portion ( flesh) from refuse (bones, skin, entrails, 
spawn, &c.).—The sample, as received at the laboratory, was weighed; 
the edible portion, “ flesh,” was then separated from the refuse, and both 
were weighed. There was always a slight loss in cleaning, due evidently 
to evaporation and to slimy and fatty matters and small fragments of 
the tissue that adhered to the hands and to the utensils used in prepar- 
ing the sample. Perfect separation of the flesh from the other tissues 
was difficult, but the loss resulting from this was small, so that, though 
the figures obtained for edible portion represent somewhat less than 
was actually in the sample, yet the amount thus wasted was doubtless 
scarcely more than would be left unconsumed at an ordinary table. 
The reasons for rejecting the skin, which generally has considerable 
nutritive value, were that its chemical constitution is different from that 
of the flesh, and that, so far as we have observed in this country, it is 
not ordinarily eaten. With the closer domestic economy that increased 
density of population must bring, people will doubtless become more 
careful hereafter to utilize such materials. 

Sampling.—The whole edible portion was finely chopped and carefully 
mixed in a wooden tray. 


[13] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 243 


Drying.—The drying was conducted in an ordinary bath at a temper- 
ature of nominally 100°, but actually about 969, as is usual in drying: 
baths which consist of an air chamber with double walls inclosing boil- 
ing water. In each case two portions were dried, one, “A,” in a current 
of hydrogen, and one, “ B,” in air. 

Drying in hydrogen.—F rom 50 to 100 grams, in most cases preferably, 
100 grams, of the freshly-chopped substance was weighed on a watch 
glass or small sauce-plate, dried in a current of hydrogen at 969° for 24 
to 48 hours, cooled, allowed to stand in the open air for some 24 hours, 
weighed, ground, sifted through a sieve with circular holes of 1™™ di- 
ameter, bottled, and labeled “A.” A few of the fattest samples, how- 
ever, could not well be worked through so fine a sieve; for these, either a 
coarse sieve was used or the substance was crushed as finely as practi- 
cable, and bottled without sifting. For the complete drying, from 1 to 
2 grams of A” were weighed in small drying flasks, and dried in hydro- 
gen three or four hours. It is extremely difficult to get an absolutely 
constant weight, though we find that the object is in most cases approxi- 
mately attained in three hours. The total moisture and dry substance 
are computed from the two dryings. 

Drying in air.—As the drying of large quantities in hydrogen was less 
convenient, and drying in air suffices perfectly well for certain determi. 
nations, particularly sulphur, phosphorus, and chlorine, a sufficient 
quantity of material for the work was insured by drying a portion in 
air. This was effected by weighing 200 grams or more of the freshly- 
chopped substance at the same time that the portion was taken for dry- 
ing in hydrogen, drying in air, exposing to air of room, weighing, grind- 
ing, and bottling as above, this portion being labeled “B.” The amount 
of water-tree substance in “B” was calculated from the data obtained 
font A? 

Prowvimate ingredients by direct determination.—In a number of the 
samples, determinations were made of the ingredients soluble in cold 
and in hot water, and of the portion not dissolved by water, alcohol, or 
ether. 

The objects of the determinations were to obtain data comparable with 
those of other investigations*, and to test the methods, as well as to learn 
the amounts of the ingredients. The methods have proved unsatisfac- 
tory in many respects, and we have felt it advisable to make no more de- 
terminations by them than are indicated in the tables, until the subject 
is worked up more thoroughly. For that matter, an at all satisfactory 
examination of the proximate constituents will naturally involve deter- 
minations of both the total amounts and the ultimate composition of the 
ingredients of the juices, as well as solids, of the flesh. Considering the 
complicated character of these compounds, the vagueness of our present 
knowledge regarding them, and the amount of preliminary work that is 


* EB. g., Almen, Analyse des Fleisches einiger Iische (Nova Acta Reg. Soc. Sc. Ups., Ser. 
III), Upsala, 1877. 


244 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


always necessary before such an investigation can be got into good 
running order, and adding to all this the importance of studying the 
mineral ingredients, it is clear that a great deal of labor will be necessary 
to reach the desired results. 

Cold-water extract.—Of the freshly-chopped substance 334 grams were 
digested for 18 to 24, generally about 20, hours, in 500° of cold water, 
and filtered. 

The filtration was conducted at first through “coffee filter paper.” 
Later Messrs. Woods and Beamer found it better to use fine linen cloth, 
which has the advantages of more rapid filtration and of allowing the 
liquid to be squeezed through with proper care. The solids do not pass 
through the cloth more than through the filter paper, and by laying on 
a glass plate, scraping, and subsequent rinsing, they are separated 
much more easily and completely than they can be from the filter paper. 

Albumen.—The filtrate thus obtained was boiled and filtered through 
previously dried and weighed asbestos filters. After washing with ether, 
the filter, with its contents, was dried and weighed. That this method 
for determining the albumen is accurate, is by no means proven or even 
probable. But we find that treatment with acid, as acetic acid, in the or- 
dinary way, instead of increasing the amount coagulated is very apt to 
hinder coagulation and sometimes to prevent it altogether, while boiling 
the extract alone invariably produces coagulation. Very likely precip- 
jtation by alcohol, ferric acetate, or otherwise, might insure more com- 
plete separation of the albumen. 

Hatractive matters.—The filtrate from the coagulated albumen was evap- 
orated in platinumeapsules and weighed. One sample was used for deter- 
mination of the ash, which was done by charring at a low temperature, 
extracting with water, igniting the residue until it was well burned, 
adding the water solution, evaporating, igniting carefully at a low tem- 
perature, and weighing. The other sample was finely ground, dried in 
air to determine the percentage of water, and extracted with ether until 
free from fat, usually two or three hours. The crude extract, minus the 
water, fat, and ash, is reckoned as pure extract, and is designated in 
Tables I and II as “ Extractive matters.” It of course contains any al- 
bumen which may not have been coagulated, the other nitrogenous com- 
pounds, the carbohydrates, and whatever else, except fats and mineral 
matters, was taken from the flesh of the fish by the digestion in cold 
distilled water. 

Hot-water extract—“gelatin.”—The residue left after the extraction 
with cold water was treated for 18 to 24 hours, generally about 20 hours, 
with distilled water at 100° or slightly below. It was then filtered 
through weighed asbestos filters, and the filtrate evaporated to dry- 
ness in platinum, and weighed as crude gelatin. In this, fat and ash were 
determined, and the pure extract called in the tables “gelatin,” esti- 
mated as in the cold-water extract. It should be stated that in both 
hot and cold water extracts the figures for total extract in the tables 


si 
———— —<—~—s 


[15] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FoR Foop. 245 


represent water-free substance, 7. e., crude extract minus water. I am 
inclined to think it would be better to determine both water and fat in 
the crude extracts in one operation by extracting with ether and noting 
the loss. 

Insoluble protein.—The residue left after the extraction with hot water 
was treated with alcohol or ether, or both, dried and weighed. Water, 
ash, and fat were then determined (except, of course, that fat was not 
determined in the cases where it had been previously extracted). The 
ash was determined by direct burning, it being assumed that the pre- 
vious treatment with cold and hot water had sufficed to remove the 
easily fusible and volatile salts. The removal of the last portions of fat 
4s often extremely difficult, and it is not impossible that in some cases 
traces were left and weighed as insoluble protein. The figures for total 
insoluble protein in the table denote water-free substance. 

Ether extract, fats—From 0.3 to 1.0 gram of “A” (hydrogen dried) was 
extracted with ether until free from fat. The operation was conducted 
in an apparatus similar to that described by Johnson* (Am. Jour. Sci., 
XIU, 1877, p.190). The fat obtained was dried in a current of hydrogen 
before weighing. 

Nitrogen was estimated by the soda-lime process. Some study has 
been made in this laboratory of the conditions under which this method 
gives accurate results, especially with materials rich in nitrogen, the 
outcome of which may be reported elsewhere. It will suffice here to say 
that we find it important to have the substance well ground and 
mixed with the soda-lime and to insure complete ammonification of the 
nitrogen in the decomposition products. This last we attempt to 
secure by a sufficiently long anterior layer of soda-lime, preferably in 
coarse particles, high enough heat and rather slow burning. 

The correctness of the determinations of nitrogen was tested by com- 
parative trials by the absolute method. In this latter, two sources of 
error, often neglected, were taken into account, namely, the air which 
adheres to the interior of the tube and its contents even after long 
exhaustion with the Sprengel pump, and the vapor tension of the 
caustic potash solution over which the nitrogen is collected and meas- 
ured in the eudiometer. 

To determine the correction for residual air in the combustion tube, 
blank determinations were made with pure oxalic acid. The tube was 
well exhausted, the mereury being allowed to run three-quarters of an 
hour after the “click” was heard, before the combustion was begun. 
The amounts of gas obtained in four combustions were, when reduced 
to 0° and 760™™, 0.3°¢, 0.6°¢, 0.5°¢, and 0.6%, averaging 0.5°°, which 
amount was deducted from the volume of gas obtained in each deter- 
mination. 

It is common to disregard the vapor tension of the caustic potash 
solution, especially when the latter is nearly concentrated. In aceu- 
rate work, however, this is hardly allowable. Even a 50 per cent. 


~ *The same as that described by Tollens, Fres. Zeit. Anal. Chem., 17, 1878, s, 320. 


246 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


solution gives an appreciable vapor tension, as has been shown by 
Wiillner (Pogg. Annalen 110, S. 570). Wiillner’s statements are not 
perfectly clear at first reading, but the facts appear from his formula for 
the tension, V = .0032T — .00000432T’, where V is the decrease of ten- 
sion for every part of “pentahydrate of potash” to 100 of water (0.51 
K,O to 100 H, O.) and T the vapor tension of pure water. Several de- 
terminations of the vapor tensions of the solutions actually used were 
made by my friend and assistant, Dr. J. H. Long, who has devoted con- 
siderable attention to these subjects, and who conducted the investiga- 
tion here referred to. The results were in harmony with Wiillner’s 
formula. 
Applying both corrections for residual air, Dr. Long obtained, in 

determinations of nitrogen in several samples of fish, results agreeing 
very closely with those obtained with the soda-lime method by Messrs. 
Woods and Beamer, as appear from the following figures: 


Soda-lime method. 

Absoluto 

method. 

a. b. Average. 

PRO MP SM CON: INiccscsbeccsccccecess = : 5. 82 5. 88 5. 85 5. 95 
XLII. Per cent. N. : 10. 77 10. 75 10. 76 10. 76 
XLV. Per cent. N . 13. 85 13. 79 13. 82 13. 91 
XLVI. Per cent. N . 10.19 10. 24 10. 22 10. 22 
XLVI. Percent. N . 11. 91 11. 89 il. 90 11. 95 
L. Percent.N .. ahh e245) 11. 85 11. 85 11. 78 
TPR SriCentaiNi seawsccss «cehece<nte es 10. 85 10. 83 10. 84 10. 83 
PP SrcentaN j= sscs. co cachove ect cs choc eeetecee eee 14. 84 14. 86 14. 85 14. 87 


It may be added that previous comparative trials with ammonium 
sulphate and oxalate had given closely concordant results. Thus, Dr. 
Long found by the absolute, and Mr. Woods by the soda-lime method, 
the following percentages of nitrogen *: 


Absolute method. Soda-lime method. 
| | 
Aver- Aver- 
a. b. c. d. age. a. b. ago. 
Ammonium. sulphate,............ 0s... 21:24 || 21.16) | 20229) | St Bou) 2122852 eS Dts 21.18 
PAMITTYO MUI OX. ACG | \-\5.0:0:= -\-\eisiesin.clceicicuic | 19.84] 19.75 | 19.71 ]|......-- LO NTT LEMOS) oa nt 19. 68 
| | 


Ash.—The ash was determined in the flesh in the same way as in the 
hot and cold water extracts, namely, by charring, extracting with water, 
burning the residue, adding the solution to the residue, evaporating and 
burning. The crude ash thus obtained was practically free from coal, 
and had, naturally, no sand. No determinations of carbonic acid in the 
ash were made. About 5 grams of substance were used for each deter- 


*It may be worth while to add that direct determinations of ammonia by distilla- 
tion with caustic alkali gave in the ammonium sulphate, 21.19, 21.21, and 21.22%, 
average 21.219; with ammonium oxalate, 19,78 and 19,749, average 19.769, results 
midway between those by the two methods above, 


[17] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FooD. 247 


mination. “ B” (the air dried material) was employed for determination 
of ash, as well as for those of phosphorus, sulphur, and chlorine. 

Phosphorus. (Phosphoric Acid.)\—About 1 gram of substance was care- 
fully burned in a platinum capsule, with some 10 grams of a mixture 
of equal parts of sodium nitrate and carbonate, previously proven free 
from phosphates. The white mass was dissolved in water, acidulated 
with nitric acid, evaporated, and treated with nitric acid again, the ope- 
ration repeated when necessary to remove chlorine, and the phosphoric 
acid estimated with ammonium molybdate solution. A number of tests 
were made by Mr. Merrill to determine the circumstances in which phos- 
phoric acid, in presence of large amounts of sodium nitrate, as here, is 
completely precipitated. The results will, I hope, be published here- 
after. In brief, at the temperature of the trials, which in each case was 
not far from 29°, two precautions are necessary: use of, a large excess 
of molybdate solution, and allowance of ample time for the precipitation. 
Neglect of these involves risk of loss of phosphoric acid, as is shown 
by the following brief recapitulation of results. The effect of higher 
temperature was not tested. 


z i 
a by § 
on wo > 
n a Ye) 
3 n n 
Time of precipitation and amount of molybdic solu- | a 5 I 
tion used. | = 5 £ 
\ 
N oO oO 
| an oO | (sr) 
a b a b a@ b 
; 4 te . | ) | 
10° Naz HPOsz Solution with no NaNOs yielded | 
OO POTTING. cee serene enon esse net seh. cesses cis <0212)}' 20211 | | | 
10° Nay HPO3 Solution witb 5 germs. NaNOyyielded | 
2) 5 POTN Besser eee mor cinck esses nace: seep eee | .0211 | .0212 
10° Naz HPOs3 Solution with 10 grms. NaNOs yielded | | | 
Spe ring fos eal aa te ts “head | .0207| .0211 | .0211| .0211| .0213| .0212 
10° Naz PHOs Solution with 20 grms. NaNO; yielded | . | 
PLO EV OTMSS Sac os cae fos ak Bae cotter na ciee sine 0190 | .0191 | .0211 | .0211 | .0212] .0211 


Practically we use 25°¢ of molybdic solution, and allow 36 to 48 hours 
for the precipitation. 

Sulphur.—About 1 gram of szbstance is oxidized as for determination 
of phosphorus, the mass dissolved in hydrochloric acid, and the sulphuric 
acid determined with barium chloride. Quite an extended series of de- 
terminations were made to learn the effect of varying quantities of sodi- 
um chloride upon the precipitation of barium sniphate in solutions, hot 
and cold, concentrated and dilute. The details, which the limits of this 
article compel me to defer for subsequent publication, showed conclu- 
sively that, although when precipitated cold from concentrated solutions, 
the barium sulphate is apt to be too heavy, 7. e., to bring down sodium 
chloride; yet, when precipitated hot, or even precipitated cold from 
dilute solutions, it is pure. This is in accordance with the previous 
observations on which general practice is based. Our determinations 
served simply to show the limits of concentration and amount of sodium 


248 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


chloride within which it is safe to work. It should be noted, however, 
that the solutions contained in all cases a small, but only a small, amount 
of free hydrochloric acid, and that only a small excess of barium chloride 
was used in the precipitation. Practically, we find the ordinary method 
as recommended by Fresenius accurate for these determinations, even 
in presence of the large amounts of sodium chloride, provided the proper 
precautions are observed. But the solution must be sufficiently dilute, 
and excess of free acid and of barium chloride should be avoided. 

Chlorine was determined by burning the substance in platinum evap- 
orating dishes, as in the determinations of phosphorus and sulphur, and 
estimating the chlorine in the fused mass with ammonium sulphocyanate 
by Volhard’s process. Dr. Long, by whom the determinations were 
made, has, at my request, made tests of the applicability of this method 
of determining chlorine in animal tissues. 

Ten parts of & mixture of equal weights of sodium carbonate and po- 
tassium nitrate were used to each part of the substance for the oxidation. 
To test the conditions in which chlorine may be lost in the burning, ex- 
periments were made with sugar and sodium chloride intimately mixed. 
Allowing for the very small amounts of chlorine in the sugar, it was 
found that when the oxidation was conducted slowly and carefully the 
whole of the chlorine was, in each of four trials, recovered ; but with 
rapid burning in four trials from 1.0 to 2.7 per cent. of the whole chlo- 
rine was lost. But while no appreciable amount of chlorine escapes in 
careful burning there is apt to be great loss of it if its determinations in 
the fused mass is attempted in the ordinary way by dissolving, precipi- 
tating with silver nitrate and weighing as silver chloride. Indeed, Dr. 
Long found that in some eases less than half as much chlorine was ob- 
tained by the gravimetric methods as by Volhard’s process. 

The method actually followed in the determinations was as follows: 

Ist. The substance was slowly fused with the mixed nitrate and car- 
bonate’so as to avoid any possible loss by spurting. 

2d. The fused mass was dissolved in quite dilute nitric acid, since by 
using a stronger acid some chlorine could easily be driven off, as was 
found by experiment. 

3d. To the solution thus obtained an excess of silver nitrate solution 
was added, and the whole boiled on the water bath for about two hours. 
This long boiling with excess of nitric acid, added after the silver 
nitrate, was necessary to expel nitrous acid coming from the reduction 
of the nitrate in the fusion. 


4th. After the boiling, the solution was allowed to become quite cold 
before titrating. 


[19] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR Foop. 249 


PA EL: 


ANALYSES OF INVERTEBRATES, 
By ©. D. Woops, B. S., AND MILES BEAMER, C. E. 


[The following analyses have been undertaken and reported, at my 
suggestion, by Messrs. Woods and Beamer, who have also shared in the 
analyses of fish above described. 

Thanks are due to Mr. F. T. Lane, of New Haven, Conn., and Mr. J. F. 
Ely, of Baltimore, Md., and especially to Mr. E. G. Blackford,* Fish 
Commissioner of the State of New York, for samples furnished for 
analysis, and for valuable information.—W. O. A.] 


DESCRIPTION OF SAMPLES. 


In the deseriptions*as well as in the tables which follow the samples 
of each species are arranged in the order of locality, the most northern 
coming first. 

OYSTERS (Ostrea Virginiana). 


No. LX VIII. From Buzzard’s Bay, Mass. 

Received from Messrs. Bunting and Warren, Newton, Mass., May 5, 
1881. They were of medium size. The relative amount of edible por- 
tion (flesh and liquids) as compared with shell was large, 20.01 per cent. 
Only one sample of all gave a larger percentage of edible material than 
this. 

No. LXX. From Providence River, Rhode Island. 

Received at the same time and from the same parties as No. LX VILL. 
They were larger than the average oyster even of our northern coast, 
but with this larger size of shell there was relatively less edible portion, 
17.00 per cent. 

No. LV. From Stony Creek, Conn. 

Purchased, April 5, in Middletown, but originally obtained from the 
Stony Creek Oyster Company. These were very large, the length aver- 
aging not far from 6 inches. There were 39 in one peck. 

No. LXXV. From Stony Creex, Conn. 

Purchased in Middletown, May 24,1881. The analysis of this second 
sample from the same locality as the previous one was suggested by 
the claim of the oystermen that the oysters at this time were much 
better than they had been earlier in the season. The analysis shows 
very little difference in composition, No. LXXV centaining relatively 
less nitrogen and more fat. The percentages of water were: in No. 


* A portion of the expense of the investigation was also borne by Mr. Blackford, as 
stated in the introduction to the present report, 


250 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


LV, 90.04; No. LX XV, 90.89. Calculated on dry substance, the ana- 
lysis of edible portion is as follows: 


Albumi- Fat. Ash. 


mondat Nitrogen. 


Per cent. | Per cent. | Per cent. | Per cent. 
34. 76 3. 55 48. 50 5: 00 
32. 89 3. 99 48. 93 5.27 


Io JEN, ceoee Se dee OO BONG AbADnaboaosbasepecaschLousD pocandea sac 


Of course the relation between composition and quality of oysters can- 
not be determined by two analyses. An extended series of observations 
might bring very interesting results. 

No. LIV. Fair Haven, Conn. 

Purchased, April 4, 1881, in Middletown. They were described as 
“natives,” from H. C. Rowe & Co., Fair Haven, Conn., and had been 
dredged three days. There were thirty-three oysters in one-half peck. 
No. LVI. Blue Point, from Patchogue, L. I. r) 

Furnished, April 8, 1881, by Mr. E.G. Blackford, Fulton Market, New 
York City. 

No. LVIIT. From Rockaway, L. I. 

Furnished, April 12, 1881, by Mr. Blackford. 

No. LVIL. Hast River, from Cow Bay, L. I. 

Furnished April 8, 1881, by Mr. Blackford. 

No. LX. “ Sounds,” from Princes’? Bay, Staten Island. 

Furnished by Mr. Blackford, April 20, 1881. 

No. LXI. Shrewsbury, N. J. 
Furnished, April 20, 1881, by Mr. Blackford. 
No. LIX. Virginias, from Norfolk, Va. 

Furnished, April 12, 1881, by Mr. Blackford. 

No. LXXIII. Virginias Transplanted (to New Haven, Conn.). 

Furnished by Mr. F. T. Lane, New Haven, Conn., May 16, 1881. In an 
accompanying letter, Mr. Lane says: “From James River, Virginia, and 
what we consider the best stock to plant, * * * have been planted 
here five weeks.” 

No. LXXIT. Virginias Transplanted (to New Haven, Conn.). 

Received as No. LX XIII. In an accompanying letter Mr. Lane says; 
“Are from Rappahannock River, Virginia, and are what we use mostly for 
winter and spring. They have been planted here three weeks, and taken 
up into a river where the water is quite fresh, and put into floats for 
forty-eight hours to fatten them.” 

No. LXXI. Virginias Transplanted (to New Haven). 

Received as Nos. LX XIII and LX XII. Mr. Lane writes: “Are from 
the Potomac River, Virginia, and are the cheapest of anything that we 
get from the South. They have been planted here three weeks.” 


[21] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 251 


No. LX XIV. “Cove” or Canned Oysters. 

Furnished by Mr. J. F. Ely, Baltimore, Md., May 24,1881. In an ac- 
companying letter, Mr. Ely says: “The oysters we steamers use are 
gathered from all points on the Chesapeake Bay and mouth of the 
Potomac River. There is no agency but heat applied in their prepara- 
tion.” We received as samples two cans, one half-pound and one pound 
can. The former conained 36, the latter 77 oysters. 


SCALLOPS (Pecten irradians). 


No. LI. Shelter Island, N. Y. 

Furnished by Mr. Blackford, March 15, 1881. The sample consisted 
not of the whole scallop, but of the part usually eaten—the adductor 
muscle—and, of course, contained no refuse. 

No. LXIII. Shelter Island, N. Y. 
Furnished by Mr. Blackford, April 26, 1881. 


LONG CLAMS (Mya arenaria). 


No. LXVII. Boston Harbor, Mass. 
Received from Messrs. Bunting & Warren, May 5, 1881. 


No. LXV. Napaug, L. I. 
Purchased in Middletown, April 28, 1831. 


ROUND CLAMS (Venus mercenaria). 


No. LXVI. Little Neck, L. I. 
Purchased in Middletown, April 28, 1831. 


LOBSTER (Homarus americanus.) 
No. L. Maine. 


Sample—two lobsters—furnished by Mr. Blackford, March 15, 1881. 
In separation of edible and refuse the weights of flesh, liquids, refuse, 
and loss in cleaning in the different parts of each animal were deter- 
mined as follows: 


A. B. 


| Grams. Grams. 


SOUT Ton OS GE Teese ene See ee ieee hares cee seein clelsiee wine woe afateeigea ite sai aeiecaiate 870. 0 1, 103. 0 
TIER HITEC] aiwiS eet ete Seen ee ey ee See CoS RLS soclte ef aetna <i> | 152. 5 219.5 
ORI TELA eo nee ee ee oe Ae ee ce ere oie s oS oa siateis sinjocirroieeimcisa'= in, =p2 138. 0 131.0 
Mesh PnAbOGY te comene ete n cate secak eee ee se asa atelasciviels a Sanielas esemiieie = cena none 118. 5 | 127.5 
Wiquids in, whole sample... ---- <0. --- .2se eee ci wean nae Saat teins se se nisin ase anes 54. 4 94.8 
Wiastemewhole sample. 9-20. coseitee sao seats ecm meena s omicael aaeicene= serie se 367.8 | , 499.5 
Loss in cleaning sample ....-----.------------0- cence nee cence eee e ne ce eden er eenees 38.8 30.7 


The liquids in all the lobsters on being exposed to the air quickly 
gelatinized, and were put with the flesh for analysis. 
No. LXII. Maine. 

Furnished by Mr. Blackford, April 26, 1881. 


‘ 


252 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


No. LXIX. Boston Bay, Mass. 

Received from Messrs. Bunting & Warren, May 5, 1881. 
No. LXXVI. Canned Lobster. 

Purchased in Middletown, May 26,1881. The can was labelied “ Thur- 
ber’s Egmont Bay Fresh Lobster,” H. K. & F. B. Thurber & Co., New 
York City. Ina letter Messrs. Thurber & Co. say: “Sample was packed 
by Castine (Maine) Packing Company. The sample consisted of a pound 
can, the contents weighing 469.5 grams, or 1 pound 0.5 ounce. 


CRAY FISH (Cambarus). 


No. LXIV. Potomac River, Virginia. 

Furnished by Mr. Blackford, April 26,1881. The animals were whole, 
but only the tails were used for analysis, as this is the portion ordinarily 
eaten. 

The weights of the different portions in the whole 21 samples were: 


Cray fish, entire. Grams. 
plat) ieee ete ote is aia wie soe Cine oslo ele ets ninipars Soe nininjae cciomieleisre <toig Bee ain sic cae al ante ois aint anette 176.6 
BOUL OSH ee nen eta see nicics sce oes aan isisecierccte ce clos ces swam eeincinne Soee aoe ceraae teens aceite meen 508. 0 
MOSSUINClOAMIN Gr cach cep ocies emia soe S Sabina = me ehiea' asec eae ne eee ees == eeee see eee 10. 4 
POCA ere tcc os oes camnianisisjse Aas vniels celels © eee dela elec ns ice ape te See ne eee eee ee 695. 0 
TAILS. 
GUD IOMD OLGON: oaccte psisrss oscisinle sooo Swicit wales cea seaweetsaascewes eee eects tee eee cerns 85.5 
NRG LUIS OMG oe cites eae oars See oern a= Se eas dais\rsmujacle eslow'ae 5c Se ORO ee ee EE eee eee 83.8 
OSSHMepreparin for, ANALY SiSisesees oe ss false ee es Sk ne ee Sa re me erage ie are 7.6 
MO GAM a sates cicle clon S siore ons dae So Mncamet amma niece ee cake oe RE EE Ee eee Senet nee See eee 176.6 


Thus while the edibie portion makes nearly 50 per cent. of the part 
taken for food, it is only 12.3 per cent. of the whole animal. 


PREPARATION OF SAMPLES FOR ANALYSIS. 


The oysters were, with the exception of the “ cove” or canned oyster, 
all received in the shell. All adhering foreign matters—as mud, sea- 
weed, hydroids, gasteropods, &c.—were removed by thorough washing. 
The oysters were then allowed to drain, wiped, and weighed. The 
weighed oysters were opened, the liquid thus escaping being caught in 
a large evaporating dish. The oysters after being opened were put upon 
a porcelain colander (“crystal drainer”), and allowed to drain into a 
beaker. In this way some very small particles of solid matter would 
probably be added to the filtrate. For the purposes of analysis we have 
called the part remaining upon the perforated dish “flesh,” and the fil- 
trate “liquids.” The flesh and liquids in the cove oyster were separated 
in the same way. After this separation the flesh was chopped in an 
ordinary wooden tray till the sample was quite fine, and evenly and 


thoroughly mixed, as was done with the samples of fish reported by 
Professor Atwater. 


[23] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 253 


In the scallops we have analyzed only the part usually eaten, viz, the 
muscle (adductor) that holds the shell together. They came from the 
market all ready for cooking, and were analyzed just as received, the 
flesh being chopped and sampled in the same way as that of the oyster. 

The clams were prepared in the same way as the oysters, except that 
in the long clam the black * mantle” was added to the refuse. In the 
case of the lobsters and crayfish the flesh was carefully separated from 
the shell and prepared as above. For parts taken for analysis see ‘ De- 
scription of Samples” above. 

In all of the samples a portion, usually about 100 grams, of the 
chopped flesh was dried in hydrogen and prepared for analysis in the 
same manner as the hydrogen dried samples (A) of fish described by 
Professor Atwater in “Methods of Analysis.” 

The liquids were evaporated on a water bath and then dried in air, as 
the samples of fish designated as “ B.? 


METHODS OF ANALYSIS. 


The methods of analysis were the same that have been employed in 
this laboratory and described by Professor Atwater above. We are 
indebted to Dr. J. H. Long for the determinations of chlorine in all the 
samples. 

DESCRIPTION OF TABLES. 


In all the tables the arrangement of samples is the same, and in order 
of locality, the more northern coming first. The canned oysters and lob- 
sters are not included in the averages. 


TABLE V. 


In the second column is given the date of receipt of each sample at 
the laboratory. In most cases they had been taken from the water two 
or three days before they were received by us. As will be seen in the 
third column, the nunaber taken for analysis was always large in order 
to obtain a fair sample. In the fourth column are given the total weights 
of the samples taken for analysis, and in the fifth are the average weights 
of the animals. Details as to the proportions of shell, flesh, liquids, total 
edible portion, &c., in the several samples of oysters and of other inver- 
tebrates are given under the heading ‘In whole sample.” Thus the 45 
oysters in the sample from Norfolk, Va., weighed together 6,635.5 grams 
(14 pounds 9 ounces), and averaged 138.3 grams (4.9 ounces). Of the 
total weight, 11.2 per cent. consisted of “edible portion” (solid and 
liquid), the remaining 88.8 per cent. being reckoned as “refuse” (55.3 
per cent. shell, and 0.5 per cent. matters lost in preparing for analysis), 
while of the total weight of the 33 oysters in the sample of Blue Points, 
20.3 per cent. was edible portion, the rest being shell, We. 

In an article published in Land and W ater and reprinted in The Sea 
World of November 10, 1880, Mr, Frank Buckland gives some deter- 


254 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


minations of the relative proportions of flesh and shell in different sam- 
ples of eysters. But as he takes only three oysters for the basis of his 
percentages in each, and does not weigh nearer than one-fourth ounce, 
his estimates can be regarded as only approximate for the samples 
examined. We may also add that we have found as great differences in 
different oysters from the same sample as he finds in oysters from dif- 
ferent localities. It wasin order to obviate as far as possible this source 
of error that we have taken such a large number of oysters in each sam- 
ple. The only American oyster Mr. Buckland notices is one trom Hast 
River, New York, laid at Beaumarais, North Wales. In this he finds the 
proportion of flesh to shell one to ten. 

The figures for “ Flesh” denote the percentages of solids or meat” 
those under ‘ liquids” the liquid portion, “liquor” in the sample. The 
solids and liquids together are designated as “edible portion,” which, 
with “refuse” and “loss in cleaning,” make up the whole sample. 

Under the heading “In Flesh” are given the percentages of water 
and dry substance in the flesh. After these follow the same percent- 
ages for liquids and for the whole edible portion. 

Some explanation may be needed of the way in which these calcula- 
tions have been made. Tor example, in obtaining the figures in the 
column headed ‘‘ water” in total “edible portion”, the percentages of 

flesh and of liquids in the total edible portion were multiplied each by 
its percentage of water as given in the table, the two products added 
and their sum divided by the sum of the percentages of flesh and liquids, 
the quotient being the percentage of water in the edible portion. The 
calculation for the Buzzard’s Bay oyster is as follows: 
(12.50 x 54,21) + (7.51 x 96.40) — 88.78. 
20.01 

The last three columns, “dry substance of flesh,” “dry substance of 
liquids,” and ‘dry substance of edible portion” are obtained by multiply- 
ing the percentage of each in the whole sample by its percentage of 
dry substance. 


TABLE AVAL: 


This table gives the figures for the dry substance in the flesh and 
in liquids. The only columns needing any explanation are those of 
albuminoids, phosphorus, and sulphur. The per cent. of “ albuminoids” 
is obtained by multiplying the nitrogen by the factor 6.25. The phos- 
phorus and sulphur are calculated as phosphoric and sulphurie anhy- 
drides. The last division of the table “in flesh and liquids” is caleu- 
lated as in Table V, already explained. 


TABLESV LI. 


In the first section of Table VII the analyses of Table VI are calculated 
over to ‘fresh substance.” By fresh substance are here meant the 
flesh and liquids as they were after the separation described under 


[25] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR Foop. 255 


“Preparation of Sample” above. The percentages in the column headed 
“extractives” are obtained by difference. That is, the albuminoids (as 
computed by multiplying nitrogen by 6.25), fats, and ash are added and 
their sum subtracted from the total dry substance. Though this method 
of computation is common in statements of the composition of animal 
and vegetable foods it is of course only a convenient and approximately 
accurate way of getting over the difficulty of determining and stating 
exactly the amounts of the several ingredients. It will be noticed that 
“extractives” as thus determined by difference are not the same as the 
“extractive matters” of the tables of analyses of fish. 

The most important column from an economic point of view is the 
one headed “nutritive valuation.” The calculations are based upon the 
standards assumed by Konig, and explained by Professor Atwater. 
Their valuations, though not absolute, are doubtless sufficiently accurate 
for purposes of comparison. 


PREVIOUS ANALYSES OF INVERTEBRATES. 


But very little work has been done hitherto in the way of analyses of 
invertebrates. In the very full compilation of analyses of this sort, given 
by Konig (Nahrungsmittel I. 17), one of a sample of oyster and one of 
the salt flesh (salted in brine) of a crustacean (‘‘Arebsfleisch, eingemacht”) 
are recorded, both analyses being by Konig and Kraut. The analy- 
ses are given below. Mr. R. H. Chittenden has reported analyses of 
two samples of American scallops (Pecten irradians) with results as ap- 
pended, except that in the figures herewith the percentages of albumin- 
oids have been, for reasons above stated (see Methods of Analysis), reeal- 
culated by multiplying the nitrogen by 6.25 instead of 6.4, the factor 
employed, perhaps more justly, by Mr. Chittenden. The extractives 
are estimated by difference, as explained above. 


Water. |Albuminoids.| Fats. Extractives. Ash. 


Per cent.| Per cent. Per cent.| Per cent. Per cent. 
Oysters HULOpeali eta ics -cicwreie sore ewes <eymierare 89.69 4.95 0.37 2.62 2.37 
= Ker ebsflesch,” HUrOpeaNn - ..-<s0ccccss cent 72.74 13.63 0.36 0.21 13.06f 
Scallop; American ..... sscscccsccscstrsececs 79.63 15.31 0.31 3.49 1.26 
Scallop, fAMerican 2. .'. scosdec cee. woe 80.25 14.69 0.28 3.55 1.23 


* The analysis of the oyster included the total shell contents. 
t Of the ash of the Krebsfleisch”’ 11.98 per cent. was sodium chloride. 


PART ILT. 


GENERAL SUMMARY OF RESULTS OF ANALYSES OF FISH 
AND INVERTEBRATES. 


The object of the present investigation has been to obtain informa- 
tion as to both the chemical constitution of the flesh of the animals in- 


vestigated and their economic values especially for food. 
The work thus far accomplished must be regarded as barely a begin- 


256 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


ning. i hope to be able to prosecute it further in both the directions 
named. Meanwhile it may be proper to consider some of the results 
already attained. 

I do not yet feel prepared to enter upon the discussion of the chemical 
constitution of the flesh, and will therefore confine myself to the more 
practical question of the economic values of the samples analyzed, re- 
serving the more abstract subject until satisfactory data shall have 


been obtained. 
cs 


COMPARATIVE STATISTICS OF SAMPLES OF FISH. 


It will facilitate a comparison of the composition of the different sam- 
ples analyzed if we select some of the figures from the tables and place 
them in more convenient juxtaposition. 

Considered from the standpoint of the food value, fish, as we buy 
them in the markets, consist of— 

1. Flesh or edible portion. 

2. Refuse—bones, skin, entrails, &e. 

In Table I, under “ Proportions of flesh and refuse” are given the 
percentages of flesh and refuse in the samples as received from the 
markets. As explained above, there was a slight but unimportant loss 
of flesh, owing to the difficulty of separating it from the skin, bones, 
&e. Below are some of the percentages of refuse: 


Proportion of refuse—bone, skin, entrails, Sc. 


os P= 
ae ae 
Number of | #4 oa 
Kind of fish and portion taken for analysis. = Baniple: a3 2 
as SL 
oF Ee 
55 Bo 
ayn < 
Per cent. | Per cent. 
HMatibubsectionvol Od ys sasase. 222s watcclaain: s ceeeveslontsisiss cupicee sie IX A172) | bos dean ces 
Halibut, posterior part of body- -=-----sccccesss<c ceo sclceence acces I 24. 08 17. 90 
Salmon, entrails removed ....- -- XIV 23: 84" ||. cee bee 
Cod, head and entrails removed | XI 31287. lle. <melesee 
Codeheadand:entrails:removed 2222 - gscaac cote escc en esl Joc cccecees IOGE 85. 43 33. 65 
IMUCKELEMaOl Gr aac cia cS rc mci ee Seee re Den cee oe ae come XERORCIORS 351357 toe eine 
Mackerelewh ole: --2a= sa ceisshoee aes csee sees ea sesaces seed ; VIIL 39: 45) Nie cee seers 
Mackerels whole... 2-2 set cocle caus ons cocoa Sees stake. o eo oan er eeerel XEXEXE 49469) |pee nee eee 
MercxGnel may DOO. cams a macic a decncmenmoe cece cemeteries aoe XIII 54. 30 | 44, 69 
Pay OLOremmiate te ce msereeaieisijscte > Soncmmseicinmeeu con ce ene ee ee XXXII AT 20 oe eee cee 
MAC HRWANOlOmsie nictles cision se sibs cance amcchion neaepeebacmacees Soekmese xe ATCO! |e seis b 
PRC RMV DO] Oteecare isis taee cieicie's. cine fot pmicis nee anata ne hence ee eee VI 51. 69 48. 85 
IWENTTS EDEL CH SWHOlG ectesecic 5 cacacwcs or ccd Pot a eb cite dentene Ween e XLIV 595500 eee é 
AVEHITOMPCLCH MWN OLE <2 ce sceecicisccicccie sacs Cowes taeeboeee ceeecet oobee | XLVI 63. 76 61. 63 
DULIPOURDASS BWill OlOs seek ioh mcm wapsleiele isos. an =e sarees came eat VIL YOM base = p 
DPOLIPCAED AGS MWNOLOE-f o27h 2a Bie sacs nds Steck ce toh celdted sates te anes mlexe 58. 49 58. 20 
IROL EAMG) Cae ays Merle sa oeinG ales scm-hee Caan so eacnctesn case neers ae XXXT DSL ON eens 
RONG VemWNOLOaG aie manasa satoeels Jo ccicie sas oc oceee tes cosmese cance | XV 61. 66 59. 93 
HOUNDS VENtLAUS TOMOVEC 22.02 once Sees ccce-ce sais Seamodeceoen 100 LTBI iy fill Nee 
WTOUNCOL EW HOLOR teas acces «aloes a'< cise nso Sisisiotemulas noms eyelte deaattce XXII 68108) |e cceaeeee 


Next to the halibut, the salmon had the least waste and most flesh. 
Then follow salt cod, salt mackerel, fresh cod dressed, &e.; while 


[27] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 257 


striped bass, porgy, and flounders end the list with the largest waste and 
_least flesh of all. It is, of course, to be understood that the variations 
in individual samples of the same fish are so wide as to make a much 
larger number of determinations necessary to give us fair averages and 
allow satisfactory generalizations. 

The proportions not only of flesh, but also of water and solids in the 
flesh differ widely in the different samples, as will be seen in the tables. 
Thus, in the third and fourth columns of Table II we find that the flesh 
in the samples of flounder contained from 83 per cent. to 85 per cent. of 
water, and only from 17 per cent. to 15 per cent. of dry substance, sol- 
ids; while in the fat shad, mackerel, and salmon we have from 65 per 
cent. to 63 per cent. of water, and from 35 per cent. to 37 per cent. of dry 
substance. Below the samples of fish are arranged in the order of their 
percentages of dry substance in flesh. 


Proportion of dry substance in flesh, edible portion. 


= A Fa 

zy a= F Ba 

cea [-5) 

8 oy —1 

Q ot. S A 

oe A S og 

© Bag 2g 

B py ere eee 

|: Sese| £2 

5 HEA Ee 6 Oo 

a a + 
Per cent. | Per cent 
Salmon (California), fat .. Sev Li i el eee ren ae 
Salmon (eastern) ....... ss XIV 33.6 36. 4 
Canned salmon ......... ie XXIX S40 Uietemieclotein 
Salmon trout ......... oe D.A'MGl BRE ARES Sac 
Herrin gf S308 sebissies sec XLVII BYHB) Wl eecouccede 
Spanishipnaokereliasecaccaccstincos Sate ecisecceatescccnecwecosccccieces xLUI BPs tl Spores: 
SACP EEE See ee asec Saath ea sas cb tabi eacked pwomoceces ec cnleekocincs x 0.0. Oaideessicele 
Shad eee scene ene saee conan asct enecccen cessor ecccocesce ee siccee's VI SONG, ‘lsere cee meee 
MLN ae eRe cha cece ob lace cab cles te ose seca setek eevee seesetsinut XXXII 29. 4 31.8 
MWihtitentish=: sac eee anes mae a Ween Coen cece etncieac cweeecis cowicieans XVIII 29) Ol Mocaae cme 
PEUEDOL cuietssce eens eee cha ctitccos cloveeces scose ence wceesecieicstecwcanc XLIX OL ECO Is Ss ae 
EH GIS eee eestor oe Mee otee tt enoe ccc se ce cece see ne cca cssciapeclciccoas TV | | 29..5)|-ss0¢---- 
Shee pis-headiscsnocstossccseccc ceeaesnscaswsece sce cecsclasceactsccueu:s XLVII 28:5: |Sstete ees 
Mankerel, very iat-ccasesccs se osc ce ccs ores asics aces es nels cls lenlaess sins xXxXxXIxX BT.) sees -ecles 
Mackerel soae= coca Boss ocsancccr aan ocicntinn coe cess wsceuscneecanes DO: OK QBs3Sencem seo 
MER OKOrOE ee ace sae cas See eae eae ua amet ae cet oceeeceseetate XIII DESH SPN See 
Mackerolisloanc. cscs cscccetsorccre cctacccoee ses acscasese con teccese VIII 21.4 27.7 
Halibut, very fat ........... BHSEe SAREE CESS E AE COSEEEEO CE ACOMEPSERIEE ayEXG BOM classes cecier 
Halibutisssscct ccs ct cesece Se I 20.7 yA f 
Muskallonge . : : : 247) ioecee sec 
White perch . ro StU ebro 
White perch . 24.1 24.5 
Alewives....... DO tears 
PROP LY $= Siscict se aisadloseoesicn wets 1: a fl ae 
PGR eee aoc asco cae see an ooo on eae canoe ween k bee casing ceseete V 28.3 24.2 
BAG Kihiahitec see ac estes toe ce ace ee osincd onc ce wma cecccisecatoecsece OSG emace acer 
HROGIAN AD DOL tees wcciscintsaicee aicclees Seine oe oe wea ccsinecstledsictesviecis tees xx 23nG leee sence 
Redisnappebecesncicsc cece essstocssea ccesce cust ccecceceecccesesaeces 23.0 23.3 
WPentiAslMOnnMalesecse. sscccowcd ce cisuccoececoceeccesacecsecieeeens XXxXV el fad ben a ac 
Spent salmon* femaletsseeee--ssehe secs sctecsses tac sees ee aweS acs sce: XXXVI 21.7 23. 2 
ELOOKsLTOU GI ee eee eect oet ieee co ce nee c nen sccuoeneneeeee XXIV 29:19H| Ee caeheee 
IBIAGKIDASS eo en sicncetaenca caeceeelbeedceeacsccecetecceleascocseseces LIII ONO Eas cc ae 
ISTRY SSeS AA Sp aan Ls be arte h ae it nik Se RETR RA pn met XII Pallet shl beeottesAc 
Spentilandslocked!sabnén;imale .252s.c.cceseet ce coo scceseesecee fe xL PAB Gp aap se 
Spent land-locked salmon, female............2.2---c-0-ceececcecoeee XLI 20.5 21.1 
SELIPSCM ASS ce wee ees semen ccnicae coe ue cocceeemee couse VII DA hl Pera a a 
Sinipedbassecc-o:.- ounce cee Z xXIX 20.9 21.2 
Yellow pike-perch.. 5 : = Lit DONE" | cece cree 
Molosaseccmicenss xXx 20. 3 os 

Haddock .... xvVI ir tol 
Haddock .... SEX 18.2 18.7 
Et SoA SB OBER GAC aC ETOCS eh Sete let apie ast xI BY Pit ecessom otc 
COi0 | 3 Gabe SS GESac ac AGS eae MAAS Ame ae eee eS oo ba, eae ke 1 17.0 17.3 
LOund ere teeta ccc cate ee ee ae oon ee ene dew ones at Santen I VEN cee aneoee 
MIOUNG ON eset eon sae c one ce ceneue ee ee eens eee eee XXII 15.2 16. 2 


S. Mis. 29-17 


258 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [28] 


Thus the flesh of flounder had 85 per cent. of water and only 15 per 
cent. of solids, while that of salmon contained 36} per cent. of solids 
and 634 per cent. of water, and the flesh of dried, smoked, and salt 
fish have still less water. Among the more watery kinds of fish are 
the flounder, cod, striped bass, and blue fish. Among those with less 
water and more solids are mackerel, shad, salmon, and salt and dried 
fish. The flesh of fish generally, though not always, contains more 
water than ordinary meats, as may be seen in Table VIII beyond. 

Since neither the refuse, bones, entrails, &c., nor the water in the 
flesh have any food-value, the actual nutritive material of the fish is, 
of course, the dry substance of the flesh. To find the actual nutritive 
substance in a sample of fish we must first subtract the waste—the en- 
trails, bones, skins, &c.—which leaves the flesh. We must then allow 
for the water in the flesh. What remains will be the total edible solids 
or actual nutrients in the sample. Thus, the sample of flounder No. II 
has 32 per cent. of flesh, of which only 15 per cent. is dry substance, 
so that the edible solids amount to only 15 per cent. of 32 per cent., 
or about 4.8 per cent. of the whole (as recalculated in Table IV, 4.85 
per cent.). That is, 100 pounds of flounder like this sample would 
furnish only 43 pounds of nutrients, the rest being water and refuse. 
As explained in “Methods of analysis,” however, the skin, which is 
nutritious and frequently eaten, is here reckoned as refuse. Consider- 
ing, further, the small portions of flesh which could not be conveniently 
separated from the skin, bones, &c., the figures for the total edible solids 
are a trifle too small. Still the deficit is inconsiderable, and the figures 
are doubtless not far from a correct expression of the amounts of nutri- 
tive material which the samples would furnish in household use. Below 
the samples are arranged in the order of the percentages of edible 
solids. 


Total edible solids, actual nutrients, in 100 pounds of samples as received from markets. 


a g As 
g ee E 
es AS a 
) aS = 
¢ on ee 
Kind of fish and portion taken for analyses. aS S = 
; ry $A 23 
oO elise tea 
Q On " 38 
E nas © 
=| oO Ry b 
7; AY < 
; : ’ Per cent. | Per cent. 
California salmon, edible portion of anterior part ...........-...---. XEXSVORT: 39: 39 | scaceoqses 
palmonventnalls: TOMOVEd. <=... ..6.-<cccsessescectlccennconet saoceae XIV 26.157, | sacemneeee 
Smoked halibut ..2.s-ceces-saecss--- cece kl aie die coe ee XXVIO 31.63) | ceeascerme 
Salimackerelmeccet oss asses coset ed once coe eer eh ee ee GH Hf 3097 |e gee sneeee 
PS ONGUICOU TAR tas ene soe ee aes le sk cena cecee sce kts Ome ent eee XeRGV 30.91 2a cence 
Cannedisaimont eo. = sa. nemceiniss 22s accaieoacacces comet ee eee D'O"d Di 29; 95,1 cemsceseie 
Smokedshermin gy sty sacs cates anes e sce ek Cera coe tee ee ee XEXeX 28.66) soccceceer 
Eels, salt water; skin, head, and entrails removed.................. IV 22550) lace aeteeiees 
Halibut, section of body:-fat on. sees cee testo tke Lee ID:€ PY ep EH ae as 
Halibut, posterior part of body, lean.-........ 20.22... cee ee nnee eee 15. 67 21. 40 
Spanish mackerel, whole .....................--.. Ree am ts MME ee XLUI QONGST Reece 
Salticod! Shoat iishityocccss ce seo aent cscs ccs OMe Loe en ee eee 9:0:O'4 20:99". eos tee 


[29] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 259 


Total edible solids, actual nutrients, in 100 pounds of samples, §:c.—Continued, 


ee g 
ie Es g 
Rp cool 
E ae Er 
g he oe 
Kind of fish and portion taken for analyses. % oF Se 
° i be o s 
2 er = 
E See e 
=] DDR b 
ZA rie < 
Per cent.| Per cent. 
Std) whole soot sce sae ee eee aa cise se oncls owls iniaisiaisin nie'cjuivielalcisje’=ineleie’e x 1 S:'56 4 Wau see 
Sliad! swhole... sas. seee ee eee a= walla hain osoin wis uwlelsle cuchiviels ce'e'~ie XXXII TS OL Re Joma 
sd wholetess eee pee eae cit wie Soins naleisiacje ivajasivsieiseenis'ss Vek 14. 81 16. 29 
PnTDOt. WholOrc sas ete rete ss tere a aac ce cocs cece ccscms sone tes SAGA XLIX TSLGIO eee eee 
Mackerel, wholen-se ssc tee aler + -rcinate ea teases Seco weeicietictleteslaeia® XXXIX | Q3U05) 2 sea 
Mackereliiwholes- ac -ce sos sectanes sum ds smaesclsiviecicecinins sdalcisic cena XXX BS 24! lances oat 
Mackerel swihol obese ae tee mises ia. -is cine salee cis Selec oem cisielainin aro -smiaiain = Waleed TBE oanecag ane 
NiackorelMwholomloalle eset secnaseina sac ceisiasaoiteisecesiclclscsemscas=- sc XII 11.76 | 15. 48 
Salmonicontiewhole sleet seems eco tain se eae wel e'omiem Sams iniain XVIT | IASB e tee ceee 
Wihiteislismwnolacave neste) fs). ius. .kledesediceh based vnaccanddl XVUL 131607) tee koe 
Spentsalmonmmale nw holes cscs is <eo = siectsisis oa seliesnie'sln « deie\-eisininsimoinia XEXGKGVA | TA ST immer 
Spent salmon; female, whele . 2.222... 222s cc eee c ene weenence eee XXXVI 12.17 13. 52 
Muskallonge, whole ..-...-- PO Da EID AROS OSGD ESE CO Oa EnbeacEcHonestid XLV 12.52) |\-=-0see os 
DIMCLUeWINOlO Rane ats Se ace cette sa as cteclcaeitasicisiem els wictls vintcinisstove = XXII Ag ee aemoce 
Sheeps-head, entrails removed ........-...-----------+--------e-e-- XLVI TGQ) |S ee eee 
EM Swivesswholotecn eres eens scone nes esmnesls oni secacsccc nae VAIS STROOD 3 ene te eee 
lerrinoswholowe cee +t serrine sets an che ares ao [eerie ce cisies= eects = XLVI | TAs 52a ek oe 
Cod, head and entrails removed......--..- De EE ese dccicis ot sneec sa XI TOD" | See ee 
Cod; head andientrailsiremoved. 2. se... 52 -< cocucwscwicceccsecccci- nes Til 10. 98 11. 45 
IBlueiish, entrails removed: -- css seo — + cece cs ssccec te ss-ce nce - c's. XII OE Tel hecemccacte 
Spent land-locked salmon, male, whole.-......--..------------------- XL | TONOT eeees See ee 
Spent land-locked salmon, female, whole.... — -------------------- XLI . 10. 74 | 10. 86 
Brook trout, Cultivated: wholoss..cjocsscc.. swavnisieece- secre eee eee XXIV LONTTe | ore sneees 
BB LAG KH Alem WNOLG cates ces sete eee Perso cline minnie Galesclerejcteieisiais s'eisieretels XXXVUI LOT Zi ereeremiatae 
Red snapper, entrails removed.........---..--- Soocere bbe soncrasooce XXVI 2S Sl Beniase econ 
Red sap POL, WHOLOG sees sana nieces alessio wisine snisleie/aicicjaiee einen =\=n1ae' =~ XEXS | 9. 33 10.11 
ORR WNOlLGs fee bases sebjstacis cece clos snepsdecies Getbeicacccrestesemee XXXI T1s73"| Ss Secee cee 
Porgy, whole......---------- 2-00-22 -- scene renee ne cone ee eaatesctoseecias EXaVi Ceathes 9. 76 
Mehitesperch;, whole 252-52 222t2-.2-5-0. Los. sasce PRE SeeCeCasee XLIV 10! 08 i. cosseeene 
Wali Gemperchs WHOlO ise 5-2 occ eaein's one was cis osSeiccies le seinaewieisemnlelei XLVI 8.73 9.41 
BlgokspAsss wholes ce feos tees cosas tee fae ctioc ee ace baacewastnee cess LUI SST Eek taseae 
Sinlpedsibass wholowes cseterren cee so Gaesel decease cre ngisitic a eeicisacmcecis VII QOL |. sahecseee 
Striped basstwholepsesessi-. gosay- cence eek occ cee ccetels- ead ecanlee xIx 8. 87 8. 94 
Haddock entrailssremovedsae ese ae ac aees eee O enon econ ea seseacs XVI 9:07, incre toe 
Maddock, entrails\removediy-cor: ss. dado toe cccc cece cess ecsecsseose pO. 8. 68 8. 88 
pMellow, pike-perch, whole sasocscconcesecaiscaps cece nc: sescaa tenance LU 8545: 2c cesses 
Hloundor, entrailsjremoved se. 2e~ ss scjos sss sccece ss fceeew enc ceher = Il 1506s se uiecsne = 
MIOUNGST EWHOlG sone nce cae e eee ence een aan cece esas cizesis xXXit 4:85) Se Seeesee 


Before proceeding further with the discussion of the composition of 
the samples of fish we may note some of the figures for invertebrates. 


STATISTICS OF THE SAMPLES OF OYSTERS. 


The samples of oysters showed much wider variations than might 
have been anticipated, both in the proportions of edible substance, solid 
and liquids, to shell and in actual nutritive value. 

In Table IV, under the heading ‘In whole sample,” are given the per- 
centages of flesh, liquids, and refuse (shell, &c.), in the samples analyzed. 
Below the samples are arranged in the order of the percentages of these 
constituents by weight, those with the largest proportion of each coming 
first in the category. 


260 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [30] 
Proportions of flesh, of liquids, and of total shell contents ( flesh and liquids) in samples of 
oysters. 

| 
Flesh in whole oysters. | Per ct.| Liquid in whole oysters. | Per ct Total See ae ™ | Per ct 
iBlneeeOINt)~.2-4-- ~~ =~ 13. 39 | Stony Creek ...........- Sl) | Mast ELVOlse-sacre cnet | 20. 28 
Shrewsburys.--2-------- 12.64 | Stony Creek ............ 11.38 | Buzzards Bay .......... 20. 01 
WITHA AVED sec ne~ coe 5 ~~ 12. 63.| East’ River ............. 10.01 | Stony Creek ............ 19.15 
Buzzards Bay ..-..-..--- 12,50 | Rockawayi:..--..--.--< %st2\| Stonyi Creek 22.2.2). == 18. 90 
Providence River...----- 10.88 | Buzzards Bay......-....: 4.00) ) Blue POM. s5os6 seni oe 18. 62 
Rockaway ----22-+--2---- 10.68 | Rappahannock River...| 7.31 | Rockaway ...-...-..:... 18. 40 
Mast River, ./.---------2|/ 10.27 | James Niver!-...---- =<. M20 ui Malm Haver smcisiseiceies 18. 06 
Staten Island.......-..-- 9.13 | Staten Island -........-- 7.10 | Shrewsbury .........---| 17.52 
Rappahannock River....| 7.86 | Norfolk --.....-..-...--- 6.52 | Providence River.....-.. 17. 00 
Stony Creek.-.....---... 7.52 | Providence River....... 6.12 | Staten Island -.......... 16. 23 
Stony; Creek. --2cee--4--- 7.34 | Potomac River.......... 5.64 | Rappahannock River.-..| 15.17 
Potomac River ....--.--- 6.51 | Fair Haven 5.43 | James River...-.......-- 13. 79 
AMES URIVEL)- <5 seco 6.50 | Blue Point-....-. 5.23 | Potomac River.-......-.-- 12.15 
BNOLiOlk <252 0% secei-- 2 = 4.66 | Shrewsbury 4) 88h SNortolks.).22 ccoeee eer 11.18 


Thus in the samples from East River, N. Y., and Buzzard’s Bay, Mass., 
the contents of the shells, including both flesh and liquids, “meat” and — 
“liquor,” made respectively 20.2 and 20 per cent. of the whole weight, 
while of the samples from the James and the Potomac the shell contents 
constituted only 12.2 and 11.2 per cent. of the whole. The East River and 
Buzzards Bay were one-fifth edible matter and four-fifths shell, while in 
the southern samples the shell contents made only one-eighth of the 
whole. 

The ratios of flesh to liquids were still more variable. The sample of 
Blue Points had 13.4 per cent. of solids and 5.3 of liquids, while one from 
Stony Creek had 7.3 per cent. of meat and 11.8 of liquor. Taking the 
flesh and liquids separately the variation is even greater. The percent- 
ages of flesh range from 13.4 in the Blue Points to 4.7 in the Norfolks, the 
liquids from 11.8 in the Stony Creeks to 4.9 in the Shrewsburys. 


None of the above figures, however, give a measure of the actual 
nutrients in the oysters, since both flesh and liquids consist mostly of 
water, and the proportions of dry substance which constitutes the ac- 
tually nutritive portion are extremely variable. 

Below the samples are arranged in the order of the percentages of dry 
substance in flesh, in liquids, and in total shell contents. 


Proportion of dry substance, actually nutritive materials, in flesh, in liquids, and in total 
shell contents of oysters. 


total shell contents, 


oie In 

In flesh. Per ct. Tn liquid. Per ct. flesh plus liquids. Per ct. 
BlnexPointit. so5.2.:2.%5 23.76:| Fair Haven:.<...:..s.-: 6.00 | Bluo Point.-...--.-.-...- 19. 24 
Potomac River.-........ 21.13 | Blue) Point. 225 s-..5--c6 5.67 | Providence River....... 15. 21 
Providence River ....... 20.99 | Providence River ....... 4.95 | Fair Haven........-.... 14. 88 
East River.............. 20:08) |, Rockaway:.<.--c.-scco. 4.94.| Shrewsbury .-.-......-..- 14. 63 
Stony Creek:.........--. 18.98 | Shrewsbury ..........-. 4.93 | Potomac River.......... 13. 40 
IROCKAWAY, -cccoct cies <= -1- 18.73 | East River......... ...- 4.56 | Rockaway......-..-..--. 13. 02 
Mas AVeN es ss ecco aise 18.70 | Potomac River.......... 4.49 | East River. --..........-- 12. 43 
Repeats masouscuucdun 18.35 | James River.........--. 4.09 | Buzzards Bay........---| 11.20 
Stony Creek............. 17.91 | Stony Creek ...........- 3.88 | Staten Island .22-2.----- 10. 42 
Rappahannock River....} 17.36 | Stony Creek ............ 3.67 | Rappahannock River...| 10.12 
James River .....-.-.--- 16.51 | Staten Island ...........| 3.65 | Stony Creek............ . 96 
INorfolkis-ca-s2cscleecelscee 16.14 | Buzzards Bay ........-... 3.60!) James River cossctesease 9. 93 
BUZZaALOS bAyesseseec caeelanlO. (Ou NOLLOLK, © oo 5- ecemice cscs 8.17 | Stony Creek ..sscn.- se 9.11 
Staten Island..........-- 15.53 | Rappahannock River...) 2.76 | Norfolk ..............-. 8.55 


[31] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 261 


Thus in the flesh of the oysters the dry substance varies from 233 per 
cent. in the Blue Points to 154 per cent. in the Staten Islands. The dry 
substance in the liquids varies from 53 per cent. in the Blue Points to 23 
per cent. in the Rappahannocks. The flesh of oysters is quite watery, 
more so than that of fish and much more than ordinary meats. The dry 
substance in the latter ranges from about 25 per cent. in lean beef to 50 
per cent. in fat pork. In fish we find from 40 to 15 per cent., in the flesh 
of oysters from 24 to 15 per cent., and in the liquids, from 6 to as low as 
23 per cent. The liquids contain but very little nutriment. 

By comparing the proportions of flesh and liquids and the propor- 
tions of actual nutrients in them, we arrive at the figures for the actu. 
ally nutritive substances in the oysters. Precisely this is done for the 
whole shell contents in the last of the above categories. The figures 
there represent the nutrients in the flesh and liquids together; that is, 
they show the proportions of actual nutrients in the total shell contents 
of the several samples. The range of variation of the nutrients is very 
wide, the Blue Points containing 194 per cent. and the Norfolks only 8$ 
per cent. In general, the Northern samples are the richest and the 
Southern the poorest in nutritive material. The mean of all the sam- 
ples is not far from 14 per cent., a little above that of .cow’s milk, which 
averages about 1245 per cent. of dry substance. 

If, however, we place the oysters in the order of the percentages of 
nutritive materials in the whole sample, including shell and contents, 
thearrangement will be as below. The other invertebrates are appended 
for comparison. 


Percentages of nutritive materials in whole sample, including shell and shell contents. 


Per cent. Per cent. 
Oysters, Blue Points 222i 32 sct-ase). 2 3.0/7 | Oysters, Staten Island ..-:-..-....-- 1. 63 
Oysters, Fair Hayen..<-..2---.-..20¢ 2.69. | Oysters, Potomac River... --.. <<: 1. 68 
Oysters, Providence River ..-..-..-- 2.58 | Oysters, Rappahannock River..---. 1.56 
Oysters, Shrewsbury....-----.--.-- 2.55 | Oysters, James River.../ ...--.---- 1.37 
Oysters; Hast River... .022..- 25. Ses. D5 Su ON Sera OLt0 lik.t 22).00, seater aoa ia 0. 96 
Oysters, Rockaway....--. 53-22. 2<<s OSH ON RC AIMS 2h cece cia1s Seve eeepc UG Ce 
Oysters, Buzzards Bay .-..-...--.-- Qi25alNROUNGLUCIAMNS S226 cok wiceroaes oes see 3. 38 
Oysters, Stony Creek .......------. ISB | MOWStEES Dace ctiscwee's Ce corecee a e.qcess 6. 80 
Oysters, Stony Creek -.-..-...----- e764 Cray fish. ele! SPs 25 ashe S228 2. 31 


These variations are the widest of all. The proportions of nutrients 
in the whole oyster, shell and all, are of course very small, the largest in 
the Blue Points, being only 31 per cent. In 100 pounds of Norfolks we 
have less than one pound of nutritive material. Here again the sam- 
ples from the New York and New England waters are the best, and 
those from Virginia the poorest. 


THE NUTRITIVE VALUES OF FISH AND OTHER FOODS. 


This subject has of late begun to attract very general attention. The 
chemico-physiological research of the past two decades has brought 
us where we can judge, with a considerable degree of accuracy, from the 


262 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [32] 


chemical composition of a food material what is its value as compared 
with other foods for nourishment. The bulk of the best investigation 
of this subject has been made in Germany, where chemists and physi- 
ologists have already got so far as to feel themselves warranted in com- 
puting the nutritive values of foods and arranging them in tables, which 
are coming into popular use. 

As this may fall into the hands of some readers not entirely familiar 


with the latest developments of the chemistry of food and nutrition, I~ 


may be permitted to cite a few explanatory statements from a paper 
read before the American Fish Cultural Association.* 


THE NUTRIENTS OF FOODS. 


We eat meat and fish, milk and bread, to build up our bodies, to repair their wastes, 
to supply heat, to keep ourselves warm, and strength with which to work. This is 
the common way of putting it. Speaking as chemists and physiologists, we should 
say that our food supplies, besides mineral substances and water, albuminoids, car- 
bohydrates, and fats, whose functions are to be transformed into the tissues and fluids 
of the body, muscle and fat, blood and bone, and by their consumption to produce 
heat and force. 

Albuminoids occur in plants, as in the gluten of wheat; and in the animal body, as 
in the fibrinogen and fibrinoplastic substances of blood, in the fibrin of muscle, in 
albumen (white) of eggs, and in the casein (curd) of milk. 

The albuminoids are the most important of the nutrients of foods. Not only do they 
share in the formation of the fatty tissues and in the supply of material for the pro- 
duction of animal heat and muscular power, thus performing all of the functions of 
the other food ingredients in the body, but they also have a work of their own in the 
building up of the nitrogenous tissues, muscles, tendons, cartilage, &c., in which 
none of the other ingredients can share. 

The carbohydrates, of which we have familiar examples in sugar, starch, and cellu- 
lose, differ from the albuminoids in that they have no nitrogen. They have, accord- 
ing to the best experimental evidence, no share in the formation of nitrogenous tissues 
in the body. It is hardly probable that they are transferred into fats to any con- 
siderable extent ; their chief use in food seems to be to supply fuel for the production 
of animal heat, and very probably of muscular power. They are very important 
constituents of foods, but much lessso than the albuminoids and fats. They occur in 
only minute proportion in meats, fish, and like animal foods. 

The fats are familiar to us in the forms of vegetable fats and oils, like linseed and 
olive oils, in fat meat, tallow, and lard, and in butter. The fats, like the carbohy- 
drates, are destitute of nitrogen. The fats of the food are stored in the body as fats, 
transformed into carbohydrates, and serve for fuel, but do not form nitrogenous tissue. 
They are more valuable than the carbohydrates, because richer in carbon and hydro- 
gen, the elements which give vaiue to fuel, and because they supply the body with 
fats. 

In brief, the albuminoids, the nitrogenous constituents of foods (albumen, fibrin, 
&c.), which make the lean meat, the muscle, the connective tissues, skin, and so on, 
are the most important of the nutrients. Next in importance come the fats, and last 
the carbohydrates—sugar, starch, and the like. One reason of the inferior position 
of the carbohydrates is the fact that they have nonitrogen. The albuminoids can do 
their own work and all the work of the carbohydrates and the fats as well, while these 
latter can only do their own. With albuminoids alone we might make a shift to get 
on for a good while, but with carbohydrates and fats alone we should speedily starve. 


*See Reports of Am. Fish Cult. Ass’n., 1880 and 1881. 


4 


{33] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 263 


We might live on fean meat, but not on tallow andstarch. Animal foods, meats, fish, 
and the like, consist mainly of albuminoids and fats, and contain very little of the 
carbohydrates. Vegetable foods, on the other hand, consist largely of carbohydrates, 
and contain less of the albuminoids and fats. Science and experience unite in testify- 
ing that a proper combination of allmakes the most wholesome, as we know it gives 
the most agreeable, diet. 


The table below is constructed to illustrate the composition and food 
values of the samples of fish, oysters, &c., analyzed, as compared with 
other animal foods and with each other. The figures for meat, game, 
milk, eggs, &c., as well as the basis of estimating the nutritive values, 
are from German sources.—(Kénig, Nahrungsmittel, I, 206-210 and 
223-226.) The analyses of fish (except the dried cod) and of inverte- 
brates are taken from Tables I-VII of this report. 


TABLE VIII. 
Composition and valuations of animal foods. 


[Valuation of medium beef assumed as 100.] 


i a OO 


Total edible solids, actual nutritive 


IN FLESH FREE FROM BONE AND OTHER WASTE, 


Solids—actual nutritive material. 


materials in whole sample. (1) 


Albuminoids, protein. 
Mineral ingredients. 
Nutritive valuation. 


Extractives. (2) 


MEATS. 
Per ct. | Per ct. | Per ct. | Per ct. | Per ct.| Per ct.| Per ct. 
Reeriblenn RS ot cet ts AT pene bl ie Pr T6h70 | Q0°6L. |. 1450) |ooac sce 1.18 91.3 
Bet eIMeMIIM << .<% 05 cite Pas somatic Se eee ee te 72.25 | 21.3 Dail 9! | emrasaroteie Ti7 100. 0 
eet tase ss sce ceiotee =o aes alates sc ele einisl|2eimem <2 54. 76 16. 93 D1e2o Nclersteiee as 1. 08 112.0 
Wiealiatiowso tc csteweecectes eee bere 72431-)| 18-88 TAL 0. 07 1. 33 92.4 
Mutton, medium .-..-.- SEE AL SOHaNAS A onoon Cmabtone 75: 991, 18. 11. BATT vscrerersere's 1533 86. 6 
ar kaetat panes rccteinsce Gacecaaeles sue ciee ac, .(be:smne aye ARE AG ed 4. 104s les OUIOL + [oo serie 0. 72 116.0 
BMO KEG DESL: = east ceiae os cate omictels'ominicias Eee ars AR GSisl pote LOM 415.130 -| satosrenr== 10. 59 146.0 
SIMD KCN AIMee Se cee eres ceases sete iencle eile sisioa=iete 27.98 | 23.97} 36.48 1.50 | 10.07 157.0 
GAME, FOWL, &C | 
| 
CCRT ATi Se oe eee 2 pel ee ER eee ee ese 75176 | 19.77 1. 92 1. 42 Las 88. 8 
LEGIT eS SE See Aa ean ao tnd pers ee 70. 06 18. 49 |} 9. 34 1. 20 0.91 93.9 
Mi oe ae aoe ee cet eee ao Ne ele ete teins [eee a% ato 70.82 | 22.65) 3.11 2. 33 1.09 104.0 
MILK, EGGS, &C 
GENE NA eee ee racicicic ae Sele ene aiate wicctesctel| eiererselnier= S741.) 854d 3. 66 4. 82 0.70 23.8 
Cow’s milk, skimmed..-..-. Reh ees Soe ate ucts eeness 90. 63 3. 06 0.79 4.77 0.75 18.5 
Wows mille \qmeam Jo. 5) So an oes ete sc in| etome se = 66. 41 3.70 | 25.72 3. 54 0. 63 56. 1 
ISTHE Se Gad SoS SEES ae ae Ae ies Bee ee eee eee See 14. 14 0. 86 83. 11 0. 70 1.19 124.9 
Oireese. skimmed milky. 2.5 3.2.0 hse sese aise |b n= snae 48.02 | 32.65 8. 41 6. 80 4.12 159. g 
MtieosowaiGlevmillosess «cco esos sao Sete neiarate arn aratnia 46.82 | 27.62 20.54 1. 97 3. 05 151.9 
GIRG GSES Gini i 0 ke CU as soe ee opcebondesne aaeacae aDanted 27.16 30. 43 2. 53 | 4.13 | 163. 9 
nS a ee es Serene en oR A ee 73.67! 12.55! 12.11! 0.55! 1.12 72.3 


(1.) The figures in the first column give the percentages of actual nutrients in the samples as actu- 
ally found in the markets. Those for fish apply to either the whole or dressed samples, as stated in 
Tables I-IV of Part I of this report; those for oysters and clams to the shell contents; scallops, the 
muscle ; lobsters and croy fish, the whole animal. 

(2.) Essentially the carbohydrates, except in the European dried cod and in the invertebrates, in 
which the extractives are calculated as explained in Part I, ‘‘ Methods of analysis,” page 25. 


264 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [34] 


Composition and valuations of animal foods—Continuéd. 


IN FLESH FREE FROM BONE AND OTHER WASTE. 


Solids—actual nutritive material 


rs) 
Ra 
ae} 
fe 
=| 
aa 
B23 E 
3 R=) a) a =| 
Z : 2. Lae 
= A tol =2| 3 
Sn x D 5 
Qe 2 . 3 
es 3 sai Ma a Ba 
ain ° = A ° 
oe B | Be > 
os roy g iS) Fs S 
aa 8 5 a £ 5 zB 
~ = 2 ~ > ‘=| ts 
° 3 iz = s 
a e 4 5 ss A A 
FISH (fresh). 
Per ct. | Per ct. | Per ct. | Per ct. | Per ct. | Per ct. | Perct. 
TWalibtutics caasascecse cease ce oss cee nce 21.40 | 74.31 | 18.23 CHEB} bososoae 1.14 87.9 
Flounder.... .. Pats dinwle cisco sjsticseteemaes ce 4.85 | 83,86 | 14.20 ONTO eon ret=i2 1.25 62.4 
ates Seles Saisie sa siew alee wie Sijaein clo aree siete 11.81} 82.46] 15.94 05245 eee Al eels 69.1 
TAO OCK ce ciceinco sla seeteaseieleteeialcapistsiet oe aistels 8. 86 81. 22 17. 26 OMG Heiss 1 1. 36 74.9 
/ Wy infec Socuesnone Hato Saonecocsondeneeoace 12. 05 75. 67 18. 94 Ob MBP beoddome 1. 46 86.8 
Helsi(Kalt water) ccnscececs ep aeaceascccee. 22.50 | 70.48 | 18.85 Oia | sane eteiete 0. 90 95. 6 
Bes ote Sn cae we claeiccleetinees ecm aoe 16. 30 68. 17 18. 80 D166" |seeccee 1 36 98. 2 
Striped bass 8.94 | 78.86 | 17.86 De LDiseetserete 1.14 80.4 
Yellow pike-perch......-.- 8.42 | 79.61 | 18.55 Ona Tailecncicins 1. 37 80.9 
Black bass...... 9, 43 78. 08 19. 72 O28 Sererctercets 1.18 86.5 
Mackerel 15.52 | 72.32] 18.30 25015) esceaoe 1. 23 90.9 
Blue fish 10.96 | 78.16 19. 32 P25 7h asosser USP 85. 4 
Salmons osc coo. scot aan ceasatoasenececewar 325199) 63552119 L9i7onl* LACE | saestorin= 1. 08 107.9 
Salmon trout 14:38 |/ 66.80 | 17.22 | 14.69) |-.-..... 1.29 95. T 
BVOOKSLOUE cocle csc Lee ae, Seta eee a 10.78 | 77.04 | 18.47 BNOST | Sameteiee mee ler 4a 84. 2 
RWWshhitestishG. cece cmc cee cota cecemecereeee 13.69 | 70.08 | 22.10 (SPAY Ildecooooe 1. 62 104.5 
Tey pc en Seep ies ARR eS aE 9.66| 75.84 | 18.15] 4.65|........ 1.36 85.2 
IB AG iets Na se oscideciicoesitac cco niacincenioe ce 10.04 | 76.66 | 19.25 Pte eGapcoec 1. 28 87.3 
ed Snap periesscccccich ciecesascicc seas SACRSS 10.10 | 76.74 | 20.53 DSBS | Series 1. 42 90. 7 
MNO Meese eis aces a ele ole Riaislajsiaiciee catocs oats 12.53 | 79.71 | 16.43 04d peeterenis 1,92 73.8 
Spanish ackKorel cs. eeckcraacces cl ciee ce ceer 20.63 | 67.77 | 21.34 ONSO a eetetarcies 1.50 105.9 
WWihtitesperchiseeascsesmccacceiseancoe ss seee cer 8.74 | 75.43 | 19.28 45 00t i eesecte se A519 89. 2 
Muskallonge.......... Boo enscuees Pecetecces | elesdt: | 7ond0u| 620) 24) eon Blaleeassecc 1.56 91. 8 
TOLTAN Pes ose cs ce as nce case coe tae ee coe ee DEAS O77 oO] LOA eS 2a eens 1.48 100. 4 
Sheepshead s. acvescceics cscs siceesenecioes ce 11.97 | 71.54] 20.68 G3685|secaeer 1.10 96.9 
PRULDOU oe eee Hsieelec tee cane aria ceeo wee 15.62 | 70.10 | 14.49) 14.15 |........ 1. 26 84.4 
Spent Salmon aes ssoe cine seeic come celiac S80006 12.96 | 76.84} 18.41 CL UN Baeaors - 1.14 84. 8 
CURED FISH. 
Balbicod ps es. sccec: smnceretees cmiceereec 19.79 | 52.50 | 25.00 O351\ |e cweisteie 1. 87 108. 9 
moned:COd. Fs. -.ces saci BbooboS nouUoecabeded 28.73 | 51.35} 26.45 OL BB al cesses 1. 90 114.8 
Mriedicod (Huropean)icecces-cec-scerceneetess We actl) 163163" 278; 91 0.78 2. 59 1.56 846. 0 
Smoked halibut, 2) 2s .2 2c ease ses ccee sees ae 32845)! 950585)! 918.430\ Sub Tale ecseecs 1. 64 102. 2 
Smoked herring .-.......---.- SHussocedse ae fa8e92 15-35. 60)| BIST e ie TBS 66s i. foe. 2. 37 163. 4 
Canned salmon acc aes ccueecccnceescenen cece 29. 91 66::00))|' 215107}. 11.104) fesse ce - £86 107.2 
Salt;mackerelis. -2 fica ccsesescce. ACB OOnE 33.14 | 42.66} 21.37 | 22.84 |........ 1. 63 125. 4 
INVERTEBRATES. 
Oysters, Stony Creek, Connecticut ......... 9.54 | 90.47 4, 42 0. 62 1. 84 2. 66 21.6 
Oysters, Fair Haven, Connecticut.......... 14.88 | 85.12 7.53 1.44 3. 41 2. 50 37.6 
Oysters, Blue Point, New York ............ 19.24 | 80.76 8. 20 1.72 7. 30 2. 02 44.3 
rysters, East River, New York .........-.. 12.43 | 87. 57 6. 31 1.10 3.15 1. 87 31.6 
Waters; NOrtolks Vias- ce ree snes seeresee ee 8.55 | 91.45 4. 50 0. 61 1.90 1. 54 22. 0 
rysters, Virginia (transplanted) (3) .....-... 5.04 | 88. 84 5. 09 1.02 2. 99 2. 06 26 1 
ysters, average of 14 samples.....-......-- 12.29 | 87.71 5. 78 1.12 3. 41 1. 98 29. 6 
Oysters, ‘'Cove’’ (canned) ......--......-.. 13.86 | 86.14 7. 89 2. 04 2.51 1. 42 39.2 
Scallops, Shelter Island, New York .-.....-.. 19.68 | 80.32 | 14.75 0.17 3. 38 1.38 67. 0: 
PON CACAMSI. G-Star ono ciceaanccieeeemees 13.92 | 86.08 7.97 0. 94 2. 54 $ 47 38. 0 
OUNG CLAMS =f. nen ace ence cicenccetee cece a 13.80 86. 20 6. 56 0. 40 4.17 . 67 32. & 
WO DStOrS fae e a tosca.cne co ncinis cau ce seaadwciccsose 6.80 | 82.73 | 13.57 1. 97 0. 00 1.74 62 0 
PEODSLELS! (CONNEA) sake scien vsnejc oes eside a: 20.64.) 79.36 | 16.75 4. 62 0. 00 2.78 79.1 
Cray SD see ccclosssecccetise cross ote see sa: 2.31 | 81.22'| 16.00 0.46 1.01 1.31 70.7 


Three things should be said with reference to this table. 
First. The figures represent simply the averages of analyses made up 
to the present time. 


a 


(@3.)'To New Haven, Conn. 


[85] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 265 


Second. The figures of some of the kinds of food, indeed all except 
the fresh meats, milk and its products, and eggs, are based upon few 
analyses. More are needed to show the actual ranges of variation 
and the actual averages. Sometimes different samples of the same kind 
of flesh will show widely varying percentages of constituents. This is 
especially true of the fats, and to a less extent of the water. But the 

. figures in the table are probably not very far from true representations 
of the average composition of the several kinds of foods. 

Third. The nutritive valuations are made with only an imperfect 
knowledge of the digestibility of the foods and the influence of palati- 
bility and other factors upon the nutritive value. They are, therefore, 
of necessity somewhat crude, and to be relied upon rather as approxi- 
mations than as accurate quantitative statements. Much more chemical 
and physiological investigation is needed to make our knowledge of these 
as complete and satisfactory as it should be. 

This table is, I think, worth studying. As above explained, after 
taking out the refuse, bones, skin, entrails, &c., of the sample we have 
left the edible portion, the flesh (or, in case of oysters, clams, &c., the 
flesh and liquids together). Multiplying the percentage of flesh by that 
of actual nutrients in each sample gives the actual nutrients in the sam- 
ple, as is done in the first column. The composition of the edible portion 
is given in the four columns under “In flesh,” the figures being taken from 
Tables IV and VII. As shown above, the proportions of flesh and of 
water and dry substance in the flesh differ greatly in the differentsamples. 


PROPORTIONS OF NUTRIENTS. 


The proportions of albuminoids, fats, &c., are, if anything, still more 
varied. The cod, haddock, and bass, have scarcely any fat, and the 
oysters, scallops, and clams, very little. But the eels, shad, mackerel, 
salmon, herring, and turbot are very fat. On the whole, fish average 
about the same percentages of albuminoids as the meats, but generally 
have less of fats. a 

It would be interesting to note in more detail the proportions of the 
constituents of the flesh, especially as illustrated in Tables IT, IT, and 
IV. The constituents soluble in cold and hot water, for instance, which 
so far as is known are analogous to those of meats, are of considerable 
interest, but demand much more investigation. Meat extract has be- 
come an important article of commerce. There is a fortune for some- 
body, I mistrust, in the extract from menhaden. 


“FOUL” OR “SPENT” FISH vs. THE SAME IN GOOD CONDITION. 


Some very interesting results are found in comparing the composition 
of the foul or spent fish witb the same in good condition, as shown in Table 
II. As the fish becomes lean, it loses nutritive value in three ways; first, 
in total loss of weight; second, in relative increase of refuse and decrease 


266 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [36] 


of flesh ; and, third, in the deterioration of the quality of the flesh which, 
in the lean fish, is more watery and considerably less valuable, pound 
for pound, than the flesh of the same fish in good condition. Thus the 
flesh of spent salmon is rated in the last column at 85, while that of fat 
salmon came up to 108. There is in this a strong argument in favor of 
legislation against the capture of fish out of season. In general the 
fatter fish are more valuable than the leaner, pound for pound, because » 
they have more nutritive material and less water. 


RELATIVE NUTRITIVE VALUES OF FISH AND OTHER FOODS. 


The above table will help us to a very fair idea of the comparative 
composition of some of our more common animal foods. 

Looking down the first column we see that while medium beef con- 
tains 72 per cent. of water, milk contains 874 per cent. Roughly speak- 
ing, beefsteak is about three-fourths, and milk seven-eighths, water. A 
pound of beefsteak would thus contain four ounces of solids, and, if we 
assume a pint of milk to weigh a pound, a quart would foment four 
ounces of solids also; that is, a pound of steak and a quart of milk con- 
tain about the same weight of actual nutrients. But we know that for 
ordinary use the pound of beefsteak is worth more for food than the - 
quart of milk. The reason is simple. The solids of the lean steak are 
nearly all albuminoid, while those of the milk consist largely of fats and 
of milk-sugar, a carbohydrate. i 

The figures in the last column are intended to show how the foods 
compare in nutritive value, ‘“medium beef” being taken as a standard. 
They are computed by ascribing certain values to the albuminoids and 
fats, and taking the sum in each case for the value of that particular 
food. Theratio here adopted, which assumes one pound of albuminoids 
to be equal to three pounds of fats and five pounds of carbohydrates, is 
that assumed by prominent German chemists.* 

Taking medium beef at 100, the same weight of milk comes to 23.8; 
mutton, medium, to 86.6; fat pork, 116, and so on. The samples of fish 
run from flounders, 65, to smoked hérring, 163; while the European 
dried cod is rated at 346. Thus we have for example the following 
valuations for flesh, free from bone, skin, shell, and other refuse— 


FISH. 
Oe wWeM MOL nase « cepicos acs cise 163.4 (Sad... 5. cerclere la eee scene eo mee 
Saltimackerelii22. sos... 1. SS e154 Mackerel. Ussher ORG) 
BON CICOMM ss a2 scm srowce nein) LA Bil eRed snappereen. a. acaceite se oe se ae Onna 
Dalticodeaweceaslececccee cs -- os. -- LOS TOM DINO tShisccs cctee serene eee ee ee COe ae 
Salmonees. scccececeecccocles coteee LOM9 || ISUEIPEGIDASS «chu t ee cera eee 80. 4 
@aunedisalmons:.:22.5..<2...5..., 1072.) Haddocks... 2) ce ee eee 74.9 
Spanish mackerel! sf.200 0 acd LCs OdCad eet... 1cc. sc fumes seems 69. 1 
White fish.. See cieieiaciae\si- i= Saison LO FO. ELOUN GOL baat aicc «i tretse eee ee eee - 62.4 
INVERTEBRATES. 

Oysters, Blue Point... .)<--<--i-<---- 44.3 | Oysters, Norfolk: 32 o...,.....2-8eenes 22.0 
Oysters, “Cove” or *‘ canned” ..-..- 3952) POCA OPS cclacie = sole cettes se eee OL 
Oysters, Hast River. 3s-.)/5 5-55-52 3156 ongiclams 238 ite ee sso kceeatee 38. 0 
Oysters, Virginia (transplanted) ... 26.1 | Round clams -..................2.- 32.6 

Mobsters. ccesacmcetteec ceeeeeeree 62. 0 


*E. g., Konig, Zeitschrift fiir Biologie, 1876, 497. 


- 


[37] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 267 
CHEAP versus DEAR FOOD. 


These figures differ widely from the market values. But we pay for 
our foods according to, not their value for nourishing our bodies, but 
their abundance and their agreeableness to our palates. 

As was stated in the introduction to this report, taking the samples of 
fish at their retail prices inthe Middletown markets, the total edible solids 
in striped bass came to about $2.30 per pound, while in the Connecticut 
River shad, whose price was very low, we bought nutritive material at 
44 cents per pound. The cost of the nutritive material in one sample 
of halibut was 57 cents, and in the other $1.45 per pound, though both 
were bought in the same place, at the same price, 15 cents per pound, 
gross weight. 

As I have said, to the man whose income will permit him to eat what 
he likes regardless of cost, it makes very little difference how much he 
pays for the albuminoids and fats of his food, but it does make a differ- 
ence to people of small means, and the knowledge that just study of 
these matters will bring, when obtained and diffused among the people, 
cannot fail to do great good. 

The cook-books and newspapers have occasionally something to say 
upon these points, but their statements are apt to be as vague and far 
from the truth as in the lack of authoritative information they might 
be expected to be. Certain it is that we need to know more about these 
things, and that proper investigations may help us toward that knowl- 
edge. 

FISH AS BRAIN FOOD. 


Before closing I ought, perhaps, to refer briefly to the widespread 
notion that fish is particularly valuable for brain food. The percentages 
of phosphorus in the analyses above reported are not larger than are 
found, according to the best analyses, in the flesh of other animals used 
for food. The number of reliable determinations of flesh in the latter 
are, however, small, and it is, though very improbable, yet within the 
range of possibility that a more complete investigation of the subject 
might reveal a smaller proportion of phosphorus in meats than in fish. 

But even if the fish be richer in phosphorus there is no proof that 
it would on that account be better for brain food. The question of the 
nourishment of the brain and the sources of intellectual energy are 
too indeterminate to allow decisive statements, and too abstruse for 
speedy solution in the present condition of our knowledge. 


Nei. oct a 
VO palnlecr Stora utd 10a 7 Oe 
fica Pr itape BED Feb sues Ava aun if Hh a son yak y 
Paik Dee RIE T;, Eiace th! age 0 Sealy ov 
Grin isi 4 oni do Rosh Gere rd) oh eee ; 
fi Shenae hater Ay | thigh eed iE 1 aig (via tf iupqean 
1 es es irs OTS Uy iY i LE OD Aes aeeh 
Adair | Lo? eae, ah) oe ka Nr oa 
} Peis cave ar alr daemian at Mats pep ety aries 4 ee, Siting i 
iit! ue Or act jhe a Ald se. ea RS 


Den) mu , by erie oe we TA... 93 0 oes a nae 


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Bitte z “gt tng i 
i ive aA sio-y i a8 ante ee oe 


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7 : Be . ™~ ¢: | nas donation 
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| ee 
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é thts 
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LIN D EX. 


Page. 
Albumen in fish......-- 2-00 sesee- eres 14 
Alewives analysis of....-..--------+------- 4 
nutritive valuation of.....----- 34 

Almen, Analyse des Fleisches einiger 
Wische, Cited 2 .<--.----0j0----.-eees sees 13 
Alosa sapidissima, analysis of...-..------ 4,7 
Analyses of fish -....--------------- 2, 3, 12, et seq. 
preparation of specimens......- 12 
sampling...-...--------++++---- 12 
O€rying..---<.-. -----. AGRDUBSCOROTS 13 
in hydrogen...-...------- 13 
AN BIT So .e.2'< clei wees 219 aie 13 
proximate ingredients. -....----- 13 
cold-water extract.....--.------ 14 
SUD MM EN hes cme isioiesens a) 2/8012 (=) 14 
extractive matter ...--..---.--- 14 
hot-water extract....-.--------- 14 
gelatine .....--..------j--- <2 14 
ingoluble protein ...----.------- 15 
other extracts, fats.......-..--- 15 
nitrogen ...-...--2---<----.20e 15, 16 
phosphorus. .-.-------------+--- 17 
sulphur .......---------++-eeeee aly 
CHIOLINO sec c's re <= c)='=tnm oinisi= = 18 
Analyses of invertebrates ..--.-.------- 2, 19 et seq. 
preparation of samples...------ 22 
methods of analyses......-.---- 23 
preparation of tables....------- 23 
previous analyses ..------------ 25 
Analyses tables, description of ..--..------ 10, 11, 12 
Anguilla rostrata. analysis of ...--------- 4 
Archosargus probatocephalus, analysis of. 10 
Atkins, Charles G., fishes furnished by. .- 7,8 


Atwater, W. O., chemical composition and 
economic values of fish andinvertebrates 1 et seq. 


Baird, Prof. 8. F.....-. Baer Oo ROOT ECU ACUED 3 
Bass, black, analysis of....---.----------- 10 
striped, analysis of.-..--.----------- 4,5 
nutritive valuation of...-...-------- 34, 36 
Beamer, Miles, assistance rendered by.- --- 2 
analyses of invertebrates.19 et seq. 

Beef, nutritive substance in .....--------- 2 
nutritive valuation of......-.. aes 33 
Black bass, analysis of.....-.---.--------- 10 
Black-fish, analysis of ..-...--.----------- i 
nutritive valuation of.......-- 34 

Blackford, E. G., contribution by -..------- 3 
* fish furnished by...-.. 4,5, 6, 9, 10 

furnished invertebrates .20, 21, 22 

thanks due.....-.-....-- 17 

Blue-fish, analysis of.....-.-----.----- S058 4 
nutritive valuation of........- . 84,36 

Boned codfish, analysis of ..........-+-+-0- 6 


[39] 


Page. 
Buckland, Mr.. on East River oyster...... 24 
Butter, nutritive valuation of....-....-.-. 33 
California salmon, analysis of....---.----- 6 
Cambarus, analysis.of ....-.....---------- 22 
Camp, S. T., fish furnished by..-.--------- 7,8 
Canned salmon, analysis of......--------- 6 
Chemical composition of fish and inverte- 
bratesia oe st sees soe fenwnee nina ctaisine 1 et seq. 
Chemico- physiological research, results 
OleceeeRiecciass Sei oe = ap oatiee es seeinelee aarele 31 
Chittenden, R. H., analyses by.----.------ 25 
@hlorinean fisht sess nin cos core cieamie 18 
in invertebrates....--....-------- 23 
Clams, analysis\0f, 2... --icescs<c-' ===" == 21 
nutritive valuation of......-- eee, oe eeti 
Clupea harengus, analysis of..--..------- 7,10 
Codfishs analysis) Of 5-6 -<c-m. csc ee. == 3, 4, 6, 7,8 
nutritive valuation of ..---..--.- 34, 36 
Coregonus clupeiformis, analysis of ...-.. 5 
Crayfish, analysis of ........----------+-- 22 
nutritive valuation of ........-. 34 
weight of ...........-.--2--020- 22 
Crittenden, A. R., contribution by....... 3 
Cybium maculatum, analysis of....----.- 9 
Duck, nutritive valuation of .......------ 33 
Eels, analysis of. ........-.--.----------s- 4 
nutritive valuation of .....-.-...--- 34 
Eggs, nutritive valuation of...-..---.---- 33 
Ely, J. F., thanks due ......------------- 19, 21 
Esox nobilior, analysis of .-.-......------ 9 
European oyster, analysis of....--------- 25 
Fish, analyses of .......----------------+- 3 
Ss rain tO] 2 oe ace seeecpew eens é 37 
chemical composition and economic 
valuation Of. .2..s.j-<<--------s655 1 et seq. 
(cured), nutritive valuation of.--.-. 34 
(fresh), nutritive valuation of ...... 34, 36 
measurements of .......------------ 7,8 
weights of ...-...-------+--+---+- 3, 7, 8, 9, 10 
samples, statistics of..-....- Symone 26 
TOLUGE --«-cccncericaecse-=- 26 
dry substance ..---------- 27 
edible portion .....------- 27 
total edible solids......--- 28 
Flounder, analysis of......---------+----- 5 
nutritive substance in.....---- 2 
nutritive valuation of..-..----- 34, 36 
Fowl, nutritive valuation of......-------- 33 
Gadus morrhua, analysis of -....--------- 3,4 
Game, nutritive valuation of ..-..-------- 33 
Gelatine in fish ......-------------++++--++ 14 
Germany, investigations of the nutritive 
value of foods .......----0----seeeeee2 Se 2 


270 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES, 


é Page. 
Haddock analy sis'Ofe <n sece= ao =-= 5 
nutritive valuation of ........-. 34, 36 
Halibut; analysis: of... -\.----.<--.s---5 3,4 
nutritive valuation of.......-... 34 
Hen, nutritive valuation of .......-....-. 33 
ET OLDIN ANALYSIS) Of ise occ sie <2 «= \-\e'micse 7,10 
nutritive valuation of ......-.... 34, 36 
Hippoglossus americanus, analysis of.... 3,4 
Homarus americanus, analysis of .....-.. 21 
Invertebrates, analyses of.........-..--. 19 et seq. 
chemical composition and 
economic values of...... 1 et seq. 
nutritive valuation of. .... 34, 36 
Jordan, W. H., assistance rendered by... 2 
CONIS;) ANaly SES DY -<--ssecss0-sss05s 32-5 25 
Nahrungsmittel, cited............ 25, 33 
Zeitschrift fiir Biologie, cited ..-.. 36 
Kran sanalyses DYinc--<sc-cmtacsscee jee 25 
Krebsfleisch, analyses of ................. 25 
Mane i. l., thanks Gues-.-.-5--25----555 19, 20 
Lobster, analysis of .-......-..-- SASocnauES 21 
nutritive valuation of.....-..... 34, 36 
Welghb Ofc ssceeseses saa ec cies: 21 
Long clams, analysis of...... Wace aesesiarss 21 
Long, Dr. J. H., determination ofchlorine. 18, 23 
determination of vapor 
tensions. sa.2 (6 tieisiorcts 16 
Lutjanus Blackfordii, analysis of......... 5, 6 
Mackerel, analysis of-...---..--....0-s< 4,6,8,9 
nutritive valuation of.......... 34, 36 
Mackinaw trout, analysis of.............. 5 
Measurements of fish..............-....-. 7,8 
Meat, nutritive valuaticn of.............. 33 
Melanogrammus aeglefinus, analysis of -. 5 
Merrill, G. P., assistance rendered by.... 2 
tests made by. --...-....-. 17 
Micropterus salmoides, analysis of ....... 10 
Milk, nutritive valuation of .............. 33 
Morone americana, analysis of .......-... 9 
Muskallonge, analysis of ................. 9 
nutritive valuation of...... 34 
Mutton, nutritive valuation of ........... 33 
Mya arenaria, analysis of ................ 21 
NTEPORON TSN sc ccse eee oe ese oe cee 15, 16 
Nutrients in fish and beéf ............2.2. 2 
Nutritive values of fish and other food.... 31 
Oncorhynchcus chouicha, analysis of..... 6 
Osborn, H. L., measurements of fish.....- Uf 
Osmerus mordax, analysis of ............- 5 
Ostrea virginiana, analysis of............. 19 
Oyster, European, analysis of ..........-. 25 
nutritive valuation of ........... - 984,36 
samples, statistics................ 29 
proportions of flesh, liquids, and 
shellicontents)..<)--.-----seeescce 30 
proportion of dry substance...... 30 
percentages of nutritive materials 31 
BNAVSIS\OL sas. sa eciciis sa.nasses eS. 19 
Paralichthys dentatus, analysis of ....... 5 
Pecten irradians, analysis of..-........... 21,25 
ETCH MANA Sis Olt ori ocinisnciiese ses sacs se 9 
nutritive valuation of ............. 34 


[40] 


Page. 

Phosphorousiniisht-.. cease em eee eee 17 

Pike-perch, analysis of .............. ABBE 10 

nutritive valuation of........ 34 
Platysomatichthys hippoglossoides, analy- 

Py) 1) ison asoccnohosaca scoor bonsecsosnsses 10 
Pleuronectus americanus, analysis of .... 3 
Pomatomus saltatrix, analysis of......... 4 
Pomalobus vernalis, analysis of .......... 4 
Porgy, analysis of...........-. sparing bance 4,6 

nutritive valuation of............. 34 
Pork, nutritive valuation of.............. 33 
Protein, insoluble, in fish=-.-. 2. .-s-sss0e- 15 
Red snapper, analysis of.......-...--..-.. 5,6 


Report of progress of an investigation of 
the chemical composition and economic 
values of fish and invertebrates used for 
food. By W.0O. Atwater, Ph. D. (title). letseg. 


Roccus lineatus, analysis of .-.-........2. 4,5 
Round clams, analysis of. .....-..........-. 21 
Salmo salar, analysis of -....-..-..-...... 4,7,8 
Salmon; analysisiof&. soc sneer sees sees vac! S08 
nutritive substance in ........... 28 
nutritive valuation of............ 34,36 
Salmon trout, analysis of ................. 5 
Salvelinus, fontinalis, analysis of ......... 6 
namaycush, analysis of ....... 5 
Scallops; analysisiof-eas-ee- oe eee eeoes - 21,25 
nutritive valuation of.........-. 34, 36 
Schoodic salmon-breeding establishment, 
fish(farnished byeerseosece ees e ee aoe 8 
Scomber scombrus, analysis of ........... 4,6, 8,9 
Shadanalysistote-)--ccere se seen eee ees 4,7 
nutritive valuation of --...-........ 34, 36 
Sheeps-head, analysis of .....-......:..... 10 
nutritive valuation of ......- 34 
Smelt, analysis of...-... pa eer aster 5 
Smoked halibut, analysis of...........-... 6 
herring, analysis of .-- 22.2.2... 7 
Snapper, nutritive valuation of........... 34, 36 
Spanish mackerel, analysis of ..........-. 9 
Spotted brook trout, analysis of .......... 6 
Stenotomus argyrops, analysis of......-.. 4,6 
Stizostedium vitreum, analysis of......-... 10 
Striped bass, analysis of.........-...- HOoe 4,5 
SolphurjiniWishoss. seceoseces cee ees tae 17 
Tables of analysis, description of. ........ 10, 11, 12 
Tautoga onitis, analysis of..-............. 8 
Trout, nutritive valuation of.............. 34 
Turbot, analysis‘ofs---5-----ae-- soseee 10 
nutritive valuation of ............ 37 
Vapor tensions, determination of......... 16 
Veal, nutritive valuation of --............ 33 
Venus mercenaria, analysis of ...........- 21 
Venison, nutritive valuation of......-.... 33 
Wieichts of fisttesee. seco ecese cise aes 3, 7, 8, 9,10 
Whitefish; analysistof.--s-+--- ese. -seeee 5 
nutritive valuation of .......- 34, 36 
White perch, analysis of...........-....2- 9 
‘Woods, C. D.,; analysis by --------:--. BOC 1 
analysis of invertebrates .19. et seq. 
assistance rendered by -... 2 


Wiallner’s' formulatssc-- cs et emeececeesone 16 


a 
-water extract. iminoids. 
am 

Not coagulated. ' rea 

Aa 
Fert) 2 

; gz 

~ —=5 

e ue 

2 hE, 

fo) +2 

eee a2 

Lol 

Io ore 

ies ES 

a 24 

% aA 

R | 4 


acid (total phos- 
atedas P2Os). 


calculated as SOs). 


phorus caleul 
Sulphuric acid (total sulphur 


Phosphoric 


Chlorine. 


n 


H 
i) 


b 


PP OPIN wo oS 
OPNWONOWS 
FPR DID ONR WOH 


22 p 
3B 
6 
| 18 
8 
: 
cf cS ie 3} leaeicosoe 
GAS AW eT Bh neces oe 
Cv) ane Ee seen coe 
OTE AY Oho Seeesoos 
TGLOS HE SOalhas eee 
Tals Z| ST eee see 
OTe 1G1S | eee 
BPG ||) W6i\ieece eee 
PEG | Way oaeeoeee 
5. 66 5 | 31.381 
14, 21 47. 71 
8.78 71 | 60.56 
6.57 a 62. 43 
6.50 8 | 56.54 
12.77 | 104 | 40.28 
3.32} 199 | 44.07 
9.17 | 104 | 67.49 
G23) AR Thal 
yieaee I See 
55 | 168| 78.08 
SS SER Veoeei 5 | ean 
9.17 By | een 
TOPS TaslSu| meee eaee 
4. 88 doyle ones 
GROOH|n 105: Maser 
(Pah, SUMMERS ee eS 
7.40 | 118 | 73.87 
EOay | ae Bie esos 
ANGSi al OS lees 
Bee i318) |ecee 
7.00) 14)6| 41.78 
13.13 | 1819 | 75.01 | 
Ona Tanto y en eeteree 


| 


PN PNNONNNEE 


Peete eaeiNe cicaretese 


=» DOE 
t 


no 


_ 


PPP PRN ONE Se ee 


oprosssssemsssruss 
> 
to) 


| Laboratory number of sample. 


3 \ 
‘ ~ 
ANALYSES OF FISH. 3 271 
: TABLE I, 
. € 1 
Analysis of flesh. 
Proportions of flesh and refuse and refuse in 
sample as received for analysis. | 
In flesh. Tn dry substance, percentages calculated on basis of dry substance = 100. 
s - " : 
= a a 3 2./5 4 
Ee q = @ ret Cold-water extract. Hot-water extract. Tnsoluble. Albuminoids. | ¢= = = 
E 2 E 2 3 20 | = EI 
s . ‘ 7 Ey =z | = z i 1 —| ast | Ss = 
E Kinds of fish and portions taken for analysis . 3 2 os B > a= | 3 Not coagulated. | | ih . 32 = c 
. < 12] = I = = s 28 3 
z NEON, eee lh vac onl tees é g & eters , | 38 lee) 34 2 
| ald = =o a rs = ¢ 3 . a £ &\| $2 |S4ale | 
al = = © se = 2 s g I S e % s “ea | se )33 A 
2 s|/2] 3 5 = , Ei 2 = a 3 xf] He |e Ss a 
tI ‘s e z ae 2 2 6 gs= | 55/22 ; 5 
z . Pele oe dhe Sil) Saeifon. | eels $s | 5 2/4 & | & | 28 |22/23! 2 z 
8 a bas| eed ee Mee) oe gs & sc Vogal Bel delet apt rm ee eh il deen Ceca eo: 
3 s | 8 z 3 g Br, ies a fwd 2 Br Mesa poet cil be = 2/4 re z # a | =)| 24 | 2214 a 2 
rR “a2|o & A | a fa = A }.4%. |) 8 | 8 a 4 | 5 | 7] 4 A 4 A wz 4 (heal 5 4 
| 3 5 = =31 ie a | oe a = = } 7.” Aan 
i , 2 3 Ots Grms. | Grins. Grime, ct. | Pr.ct, | Pr.ct. |Pr. ct.) Pr.ct. Pr.ct.| Pr. ct. Pract. | Pr.ot. Py.ct. |Pr. ct. 
IT Halibut (Hippoglossus americanus). Posterior part of body, lean - 15 | - u 
Il | Flounder (Paralichthys dentatus). Entrails removed. 2/ 10 II 
Ill Cod (Gadus morrhua). Head and entrails removed -. 1} 10 Mr 
Eels (Anguilla rostrata). Skin, head, and entrails removed 11 15 | q IV 
V | Alewives (Pomolobus vernalis). Whole. Connecticut River. 12} 15 . 1¥ 
VI | Shad (Alosa sapidiseima). Whole. Hudson River ....... 2 20 st 85, 67 4.27 9.83 | 61.44 VI 
vil Bisel bass (/toceus lineatus). Whole. Connecticut River 1 20 7.56 4.42 | 14.58 | 91.13 Vit 
VIII | Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). Whole ...--.....---..-- 4| 15 10.31 | 4.46} 13,72) 85,75 -| VIL 
IX | Halibut (Hippoglossus americanus). Section of fatter portion of body a5 5 35.65 | 8.83 | 10.26) 64.18 QD 
X | Shad (Alosa sapidissima). Whole. Connecticut River 1] 08 5.35 41,83 | 4.26) 9,29 | 58, 06 . 
XI | Cod (Gadus morrhua). Head and entrails removed 1} 08 . 14. 81 2.39] 7.33) 14.94) 93.38 
; XU | Bluefish (Pomatomus saltatriz), Entrails removed - 1 10 i 9.52 5.79 | 5,91 14.42) 90.13 
XUI | Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). Whole ..... En 2] 18 A 2.12 27.26 | 4.83) 10.89) 68.05 
XIV | Salmon (Salmo salar). Entrails removed. Maine - ii, es 3 6.18 39.29) 8.85 | 9.72) 60.75 
XV | Porgy (Stenotomus argyrops). Whole.....-...-.. aa), wan 4 5 6,88 | 13.74 | 85. 88 
XVI Hadi jock (Melanogrammus eglejinus). Tntrails removed 1} os 2 5.79 | 14.59 | 91.19 
Salmon trout. ‘Mackinaw trout” (Salvelinus nama: 5 terse 3, 600. 4 ’ 4.27) 9.08) 56.75 
XVIII | Whitefish (Coregonus clupeiformis). Whole. Lake Champlain . 1 1,313.0 5. 5.56 | 12.26) 76,63 
Striped bass (ocous lineatus) Whole. Bridge Hampton, 1 098, 5 8.88 6.69 | 13.34) 89. 38 
XX | Red snapper ui natonny Blackfordii). Whole. Fernandina, Fla 1 6.85 6.40) 14.82) 02, 63 
XXI | Haddock (Melanogrammus ple nus). Entrails removed. Rock: 1 7.96 8.72 
XXU |} Flounder (Paralichthys dentatus). Whole. Amagansett, L. I 1 6.56 8.16 
XXII | Smelt (Osmerusmordaz). Whole. Hackensack River, N. 8.02 . 
XXIV | Brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis). Whole, Cultivated 8.01 
XXV | Boned cod.(Gadus morrhua).- rae ee cena 1.84 
XXVI | Red snapper (Lutjanus Blackford Entrail 5 p 10,7 8.1: 
XXVII } California salmon (Oncorhynchus chouicha). Edible portions of anterior p seteranels - “98 
XXVIII | Smoked halibut (Hippoglossus americanus) ... eereeeeoe . 10.0 0 1 1.38 
X XIX } Canned salmon (Oncorhynchus chouicha), Cali . (0: I 8.0 870.0 va? 168 
XXX | Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). Whole. Cape May, N.J - 0 22.0] 2,594.0 ty Let 
XXXI | Por; Uke: argyrops). Whole. Rhode Island. . 3 4 .0} 19.0] 2,847.0 “77 | 1.78 
XXXII | Shad (Alosa sapidissima}. Whole. Connecticut River Z 1 804.0 23.0} 1,752.0 | “og | ag4 
XXXII | Smoked herring (Olupea harengus) (ees Sea =| 6 202.0 2.7 454.7 “53 | 1.56 
XXXIV | Salt cod (Gadus morrhua). “Channel fish.” George's Banks 2 1 1,055.9 | 21.2 145.7 1o1| 158 
XXXY | Spent salmon, male (Salmo salar). Whole. Penobscot River, Main 7 2 $.718.4| 42.5 482.7 | 55.78 | 75.27 | 24.73 | 4.69 | 18.84] 4.17 |...-.. 11s | 145 
XXXVI } Spent salmon, female (Salino salar). Whole. Penobscot River, Maine- é 2 4, 443.4 28.3 | 10, 204.9 “4s | 1.61 
XXXVII | Salt cod (Gadus morrhua). ‘Boat fish.’ Vicinity of Nantucket, Mass A 1 684.8) 30.6 813.4 294) 197 
XXXVIII | Blackfish (Tautoga onitixs). Whole. Stonington,Conn..... I 2 1,158.7] 34.8 060. 0 “arlene 
XXXIX | Mackerel if er scombrus). Whole. Cape Cod, Mass... EI 1 176.4 8.4 522.1 ‘}ag1| 77 
XI. | Spent land-locked salmon, male (Salmo salar, subsp., sebago) ... ek 2,753.0) 48.3 3 “| 9°43 | 1.08 
XLI | Spent land-locked salmon, female (Salmo salar, aubsp., sebago). Whole. Grand Lake Stream, Maine 4 1,673.5} 47.0 3 | 61 | 1.05 
XLII | Salt mackerel (Scomber scombrus). ‘No. 1mackerel’’. aaa 3 179.0 | 37.6 +4] *) gigs | 1.81 
XLII | Spanish mackerel (Cybium maculatum). Whole. |) od. 523.5 | 20.9 . “alae | 2054 
XLIV hite perch (Morone americana) ..-. 0.20 ..-0-e0e-- 22. i 3 487.0} 11.7 FP betes 
XLV | Masquallonge (Exox nobilior), Whole. St. Lawrence River. z 1 2, 027.4 0 2:13 | 2.80 
XLVI | White perch (Morone americana). Whole-..--. 3 4 578.4 .3 4397 | 1497 
XLVII | Herring (Clupea harengus). Whole Florida. - ] 4 497.2 pi . 1.62 | 1.71 
XLVI | Sheep's-head (Archosargus 3 1 1.117.3 . ) ee | ae 
Turbot (Platysoma' 3 1 1,149.3 10.67 | 3.22) .45) 7.00) 14. 14.47 2.24 | 4.43 
p ee 642.7 17.87 | 4.44) .30| 13.18 : 1.09 | 52.17 ied) heeget 
a 1}. 939. 8 15. 80 4,91 42 10,47) 15.84 | 1.08 u | 14. 67 saeen|ewda>-~s)aq eaeeee  lieabiea | 


{Page 44a,—Aawatnn’s AntICLE, U.S. F. C., 1880.] 


SH. 


ation. 


@ nitrogen by 6.25.] 


Percentage 
2 A ee eS Se ee ee ere eae 
ee ea ee pe 
Summary. | 
oo See ¢ 
. | =| 
; Calculated to baf!s of 100 per & 
Per analyses. 100 per cent os 
eS i 
e | 2 
x 2 
rat a 2 
a\|net| & 2 s 
ape Mm 
2 | ae] 4 3 z 
, 2 Be I F F < 3 
2 = eH 2 2 ies = a 
ow tH Ls I a = a | Lao] 
pes S) < < & = els 
5 | 
Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr. ct. rect. | Pr. ct. | 
10.26)\2 7 54S), go9.80 | 164.19), 10.261) }= 22 )| pitt) Te 
35.65 | 3.83 | 103.61 | 62.06] 34.21| |20-53 | 1.138) Ix 
3.721 7.76) 103.73 | 8893| 3.58} | 61) 1.27 / IT 
5.18| 8.16) 101.72| 86.89} 5.07} | %%7-| 1.22) XX 
1661 7.46| 100.87| 90.94} 1.64|| %28| 1.26 | IIT 
2.391 7.33 | 103.10 | 90.64] 2.23) | %39| 1.20) XI 
0.90| 5.79| 97.88| 93.16] 0.93 ,| 18) 1.14) XVI 
0.78| §72{101.81| 90.65] 0.77|| %J4, 1.57 | XXI 
i gavo7. | /Si9s:| uae '8L || 63,657 183, 2581 | e072 j> 0-90 | TV 
16.35| 6.08 | 101.24 | 77.85] 1615||,%93, 1.46) V 
35.67 | 4.27 | 101.38 | 60.65| 35.15 | |10-76, 1.30) VI 
41.33 | 4.26 | 103.65 | 55.82] 40.04 | |14-20|) 1.47) X 
34.371 4.51 | 100.76 | 61.46 | 34.12 | |20-02) 1.382 | XXXIT 
756) 4.421103.11| 8841| 7.33/|/ 258| 0.92) VIL 
13.40 | 6.69 | 103.47 | 80.53 | 13.00|| 271) 1.36 | XIX 
10.31| 4.46 | 100.52] 95.30| 10.95|| 219| 0.95) VIIT 
97.96 | 4.83 | 100.15 | 67.93 | 27.25 || 7 02/ 1.24) XUT 
97.04 | 5.02 | 102.37| 66.68 | 26.41; |,895| 1.29) XXX 
46.53| 4.11 | 105.39 | 51.93| 44.16 ||1645) 1.46) XXXIX 
5.79 | 5.91|101.88| 8851] 5.68||,25 1.27 | XI 
39.29 | 3.35 | 103.39 | 5863| 38.12} |22%77| 1.09 | XIV 
51.59 | 2.99 | 109.33 | 50.08| 47.19 ||18:-60; 1.08) XXVII 
48.48| 4.27 109.50| 51,80| 44.93 ||1469| 1.29; XVII 
13,821 6.33 | 10296] 80.41| 13.43|| 208) 141) XXIV 
Plicotda sl inrco, | 103. on: | e78ees | 120, 76)))) 8: 20m ge || VEL 
bl wish @s8| 9994} 95.941 718|| -42| 1.39) XV 
+ | osio4 | 4.81 | 100.16 | 67.21| 27.99|| % 86] 1.35 | XXXT 
B| 1290] 5.54|101.62| 92.56] 12.00 || 282 | 1.28) XXXVUOI 
bt a981 6.40 | 102.01] 90.80) 2.92}| 969] 1.48) XX 
Bi g58| 5.92 / 101.75) 8575/9 .8.43|| 94) 134) XXVI 
e| 9.76) 9.65 | 102.66| 8i.09| 9.51|/| 94, 1-92) XXII 
5 | 29,56| 4.71 |101.52| 66.24] 29.12|| 239} 1.50) XLII 
b1*9307| 4.56 | 102,82 | 73.13 | 2244|| 257) 1.11) XLIV 
B| 996] 5.271] 99.11| 84.05{ 10.35|| 242] 1.28) XLVI 
B| 12181 6.63 | 105.19 | -92.04| 11.59||,287 | 1.56) XLV 
B| 37.20| 4.83 | 105.91 | 60.32| 35.12||21-82) 1.48 | XLVII 
B| 24.02| 3.93) 102.33 | 72.69| 23.47 || 962 | 1-09) XLVIIT 
Bil eso seul mi dtay, etoesso) eae 2tm'47ce0 || + ten 220) EES 
5 | 231| 675 | 100.751 91.03| 229|| 94%) 1.37 | LIL 
i | 475] 5.57 | 10313 | 89.99| 4.61 || 102) 318) LUI 
4| 17.66] 4.51| 99.61| 77.75| 17.72 || #37 | 2:12 | XXXV 
h | wos! 5.36! 99.15| 81.35| 1212|| 284) 117 | XXxvI 
Eyl agers line zatl vam 01. lro-asila 18.68))|-o7Ca |) enw eee 
B| -9.36| 6.76| 98.00) e452] 9.54 |) 186, 120) KET 
| | 
| | 
ile oreeult 50s 118.01 nao a 0n78)||- Poe esi es | SY 
| of58)| 3.82 | 107.04 |49.24) 0.50 || Oot | to gy | Seeoy 
fel eet ous 24a 49) Moyea: |" 64. BG) .98'|| a2 ot) A208 | RVI 
6 | 'sr ool) s1-q1" 10065) |)) 87750 | 81.69 || doen |e ag 47 | eae 
a |) 26.00 | 39:72 | 89.66] 49.014 29.00 || 1868) 14.17 | XXXUT 
ail cepa nas asuienoteol Melosh sete liye) oat ce fee 
6} 39.08| 22.47| 9811] 37.27| 39.83 || 284) 13,18 | SEI 
 _ 
| 


re. 


ne a 
i 


Why, cee au 
i Gy | ahd 
a 

nia 


Bias 


i 


sai, 
bal i 
Cie aig 


Kind of fish and portion taken for analysis, 


Laboratory number of sample. 


FRESH FISH. 


| Halibut (Hippoglossus americanus). Posterior part of body, lean -. 
Halibut eau americanus). Section of fatter portion of b 
Flounder (Paralichthys dentatus). Entrails removed. 
Flounder (Paralichthys dentatus). Whole. Amagansi 
Coil (Gadus morrhua). Head and entrails removed. . 
Cod (Gadus morrhua). Head and entrails removed .. 
Haddock (Melanogrammus eglefinus). Entrails remove: 
Haddock (Melanogrammus aglejinus). Entrails removed. okaway, L. 
Eels, salt-water (Anguilla rostrata). Skin, head, and entrails removed -. 
Alewives (Pomolobus vernalis). Whole. Connecticut River ..- 
Shad (Alosa sapidissinma). Whole. Hudson River, first of season 
Shad (Alosa sapidissima). Whole. Connecticut River, early in season 
Shad (Alosa sapidissima). Whole. Connecticut River... 
Striped basa (Ttoceus lineatus). Whole. Connecticut River - 
Striped bass (doccus lineatus). Whole. Bridge Hampton, L, I 
Maokerel (Scomber scombrus). Whole. - 
XIII | Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). Whole . 
XXX | Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). Whole. Cape May, N.J- 
XXXIX | Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). Whole. Cape Cod, Mass 
XIT | Bluefish (Pomatomus saltatriz). Eutrails removed .. 
XIV | Salmon (Salmo salar). Entrails removed. Maine... 
VII | California salmon (Oncorhynchus chouicha). Edible portions of anterior part. 


ce ee ee 


alifornia. 

Vit Salmon trout, “Mackinaw trout” (Salvelinus namaycush). Whole, Lake Ontario. 
XXIV Brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis). Whole. Cultivated .....- 
XVII | Whitefish (Coregonus clupeiformis). Whole. Lake Champlain 

XV | Porgy (Stenotomus argyrops). Whole... ....-....---.-- 
XXXI | Porgy (Stenotomus argurops). Whole. Rhode Island . 
XXXVOT! Blackfish (Tautoga onitis). Whole. Stonington, Conn. 

xx snapper (Lutjanus Blackfordii). Whole. Wernandina, 
XXVI Bedananper (Zaitjonue Blackford . Entrails removed. Flori 
XXII | Smelt (Osmerus mordaz). Whole. Hackensack River, New Jersey 
XLUI Spaniah mackerel (Oybium maculatum). Whole... 
hite perch (Morone americana) ....... 
XLVI | White perch (Morone americana). Whole 

XLV pain oe (Exox nobilior). Whole. St. La iv 
XIVIE | Herring (0 lupea harengus). Whole. Florida..-.......---... 
XLVI Sheepshead (Archosargus probatocephalus) Entrails removed. Florida 
/XLIX Durbot (Platysomatichthys hippoglossoides). Whole. Newfoundland 

LIL | Yellow pike-perch (Stizostedium vitreum). Wholo.....-- 

LUI } Black bags (Micropterus allidus). Whole. North Caroli 
XXXV | Spent salmon (Salmo salar), male. Whole. Penobscot River, Maine 
XXXVI Spent salmon (Salmo salar). female. Whole. Penobscot River, Maine 
Spent land-locked salmon (Salmo salar, subsp., sebago), male. Whole, Grand Lake Stream, 


| CURED FISH. 


XXXVI 

XXVIIT 

Xxx | sok 
Sur 


——EE 


(Page 44b—Atwartnn’s anvicir. U.S. IP. C., 1880.1 


=LI | Spent Jand-locked salinon (Salmo salar, subsp., sebago), female. Whole Giand Lake Stream, Maine... 


ANALYSES OF FISH. 273 


Tabi 1L.—Recapitulation, 


[Albuminoids computed by multiplying nitrogen by 6.25.) 


Aine... 


sé Percentages of ingredients. 
2 ' 
= 
% Tn flesh. In dry substance. In flesh, dry substance plus water. 
Fa 
° . 
a 4 oe } 4 s 
= Cold-water ex- z 3 . Cold-water a = 
= tract. 6 ls Summary. extract. e ° Summary. : 
i} a = coc; e 
e =P le es5\4 =" 
2 s z a ne Calculated to basis of 3 ar, an Pp 1 Caleulated to basis of 100 per | g 
3 : a £ Ze ae Per analyses. 100 per cent. | Res 3 z a8 ‘er analyses. went é 
Z 2 jee | ¢ He | 3a - Sele He | Se 
3 3 SS el ese} a |oz|"s + 2 \23 a lee |o a+ : 3 
= = & ia | vee | Se Weal a8 } £ B | Ea 3 |33\2s Z E 
S s s | Fe) = Ss |#8/34 Sa] a 3 a S 142/88 3 ae 3 2 
= Bohoe Ket | |e melee | a \s| 2 a | 283 eA KSeN lee |p 3 a |2, 3 Saleae 
sg z FA & bo co et es é | % eaabe le et 2 all iceest ee 2 |sslez é 8 | s | et z = § 
= : a = Fy = We | a « 5 Bg \3 | S |46/¢8 g % E a a s = -j 
& 5 = 2 3 = S| 4 2 52 E Fi 2 = 3 3 a | 4 12 5 5 Eg 2 Ds 5 | 2 5 
2 é = & A | = S = et =] a & ‘a 7 = 6 3 s £5 ec) S 3 
E | 2 5 a 3 a) aE te Boye) BS pee Ble We pes |S Se feat | So ee RN ses 1) sen ecclesia 4 
& E a a & eA ica 5 o | 4 = a So |43 lia |}o] 8 la Ia 6 | ale 4 5 So |E ae lr al Wa as 
| ee) tele es wes 
Pr. | Pr. Pr. ct.| Pr.ct. | Pr. ct. Pr.ct. | Pr. ct. | Prt. 
= = an) as | aire 
: 70. Bt é 
i133 83.37 | 15.31 Lar | 1 
a | eu ie ae 
68.13 . 83.39 | 16.69 1.20 | XI 
40. 84 48 80.30 | 17.96 Lis | XVE 
oe : Baie iB 
aie ee . 75.92 | 19.00 1.46 | V ; 
| 4a 2 69.65 | 18.64 @ 1.30 | VI 
1] 52.35 . 8 65.25 | 20.16 5 1.47) X 
1) 52:80 0.52 70.78 | 18.08 82 1.32 | XXXIT 
1] 42, | 0.58 79.18 | 18.99 0.92 0,92 | VIL 
Hee 0. 68 79.738 | 16.90 1.36 1.36 | XIX 
-| 42.51 0.48 78.69 | 18.27 0.95 0.95 | VILE 
60, 55 0.62 74.26 | 17.51 1.24 1.24) XML 
aces | 058 74.14| 18.18 1.30 1.90 | Xxx 
“| Baan | 0.58 64.01 | 19.71 1.48 1.46, XX XIX 
4 ra 14 0, 63 78.46) 19.41 1.27 | 1.27) XT 
| 76. i 0.59 67.15 | 20.06] 12.91! 1.10) 1.09 | XIV 
+} 76.16 Ud 0.71 | 0.43 62.68 | 20.43 25} 112) 1,08 | XXVIT 
“G33 194 0.55 | 0.60 |. 68.78 | 17.71 18| 1.33] 1.29} XVII 
-| 43.31 ke 0.61 | 0.48 |. 77.54) 18.60] 3.10] 1.42 1.41 | XXIV ‘ 
rea dd 0.72 | 0.42 |. 70.83 | 22.35] 6.26] 1.62 1.62 | XVIII 
ead 3 : 0.62 |... 9| 79.68| 17.44| 1.46| 1.40 1,39 | XV 
at | 198 | i384 1.84 | 2.07 0.56 | 0,52 2} 7.98) 1886| 7.86} 1.35 185 | XXXI 
rie # 2,24 | 197 11.75 | 8.64 52 | 0.46 .00| 76.95} 19.33] met] 128! 1,28 | XXXVI 
42.16 : 2. 24| 2:38 | a2 | 3.65 0.52 |. 44 76.81) 2148] 0.69] 1.49 | fae | ees 
39, 60 5 by OB 1.85 | 2.89 |. 0.47 |. 16 77.34) 19.75) 19s] 1.34 19.66 | 3.9$| 1.34 | XXVI 
47. 36 eae 3. . 3.22 | 4.91 0.53 |. 64) 80.16) 16.52! 1.94) 1.9L 10.43} 1.94) 192 ee 
61.78 : 18 2.23 | 2.91 0.58) 0.16) 3.43 6810} 21.45] 943] 1.50 ast | 9.30 1.50) XU 
64. 02 ; ee 161 | 3.28 0.62! 0.16/293! 75.64| 1832] 562) 111 18.20} 5.57) 1.11 | XLIV 
35.8 ; 2. 1.50 | 2.68 0.68{ 0.20/3.25| 75.77| 20.82] 241] 1.98 90.0) 242) 1.38) XLV 
86.24 f | 3¢s1 | 4. 1.76 | 2.42 0.37] 0.20} 3.28 | 76.26] 20.51) 289] 1.57 20.24 | 2.87] 1.80) XLV 
50.57 7.40 2.81} 1.85 142 | 2.97 0.55} 0.81} 3.16| 69.08 19.78| 11.52] 1.50 19.48 | 32] 1.48) SEV IT 
51.13 4.68 te eealionea 1.44 | 3.36 |. 0.48| 0.20/3.93| 72.01) 2082] 672| 1.10 20.68 | 69) 1.09) XLVI 
42.07 pan eealleeee 2.00 | 3.69 0,32] 0.82]236} 71.39| 14.75] 14.40) 1.28 14.49 | 1415] 1.26 | XE 
52,27 7,00 1 HA 1,12 2.66 | 8.44 0.90} 0.16 )2.97| 70.74] 18.58} 0.47] 1.37 18.55 a a 
4037 Were rigeilleceet 2.4 | 3.10 0.88| 0.16|3.18| 7861) 1985] 1.02] 1.19 1.72 | oR) 1.18 
48,16 ee porilaes 2.97 | 939 0.39! 018] 306| 75.27| 1915] 4:37] 1:12 19.17) 437) il 
9.17 1e01))/1.68 ; By 2| 2 17.65] 284) 1.17 
55. 73 8 3 1.36 | 3.03 0.32] 0,19] 282} 7820) 17.62] 283] 117 a7 | XL 
56.18 &. 2 a A : ee 2.03 | 1.96 |. 0,30) 0.21) 2.50) 77.88) 1618) 4.01) 1.27 era a be XLI 
3280 10! 57 2.48 | 1.98 2.20 | 2.20 0.41] 0.19} 276} 79.20] 17.24) 1.95] 1.20 z i | 
| 
ae ; .20 | 105.95 | 51.35 | 26.45] 0.38) 21-82 | XXV 
45.05] 1.84] 7.01 Da alee saeaeat 9.81 Sa.02 | aesz| 02] akoe|ox27 | sioa| 2367 | oak | Mat) XXXIV 
46.38 | 1.07] 3.32 0,53 | 1.56 | 25.66) 8.43 53,54 | 24.56{ 0.00] 19.72] 98.72] 54.24) 24.87] 0.01) 19.98) XXXVIT 
* 2 148.) 1.61) 25.71 i . = B 85 | 18.48) 15.57) 15.15 | NXVIIT 
46,46) 2.07 |.--.-.-- 0, | 8.45 51.03 | 18.49| 15,62] 15.20 | 100.34] 50. 4 3 | XX 
‘ ; 4 | 0,08 }-...... 5.60 | 31.57| 1866) 14.17) XNXIIL 
48.97] 1.51] 5.66 LY sp--| 6.08 33.14 | 29.38 | 17.39) 13.20] 93.11) 2%. | 
66.86 | 0.48) 12.77 Bea AE AOL 208 65.86 | 21.06] 11,09| 1.85| 99.86| 66.00] 2110| 104! 1.86) XXIX 
414 Jonas ea racers eee DBT 42.19 | 211¢| 2269) woo] oor | 420s | 21.97 | age) 18:18 | SLIT 
57.81] 0.50| 4.88 0.61 | 1.05} 15.52] 585] 36.56| 39.08 flaca) 2) ee 


S. Mis. 29 


i 


a a ee 


tte tee 


tp 4 
fi ? 
A 
», 
oD vi 


) . 
{ 
‘ 
' 
No 
ie 
4 aes 
. n 
. 
1 
/ 


a 


275 


———— a ea 


|. 30 


ET 


|. 32 |®100. 


100. 
100. 
100. 
100. 


et. 


ee 


Extractive matters, cold-water 


i 
LOO S290 


i 


a 
PR oH © 


WISP 9° 


extract, not coagulated. 


Proteids, &c.teids, &c. 


Albumen, coagulated from 
cold-water extract. 


6. 
4. 
4. 
1. 
uf 
a6 
0. 


RPANOeHAINS 
Cr Oe OO 


Gelatin, hot-water extract. 


Gelatin, hot-water extract. 


In dry subjubstance plus water. 


Insoluble protein. 


Laboratory number of sample. 


D a 
el 
a eS 
Pr. ct. | Pr.ct.| Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr. ct. 
6. 25 1. 86 12. 64. | 9. 94 LS SDs) XEN OUT 
HaSpell | Loe: a ely) 6. 95 1.30 | XXX 
4,72 OTH 11.95 19. 25 1B el}, ROS VABE 
%20 2. 07 12.3 7.80 | 1.35 | XXXI 
15527 3. 60 11. 65 PBs 27a ROVE 
16. 24 8. 68 13235 0. 69 1.49 | XX 
12.80 | | 2.89 12. 71 1.95 1.34.) XXVI 
24.51 | | 4.91 7.44 1. 95 1,92!) XXL 
10.18 2042 13. 45 2. 89 TIE NP OSIENE 
12.47 | | 8.65 8.16 14. 26 1227) | XS 
17.44 | | 3.47 10. 65 0. 48 1.38 | LI 
9. 82 2.39 ne Sa ly) 4.38 ATS) | EXCXORGV 
14, 12 38. 04 12. 02 2, 84 1.17 | XXXVI 
6. 62 3. 02 14. 98 0. 40 23.20 | KXV 
10.16 | 4.75 | 15.03 0.25 | 24.75 | XXXIV 
3.23 1. 54 13. 01 15. 63 159204] XexeViILE 
7.46 4.95 21. 87 17. 61 BePAL WS: S.@.900t 
5.27 1.80 14 49 11.109 T./85))|| KeXaTX 


yk. 

W 

Ocean 
i we 


EA as a aS 


° 
ANALYSES OF FISH. 275 
TaBLeE ILI.—Mecapitulation. 
[Albuminoids as directly determined.) 
Per analyses. Calculated to basis of 100 per cent. 
In dry substance. In flesh, dry substance plus water. In dry substance. In flesh, dry substance plus water. 
5 ., 5 . 5 : & . 
é = Proteids, &o, 3 Proteids, &c. 2 Proteids, &o. 2 Proteids, &e. 2 
= Lae} = Eg ; Ed ; ae ; z 
E asi|e | 4 g2\2 | 2 gijg | ¢ 22/2 | 3 I 
S Kind of fish and portion taken for analysis, sa \é “ £ oe és g 4 cet ee £ SE & e|& s 
m0 3 ” c = c % = re % o 
5 ge ivagh eal ge\ee| | ee\ ga) El. ge|28| & 3 
E ze /25| 2 | 2 gsie°|3| = se [ee| 4a | 2 ee 8 le E 
z Be (a. || eeeliete BH) 2g|e | 2 ae | fe] & | ¢ pe | es) e | 3 a 
e o# | 82 3 & os | Sa] 6 & os | Sa x & of | Se] s = fal 
s Ee ae a 2 be| ek) 4 2 3 ae a 2 E2| gel 4 2 8 
= ea | ge] 8 3 ; ese al amauliterese| sell et sl Bee geal a 2 ens estes less 2 
E gel be14a/2)al4ia]2 eee13|/¢)/¢)4|2 88128) 3/el4ai4\2 Be. ee ea a ai eta |e 2 
Co Zz » A ° (a! S = 2 3S 2 7 = 
a | a & 4 & 4 a Fla 14/0] 4 A 4 a |a 2 5 a 5 4 Bes er iret idea 5 < 4 
<= eS SS SS — 
| Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Priet. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. “ti et. nh A ae an aR a cf Pr. ct. at Be eee (la 7 Pr.ct. Pr. ct.|Pr. ct. Pr.ct.| Pr. ct. | Pe. ot ae oe sai 
i c} i i 6.57 6.37 | 43.60 | 34.37 4.51 | 101.92} 7 90 | 1,92 | 1.86 2. 32 . 6.45 4.43 1.90} 1.92} 1.86 | 12.04 ). 2 x 
ee ot Se ae te a orate Gene Meee, woy| son) 47.37 | 27.04| 5:02 | 101.40 | 74.14 | 2.27 | 1.88] 1.53) 12.25 1.30 | 100.36 7.18 <0 2:27 | 1.88 | 153 | 1217| 0.95 
XXVII | California salmon (Oncorhynchus chouicha). Edib' fe pol 421] 4.74| 92,02] 51.59] 2.99 100.40} 62.68} 1.81) 1.57} 1.77) 11.95 1,12 | 100.15 4.19 2,98 4.81 | 1.57 |1.77| 11.05] 19.25 
XXX1 | Porgy (Stenotomus ops). ole. Rhode Island .. 10.64} 7.39| 44.40| 28.04| 4.81 | 101.85] 71.98 | 1,84 | 2.08) 2.07 | 12.44 1.35 | 100. 52 10.45 4.73 1. 8&4 | 2.98 | 2. 12:38! 7.80 
XXRVIIE | Blackish (Tautoga onitis). Whole. Stonington, Conn 11.32 | 15.79] 50.97| 12.20) 5.54] 103.37 | 76.95 | 1.75 | 2.61) 3.08) 11.75 1.28 | 100.79 10.95 5.97 1.74} 2.59 | 3.60} 11.65] 279 
XX | Red snapper (Lutjanus Black/ordii), Whole. Fernand 6.85 | 15.74] 67.14| 2.98] 6.40] 96.96) 76.81 | 1.82) 1.59) 3.65) 13.25 1.49] 99.30 7.07 6.58 1,83 | 1.60) 8.68) 13.35] 0.69 
XXVI | Red snapper (Hubanus Blackjordii). Entrails removed, Florid. g12| 12.75] 56.09| 858] 5.92) 99.62] 77.34] 1.85] 1.84] 289) 12.71 1.34] 99, 91 8.15 6.94 185 | 1.84} 2.89] 1271] 1.95 
XXIII | Smelt (Onneria mordaz). Whole. kk 3.02 | 24.75 | 87,50) 9.76) 9.65 | 100.91| 80.16] 3.22 | 0.60) 4.91] 7.44 1,92 | 100, 20 . 3.04 9. 56 3.92] 0.60 | 4.91) 7.44] 1.95 
XL nallouge (Esox nobilior). ole. St. Lawrence River...----- 695 | 10.19| 56.73 | 12.18] 6.63 | 100,08} 76.26] 1.76) 1.05 | 242) 13.48 1.57 | 100.03] 7.39} 6.9% 6.63 1.76] 1.65 | 242) 13.48] 289 
XLIX | Turbot (Platysomatichthys hippoglossoides). Whole. New Foundlan 0.42! 12.92! 28.44] 50.36] 4.47 | 103.61] 71.39] 2.00) 0.12) 3.69) 8.14 1.28 | 101.02] 6.76) 0.41 4,81 1.98} 0.12) 9.65] 8.16] 14,26 
Lil | Yellow pike-peroh (Stizostedium vitreum). Whole.........----.---- 6.87| 16.97] 52.17] 231| 6.75] 97.20] 79.74] 2.66] 1.10] 8.44) 10.60 1.37 | 9947] 13.60) 6.04 6.93 2.68 | 1.20 | 3.47] 10.65) 0.48 
XXXV | Spent salmon (Salmo salar), male. Whole. Penobscot River, Main 4.69| 9.70| 53.10| 17.66) 4.51] 98.83 | 75.27) 2.27] 1.16) 2.39] 13.13 112] 99.71) 9.28] 4.75 4.56 207/116] 2.99] 1317) 4.38 
XXXVI | Spent salmon (Salmo salar), female. Whole. Penobscot River, Maine. 4.50 | 13.82] 54.90] 12.98) 6.36] 97.88] 78.20] 1.36] 1.00 | 8.03) 11.98 117} 99.57] 6.36] 4.69 5.48 1.36 | 1.00} 8.04] 12.02] 2.84 
XXvV | Boned Cod (Gadus morrhua) J Ye4| 6.62| 32.81] 0.88| 50.82] 99.98 | 54.35 | 3,20 | 0.84 | 3.02) 14.98 29.20} 99.99) 7.01} 1.84 50. 83 3,20 | 0.84 | 3.02] 14.98] 0.40 
Salt Cod (Gadus morrhua), “channel fish.” George's Banks 10.33 | 32.67] 0.53 | 53.82 | 101.74 | 63.62 | 1.54 | 0.50 | 4.79} 15.15 24.96 | 100.81] 8.27] 1.05 52. 89 1.53 | 0.50} 4.75 | 15.03) 0.25 
Smoked halibut (Hippogloseus americanus) 3.28 | 26.57) 21.90) 31,01) 99.88) 51.03 | 2.77} 0.74 | 1.58] 13. 15.20) 99.95) 5.66) 1.51 81.05, 2.27 | 0.74 1.54] 18.01) 15.63 
Smoked herring (Clupea harengus) : 26.00 | 19.72) 08.77 | 23.14 | 8.54] 0.82 | 4.92) 2 13.20| 99.20] 1291] 0.48 19. 98, 8. 60 4.95 | 21.87] 17.61 
Canned salmon (Oncorhynchus chouicha ¥ 65.86 | 4.85 |.....-| 1.80 1.85 | 99.94 5.43 4.85 |. 80] 1449] 11.09 


[Page 44e.—ATwater's AnticiE, U.S. ¥. C., 1880.) 


sy on f 


ae es yf 


ip vi NN A 
= eh. 
H 


276 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [46] 


ANALYSES 
TABLE 1IV.—Gen 


Kind of fish and portion taken for analysis. 


Laboratory number of sample. 


FRESH FISH. 

I | Halibut (Hippoglossus americanus). Posterior part of body, lean.....-..----------+ mallee 
IX | Halibut (Hippoglossus americanus). Section of fatter portion of body ........--..-..ee-. 
Halibut, average of two samples...-..-..---------sece+ -ceccee cnc cece en -cccesc cece 
TI | Flounder (Paralichthys dentatus). Entrails removed ...-...--.-..2-----00-e-0--- ene ee ee 
XXII | Flounder (Paralichthys dentatus). Whole. Amagansett, L. I.........-....--.---eeee--s- 
Flounder, average of two samples... -...- 2.20. ----20ceencc conan ceeccccnccnsccncn= 
TII | Cod (Gadus morrhua). Head and entrails removed......--.--2.0seccncccescceeneeeeences 
XI | Cod (Gadus morrhua). Head and entrails removed ..............20.20.cccccscncccenccccs 
Cod; average of two samples =. scene ee sec vc oo cle ciate <= emweineis=lomainial=loluel=nlale ae 
XVI | Haddock (Melanogrammus ceglefinus). . Entrails removed .....--.---------------eeeee-ee- 
XXI | Haddock (Melanogrammus eglejinus). Entrails removed. Rockaway, L.I.....--.-..... 
Haddock, average of two samples... .....222.cececceceesceensccnccee eaialele clases 
IV | Eels, salt water (Anguilla rostrata). Skin, head, and entrails removed .......-....------ 
V | Alewives (Pomolobus vernalis). Whole. Connecticut River ....-.....-..------2-.e- wese 
VI | Shad (Alosa sapidissima). Whole. Hudson River. First of season.........-.-.--- aenee 
X | Shad (Alosa sapidissima). Whole. Connecticut River. Early in season -....--..-...- O 
XXXII |+Shad (Alosa sapidissima). Whole. Connecticat River.......-..--.---.022-s2-se-eeeene- 
Shad, average of three samples ....-.----.-------- eee ees eneee ence emenwereccveaces 
VII | Striped bass (Roccus lineatus). Whole. Connecticut River ..........e.----ecseecneeeces 

XIX | Striped bass (Roccus lineatus). Whole. Bridgehampton, L. I...... oe nies 

Striped bass, average of two samples ..-..--.-..--.--+---- aes 

WEE | Mackerel (Scomber.scombrus). Whole:ccs--.--ccconcecnesacsccie cesses alceiacnae BBO BCOACOCC 
XPT.) Mackerel (Scomber'scombrus). Whole. socc-o2-s-s-ceccleeseccmeccencic=-cscsncsene chscenee 
XXX | Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). Whole. Cape May, N. J....-.-.---0------eeeeee Saccoase 
XXXIX | Mackerel (Scomber scombrus). Whole. Cape Cod, Mass .....-... BodednonS SACB00e eaenierats 
Mackerel, average of four samples. ...,.-..---.++--0+eeeceecneres os cnennecccccccene 
XII | Blue fish (Pomatomus saltatriz). Entrails removed -...-...---.----------- wedescewee ene 
XIV | Salmon (Salmo salar). Entrails removed. Maine..--.....:-......-----0-ceesce-ec cee oe: 
XXVII | California salmon (Oncorhynchus chouicha.) Edible portion of anterior part. California - 
XVII | Salmon trout, Mackinaw trout (Salvelinus namaycush). Whole. Lake Ontario .....-..- 
XXIV | Brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis). Whole. Cultivated ...........-.--..-0--0--en0-eee- 
XVIII | White fish (Ooregonus clupeiformis). Whole. Lake Champlain.......-....------ eOCHSO 
EVs | Porgy (Stenotomus argyrops). Whole -cmensec se ceeessieeaeal aie maeissin sielelete= o> aisieisielaistetelete 
XXXI | Porgy (Stenotomus argyrops). Whole. Rhode Island ...-.........-.--------+---++ Geasaee 
Porgy, average.of two samples... ...-....0.0e-. screen a2 mnee caeeence ccecccccccnes 
XXXVUII | Black fish (Tautoga onitis). Whole. Stonington, Conn..........------- pes acewnesalesten an 
XX | Red snapper (Lutjanus Blackfordii). Whole. Fernandina, Fla.........------------ asene 
XXVI | Red snapper (Lutjanus Blackfordii). Entrails removed. Florida Coast......... woetoas 
T Red snapper, average of two samples ..........-.-----.2-ceeceeeroeceee aialsietelaleaiointe 
XXX} Smelt (Osmerus mordaz). Whole. Wackensack River, New Jersey----------- oncccccces 
XLIII | Spanish mackerel (Cybiwm maculatum). Whole .....-.------------e-e-eee- eee e ee eceeeee 
XLIV | White perch (Morone americana). Whole...-..-.......--------cceecccee Bocsoorccnocosod 
XLVI | White perch (Morone americana). Whole.........--- Ss iseniesiee eeeinode cecmaces Speeaece 


White perch, average of two samples..............--.- Waa vicia ninicic aishsineteloislalcietatsterstaiats 


[47] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FooD. 277 


OF FISH. 


eral Résumé. 


Flesh, edible portion. Whole or dressed fish. & 
a 
Ingredients of solids a : : ae Re 
SP auaiontay: Edible portion. 8 g 3 
= oo oO 
—| 3. —\|ga| 4 
; 8 gs ; § eo = 
3 leas a ad BEC De 
S 8 2s © g op Ke 
” a| = *) A = Home) 2S 
i 3 A g o H q S one S 
2 iI 2 ad 9 | & 2 3 a 3 a3 8 
Smite lee ee. leg || 8 > | 4/8 / 2 | 34 2 
= n a em =| E = <4 fy = a Pe | 
Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. |Pr.ct.| Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr. ct. 
79.20 | 20.80} 17.52] 914] 1.14] 24.08] 60.12] 13.30] 1.63] 0.87] 15.80|TI 
69.41 | 30.59] 18.93| 10.53| 1.13| 11.72| 61.27| 16.71| 9.30] 1.00| 27.01| 1x 
94.31 | 25.69| 1823| 633] J.14|...... Pee Oy anes Wo a Me a Sa 
82.89 | 17.11| 15.23| 0.61| 1.27| 58.67| 34.27| 629| 0.25| 0o52| 687 | I 
g4.82 | 15.18] 13.19| 0.77) 1.22] 68.03] 27.12] 4.21] 0.25] 0.39] 4.78 | XXII 
‘SORE 7p PO Leah a COTY ar Te BPN [seine UT LC i 
3.00 | 17.00! 15.46| 0.28| 1.26| 35.43! 53.59] 9.98] 0.18| 0.82! 10.98 | DT 
81.91 | 18.09 | 16.42| 0.39| 1.20| 31.87| 55.61] 11.43| 0.27] 0.82| 12.54] XI 
~ 82.46 | 17.54| 15.94| 0.34| 1.23| 33.60| 54.60| 10.76] 0.23| 0.82| 11.81. 
80.64 | 19.36| 18.04] 0.18| 1.14| 53.16| 37.77| 845| 0.08| 0.54] 9.07 | XVI 
81.79 | 18.27| 16.50| 0.14| 1.57| 52.50| 38.85| 7.84] 0.07| 0.74] 865] XXI 
81.22 | 1878) 17.26| 0.16| 1.36| 52.83| 3831| 815] 0.07| 0.63| 886. 
“70.48 | 99.52| 18.85| 9.77 | 0.90| 23.76| 53.74| 14.37| 7.45| 0.68| 22.50|/IV 
75.67 | 24.33 | 18.941 3.93| 1.46| 50.52| 37.43] 9.37] 1.95| 0.73| 12.05/V 
69.37 | 30.63 | 18.57| 10.76| 1.30| 51.69| 33.51| 897| 5.20| 0.63] 14.80| VI 
64.53 | 35.47 | 19.80| 14.20| 1.47| 47.65| 33.78| 10.37| 7.43] 0.77| 1857|X 
70.62 | 29.38| 18.04! 10.02 | 1.32] 47.20| 37.27) 9.54] 5.29| 0.70| 15.53 | XXXII 
68.17 | 31.83 | 1880 | 11.66| 1.36| 47.43 | 34.85 | 963| 5.97| 0. 70 | 16.30 
78.68 | 21.42| 18.92| 1.58| 0.92 | 57.91| 33.08| 7.96| 0.66 ie 0.39| 9.01 | VIE 
79.13 | 20.87| 16.80| 2.71 | 1.36| 57.49| 33.64| 7.14] 1.15] 0.58| 887 | XIX 
————— eI ta |e —_—- >! ——_—— ene 
78.86 | 21.14| 17.86| 2.15) 1.14] 57.70| 33.36) 7.55| 0.90| 0.49| 894 
~“78.59| 21.41| 18.27| 2.191 0.95| 39.45| 47.58| 11.06| 1.33| 0.58| 12.97 | VIII 
74.23 | 25.77 | 17.51| 7.02| 1.24, 54.24| 33.97| 801| 3.21| 0.57| 11.79) XIU 
73.69 | 26.31| 18.07| 6.95| 1.29! 49.71| 37.05] 9.09] 3.50] 0.65| 13.24| XXX 
62.75 | 37.25 | 19.34) 16.45 | 1.46| 35.40| 40.54 | 12.49| 10.63] 0.94 | 24.06 | XXXIX 
72.32 | 27.68| 18.30| 815| 1.23| 44.70| 39.78 | 10.16| 4.68| 0.68| 15.52 
“78.16 | 21.84| 19.32| 1.25 | 1.27| 49.86| 39.18| 9.69| 0.63| 0.64| 10.96 | XII 
66.33 | 34.67| 19.81 | 12.77! 1.09] 23.84] 50.52! 15.09! 9.73! 0.82] 25.64) XIV 
60.57 | 39.43] 19.75] 18.60| 1.08| 00.00} 60.57| 19.75] 1860| 1.08, 39.43 | XXVII 
66.80 | 33.20] 17.22] 14.69] 1.29| 5669| 28.93| 7.46| 636] 0.56| 14.38 | XVII 
77.04 | 22.96| 18.47| 3.08| 1.41| 53.05 | 3617| 867] 1.45/ 0.66/ 10.78 | XXIV 
70.08 | 29.92 | 22.10] 6.20] 1.62| 54.24 | 32.07| 10.11) 2.84] 0.74| 13.69) XVIII 
79.72 | 20.28| 17.44] 1.45! 1.39] 61.66! 30.56/ 669] 0.56) 0.53) 7.78 | XV 
71.94 | 28.06| 1885] 7.86| 1.35| 5819| 30.09| 7.88] 3.28] 0.56} 1172 | XXXI 
75.84 | 24.16| 18.15| 4.65| 1.36| 59.92| 30.33] 7.29] 1.82] 0.55| 9.66 | 
| Se, se SSS — _ Sy nes [an ceneeniry = SS = 
76.66 | 23.34| 19.25| 2.81 | 1.28| 57.84| 3212] 831) 1.19] 0.54 | 10.04 | XXXVI 
76.45 | 23.55] 21.38| 0.69} 1.48] 60.40| 30.27| 847| 0.27] 0.59| 9.33} XX 
77.06 | 22.94| 19.66| 1.94| 1.34| 52.64] 36.50] 9.31] 0.92] 0.63] 10.86 | XXVI 
Bryeivailn 23.06 [20069 | 1.81 ||) 142 |. ....-c\sccencs ioe ee See ene 
| ee Ere] ec er rere TL 
79.71 | 20.29| 16.43| 1.94| 1.92] 3822| 49.25/ 10.15/ 1.20) 1.18) 12.53 | XXIT 
67.77 | 32.23 | 21.34] 9.39] 1.50] 35.98] 43.39 | 13.66) 6.01 0.96 | 20. 63 oe 
75.12 | 24.88| 18.20| 5.57 | 1.11| 64.76| 2647| 641) 1.96] 0.39| 876 XLIV 
75.94 | 24.06| 20.36| 2.42| 128| 63.76) 27.51| 7.38| 0.88) 0.47) 873) 2 
75.43 | 24.57 | 19.28| 4.00| 1.19| 6426| 26.98) 689 | 1.42| 0.43| 874 


278 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [48] 


ANALYSES 


TABLE IV.—General 


Laboratory number of sample. 


Kind of fish and portion taken for analysis. 
| 


| FREsH FISH—Continued. 


XLV | Masquallonge (Esox nobilior). Whole St. Lawrence River ..-...........------- Atibennae 
AGERE | Heérrins \(Oltuipeaharengus). oWihole, lords. seen oe aes noes ace einaie meena eiosee oe 
XLVJII | Sheepshead (Archosargus probatocephalus). Entrails removed. Florida.......-...-...-- 
XLIX | Turbot (Platysomatichthys hippoglossoides). Whole. Newfoundland...............----. 
LII | Yellow pike-perch (Stizostedium vitreum.) Whole...........-.-.--..-+.eeseceeececcecces 
LIII | Black bass (Micropterus pallidus). Whole. North Carolina .....................---...- 
XXXV | Spent salmon (Salmo salar), male. Whole. Penobscot River, Maine -.-................ 
XXXVI | Spent salmon (Salmo salar), female. Whole. Penobscot River, Maines. (4. sc.ceeieccerene 


XL | Spent land-locked salmon (Salmo salar, subsp. sebago), male. Whole. Grand Lake 
Stream; Maine. seman so cet cc dosaes cosa me coestet no see cfecices Mees aethe ene epee 
XLI | Spent land-locked salmon (Salmo salar, subsp., aebago), female. Whole. Grand Lake 
Stream; Maine. s2 5.250 cece see ses ceaere ce see a sce bc csmee acisarracice came reer 


CURED FISH. Salt.* 

Per ct 
XXIX | Canned salmon (Oncorhynchus chouicha). California. (Oregon) ..........------|-------- 
XXVIII | Smoked halibut (Hippoglossus americanus) ..........-.0.0eee0-enceseccee ens see 13.51 
KOREN | Smoked herrino(Oluiped karengueye score ne ocean eee se eee ee cree ceeeee eee 11. 80 
SXEXGV)s || Boned i codu(Gadusimors: hud) eh cee mee eee tee ee een eee ee eee 19, 92 
XXXIV | Salt cod (Gadus morrhua). ‘‘Channel fish.’’ St. George’s Banks...........-----| 22.33 
XXXVITI | Salt cod (Gadus morrhua). ‘Boat fish.’ Vicinity of Nantucket, Mass.......-- 18. 12 
Salt cod, average of three samplesf .-....-..-- Bist poeets. UU Ae ee 

XLII | Salt mackerel (Scomber scombrus). ‘No.1 mackerel” ............-...--.-! Cease 11. 50 


*In computing the mineral matter in the salted and smoked fish, it was assumed that the mineral 
as in the averages of the corresponding samples of fresh fish; the excess actually found is counted 


[49] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD 279 


OF FISH. 
Résumé—Continued. 


Flesh, edible portion. 


Whole or dressed fish. 


Ingredients of solids 


Edible portion. 


3 
A 
. re 
Sy ad Pe 
(nutrients). : BLO ° 
f aa 8 
ies QS ; z 2 | 
1 § os B a2 
oa 2 | $e E 8 ae 3 
= ore g 3 | 80 Pp 
# alee a BR | 24 g 
. ‘ 3 ae £3 oa on 3 
S a 5 ree (a a 2 = rs a | SA 4 
E E 4 a Ss | 6 B 4 a a a. | oa 
— =| — — 
| 
Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. |Pr. ct | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ect. | Pr. ct. 
75.33 | 24.67 | 20.24| 2.87| 1.56| 49.43 | 3810] 10.23) 1.45 | 0.79) 12.47 XLV 
67.77 | 32.23| 19.43| 11.32| 1.48] 48.87] 34.65) 9.93 | 5.79] 0.76] 11.48 XLVII 
71.54 | 28.46| 20.68| 6.69) 1.00] 57.93; 30.10] 870| 281] 0.46) 11.97 XLVII 
70.10 | 29.90] 14.49| 14.15| 1.26| 47.73 | 36.65) 7.57 | 7.39) 0.66) 15.62 Xx 
79,61 | 20.39| 18.55| 047| 1.37| 5873) 32.86) 7.66) 0.19| 0.57} 842) LIT 
72.08 | 21.92| 19.72| 1.02| 1.18) 5684] 33.73| 851] 0.44) 0.48) 9.43) LOL 
75.34 | 24.66] 19.17| 4.37| 1.12} 44.27| 41.99| 10.68| 244] 0.62) 13.74 XXXV 
78.34 | 21.66| 17.65} 2.84] 1.17| 43.82| 44.00) 9.92| 1.60] 0.66) 12.18 XXXVI 
78.40 | 21.60] 1629) 4.04] 1.27 | 49.26 | 39.78 | 8.27| 2.05! 0.64} 10.96 | XL 
79.53! 20.47! 17.31] 1.96/ 1.20) 47.50 | 41.75 | 9.09 | 4.031 0.63] 10.75 | XLI 
| | | 
) | { 
| | | | 
66.00 | 34.00] 21.10 | 11.04) 1.86 | 001! 5808) 1856| 9.71! 1.64] 29.91 | XXIX 
50.85 | 49.15 | 1843 | 15.57| 1.64) 866) 46.45) 16.83) 14.22) 1.40/ 32.455 XXVIII 
35.60.| 64.30 | 31.57 | 18.66| 2.37| 45.02 19.57] 17.36] 10.26] 1.30) 28.92 XXXII 
51.35 | 48.65| 26.45| 0.38 | 1.90 |......-- | 51.35) 26.45] 0.38) 1.90 | 28.73 XXV 
big | 48.08 | 23.67| 0.24] 1.84| 25.98| 3843] 17.52) 0.18) 1.39] 19.09 | XEXOKLV: 
404 | 45.76 | 24.87| 0.91] 1.86| 25.75] 39.95| 18.46} 0.68] 1.35 | 20.49 XXXVII 
52,50 | 47.49 | 25.00| 0.51| 1.87| 25.87| 38.69 17.90| 0.43| 1.37| 19.79 | 
42.66 | 57.34 | 21.37| 22.84| 1.63 | 27.72 | 30.83 15.45| 16.51| 1.18| 33.14| XLII 


matters properly belonging to the fish would bear the same ratio to the flesh (albuminoids plus fats), 


as Salt.” 


+Under ‘Whole or Dressed Fish,” two samples. 


280 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [50] 


ANALYSES’ OF 


TABLE V.—Statistics and propor 


In whole sam- 


s a 
2 eS ple. 
E E 
as rd 5 3 
Ba ; rs) a) a 
Ey Name and locality of sample. oa B # 2 
bs 9 | By Bs 
Ee PL lamer | ea A 
3 Cy 5 B op 2 
im] eu 2 ot S a = 
nN 
2 g Bele P| 2) = 
Wa | DQ va) H 4 ie) A 
OysTERS (Ostrea virginiana). 
1881. Grams. | Grams.) Pr. ct. 
Waxsvalhl |p bazzard sibayMass\oc-ccwececescescic May 5/] 29 2, 764. 0 95.3) || 12550 
16: Providence River, R..Pi...s.ccc.e ses. May 5} 28 3,301.0} 117.9] 10.88 
LV | Stony Creek, Conn.....- SESCENGoDOS Coe Apr. 5| 39 6,685.0 | 171.4 7. 52 
IRONS eco ae CORRE Ga een Oe mate et See sic e ae: May 24] 30 3,448.0] 114.9 7. 34 
hve |phair Haven. Conninac. 205 secs seer Apr. 4/{ 33 3,784.5 | 114.7] 12.63 
TAVAIS | POLUOZE ONL YN s oe eno see eee eect Apr. 8| 47 3, 725.5 79.3 | 13.39 
eWay ROCKAWAY. NY. ssccmccce sce seceee cei Apr: 12, 50 5,058.0 ; 101.2]! 10.68 
TW Villa BastiRiver; Nv Vi. sesc--csecsccee messes Apr. 8| 51 5,493.7 | 106.5 | 10.27 
Wxe|lnstaten sland IN GWe:cccaccceneseessce Apr. 20] 30 3,901.5 | 130.4 9.13 
Xe | SHOW SDULYAIN. dicceceece sess cee ebeee Apr. 20] 28 3,904.0} 139.4 | 12.64 
MEX || Norfolk, Via-....<.j.-.-5s SSP BcaSObbs 05 Apr. 12} 48 6,635.5 | 138.3 4. 66 
LXXIII | Potomac River, Va. (Transplanted.) .| May 16| 55 3, 501. 4 63.7 6. 51 
L Ruppetaanock River, Va. (Trans- | May 16] 28 3,309.5 | 118.2 7. 86 
planted.) 
LXXI | James River, Va. (Transplanted.) ...|May 16] 30 3,085.9 | 102.8 6. 50 
Average of 14 samples ..---...---|-con.csaa- 37.4 | 4,181.2} 113.8 9. 47 
LXXIV | ‘‘Cove,’’ Chesapeake Bay. (Canned.).| May 24|--....]-.-.-----.]-------- 50. 23 
SCALLOPS (Pecten irradians.) a 
Aale|shelterisland, N. Yiccos: -<.coseeiee cece Mar Siac ccis| oisiwlecicisr=|mistsmren 100. 00 
sp. @ 00h PaO Ue ie renee At Apr. 220 (Ess eee Ss 100. 00 
AVErsge Of.2 BAMPlOS) <2... sue necleecesenses|seosee| ecco esos | aaencoens 100.00 
LONG CLAMS (Mya arenaria). a 
PexcVs Boston Mass). 2. sc. cctsectenceecuecee May 5] 20 1, 504. 0 75.2 | 29.26 
TXaV) || Long Island, NOY ...ccsscsceececee set Apr. 28, 20 1, 378.5 68.9 | 36.49 
Average of 2 samples ...........-|,......--- 20 “1,441. 3 72.1 | 32.87 
ROUND CLAMS (Venus mercenaria). os ans 
Pi XeVels | LittlewNeck, N.vVi i-:2.ssso-caceee sees Apr. 28] 20 1, 907.5 95.4 | 16.80 
LossteErs (Homarus americanus). | anne ia 
gal PMBiN 6.5/2: 20-50%. va saiseecs sonkeomeese ee Mar, 15| 2 1, 973.0 O86R5 ae ceaace GHencede 
0p. 40 Beer CO je Fa ae soecamecen sce eee ee Apr. 26] 1 MG25))|| 81620) ee semeeee meen 
TEXEXe || Boston, Mass -...02.2005-0.2ee eee May 5] 1 1,335.0 |1, 335.0 |.....--. ek BP one 
Average of 3isamplesi:s22esco sees semen | seer eae es 1106557 ||Ec ete eee | 
LXXVI | Canned lobster. Maino .............. May 26!...... Pee fae 2 ee 
CRAY-FISH. aa an | 
LXIV | Potomac River, Va ................... Apr. 26| 21 695.0 | 33.1] 12.30 aces 


[51] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 281 


INVERTEBRATES. 


’ 


tions of water and dry substance. 


Ll 
In whole sample. In flesh. In liquids. | ™ ecls Por- | In whole sample. ° 
: : S 
g i lege et es ike 
3 ; : : 
E Sy eel Hy F gee iSh 32 We Se: iene 
a = A 8 3 $ q a4| 82 E 
x) cs) a a a q S$q | Sa) Ss a 
2 a 2 $ 8 § wa | 25) 2a Pa 
| = Hoe a A 2 |sa |es|/ se] 8 
2 2 a] i 3 i 3 Ki =] 2 an a3 3 
a 3 a 2 hy 2 2 Ss S 3 i) 
Se. ee ae et | ee lee le bes |e 
™ 64 4 e a) e A E a> ‘fa ka a 4 
Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. |Pr.ct.| Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. |Pr.ct.| Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr. ct. |Pr. ct.| Pr. ct. 
20.01 | 79.77 | 0.22 | 84.21] 15.79] 96.40 | 3.60| 8880] 11-20] 1.98|0.27| 225 | LXVUI 
17.00 | 82.41] 0.59| 79.01! 20.99] 95.05| 4.95] 84.79| 15.21] 2.29810.30] 258] LXX 
18.90 | 79.74 | 1.36! 81.02| 18.98; 96.12|3.88! 90.04| 9.96| -1.43| 0.44] 1.87| LV 
19.15 | 79.66/ 1.19 | 82.09| 17.91 | 96.33|3.67| 90.89| 9.11| 1.341] 0.43] 1.76| LXXV 
18.06 | 79.92 | 2.02] 81.30] 18.70 * 94.00 | 6.00 85.12/ 14.88| 2.36|0.33| 2.69 | LIV 
18.62 | 80.16] 1.22| 76.24! 23.76 | 94.33|5.67| 80.76) 19.24] 3.18| 0.19] 3.37] LVI 
18.40| 81.18] 0.42| 81.97/ 18.73 | 95.06! 4.94| 86.98| 13.02] 2.00| 0.38] 2.38 | LVIIZ 
20.28 | 78.86] 0.86| 79.92! 20.08| 95.44|4.56| 87.57] 12.43] 2.07|0.46| 2.53 | LVIL 
16.23| 83.16 | 0.61) 84.47| 15.53| 96.35 |3.65| 89.58| 10.42! 1.42|0.26| 1.68| LX 
17.52 | 81.76 | 0.72] 81.65] 18.35 | 95.07 | 4.93| 85.37] 14.63] 2.31| 0.24] 2.55 | LXI 
11.18 | 88.31] 0.51 | 83.86] 16.14| 96.83| 3.17] 91.45| 8.55| 0.75/ 0.21] 0.96| LIX 
12.15] 87.10] 0.75] 78.87] 21.13] 95.51 | 4.49| 86.60] 13.40] 1.38|0.25| 1.63 | LXXII 
15.17 | 84.02| 0.81 | 62.64] 17.36] 97.24/2.76| 89.88! 10.12] 1.36] 0.20; 1.56| LXXII 
13.79 | 85.30} 0.91 | ‘93.49 | 16.51] 95.81/ 4.09] 90.05] 9.95] 1.07} 0.30| 1.37 | LXXI 
16.89 | 82.23|0.88| 81.43 | 1857| 95.69 | 4.31| 87.71| 12.29] 1.85 |0.30| 2.08 
arOUNONG fier as lene 78.73 | 21.27] 93.57 | 6.43| 86.14| 13.88 | 10.68 | 3.20 | 13.88 | LXXIV 
22.21 | 22.21 |...... 22,21 | LI 
W716) AWI16 222. 17.16 | LXUI 
19. 68 | 19.68 |...... 19. 68 
| | 
53.90 | 44.28 | 1.82] 77.98 | 22.04] 95.73 | 4.27] 86.11) 13.89) 6.45/1.05| 7.50 | LXVIZ 
57.64 | 39.93} 2.43] 81.05| 1895| 94.76 | 5.24] 86.05| 13.95| 6.91|1.08| 7.98 | LXV 
55.77 | 42.11 | 2.12| 79.52 | 20.48| 95.25 | 4.75 | 86.08| 13.92] 6.68|1.07| 7.74 
31.71 | 67.50 | 0.79| 78%24| 21.76] 95.22 | 4.88] 86.20] 13.80| 3.66] 0.73| 4.39 | LXVI 
52.52 | 43.96 | 3.52] 84.30 15.70 8.25 | L 
36.24 | 60.87 | 2.89 | 81.77 18, 23 6.60 | LXII 
30.56 | 67.57 | 1.87 | 82.11 17. 89 5.47 | LXIX 
39.77 | 67.47 |2.76| 82.73 | 17.27 |.....-..|.....- 82.73 | 17.27| 6.77 |.....- 6.77 
| — —SS= Py 
STN) fl eee eee 79.36 | 20.64 |........|...... 79.36 | 20.64 | 20.64 |...... 20.64 | LXXVI 
12.30| 85.15 |2.55| 81.22} 18,78 |........|.....- 81.22} 1878| 2.31 |...... 2.31 | LXIV 


282 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


[52] 


ANALYSES OF 


TABLE VI.—Analyses cal 


me 
© In flesh. 
& 
ao == 
ce of 
5 s ery | 
N | 
is 5 Name and locality of sample. gs | 
5a : ox |) ae 
oe) =| g | Q 
3) a8 3 
g oo 8 | 
3 2 a) 5 ro 
I a ic] = Fa 
il 
4 a 4 'S) 
OysTERS (Ostrea virginiana). 
Priets || Prict |eerictes | Enact: 
DPXVAL |) -Buzzard's Bay, Mass-- mci ce aelanin am a ee en\=\el-i=ii-lem sinloln 7.85 | 49. 06 9. 95 9. 39 
GENEXS || FP TOvad OnCOyLVer, | lee ly sos cleanin am sleet aisle Jalemiaeieiare 7.85 | 49.06 | 12.25] 10.15 
PIVEN Stony: Creek, Commas ie asm ecieteleto ete oe i= seeiciel lalate =a 8.82 | 55.18 8.41 | 14.58 
TOK: [tee daha i et Eg Be ee eh ce oe ne eee 8.83 | 55.19! 829] 14.30 | 
MGR; |pHairhaven. (Conn: \-c4-2 osc ooesaseate sae se senescence ate 8.46 | 52.88} 10.92 | 11.77 
LVI | Blue Point, N. Y .. 7.08 | 44,25 9. &9 8. 66 
TET PROC kawiayeNin 4 ar seeisiseeiee enieetre semienceheane « ==-|- of184 | 49.00 | 1134 8. 94 
LVII | East River, N. Y...-.... Paaue bons aocorn so seb nosanoaondaocc 8.32 | 52.00 10. 7 8. 89 ! 
LX | Staten Island, N. ¥ : 8.51 | 53.18 | 10.84 9.10 | 
TEXT (Shrewsbury iN. diate ae. beke he pees ceeecee cee hake 7.15 | 44.69/ 12.00] 7.24 | 
GONG PIN OTTONES Widsets cre seta - aoe reise ereiece ee oem erectile 9524) (57575 901 117275 
LXXIII | Potomac River, Va. (Transplanted).....-......-...-.--. 7.43 | 46.44] 10.77] 12.02 
LXXII | Rappahannock River, Va. (Transplanted ............--- 7.83 | 48.94 | 10.96 9.12 
TEX XI || James River, Va. | (Transplanted): .55- .-2<--.=----4----- 8.01} 50.06 | 10.76! 10.48 
Averageiof 14 samples <2 js oc. -)21-.0 oa reieisis aoe =! ie = 8.09+| 50.56 | 10.44] 10.42. 
LXXIV | ‘'Cove,” Chesapeake Bay. (Canned)....:.-........-..--- mat 50 | 65.62 m7 76 oar 51 
_ [Ss SSS eS Se, 
SCALLOPS (Pecten irradians). | 
ls ShelterMisland Nee eerste sc nee a a ce ase eee reiatee eyes 10. 84 67.75 0.13 6. 68 
I FPG O UE eee it Ren Aer Aiea Aes BEES OSCR BOA SG odatee 13.46 | 84.13 1.76 Tol 
AV erage Ola, SMNPlOS: sacle selocesie ec cinee eerste 12.15 | 75.94 | 0.95 7.10 | 
LonG CLAM (Mya arenaria). oes i ee 
TexVeliiy Bostons Massics-. =o ces cceses coe ceeene a see eriennels --+-| 10956 | 66.00 813; 12.51 
EEXSV ai aluon'o Meland.y Ns Veter steam ceeeeee eerie sree aeiase ee eesieers 107 | 66.06 | 8 03 8. 23 
Average of 2 samples sas. coc.c-bsee-/2>22 202s! meen 10.57 | 66,03} 808| 10.37 
ROUND CLAM (Venus mercenaria). iy ip ata | 
TXAVIG) Little Neck: aN. Viseeeccc-- sc canseceelonccaceicecteemaciona. 8. 52 53.25. 8.39 | 10.19 
LosstErs (Homarus americanus). Rae ‘ae 
Rag W Maino (235 swe alee hotee ee Scene eee 11.85 | 74.06) 11.62| 10.38 
159.00 0 eae GOs. aiswems cite eeccsisisematscecmeros afelstorelelelalorcteeine stes 12. 33 77. 06 8.47 9. 36 
LXIX | Boston, Mass ..... patie fees canc tae ee cmenneccoceeeemaccae 13,44 | 84.00) 14.19 | 10.43 
AVeTAC SOLS SAMPLES isc eeiels\isilecisisinneeee sisesee elses 12.54 | 78.37 | 11.43 | 10.06 
eXexavle| (Canned lobster. Maine 22222 scence econ cecececesce seeennae 42.98 | 81.13 2.24 | 138.44 
CRAY-FISH. | te 
EEX PPOtomac River, Vai «i-=<io ase scene estmeenseeeeeseencees ae 13.63 | 85.19 2.45 6. 98 
e 


[53] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 283 


INVERTEBRATES. 


culated on dry substance. 


ow 
Tn flesh. In liquids. In flesh and liquids. 2 
3 ae Fi : ' 3 
i A s - , 4 
ir os | Gre A F Cy 
rar) { Ye) ~1O 
Oe) | aaa 2 Bie AS, 
Bee 8 é F 2 a a ae a 6a 
a3 | 33 8 2 i) = 2 ‘30 3 8 
A eee ‘a J 5 bp 2 oe Bp 2 mR 
Qo | AS i) & [=e=) = =) 2 Bo 5 so ° 
ee) ee a = 25 s = RS 25 8 5 r 
a | a Sree Piece Oe. hl eter lac & | 6 4 
| 
i | 
Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr. ct. | Pr.ct. | Pr. ct. 
1.17| 4.15] 3.53] 5.58| 34.87] 0.07] 45.27] 7.00] 43.68] 621] 29.34] LXVIII 
1.64] 3.55| 2.39| 4.78] 29.87] 0.04] 4879| 6.74| 42.17| 7.86| 24.06| LXX 
1.46} 5.31] 4.33| 3.421 91.35] 0.35] 70.91| 5.57] 3476] 3.55] 4850/1 LV 
1.77| 3.65| 3.70| 3.06! 1912! 1.31| 70.46| 5.27] 3289! 3.99| 48.93] LXXV 
1.57] 5.58] 3.11| 5.56| 34.76] 0.27] 53.13! 7.61| 47.49! 7.70] 24.33! LI 
1.28] 3.70] 1.96| 6.50| 40.62| 1.54] 33.74| 6.921 43.18| 7.55] 15.71 |L 
1.59] 3.89] 2.81] 5.32] 33.27| 0.71] 45.75| 6.78| 42.31] 6.88| 24.38 | LVIIE 
1.62] 9.01| 2.94! 5.85] 36.57! 0.45] 34.45] 7.10] 44.31] 5.69| 21.51 | LVI 
TOs) Bok 1.98| 5.71] 35.68! 2.55] 23.15! 7.29] 45.42] 7.21] 15.95| LX 
1.61| 223] 1.58] 660] 41.25] 0.88] 37.18| 7.00] 4368] 886] 15.58| LXI 
1.79} 2.88! 276] 5.22] 32.63] 0.18] 5203] 6.90] 43.05] 3.86] 35.08 | LIX 
179| 259] 3.18] 516] 3224] 0.25] 54.96] 6.37] 39.75] 5.89| 31.96 | LXXUOr 
1.80} 213] 1.93] 5.89] 3681] 0.24] 53.66| 6.90| 43.05] 5.80| 30.59) LXXIL 
179| 2.78] 3.24] 4.64] 29.00] 0.27] 62.64| 6.23] 38.88] 5.21| 3806| LXXI 
1.63| 3.63| 282| 5.24] 3275| 0.51| 4901| 669] 41.79| 616| 28.31 | 
162| 0.94; 256| 4.41] 27.56| 4.14| 19.32| 7.47| 46.61| 10.98| 13.39 | LXXIV 
—————— (Fare SSS SS SSS ————_—— { 
| 
ETT aOe PLS TB' chee oe lt satelite, coca e bs: 10.84 | 67.75| 0.13] 6.68 | LI 
CUD STI pe Gr Goud mn Us a geen ean ae a ec Di a 13.46 | 84.13| 1.76| 7.51 | LXItr 
OMG Woderos |e Weel ace Paha os. heat, eee ..| 12.15 | 75.94] 0.95| 7.10 | 
ces ee ee ee eee | 
| 
2.93! 3.14| 2.98! 4.86] 11.62) 0.14] 77.20; 658) 41.07] 4.48] 4208] LXVIZ 
2.48] 235) 1.84| 3.92] 2450| 0.55] 5600) 814| 50.79| 5.29] 25.75 | LXV 
2.36| 2.75| 2.41| 289] 1806] 0.35] 6660] 7.36| 45.93] 4.89| 33.97 
| i ae 
L71| 4.11| 322] 296] 1850] 0.34] 64.97] 5.90] 3683] 1.95] 3594 | LXVI 
C2 in ie eer eer eee eee | 
DLT Elie ae meri ie: ae a ame een) | eee 11.85| 74.06| 11.62] 10.38] L 
S70 Wey al ae os el eee! Pe ana ae (TC UR oe RS 12.33 | 77.06| 847| 9.36| LXII 
Ben nOG SBT. cee sete ooo. like een 13.44 | 84.00| 14.19| 10.43 | LXIX 
er ee ae eve tomes. ate sl) aoe aay | Pinas -10006 
1.14 | 2.34 | 5.05 Baie ee ares eee eee 12.98| 81.13| 2.24 | 13.44 | LXXVI 
Pfs ee By Pm eae a a seoe----| 1363| 8519| 2.45] 6.98 | LXIV 


a D 


284 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [54] 


ANALYSES OF 


TABLE VII.—Recap 


Calculated on 


2 In flesh. 
F i 1 
“ g 3 if 
° 41) 4 
h . ° cay ro 
Q Name and locality of sample. 5 3 2 
E ‘aye aa/|8 
me 86 | §- 
a gs . | a | 3S 
ba : Sx a eS ~—n A 
So =| | n og a oO 
— (3) = 3s | a 
& K on g © ray 5 o 
) ° aq [2 
2° ~ A =] a =} 2 a, ° 
3 S real =| 3 aad eS ‘a | 
a EB | zm! 4 yal Oy oR R 5 
OysTERS (Ostrea virgini- 
ana). Per Per Per Per Per Per Per | Per 
ct. et ct. ct. ct. ct. cet. cet. 
LXVITI | Buzzard’s Bay, Mass.....-..-| 84.21] 1.24 7.75 | 1.57] 1.48] 0.16] 0.66] 0.56 
LXX | Providence River, R.I....-.--. 79.01 | 1.65} 10.30} 2.58] 2,13 | 0.40] 0.75 | 0.50 
LV | Stony Creek, Conn ........-.. 81.02 | 1.67) 10.46] 1.60] 2.76] 0.28] 1.01 | 0.82 
1 BDO: QV aaa GOR. Asn ecenectceassape 82. 09 aay 9. 83 1.48.) 2.55) 0.32 0.65 | 0.69 
Vs) Hair, Haven: Conny ..--- ---s-< 81.3 1.58 9:89 |, 2:05.) °2520)1 0.29 I= 1045) 0253 
Vile: |Blue Point, IN. Wi saes cosine see) 9 Gee 1. 68 10. 51 2. 35 2. 06 0. 30 0.88 | 0.47 
Piven Rockawaiy;N: Mi--s--ce=6e =< 81. 27 1.47 9.18 2.13 1. 67 0, 30 0.73 | 0.53 
TVelle| Bastupiver: IN. Yo .cesesecce cee 79.92) 1.67) 10:44) 2:16 | 1.7 0.33 | 1.01 | 0.59 
Tx Staten Island: NoW co.cc -cc coe 84. 47 1.33} 8.30 I6Sel) 1a Osa 0.50 | 0.31 
LXI | Shrewsbury, N.J ..-...-.-.-- 81.65 |} 1.31 8.20 | 2.20) 1.33 | 0.29) O541 |0529 
MRIEXS | NOTTONK A Vidiver no ciaeiotcn olen eeisicte 83. 86 1.49 9. 32 1.45] 1.82] 0.29 0.46 | 0.45 
LXXIIl PCM RLee yer Va. (Trans- | 78. 87 nts (an it: t= 2.27 2.54 | 0.38 | 0.55 | 0. 67 
planted.) | | | 
LXXII | Rappahannock River, Va. | 82.64! 1.36 8.49 | 1.90 | 1.58] 0.31 | 0.37 | 0.34 
(Transplanted.) 
LXXI| James River, Va. (Trans- | 83.49 | 1.32 819 | 1.78 | 1.71} 0.36 0.46 | 0.54 
planted.) | | | 
Average of 14 samples. - | 1.43 | 1.49| -9.31| 1.94| 1.93. 0.30 | 0.68 | 0.53 
LXIV | Cove, - Chesapeake Bay | 7873 | 2.24) 13.96) 3.78 | 1.60| 0.34| 0.20| 0.54 
(Canned). = ee eee SS SS SS SS SESS 
ScALLOPsS (Pecten irradians). 
Tiles} Sheltersland New osecsecser 77.79 2.41 | 15. 05 0. 03 1.48 | 0.48 0.50 | 0.39 
1 Gp: G 00 beetess GOs sacskowescs ais cisineieis 82. 84 2.31 | 14.44 0. 30 1.29 0. 47 0.47 | 0.32 
Average of 2 samples ..| 80.32 | 2.36| 14.75| 0.17| 1.38| 0.48! 0.49 | 0.36 
Lone cLaM (Mya arenaria). | Pete aed ena - 4 * 
| 
EAXVIL | Boston; Mass -:-..2-5.-<.-.2~- 77.98 | 216] 13.46] 1.65| 2.55! 0.46] 0.64 | 0.66 
TeXsVee| ong Island, Nei -.--<- eaters | 81. 05 2.00} 12.53) 1.52 1.56 0. 47 0.45 | 0.35 
Average of 2samples ..| 79.52 | 2.08 | 12.99) 1.59] 2.05| 0.47| 0.55 | 0.50 
— = Se = 
ROUND CLAM (Venus merce- | | 
naria). | 
Txoval | duittle: Neck, N. Yo... 25sec -se 78. 24 1. 86 11. 59 | 0.74 | 2.22 0. 37 0.89 | 0.70 
Lopster (Homarus ameri-| i | ne | oo hl a 
canus). | ' 
lie |PNU BIN Oto nsinierse o> sem ae eeioatees 84. 30 1. 86 11. 65 1. 82 1. 63 0.33-' 0.38 | 0.68 
TEXTS: See ace Omen aisisisiein owtalcieta.cisteiete 81.77 2. 24 14. 05 nt) 1 i. 71 0.41 0.36 | 0.59 
pXaleXer | BOStON = MASS 2 c.c0.<c0-eccccscee 82. 11 2.41 15. 03 2. 54 1. 87 0. 42 | 0.55 | 0.50 
Average of 3samples...| 82.73 | 2.17| 13.57| 1.97| 1.74; 0.39| 0.43 | 0.59 
LXVI | Canned lobster, Maine....... 79,36 | 2.68| 16.75! 4.62| 2.78] 0.24| 0.48| 105° 
CRAY-FISH. Rep iz + Gs i 
LXIV | Potomac River...........-..-| 81.22} 2.56] 16.00] 0.46] 1.31] 0.54] 0.26 | 0.27 


[55] CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND VALUE OF FISH FOR FOOD. 285 


INVERTEBRATES. 


itulation of analyses. 


fresh substance. A 
a2 
& 6 
In liquids. In edible portion = flesh and liquids. q iON a 
= BP | 
FI z aS é 
A In dry substance. = a b= 
3 a | 8a ‘S 
S : #S |g 3 
ee : a. eo | se | 
eS 2 Sate) Bo | Be 3 
an 2 an Cal ed =| 
gs ; a | 3° oll pe b 
a ox Ea =o ox = 5 = g oe) inl 5 
21 8/4 er cat ees edie ete aleoan er: 
eS mlec mies sey) 8: epee | US lee] cer lee ag Z 
Soe So tomer Mee So sks ee ee: ed a ees eB he 3 
PlRmti¢ Eo Pe Als &/o;la|4/|4 |8 4 
Per | Per| Per | Per | Per | Per Per | Per | Per | Per | Per | Per | Per | Per 
ct ct ct ct et ct. ct ct ct ct. et ct ct. ct. 
96.40 | 0.20 | 1.23 | 0.03 | 1.63 | 88.80 | 11.20] 5.3 0.99 | 1.54 | 3.37 | 0.85 | 28.00} 20.01; LX VUOII 
95.05 | 0.24 | 1.48 | 0.00 | 2.41 | 84.79 | 15.21 | 7.12 | 1.65 | 2.23 | 4.21 | 1.14 | 36. 83} 17.00] LXX 
96.12 | 0.13 | 0.80 | 0.01 | 2.72 | 90.04 9. 96 4.64 | 0.64 | 2.73 | 1.95 | 0.74 | 22.68) 18.90) LV 
96. 33 | 0.11 | 0.68 | 0.05 | 2.61 | 90.89 9.11 4.19 | 0.60 | 2.59 | 1.73 | 0.67 | 20.48! 19.15, LX XV 
94.00 | 0.33 | 2.03 | 0.02 | 3.19 | 85.12 | 14.88 | 7.53 | 1.44 | 2.50 | 3.41 | 1.20 | 37.60! 18.06) LIV 
94.33 | 0.37 | 2.26 | 0.09 | 1.91 | 80.76 | 19.24 8.20 | 1.72 | 2.02 | 7.3 1.31 | 44. 26) 18.62) LVI 
95. 06 | 0.26 | 1.60 | 0.04 | 2.26 | 86.98 | 13. 02 6.00 | 1.25 | 1.92 | 3.85 | 0.96 | 31.09; 18.40} LVIIL 
95. 44 | 0.31 | 1.91 | 0.02 | 1.83 | 87.57 | 12.43 6.31 | 1.10 | 1.87 | 3.15 | 1.01 | 31.61) 20.28) LVITI 
96.35 | 0.21 | 1.30 | 0.09 | 0.85 | 89.58 | 10.42 | 5.24! 0.98 | 1.17 | 3.03 | 0.84 | 26.70) 16.23) LX 
95.07 | 0.33 | 2.03 | 0.04 | 1.83 | 85.37 | 14.63 6.48 | 1.60 | 1.47 | 5.08 | 1.04 | 34.72) 17.52) LXT 
96.83 | 0.17 | 1.05 | 0.01 | 1.64 | 91.45 8, 55 4.50 | 0.61 | 1.54 | 1.90 | 0.72 | 21.99] 11.18) LIX 
95.51 | 0.23 | 1.42 | 0.01 | 2.47 | 86.60 | 13.40 5.92 | 1.22 | 2.51 | 3.75 | 0.95 | 80. 61) 12.15; LX XTIT 
7.24 | 0.16 |; 0.99 | 0.01 | 1.48 | 89.88 | 10.12] 4.88, 0.99 ; 1.52; 2.73 | 0.78 | 24.90) 15.17) LX XI 
95. 81 | 0. 19 | 1.17 | 0.01 | 2.56 | 90.05 | 9.95] 4.47 | 0.84 | 2.16 | 2.48 | 0.74 | 22.69) 13.79) LXXT 


| 


93.5 70.28 | 1.77 | 0.27 | 1.24 | 86.14 | 13.86 | 7.89 | 2.04 | 1.42 | 2.51 | 1.26 | 39. 24/100. 00] LXIV 


ee ere Pema Pies: ee eee | 77.79 | 22.21 | 15.05 | 0.03 | 1.48 | 5.65 | 2 41 | 70.03'100.00 LI 
2.31 | 63. 87/100.00 LXIII 


2.57 | 1.21 | 36.09) 53.90, LX VII 
2.52 | 1.34 | 39.91) 57.64, LXV 


95.73 | 0.08 | 0.49 | 0.01 | 3.29 86.11 | 13.89 | 7.53 | 0.90 | 2.89 
0.21 | 1.30 | 0.03 | 2.93 86.05 | 13.95 | 8.40 | 0.97 | 2.06 


95.25 | 0.15 | 0.89 | 0.02 | 3.11 | 86.08 | 13.92 | 7.97 | 0.94 | 2.47 | 2.64 | 1.27 | 38.00) 55.77) 


| | | 


| | 


| | 
95.22 | 0.14 | 0.86 | 0.02.! 3.17 | 86.20 13. 80 6.56 | 0.40 ,; 2.67 | 4.17 | 1.05 | 32.56) 31.71) LX VI 


79,11 100.00; LX VI 


ee =] o> 


i ) 


18.78 | 16.00 | 0.46 | 1.31 | 1.01 | 2.56 | 70. G 12. 30; LXIV 
| 


APPENDIX E. 


JS aed WO lg oy pa red Bi) Sa 


XH.—MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISH. 


By G. Brown GOODE. 


ANALYTICAL SYNOPSIS. 


S. Mis. 29-—19 289 


Page. 
AG IN tLOMUC TOM mee aca sei sctcr aslo Swinisicie o/s stele sa aby sce se Sess oecoelecceiieseiee cece 2 
1, Object of essay and sources of information .... .... 22. -------- ence eee es 
B.—Names of the Sword-fish -.....----. aoe cou decadence ies Skee oon es esiee 3 
Oo: Populannames-of Sword fish. 710d. 0.e2s6 oss ousadileeesce soeusssh eee 3 
3. Zoological names of Sword-fish, with synonymy .........--.---------- 3 
4. Popular names of allied American species...-~..-..-.-..-+2.--ss0e2--- 5 

' C.—Descriptions of the Sword-fish family, with its subfamilies and genera, with 
descriptive and anatomical notes upon the American species.....--.. 6 
5. Description of the-family Xiphitd@ <2 << oss ae ne sccsscecseelsceccceccse 6 
6. Description of the subfamily Xiphine and the genus Xiphias BEC oOD HaaaS 7 

7. Description of the subfamily Histiophorine and the genera Tetriapturus 
And FisOphorus -22 lees oe as Vaal bceice Suis ots Seles Joes sichewecce chon meee 8 
8. Descriptive notes on the Sword-fish, Xiphius gladius...--...-.-22 .----- 9 
9. Descriptive notes on the Spear-fish, Tetrapturus albidus.....-.:-------- 11 
10. Poey’s descriptions of Tetrapdurus albidus and Tetrapturus amplis -...--. 15 
11. Notes on the Sail-fish, Histiophorus americanus ...-...------------------ 16 
12. An enumeration of the species of the Sword-fish family ..--.......----- 18 
D:—Georraphical distribation co. cose rrsewwcad das C2202 Ste oes weclemecetinns 23 
13. Early allusions to the Sword-fish in Europe........--------.---------- 23 
14. Allusions to the Sword-fish in America by early writers ...-..--..---.- 25 
15. Distribution of Xiphias gladius in the Eastern Atlantic.......--..------ 26 
16. Distribution on the coast of the United States .........-...----- 2-26 27 
17. Occurrence in the Pacific and Indian Oceans.........--. --.. ----+-0c-00 29 
18:\Sword-fish) entero rivers ~.s22 =<: is eos aw eros a--sserwciaccccs wanes 29 
19. Geographical range of other members of the family ....-...-.----.---- 30 
20. Periodical movements of the Sword-fish ..........-.---.---------. +s 31 
21. Reasons of the coming of the Sword-fish in the Western Atlantic ...-- i. 33 
22. The influence of temperature upon the movements of the Sword-fish-. - 33. 
23. Probable winter habitat of the Sword-fish .... .... 2.2. .----- 20+ seco 34 
24. Movements of individual Sword-fishes...-.. .--.---. .-2-0. -200 22+ + --- > 35 
25... Movements of Spear-fishes: so-so. ---+ -2sssensee nese cciciine'soce.coemas= 35 
26.) Movementsiof Sall-fishes!iu2 22/255 )12 5 ssiseee Sense saldes ice -aalelee~ === 36 
Pi Sizeand tater crow bh .2o5-0 22. oo. pclseteiaeies amiseewice ae sere some esese= 36 
27. Maximum and average size of American Sword-fishes ..........------- 36 
28. Minimum size of American Sword-fish ...... 2.2... 22.2 e222 cone eee 37 
29. Size of Sword-fish in the Mediterranean ...... 2.2.20. c200 cone eoee eons 38 
BU MI AbO ero iil Sees see tein ee aoe eee aaneone abemeee es seas <eee 38 
i —-ADUMM ANGI Aenea asse bot ka tect ek cenit ebtenee aelemesisbaciscicl wane cewiates 40 
31. Abundance at the present time...... 2-22. 020. oo ene cone cee eee cee eee : 40 
32. Abundance in the past and probability of future decrease.....--------- 40 
33. Effects of overfishing in the Mediterranean .......--.------2+--------- 40 


290 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


(Eh 5 1G | Ae A See Oem Bae eRe eRe See sce O marc Ooesan sen Cease ascbsocs- 41 
Bul, INE RAIYS ChE IYO oS 666 Godin cagcog cog0ns odd Hoot Soes ctocon So qeaé soos osensss 41 
35. Manner of. obtaining food .... 2. 22-220 c 2-2 won oan wens nnn wens onan 41 
H. Reproduction..---. ..---- e2-c0. cone conn ee ce een n cons ce eran enn n ne tone one ne ee 42 
36, Location of the breeding, crounds sea ee es sae ee ae cee aa ee ele eete nee eneat= 42 
37. Habits of the Sword-fish in the breeding season.......--..----.--------- 42 
38. Absence of habits of breeding season on coast of United States -......... 43 
39. Curious ancient belief in the viviparous reproduction of the Sword-fish-. 43 
fe Hnemies and fatalities ....0...eete seen -- ee oar ee een ee 43 
40. Pugnacity of the Sword-fish ..........---------- ---- -----+ ----- +20. eee 43 
Al. Pugnacity of the Spear-fish’-. 2. cols. - 2. oon 3-3 = woe conn n ence ne were 49 
42) Attacks of Sword-fish nponswhales sj. scccelocecc cases cose eae ce sels salle siaie 49 
43) Eneniies of the Ss wOrd-ts te sescre ae see haem saccm slew cine toe oie eee 54 
44. Invertebrate parasites of the Sword-fish ....-...---..----- -------------- 54 
45. Fish parasites—the suckers or remoras....--..---.---------------------- 58 
Reiki yesicnaecs coaaep Saaooo Sesas eoocondeds edoclboobed seas dacs Gagd aasa's 59 
46. The location of the fishing groundS...... .0.225 .2<--- seeee- n-ne n ne - 59 
47. Apparatus of capture... 2... 22. css ge snes we cece Seco eseres dnc enelnesninn 60 
48, The manner of fitting a vessel for swordfishing..........---..----------- 62 
AQ, -Manneriof capture). < - fas 2 si=- Se cis a ucins ajo inla wie olnle pies ele lainielo mis) = mlnle lies meme 63 
50. The perils and the romance of swordfishing ....---...------------+------ 63 
51. A landsman’s description of swordfishing .......--.-..---.-------------- 64 
52. The capture of Sword-fish by hook and line -.....---..--.---- Steed cece 65 
53. Swordfishing vessels ... 2. .2.. -220 cccecs coccee sencee cnccee cons ence cone - 66 
de Minancial profits pomishermeni- sstseieesiee semeler -et-li 9) tole eias em oem 67 
55, History of the American Sword-fish fishery .........----. --------------- 67 
56. The Sword-fish fishery of the Mediterranean ....-..-.--.---..----------- 68 
i —Products,of the fishebyis:=s2-t - ln sie miel= sceie oie el =e aie ee eines cleo elem 73 
57. Record of a Gloucester schooner for the season of 1878.......-.---..----. 73 
58. Results of trips by other vessels -...-.. oe ABS he Sere eee Be RR 74 
59. Statistics of Capture... seesetceus oecie == sei seie mien ooe ne acts) aeeeieeeee a= eee 
M.—Economical uses and the markets... -.. << c2 2005. ac celewne seen sane encore sees 75 
60; “Sword-fish.as an articleiof food ce ooo on ose. eeemiom eles = em lenin em icinrialelcine 75 
Gly Wiehe eee Bon aaetesus odecssoooces nciacco code HSco coesan ssp es occu acdc 78 
(Ge JES UKE ne ROB HOC ea B SO eOSeGad noo obo qabOSrbonUEN cSodgoorHoecne codes peae¢ 78 
Appendix .- 2... secs ce cece te as Sos ewe w wemalesw = eewele neler == *iresp es eee bane = 81 
(O83, JU EIAS «ISeGe Ss Soe A ooeae eo aSeooisced o450 o550 cdohoe Sduods c6n6Gd 7.ca5eo Dadbo= 81 
64, 65, 66. Descriptions and discussions of allied species.......-.------------- 87 
Pts O PL BLOS gos a wicis simeicnin soe oo ecinnccesscer peas oo seembieie Sem ss sor= faint e aeceiee 98 
Alphabetical INGex —- <<< aniccw cee eck amine ome wee cle eee s-marisiasms bore onnininen a meee 99 


A.—INTRODUCTORY NOTES. 
1. OBJECTS OF THE ESSAY AND SOURCES OF INFORMATION. 


This essay upon the Sword-fish and its uses makes no claim to be con- 
sidered a contribution to knowledge. In the course of six summers’ 
study of fish and fisheries on the coast of New England and as many 
winters of research into ichthyological literature, a considerable quan- 
tity of notes concerning the Sword-fish have accumulated in the writer’s 
portfolio. These are printed below, arranged in systematic order, with 
the hope that they may stimulate inquiry by showing at a glance what 
is now known about the habits of this mysterious fish and what it is 


[3] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 291 


desirable should be learned. Such of the facts as have not previously 
been printed are for the most part drawn from the experience of fisher- 
men either by the writer or by others who have kindly responded to let- 
ters asking for information by interviewing their local authorities. Mr. 
John H. Thomson, of New Bedford; Mr. Willard Nye, of New Bedford ; 
Mr. E. G. Blackford and Mr. Barnet Phillips, of New York; and Mr. C. 
B. Fuller, of Portland, have aided thus. Capt. Benjamin Ashby, of No- 
ank; Capts. R. H. Hurlbert, John Rowe, and George H. Martin, of Glouces- 
ter; and Capt. I. H. Michaux, of New Bedford, veteran swordfishermen, 
have been asked questions innumerable, and their words are frequently 
quoted. As far as possible, all statements have been confirmed by per- 
sonal observation; but for this there has been little opportunity. Few 
fishes are so difficult to observe, and a student may pass summer after 
summer in the attempt to study them with few results other than the 
sight of a few dozen dorsal fins cutting through the water, a chance to 
measure and dissect a few specimens, a page or two of estimates of an- 
nual captures, and perhaps the experience of ae the side of his 
boat pierced by one of the ugly swords. 

This paper is the fourth of a series upon The Natural and Eeonomi- 
cal History of Aimerican Food-fishes, the first, on THE SCUPPAUG, and 
the second, on THE BLUEFISH, having been published by Professor 
Baird in the Report of the United States Fish Commission, Part I 
(1873); the third, on THE MENHADEN, in Part V (1879) of the same 
report. The HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN WHALE FISHERY, by Mr. 
Alexander Starbuck in Part IV of the same report, is also properly to 
be enumerated in ghis series. 


B.—_NAMES OF THE SWORD-FISH. 
2.—POPULAR NAMES OF SWORD-FISH. 


The names by which the fish under consideration is known all have 
reference to its most prominent feature, the prolonged snout. The 
“ Sword-fish” of our own tongue, the “ Zwaard-fis” of the Hollander, 
the Italian “Sifio” and ‘“ Pesce-epada”, the Spaniard’s “Espada”, ‘ Bspa- 
darte”, and varied by “Pez de epada” in Cuba, and the French “Espadon”, 
“Dard”, and * Epée de mer” are simply variations of one theme, repeti- 
tions of the “Gladius” of ancient Italy and “Xiphias”, the name by 
which Aristotle, the father of zoology, called the same fish twenty-three 
hundred years ago. The French ‘‘Hmpereur” and the ‘“Imperador” and 
“Qcean King-fish” of the Spanish and French West Indies carry out 
the same idea; the Roman emperor was always represented holding a 
drawn sword in.his hand. The Portuguese names are Agulha and 
Agulhao, meaning “needle” or ‘needle-fish”. 


3.—ZOOLOGICAL NAMES OF THE SWORD-FISH—WITH SYNONYMY. 


Zoological names. 


This species has been particularly fortunate in escaping the numerous 
redescriptions to which almost all widely distributed forms have been 


292 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


subjected. By the writers of antiquity it was spoken of under its Aris- 
totelian name, and in the tentlr edition of his Systema Nature, at the 
very inception of binomial nomenclature, Linnzus called it Xiphias 
gladius.* By this name it has been known ever since, and only one ad- 
ditional name is included in its synonymy, Xiphias Rondeletii, Leach. 
In the following table of synonyms, references are given to the princi- 
pal descriptions and figures in the standard ichthyological works: 


XIPHIAS GLADIUS, Linnzus. 
Xiphias gladius, LINNEZvS, Systema Nature, 10th ed. 1758, i, p. 248; 12th ed. 
1766, iii, p. 432 (‘habitat in oceano Europe”). 

BuiocH, Ichthyologie, iii, 1786, pl. 1xxvi, p. 23 (habits from statements of 
Chevalier Hamilton). 

GMELIN, Linn. Syst. Nat. 1788, p. 1149 (includes also under () the Ameri- 
can Histiophorus). 

WALBAUM, Artedi, Genera Piscium, 1792, p. 207. 

LACEPEDE, Hist. Nat. Poiss. 2d ed. 8vo. 1819, i, p. 538, fig. 2, pl. 24 (gro- 
tesque figure). 

SCHNEIDER, Bloch’s Systema Ichthyologiax, 1801, p. 93 (mentions occur- 
rence in Baltic). 

SuHaw, Zoology, 1804. 

Risso, Ichthyologie de Nice, 1810, p. 99 (obs. on habits); Hist. Nat. Eu- 
rope Méridionale, 1826-27, iii, p. 208. 

CUVIER, Régne Animal, 1st ed. 1817, p. 326; 2d ed. 1829, p. 200; Griffith’s 
ed. 1834, p. 187, pl. xxvii, figs. 1, 2 (taken from Cuv. & VAL. Hist. Nat. 
Poiss. q. v.); Suppl. p. 349. 

ScorEsByY, in Edinburgh Phil. Journ. iii, p. 411 (vessel struck by Sword- 
fish). 

FLEMING, British Animals, 1828, p. 220, and in Brewster’s Journal, ii, p. 
187 (specimen taken in the Tay). e 

CUVIER & VALENCIENNES, Hist. Nat. Poiss. viii, 1833, p. 255, pls. cexxv 
(figure of young of 12 to 18 inches length), cexxvi (fig. of adult). 

JENYNS, British Vertebrates, 1835, p. 364. 

YARRELL, History of British Fishes, 1st ed. 1836, p. 143 (fig. of young); 
2ded.p. 164 (fig. of young). . 

RICHARDSON, Fauna Bor. Amer. 1836, pp. 78, 81 (denies its existence in 
the Western Atlantic). 

WILSON, Encyclopedia Britannica, art. Ichth. p. 184, pl. ecii. 

PARNELL, Fishes of the Firth of Forth, 1838, p. 55. 

STORER, Report on the Fishes of Massachusetts, 1839, p. 51: Memoirs 
American Academy of Sciences, p. 36; 1853, p.149: Synopsis of the Fishes 
of North America, 1846, p. 95: History of the Fishes of Massachusetts, 
1867, p 71, pl. xiii, fig. 2. 

DEKAY, Zoology of New York, Fishes, 1842, p. 111, pl. xxvi, fig. 79. 

LowE, Trans. Zoological Society London, iii, 1849, p. 5. 

GUICHENOT, Exploration Scientifique de l’Algérie, Poissons, 1851, p. 60. 

GUNTHER, Cat. Fish. Brit. Mus. ii, 1860, p. 571; Fische der Siidsee, i, 
1873~75, p. 105: Study of Fishes, 1880, pp. 178, 431 (cuts), and article 
Ichthyology, Encye. Britannica, vol. xii: Journ. Mus. Godeffroy, part ii, 
p. 170, fig. ‘ x 

GILL, Cat. Fish. E. Coast N. A. 1861, p. 38: Canadian Naturalist, 1865, p. 
250: Cat. Fish. E. Coast N. A. 1873, p. 24: and in Rep. U.S. C. F. i, 

1873, p. 802. 


*Linné, Systema Nature, 10th ed. 1758. 


[5] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 293 


XIPHIAS GLADIUs, Linnzus. 

Pory, Syn. Piscium Cubensium, ii, 1868, p. 379 (Xyphias gladius). 

STEINDACHNER, Sitzb. Ak. Wiss. Wien. 1868, p. 396 (measurement of a 
Spanish specimen). 

Hector, Trans. New Zealand Institute, vii, 1873, p, 246 (occurring at 
Auckland) (Ziphius gladius). 

Hutton, Trans. New Zealand Inst., vii, 1874, p. 211 (second occurrence 
at Auckland). : 

CHEESEMAN, Trans. New Zealand Inst., viii, 1875, p. 219 (Ziphias gladius, 
measurements of specimens from Shelly Bay, Auckland). 

GoopE, Cat. Fishes Bermudas, 1876, p. 45. 

GOoDE & BEAN, Cat. Fish. Mass. Bay, 1879, p. 14. 

GIGLIOLI, Catalogo Esp. Internat. di Pesca. Berlin, 1880, p. 88. 

LUTKEN, Vid. Selsk. Skr. 5te Rekke, Naturv. og math. Afd. xii, 6 (Spolia 
atlantica), pp. 441, 592, figs. 1, 2, 3, pl. ii, fig. 10 (notes upon the young 
of Xiphias gladius and related species), 

STEINDACHNER, Sitzb. Ak. Wiss. Wien, 1868, p. 396. 

Hutton, Trans. New Zealand Inst., viii, 1873, p. 211. 

Xiphias Rondeletii, LEACH, Mem. Wernerian Nat. Hist. Society, ii, 1818, p. 58. 


4.—POPULAR NAMES OF ALLIED AMERICAN SPECIES. 


The Sword-fish has been so long and so well known that its right to 
its peculiar name has seldom been infringed upon. The various species 
of Tetrapturus have sometimes shared its title, and this is not to be 
wondered at, since they closely resemble Xiphias gladius, and the ap- 
pellative has frequently been applied to the family Xtphiida—the Sword- 
fish family—which includes them all. 

The name Bill-fish, usually applied to the Tetrapturus albidus, a fish 
of the Sword-fish family often taken on our coast, and described below, 
is objectionable, since it is in many districts used for the various species 
of Belonide, the ‘“ Gar-fishes” or “Green-bones” (Belone truncata and 
others), which are members of the same fauna. Spear-fish is a much 
better name, and is recommended for adoption. 

The “Sail-fish”, Histiophorus americanus, is called by sailors in the 
south the “‘ Boohoo” or “ Woohoo”. ‘This is evidently a corrupted form 
of “Guebucu”, a name, apparently of Indian origin, given to the same 
fish in Brazil. It is possibile that the Tetrapturus is also called * Boo- 
hoo”, since the two genera are not sufficiently unlike to impress sailors 
with their differences. Bleeker states that in Sumatra the Malays call 
the related species, H. gladius, by the name Joohoo (Juhu), a curious co- 
incidence. The names may have been carried from the Malay Archipel- 
ago to South America, or vice versa, by navigators. 

In Cuba the Spear-fishes are called Aguja and Aguja de Paladas ; the 
Sail-fish, Aguja prieta or Aguja voladora; Tetrapturus albidus is specially 
known as the Aguja blunca, T. albidus as the Aguja de Casta. 

In the We&t Indies and Florida the Scabbard-fish or Silvery Hair-tail 
(Trichiurus lepturus), a form allied to the Xiphias, though not resembling 
it closely in external appearance, is often called ‘“ Sword-fish”. The 


294 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


body of this fish is shaped like the blade of a saber, and its skin has a 
bright metallic luster like that of polished steel; hence the name. 

The various species of Sticklebacks, Gasterosteus aculeatus, G. nove- 
boracensis, and Pygosteus occidentalis, are known as “Little Sword-fish” 
by the boys of Portland, Me., and vicinity. The spines, damaging in the 
extreme to small fingers of tyro fish-gatherers, give reason to the name. 

Sail-fish appear to occur throughout the tropical and southern parts 
of the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean. Their names, wherever they 
are found, point to its most striking characters. In Maregrave’s time 
the Portuguese of Brazil called it Bicuda, referring to its snout, and 
Rochefort, in his History of the West Indies, calls it the Bécasse de Mer ; 
a bécasse being a long-snouted bird like a woodcock or a snipe, while 
in the Malay Archipelago the Dutch call it Zee-snip or ““Sea-snipe”. The 
Malays of Amboyna called it the I/an-layer or Fan-fish, in allusion to the 
fan-like movements of its dorsal fin, while those of Sumatra called it 
Tkan-jegan or Sail-fish. The French Voilier and the Dutch Zeyl-fisch and 
Bezaan-fisch mean the same; a bezaan being the sail upon the mizzen 
mast of a ship. The names “ Boohoo” and ‘“ Woohoo” have already 
been referred to. The Tamil name used about Madras, South Hindoo- 
stan, is ‘‘ Myl-meen”, signifying ‘ Peacock-fish”. 


C.—DESCRIPTIONS OF THE SWORD-FISH FAMILY, WITH 
ITS SUBFAMILIES AND GENERA, WITH NOTES UPON 
THE AMERICAN SPECIES. 


5.—DESCRIPTION OF THE FAMILY XIPHIIDA. 
Family XIPHIIDA, Agassiz. 


Xiphioides, AGAssiz, Recherches sur les Poissons Fossiles, v, 1843, p. 89.—BLEEKER, 
Enum. Sp. Pisc. 1859, p. 62. 

Xiphiide, GUNTHER, Catalogue of the Fishes in the British Museum, ii, 1860, p. 511; 
Fische der Siidsee, i, 1873-5, p. 105; Study or Fishes, 1880, p. 431.—GILL, 
Arrangement of the Families of Fishes, 1872, p. 8 (name only).—Day, Fishes 
of India, i, 1876, p. 198. 


Diagnosis of Family. 


Scombroid fishes, with elongate, compressed bodies, naked (Xiphiine) 
or covered with elongate scale-like scutes (Tetrapturine). Premaxilla- 
ries with nasal and vomerine bones, produced in along spear-like snout, 
immovably articulated with the prenasal and maxillary. Teeth absent 
(Xiphiine) or rudimentary (Zetrapturine). Nasal bone cellular at its 
base. Ventrals absent (Xiphiinw) or rudimentary (Tetrapturinw). A 
single dorsal, extending nearly the whole length of the body in young, 
becoming with age subdivided into two short dorsals (Xiphiina), or per- 
sistent (Histiophorus) or subpersistent, divided in middle with age 
(Tetrapturus). A similar rudimentation of anal fin in both subfamilies. 
Preopercular spine present in young (Xiphiine) or parietal and pre- 
opercular spines (Tetrapturine), disappearing with age. Seven branch- 
iostegals. Pseudobranchize present. Branchie cancellated or reticu- 


[7] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 295 


lated. Air-bladder present, simple (Xiphiinc) or cellulated ( Tetrapturus 
and Histiophorus(?). Intestine long, sinuous (Xiphiine), or short, not 
sinuous (Tetrapturinw). Gall-bladder free, hanging at some distance 
from the liver. <Articular processes developed from the parapophyses. 


Synopsis of subfamilies. 


Ventrals absent, skin scaleless, snout flat, caudal keel single... XIPHIINZ, Swainson. 
Ventrals present, skin with scutes, snout rounded, caudal keels double. 
HISTIOPHORINZ, Liitken. 


6.—DESCRIPTION OF THE SUBFAMILY XIPHIINA: AND THE GENUS 
XIPHIAS. 


Subfamily X1PHIINz, Gill. 


> Xiphyine, SWAINnsoNn, Nat. Hist. Fish. Amphib. etc. 1839, p. 239. 
> Xipheini, BONAPARTE, Cat. Metod. Pesci Europei, 1846, p. 80. 
Xiphiine, GILL, Canadian Naturalist, 1867, p. 250. 


Diagnosis of subfamily. 


Xiphiid fishes, with bodies somewhat compressed, scaleless, or in 
young sate covered with rough granulations. Sword flattened hori- 
zontally. Teeth absent. Pectorals sublateral. Pelvic arch and ven- 
trals absent. A keel upon each side of the caudal peduncle. Air-blad- 
der simple. Intestine long, sinuous. A single genus, XIPHIAS, L. 


Genus Xiphias, Artedi. 


Xiphias, ARTEDI, Genera Piscium, 1738, p. 29. 

Xiphias, LINNZUS, Syst. Nat. ed. x, 1758, p. 248; ed. xii, p. 432. 
Xiphias, CUYIER, Regne Animal, 1817, p. 326, 1829, p. 200. 
Aiphias, GUNTHER, Cat, Fish. Brit. Mus ii, p. 511. 


Diagnosis of genus. 


Xiphiine fishes, with two dorsal fins in adult condition, the continu- 
ous dorsal of the young having become rudimentary in its median por- 
tion. Preeperculum spineless in adult, the large spine of the young 
disappearing at an early age. ‘Teeth absent “ except upon the pharyn- 
geal bones, which are covered with a villosity of extremely fine and 
minute denticles” (Owen). Number of dorsal rays probably variable. 
Vertebree 26 (Steindachner). Branchiostegals 7. Stomach siphonal, 
pyloric ceca very numerous. Gall-bladder large. 

HApirat.—Tropical and temperate parts of the Atlantic, Mediter- 
ranean, New Zealand, and South Pacific north to California. 

A single species of this geuus is now known, Xiphias gladius, L. The 
species recorded in GUNTHER’S Catalogue of the Fishes in the British 
Museum, vol. ii, p. 512, under the name Xiphias velifer, if not mythical, 
is probably a Histiophorus. Lacépéde’s figure represents it with two 
caudal carinz, and, what is stranger, without ventrals. 


296 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


7.—DESCRIPTION OF THE SUBFAMILY HISTIOPHORINA AND THE 
GENERA TETRAPTURUS AND HISTIOPHORUS. 


Subfamily HisTIoPHORIN.A, Liitken. 


Tetrapturina, Gill in Rep. U. S. F. C. i, 1873, p. 787 (name only; no Tee 
Histiophorine, Liitken, Vid. Med. Nat. Forew., 1875, p. 18. 


Diagnosis of subfamily. 


Xiphiid fishes, with bodies much compressed, covered with elongate, 
scale-like scutes. Sword rounded at edges, spear-like. 'Tooth-like gran- 
ulations upon the jaws. Pectorals lateral. Pelvic arch present. Ven- 
trals present, slender, elongate. Dorsal fin single (Histiophorus) or 
in two portions, but little remote, separated by aborted section (Te- 
trapturus). Preopercular spine absent (but probably present in young). 
Two keels upon each side of caudal peduncle. Ultimate dorsal and 
anal rays suctorial. Air-bladder very large, sacculated, consisting of 
numerous separate divisions. Intestine short, straight. 


Synopsis of genera. 


Dorsal fin double, Xiphias-like, ventral rays anchylosed...--.. Tetrapturus, Rafinesque. 
Dorsal fin single, high, sail-like, ventral rays separate........ Histiophorus, Lacépéde. 


Genus Tetrapturus, Rafinesque. 


Tetrapturus, RAFINESQUE, Caratteri, etc. 1810, p. 54, pl. 1, fig. 7. 
“ Tetrapterurus, BONAPARTE.” 
Tetrapterus, AGASSIZ, Poiss. Foiss. v, 1843, p. 7. 


Diagnosis of genus. 


Xiphiid, tetrapturine fishes, with body much compressed. Two dor- 
sal and two anal fins in adult state; single dorsal and anal in immature 
ages. ‘Tooth-like asperities on palatines and lower jaw. Body covered 
with cultriform scale-like scutes, under epidermis. Dorsal rays much 
more numerous than in Xiphias, less so than in Histiophorus. Ventrals 
rudimentary, consisting of one pair of very elongate, flattened rays. 
Vertebree 24 (7. belone). Pyloric exca very numerous. Intestine short, 
nearly straight, making only about two foldings. 

HApitat.—Mediterranean; tropical and subtropical seas. 


Genus Histiophorus, Lacépéde. 


< Istiophorus, LACKEPEDE, Hist. Nat. Poiss. iii, 1803, p. 374. 

< Histiophorus, CUVIER & VALENCIENNES, Hist. Nat. Poiss. viii, 1831, 291. 
< Histiophorus, GUNTHER, Cat. Fish. Brit. Mus. ii, 1860, p. 512. 
“Notislium, HERMANN, Observ. Zool. 1804, p. 305.” 


Diagnosis of genus. 


Xiphiid, tetrapturine fishes, with body slender and very much com- 
pressed. Dorsal single (though the last few rays are nearly abortive), 
retaining the character of extreme youth, which is lost in Xt%phias and 
Tetrapturus, and very lofty. Vertebree 24 (H. indicus). Anal fin double. 
Numerous tooth-like asperities on the jaws. Body covered with elon- 


[9] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 297 


gate scales. Dorsal rays, being unaborted, very numerous. Ventrals 
consisting each of two or three elongate rays. Intestine short, nearly 
straight, with two foldings. 

HABITAT.—Tropical and subtropical seas. 


8.—DESCRIPTIVE NOTES ON THE SWORD-FISH, XIPHIAS GLADIUS. 


My notes fail to supply the necessary data for a full description of 
the species, and since the fish is not likely by any one to be con- 
founded with any other, I do not think it necessary to defer publication 
until these data can be obtained. I append the following note upon a 
small specimen, and also partial measurement table for two others, the 
dimensions in one case in inches, in the other in millimeters. 

A specimen taken off Seaconnet, July 23, 1875. Weight 113 pounds; 
extremity of sword gone. One of the smallest ever seen in this region. 
Dorsal fin in its median part nearly destroyed, but traces of the groove 
and spines remaining. 

Color.—Above rich purplish blue, shading into whitish beneath the 
sides, and belly with a silvery luster. Fins bluish dark with silvery 
sheen, except dorsal. Top of the head rich purplish blue, the color ex- 
tending upon the rostrum. Lower side of rostrum rich brownish pur- 
ple. Eye deep blue. No trace of scales. 

Viscera.—Liver greenish light brown. Stomach siphonal; pyloric ceca 
infinite in number; intestine spiral 10 inches long when in position, 90 
when stretched out. Gall-bladder large, situated on the same line with 
the spleen, and at same distance from the liver, connected by a duct. 
Air-bladder simple, large. Spermaries large, 6 inches long. Stomach 
contained small, fish perhaps Poronotus, and jaw of Loligo Pealii. Fluke 
worms in cover of stomach and air-bladder. 


Table of measurements. 


Cuaxrentinumber of specimen: os.a.:.2<. cs see ste see eesieenes cose cs cece A. B. 
AGOGO Lyre connie ccinicicl cwiais'slojccla'e wicca sete /o'ciale cise sna sicale sevens iolalatectoenee nic sie'ais Seaconnet, | Gloucester, 
.1., July | Mass., 1878, 
23, 1875. 
Inches. Millimeters. 
Extreme length (tip of sword gone). --..--.22..22202- 052 0-c- cece ene w noes OT) cay Baas See 
Length to end of middle caudal 0M BOBO UE ETC EEE DOS DEO SDOGSCOOCON SER SOS 81. 50 2, 040 
y: 
Grostestiheithtiassossscectesencscceessec ese cessseeces ses i ocopoSamnaac MOS OOM Eee Sec cc cecieee 
Greatest, circumterence-:=ss<-cs2- 25-22 2-5 ees sesesescceced asec SoNOO =| sc o2 Soe. 
Weasels bOtballesscemsseoeaciecoss ls cese secaeeeecla ss onsen esasemeclccess cca ans s a: 80 
Head: X 
Greatestiencbhececcnecesssasmec sma sas coc- ene scinseces see aeeee saa see PY GU LE Sal eee ISIC 
Heng th tobipioLr lOWerJjNW. 325.2 sot oceccce cs. saseesmespeecesse cesses 16. 50 490 
Greatestiwidthiweascees.. = ab sce suns vcecs cs ccchsepecocsoceee nt oee Lace GUIDSS ee 5co2 St aoe 
Wadthrotinterorbitallarea: -s2 2.0 --cces.scc-sccce tc coe ctemeenesces cee 4.35 170 
LENGE NOLMSUONG er ee seen nese Seeee oe seen cisnia soe hace ons sesees esses 26200=F 4|5.ocos ates 
ENE UMOMOPCLCMLUNMssacecceccsicresss ss secs ccocceeneesesee ete ceses 5. 00 150 
ene thorumandible’. <2. sss cos te ecscescccsccce costo esanaccecoctse 11. 00 310 
MIAMOEL OM OVO ose sesioessesiscleeciscscccccscecestsscssceseueeceecss see 2.75 80 
Dorsal (first) : 
Distance oman Of LOWELL AWecssacesesocisascse sees ascaeeenes vases: 15.50) | cecjes sree 
Length of base (including first and second) ....-...--........---.----- 37. 00 470 (1st) 
Greatesthelohtrcd secs cecc acc caceccceccccesccccccccccccccsccoessccsess 12. 00 470 


298 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 
3 ‘ 
Table of measurements.—Continued. 


Current number of specimen.......-------- SqncsoscnocsSscepongoodsSescor - A- B. 
CDV eee meen ceineaas secieesices= sans eobandesdoaqccntdencudsesosccedias Seaconnet, | Gloucester, 
R.1.,July | Mass., 1878. 
23, 1875. 


Inches. Millimeters. 


Dorsal (second): 
Length of base ....-----..2200---0 
Height at longest ray... 
Height at last ray ...2.0.cee0. sccccee 
al : 


Distance from snout......... DOneedaac 5 

Meng thiolase as... ose decors oceeemee tee ee eee cee tees sat cece . 

Height at longest ray..........-..2---2- Be nOaobOD 6 SOBARRICRADGSOOUSESE 8. 25 300 

Heiphviatilastiraysssccsescesnseeosne ses oeecnseces andanoseaososenosed PAPLY | Secccsoscecce 
Caudal: 

Length of middle rays... <<< .saccecssncmcecae See sine ee ealeericcete mete 3. 50 160* 

ength/ofextermal Vays \.-- tet sasijese cee ciedeaite sn chllacseckic ecleieemce 16. 50 550 
Pectoral: 

Distance from tip of lower jaw ..-.- eine uincleleteteletelsianie siete sows miaiainrstaiaiats 16.00: | setetlatnaeeee 

LOGY a Sa S ae ea B SBC a CREE CHO CT CGE CRETE qORBam eC DES SBADOeSOE 14. 25 390 
Branchioste gals |< -- ssc none ccesscisss rea saseecicecsmchmnnaeaneesan eas sesee Sis | Jactowareentee = 
WOLS8l cose case weescoccccccessnccacan wacces ve cmesteis seciemeinsenwaceesrcsenten 20:(19),;2) Jcccceasenqeaes 
PAT ANE is Se dcniecios s1etecisceeclisweaieacke s Haaee cuelesioasc dacs entcausosueecneceee A (KOS 3) © [rcdsesesasss P 
Pectoraleesceceeessaasseaincec seasenceeceeeecee eae sneaeenesccecdanas oS 20)» |o2-Heceeaenee 
Welz hE pOUNdS) i - steers soctenic cose, Cacee eset ete meee corer cc ecceeace D3 74|Sscceeeeeescr 


*From end of carina. 


Table of measurements. 


Weocalityaaosescsansencesacoctcccessssccesatcsssssensmeccssececeascssdststsca-cisccrescosas Portland, 
, Me., Aug. 15. 
Millimeters. 
EXUOMOMONn Cth sesac en acnce a= = eines sc ciceecetios Seo eices seers psececcsecescisccee sesecscer 3, 990 
pengeh toyend\of. middle;caudalirays 22. eusc.cescectseee eet cees ce teeee ates ce sere et ece ene 3, 780 
Yi: 
Greatestheight.c-: 2s -as.cccsaesscw cede caseecseeeesettcs sett cmos tease sere sect eeteeee 638 
Greatest widthiie r/o stoceces oss eesneecces ce nenese seewecieereresenens teeeereE teres 470 
Greatesticircumference: ...5....2.2- ca ssacesteceeeress a prin aceaatecoe nese. dacetinacene 1, 705 
Height at origin of anal ...............0.--ccceee Baccoadocds poaadecencudaEsondabeadac 520 
Heast heightiot tail ics. sceces ce s-cwiacescedessnciececsecsscnsceetesceetcuteceesuenee 120 
Height underisecond dorsal :.5::.c2- sete sosems snes ose eeenee cess oceen ees caecestaecee 22 
Length of caudal peduncle............ Beno OA CODOHECHocHOO Sap SGcooKobaaSobeccosansac 238 
Head: 
Greatestilontthi..-2-c-ccsacesc snes a sccces cece termes E. .HBECaHOCSocHOOSacEeaCSeAcSses 1, 570 
Greatest width 2 25..-cesesscons sebecebece cae sce onoeece eens ce eeeee a 385 
Widthiof interorbital areas. o.22 22 saccse ec sasecemes see eone nee cae canes cer ace ee eee 223 
Mengthlor snowy see ke sens ene cse ec ciccesie ec Soca eee eee ee ee eee ene 1, 085 (870) 
Benethiotioperculum ccs. acces asec eee ccecioccen seemoc cece e cotton eet e acer ee ee ete ee 200 
Mensthyof-mandiblot os cscsececsscseeece eee con ee eee once e ena eee BS SOE OBOE 435 
Diameteriof orbit ¢---- < {oe soecees eee BEC COOOETEOOOC HIG COLE EOOODOSE CSae-Hiancuqcorcecc 100 
Dorsal (spinous) : 
DistancedromSNOUG-scs-csaccos sce ceeeeclesecteeeeee SpSGBSGBCESROSE BoSnciceesasseccies 1, 530 
eneth Of base ss-esncascesecccoesen eset ene eeen ee cee e eee tee aeons seceacocees 500 
Greatest*height: $522 \J5s.-sceccs scence s saeco ee teree ee eee eee eee re canoe semen 550 
Dorsal (soft) : 
ONSEN OLIDASOL wae ons coccna walsiseasceltinanccisesecesesaecoeae ase ceue seeaea see Daten 50 
MIStANCe {POM SNOUG: «ss selec wis scan cciese se ue osmemasecenee eee cent eae etc eenaee eee 3,175 
MEGS NG ecto cle cence o- eemidemss i oenaincadce eceawereeen cee oeenec eens ee one eee etenanen 90 
Mistance Met ween COrgals sess s . ve vemawe cee ee cee eee Oe ee eet eee 1, 208 
Anal: : 
Distance from snout............-.-- eoeveeease Scosceccssmecsce Sveswsueae occas collet 2, 538 
ON SEN OLIDASOh 2 Ane eae no Sectio ne cases mec eee mene ee ee See eae aoe Aaa 330 
Distance of second anal from snout. ..---- 00. o. ccc co sec ec cn cecece eccccecenns: encscs 3, 125 
Heishtiatilongest tay: os.<.crecsesccscocisseceeee ease tee se eran ae ee ere a knee eee 340 
Caadal: 
Width iaticaudal'carinw: J. 2.210505 tc2scose ceca cw meen eee ce cone ote weno ae ose eee: 500 
ene UNOMeXtOImMalirays sosceenscns code cee cere eee eee en ete cot ee ete e eee eer eeee 730 
Tpabolipoticaudal 2s asccscocusessccce teewe eels baa cite ae are nese weeeeccecweaccuesen 1, 140 
Pectoral: 
Wistance fromisnoub-.- coe ssscsenacec sacs cece ones eee eoee eee ee ee ee eee eee 1, 598 
Wen othe sects teen cebenins sec ce socecmees acetone cee ene ee Raa So Looeedeaue 532 


Weight, about (pounds) ..........-.... PE icin ee mee eae 5 sdedeecee PPP A eee ee 600 


[11] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 299 


Steindachner has given the following measurements of two specimens 
obtained by him on the coast of Spain, the largest 3 feet 7 inches in 
length, the smallest much younger and corresponding to the young 
specimen figured by Cuvier and Valenciennes in the Histoire Naturelle 
des Poissons, pl. 225.* 


Table of measurements. 


e 
A. B. 
Inches. | Inches. 
Total length.......--.---- +22 sees ee cceeee cece ee cee nee eenee ene e cece ceeee en eeceees 43.0 24, 6 
Mengthorshordtecerrcass selene -enetnas eta asec aan apr eeassan- acces sanem eas 20.7 9.7 
Length of intermaxillary from anterior margin of eyes.........-.-..--------.---- 

Length of mouth-opening from point of intermaxillary to posterior end of upper W564 Ps stoce ces 
Fai we eh SOUS 5 USS tee Uee te eo Ls tae eee ene 17.2 8.0 
BreaduMmotetoronGaduesnccmiacse ses scsice soweascseseowset cnet ne ee eecensece aes sice 19 1.14 
Tsar ln O22 ULC ETN Ge GOnObE ENO CO SOUL ODDO DOC ISOUTIEC BCDB apnigsO nd uoOcUceodcooouEoe GLO aeasesnes 
HMoeishtiot; DOdysse esse ssct cess cas = a isteteo ci ine te ore ches chee eetistcee eee acct rm cece 4.6 2. 34 
eneth of pectoral) 2. ..t.-cc-cecjscaccosacs Pomele mms sc aero eeniclece cists tae teens csi 5.8 3. 53 
Heightof- dorsal at first Cloft Ths scars ccc cee wecscce wescnersescceweccese= sess G2 ll ueneeeetes 
Greatestihermhtiofy@orsall ease <Peccisccjaisisicjecaics vcleise ain siniw cidic cntis Uinialanjnieisiats oso aicll/awiojsicleicine 3. 13 
Hon MhtotsDASCOMGOISalis acces ceasac essere covccesacsselaacessesccssm ascetics a  emaposecc! 
HMeishtiomanale sssecrmas sei-scecteecssciecsmine ise ecmcascecccssccossen sesmicsisinieci acces 3.4 1.11 
MenzinOrsbase Oranalescnsteascesree cee cel aise rcmiesaicee lem ecciinseicescestonccs a ANGI | Sassen sees 


The following measurements were taken by T. F. Cheeseman, esq., F. 
L. S., from a specimen stranded in January, 1875, at Shelly Beach, Auk- 
land, New Zealand: 


Feet. Inches. 


bh 


COPNNF OCHRE WOW RR OH 


Total length from tip of snout to end of candal fin............ Weaee atta seeeeecees 
Length of snout\from tip to center of eye ...... 22... 2. 22 eee ee ccs ccc ece ce ccccces 
Men sthrofsnounaronl tips PaApOrce ce eaeses cess cena ccceee ae wea es eseacce sneer, 
Length of snout from tip to free edge of operculum ............---..-2-00---+0e-- 
iene thiol snout tcomivip oO MOStiuUS epee noes cocemes cscs cecice toc scummee 
Mengthiof lower jaweallompointito Pape)-.-<5- .<$4-seiccsec cases ccccosscodcccsonacce 
ELO|OCHON Of Upper |aAWwaOVel lOWOls-c55- corte cere secces se cwencc ence ese reccessecie: 
Meightiot dorsalfim een ccccicc cers cwlcintes acca essaliccics ee cclsjanlencnisicoielainaisige cesonmec 
Hromd@orsal to. caudal o<- os -ccaceseeecemsccse = 

Length of pectoral fins .....-. 

Length of anal ......:-.-<.-; 

Height of second dorsal 
From anal to caudal .......... 

Myadtaacross\the:talles ss re-wetasste see a= cece cn ccnoset ace seensecockiossossr eee 
Girtheyastibebinditheeyeses: oles tases et ocee eco eeeeseneraeeeenesaeciossesencr= 
Girthapehindidorsale-eiss seen se coset as oan sea eterna caneae sete e ta cecetesee 
Girthypehindecandalecnssereracscoseeeacscscasoccte domseecasisccscaescisaereesioce 
DDIAMELOLLOMOY.CTssoee ere cee eee ten cece cee coset tec ne ete meeeebbe come oe semelaes 


bed 


G2 EA O0 AICS. COS 20 SU 20 BO SY CFC 


_ 


ee 


— 


The extreme point of the snout was broken off, about three inches 
being wanting.t 


9.—DESCRIPTIVE NOTES ON THE SPEAR-FISH, TETRAPTURUS ALBIDUS. 


The following description was drawn up from a fine specimen of the 
Spear-fish taken at Block Island, R. IL. in 1875 :* 

A male fish of 2,150™™ (84.646 inches), ordinary size. 

Body elongated, nape elevated, bringing the greatest height over the 


*Sitzb. Ak. Wiss. Wien. 1868, p. 396. 
t Transactions New Zealand Institute, viii, 1875, p. 219. 


300 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


operculum (10.27 inches). At the point of the pectoral the height is 
nine-elevenths of that at the operculum (8.4 IMeRes), and is contained 
about 10 times in total length. 

The head from extremity of loyer jaw is contained in the total length 
4 times (21.161 inches). The eye is situated midway between operculum 
margin and tip of lower jaw. The length of the bill beyond lower jaw 
equals greatest height of head. Palatines with a narrow band of rough 
denticulations. Asperities on the lower jaw. Bill extremely hard, espe- 
cially at its extremity; its form is depressed, its edges rounded, its height 
greater than half its width. Preoperculum situated far back; com- 
mences midway between the eye and the opercular margin. The other 
opercular bones are not visible in fresh specimen. 

Lateral line marked by a series of minute apertures on a continuous 
band, connected at the top of operculum; continues backward in a 
straight line for a short distance, then bends downward and reaches the 
middle line of the body at the point of the pectoral. Scales bony, linear, 
absent from the head, except on the cheeks. Those of lateral line not 
pierced. All the scales covered by epidermis. ; 

Brivts D..3, 39-63. A. 2, 13-65 P.19 3 V1, 4s ©. 12. 

All the rays osseous, not articulated; those indicated as osseous are 
only distinguished from the others by their terminating in a point, 
which is not free. The others are flattened towards the extremity and 
frayed at the ends. The two first anal and three first dorsal rays are 
ossified to each other and upon the ray behind them, so that they appear 
to sight and touch as if only a single ray. Dissection shows that the 
first dorsal is very small (20™™) ; second, 24 times as high (50™™) ; third, 
115"™™; the fourth twice aslong. Thesameinanal. First, 30™™; second, 
70™™; third like fourth dorsal in form. These fins are for the most part 
hidden in the furrows, and their last rays are extremely short, so that it 
is necessary to lay them bare by dissection. 

First ray of second dorsal and second anal flat and striated; these 
fins are crenated. The fourth of first dorsal and third of first anal touch 
the summits of the fins, which are slightly rounded. 

First ray of pectoral very strong and prolonged to the extremity; 8 
ast short, forming the subbrachial dilation. ; 

Ventral appears at first sight a single ray, but dissection shows 5, the 
3 first anchylosed. They are received in a furrow, which extends to the 
anus. 

Caudal stiff; bifurcation making angle of 72° from middle of the two 
caudal crests to the point of the lobes, and, neglecting points, 80°. 

Origin of first dorsal above preopercle, its height surpassing by one- 
sixth the height of the body beneath it. 

Pectoral one-eighth length of body from point of lower jaw. 

First anal lower than dorsal. 

The two others are small and opposite. The second dorsal a little 
farther back, a little higher, and a little more “échancrée”. 


[13] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 301 


Color.—Pronounced deep blue above, a little lighter on the flanks, 
passing into white below. Fins intense blue; second anal and outside 
of pectoral lighter. First dorsal with rounded spots, more intense, of 
same color. Iris clear blue; cornea blackish. 

Four gills of double structure and an accessory, reticulated as in 
Xiphias. 

Bylorus attached high up and has great longitudinal folds; also the 
duodenum, which is swollen and receives, by two openings, the secretions 
of the compact and glandulous mass which covers it. 

Intestine slender, with two short Soo Or: embracing in its last 
the spleen. 


Swim-bladder cellulous, showing great puffs, which extend far behind 
the anus. 

A second specimen, the measurements of which are given below (B), 
suggested the following notes: 

Top of head and body, upper lobe of caudal fin, and caudal cartilage 
bluish black. Belly and throat white. Cheeks and opercular blackish, 
covered with a pearly sheen. The black hue of the back shades into 
the white of the belly through an insensible gradation of lines, the 
most prominent of which are rich purplish brown and light smoky gray. 
The belly and the sides are pearly up to the lateral line. The boundary 
between the colors of the back and the belly is indicated by an indis- 
tinct line, which may be traced from the base of.the rostrum over the 
top of the orbit and the operculum, then descending across the lateral 
line at a point above the middle of the pectoral fin; it then rises in the 
arc of a circle above the lateral line, which it meets again at the tail, the 
distance between them being the greatest over the anal fin. The icone 
lobe of the caudal is blackish, with a pearly sheen. The ventrals and 
second dorsal fins are blue-black. The anterior rays of the first dorsal 
are also blue-black, the membrane being light bluish purple, irregu- 
larly spotted with circular dots from one-quarter to one-half an inch in 
diameter. The first anal is deep bluish purple at its extremity, but on 
its basal half bright pearly white. The inner surface of the pectoral is 
bluish purple, brightest in the axil; its outer surface is blackish, though 
completely covered with a pearly sheen. 

The ventrals, first dorsal, and first anal, when not erected, are com- 
pletely hidden in grooves. The second dorsal and second anal are not 
so hidden. The pectorals are flat, closely clinging to the sides when 
not in motion; their base received into a depression in the side of the 
fish. 

The lanceolate scales may be seen through the epidermis, giving a 
reticulated appearance to sides of the fish. 

The second dorsal and the second anal have broad, flattened, ultimate 
rays, which adhere closely to the body of the fish. 


302 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


Measurements. 
Current number of specimen .....--.--- --------- cee mececanereeneceenne-a-- At. B. 
Locality oso. 2 nn eno cece nen cnn nnn nnn nna nn eerneees oneeeerenenace== New Bedford,| Wood’s Holl, 
Mass., July,| Mass., 1875. 
25, 1875. 
Inches. Inches. 
Sees SE 
Extreme length......0...020---2-2- cee eeeene eee eee eecees elsieisiwencinseseinis = 80. 00 89. 007 
Hengtn to end of middle caudal rays ......-.---.---- necisooonngocdadeessede 70. 50 81. 00 
y: 
- Greatest height.....----- o ecesenrenee wceee eee cecceeee o cece ee eceeen nese 9. 00 ; oe 
ASS 
Height at ventrals..........--.-++.-- EID CoSHCASSSnSebocddeeauSBIE Bede OA00t Se aeestereseeae 
aad : : 
Greatest length. ......2.-cc.ccecsennccccnnnc cence ceccnannscennne senboe 27. 00 28.75 
Greatest width: ...<- -.--s<-sc- sone oriEacen ede sQoosaotedsoSnoeatosseS SPOON PMadses tence 
iWadthiof interorbital &rOd\. cocen.ccece tes nenecleee=sieelecns «cance See 4.20 52 acces scene 4 
Length of snout . 2. .-- 2.2 cccnee sacece come cnconeccncsscoscennecnscsaa> 17. 50 19. 50 
Length of bill... ...---..2------ 20-22 e cee ne cee ne cee nee cence cece ee ene e[en nee e nese eee 12. 25§ 
Length of operculum .........-.-----+------2eee een ne cee e ne cone eee eee CBUDN Sacer amce Dad . 
Length of upper jaw to commissure of jaws ..-..--.--+-------se------|--eee eee eee 22. 75 
Length of lower jaw to commissure Of jawWS. ...-.-..-.------------0---|--02-e22 2-2 --- 10. 50 
Distance from snout to orbit ..........--.--. GanOOS BOSE aSanoncHacesce 27.50) | eerste 
Diameter Of OrDibss =e secseeecle sew ssacelaceeees= ele ccevereeweeelnsmal . 
Dorsal : 
Distance from snout... ...-.2.2-- 20. ceccececcccccccccccccescccnecnese> 
Length of base ........-.. 
Greatest height........-.....-....- Bono bodaceooeoSa sees Sac 
Height at first'spine,- <<< -26 nc; jccermaasmesscueasccanisacccecessa sens 
Height at second spine : 
Height at third spine ...-.......... Belteniemicleaseiamain lees sinsisveme=(ne== << OOF I seater eestor 
Height at fourth spine... ..... 2... ce cece nec en eens cece sence ene on---- . SBocbaeacsade 
Height at fifth spime..-. 2.2... 22.52. ccccen ccc cecnes cnwncocenene------ 10550) | ee eemecceeeee 
Height at sixth spine 22.2 21s oe cece ec ccc cwcnecresocomecisesneseee==- 9500) ooo areelete eeiaeate 
Height at seventh spine ...... 2.2.5... .ccecnesscncence SEdaosagonadnsod Ue20)| Joneses aee 
Heightiatieighth spine! - 25.5 .j. 5. cesses cacccccccnucenccccccccceencsios- ONO Hee cases eee 
Heishtiatminthispine.. 22 sms eqecm 46 eess > come caee eee ae eecemo\coe= == 5.15) | acne ee eee : 
Height at tenth spine. ..... ete ee poceee tem eeeen eee es demscemeraci se 4.50 | 255s secrecees 
Height at eleventh spine........... SOE SO BES SOO COC COCIE OS CCInODBabEE Be:00) (0153.5, 2 taeyete A 
Height at tweltth spine: — 2c. <.-sccec tone c wae scseewmececeicceqae aes BEG Wempaaaecocso * 
Height at thirteenth spine B00 552-0 cao ee etate 
Height at fourteenth spine PB BeenaseaqaninoS 
Anal: 
Mistancesfrom i SnOUbi. sa<m< nose cee ce sseiceccsiseleeesicce Sonne Sdoobcr 49. 00 54. 00 
Menethvot baseres- sass senas geese eee nosmenacewe sine ame cnen steisiacene 15. 00 10. 25} 
HMeiphtiapHirstispine) ios. e asserts tells ee semas secie eecemetsia ciemnistertersias 40,00) | asec aces = 
Hoeicht/atisecondi spine: ..J.cssacenceceerace ci ectesisi=cesaeetectackeanact ea ee aS ercccin . 
Heishtat thirdispinem.cs-semasacekema nce te nldelacieeewaciececiescinstcicice. 6575) |c-ee cea eeocee - 
Heightiat fourthispinels 22.6 ct-tc0!ste lalla eee os cisiemicaee be sinmineme = = 6500) Serene sere ° 
Herchitiat fifth spine) scsi cman ew enee cise eee sees cis caceiesscmatente O00) |e eee ete ° 
Height at sixth spine 2525 25508 ceacscdces woe ceclcsebice sles seelsccteis 2. TO Eines temas - 
Height at seventh spine .....-...--..------- 0-2 eee n enema eceee nee nes ASO loco erases ae 
Heightiat cighthi spme.casesss) sos oseee oe ee nem coe ce sam ee meaene ener gat eee MeN a Sra : 
Heipthiat Min this pinerccemeceee=scimes canine nie since eeenies eee ne + senate 5'B5: |. os cibt eres melee 
Heriehtiat tenthispine .42 cms sans. cncice es se ese Seercinclso nase ciate oot BY | Peatpescacsus . 
Height:atieleventh: spinGssccac-<eememcecesteraccaieeet wena Je seae (102 éssccek sete 
Heichtotfiniahboveisheath*=esccesss-ccs= socescecninesee reece scot eer ace | sceanescce seat 7.25 
Caudal: > 
Menethiofymiddle TaAysuccc~ sc sesictecccie ves ucesesssseneeeece 2.00 
engthof external Tays.\-- 2.06 --ssccnee-semereee see 16. 00 
Distance between lobe tips. ..-.. POOSe GogHScu oC egGoU acESsHodUaUCoad er leeSosnesescane 
Pectoral : 
Mistance fromisnout:..c-ss.<a-2o<osse seseneeisia sees aces eeecenene a 28. 50 
Meno th'+ 2.4712. f te o.soceees ss ee cat se seeeien pee eee eee coe eeeees 14. 75 
Ventral: 
Distance: fromsnout: «2... sassesese ens esse se sees Seidsocblteceasciamilecste hin Sib sec ae 
Length of groove from base of ventrals to vent.......---.-.-----.---- 10. 00 
OTHE eee SA ee ee tie Omer ee meee | hoe) bay ae ae eS or eee ee ae 40+ 6 
El mio 5 COG OHEOOORSE DUBE BACR CCS oRr amon mcooEeesanacocesacudene AaCaG0OOSE 11+ 6 
CRUG eee wiswicnis ttle sa Selene aia cauvomeendcocece Dos ecotemeoneemer eeaciemecne 6+444+5 
BGCtOTANEe ce eerie ose n at ase cs cnch elo Sg cemee eee coos oh eosemeneteecmacotaee onc 18 
MEM balls Saco asts tas. tthe pdcabinscodsocssseer sige deca sececsonsaemecsocnceeee 1 
Wreirhtudressed (pounds) j.ac-..c-se= sa-secnpacas cceeeet pees mdeeescacsacee 654 
Number of vertebra: 
IDO ESA + See RSOBOOQGOC OUR SEORe dHE DO Obae SoDaCne conoddaoaosdaSancaducp DP ee abocdo boc c 
Caudo-lumbartssseacss tices steno ant sce w ener eee te meee nen senses BB es se ser cannes 


* To vertical from upper caudal lobe. 
t At origin of dorsal. 

+ Over vent. 

§ Beyond tip of lower jaw. 

\| ‘‘Length of anal groove.” 


a 
* [15] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 3(03 


4 
10.—POEY’S DESCRIPTIONS OF TETRAPTURUS ALBIDUS AND TETRAP- 
TURUS AMPLUS. 


It is quite probable that the larger species of Tetrapturus, T. amplus, 
Poey, which frequents the waters of Cuba, in company with the species 
now so often seen on our coast, may yet be found on the coast of the 
United States. It seems desirable, therefore, to quote here, in full, 
translations of the original descriptions. These species should both be 
critically compared with the Tetrapturus Georgii, described by the Rev. 
H. T. Lowe from Madeira.* 

“Tt is very strange that the fishes known at Havana by the names 
Aguja and Agua de Paladar have never been described in ichthyologi- 
eal works. Their size would naturally attract the attention of travelers, 
and since they are very Common for four months in the year it would 
have been very easy to obtain them. Their flesh is palatable and always 
wholesome. They may have been confounded with 7. belone of the 
Mediterranean, especially since the Xiphias gladius, here known as the 
Emperador, is often taken in our waters. 

It is only necessary to glance at the figure of T. belone given by Cuvier 
and Valenciennes, and to carefully follow the description, to be satisfied 
that it is another species. The Histiophorus americanus, which we eall 
Aguja prieta or Agua voladera, is also found on our shores. Of the true 
_ Tetraptures we have two species, very distinct, the Aguja blanca ( Tetrap- 
turus albidus) and the Aguja de Casta (Tetrapturus amplus). 

Tetrapturus albidus is abundant during the month of June and up to 
the middle of July; some are taken in August. The ordinary weight 
is 40 pounds, though they are sometimes taken of 100. pounds weight. 

Tetrapturus amplus makes its appearance at the end of July, and is 
most abundant during August. Its ordinary weight is 200 to 300 pounds, 
but it reaches a much greater size, and is often taken weighing 400 to 
500 pounds, and even 800. 

The males are the smaller. These two species swim at the depth 
of 100 fathoms. They journey in pairs, shaping their course toward the 
Gulf of Mexico, the females being full of eggs. 

Only adults are taken. It isnot known whence they come, where they 
breed, or how the young return; it is not even known whether the adult 
fishes return by the same route. 

When the fish has swallowed the hook it rises to the surface, making 
prodigious leaps and plunges; exhausted at last, it is dragged to the 
boat, secured with a boat-hook, and beaten to death before it is hauled * 
on board. 

Such fishing is not without danger, for the Tetrapture sometimes 
rushes upon the boat, drowning the fisherman or wounding him with 
his terrible weapon. 

The fish becomes furious at the approach of sharks, which are its 


*Proceedings Zoological Society of London, 1840, p. 36; Transactions Zoological 
Society of London, iii, 1840, p. 3. 


304 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] * 


natural enemies. They engage in violent combats, and when the Te- 
trapture is attached to the fisherman’s line it often receives frightful 
wounds from its adversary. 

The ovaries are large; the ova are small and yellow, and nearly one- 

eighth of an inch in fiamicter 

The Cuban fishermen agree in admitting ued the name Aguja blanca 
two species, one called Cabezona (large-headed) ; the other smaller, the 
nape lower. I agree with them to some extent; yet, although I have 
drawn and measured many individuals of the two kinds, I do not dare 
to describe them as distinct, since I find remarkable variations, which 
lead me to suspend my judgment. I only describe one individual from 
those considered the large-headed variety.” 

For the more technical part of the description of these two species see 
paragraph 64. 


11.—NOTES ON THE SAIL-FISH, HISTIOPHORUS AMERICANUS. 


Strange as it may seem, the American species of Histiophorus. has 
never been studied by an ichthyologist, and no attempt has ever been 
made to describe it or to compare it carefully with the similar species 
occurring in the Indian Ocean. The identity of the two has been as- 
sumed by Dr. Giinther,* but since no American specimens have ever 
been seen by this authority, I hesitate for the present to follow his 
lead. 

The history of the Sail-fish in iohthsolamical literature is as follows: 

The first allusion to the genus occurs in Piso’s “ Historia Naturalis 
Braziliz,” printed at Amsterdam, in 1648. In this bookt may be found 
an identifiable though rough figure of the American species, accom- 
panied by a few lines of description, which, though good, when the fact 


* Catalogue of the Fishes in the British Museum, ii, 1860, p. 513. 

+1648. PIso AND MARCGRAVE. 

Historia Naturalis | Brasilie, | Auspicio et Beneficio | Illustrisa. | Mauritii Com. 
Nassau | illius Provincim et Maris summi Prefecti Adornata: | In qua | Non tantum 
Plante et Animalia, sed et In- | digenarum morbi, ingenia et mores describuntur et | 
Iconibus qungentus illustrantur | (Elaborate engraved title-page, upon which the 
preceding inscription is inserted upon a scroll, the following upon a shell.) Lyvgyn 
Batauorum, | Apud Franciscum Hackium, | et | Amstelodami, | Apud Lud. Elze- 
virium. 1648. | pp. (12) 122 (2) (8) 293 (7). 


Second title. 


Guilielmi Pisonis, M. D. | Lugduno-Batavi, | de Medicina Brasiliensi | Libri Qua- 
tuor:| I. De Aére, Aquis & Locis. | II. De Morbis Endemiis. | III. De Venenatis 
& Antidotis. | IV. De Facultatibus Simplicium | et Georgi Marcgravi de Liebstad, | 
Misnici Germani, | Historis® Rerum Naturalium | Brasilix, | Libri octo: | Quorum | 
Tres puores agunt de Plantis, | Quartus de Piscibus. | Quintus de Avibus. | Sextus de 
Quadrupedibus & Serpentibus. | Septimus de Insectis. | Octavus de Ipsa Regione, & 
Illius Incolis. | Cum | Appendice de Tapuyis, et Chilensibus. | Ioannes de Let, | 


Antwerpianus, | In ordinem digessit & Annotationes addidit, & varies ab Auctore | 
Omissa supplevit & illustravit. | 


[17] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 305 


that they were written in the seventeenth century is brought to mind, 
are of no value for critical comparison. [See paragraph 64.| 

The name given to the Brazilian Sail-fish by Marcgrave, the talented 
young German who described the fishes in the book referred to, and 
who afterward sacrificed his life in exploring the unknown fields of 
American zoology, was Guebucu brasiliensibus. The use of the name 
Guebucu is interesting, since it gives a clue to the derivation of the 
name ‘ Boohoo”, by which this fish, and probably the Spear-fishes, are 
known to English-speaking sailors in the tropical Atlantie. 

Sail-fishes were observed in the East Indies by Renard and Valentijn, 
explorers of that region from 1680 to 1720, and by other eastern voy- 
agers. No species of the genus was, however, systematically described 
until 1786, when a stuffed specimen from the Indian Ocean, eight feet 
long, was taken to London, where it still remains in the collections of 
the British Museum. From this specimen M. Broussonet prepared a 
description, giving it the name Scomber gladius, rightly regarding it as 
a species allied to the mackerel. In 1803 Lacépéde established the genus 
Histiophorus for the reception of this species. 

When Cuvier and Valenciennes published the eighth volume of their 
Natural History of Fishes, they ignored the name gladius, which had 
been given to the East Indian fish by Broussonet, redescribing it under 
the name Histiophorus indicus. At the same time they founded another 
species upon the figure in Piso’s Natural History of Brazil, already 
mentioned, This they called Histiophorus americanus. 

In a pa printed in 1833, Dr. Nardo, of Venice, proposed the estab- 
lishment of a new genus allied to Tetrapturus and Xiphias, to be called 
Skeponopodus. In this he ineluded the fish described by Maregrave, 
under the name Skeponopodus guebucu, and also a form observed by him 
in the Adriatic in 1829, which he called S. typus. Tam not aware that 
ichthyologist have yet learned what this may have been.* 

From the time of Marcgrave until 1872 it does not appear that any 
zoologist had an opportunity to study a Sail-fish from America, or even 
from the Atlantic, yet in Giinther’s “Catalogue” the name H. americanus 
is discarded and the species of America is assumed to be identical with 
that of the Indian Ocean.t 

Giinther restores Lacépéde’s name, H. gladius, for the Indian species. 
Possibly, indeed probably, this name will be found to include the Sail- 
fish of our own coast. At present, however, it seems desirable to retain 
a separate name. To unite species from widely distant localities with- 


*Tsis, 1833, Heft iv, pp. 415-419. 

t The specimens in the British Museum are catalogued as follows: 
a. Eight feet long; stuffed. Indian Ocean. Type of the specics, 
b. Seven feet long; stuffed. Cape of Good Hope. 

c. Dorsal fin. N.S. Wales(?). Presented by Dr. G. Bennett, 

d. Snout; dried. 


S, Mis. 29-20 


a 


306 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


out ever having seen them is very disastrous to a proper understanding 
of the problems of geographical distribution. 

The materials in the National Museum consist of a skeleton and a 
painted plaster cast of the specimen taken near Newport, R. 1, in 1872, 
and a drawing made of the same, while fresh, by Mr. J. H. Blake. 

The occurrence of the Sail-fish is, as has been already stated, very 
unusual. Marcgrave saw it in Brazil as early as 1648. De la Sagra and 
Poey mention that it has been seen about Cuba, and Schomburgh includes 
it in his Barbados list. The specimen in the United States National Mu- 
seum was taken off Newport, R. I., in August, 1872, and given to Pro- 
fessor Baird by Mr. Samuel Powell, of Newport. No others were ob- 
served in our waters until March, 1878, when, according to Mr. Neyle 
Habersham, of Savannah, Ga., two were taken by a vessel between 
Savannah and Indian River, Florida, and were brought to Savannah, 
where they attracted much attention in the market. In 1873, according 
to Mr. E. G. Blackford, a specimen in a very mutilated condition was 
brought from Key West to New York City. 


12.—AN ENUMERATION OF THE SPECIES OF THE SWORD-FISH FAMILY. 


1. XIPHIAS GLADIUS, Linn. 

The synonymy of this species, with discussions of all the facts regard- 
ing it which have come within my observation, are given elsewhere in 
this paper. Professor Liitken, in recently published papers, has ex- 
pressed the opinion that the genus Aiphias cannot be regai¥fed, as has 
hitherto been customary, as the central type of the family Xiphiide, but 
rather as a divergent or aberrant form, while the round-billed Sword- 
fish provided with ventral nus are most typical and representative of 
the group.* 


2. TETRAPTURUS IMPERATOR (Schneider). 

Niphias imperator, SCHNEIDER, Bloch’s Syst. Ichth. 1801, p. 93, pl. xxi (poor 
figure), founded on Duhamel, iii, p. 333, pl. xxvi, fig. 2. 

Tetrapturus belone, RAVINESQUE, Caratteri Animali e Pianti della Sicilia, 1810, 
p. 54, pl. i, fig. 1.—Cuvirer, Regne Animal, 2d ed. 1829, ii, p.201.—CuUVIER 
& VALENCIENNES, Hist. Nat. Poiss. viii, 1831, p. 280, pls. cexxvii (skeleton), 
cexxviii (adult fish).—BdNaparte, Catologo Metodico, 1846, p. 80. 

Tetrapterus belone, AGASSIZ, Poissons Fossiles, 1843, v, p. 89, tab. E. (fine 
figure of skeleton). 

Tetrapierurus belone, BONAPARTE. 

Histiophorus belone, GUNTHER, Cat. Fish Brit. Mus. ii, 1860, p. 518. 

Skeponopodus typus, NARDO, Isis, 1833, Heft iv, p. 417 (Adriatic). 

This species appears to be limited to the waters of the Mediterranean. 
It was not noticed by Linneus, or indeed by any of the binomial writers 
before Schneider. In his posthumous edition of the writings of Bloch, 
the latter has made reference to a figure and description in Duhamel, 


*1875. LUTKEN, CHR. 
Om rundnebides Svaerdfiske, saerligt om Histiophorus orientalis, Schl. < Vidensk. 
Meddel. Natuvhut. Foren. Kjébenhavu, 1875, pp. 1-21 + 1-5, 


[19] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 307 


and has given to a fish, which he figures in plate xxi of this work, 
the name Xiphias imperator. This name was rejected by Cuvier (Regne 
Animal, 1. c.), and has not been recognized by later writers. It seems to 
me, however, that Schneider has, perhaps unintentionally, yet quite in- 
telligibly, feed the principal differential characters of Tetrapturus. 

By “dorso scabro” he covers the question of the scales; by ‘“carnia 
caudali nulla” he refers to the absence of the single ae carnia of 
Xiphias, while by figure and by implication in his description he admits 
the presence of ventral fins. His figure, though bad, is as good as most 
of the old figures of Xiphias—that in Lacépéde for ere. 

T. imperator is said to attain the length of five or six feet, and the 
weight of 150 pounds. It has been taken in the Straits of Messina 
with the harpoon, but according to Rafinesque is very rarely seen on 
the coasts of Sicily, and then only in autumn, when it is following the 
dolphin and flying-fish, upon which it feeds. It is ordinarily seen in 
pairs, male and female together, and they are taken often in the nets 
together. Its flesh is white, but not particularly well flavored. At 
Messina it is call “ Aguglia imperiale (Cuvier & Valenciennes, lL. c.). 


3. TETRAPTURUS INDICUS, Cuv. & Val. 
Tetrapturus indicus, Cuv. & Vau. Hist. Nat. Poiss. viii, 1831, p. 286 (on figure 
belonging to Sir Joseph Banks). 

A species founded on a figure of a specimen obtained in Sumatra, 
communicated by Sir Joseph Banks to Broussonet, who refers to it at 
the end of his “‘ Memoire sur le Volier”.* 

The description is worthless. It is stated by Cuvier and Valenciennes 
that this fish had been supposed to be the male of Histiophorus gladvus, 
but that it is much more nearly related to Tetrapturus of the Mediter- 
ranean, though. with a longer beak. 

The notes accompanying the figure state that it attains the leng th of 
nine feet and the weight of 200 pounds, and was known to the Malays 
by the name ‘*Joo-hoo”. 

Giinther regards it as perhaps synonymous with 7. Herschelii, Gray. t 


4, TETRAPTURUS HERSCHELU, Gray. / 
Tetrapturus Herschelii, GRAY, Ann. Nat. Hist. i, 1838, p. 313, pl. x.—LUTKEN, Il.c. 
Histiophorus Herscheliit, GUNTHER, 1. ¢. 

This species was described from a specimen eleven feet long obtained 
at Table Bay, Cape of Good Hope, in 1837. The description is repro- 
duced in the appendix, and the plate is also here presented. The type 
of Z. Herschelii is in the British Museum. The United States National 
Museum has some fine skins, apparently of this species, brought from 
Mauritius by Col. Nicholas Pike, United States consul. There is no 
reason to doubt that this species may be the same with 7. indicus, 
Cuv. & Val., just described, ee being little probability that there 


* Hist de VAcad. ae s Sciences Paris, 1786, pp. 490- 455. 
+Giinther, 1. ¢, p. 513, sub. Histiophorus. Herschelii, 


308 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


are two species in waters so close together as those of Sumatra and the 
Cape of Good Hope. 


5. TETRAPTURUS GEO.2GIL. 
Tetrapturus Georgii, Lowe, Proc. Zool. Soc. viii, 1840, p. 36: Trans. Zool. Soc. 
iii, 1849, p. 3 (reprint of first).—GUNTHER, op. cit. p. 512, foot-note.—LUT- 
KEN, ll. c. 

This species, known at Madeira as “ Peito”, was described by Lowe 
thus briefly: “Iam enabled to state that it forms a new and very dis- 
tinct species of Tetrapturus, Raf., differing from T. belone, Raf., as de- 
scribed by MM. Cuvier and Valenciennes, especially in having the 
pectoral fins proportionately twice as long, and the body clothed with 
large scales of a peculiar shape and character.” 

Liitken believes it to be identical with the two species of the Indian 
Ocean just discussed, as well as with the two Cuban species. It should 
surely be carefully compared with the latter. 


6. TETRAPTURUS ALBIDUS, Poey. 
Tetrapturus albidus, Pory, Mem. Hist. Nat. Cuba, ii, 1858, p. 237, pl. xv, fig. 1; 
pl. xvi, figs. 2-13; pl. xvii, figs. 1, 5, 6-9, 10-11, 26: Ib. p. 258: Rep. Fis. 
Nat. Cuba, ii, 1868, p. 380.—GILL, Cat. Fish E. Coast N. A. 1873, p. 24.— 
LUTKEN, Jl. ¢. 
7. TETRAPURUS AMPLUS, Poey. 
Tetrapturus amplus, PoEY, op. cit. p. 243, pl. xv, fig. 2; pl. xvi, figs. 12-25: Rep. 
Fis, Nat. Cuba, ii, 1868, p. 380.—LUTKEN, Il. ¢. 

These two species described by Poey from Cuba, one of which, 7’. al- 
bidus, is not uncommon on the Atlantic Coast of the United States, 
have already been partially discussed, and a translation of Poey’s 
description is given in the appendix. Liitken is disposed to consider 
them both identical with the 7. indicus type, and it seems to me that 
there is as much reason for doing this as for throwing together the Sail- 
fishes of the Atlantic and Indian Ocean, as has been persistently done 
by all writers on ichthyology. 


8. TETRAPTURUS BREVIROSTRIS (Giinther & Playfair). 

“‘ Histiophorus brevirostris, GUNTHER & PLAYFAIR, Fishes of Zanzibar, 1866, 

pp. 53, 145, figure.”—Day, Fishes of India, 1876, p. 199, pl. xvii, fig. 3. 
Tetrapturus brevirostris, LUTKEN, 1]. c. 
Histiophorus, KNOX, Trans. New Zealand Institute, ii, 1870, pp. 13-16, fig. 1. 
This species, the habitat of which is given by Day as “? East coast of 

Africa, seas of India, perhaps New Zealand”, is referred by Liitken to 
the same species with 7. indicus and J. Herschelii. Day considers it 
closely allied to Tetrapturus Lessone, Canestrini. 


9. TETRAPTURUS LESSON&, Canestrini. 
Tetrapterus Lessone, CANESTRINI, Arch. Zool. 1861, i, p. 259, pl. vii —LUTKEN, 
I. e.—Day, lhe. 
This species, described by Canestrini from the Mediterranean, is re- 
ferred by Liitken to the general cosmopolitan type, of which 7. indicus 
and T. Herschelii are the representations. 


[21] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 309 


10. HISTIOPHORUS GLADIUS (Broussonet) Lacép. 
_ Scomber gladius, BROUSSONET, Mém. Acad. Sci. 1786, p. 454, pliisx: 
~ > Scomber gladius, BLocH, Ichthyology, pl. ecexly: Hist. Nat. Poiss. 
> Istiophorus gladius, LACHPEDE, ‘iii, pp. 374-5’, 2d ed. 8°, 1819, p. 542, 
Histiophorus gladius, GUNTHER, 1. ¢. p. 513. ahem Il. ¢. 
> Xiphias velifer, SCHNEIDER, |. c. p. 93. 
Histiophorus indicus, Cuv. & VAL. 1. ¢.p. 293, pl. COxkIs 
This species, described first by Broussonet from specimens brought 
from the Indies—“la mer des Indes ”—by Banks, has usually been con- 
sidered, perhaps rightly, by later authors as identical with the American 
form. 


11. HisrloPHORUS AMERICANUS, Cuv. & Val. 
Guebucu brasiliensibus, MARCGRAVE, Hist. Brasil. 1648. 
> Scomber gladius, BLocH, 1. c. 
> Histiophorus gladius, authors. 
Histiophorus americanus, Cuv. & VAL. 1. ¢. p. 303. 
Skeponopodus guebucu, NARDO, Isis, Heft.iv, p. 416. 
The history of this species has already been detailed under paragraph 
11. lLiitken follows the general lead in identifying this with H. gladius. 


12. HISTIOPHORUS ORIENTALIS, Temminck & Schlegel. 
Histiophorus orientalis, TemM. & SCHLEG. Fauna Japonca, Pisces, 1842, p. 103, 
pl. lv (specimen 7 feet long, from Japan). —GUNTHER, op. cit. p. 514.— 
LUTKEN, Vid. Med. Nat. ree 1875, p. 1. pl. i (specimen 7 feet 1} inches 
long, from Singapore). 

In his first paper on the Sword-fishes Liitken seemed inclined to con- 
sider. this a distinct species, though doubtful. In “ Spolia Atlantica iY 
he speaks of two species of Histiophorus, but I am unable to decide 
whether it is this or H. gracilirostris which he regards as well separated 
from H. gladius. Speaking of the occurrence of this fish in the seas of 
Japan, Temminck and Schlegel remark that its Japanese name is ‘ He- 
rivo”; that it is occasionally taken in autumn on the southwest coast of 
J Rian: during the progress of the tunny fishery, and that its flesh is 
much esteemed. ° 


13. HISTIOPHORUS IMMACULATUS, Riippell. 
Histiophorus immaculatus, RUPPELL, Proc. Zool. Soe. iii, 1835, p. 187 (abstract): 
Trans. Zool. Soe. ii, p. 71, pl. xv: “N. W. Fische, p. 47, taf. xi, fig. 3.”— 
GinTHER, |. c.—LUTKEN, ll. e.—Day, Fish. India, 1876, p. 199. 

Riippell’s specimen came from Djetta on the Red Sea, where the Arabs 
caught it in a net. He regards it as rare because the Arabs had no 
common uame for it. The specimen is preserved in the museum at 
Frankfort, and, if I rightly understand Dr. Liitken, is 18 inches long. 
Dr. Liitken H neaitatintely pronounces it the young of H. gladius or 
H. orientalis, considering it as being slightly older than the one figured 
by Cuvier and Valenciennes as I. pulchellus. Day mentions a specimen 
of this species in the Madras Museum 5 feet 9 inches long. This, to be 
consistent with Liitken’s theory, must be regarded as a specimen in 
which the colors have disappeared in drying. 


310 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


14. HISTIOPHORUS PULCHELLUS, Cuvier & Valenciennes. 
Histiophorus pulchellus, Cuv. & Vau. Hist. Nat. Poiss. viii, 1831, p. 305, pl. 
ccxxx.—GUNTHER, op. cit. p.514.—LUTKEN, ll. ¢. . 


Cuvier and Valenciennes described under this name a specimen 4 
inches Jong taken in the Eastern Atlantic, north of the Cape of Good 
Hope, probably somewhere on the west coast of Africa, by M. Raynaud. 
There were said to have been a great many more of the same size in the 
region of the Atlantic where it was taken. ; 

Liitken regards it as the young of Histiophorus gladius. He usesit to 
complete the series of development between the small specimens de- 
seribed by Giinther and the adult forms. 


15, HISTIOPHORUS GRACILIROSTRIS, Cuv. & Val. 
Histiophorus gracilirostris, Cuv. & VAL. 1. c. p. 308 (description of a snout from 
Seychelles).—LUTKEN, ll. ¢. 


Cuvier and Valenciennes had in their possession, and deseribed, a beak 
of a Spear-fish, the breadth of which was contained 25 to 26 times in its 
length, and the sides of which were more rounded than in the other 
specimens accessible to them. This wasfrom Seychelles. Liitken is in- 
clined to admit this provisionally as a distinct species. Giinther, on 
he other hand, ignores H. gracilirostris, but regards H. ancipitirostris as 
a possibly existing form. 


16. HISTIOPHORUS ANCIPITIROSTRIS, Cuv. & Val. 
Histiophorus ancipitirostris, CUv. & VAL. op. cit. p. 309.—GUNTHER, op. cit. p. 
512, note. 


A. snout (locality unknown), having a flattened surface, its width con- 
tained 19 or 20 times in its length. Probably a species of Tetrapturus. 


17. MAKAIRA NIGRICANS, Lacép. 
Makaira nigricans, LACEPEDE, Hist. Nat. Poiss. ‘‘iv, pp. 688, 689, pl. xiii, fig. 
3”.—Cuv. & VAL. Hist. Nat. Poiss. viii, p. 287. 
Xiphias makaira, SHaw, Zool. iv, Fish. p. 104, 
Machera velifera, CUvirR, Nouv. Ann. Mus. Hist. Nat. 1832, p. 43, pl. 3.— 
LUTKEN, ll. ¢. 
Xiphias vilifer, GUNTHER, op. cit. p. 512. 


This species is undoubtedly mythical. Liitken and others have 
pointed out the error of arranging it, as Gtinther has done with Xiphias. 
He suggests that in the specimens deseribed by Lacépéde the ventral 
rays were hidden in the ventral furrow, and unperceived. In this case, 
he remarks, it would be identical with Histiophorus gracilirostris ; but, 
at all events, whether it has ventral fins or not, its right place is with 
the subfamily Histiophorine. 

The specimen described by Lacépéde was never seen by him. It was 
driven ashore near Rochelle, and his sole acquaintance with it was 
from a drawing and description given him by M. Traversay, sous-préfet of 


[23] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SwoRD-FisnEs. 311 


that town. It seems strange that so much stress has been laid upon 
this description and so much discussion has been held over the true 
classification of a form so evidently incorrectly described. 


Fossil forms. 


Agassiz, in his ‘ Poissons Fossils,” has described two species of Tet- 
rapturus: one, Tetrapturus priscus (vol. v, p. 91, tab. 31), from the London 
Clay, in the Isle of Shepley; the other, Tetraptwrus minor (vol. v, p. 91, 
tab. 60 a, figs. 9-13), from the Lewes Crag. The types of the former are 
in the Paris Museum (other similar specimens are stated to be preserved 
in the collections of Lord Enniskelien and Sir Philip Egerton); of the 
latter, in the collection of Mr. Mantell. 

He has also described the genus Celorhynchus, from fossil fish-beaks 
which appear to belong to members of the Sword-fish family. These 
are very long, slender, tapering more gently even than in the living 
forms, and are hollow throughout the entire length. There are two 
species, distinguished by name, but not described, viz, C. rectus and 
C. sinuatus, both from the London Clay of the Isle of Shepley. 

Four extinct species of Histiophorus have been described: H. priscus, 
Ag., from the London Clay, the beak of which is not known; H. minor, 
Ag., which has a deeply fluted beak; H. robustus, Leidy (Post-pliocene 
Foss. 8. Car. p. 119, Xiphias), which is from the Post-pliocene of Ashley 
River, South Carolina, with beak much depressed, the dentigerous sur- 
face a continuous plane, separated by a deep groove; H. antiquus (Leidy) 
Cope, from the New Jersey Eocene, has also a more depressed beak, with 
the dentary surfaces on one plane. 

At a meeting of the Boston Society, October 6, 1852, Professor Wy- 
man exhibited three fragments of the beak of a fossil [stiophorus, from 
the Tertiary deposits at Righmond, Va. 

Paleorhynchus, of the schists of Glaris, has a bill like Viphias ; also 
Hamorhynchus Des Hayes, first described by Agassiz as Histiophorus Des 
Hayes, a» Scombroid with elongated bill. 


D.—GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION AND MOVEMENTS. 
13.—EARLY ALLUSIONS TO THE SWORD-FISH IN EUROPE. 


The Sword-fish was known to Pliny, who writes: ‘The Sword-fish, 
called in Greeke Xiphias, that is to say in Latin Gladius, a sword, hath 
a beake or bill sharp pointed, wherewith he will drive through the sides 
and plankes of a ship, and bouge them so, that they shall sinke withall. 
The experience whereof is scene in the ocean, neare to a place in Mau- 
ritania called Gotta, which is not far from the river Lixos.”* 

Many other classical and medieval writers made curious allusions to 
the Sword-fish. A very good summary of their views is given by Bloch 


——» 


* Holland’s Pliny, ii, p. 428. 


312 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES [24] 


and is here quoted. The skepticism of this author is sometimes a little 
too sweeping, but is in general judicious: 

“ This fish is found in the North Sea and the Baltic, but is rare in 
those waters. In the Mediterranean, however, it is very abundant. It 
lives for the most part in the Atlantic, where in winter it is found in 
mid-ocean In spring it appears on the coast of Sicily, where its eggs 
are deposited on the bottom in great numbers. However, according to 
what I have been told by the illustrious Chevalier Hamilton, it is never 
seen in that region more than three or four feet long. The larger ones, 
often weighing four or five hundred pounds, and eighteen to twenty feet 
long, are found on the coast of Calabria, where they appear in June and 
July. Pliny remarked that they often exceed the dolphin in size. * * * 

‘Various writers have spoken of the ‘ Emperor of the Sea’ as occur- 
ring in the Baltic. Olearius and Schelhammer record its capture near 
Holstein; Schoneveld mentions one from Mecklenburg ; Walbaum one 
from the vicinity of Liibeck; Hanover and Klein one from the vicinity 
of Danzig; Hartmann one from near Pillau; and Wolf another taken 
near Konigsberg. 

«One mentioned by Schoneveld as taken near Mecklenburg was so 
large that it required two strong horses to draw it from the water. The 
body, without the sword, was eleven feet long, the sword three. The 
eyes were as large as hens’ eggs, and the tail was two feet broad. Of 
four seen by Professor Koelpin during his stay at Greifswald, one meas- 
ured more than three and one-half feet in circumference. * * * 

“ These fish, according to the story of the Chevalier Hamilton, always 
appear in pairs as they approach Messina, a female and a male together.” 

[Then follows a description of the method of capture, very similar to 
that given below in paragraph 56.| 

“This fish lives upon marine plants andgfish. It has such a terrible 
defensive weapon that other voracious fishes do not dare to attack it. 
According to Aristotle, it is, like the tunny, tormented by an insect, and 
in its fury leaps out of the sea and even into vessels. According to 
Statius Miiller, the skin is phosphorescent at night. Although such 
large fishes are not usually well flavored, this one is considered palata- 
ble. Pieces of the belly and the tail are especially esteemed, and hence 
they are expensive. The fins are salted and sold under the name 
SCAU Oee veg te 

‘‘Aelian errs in saying that it enters fresh water, and in cataloguing it 
among the fishes of the Danube. 

*¢ Oppian and Ovid consider it, on account of its sword, one of the most 
terrible denizens of the sea. It is not at all probable that, as Pliny and 
many other later ichthyologists have written, it pierces the sides of ves- 
sels with its sword and sends them to the bottom ; its sword is not suffi- 
ciently strong. 

“Salviani, who gave the first figure of the fish, was wrong, like many 
writers who followed him, in giving two dorsal and two anal fins. 


[25] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 313 


‘“‘ Gesner, Aldrovandus, and Jonston have represented the species with 

two ventral fins. Bellon and Bomare were wrong in classing it among 

« the whales. Subsequent authors have failed to find the scales repre- 

sented in the figure given by the former and the teeth of which the latter 
spoke.”* 


14.—ALLUSIONS TO THE SWORD-FISH IN AMERICA BY EARLY 
WRITERS. 


The ancient city of Siena, secluded and almost forgotten among the 
hills of Northern Italy, should have a peculiar interest for Americans. 
Here Christopher Columbus was educated, and here, in the height of 
his triumphs as a discoverer, he chose to deposit a memento of his first 
voyage across the seas. His votive offering hangs over the portal of 
the old collegiate church, closed for many years, and rarely visited save 
by enterprising American tourists. It. consists of the helmet and 
armor worn by the discoveror when he first planted his feet on New 
World earth, his weapons, and the weapon of a warrior killed by his 
party when appoaching the American coast—the sword of a Sword-fish. + 

It is not probable that Columbus or some of his crew, sea-faring men 
of the Mediterranean, had never seen the Sword-fish. Still, its sword 
was treasured up by them, and has formed for more than four centuries 
and a half a striking feature in the best preserved monument of the 
discoverer of America. 

The earliest allusion in literature to the existence of the Sword-fish 
in the Western Atlantic seems to occur in Josselyn’s Account of Two 
Voyages to New England, printed in 1674, in the following passage: 

‘First Voyage:—The Twentieth day, we saw a great number of Sea- 
bats, or Owles, called also flying fish, they are about the bigness of a 
Whiting, with four tinsel wings, with which they fly as long as they are 
wet, when pursued by other fishes. Here likewise we saw many Grand- 
pisces, or Herring-hogs, hunting the scholes of Herrings, in the after- 
noon we saw a great fish called the Vehuella or Sword-fish, having along, 
strong and sharp finn like a Sword-blade on the top of his head, with 
which he pierced our Ship, and broke it off with striving to get loose, 
one of our Sailers dived and brought it aboard.” 

A half century later the species is referred to in Catesby’s work. ¢ 

Pennant, though aware of the statement made by Catesby, refuses 
the species a place in his List of the Fishes of North America, § supposing 
him to refer to the orca or high-finned killer-whale: ‘I am not certain 
whether Catesby does not mean the high-finned Cachelot by his Sword- 


* Bloch, Ichthyologie, iii, pp. 24-26. 

t For this fact, which I do not remember to have ever seen on record, I am indebted 
to my friend Col. N. D. Wilkins, of the Detroit Free Press, who visited the locality 
in 1879. 

¢ Historia Naturalis Caroling, &c., 1731. 

§ Arctic Zoology, vol. iii, 1784, p. 364. 


314 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


fish; yet as it is found in most seas, even to those of Ceylon (Mr. Lo- 
ten,) I give it a place here.” 

Catesby’s testimony was soon confirmed by Dr. lgeander Garden. 
This enthusiastic collector, through whose correspondence with Linnzus * 
so many of our southern plants and animals were first brought to knowl- 
edge and named, writes to John Ellis, from Charleston, S.C., March 25, 
1755: “T have sent you one of the rostrums of a fish found on the 
Florida coast, which I take to be a species of the Ziphias rostr. apice ensi- 
forme, pinnis ventralibus nullis.* I have been told that they are frequently 
found on the Carolina coast, though I have never seen any of them, 
and I have been ali along the coast to the Florida shore.” t 

Another allusion occurs in a communication by Prof. S. L. Mitchill, of 
New York, in the American Monthly Magazine: 

“¢ An individual of this species was taken, off Sandy Hook, by means 
of a harpoon, on the 19th June, 1817. The next day it was brought to 
New York Market and cut up like halibut and sturgeon for food. The 
length was about 12 feet, and girth, by estimation, 5. * * * The 
stomach contained seven or eight mackerel. The flesh was remarkably — 
firm; it was purchased at a quarter of a dollar the pound. I tasted a 
chop of it, broiled, and found it savory and excellent. It resembled the 
best sturgeon, without its strong and oily flavor. While I ate it I 
thought of veal cutlet. * * * Ihave been informed by my: friend 
John Renny that a Sword-fish 16 feet long was exhibited at New York 
in the year 1791.”t¢ 


15.—DISTRIBUTION OF XIPHIAS GLADIUS IN THE HASTERN ATLANTIC 


The Sword-fish is abundant in the Mediterranean§ even as far east 
as Constantinople. Aelian said that it was frequent in the Black Sea, 
entering the Danube. Unfortunately, this is neither confirmed nor con- 
tradicted by any later writer whose works I have seen, except Bloch, 
whose skepticism is as unreliable as the statements of Aelian. Aelian 
says that this species, with several others, is frequently taken in the 
Danube at the breaking up of the ice in spring. TYhisis so contrary to the 
known habits of the fish that it throws discredit on the whole story, for 
the present at least. J‘rom the entrance to the Mediterranean they 
range south to Cape Town. Berthelot saw great numbers of them off the 
Canaries. They have been frequently noticed on the coasts of Spain 
and France. They occur sparingly in summer in the British waters, - 
even to the Orkneys and the Hebrides. They occasionally reach 


* The name by which this fish was designated in the earlier editions of Linnzus’s 
writings. 

tA selection of the correspondence of Linneus and other naturalists, from the origi- 
nal manuscripts. By Sir James Edward Smith, M. D., F. R.S., &c., &c., president 
of the Linnzan Society. In two volumes. London. Printed for Longman, Hurst, 
Rees, Orme and Brown, Paternoster Row, 1821. (Vol. i, p. 353.) 

t American Monthly Magazine, ii, 1818, p. 242. 

§ Risso, Cuvier & Vacncion Guichenot, &c, 


7 
of 


‘ 


[27] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 315 


Sweden and Norway, where Linneus observed them, and, according to 
Liitken, have been taken on the coast of Finmark. They are known to 
have occurred in Danish waters and to have found their way into the 
Baltic, thus gaining a place in the fauna of Russia. A number of in- 
stances of the occurrence of Sword-fish in the Baltic are mentioned 
above in paragraph 13. 


16.—DISTRIBUTION ON THE COAST OF THE UNITED STATES. 


Allusion has been made to the early accounts of the Sword-fish on the 
coast of the United States both in the work of Catesby and the letters 
of Garden to Ellis and Linnzeus; also, to Mitchill’s account of it in 1818. 
Though it is strange that this very conspicuous species was not recorded 
more frequently by early American authors, it is still more remarkable 
that its right to a place in the fauna of the Western Atlantic was either 
denied or questioned, as late as 1836, by such well-informed authors as 
Sir John Richardson and MM. Cuvier and Valenciennes. 

Storer’s “Report on the Ichthyology and Herpetology of Massachu- 
setts”, published in 1839, was the first American faunal list, after Cates- 
by’s, in which the Sword-fish was mentioned among the American fish. 

The range of the species on the eastern coast of America can now be 
defined with some accuracy. Northward and eastward these fish have 
been seen as far as Cape Breton and Sable Island Banks. 

Captain Rowe states that during a trip to George’s Banks he has 
seen them off Chebucto Head, near Halifax, where the fishermen claim 
occasionally to have taken them with a seine. 

Capt. Daniel O’Brien, of the schooner “‘ Ossipee”, took five Sword-fish 
on his halibut-trawl, in 200 fathoms of water, between La Have and 
Brown’s Banks, in August, 1877. 

*Richardson remarks: ‘‘ The habits of the Scomberoid@ are quite in accordance 
with their great powers of natation. We found among them many fish that pass their 
lives remote from the land, in the middle districts of the ocean, and the family may 
be termed pelagic with as much propriety as some of the preceding ones have been 
named after the countries where they most abound. The bonitos and dolphins, or 
Coryphene, especially, roam about the tropics, pursuing schools of various kinds of 
flying fish. There is a greater number of species that cross the Atlantic belonging to 
this family than to any preceding one. Among these are Scomber grix, Pelamys sarda, 
Trichiurus lepturus, Elacate atlantica, Lichia glaucus, Caranx carangus, and Nomens mau- 
ritii. Several not only traverse the Atlantic from side to side, but also range through 
other seas; thus, Thynnus pelamys and Sariola cosmopolita are known on both sides of 
the Atlantic and in the Indian Ocean. Ausxis vulgaris, which is common to the Medi- 
terranean and Caribbean Seas, also extends to the Indian Archipelago, if the Taso of 
New Guinea be the same species. Vomer Brownii visits both sides of the Atlantic, 
and also the sea of Peru. Many of the species mentioned above as traversing the Atlantic 
exist also in the Mediterranean ; and there are several others which have an extensive range 
in the latter sea and through the whole eastern s‘de of the Atlantic, though they, do not cross 
to America, such as Scomber scombrus, Lepidopus argyreus, XIPHIAS GLADIUS, and Nau- 
crates ductor. * * * Xiphias gladius is enumerated by Dr. Smith, in his list of the 
fish of Massachusetts; but as he has included several other European species in his 
list on very insafficient grounds, further evidence is required of its being an American 
fish.”—(Richardson, Fauna Boreali-Amercani, p, 78.) 


316 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [28] 


Capt. Jerome B. Smith, of the schooner “ Hattie Lewis”, of Glouces- 
ter, killed a Sword-fish off Cape Smoke, near Sidney, Cape Breton.* 

Mr. J. Matthew Jones, of Halifax, N.S., writes, in 1877: “The Sword- 
fish is by no means common on our coast, and only makes its appear- 
ance at intervals in our harbors and bays. One waS taken in 1864 in 
Bedford Basin, at the head of Halifax Harbor. September 6, 1866, an 
individual weighing 200 pounds was taken in a net at Devil’s Island. 
November 12, 1866, the Rev. J. Ambrose sent me a sword, 3 feet and 6 
inches long, from a fish taken at Dover, N. 8., a few days previously.” 

The Sword-fish has, once at least, penetrated into the Gulf of St. 
Lawrence. In September, 1857, Capt. J. W. Collins was one of the crew 
of the schooner “ Mary Ellen”, of Truro, Mass., and harpooned a Sword- 
fish four miles southwest of the eastern part of Prince Edwards Island. 

On the coasts of Maine, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island they abound 
in the summer months. Southward they are less frequently seen, though 
their occurrence off New York is not unusual. Ihave never known one 
to be taken off New Jersey, and in our southern waters they do not 
appear to remain. Uhler and Lugger vaguely state that they sometimes 
enter the Chesapeake Bay.t This is apparently traditionary evidence. 

Dr. Yarrow obtained reliable information of their occasional appear- 
ance near Cape Lookout, N.C. 

Mr. A. W. Simpson states, in a letter to Professor Baird, that Sword-fish 
are sometimes seen at sea off Cape Hatteras, in November and Decem- 
ber, in large quantities. They sometimes find their way into the sounds. . 

An item went the rounds of the newspapers in 1876 to the effect that 
a Sword-fish 4 feet long had been captured in the Saint John’s River, near 
Jacksonville. After personal inquiry in Jacksonville, I am satisfied that 
this was simply a scabbard-fish or silvery hair-tail (Trichiurus lepturus). 

Professor Poey states that the fishermen of Cuba sometimes capture 
the Pez de espada when in pursuit of Agujas or Spear-fishes. § 

They have also been seen in Jamaica. 

Liitken gives instances of the capture of young Sword-fish at various 
points in the open Atlantic, as follows: 

(1) Lat. 32° 50’ N., long. 74° 19’ W. (about 150 miles SE. of Cape 
Hatteras). 

(2) Lat. 23° W., long. 55° W. (about 500 miles NE. of the Island of 
Antigua). 

(3) Lat. 20° N., long. 319° W. (about 150 miles NW. of Teneriffe and 
250 SW. of Madeira). 


* Capt. R. H. Hulbert. 

t List of the Fishes of Maryland. By P. R. Ubler and Otto Lugger, in Report of the 
Commissioners of Fisheries of Maryland, January, 1876, p. 90. 

t Notes Mf the Natural History of Fort Macon, N. C.,, and vicinity (No. 3). By H. 
C. Yarrow, in Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, 1877, 
p. 207. ’ 

§ Synopsis Piscium Cubensium, Cataloga Razonado de los Peces de Ja Isla de Cuba, 
in Repertorio Fisico-Natural de la Isla de Cuba, ii, 1868, p. 379. 


[29] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 317 


(4) On the equator, long. 29° (about 500 miles NE. of Cape St. Roque). 
(5) Lat. 25° 4’ 8., long. 27° 26’ W. (about 500 miles S. of the Island 
of Trinidad, South Atlantic). 


17.—_OCCURRENCE IN THE PACIFIC AND INDIAN OCEANS. 


We have no record of the occurrence of Sword-fishes on the eastern 
coast of South America, but the species is found on the Pacific coast of 
the same continent, and north to California. 

Professor Jordan writes: ‘Occasionally seen about Santa Catalina 
and the Coronados, but never taken, the fishermen having no suitable 
tackle. One seen by us off Santa Monica, in 1880, about eight feet in 
length.” . 

Mr. Willard Nye, of New Bedford, Mass., kindly communicates the 
following notes: Captain Dyer, of this port, says that Sword-fish are 
plentiful off the Peruvian coast, a number being often in sight at one 
time. The largest he ever saw was one caught by himself about 150 
miles from the shore, and which he estimates to have weighed 900 to 
1,000 pounds; the ship’s crew subsisted on it for several days and then 
salted 400 pounds. 

Captain’ Allen aiso states that while cruising in the Pacific for whales 
he has found the Sword-fish very abundant on the coasts of Peru and 
Chili, from the immediate coast 300 miles out, though outside of that 
limit they are seldom seen. They are most plenty during the month of 
January, when they are feeding on the common mackerel, with which 
those waters at that time abound. The largest he ever caught weighed 
about 600 pounds. 

Both Captain Allen and Captain Dyer have made several voyages as 
masters of whaling ships, and are perfectly familiar witlr Sword-fish on 
our coast; both speak of seeing plenty of Bill-fish in the Pacific, but 
they never had taken the trouble to catch them. Giinther mentions 
them in his book on the Fishes of the South Sea. 

In 1874 Dr. Hector discovered a Sword-fish snout in the museum at 
Auckland, New Zealand, and his announcement of the discovery was 
followed by the publication of two other instances of its occurrence in 
this region.* 
18.—SworD-FISH ENTERING RIVERS. 

Sword-fish have been known to enter the rivers of Europe. We have 
no record of such a habit in those frequenting our waters.t 


*Hector, Trans. New Zealand Inst. vii, (1874) 1875, p. 246. 

Hutton, ibid. viii, (1875) 1876, p. 211. 

Cheeseman, ibid. p. 219. 

tThey sometimes approach very near the shore, however, as is shown by the fol- 
lowing extract from a Cape Cod paper: 

“A Swordfish in close quarters.—Monday afternoon, while Mr. A. McKenzie, the boat- 
builder on J.S. Atwood’s wharf, was busily at work, his attention was attracted by a 
splashing of water under his work-shop, as if a score of boys were swimming and 


318 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [30] 


Aelian’s improbable story that they were taken in the Danube in 
winter has been mentioned. Southey and others relate that a man was 
killed while bathing in the Severn, near Worcester, by one of these 
fishes, which was afterwards caught. 

Couch states that a Sword-fish, supposed to weigh nearly 300 pounds, 
was caught in the river Parrett, near Bridgewater, in July, 1834.* 

According to De la Blanchére, one of them was taken, in the ninth 
year of the French Republic, in the river of Vannes, on the coast of 
Rhuys.j 

In the great hall of the Rathhaus in the city of Bremen hangs a 
large painting of a Sword-fish which was taken in the river Weser by 
some Bremen fishermen some time in the seventeenth century. 

Underneath it is painted the following inscription : 

“ ANNO. 1696. DEN. 18. JULI. IST. DIESER. 
FISCH. EIN. SCHWERTFISCH. GENANNT. VON. DIESER. 
STADT. FISCHERN. IN. DER. WESER. GEFANGEN. 
UND. DEM. 20. EJUSDEM. ANHERO. NAEHER. 
BREMEN. GEBRACHT. WORDEN. SEINE. GANZE. 
LENGTE. WAR. 10. FUSS. DAS. SCHWERT. WAR. 
74. VIRTEL. LANG. UND. 3. ZOLL. BREIT.” 


19.—GEOGRAPHICAL RANGE OF THE SWORD-FISH FAMILY. 


Although it may not seem desirable at present to accept in full the 
views of Dr. Liitken regarding the specific unity of the Spear-fishes 
and the Sail-fishes of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans, it is convenient 
to group the different species in the way he has suggested in discussing 
their geographical distribution. — 

THE SworpD-Fisu, Xiphias gladius, ranges along the Atlantic coast of 
America from Jamaica, lat. 18° N., Cuba, and the Bermudas to Cape 
Breton, lat. 47°. Not seen at Greenland, Iceland, or Spitzbergen, but 
occurring, according to Collett, at the North Cape, lat. 71°. Abundant 
along the coasts of Western Europe, entering the Baltic and the Medi- 
terranean. I can find no record of the species on the west coast of Africa 
south of the Cape Verdes, though Liitken, who may have access to 
facts unknown to me, states that they occur clear down to the Cape of 


making all the noise they possibly could by beating the water with their feet and 
hands. After this had been kept up a while his curiosity became excited, and upon 
investigating the cause of the disturbance discovered a Sword-fish among the, 
where, in his attempts to escape, he had become bewildered and imprisoned. Quickly 
getting a harpoon, Mr. McKenzie fastened the fish, and with the aid of bystanders 
drew it alive upon the wharf, where it was visited by many spectators, and subse- 
quently dressed and sold. It measured ten feet from the end of its sword to the tip 
of the tail—the sword itself being three feet in length. It is the first instance known 
of one of these fish being so near the shore, and why it should have been there at 
that time described is not easily explained.”— Provincetown Advocate, September 29, 1875. 

* History of British Fishes, ii, p. 145. 

t Dictionnaire Général des Péches. 


[31] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 319 


Good Hope, South Atlantic in mid-ocean, west coast of South America 
and north to Southern California, lat. 34°, New Zealand, and in the 
Indian Ocean off Mauritius. Good authorities state that sperm-whales, 
though constantly passing Cape Horn, never round the Cape of Good 
Hope. Can this be true in the case of the Sword-fish ? 

THE SAIL-FISH, Histiophorus gladius (with H. americanus and H. ori- 
entalis, questionable species, and H. pulchellus and H. immaculatus, 
young), occurs in the Red Sea, Indian Ocean, Malay Archipelago, and 
south at least as far as the Cape of Good Hope, lat. 35° S.; in the At- 
lantic on coast of Brazil, lat. 30° S. to 0, and north to Southern New 
England, lat. 42° N.; in the Pacific to Southwestern Japan, lat. 30° to 
10° N. Ina general way the range may be be said to be in tropical and 
temperate seas, between lat. 30° S. and 40. N., and in the western parts 
of those seas. 

THE BILL-FISH OR SPEAR-FISH, Tetrapturus indicus (with the various 
doubtful species mentioned in paragraph 12), occurs in the Western 
Atlantic from the West Indies, lat. 10° to 20° N., to Southern New 
England, lat. 42° N.; in the Eastern Atlantic from Gibraltar, lat. 45° 
N., to the Cape of Good Hope, lat. 30° S.; in the Indian Ocean, the 
Malay Archipelago, New Zealand, lat. 40° S., and on the west coast of 
Chili arntd Peru. In a general way, the range is between lat. 40° N. and 
lat. 40° S. 

_ The species of Tetrapturus which we have been accustomed to call 7. 
albidus, abundant about Cuba, is not very unusual on the coast of South- 
ern New England. Several are taken every year by the Sword-fish fish- 
ermen. I have not known of their capture along the Southern Atlantic 
coast of the United States. All I have known about were taken between 
Sandy Hook and the eastern part of George’s Banks. 

THE MEDITERRANEAN SPEAR-FISH, Tetrapturus belone, appears to be 
a land-locked form, never passing west of the Straits of Gibraltar. 


20.—PERIODICAL MOVEMENTS OF THE SWORD-FISH—TIMES OF AR- 
RIVAL AND DEPARTURE. 


Betore entering upon a discussion of the movements of the Sword-fish 
and their causes, it seems desirable to bring together the facts which 
have been learned, by conversation with fishermen and otherwise, in one 
group. Each man’s views are given in his own style, and as nearly as 
possible in his own words. There is no attempt at a classification of 
the facts. This will be made subsequently. 

An old swordfisherman at New York informed Mr. Blackford that 
the season opens in the neighborhood of Sandy Hook about the 1st of 
June, and continues along the coast as far east as Martha’s Vineyard 
and Nantucket Shoals until about the middle of September. He has 
heard of their being caught as far east as Cape Sable. At the first cold 
winds of September they disappear. They are, like the mackerel, at 
first very poor and lean, but as the season advances they grow fatter, 


320 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES, [382] 


Mr. John H. Thomson, of New Bedford, who kindly interviewed some 
of the local fishermen, writes: ‘‘ The Sword-fish appear on our coast, south 
of Block Island, about May 25 to Junel. They appear to come from 
the southwest, or just inside the track of the Gulf Stream. They grad- 
ually approach the Vineyard Sound and vicinity during June and until 
July 10 or 15, then appear to leave, working to the southeast, and are 
to be found to the southeast of Crab Ledge about the middle of July. 
This school is composed of comparatively small fish, averaging about 
150 pounds, gross, or about 100 pounds without head and tail, as they 
are delivered in the market. The smallest are 4 feet long, including the 
sword, and weigh from 50 to 40 pounds; the largest 84 feet long, with 
sword, and weighing 300 pounds gross. These fish are of a light plum- 
beous hue, darker on the back and white on the belly. 

“Of late years another school has appeared southeast of Cape Cod and 
George’s Banks about the Ist of August. These fish are altogether dif- 
ferent, being much larger, weighing from 300 to 800 pounds gross, and 
are entirely black. Ihave this week conversed with an old smackman, 
M. C. Tripp, who has all his life been a fisherman, and has this year 
(1874) captured about ninety fish, and his opinion is that they are not 
the same school. They appear to be of about the same abundance in 
average years, the catch depending on weather, fogs, &c. They come 
and leave in a general school, not in close schools Hke other fish, but 
distributed over the surface of the water, the whole being called by the 
fishermen the ‘annual school’, though it cannot strictly be so named.” 

According to Mr. Willard Nye, Sword-fish appear on the coast of 
Massachusetts from the Sth to the 20th of June, and are first seen south- 
west of Block Island. They begin to leave in August, but stray ones 
are sometimes seen as late as the last of October. The usual explana- 
tion of their movement is that they are following their food—mackerel 
and menhaden—which swarm our waters in the season named, and which 
are of course driven off by the approach of winter and rough weather. 

Capt. R. H. Hurlbert took a very large Sword-fish on George’s Banks, 
in November, 1875, in a snow-storm. 

The first Sword-fish of the season of 1875 was taken June 20, south- 
west of Montauk Point; its weight was 185 pounds. 

One taken off Noman’s Land, July 20, 1875, weighed when dressed 
120 pounds, and measured 7 feet. A cast was taken (No. 360), which 
was exhibited in the Government Building at Philadelphia. 

Capt. Benjamin Ashby, of Noank, Conn., tells me that the New Lon- 
don and Noank vessels leave home on their swordfishing cruise about 
the 6th of July. Through July they fish between Block Island and 
Noman’s Land ; in August between Noman’s Land and the South Shoals 
Light Ship. The fish “strike in” to Block Island and Montauk Point 
every year about the Ist of July. They are first seen 20 to 25 miles 
southeast of Montauk. At the end of August they are most abundant 
in the South Channel. Captain Ashby never saw them at any time so 


[33] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 321 


abundant as August 15,1859. He was cruising between George’s Banks 
and the South Shoals. It was a calm day, after a fog. He could at any 
time see twenty-five or thirty from the mast-head. They turn south 
when snow comes. 

Capt. George H. Martin, of East Gloucester, tells me that the Glouces- 
ter vessels employed in this fishery expect to be on the fishing grounds 
south of George’s Banks by the 10thof June. They almost always find 
the fish there on their arrival, following the schools of mackerel. They 
“tend on soundings”, like the mackerel. The first Sword-fish of 1877 
was taken June 10; the first of 1878, June 14. 

The statements already quoted, and numerous conversations with 
fishermen not here recorded, lead me to believe that Sword-fish are most 
abundant on the shoals near the shore and on the banks during the 
months of July and August; that they make their appearance on the 
frequented cruising grounds between Montauk Point and the eastern 
part of George’s Banks some time between the 25th of May and the 20th 
of June, and that they remain until the approach of cold weather in 
October or early in November. The dates of the capture of the first fish 
on the cruistmg ground referred to are recorded for three years, and are 
reasonably reliable: 1875, June 20; 1877, June 10; 1878, June 14. 

South of the cruising ground the dates of arrival and departure are 
doubtless farther apart; north and east the season shorter. There are 
no means of obtaining information, since the men engaged in this fishery 
are the only ones likely to remember the dates when the fish are seen. 


21.—REASONS OF THE COMING OF SWORD-FISH UPON OUR COAST. 


The Sword-fish comes into our waters in pursuit of its food. At least 
this is the most probable explanation of their movements, since the duties 
of reproduction appear to be performed elsewhere. Like the tunny, 
the bluefish, the bonito, and the squeteague, they pursue and prey upon 
the schools of menhaden and mackerel which are so abundant in the 
summer months. ‘ When you see Sword-fish, you may know that mack- 
erel are about!” said an old fisherman to me. ‘* Where you see the fin- 
back whale following food, there you find Sword-fish!” said another. 
The Sword-fish also feeds upon squid, which are at times abundant on 
our banks. ; 


22.—THE INFLUENCE OF TEMPERATURE UPON THE MOVEMENTS OF 
THE SWORD-FISH. 


To what extent this fish is amenable to the influences of temperature 
is an unsolved problem. We are met at the outset by the fact that they 
are frequently taken on trawl-lines which are set at the depth of 100 
fathoms or more on the off shore banks. Weknow that the temperature 
of the water at those localities and at that depth is sure to be less than 
40° Fahrenheit. How is this fact to be reconciled with the known habits 
of the fish, that it prefers the warmest weather of summer and swims at 

S. Mis. 29——21 


322 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [34] 


the surface in water of temperature ranging from 55° to 70°, sinking 
when cool winds blow? The case seemed clear enough until this per- 
plexing discovery was made, that Sword-fish are taken on bottom trawl- 
lines. In other respects their habits agree closely with those of the 
mackerel tribe, all the members of which seem sensitive to slight changes 
in temperature, and which, as a rule, prefer temperature in the neigh- 
borhood of 50° or more. 

There is one theory by which this difficulty may be avoided. We 
may suppose that the Sword-fish take the hooks on their way down to 
the bottom; that in their struggles they get entangled in the line and 
nooks, and when exhausted sink to the bottom. This is not improbable. 
A conversation with some fishermen who have caught them in this way 
develops the fact that the fish are usually much tangled in the line, and 
are nearly lifeless when they are brought to the surface. A confirmation 
is found in the observations of Captain Baker, of the schooner “ Peter D. 
Smith”, of Gloucester, who tells me that they often are taken on the hand- 
lines of the codfishermen on George’s Banks. His observations lead 
him to believe that they only take the hook when the tide is running 
very swiftly and the lines are trailing out in the tide-way at a consider- 
able distance from the bottom, and that the Sword-fish strike for the 
bottom as soon as they are hooked. This theory is not improbable, as I 
have already remarked, but it is not at present very strongly advocated. 
I want more facts before making up my own mind. At present the 
relation of the movements of the Sword-fish to temperature must be left 
without being understood. 

The appearance of the fish at the surface depends apparently upon 
temperature. They are seen only upon quiet summer days, in the morn- 
ing before ten or eleven o’clock and in the afternoon about four o’clock. 
Old fishermen say that they rise when the mackerel rise, and that when 
the mackerel go down they go down also. 


23.—PROBABLE WINTER HABITAT OF THE SWORD-FISH. 


Regarding the winter abode of the Sword-fish conjecture is useless. I 
have already discussed this question at length with reference to the 
menhaden and mackerel. With the Sword-fish the conditions are very 
different. The former are known to spawn in our waters, and the schools 
of young ones follow the old ones in toward the shores. The latter do 
not Spawn in our waters. We cannot well believe that they hibernate, 
nor is the hypothesis of a sojourn in the middle strata of mid-ocean 
exactly tenable. Perhaps they migrate to some distant region, where 
they spawn. But then the spawning time of this species in the Medi- 
terranean, as is related in a subsequent paragraph, appears to occur in 
the summer months, at the very time when our Sword-fishes are thronging 
our own waters, apparently with no care for the perpetuation of their 
species, 


[35] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 323 
24.—_-MOVEMENTS OF INDIVIDUAL SWORD-FISHES. 


A Sword-fish when swimming near the surface usually allows its dor- 
sal fin and the upper lobe of its caudal fin to be visible, projecting out 
of the water several inches. It is this habit which enables the fishex- 
man to detect the presence of the fish. It swims slowly along, and tie 
fishing schooner with a light breeze finds no difficulty in overtaking it. 
When excited its motions are very rapid and nervous. Sword-fishes are 
sometimes seen to leap entirely out of the water. Early writers attrib- 
uted this habit to the tormenting presence of parasites, but this theory 
seems hardly necessary, knowing what we do of its violent exertions at 
other times. The pointed head, the fins of the back and abdomen snugly 
fitting into grooves, the absence of ventrals, the long, lithe, muscular 
body, sloping slowly to the tail, fit it for the most rapid and forcible 
movement through the water. Prof. Richard Owen, testifying in an 
English court in regard to its power, said: 

“Tt strikes with the accumulated force of fifteen double-handed ham- 
mers. Its velocity is equal to that of a swivel-shot, and is as dangerous 
in its effects as a heavy artillery projectile.” 

Many very curious instances are on record of the encounters of this 
fish with other fishes or of their attacks upon ships. What can be the 
inducement for it to attack objects so much larger than itself it is hard 
to surmise. Every one knows the couplet from Oppian: 

‘Nature her bounty to his mouth confined, 
Gave him a sword, but left unarmed his mind.” 

It surely seems as if a temporary insanity sometimes takes possession 
of the fish. It is not strange that, when harpooned, it should retaliate 
by attacking its assailant. An old swordfisherman told Mr. Blackford 
that his vessel had been struck twenty times. There are, however, 
many instances of entirely unprovoked assault on vessels at sea. Many 
of these are recounted in a later portion of this memoir. Their move- 
ments when feeding are discussed below, under section 35, as well as 
their alleged peculiarities of movement during the breeding season, un- 
der section 37. 

It is the universal testimony of our fishermen that two are never seen 
swimming close together. Captain Ashby says that they are always 
distant from each other at least 30 or 40 feet. 


25.—MOVEMENTS OF SPEAR-FISHES. 


The Spear-fish in our waters is said by the fishermen to resemble the 
Sword-fish in its movements and manner of feeding. Professor Poey 
narrates that both the Cuban species swim at a depth of 100 fathoms, 
and they journey in pairs, shaping their course toward the Gulf of Mexico, 
the females being fuil of eggs. Only adultsaretaken. It is not known 
whence they come, or where they breed, or how the young return. Itis 
not even known whether the adult fishes return by the same route. 


324 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [36] 


When the fish has swallowed the hook it rises to the surface, making 
prodigious leaps and plunges. At last it is dragged to the boat, se- 
cured with a boat-hook, and beaten to death before it is hauled on board. 
Such fishing is not without danger, for the Spear-fish sometimes rushes 
upon the boat, drowning the fisherman, or wounding him with its terri- 
ble weapon. The fish becomes furious at the appearance of sharks, 
which are its natural enemies. They engage in violent combats, and 
when the Spear-fish is attached to the fisherman’s line it often receives 
frightful wounds from these adversaries. 

In Land and Water for August 31, 1872, Col. Nicholas Pike, author of 
‘“‘ Subtropical Rambles”, at that time United States consul at Mauritius, 
describes the habits of a species of Tetrapturus occurring in that viein- 
ity. He states that they have the habit of resting quietly on the surface 
in calm weather, with their dorsals expanded and acting as sails. They 
are taken in deep water with hook and line or speared when near the 
surface, like Sword-fish. When hooked or speared they make for the 
boats, taking tremendous leaps in the air, and if care is not taken they 
will jump into the boats, to the great consternation of the fishermen, 
or else pierce the boats with their bills. The fish is highly esteemed in 
the Mauritius, the flesh being of a salmon color near the vertebre ; 
lower down it is red and like coarse beef. The species attains a large 
size, one having been seen measuring 26 feet. 


26.—MOVEMENTS OF SAIL-FISHES. 


No observations have been made in this country, and recourse must 
be had to the statements of observers in the other hemisphere. 

In the life of Sir Stamford Raffles there is the following account from 
Singapore, under date of November 30, 1822: 

“The only amusing discovery we have recently made is that of a sail- 
ing fish, called by the natives Ikan layer, of about 10 or 12 feet long, 
which hoists a mainsail, and often sails in the manner of a native boat, 
and with considerabie swiftness. 1 have sent a set of the sails home, as 
they are beautifully cut and form a model for a fast-sailing boat. When 
a School of these are under sail together they are frequently mistaken 
for a fieet of native boats.” 

The fish referred to is in all likelihood Histiophorus gladius, a species 
very closely related to, if not identical, with our own. 


K.—SIZE AND RATE OF GROWTH. 


27.—MAXIMUM AND AVERAGE SIZE OF AMERICAN SWORD-FISH. 


The only individual. of which we have the exact measurements was 
taken off Seaconnet, R. I., July 23, 1874. This was 7 feet and 7 
inches long, weighing 113 pounds. Another, taken off Noman’s Land, 
July 20, 1875, and cast in plaster for the collection of the National 
Museum, weighed 120 pounds, and measured about 7 feet. Another, 


[37] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 325 


taken off Portland, August, 15, 1878, was 3,999 millimeters long, and 
weighed about 600 pounds. Many of these fish doubtless attain the 
weight of 400 and 500 pounds, and some, perhaps, grow to 600; but 
after this limit is reached, I am inclined to believe larger fish are excep- 
tional. Newspapers are fond of recording the occurrence of giant fish, 
weighing 1,500 pounds and upwards, and old sailors will in good faith 
describe the enormous fish which they saw at sea, but could not capture ; 
but one well-authenticated instance of accurate weighing is much more 
valuable. The largest one ever taken by Capt. Benjamin Ashby, for 
twenty years a swordfisherman, was killed on the shoals back of Edgar- 
town, Mass. When salted it weighed 639 pounds. Its live weight must 
have been as much as 750 or 800 pounds. Its sword measured nearly 
6 feet. This was an extraordinary fish among the three hundred or 
more taken by Captain Ashby in his long experience. He considers the 
average sizé to be about 250 pounds dressed, or 325alive. Captain Mar- 
tin, of Gloucester, estimates the average size at 300 to 400 pounds. 
The largest known to Captain Michaux weighed 625 pounds. The 
average about Block Island he considers to be 200 pounds. 

There are other stories of large fish. Capt. R. H. Hurlbert, of 
Gloucester, killed one on George’s Banks, in September, 1876, which 
weighed when dressed 480 pounds. Capt. John Rowe, of the same port, 
salted one which filled two and one-half barrels. This probably weighed 
600 pounds when alive. I have been told that a Sword-fish loses one- 
third of its weight in dressing, but I should think that one-fourth would 
be nearer to the truth. Captain Baker, of the schooner “ Peter D. 
Smith”, of Gloucester, assures me that he killed, in the summer of 1874, 
off Portland, a Sword-fish which weighed 750 pounds. 

Mitchill and DeKay state that in 1791 a Sword-fish 16 feet in length 
was exhibited in New York. It is questionable whether they often 
exceed this measurement. My own observations have been made on 
specimens from 7 to 12 feet long. A stuffed specimen in the United 
States National Museum measures eleven feet, and this seems to be very 
nearly the average size. 


oe 
°8.--MINIMUM SIZE OF AMERICAN SWORD-FISH. 


The size of the smallest Sword-fishes taken on our coastis a subject of 
much deeper interest, for it throws light on the time and place of breed- 
ing. There is some difference of testimony regarding the average size, 
but all fishermen with whom I have talked agree that very small ones 
do not find their way into our waters. I have collected several in- 
stances from the experiences of men long wonted to this fishery. 

Capt. John Rowe has seen one which did not weigh more than 75 
pounds when taken out of the water. 

Capt. R. H. Hurlbert killed, near Block Island, in July, 1877, one 
which weighed 50 pounds, and measured about 2 feet without its sword. 

Captain Ashby’s smallest weighed about 25 pounds when dressed ; 


326 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [38] 


this he killed off Noman’s Land. He never killed another which 
weighed less than 100. He tells me that a Bridgeport smack had one 
weighing 16 pounds (or probably 24 when alive), and measuring 18 
inches without its sword. 

In August, 1878, a small specimen of the mackerel shark, Lamna cor- 
nubica, was captured at the mouth of Gloucester Harbor. In its nostril 
Dr. Bean found the sword, between 1 and 2 inches long, of a young 
Sword-fish. When this was pulled out the blood flowed freely, indicat- 
ing that the wound was recent. The fish to which this sword belonged 
cannot have exceeded 10 or 12 inches in length. Whether the small 
Sword-fish met with its misfortune in our waters, or whether the shark 
brought this trophy from beyond the sea, is a question I cannot answer. 

Liitken speaks of a very young individual taken in the Atlantie, lat. 
32° 50! N., long. 749 19’ W. This must be about 150 miles southeast of 
Cape Hatteras. ; 


29.—SIZE OF SWORD-FISH IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 


In the Mediterranean, near Sicily and Genoa, young fish, ranging in 
weight from half a pound to 12 pounds, are said to be abundant be- 
tween November and March. 

About La Ciotat and Martigues, in the south of France, many are 
taken too small to injure the fishing-nets, and very rarely reaching the 
weight of 100 pounds. 

Irom the statements of Bloch and later writers it appears that large 
Sword-fish also are abundant in the Mediterranean. Late Italian fishery 
reports state that the average weight of those taken on the coast of 
Italy is 50 kilograms (110 pounds). 

Of the coasts of Spain and Portugal Steindachner remarks: ‘More 
abundant on the southern coasts of Spain than on the northern, western, 
and eastern sides of the Iberian peninsula. We saw quite large exam- 
ples in the fish-markets at Gibraltar, Cadiz, Lisbon, La Corufia, and Bar- 
celona, and at Santa Cruz, Teneriffe. The largest of three specimens 
in my possession is 43 inches long, another 24 inches.”* 


30.—RATE OF GROWTH. 


Little is known about the rate of growth. The young fish taken in 
winter in the Mediterranean, ranging in weight from half a pound to 
12 pounds, are thought to have been hatched during the previous sum- 
mer. Those of a larger size, ranging from 24 to 60 pounds, taken on 
the New England coast in the summer, may perhaps be the young of 
the previous year. Beyond this even conjecture is fruitless. As in 
other species, the rate of growth depends directly upon the quantity ot 
food consumed. It is to be presumed that a summer passed in feasting 
among the crowding schools of menhaden and mackerel in our waters 


*Sitzb. Ak. Wiss. Wein, 1868, p. 396. 


[39] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 327 


would bring about a considerable increase in weight. That this is the 
case is clearly shown by the testimony of the fishermen, who say that in 
the spring Sword-fish are thin, growing fatter and heavier as the season 
goes on. 

Dr. Liitken and Dr. Giinther have lately made some exceedingly inter- 
esting observations upon the young of the Sword-fish and of the Spear- 
fish and Sail-fish. A translation of Dr. Liitken’s paper, furnished by 
Dr. T. H. Bean, is given in the Appendix (paragraph 64). 

Dr. Giinther’s studies were made upon very small specimens of unde- 
termined species, belonging to either Tetrapturus, Histiophorus, or both. 
In his latest work, “The Study of Fishes,” he summarizes the facts 
observed by him as follows: 

‘The Sword-fishes with ventral fins (Histiophorus) belong to the Tele- 
osteans of the largest size. In young individuals, 9 millimeters long, 
both jaws are produced and armed with pointed teeth, the supraorbital 
margin is ciliated, the parietal and preoperculum are prolonged intolong 
spines, the dorsal and anal fins are a long fringe, and the ventrals make 
their appearance as a pair of short buds. When 14 millimeters long the 

_young fish has still the same armature of the head, but the dorsal fin 
has become much higher, and the ventral filaments have grown to a 
great length. At the next stage, when the fish has attained to a length 
of 60 millimeters, the upper jaw is considerably prolonged beyond the 
lower, losing its teeth, the spines of the head are shortened, and the 
fins assume nearly the shape which they retain in mature individuals. 

“ Young Sword-fishes without ventral fins (Xiphias) undergo similar 
changes, and, besides, their skin is covered with small, rough excres- 
cences, longitudinally arrayed, which continue to be visible after the 
young fish has attained the form of the mature in other respects.” 

Dr. Liitken’s description of the young Sword-fishes ts an exceedingly 
valuable contribution to knowledge. 

I have collected together, in the plates which accompany this paper, 
the various published figures of young Sword-fishes, and have had them 
redrawn as nearly as possible to a unifdrm scale. 

Of the Sword-fish, Xiphias gladius, two figures are given. One, taken 
from Liitken’s “‘Spolia Atlantica ” (pl. ii, fig. 10), is 37 millimeters long ; 
the other is a reproduction of the often-copied figure in Cuvier and 
Valenciennes’s “Histoire Naturelle des Poissons” (pl. cexxv), 12 to 18 
inches long. Liitken had a smaller specimen, 10 millimeters long, but 
it was too poorly preserved to be figured. 

Of the various species of Tetrapturus and Histiophorus, six figures are 
given. The smallest is that from “ Spolia Atlantica” (pi. ii, fig. 11), and 
is of a fish 54 millimeters long. Liitken remarks that he has a series 
‘from 54 to 12 millimeters long which differ very little from each other. 
The next in size is copied from Giinther, and is probably about 10 milli- 
meters long; the third, also from Giinther, is 14 millimeters long.  Liit- 
ken has another link in the series, a specimen 21 millimeters long, which 


328 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [40] 


he has not figured. The fourth stage is from Giinther, a specimen 60 
millimeters long; the fifth, from Cuvier, and Valenciennes (pl. cexxx), 
their Histiophorus pulchellus, about 410 millimeters long; the sixth, from 
Riippell, a copy of his figure of H. immaculatus, said to be about 1,800 
millimeters long. ‘These illustrations show the development in a very 
satisfactory manner. . 
I'.—_ABUNDANCE. 


31.—ABUNDANCE AT THE PRESENT TIME. 


For many years from 3,000 to 6,000 of these fish have been taken an- 
nually on the New England coast. It is not unusual for twenty-five or 
more to be seen in the course of a single day’s cruising, and sometimes 
as many as this are visible from the mast-head at one time. Captain 
Ashby saw twenty at one time, in August, 1839, between George’s Banks 
and the South Shoals. One Gloucester schooner, the “ Midnight”, Capt. 
Alfred Wixon, took fourteen in one day on George’s Banks, in 1877. 

Capt. John Rowe obtained twenty barrels, or 4,000 pounds, of salt fish 
on one trip to George’s Banks; this amount represents twenty fish or 
more. 

Captain Ashby has killed 108 Sword-fish in one year; Capt. M. C. 
Tripp killed about $0 in 1874. 

Such instances as these indicate in a general way the abundance of 
the Sword-fish. A vessel cruising within 50 miles of our coast, between 
Cape May and Cape Sable, and during the months of June, July, 
August, and September, cannot fail, on a favorable day, to come in 
sight of several of them. Mr. Earll writes that the fishermen of Port- 
land never knew them more abundant than in 1879. This is probably, 
in part, due to the fact that the fishery there is of very recent origin. 


32.—ABUNDANCE IN THE PAST. AND PROBABILITY OF FUTURE DE- 
CREASE. 


There is no evidence of any change in their abundance, either increase 
or decrease. Fishermen agree that they are as plenty as ever, nor can 
any change be anticipated. ‘The present mode of fishing does not de- 
stroy them in any considerable numbers, each individual fish being the 
object, of special pursuit. The solitary habits of the species will always 
protect them from wholesale capture, so destructive to schooling fish. 
Kven if this were not the case, the evidence proves that spawning 
Sword-fish do not frequent our waters. When a female shad is killed 
thousands of possible young die also. The Sword-fish taken by our 
fishermen carry no such precious burden. 


33.—EFFECTS OF OVERFISHING IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 


A very different tale was once told of the winter fishery in the Mediter- 
ranean. Meunier. quotes this testimony by Spallanzani: “I took part 


[41] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 329 


many times in this fishery, and I dare not tell how many young fish are 
its victims; being of no value they are thrown back into the sea, mutilated 
or already dead from the rubbing of the net-meshes. I write denouncing 
this destructive method, and I urge forcibly the harm which results 
from it. They tell me it is true that there is a law of Genoa which for- 
bids its use, or rather its abuse, but this does not do away with the fact 
that each year there sail from the Gulf of Spezzia three or four pairs of 
fishing boats which go to the sea to carry on this fishery. Still more, 
the governor of the place, who should carry out this law, is the first to 
favor, by means of a gift of silver, the abuse which it is intended to 
prevent.” 

This, however, was a century ago. I have met with no complaints 
of decrease in the works of later writers, though in Targioni Tozzetti’s 
report, published in 1880, it is stated that there is much opposition to 
the capture of small fish. 


G.—FOOD. 
34.—NATURE OF FOOD. 


Dr. Fleming found the remains of Sepic in its stomach, and also small 
fishes. Oppian says that it eagerly devours the Hippuris (probably 
Coryphena). 

A specimen taken off Seaconnet, July 22, 1875, had in its stomach 
the remains of small fish, perhaps Poronotus,and jaws of a squid, per- 
haps Loligo Peaki. 

Their food in the Western Atlantic consists for the most part of the 
common schooling species of fishes. 


30.—MANNER OF OBTAINING FOOD. 


They feed on menhaden, mackerel, bonitoes, bluefish, and other species 
which swim in close schools. Their habits of feeding have often been 
described to me by old fishermen. They are said to rise beneath the 
school of small fish, striking to the right and left with their swords 
until they have killed a number, which they then proceed to devour. 
Menhaden have been seen floating at the surface which have been cut 
nearly in twain by a blow of the sword. Mr. John H. Thomson re- 
marks that he has seen them apparently throw the fish in the air, 
catching them on the fall. 

Capt. Benjamin Ashby says that they feed on mackerel, herring, 
whiting, and menhaden. He has found half a bucket full of small fish 
of tlrese kinds in the stomach of one Sword-fish. He has seen them in 
the act of feeding. They rise perpendicularly out of the water until 
the sword and two-thirds of the remainder of the body are exposed to 
view. He has seen a school of herring crowding together at the sur- 
face on George’s Banks as elosely as they could be packed. A Sword- 
fish came up through the dense mass and fell flat over on its side, 


330 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [42] 


striking many fish with the sides of its sword. He has at one time 
picked up as much as a bushel of herrings thus killed by a Sword-fish 
on George’s Banks. 


H.—REPRODUCTION. 
36.—LOCATION OF THE BREEDING GROUNDS. 


But little is known regarding their time and place of breeding. They 
are said to deposit their eggs in large quantities on the coasts of Sicily, 
and Eurepean writers give their spawning time as occurring the latter 
part of spring and the begmning of summer. In the Mediterranean 
they occur of all sizes from 400 pounds down, and the young are so 
plentiful as to be a common article of food. Except in this region the 
young are never taken; on our own coast, plentiful as they are, they 
are never seen less than 3 feet, and are usually much larger. M. Ray- 
naud, who brought to Cuvier a specimen of Histiophorus four inches 
long, taken in January, 1829, in the Atlantic, between the Cape of Good 
Hope and France, reported that there were great numbers of young 
Sail-fish in the place where this was taken.* . 

Old fishermen who have taken and dressed them by the hundreds as- 
sure me that they have never seen traces of spawn in them. The ab- 
sence of young fish and spawning females on the coast of North Americé 
would indicate that they do not breed with us. Judging from the lo- 
cations where young fish have been taken, it seems probably that they 
breed in the open ocean. (See paragraph 16, and the paper by Dr. 
Liitken in the Appendix, paragraph 64.) 


37.—HABITS OF THE SWORD-FISH IN THE BREEDING SEASON. 


Meunier, quoting Spallanzani, states that the Sword-fish does not 
approach the coast of Sicily except in the season of reproduction; the 
males, are then seen pursuing the females. It is a good time to capture 
them, for when the female has been taken the male lingers near and is 
easily approached. The fish are abundant in the Straits of Messina 
from the middle of April to the middle of September; early in the 
season they hug the Calabrian shore, approaching from the north ; after 
the end of June they are most abundant on the Sicilian shore, approach- 
ing from the south. : 

From other circumstances, it seems certain that there are spawning 
grounds in the sea near Sicily and Génoa, for from November to the Ist 
of March young ones are taken in the Straits of Messina, ranging in 
weight from half a pound to twelve pounds. 


*Cuv. & Val..Hist. Nat. Poiss.<viii, p. 305. 
tLes Grandes Péches, p.*142, 


[43] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 331 


388.—ABSENCE OF ORDINARY HABITS OF BREEDING SEASON AMONG 
OUR SWORD-FISH. 


In the Mediterranean, as has been already stated, the very young fish 
are found from November to March, and here from July to the middle of 
September the male fish are seen pursuing the female over the shoals, 
and at this time the males are easily taken. Old swordfishermen assure 
me that on our coast, out of thousands of specimens they have taken, 
they have never seen one containing eggs (Captain Ashby and Captain 
Kirby). I have myself dissected several males, none of which were near 
breeding time. In the European waters they are said often to be seen 
swimming in pairs, male and female. Many sentimental stories were 
current, especially among the older writers, concerning the conjugal af- 
fection and unselfish devotion of the Sword-fish, but these seem to have 
originated in the imaginative brain of the naturalist rather than in his 
perceptive faculties. It is said that when the female fish is taken the 
male seems devoid of fear, approaches the boat, and allows himself easily 
to be taken; but if this be true, this appears to be the case only in the 
height of the breeding season, and is easily understood. I cannot learn 
that two Sword-fish have ever been seen associated together in our 
waters, though I have made frequent and diligent inquiry. 

There is no inherent improbability, however, in this story regarding 
the Sword-fish in HKurope, for the same thing is stated by Professor 
Poey as the result of his studies upon the habits of Tetrapturus. 


39.—CURIOUS ANCIENT BELIEFS CONCERNING THE VIVIPAROUS RE- 
PRODUCTION OF THE SWORD-FISH. 


A curious faney was prevalent in former days regarding an anatomi- 
cal character of the Sword-fish. In an article by Mr. Dale in Philosoph- 
ical Transactions (abridged edition, ii, p. 835), he remarks: “I cannot 
conceive it to be consonant to that Care and Industry of Nature, in pro- 
viding convenient Receptacles for preserving the Fetus; neither is it 
agreeable to Reason to believe, that when Nature hath provided an 
* Uterus in all Animals, not only the Viviparous, and such as only cherish 
the Embryo in Utero, but in the Oviparous also and Insects, the Hel and 
the Xiphia, or Sword-fish, should be the only Animals without it.” 


T.—ENEMIES AND FATALITIES. 
40.—PUGNACITY. 


The pugnacity of the Sword-fish has become a by-word. Without any 
special effort on my part, the following instances of their attacks upon 
vessels have, in the last six years, found their way into the pigeon-hole 
labeled “ A, ILI, 76, Sword-fish ”. 


332 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [44] 


Aelian says (B. xxxii, C. 6) that the Sword-fish has a sharp-pointed 
snout with which it is able to pierce the sides of a ship and send it to 
the bottom; instances of which have been known near a place in Mau- 
ritania known as Cotte, not far from the river Lixus, on the African 
side of the Mediterranean. He describes the sword as like the beak of 
the ship known as the trireme, which was rowed with three banks 
of oars. 

One of the earliest accounts is that given in the second part of vol. 
i, lib. ii, p. 89, 1615, of Purchas’ Pilgrims: 

“The sixth Circum-Navigation, by William Cornelison ‘Schovten of 
Horne; who Sovthwards from the Straights of Magelan in Tierra-Del- 
fvogo, fovnd and discovered a new passage through the great Sovth- 
Sea, and that way sailed rovnd about the World,” &c. 

Off the coast of Sierra Leone: 

“The fift of October we were vnder foure degrees seuen and twentie 
minutes, the same day about noone, there was such a noyse in the Bough 
of our Shippe, that the master, being behind in the Gallerie, thought 
that one of the men had fallen out of the Fore-ship, or from the Boe-sprit 
into the sea, but as hee looked out over the side of the Ship hee saw 
the Sea all red, as if great store of bloud had beene powred into it, 
whereat hee wondred, knowing not what it meant, but afterward hee 
found, that a great Fish or a Sea monster having a horne had there- 
with stricken against the ship with most great strength. For when we 
were in Porto Desire where we set the Ship on the Strand to make it 
cleane, about seven foot under water, before in the Ship, wee found a 
Horne sticking in the Ship, much like for thicknesse and fashion to a 
common Elephants tooth, not hollow, but full, very strong hard Bone, 
which had entered into three Plankes of the Ship, that is two thicke 
Plankes of greene and one of Oken wood, and so into a Rib, where it 
turned upward, to our great good fortune, for if it had entered between 
the Ribbes, it would happily have made a greater Hole and have brought 
both Ship and men in danger to be lost. It strucke at least halfe a foote 
deepe into the Ship and about half a foote without, where, with great 
force it was broken off, by reason whereof the great monster bled so 
much.” 

More than a century later C. Mortimer, M. D., records this expe- 
rience: 

‘‘Mr. Bankley shewed me the Horn of a Fish that had penetrated 
above 8 inches into the Timber of a Ship and gave me the following Re- 
lation of it: ‘His Magresty’s Ship Leopard, having been at the West 
Indies and on the Coast of Guiney, was ordered by Warrant from the 
Honorable Navy-Board, dated Aug. 18, 1725, to be cleaned and refitted 
at Portsmout for Channel-Service: Pursuant thereto, she was put into 
the great Stone-dock; and, in stripping off her Sheathing, the Ship- 
wrights found something that was uncommon in her Bottom, about 8 


[45] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 333 


Feet from her Keel, just before the Fore Mast; which they searching into, 
found the Bone or Part of the Horn of a Fish of the Figure here de- 
scribed ; the Outside Rough not unlike Seal-Skin; and the End, where it 
was broken off shewed itself like coarse Ivory. ‘The Fish is supposed to 
have followed the Ship, when under Sail, because the sharp End of the 
Horn pointed toward the Bow: It penetrated with that Swiftness or 
Strength that it went through the Sheathing 1 Inch thick, the Plank 3 
Inches thick, and into the Timber 45 Inches.’”* 

Don Joseph Cornide, in his “ Essayo de Una Historia de los Peces 
de la Costa de Galicia”, 1787: 

“This fish is taken in the seas of Galicia, where it is more common 
toward the Rio de Vigo, where it is well known that the Balandia (a 
small fishing vessel) of S. M. le Ardilla was pierced in its side and sunk 
~ by the arm of one of these fishes, which is preserved in the Royal Cabi- 
net of Natural History.” 

In 1871 the little yacht “‘Redhot”, of New Bedford, was out swordfish- 
ing, and a Sword-fish had been hauled in to be lanced, and it attacked 
the vessel and pierced the side so as to sink the vessel. She was re- 
paired and used in the service of the Commission at Wood’s Holl. 
(Professor Baird.) 

Couch quotes the personal statement of a gentleman, who says: 

‘¢ We have had the pleasure of inspecting a piece of wood cut out of 
one of the fore planks of a vessel (the ‘ Priscilla’, from Pernambuco), 
through which was struck about 18 inches of the bony weapon of the 
Sword-fish. The force with which it must have been driven in affords a 
striking exemplification of the power and ferocity of the fish. The ‘ Pris- 
cilla’ is quite a new vessel. Captain Taylor, her commander, states that 
when near the Azores, as he was walking the quarter-deck at night, a 
shock was felt which brought all hands from below, under the impres- 
sion that the ship had touched upon some rock. This was, no doubt, 
when the occurrence took place.” 

The New York Herald of May 11, 1871, states: 

“The English ship ‘Queensberry’ has been struck by a Sword-fish, 
which penetrated to a depth of 30 inches, causing a leak which neces- 
sitated the discharge of the cargo.” 

The London Daily News of December 11, 1868, contained the follow- 
ing paragraph, which emanated, I suspect, from the pen of Prof. R. A. 
Proctor: 

‘Last Wednesday the court of common pleas—rather a strange 
place, by the by, for inquiring into the natural history of fishes—was 
engaged for several hours in trying to determine under what circum- 
stances a Sword-fish might be able to escape scot-free atter thrusting his 
snout into the side of a ship. The gallant ship ‘Dreadnought’, thor- 
oughly repaired, and classed Al at Lloyd’s, had been insured for £3,000 


“An Account of the horn of a Fish struck several Inches into the side of a Ship, by 
C. Mortimer, M. D.F.R.S. Philos. Trans. xl, No. 461, p. 862, 1741. Abr. ed. ix, p. 72. 


334 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [46] 


against all the risks of the seas. She sailed on March 10th, 1864, from 
Colombo, for London. Three days later the crew, while fishing, hooked a 
sword-fish. Xiphias, however, broke the line, and a few moments after 
leaped half out of the water, with the object, it should seem, of taking 
a look at his persecutor, the ‘Dreadnought’. Probably he satisfied him- 
self that the enemy was some abnormally large cetacean, which it was 
his natural duty to attack forthwith. Be this as it may, the attack was 
made, and at four o’clock the next morning the captain was awakened 
with the unwelcome intelligence that the ship had sprung a leak. She 
was taken back to Colombo, and thence to Cochin, where she was hove 
down. Near the keel was found a round hole, an inch in diameter, run- 
ning completely through the copper sheathing and planking. 

“« As attacks by Sword-fish are included among sea risks, the insurance 
company was willing to pay the damages claimed by the owners of the 
ship if only it could be proved that the hole had really been made by a 
Sword-fish. No instance had ever been recorded in which a Sword-fish 
had been able to withdraw his sword after attacking aship. A defense 
was founded on the possibility that the hole had been made in some 
other way. Professor Owen and Mr. Frank Buckland gave their evi- 
dence, but neither of them could state quite positively whether a Sword- 
fish which had passed its beak through three inches of stout planking 
could withdraw without the loss of its sword. Mr. Buckland said that 
fish have no power of ‘ backing,’ and expressed his belief that he could 
hold a Sword-fish by the beak; but then he admitted that the fish had 
considerable lateral power, and might so ‘wriggle its sword out of a 
hole’. And so the insurance company will have to pay nearly six hun- 
dred pounds because an ill-tempered fish objected to be hooked, and 
took its revenge by running full tilt against copper sheathing and oak 
planking.” 

The Gloucester schooner “ Wyoming”, on a last trip to Géorge’s Banks, 
records the New York World of August 31, 1875, was attacked by a 
Sword-fish in the night time. He assailed the vessel with great force, 
and succeeded in putting his sword through one of her planks some two 
feet, and after making fearful struggles to extricate himself, broke his 
sword off, leaving it hard and fast in the plank, and made a speedy 
departure. Fortunate was it that he did not succeed in drawing out 
his sword, as the aperture would undoubtedly have made a leak suffi- 
cient to have sunk the vessel. As it was, she leaked badly, requiring 
pretty lively pumping to keep her free.* 

Another instance of a similar nature is this, which was recorded in 
the Liverpool Mercury about the year 1876: 

“Mr. J. J. Harwood, master of the British brigantine ‘ Fortunate’, in 
dock at Liverpool, reports that whilst on his passage from the Rio 
Grande, when in latitude 20° 12’ north and longitude 47° 9’ west, this 


ee 


“New York World, August 31, 1875. 


[47] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 335 


ship was struck by a large fish, which made the vessel shake very much. 
Thinking the ship had been merely struck by the tail of some sea-mon- 
ster, he took no further notice of the matter; but, after discharging 
cargo at Runcorn, and coming into the Canada half-tide dock, he found 
oue of the plank ends in the stern split, and on closer examination he 
discovered that a Sword-fish had driven his sword completely through 
the plank, four inches in thickness, leaving the point of the sword nearly 
eight inches through the plank. The fish in its struggle broke the 
sword off level with the outside of the vessel, and by its attack upon the 
ship lost nearly a foot length of the very dangerous weapon with which 
it was armed. There is no doubt that this somewhat singular occur- 
rence took place when the vessel was struck as Captain Harwood de- 
scribes.” 

Forest and Stream of June 24, 1875, recorded the following inei- 
dent: . 

“On Wednesday of last week a Sword-fish attacked the fishing-boat 
of Capt. D. D. Thurlow while he was hauling mackerel-nets off Fire 
Island, thrust its sword clear through the bottom, and stuck fast, while 
the fishermen took several half-hitches around its body and so secured 
it. It was afterwards brought to Fulton Market, and found to weigh 
390 pounds. Its sword measured 3 feet and 7 inches, and its entire 
length was over 11 feet. The stuffed skin will adorn the Central Park 
Museum.” 

The Landmark, of Norfolk, Va., also mentioned a similar occurrence 
in February, 1876: 

“The brig ‘P. M. Tinker’, Captain Bernard, previously mentioned as 
having arrived here from Richmond, leaking, for repairs, has been hauled 
up on the ways at Graves’s ship-yard. On examination it was discov- 
ered that the leak was caused by a Sword-fish, the sword being found 
broken off forward the bands, about sixteen feet abaft the forefoot. 
The fish, in striking the vessel, must have come with great force, as the 
sword penetrated the copper sheathing, a four-inch birch plank, and 
through the timbers about six inches—in all about ten inches. It oc- 
curred on the morning of the 25d of December, when the brig was eigit- 
een days out from Rio, and in the neighborhood of Cape St. Roque. 
She was pumped about 4 o’clock in the morning, and found free of water. 
About 6 o’clock the same morning she was again pumped, when water 
was obtained, and on examination it was found that she had made ten 
inches of water. The men were kept steady at the pumps until her 
arrival at Richmond, and while there, and on her trip here.” 

Mr. Willard Nye sends me this note: 

“‘ A few years ago Captain Dyer, of New Bedford, struck a Sword-fish, 
from a thirty-foot boat, forty miles southwest of Noman’s Land, threw 
overboard the keg, tacked, and stood by to the windward of it. When 
nearly abreast of it the man at the masthead called out, ‘ Why here he 


336 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [48] 


is, right alongside’ The fish was then about 10 feet from the boat, and 
swimming in the same direction, but when he got where he could see 
the splash of water around the bow he turned and struck the boat about 
2 feet from the stern and just below the water-line. The sword went 
through the planking, which was of cedar an inch and three-quarters 
thick, into a lot of loose iron ballast, breaking off short at the fish’s head. 
A aber of boats, large and sacle have been ‘ stove’ by Sword-fish on 
our coast, but always after the fish had been struck.” 

A nemeleas writer in Harper’s Weekly, October 25, 1879, narrates 
these instances, for which I am unable te give the original authority : 

‘In a calm day in the summer of 1832, on the coast of Massachusetts, 
a pilot was rowing his little skiff leisurely along, when he was suddenly 
roused from his seat by a thrust from below by a Sword-fish, who drove 
his sharp instrument more than three feet up through the bottom. 
With rare presence of mind, with the butt of an ore he broke it off level 
with the floor before the fish had time to withdrawit. Fortunately, the 
thrust was not directly upward. Had it been so, the frail boat would 
have been destroyed. 

‘‘A Boston ship hauled up on the ways for repair, a few years since, 
presented the shank of a Sword-fish’s dagger, which had been driven 
considerably far into the solid oak plank. A more curious affair was 
brought to lightin 1725 in overhauling His Majesty’s ship ‘ Leopard’, from 
the coast of Africa. The sword of this marine spearsman had pierced 
the sheathing one inch, next it went through a three-inch plank, and 
beyond that three inches and a half into the firm timber. It was the 
opinion of the mechanics that it would have required nine strokes of a 
hammer weighing twenty-five pounds to drive an iron bolt of the same 
dimensions to the same depth in the hull. Yet the fish drove it at a 
single thrust. 

“On the return of the whale-ship ‘Fortune’ to Plymouth, Mass., in 
1827, the stump of a sword-blade of this fish was noticed projecting like a 
cog outside, which, on being traced, had been driven through the copper 
sheathing, an inch-board undersheathing, a three-inch plank of hard 
wood, the solid white-oak timber twelve inches thick, then through 
Aifotiier two-and-a-half-inch hard-oak ceiling, and lastly penetrated the 
head of an oil-cask, where it stuck, not a drop of the oil having escaped.” 

Such instances could be found by the score, if one had the time and 
patience to search. The thing happens many times a year, and nearly 
as often affords a text for some paragrapher or local editor. 

Captain Beechy, in the narrative of the voyage of H. M.S. “Blossom”, 
mentions the following incident which occurred in the Pacicific, near 
Easter Island: “As the line was hauling in, a large Sword-fish bit at 
the tin case which contained our thermometer, but fortunately failed in 
carrying it off.” 


[49] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES 337 


41. PUGNACITY OF THE SPEAR-FISH. 


The Spear-fish (Tetrapturus albidus, &c.) also strikes vessels. I am 
indebted to Capt. William Spicer, of Noank, Conn., for this note: 

Mr. William Taylor, of Mystic, a man seventy-six years old, who was in 
the smack ‘Evergreen’, Capt. John Appleman, states that he started 
from Mystic, October 35, 1832, on a fishing voyage to Key West, in com- 
pany with the smack ‘ Morning Star,’ Captain Rowland. On the 12th 
they were off Cape Hatteras, the wind blowing heavily from the north- 
east, and the smack under double-reefed sails. gAt ten o’clock in the 
evening they were struck by a ‘ Woho’ (sic), which shocked the vessel 
all over. The smack was leaking badly, and they made a signal to the 
‘Morning Star’ to keep close by them. The next morning they found the 
leak, and both smacks kept off to Charleston. On arrival they took out 
the ballast, hove her out, and found that the sword had gone through 
the planking, timber, and ceiling. The plank was 2 inches thick, the 
timber 5 inches, and the ceiling 14 inches white oak. The sword pro- 
jected 2 inches through the ceiling, on the inside of the ‘“after-run”.* 
It struck close by a butt on the outside, which caused the leak. They 
took out and replaced a piece of the plank, and proceeded on their 
voyage.” 

J. Matthew Jones, esq., of Halifax, N. S., in his delightful little book 
“The Naturalist in Bermuda”, records the case of the Bermudian 
schooner ‘“ Karl Dundonald”, arrived in the port of Hamilton, which 
was pierced by one of these formidable fish off the coast of British 
Guiana. 

In the museum of Charleston College, Charleston, S. C., is preserved 
a fragment of the snout of a Bayonet-fish, apparently Tetrapturus albi- 
dus. By the kindness of the curator, Dr. G. E. Manigault, I was allowed 
to examine it and copy the label, which reads as follows: “The brig 
‘Amsterdam’, bound to Charleston, owned by F. C. Bray, was struck in 
the Gulf Stream by a monster or Sword-fish, which caused the vessel to 
leak considerably. By great exertion she was kept free, and gained the 
port in safety.” 

Messrs. Foster, Waterman & Co., of Boston, presented to the Boston 
Society of Natural History, in 1869, a plank of Southern pine perforated 
by and containing a portion of the sword of a Sword-fish (Histiophorus) 
from the side of the ship ‘ Pocahontas”, owned by them. (Proc. Bost. 
Soe. Nat. Hist. xiii, 1869, p. 64.) 


- 42,— ATTACKS OF THE SWORD-FISH UPON WHALES. 


One of the traditions of the sea, time-honored, believed by all mari- 
ners, handed down in varied phases in a hundred books of ocean travel, 
relates to the terrific combats between the whale and the Sword-fish, 
aided by the thrasher-shark. The Sword-fish was said to attack from 


*A hold under the cabin. 
S. Mis. 29-——22 


| 
338 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [50] 


below, goading his mighty adversary to the surface with his sharp beak, 
while the thrasher, at the top of the water, belabored him with strokes 
of his long, lithe tail. 

An early explorer of the Bermudas gives the following version of the 
story, with tone so fresh and enthusiastic that we might well believe 
him to have seen the occurrence with his own eyes. The passage oc- 
curs in “Newes from the Bermudas”, a pamphlet dated “ Burmuda, 
July, 1609”, and reprinted in “Force’s Historical Tracts”, vol. ii: 

“ Whale, Sword-jfish & Threasher.—The sword-fish swimmes under the 
whale, & pricketh him upward. The threasher keepeth above him, & 
with a mighty great thing like unto a flaile, hee so bangeth the whale, 
that hee will roare as though it thundered, & doth give him such blowes, 
with his weapon, that you would thinke it to be a crake of great shot.” — 
(Page 22.)* 

Skeptical modern science is not satisfied with this interpretation of 
any combat at sea seen at a distance. It recognizes the improbability 
of aggressive partnership between two animals so different as the Sword- 
fish and a shark, and explains the turbulent encounters occasionally 
seen at sea by aseribing them.to the attacks of the killer-whale, Orca 
sp., upon larger species of the same order. 

There can be little doubt though that Sword-fish sometimes attack — 


* The following is a fair example of the average newspaper paragrapher’s treatment 
of the subject: 

“Combats of the ocean.—Among the extraordinary spectacles sometimes witnessed 
by those who ‘‘ go down to the sea in ships” none are more impressive than a combat 
for the supremacy between the monsters of the deep. The battles of the Sword-fish 
and whale are described as Homeric in grandeur. The Sword-fish go in schools like 
whales, and the attacks are regular sea-fights. When the two troops meet, as soon 
as the Sword-fish have betrayed their presence by a few bounds in the air, the whales 
draw together and close up their ranks. The Sword-fish always endeavors to take 
the whale in the flank, either because its cruel instinct has revealed to it the defect 
in the carcasses—for there exists near the brachial fins of the whale a spot where 
wounds are mortal—or because the flank presents a wider surface toits blow. The 
Sword-fish recoils to secure a greater impetus. If the movement escapes the keen 
eye of his adversary the whale is lost, for it receives the blow of the enemy and dies 
instantly. But if the whale perceives the Sword-fish at the instant of the rush, by a 
spontaneous bound it springs clear of the water its entire length, and falls on its 
flank with a crash that resounds for many leagues, and whitens the sea with boiling 
foam. The gigantic animal has only its tail for its defense. It tries to strike its 
enemy, and finishes him at asingle blow. But if the active Sword-fish avoids the 
fatal tail the battle-becomes more terrible. The aggressor springs from the water in 
his turn, falls upon the whale, and attempts, not to pierce, but to saw it with the 
teeth and garnish its weapon. The sea is stained with blood; the fury of the whale 
is boundless. The Sword-fish harrasses him, strikes him on every side, kills him, and 
flies to other victories. Often the Sword-fish has not time to avoid the fall of the 
whale, and contents itself with presenting its sharp saw to the flank of the gigantic 
animal about to crush it. It then dies like Maccazus (sic), smothered beneath the 
weight of the elephant of the ocean. Finally, the whale gives a last few bounds in 
the air, dragging its assassin in its flight, and perishes as it kills the monster of which 
it was the victim.” 


(51] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 339 


whales just as they do ships. The habit is mentioned by Pliny, and is 
the motive for one of the Visions of the World of Edmund Spenser: 


Toward the sea turning my troubled eye 

I saw the fish, (if fish I may it cleepe) 

That makes the sea before his face to flye 

And with his flaggie finnes doth seeme to sweepe 
The fomie waves out of the dreadfull deep. 

The huge Leviathan, dame Nature’s wonder, 
Making his sport, that manie makes to weep: 

A Sword-fish small, him from the rest did sunder, 
That, in his throat him pricking softly under, 
His wide abysse him forced forth to spewe, 

That all the sea did roare like heavens thunder, 
And all the waves were stained with filthie hewe. 
Hereby I learned have not to despise 

Whatever thing seems small in common eyes.* 


I give also a few lines from an old play quoted by Scott as a heading 
to one of the chapters of the “The Antiquary ”: 


Who is he ?—One that for the lack of land 
Shall fight upon the water—he hath challenged 
Formerly the grand whale; and by his titles 
Of Leviathan, Behemoth, and so forth 

He tilted with a Sword-fish.—Marry, sir, 

Th’ aquatic had the best—the argument 

Still galls our champion’s breach.t 


Baron Lahontan, in a letter from Quebec, November 8, 1783, described 
an engagement between a whale and a Sword-fish which took place 
within gun-shot of his frigate. He remarks: 

“We were perfectly charmed when we saw the Sword-fish jump out 
of the water in order to dart its spear into the body of the whale when 
obliged to take breath. This entertaining show lasted at least two 
hours, sometimes to the starboard and sometimes to the larboard of the 
ship. The sailors, among whom superstition prevails as much as among 
the Egyptians, took this for a presage of some mighty storm.” 

Another early observer wrote as follows: 

“Concerning the Death of the Whale, which hath been related to have 
been stranded upon New England, it is not very improbable but that 
it may have been killed by a certain Horny Fish, which is said by Mr. 
Terry, in his East India Voyage, to run his Horn into the Whale’s 
Belly; and which is known sometimes to run his Horn into Ships, per- 
haps taking them for Whales, and there snapping it asunder, as hap- 
pened not long since to an English Vessel in the West Indian Seas.Ӥ 

* Spenser’s Visions of the Worlds Vanitie, 1591. 

t‘‘Old Play,” Antiquary, chap. xxx. 

} Travels in Canada, 2d ed., London, 1785, 2 vols. 8vo. 


§ An account of Whale fishing about the Bermudas by an understanding and hardy 
Seaman. Phil. Trans. abr. ed. ii, p. 844. 


340 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [52] 


“In the month of August, 1861,” says Couch, “near Westra, one of 
the northernmost islands of the Orkneys, an individual of the smaller 
species of whales, known as the herring-hog, was attacked by a Sword- 
fish; and when thus compelled to leap out of the water, which it did 
to the height of six feet, it was observed that the sword had been thrust 
into the whale’s body behind the pectoral fins. Its leaps continued, 
and then it was perceived that a thrasher was assailing it on the sides.”* 

Captain Crow, quoted by Parnell, relates the following incident as 
having occurred on a voyage to Memel: “One morning, during a calm, 
when near the Hebrides, all hands were called up at 3 a. m. to witness. 
a battle between several of the fish called thrashers or fox-sharks and 
some Sword-fish on one side, and an enormous whale on the other. It 
was the middle of summer, and the weather being clear and the fish 
close to the vessel, we had a fine opportunity of witnessing the contest. 
As soon as the whale’s back appeared above the water, the thrashers, 
springing several yards into the air, descended with great violence upon 
the object of their rancor, and inflicted upon him the most severe slaps 
with their long tails, the sound of which resembled the reports of mus- 
kets fired at a distance. The Sword-fish, in their turn, attacked the dis- 
tressed whale, stabbing from below, and thus beset on all sides and 
wounded, when the poor creature appeared the water around him was 
dyed with blood. In this manner they continued tormenting him and 
wounding him for many hours, and I have no doubt they in the end 
completed his destruction.t 

The following is a story given to Frank Buckland by Mr. Hill, captain 
of an English trawling vessel : 

“The thrasher-sharks just do serve out the whales. The sea some- 
times is all blood. A whale once got under our vessel—the ‘ Hurri- 
cane ’"—to get away from these thrashers, and when she was there we 
were afraid to throw a rope overboard, almost to walk out, for fear she 
would chuck her tail, and punch a hole in our vessel. She was full 
length in water, as clear as gin, right under our bottom, and laid as quiet 
as a lamb for an hour and a-half, and never moved a fin. Where they 
had been a-thrashing of her the sea was just like blood. I have seen 
these ’ere thrashers fly out of the water as high as the mast-head and 
down upon the whale, while the Sword-fish was a-pricking of ’im up 
from underneath. There is always two of ’em, one up and one under, 
and I think they hunts together ; and you can see the poor whale blow 
up in great agitation; and I be bound the pair on ’em don’t leave him 
until they have their penn’orth out of him. It is just for wengeance 
they does it. Whether Master Whale has offended them or not, it’s hard 
to tell. If they eats him they must have a tidy blow-out of him, but I 
don’t think they like the oil. I saw one engagement off the Staples; it 


* History of British Fishes, ii, p. 174. 
t Parnell, Fishes of the Firth of Forth, 1838, p, 216. 


{53] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 341 


was all two or three hours they was at it. I don’t think they leaves him 
till they kills him.” 

Egede puts on record the belief of Danish explorers of the last century : 

“The Sword-fish who is the Whales greatest Enemy; and when he 
kills one eats nothing but his Tongue, leaving the rest to the Shark, 
Walrus and Birds of Prey.” * 

The last quotation is especially important, since it shows how the 
Sword-fish and the killer-whale have been confused. It is still held, on 
good authority, that the killers eat the tongues of their victims.t 

At a meeting of the Boston Society of Natural History in 1864, in 
reply to a question of Dr. J. B. S. Jackson about the thrasher or swin- 
gle-tail shark recently exhibited in Boston, Captain Atwood said that 
they were abundant at Provincetown, though not so common as the 
mackerel-shark. He also observed that he placed no confidence what- 
ever in the stories current of attacks on the whales by the thrasher, 
believing them to be quite harmless and unable to hurt a dolphin. 
The story very likely arose from some peculiar movements made by 
the hump-backed whale. Sword-fish, he believed, might attack a whale 
and kill him, from what he had seen of the force of their thrusts into 
the bottom of vessels, though he has no evidence that they ever do 
attack them. He was not aware, either, that the thrasher ever uses his 
tail for offensive purposes. t 


*Hans Egede, Natural History of Greenland, 1741, p. 37. 

t‘*Three or four of these voracious animals do not hesitate to grapple with the 
largest baleen-whales, and it is surprising to see those leviathans of the deep so com- 
pletely paralyzed by the presence of their natural although diminutive enemies. 
Frequently the terrified animal—comparatively of enormous size and superior 
atrength—evinces no effort to escape, but lies in a helpless condition, or makes but 
little resistance to the assaults of its merciless destroyer. The attack of these wolves 
of the ocean upon their gigantic prey may be likened, in some respects, to a pack of 
hounds holding the stricken deer at bay. They cluster about the animal’s head, some 
of their number breaching over it, while others seize it by the lipsand haul the bleed- 
ing monster under water; and when captured, should the mouth be open, they eat 
out its tongue. We saw an attack made by three killers upon a cow-whale and her 
ealf, in a lagoon on the coast of Lower California, in the spring of 1858. The whale 
was of the California gray species, and her young was grown to three times the bulk 
of the largest killers engaged in the contest, which lasted for an hour or more. They 
made alternate assaults upon the old whale and her offspring, finally killing the latter, 
which sunk to the bottom, where the water was five fathoms deep. During the strug- 
gle the mother became nearly exhausted, having received several deep wounds about 
the throat and lips. As soon as their prize had settled to the bottom the three orcas 
descended, bringing up large pieces of flesh in their mouths, which they devoured 
after coming to the sarface. While gorging themselves in this wise, the old whale 
made her escape, leaving a track of gory water behind. Instances have been known 
on the northwestern coast where a band of orcas laid siege to whales that had been 
killed by whalemen, and which were being towed to the ship, in so determined a 
manner that, although they were frequently lanced, cut with boat-spades, they took 
the dead animals away from their human captors, and hauled them under water out 
of sight.”—(C. M. Scammon, Marine Mammals, p. 89.) 

t Proc. Bost. Soc. Nat. Hist. vol. x, 186466, p. 82. 


J 
342 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [54} 


Captain Scammon, in his ‘ Marine Mammals”, gives the following 
confirmation of Captain Atwood’s views, speaking of the habits of the 
hump-back whale of the Pacific: 

‘In their wanderings they are addicted more than any other roqual 
to ‘breaching’, ‘bolting’, and ‘finning’. In the mating season they are 
noted for their amorous antics. Atsuch times their caressings areof the 
most amusing and novel character, and these performances have doubt 
less given rise to the fabulous tales of the Sword-fish and thrasher at- 
tacking whales. When lying by the side of each other the Megapteras 
frequently administer alternate blows with their long fins, whichelove- 
pats may, on a still day, be heard at a distance of miles. They also rub 
each other with these same huge and flexible arms, rolling occasionally 
from side to side, and indulging in other gambols which can easier be 
imagined than described.” 


43.—ENEMIES. 


Such a large animal as the Sword-fish can have but few antagonists. 
whose attacks would be disastrous. The tunny or horse-mackerel, 
Orcynus thynnus, other Sword-fishes, and sharks are its only peers in 
size, and of these the sharks are probably its worst foes. 

Capt. N. E. Atwood exhibited to the Boston Society of Natural His- 
tory, December 7, 1864, the lower jaw of a large shark, taken at Prov- 
incetown, Mass., in whose stomach nearly the whole of a large Sword- 
fish was found. Some ten or twelve wounds were noticed in the skin 
of the shark, giving an idea of the conflict. The shark was doubtless 
the tiger shark Galeocerdo tigrina. 

Couch was told by a sailor that he had watched with interest the anx- 
ious motions of one as it was followed closely and rapidly in all its turn- 
ings by a blue-shark. Twice did it leap above the surface to escape the 
near approach of its pursuer, but with what success at last the observer 
had no opportunity of knowing. 

Mr. John A. Thomson states that the Bill-fish (probably Tetrapturus 
albidus) is their especial enemy. Bill-fish, six to twelve feet long, appear 
about the last of the season, and their appearance is a signal that the 
Sword-fish are about leaving. 


44.—INVERTEBRATE PARASITES OF THE SWORD-FISH. 


Aristotle thus explains the leaping movements of the fish: ‘‘ The tunny 
and the Xiphia suffer from the estrus at the rising of the dog-star, for 
both these fish at this season have beneath their fins a little worm which 
is called estrus, which resembles a scorpion, and is about the size of a 
spider; they suffer so much from this torment that the Xiphias leaps 
out of the sea as high as the dolphin, and in this manner frequently 
falls upon ships.” 

This description of the parasite is somewhat vague; yet it is evident 
that allusion is made to one of the Lerneans or gill-lice, little crustae 


[55] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 343 


ceans remotely resembling crabs and lobsters, which attach themselves 
to the gills and skin of many kinds of fishes, sucking the blood from 
their veins, and often causing death; dreadful to their victims as was 
their namesake, the fabled Lernean Hydra, to the Argives of old, and 
not to be destroyed by any piscine Hercules and Iolaus. 

In one of the early volumes of the Philosophical Transactions is an 
account by 8S. Paulo Boccone of ‘an extraordinary Sanguisuga or Leech, 
found sometimes sticking fast in the Fish called Xiphias or Sword-fish”” 
It is described as “about four Inches long, the Belly of it white, carti- 
laginous and transparent, without Eyes or Head, but instead of a Head 
it had a hollow Snout, encompassed with a very hard Membrane ; which 
Snout it thrusts whole into the Body of the Fish, as strongly as an 
Augre is wound into a piece of Wood, and fills it full of Blood into the 
very Orifice”. He names it “‘ Hirudo or Acus cauda utrinque pennata”.* 

A specimen taken off Seaconnet, July 22, 1875, had fluke-worms in the 
external coat of the stomach and in the air-bladder. 


I am indebted to Mr. Frederick W. True for the following account of 
the parasites of the Sword-fish : 


_ The Sword-fish is infested by many species of parasites. Some hang 
on the gills, others fasten themselves to different parts of the alimentary 
canal—the cesophagus, the stomach, and the intestines—and others, 
still, bore into the flesh. Several species, as might be expected from the 
size of the fish, are among the giants of their races. All undoubtedly 
cause more or less pain to their host, but especially those which attach 
themselves to the gills, disturbing their action and destroying their sub- 
stance. 

The parasites of the Sword-fish, for convenience, may be classified in 
two groups, the Worm-like parasites (Helminthes) and the Crustacean 
parasites. 

a. The Worm-like parasites (Helminthes)—Seven species of Helminthes 
from the Sword-fish have been described, of which one belongs to the 
group Nematoda, or Round-worms, four to the Trematoda, or Flukes, 
and two to the Cestoda, or Tape-worms. 


NEMATODA. 
1, ASCARIS INCURVA, Rudolphi. 


Ascaris incurva, RUDOLPHI, Entozoorum Synopsis, 1819, pp. 51, 292.—DuJaR- 
DIN, Hist. Nat. des Helminthes, 1845, p. 203.—DirsinG, Systema Helmin- 
thum, ii, 1851, p. 163.—ScHNEIDER, Monographie der Nematoden, 1866, p. 
48, pl. ii, tig. 11.+ 


“ The | Philosophical | Transactions | and | Collections | To the End of the Year 
MDCC | Abridged | and | Disposed under General Heads | —— | Vol. II | —— | Con- 
taining all the | Physiological Papers | —— | By John Lowthorp, M. A. and F.R.S. | 
— | The Fourth Edition | iondons erie lp MDCCXXXI, p. 821.) 

t This synonymy does not profess to be complete. Reference is given only to the 
authority in which the original description occurs, to one or two later ones giving an 
accurate description, and to one in which the species is figured. 


344 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [56] 


This round-worm belongs ¢o the genus which is characterized by the 
possession of a mouth with three lips. It is found only in the Sword- 
fish, and may be readily distinguished by its large size. The male is 
about 55 millimeters in length, the females about 122 millimeters. It 
makes its home principally in the intestines and stomach of the fish, 
causing the growth of morbid tubercles. It has been discovered also in 
the gills and the wsophagus. 


TREMATODA. 


2. DISTOMA DENDRITICUM, Rudolphi. 


Distoma dendriticum, RUDOLPHI, Entozoorum Synopsis, 1819, pp. 93, 364.— 
DuJARDIN, Hist. Nat. des Helminthes, 1845, p. 460. 
Distomum dendriticum, DimsinG, Systema Helminthum, i, 1850, p. 336. 


(This species, as far as I am aware, has never been figured). 

This fluke is peculiar to the Sword-fish. It is lanceolato-ovate in 
outline and quite flat. When alive the color of its body is white, with 
ramifications of black, a character by which it may be distinguished from 
other species. It varies in length from 3.37 to 6.75 millimeters, and in 
width from 1 to 2.25 millimeters. It locates itself in the intestines of the 
Sword-fish, where it is frequently found in large numbers. 


3. DISTOMA VENTRICOSA (Pallas) True. 
Fasciola ventricosa, PALLAS, Spicilegia Zoologica, fascic. x, 1774, p. 18. 
Distoma clavatum, RUDOLPHI, Entoz. Hist. ii, 1809, p. 391.—OWEN, Trans. Zool. 
Soc. London, i, pp. 381-384, pl. xli, fig. 17.—DuJarDIN, Hist. Nat. des Hel- 
minthes, 1845, p. 459. 

This species, which is well displayed in the figure, is somewhat cylin- 
drical in form, but has a globular expansion at the posterior extremity. 
It often reaches a length of two inches, and a specimen five inches long 
and nearly half an inch in breadth is said to have been taken from the 
stomach of a fish captured in the Gulf of Venice. Menzies says of it: 
“In moving, it fastens itself alternately by the ventral aperture and its 
mouth, raising its slender neck between them into an arched form, like 
a leech, and in this manner drags its body along with a slow motion. 
It is of a whitish color, somewhat pellucid, discharging at its mouth a 
black-colored fluid, which can easily be perceived through its body.”* 
It lives in the stomach of the Sword-fish and other fishes. 


4, TRISTOMA COCCINEUM, Cuvier. 

Tristoma coccineum, Cuvier, Regne Animal, 1st ed. iv, 1817, p. 62, pl. xv, fig. 
10.—DUJARDIN, Hist. Nat. des Helminthes, 1845, pp. 322, 323.—BLANCHARD, 
Recherches sur l’Organization des Vers, Ann. des Sci. Nat. 3d series, viii, 
1847, pp. 322-325, pl. x, fig. 2, and pl. xiv, figs. 2-2 c. 

Tristomum coccineum, DIESING, Systema Helminthum, i, 1850, p. 429. 


The species composing the genus Tristoma are characterized by the 
possession of three suctorial disks. 


— 


* Trans. Linn. Soc. i, 1790, pp. 187, 188. 


[57] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 345 


T. cocecineum is almost orbicular in outline and quite flat. The pos- 
terior border is never scalloped, as in a closely allied species. The 
diameter of the posterior sucker is nearly equal to one-fifth the length 
of the body, and presents seven rays. The total length of the animal 
is about 25 millimeters. Its color, according to some authors, is rose-red, 
but, according to others, red approaching vermilion. Like all other 
species of the genus, it lives in the gills of the fish it infests. 


5, TRISTOMA PAPILLOSUM, Diesing. 

Tristoma papillosum, DIESING, Nov. Act. Nat. Curios. xviii, 1836, pp. 313-316, 

pl. xvii, figs. 13-18. 
Tristomum papillosum, DIESING, Systema Helminthum, i, 1850, pp. 430-431. 
This fluke is oblong in outline. The posterior sucker is quite as 
large as that of the preceding species, but is situated nearer the pos- 
terior margin. The dorsal surface is covered with many little papillary 
appendages. The animal is about nine-tenths of an inch in length and 
three-tenths in breadth. Its color is a dusky yellowish white. It lives, 
in company with the preceding species, in the gills of the Sword-fish and 
other fishes. 
CESTODA. 


6. TETRARHYNCHUS ATTENUATUS, Rudolphi. 
Tetrarhynchus attenuatus, RUDOLPHI, Entozoorum Synopsis, i, 1819, pp. 130, 
449, 688. 
Tetrarhynchus discophorus, BREMSER, Icones Helminthum, 1824, pl. xi, figs, 
14-15. 

The tape-worms of this genus possess a very short body, a long and 
narrow neck, and a head furnished with four long proboscises, armed 
with a great number of recurved hooks. The species under considera- 
tion varies in length from 2 to 5.9 millimeters. The head is somewhat 
conical in shape, and bears two round and strongly concave suckers. 
The neck is narrow behind, and transversely rugose. As it is the only 
species of the genus found in the Sword-fish, it cannot be easily mistaken. 
It has been found on the gills of the Sworn eae and also in the walls 
of the abdomen. 


7. BOTHRIOCEPHALUS XIPHLA (Gmelin) True. 


Echinorhynchus xiphiw, GMELIN, Linn. Syst. Nat. vi, 1788, p. 3047. 
Bothriocephalus plicatus, RUDOLPHI, Entozoorum Synopsis, 1819, pp. 136, 479, 
pl. iii, fig. 2. 

This tape-worm varies in length from 30 to 300 millimeters. Its 
head is elongated-arrow-shape or fusiform in outline. The anterior artic- 
ulations of the body are very narrow, but they widen towards the cen- 
ter; the posterior ones, again, are narrow. It usually inhabits the rec- 
tum of the Sword-fish, but has been also occasionally found buried in 
the walls of the intestines. 


b. The Crustacean parasites—The Crustacean parasites of the Sword- 
fish belong to the group known as Copepoda. They are five in number. 


346 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [58] 


1. PENNELLA FILOSA (Linn.) Cuvier. 
Pennatula filosa, LINN. Syst. Nat. 10th ed. i, 1758, p. 819. 
Pennella filosa, CUVIER, Régne Anim, 2d ed. iii, 1830, p. 257.—Gufrin, 
Iconogr. de Régne Anim. de Cuvier, pt. v (Zoophytes), 1829~39, pl. ix, fig. 3. 
The females of this genus are characterized by the presence of hooks 
attached to the head—by which they cling to the animal they infest— 
four pairs of rudimentary feet on the ventral side, and an abdomen 
very well developed and furnished with a number of penniform append- 
ages, directed obliquely backward. The male is very small and nearly 
orbicular. The species P. filosa has a long, narrow, and straight body, 
and a large head, carrying behind two short, obtuse hooks. 
It fastens itself in large numbers to the gills of the Sword-fish, greatly 
inconveniencing it in the act of breathing. 


2. PENNELLA CosTAtl, Richiardi. 
Pennella Costaii, RICHIARDI (name only), Expos. Intern. di Pesca, Berlin, 
Sez. Ital. Cat. 1880, p. 150. 
No description of this species is given in the place cited above. It 
lives in the flesh of the Sword-fish. 


3. PHILICHTHYS XIPHIZ, Steenstrup. 
Philichthys xiphie, STEENSTRUP, Soc. R. Scient. Hafn. Act. Consp. 1861, p. 295. 
This animal lives in the cavities and canals of the frontal bone of the 
Sword-fish. The descriptions of this and the two succeeding species 
were not accessible to me. 


4, BRACHIELLA RAMOSA, Richiardi. 
Brachiella ramosa (name only), RICHIARDI, Expos. Intern. di Pesca, Berlin, 
Sez. Ital. Cat. 1880, p. 151. i 


This parasite hangs on the gills of the Sword-fish. 


5. CHONDRACANTHUS XIPHLE, Cuvier? 


Chondracanthus xiphie, GUERIN, Icon. Régne Anim. de Cuvier, pt. v (Zoophy- 
tes), 1829~39, pl. ix, fig. 20.—MILNE-Epwarps, Hist. Nat des Crust. iii, 
1840, p. 504, 


This species also lives on the gills of the Sword-fish. 
45.—FISH-PARASITES—THE SUCKERS OR REMORAS. 


Several species of “stay-ships” or “‘remoras” occur on our coast. 
The ordinary kinds, such as Leptecheneis naucrateoides, the one with a 
black stripe down its side and white corners to its caudal fin, appears 
to choose companionship with the sharks, while the oceanic species, 
Echeneis remora, is most often found clinging to ships. 

A third species, Remoropsis brachyptera, is the particular parasite of 
the Sword-fish. I have several times identified it when found attached 
to the fish, and have never known it to be found on any other species. 
It has never come to us, moreover, from locality and season which 


[59] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 347 


would be inconsistent with a theory that it had been brought near 
shore by a Sword-fish. 

Still another, Rhombochirus osteochir, seems equally inseparable from 
Tetrapturus albidus. This fact is known to the Cuban fishermen, who 
call it by the name Pega de los Agujas, the parasite of the Spear-fish. 
The two species last referred to are figured in the plates accompanying 
this article. 

Perhaps the two species are not so fixed in their likings that they will 
change from Xiphias to Tetrapturus. My friend Professor Giglioli, 
of Florence, who speaks of Rh. brachyptera as a fish new to the Mediter- 
ranean, obtained from Taranto a specimen said to have been taken 
from the gills (operculum ?) of Tetrapturus belone. 

These parasites probably prefer to cling with their curious suckers to 
the hard exterior surface of the opercular flap of the Sword-fish. 


K.—THE FISHERIES. 
46.—THE LOCATION OF THE FISHING GROUNDS. 


In what has already been said regarding the dates of appearance and 
local movements of the Sword-fish in our waters may be found all the 
facts relating to the location of the fishing grounds, for the fishermen 
follow the Sword-fish wherever they appear to be most abundant. 

Early in the season the Sword-fish are most abundant west of Mon- 
tauk Point, and later they spread over the shoal-grounds along the coast 
even as far north as the Nova Scotia Banks. They may be found wher- 
ever mackerel and menhaden are abundant, as may be inferred from 
the almost universal practice of carrying Sword-fish irons on board of 
mackerel vessels. 

I quote the statements of three or four correspondents who have taken 
the trouble to interview the fishermen of their respective localities. 

Mr. E. G. Blackford writes: “The following information I received 
from an old swordfisherman, a man whose statements may be relied 
on. The season first opens early in June in the neighborhood of Sandy 
Hook, and continues along the coast as far east as Martha’s Vineyard 
and Nantucket Shoals until about the middle of September. They are 
said to have been caught as far north as Cape Sable. At the first cold 
wind blowing in September they disappear, and are not found again on 
the coast that season.” This is the statement of a New York man. 

Capt. Benjamin Ashby, of Noank, Conn., informs me that the Sword- 
fish vessels of Noank and New London are accustomed to leave the 
home-port about the 6th of July, and throughout the month they find 
fish most abundant between Block Island and Noman’s Land; in Au- 
gust between Noman’s Land and the South Shoal Light Ship. They first 
meet the fish twenty to twenty-five miles southeast of Montauk Point. 
In August and September they are found on George’s Banks. There is 
no fishing after the snow begins to fly. 


348 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [60] 


A little farther east is the New Bedford fleet. Capt. I. H. Michaux, 
of the schooner “‘ Yankee Bride”, tells me that Sword-fish strike in 
about Block Island in the middle of June, and stay in that vicinity until 
the 15th or 20th of August. North of Cape Cod they are taken up to 
the 20th of October. 

The statements of Mr. John H. Thomson, of New Bedford, have 
already been quoted, but may be epitomized in this connection. From 
May 25 to June they are found south of Block Island, approaching the 
Vineyard Sound and the neighboring waters through June and to the 
middle of July. <A little later they are more abundant to the southeast 
of Crab Ledge, and after August 1 to the southeast of Cape Cod and 
George’s Banks. 

The schooner “ Northern Eagle”, of Gloucester, Capt. George H. 
‘Martin, when engaged in swordfishing, is accustomed to leave Glouces- 
ter so as to be on the ground south of Block Island by the 10th of June, 
and the fish are followed as far east as Portland. 

Mr. Earll ascertained that the Sword-fish are mostly fished for on the 
coast of Maine from July 1 to September 1. 

Halibut vessels on La Have and Sable Island Banks occasionally take 
these fish upon their lines. 

Mackerel vessels on the New England coast are always prepared for 
Sword-fish when cruising among mackerel schools. I am not aware 
that they have more than once been seen on the mackerel grounds of 
the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. 


47.—APPARATUS OF CAPTURE. 


The apparatus ordinarily employed for the capture of the Sword-fish 
is simple in the extreme. It is a harpoon with detachable head. When 
the fish is struck the head of the harpoon remains in the body of the 
fish, and carries with it a light rope, which is either made fast or held 
by a man in a small boat, or is attached to some kind of a buoy, which 
is towed through the water by the struggling fish and which marks its 
whereabouts after death. 

The harpoon consists of a pole 15 or 16 feet in length, usually of 
hickory or some other hard wood, upon which the bark has been left, 
so that the harpooner may have a firmer hand-grip. This pole is from 
an inch and a half to two inches in diameter, and at one end is pro- 
vided with an iron rod, or “shank”, about two feet long and five-eighths 
of an inch in diameter. This “shank” is fastened to the pole by means 
of a conical or elongated cup-like expansion at one end, which fits over 
the sharpened end of the pole, to which it is secured by screws or spikes. 
A light line extends from one end of the pole to the point where it joins 
the “shank”, and in this line is tied a loop, by which is made fast 
another short line which secures the pole to the vessel or boat, so that 
when it is thrown at the fish it cannot be lost. 

Upon the end of the “shank” fits somewhat securely the head of the 
harpoon, known to the fishermen by the names Sword-fish iron, lily-iron, 


[€{} MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 349 


or Indian dart. The form of this weapon has undergone much variation, 
as is Shown in theseries of figures of specimensin the National Museum in 
one of the accompanying plates. The fundamental idea may very possi- 
bly have been derived from the Indian fish-dart, numerous specimens of 
which are in the National Museum, and one form of which is shown in the 
plate by the side of the others. However various the modifications may 
have been, the similarity of the different shapes is no less noteworthy 
from the fact that all are peculiarly American. In the enormous col- 
lection of fishery implements of all lands in the late exhibition at Ber- 
lin, nothing of the kind could be found. What is known to whalers as a 
toggle-harpoon is a modification of the lily-iron, but so greatly changed 
by the addition of a pivot by which the head of the harpoon is fastened 
to the shank that it can hardly be regarded as the same weapon. The 
lily-iron is in principle exactly what a whaleman would describe by the 
word “toggle”. It consists of a two-pointed piece of metal, having in 
the center, at one side, a ring or socket the axis of which is parallel with 
the long diameter of the implement. In this is inserted the end of the 
pole-shank, and to it or near it is also attached the harpoon-line. When 
the iron has once been thrust point first through some solid substance 
such as the side of a fish, and is released upon the other side by the 
withdrawal of the pole from the socket, it is free, and at once turns its 
long axis at right angles to the direction in which the harpoon-line is 
pulling, and thus is absolutely prevented from withdrawal. The prin- 
ciple of the whale-harpoon or toggle-iron is similar, except that the pole 
is not withdrawn, and the head, turning upon a pivot at its end, fastens 
the pole itself securely to the fish, the harpoon-line being attached to 
some part of the pole. The Sword-fish lily-iron head, as now ordinarily 
used, is about four inches in length, and consists of two lanceolate 
blades, each about an inch and a half long, connected by a central piece 
much thicker than they, in which, upon one side, and next to the flat 
side of the blade, is the socket for the insertion of the pole-shank. In 
this same central enlargement is forged an opening to which the har- 
poon-line is attached. The dart-head is usually made. of steel; some- 
times of iron, which is generally galvanized; sometimes of brass. 

The entire weight of the harpoon-pole, shank, and head should not 
exceed 18 pounds. 

The harpoon-line is from 50 to 150 fathoms long, and is ordinarily 
what is known as “fifteen-thread line”. At the end is sometimes 
fastened a buoy, and an ordinary mackerel keg is generally used for 
this purpose. 

In addition to the harpoon, every swordfisherman carries a lance. 
This implement is precisely similar to a whaleman’s lance, except that 
it is smaller, consisting of a lanceolate blade perhaps one inch wide and 
two inches long, upon the end of a shank of five-eighths-inch iron, per- 
haps two or three feet in length, fastened in the ordinary way upon & 
pole 15 to 18 feet in length. 


350 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [62] 
48.—THE MANNER OF FITTING A VESSEL FOR SWORDFISHING. 


The Sword-fish are always harpooned from the end of the bowsprit of 
a sailing-vessel. It is next to impossible to approach them in a small 
boat. All vessels regularly engaged in this fishery are supplied with a 
special apparatus for the support of the harpooner as he stands on the 
bowsprit, and this is almost essential to success, although it 1s possible 
for an active man to harpoon a fish from this station without the aid of 
the ordinary frame-work. Not only the professional swordfishermen 
but many mackerel schooners and packets are supplied in this manner. 

An illustration of the Sword-fish “ pulpit” is given in one of the plates. 
It is constructed as follows: The harpooner stands upon the tip of the 
bowsprit, outside of the jib-stay. Atthis point is fastened a square plate 
of iron as wide as the bowsprit. In the middle of this plate is a mortise 
two inches square and extended three or four inches down into the 
wood, forming a socket for an upright iron bar two inches square and 
three feet high. At the top of this bar is a bow of iron bent backward 
in semicircular form to surround the waist of the harpooner, the ends 
of the bow being separated by a distance of perhaps two feet. In the 
ends of the bow-iron are holes through which are passed irons to hold 
the dart when not in use. Through these same holes are sometimes 
passed ropes, by which is suspended a swinging seat for the use of the 
harpooner when not in action. When not in use the dart is lashed in a 
horizontal position to the top of the “rest”. The lanceis usually allowed 
to rest against the jib-stay, to which it is secured by passing it through 
loops of rope arranged for the purpose. Upon the tip of the bowsprit, 
at the base of the rest, is a platform of wood about two feet sqnare, large 
enough to afford a firm foot-hold to the harpooner. The harpoon-line is 
coiled upon the bow of the vessel, the buoy usually resting upon the 
bulkhead or close at hand. A second harpoon-line, attached to the re- 
serve or second harpoon, is coiled upon the other side. 

The structure above described is usually called a “rest”, though not 
infrequently the “pulpit”. Capt. Benjamin Ashby always called it an 
“oresembo”. I was unable to obtain from him any derivation of this 
remarkable word. He informed me that he had always used this name 
because the thing looked to him as if it ought to be called by that name, 
and that he had never heard any one else call it so except members of 
his own crew, who had learned the word from him. This is a curious 
illustration of the arbitrary manner in which fishermen are accustomed 
to coin names for new articles of apparatus. Although many archaic | 
and provincial terms whose etymology is plainly traceable are in use 
among our sea-faring men, there are numerous others for whose mean- 
ing and origin it would be vain to search. 

I have been unable to learn when and by whom this peculiar piece of 
apparatus was devised. 


[63] MATERIALS FOR 4 HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 351 
49.—MANNER OF CAPTURE. 


The Sword-fish never comes to the surface except in moderate, smooth 
weather. A vessel cruising in search of them proceeds to the fishing 
ground, and cruises hither and thither wherever the abundance of small 
fish indicates that they ought to be found. Vessels which are met are 
hailed and asked whether any Sword-fish have been seen, and if tidings 
are thus obtained the ship’s course is at once laid for the locality where 
they were last noticed. A man is always stationed at the masthead, 
where, with the keen eye which practice has given him, he can easily 
descry the tell-tale dorsal fins at a distance of two or three miles. When 
a fish has once been sighted, the watch “ sings out”, and the vessel is 
steered directly towards it. The skipper takes his place in the “ pul- 
pit”, holding the pole in both hands by the small end, and directing 
the man at the wheel by voice and gesture how to steer. There is no 
difficulty in approaching the fish with a large vessel, although, as has 
already been remarked, they will not suffer a small boat to come near 
them. The vessel plows and swashes through the water, plunging its 
bowsprit into the waves, without exciting their fears. Noises frighten 
them and drive them down. Although there would be no difficulty in 
bringing the end of the bowsprit directly over the fish, a skillful har- 
pooner never waits for this. When the fish is from 6 to 10 feet in front 
of the vessel it is struck. The harpoon is never thrown, the pole being 
too long. The strong arm of the harpooner punches the dart into the 
back of the fish, right at the side of the high dorsal fin, and the pole is 
withdrawn and fastened again to its place. When the dart has been 
fastened to the fish the line is allowed to run out as far as the fish will 
earry it, and is then passed in a small boat which is towing at the stern. 
Two men jump into this, and pulling in upon the line until the fish 
is brought in alongside, it is then killed with a whale-lance or a whale- 
spade, which is stuck into the gills. 

The fish having been killed, it is lifted upon the deck by a purchase- 
tackle of two double blocks rigged in the shrouds. 

The fishermen have a theory to the effect that the Sword-fish can see 
nothing directly in front of him, on account of the peculiar location of 
the eyes, and there are instances of their having been approached, and 
killed, by men in a skillfully-managed dory. 


50.—THE PERILS AND THE ROMANCE OF SWORDFISHING. 


The pursuit of the Sword-fish is much more exciting than ordinary 
fishing, for it resembles the hunting of large animals upon the land, and 
partakes more of the nature of the chase. There is no slow and careful 
baiting and patient waiting, and no disappointment caused by the acci- 
dental capture of worthless “ bait-stealers”. The game is seen and fol- 
lowed, and outwitted by wary tactics, and killed by strength of arm and 
skill. The Sword-fish is a powerful antagonist sometimes, and sends 


352 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [64] 


his pursuers’ vessel into harbor leaking, and almost sinking, from inju- 
ries which he has inflicted. I have known a vessel to be struck by 
wounded Sword-fish as many as twenty times in one season. There is 
even the spice of personal danger to give savor to the chase, for the 
men are occasionally injured by the infuriated fish. One of Captain 
Ashby’s crew was severely wounded by a Sword-fish which thrust his 
beak through the oak floor of a boat on which he was standing, and 
penetrated about two inches in his naked heel. The strange fascination 
draws men to this pursuit when they have once learned its charm. An 
old swordfisherman, who had followed the pursuit for twenty years, told 
me that when he was on the cruising ground he fished all night in his 
dreams, and that many atime he has bruised his hands and rubbed the 
skin off his knuckles by striking them against the ceiling of his bunk 
when he raised his arms to thrust the harpoon into visionary monster 
Sword-fishes. 


51.—A LANDSMAN’S DESCRIPTION OF SWORDFISHING. 


Mr. ©. F. Holder, of New York, published in the New York “ Forest 
and Stream”, February 17, 1876, the following description of a trip after 
Sword-fish in Block Island Sound: 

“ Lying all night in the harbor of Wood’s Holl, we had ample time to 
prepare for sport, and at three o’clock in the morning our little sloop 
was swinging around, and, gathering herself together, headed for Gay 
Head. The vessel was a common sloop of about sixty tons, 1ts only 
peculiarity being a stanchion with a curved top, to hold the harpooner, 
rigged on the extreme end of the bowsprit. At nine o’clock we were 
out of sight of the Vineyard. The wind settling, I was informed that I 
could go aloft and use my weather-eye, and the better I used it the 
more fish we would get. After not a few attempts to climb the greasy 
pole of a mast I found myself aloft, with a firm grasp upon the throat 
of the gaff, my weather-eye, contrary to orders, full of tar, and my port 
one on the lookout for the game. We were just moving along, and I 
was taking in the horizon for miles around, when the man at the bow 
uttered a sound, which was a sortof a cross between a cluck and a groan, 
which I saw meant ‘ port’, and that something had been sighted. The 
old craft fell lazily away, and I then saw two dark forms with their 
razor-like fins out of the water slowly moving along ahead of us. The 
captain signaled at once for me to come down, and as I reached the deck 
the fun commenced. The man waited until we were almost upon them, 
and as one of them turned, as if in idle curiosity, to see what the great 
shadow meant, he hurled a spear, and the next moment the huge fish 
sprang from the water and with a furious twist tried to shake out the 
iron. So great was the effort that it fell on its side with a crash, and 
for a moment was still, but it was only for a second. The line jumped 
into activity and rushed out so you could not follow it, now swaying to 
and fro, and making the water fly like rain. About 50 feet of line had 


[65] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 353 


gone out, when six of us managed to get a fair hold on the line, and at- 
_ tempted to try ourstrength. If six individuals were ever jerked around 
in @ more vivacious manner they have my utmost sympathies. Now 
the Sword-fish would land us altogether in a heap, then slacken up, and 
take us unawares, throwing us to the deck with a force that fully came 
up to my preconceived ideas of the sport. He would undoubtedly have 
dragged us all overboard if the rope had not been sure and fast. This 
sort of fun was kept up for about fifteen minutes, when the fish percepti- 
bly weakened, and the long rushes to the right and left grew feebler 
and feebler, until we ventured to haul in. At last we had the brute 
alongside. A rope was rigged from the peak and fastened around the 
long sword, and the monster was rolled on board the sloop. We meas- 
ured our game, which was 9 feet 6 inches long. Though I have fre- 
quently caught sharks which measured 13 feet, I never saw any that 
showed near the strength of this peculiar creature. 

‘“We cruised about all day in the vicinity, and succeeded in capturing 
three more, varying in length from 6 to 9 feet, and as we returned to 
Wood’s Holl I felt that I had well earned my experience.” 


52.—THE CAPTURE OF SWORD-FISH BY HOOK AND LINE. 


One or two instances are on record of the capture of Sword-fish upon 
an ordinary hand-line, and it is probable that this is much more com- 
mon than has been usually supposed. Capt. George H. Martin, of Glou- 
cester, informed me that he had seen seven caught in this manner in 
one day in the South Channel. They were caught in water fifteen to 
twenty-five fathoms deep, on the old-fashioned George’s cod-hook, with a 
six-inch shank. Mackerel were used for bait; these were split down the 
tail so that the shank of the hook could be entirely hidden in the gash, 

Ihave been told that they are also taken in this way about Block 
Island, and a similar method of fishing is described by Italian writers. 

Within the past three years it has not been unusual for Sword-tish to 
become entangled in the long lines of the halibut fishermen on the 
northern banks. The manner in which this occurs has already been 
discussed above. 

I have collected several instances. In 1877, in the month of August, 
Capt. Daniel O’Brien, of the schooner “ Ossipee”, of Gloucester, fishing 
in 200 fathoms of water, between Le Have and Western Bank, caught, 
in one voyage, five Sword-fish. 

At about the same time, Capt. R. L. Morrison, of the schooner “ Laura 
Nelson”, fishing in 275 fathoms, on Sable Island Bank, caught three 
Sword-fish. Another vessel, in August, 1877, fishing on Le Have, in 
from 175 to 180 fathoms, caught twelve, as well as three or four more in 
September. August 17, 1878, Capt. Joseph W. Collins, of the schooner 
“ Marion”, fishing on the southwest prong of Banquereau, in 200 fath- 
oms of water, caught one Sword-fish ; again, on October 1, fishing south- 

S. Mis. 29-——23 


354 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES, [66] 


east of Sable Island, in 175 fathoms, caught one Sword-fish on his trawl 
and saw several others swimming at the surface; October 8, caught 
another on Banquereau, in the locality first mentioned. In August, 
1878, Captain Greenleaf, of the schooner “Chester R. Lawrence”, of 
Gloucester, fishing in 140 fathoms, caught chirteen in one trip. I ean- 
not learn that this manner of capture was ever known before 1876, but 
it has since become so frequent that it excites no remark for a halibut- 
catcher to unload several Sword-fish among its halibut. This manner 
of taking the Sword-fish is of course purely accidental, and is rather a 
vexation than otherwise to the fishermen. It is probable that the fish 
take the bait when the line is being set and they are swimming near 
the surface, and they are involuntarily carried down by its great weight. 


53.—SWORD-FISH VESSELS. 


The vessels engaged in swordfishing are sloops and small schooners 
of generally less than fifty tons. The crew is also small, consisting of 
two or sometimes three men besides the cook andaboy. Although 
many vessels are employed in this fishery for several successive years, 
there are many others which fit out for a single season or for a part of 
a season. Others, on the south coast of New England, divide their 
time between fishing for sea-bass and hunting for Sword-fish, all 
warm and quiet days being devoted to the latter pursuit. Six or eight 
vessels from New London are thus employed, as well as others from 
Noank and Bridgeport. On the coast of Maine, as has already been 
mentioned, many of the smaller fishing vessels fitted for the capture of 
mackerel and cod devote a part of the season: to swordfishing. Other 
vessels, among them occasionally a gentleman’s yacht, enter the field 
for a cruise or two in the course of a summer. To do this is a favorite 
recreation for old swordfishermen engaged in other work. Numerous 
mackerel schooners carry the Sword-fish “pulpit” on their bows, and 
so do various coasters and packets. ; 

It has therefore not been thought desirable to attempt to make a list 
of the vessels engaged in the swordfishery, or even an exact enumera- 
tion of them. In 1879 estimates by careful men engaged in the busi- 
ness fixed the number belonging in different ports as follows: 


New Work (hailing from New London) c-ranere seers ce <b a. seen ones een eee eee eee 2 
Greenport (Sloops) a: :.<5-6224.).5- case see eee mee Se caeiae te a ae eee ee 2 
WewyplOnGONs.5 2-20.20. ens teen hoe NS ee oEtUE ec neds os Seater Saree eee 8 
ING WDORU se cisco cies weinimine res ss genes See Meee ence Ce eae ne cece een eee 1 
IDM I Rey) oe et an a 2 9 kT ee eee ORM es Sh 2 
Cotiybhunkeee sees eS seins oes Sek ee ee eee ate seen eee 3 
WVeEStpOnG ee tec aes Lk i te ee oe oe ee ca RE ee 2 
IN Gn pels COOL ie mie ters Swleln ace, a aiicicicivie ere aS ee eee eee eiecnc eee een eee 13 
DarumMOUb bs ceyne sss eels cic sain occmieeys fe SA OOO teem aren oscenine Ree rece ee ween 2 
SouthisidejotiCape Codt. 5. 2225. caccco seen eeece gM eee ecco a cmes cmos eee 5 


~ 


SSS) ae hers SUN OE Ooh co INe Fearn eA eEe Ge Oy ce dtl 


[67] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 355 


In 1874, according to Mr. Thompson, New Bedford had twelve ves 
sels in this fishery. In 1877 the estimates of total number of vessels 
made by different men varied between thirty and forty. 

To show how uncertain the continuance of vessels in this fishery may 
be I will refer to the annals of Gloucester. In 1876, one schooner, the 
“‘ Meteor”, was engaged; in 1877, the schooner “Champion”; in 1878, 
the schooner “ Northern Eagle”; while in 1879 and 1880 the field is 
abandoned by this port. ® 


54.—FINANCIAL PROFITS TO FISHERMEN. 


I have before me the record of a single schooner for the season of 
1878, from which it appears that in the season of four months eight trips 
were made, averaging about twelve days in continuance. One hundred 
and sixty-three fish were taken between June 7 and September 20, 
weighing, in the aggregate, in round numbers, about 47,000 pounds, 
dressed. These were sold at an average price of three cents per pound. 
The gross stock of the season would amount to about $1,300. From 
this must be deducted the expense of living, the interest on capital in- 
vested, and the wages of the cook and the boy. The remainder would 
probably not exceed eight or nine hundred dollars, and the profits have 
to be divided among the two or three men composing the crew and the 
owner of the vessel. It is not probable that many vessels stock as large 
a proportionate amount as did the “ Northern Eagle”. The success of 
one New Bedford vessel in the season of 1878 was spoken of as extraor- 
dinary, the return being $311 to each of the crew’s share. 

The price of Sword-fish is low, and the success of the voyage is 
always somewhat precarious. A few small vessels ‘with experienced 
‘ skippers apparently succeed in making a fair living, but that the profits 
are not great is clearly indicated by the fact that there is no great in- 
crease in the number of vessels engaged, and that so many are con- 
stantly undertaking and abandoning the swordfishery. 


55.—HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN SWORDFISHERY. 


There are few data upon which to found conjecture as to the time when 
the Sword-fish came to be regarded as sufficiently useful to be sought 
for by fishermen. One of the earliest records of its use for food is found 
in the Barnstable Patriot of June 30, 1841, in which it is stated that 
the fishermen of the island south of Cape Cod take a considerable num- 
ber of these fish every year by harpooning them, and that about two 
hundred pounds a year are pickled and salted at Martha’s Vineyard. 

Captain Atwood remembers seeing Sword-fish on the coast of Maine 
as early as 1826, although up to the time of his retirement from active 
participation in the fisheries, in 1867, no effort was made by the fisher- 
men north of Cape Cod to capture them. 

The fishery apparently sprang into existence and importance between 


356 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES [68] 


the years 1840 and 1855, upon the south coast of New England. Cap- 
tain Ashby first engaged in it in 1859, when it was apparently a well-es- 
tablished industry. In 1861 it is recorded that some thirty vessels from 
New Bedford were profitably engaged in this business on the favorite 
ground, 15 to 20 miles southeast of Noman’s Land.* 

Mr. Earll ascertained that little attention was paid by the fishermen 
of Portland, Me., to Sword-fish until within two or three years. This 
fishery is carried on at odd times by mackerel gill-net fishermen, and 
by cod-trawling vessels when their regular industry is interfered with 
by the abundance of dog-fish. The season for dog-fish is also the time 
for Sword-fish, and at the present time, when the price of Sword-fish 
justifies it, smaller fishermen, when they are driven from their regular 
work by the dog-fish, make trips for the express purpose of capturing 
Sword-fish. Mackerel-seiners are beginning to carry Sword-fish irons, 
and are often very successful in killing the fish. 

At the present day, and for five or six years past, perhaps much 
longer, there has been very: little change in the number of vessels en- 
gaged, this varying from thirty to forty approximately in different years, 

Capt. Epes W. Merchant, of Gloucester, who has been familiar with 
the fisheries since 1804, tells me that the first Sword-fish ever brought 
to Gloucester within his recollection was caught on George’s Bank about 
the year 1831, by Captain Pugh, who brought it in and sold it at the 
rate of eight dollars a barrel, salted. Fishermen had before that been 
very much afraid of them, but afterwards a good many were caught. 


56.—THE CAPTURE OF THE SWORD-FISH IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 


M. Victor Meunier, in his little treatise, ‘‘Les Grandes Péches”, p. 
141, describes the various methods formerly and at present in use in the — 
fisheries of the Mediterranean. The Greeks were accustomed to use 
boats with projecting bows, modeled to resemble a Sword-fish, and 
painted with its peculiar colors. This the unsuspecting fish would ap- 
proach, thinking to meet one of its own kind. The fishermen, taking 
advantage of the mistake, would pierce it through and through with 
their lances. Although surprised, the Sword-fish would defend itself 
with vigor, striking the treacherous boat with its sword and endanger- 
ing its safety, while the fishermen strove to seize it by the head and, if 
possible, to cut off its sword. Having overcome their captive, they 
would fasten it behind their boat and carry itashore. Oppian compared 


* “Sword-fish have been taken this season in large numbers. New Bedford vessels. 
have made a good thing in them. Few of the boats failed to take one or two daily. 
Captain Cobb, of the pilot-boat ‘Vision’, in a day and a half took nine, the largest 
weighing 400 pounds, Thirty vessels are fifteen miles sonth and east of Noman’s 
Land, or sixty miles out from New Bedford, and same distance from Nantucket. 
The season extends from June to September. The fish generally weigh 400 or 500 
pounds, and are from 10 to 12 feet long. ‘They are sold in New York. After a fish 
is harpooned it scuds away, with a coil of rope paying out, and sometimes an hour 
is used before he is brought on board.”—Barnstable Patriot, Aug. 20, 1861. 


(69] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 357 


this method of fishing to a military stratagem. This ruse was known 
also to the Romans, and in their time the swordfishery was one of the 
most important. They also captured these fish in madragues, in which 
they were easily entangled while pursuing tunnies and other fishes of 
the mackerel tribe. ‘Although he is able to break the nets,” said Op- 
pian, ‘he shrinks from it; he fears some snare, and his timidity coun- 
sels him ill; he ends by remaining a prisoner within the ring of the net, 
and becomes the prey of the fishermen, who with united effort drag him 
to the shore.” This does not always occur, to be sure, for often, to the 
grief of his would-be captors, he breaks the walls of his sepulcher, liber- 
‘ating also the other fishes buried with him. 

There is at the present day a fishery in the Straits of Messina, con- 
tinuing on the Calabrian shore from the middle of April to the latter 
part of June; on the Sicilian shore from the first of July to the end of 
September. The Calabrian fish appear to approach by the Pharos, the 
Sicilian ones by the southern entrance of the straits. This summer 
fishery has for its object the capture of the large fish, which are killed 
with a lance. The boats used are about 18 feet long, 4 feet deep, and 
broader at the stern than at the bow. There is a single mast, 17 feet 
high, surmounted by a brace of a curved form, intended to support the 
lookout, who gains access to it by steps fastened to the mast. The look- 
out from this elevated station views the movements of the fish, and by 
voice or gesture directs the movements of the oarsmen. At the proper 
time he descends, and standing on a narrow thwart amidships he aids 
the waist-oarsmen and performs the office of steersman. 

At the bow stands the man who strikes the fish. His lance is about 
12 feet long, with an iron head, which, from the vague description of 
Meunier, appears to resemble closely the American lily-iron. This is 
detachable, and to it is fastened a line as thick as one’s little finger and 
600 feet long (200 meters). 

Two guards are also stationed on the shore. On the Calabrian coast 
they climb upon high rocks and cliffs; on the opposite shore, where 
there are none, they stand on a tower, built expressly for this purpose, 
about 800 feet in height. 

“Eiverything being arranged,” says Spallanzani, “behold the order 
of the fishery. When the two watchmen perched upon the tops of the 
rocks or of the mast judge that a Sword-fish approaches from afar, by | 
the change in the color of the water, at the surface of which he swims, 
they signal with the hand to the fishermen, who row toward it with their 
boats, and they do not cease to ery out and to make signs until the other 
lookout on the mast of the boat has perceived the fish and follows it 
with his eye. At the voice of the latter the boat veers now to the right, 
now to the left, until the lancer, standing at the bow, weapon in hand, 
eatches sight of the fish. Now the lookout descends from his mast, sta- 
tions himself among the oarsmen, and directs their movements in accord- 
ance with signals given him by the lancer; he, seizing a favorable oppor- 


358 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [70] 


tunity, strikes the fish, often at the distance of 10 feet. Immediately he 
slackens out the rope, which he holds in his hands, while the boat, with 
the force of all its oars, follows the wounded fish until he has expended 
all his strength. Then he rises to the surface ; the fishermen, approach- 
ing, fasten to him with an iron hook and carry him to the shore. Some- 
times the fish, furious from his wound, strikes the beat and pierces it 
with his sword, so the fishermen stand on their guard, especially if the 
animal is large and active.” 

The young fish are captured in nets about 300 feet long, called pali- 
madaras. These are stretched between two boats with lateen sails, 
moving along, entangling in their meshes everything which they touch. : 
Spallanzani protested vehemently against this fishery. It is carried on 
from October to March. 

Oppian describes a method of capture used in the Mediterranean. A 
bait was fastened with a sliding noose to the line at a distance above 
the naked hook. and the whole was so contrived that when the Sword- 
fish seized the bait with its mouth the hook seized it from behind with 
great force. This story is declared by writers of the present day to have 
been fanciful and without foundation. 

I am indebted to Mr. Frederick W. True for the following translation 
from Prof. Adolfo Targioni Tozzetti’s essay on ‘The Fisheries of Italy”, 
published in 1870,* which gives briefly a description of the methods now 
employed in the vicinity of Messina and elsewhere on the Italian coast :t 

‘“‘ Sword-fish are taken from time to time, together with the tunnies, 
in the tonnare ;t but hook-and-line and gill-net fisheries are also carried 
on, the methods of which we may describe somewhat at length. 

“Two very distinct fisheries are prosecuted—one by day, the other by 
night. The former is carried on by means of peculiarly constructed nets 
called palamitare; the latter by the use of harpoons, or draffiniere, 
as they are called. The harpoon fishery is prosecuted in the Straits of 
Messina, on the coasts of Calabria and Sicily, and among the Eolian 
Islands. 

““The fish appear earliest along the coasts of Calabria, between Gioia 
Tauro, Palmi, Bagnara, and Scilla, and hence it is in these localities 
that the fishery first begins. It is prosecuted later in the season on the 
Sicilian coast, between S. Teresa al Faro, Gazzi, Salvatore dei Greci, 
and Capo Peloro. 

“The net fishery on the Calabrian coast is carried on most extensively 
between Palmi and Scilla, the harpoon fishery between Palmi and Capo 


*La Pesca nei Mari d'Italia e la Pesca all’Estero Esercitata da Italiani. < Cata- 
logo degli Espositori e delle cose esposte, Sezione Italiana, Esposizione Internazionale 
di Pesca in Berlino, 1880. Firenze, Stamperia Reale, 1880, pp. Xv-cxxxvi. 

Swordfish Fishery—Pesca della Pesce spada, pp. lxix-]xxiii. 

t The author states that the material for the following article is derived from the 
writings of Duhamel, Oppian, Spallanzani, and Vetrioli. 

tA kind of pound-net constructed for the capture of tunnies or horse-mackerel 
£ Orcynus thynnus). 


[71] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 359 


delle Volpi. On the Sicilian coast nets are employed principally between 
S. Teressa and Gazzi, but between Salvatore dei Greci and Capo Peloro, 
where the management of nets would be very difficult on account of the 
deep water and rapid currents, the harpoon fishery prevails. 

‘The season of the regular fishery in Calabria extends from the mid- 
dle of April to the end of June, and in Sicily from the middle of July to 
the middle of August. The capture of young Sword-fish, however, con- 
tinues to increase long after this time, the season often extending to the 
middle of October. Fish weighing little more than a single kilogram 
are frequently taken, and the practice, therefore, has been strongly cen- 
sured. In the latter part of October both adult and young fish disap- 
pear, retreating, as many suppose, to the depths of the ocean. They 
reappear in spring prior to spawning time, and remain on the fishing 
grounds throughout the entire season. 

‘‘ Fisheries are also carried on, but with more or less irregularity, among 
the Liparian Islands, near Tropea, in Calabria, in the tunny-nets of 
Milazzo, Oliveri, and 8. Giorgio, near Patti, and in the waters of Sar- 
dinia. 

‘‘ The fishery on the Sicilian and Calabrian coasts is prosecuted at cer- 
tain fixed stations. At some of them, such as station 25, in Calabria, net 
and harpoon fisheries are carried on with equal success; but at others, 
as for instance at station 21, in Sicily, only the harpoon fishery can be 
prosecuted, and at others, again, as at station 20, the net fishery alone 
prospers. 

‘‘The stations are occupied by the gangs (poste) of fishermen. The 
conformation of some portions of the coast of Calabria is such that the 
day fishery with nets cannot be carried on, and at these points each 
gang comprises two boats, or feluccas, of from 10 to 16 tons, two skiffs 
for each felucca, and one additional skiff used in carrying on communica- 
tion between the boats. 

“The palamitara is set from time to time, and at each station is fitted 
up in the manner deemed most suitable by the fishermen. It is made 
of gfrong hemp twine, and is hung to two ropes, the upper being buoyed 
by cork floats and the lower weighted with leads. The length of the 
net varies between 600 and 800 meters, the breadth is 16 meters, and 
the area 14,000 to 15,000 meters, more or less, according to the depth of 
water, which on these coasts varies between 40 and 600 meters; the 
mesh measures about 17 centimeters, bar. Each end of the upper rope 
is tied to a large cork buoy, to which a bell is attached, which sounds 
with every motion of the net. 

‘‘ By these arrangements the net has sufficient play, so that it is not 
liable to injury by the sea. At the same time, when a fish strikes the 
net and is gilled, the more it struggles to get free the more it becomes 
entangled. In the mean time the ringing of the bell gives the fishermen 
the signal that a fish is captured, and they hasten to free the net and 
set it again. 


360 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [72] 


“The method of the harpoon fishery is very different. A watchman 
is employed, who has his station on the cliffs overlooking the water, or 
at the masthead of the feluecca. The mast of the felucca is usually 20 
meters or more in height, and the watchman climbs to his station by 
means of arope ladder. IT'rom his elevated position he scans the sea far 
and near, and when he perceives a Sword-fish gives the signal to a look- 
out, called fariere, foriere, or foliere, standing at the masthead of some 
one of the boats, or lontro, at the station. 

“The watchman indicates the movements of the fish by certain sig- 
nals. For instance, he cries out ‘va susu’, meaning that the fish goes 
yonder, or toward Il Faro; or ‘va jusu’, he goes down, that is, toward 
Messina; or ‘va fora’, he goes out, or toward Levante; or sometimes ‘va 
wterra’, meaning that the fish is swimming toward the shore. 

“The lookout, at first obeying these signals, and then relying on his 
own observation, guides the lontro toward the fish. Wnen the boat has 
approached sufficiently near, the harpooner strikes the fish with his 
draffiniera, or harpoon. 

“The draffiniera consists of a wooden staff 12 feet long, furnished with 
an iron 7 inches in length. The iron has two wings, and is constructed 
in such a manner that when it strikes the fish the point enters the flesh 
and the wings spread in the wound.* <A rope, or protese, often 600 feet 
or more in length, is fastened to the harpoon-head, so that it may be 
recovered when the fish, weakened by loss of blood, is captured and 
brought into the boat. 

‘‘A short warp is tied to the staff of the harpoon, by which when the 
head is detached it is brought back into the boat. After the fish is 
struck, the lontro puts back to the station, leaving the chase and capture 
of the wounded fish to a second. boat. Usually he is easily captured, 
but sometimes by dashing against the boat or by other movements he 
manages to free himself and make his escape. 

“A fishery very similar to that carried on at the present time was de- 
scribed by Polibius, according to Strabo, more than two thousand years 
ago. The account of the fishery at Messina given by Oppiant is some- 
what fanciful and inaccurate, but in the last century Spallanzani gave a 
more strictly technical description of it.t Recently the fishery has been 
accurately descrabed in elegant Latin verse by Vetrioli.§ 

“The following table gives the number of fishermen and boats en. 
gaged in the Sword-fish fishery on the Sicilian and Calabrian coasts: 


1. The harpoon fishery. 
: f , Calabria. Sicily. ° 


Warnrewboats(orteluche)<o- 1). 5.5. 2u5 kee eee ioe monic oon seme 6 52 
Sita beowta (ONG)? otc. <<. zn. vac caeon Teese oeme eee niad hoe Liane "260-52 
Smalishoatsbarche)ecccs sone sccccs ce sees meee eee eee eee 52 


VISHETIMEN bs cose ets oe isos Se oe eee RAR eee ee ce ee eye oy Baa 275 384 


* This iron resembles closely the American lily-iron. 

t Oppiano, Della Pesca, lib. iii. 

{Spallanzani, Viaggi alle due Sicilie ecc. vol. iv, p. 308, et seq. 

§ Vetrioli, Xyphias Carmen, Naples, 1870. \ 


{73] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 361 


2. The gill-net fishery. 
Calabria. Sicily. 
oausolpouTee CONS, DULGEN -<.js cs ce ces iscic nis sisecie science desc cscces 80-90 50 
Hishermenwecesers ceccciecc cee caine cates ccrseiieele soo cieeer tiecitcistcoae 650 400 
“The fishery is extremely productive. On the coasts of Sicily a gang 
of fishermen frequently capture fifty fish, each weighing from 100 to 200 
kilograms, in a single day, and on the Calabrian coast, 20 fish. 
“The following table shows the average annual catch in Sicily and 


Calabria : 
1. The harpoon fishery. 


OngiheiCalabrianicodstiercsstwcccte coos, se eeicrs ac’oea Goce eeee wees cine cesewe ce 60, 000 
Or therSicilismiCoasuers ces cioeciss cashivs wesc cc\s aciersia sce secctie c Uwe cebsivcceeis cee 40, 000 
2. The gill-net fishery. 

Oni the) Calabrianicoast= is. sss1.-tueccecceees ce nnd slet eee Sek eater oes 25, 000 
Oat MOSS Cll anacOAg theese kiseciere cine clase Seisines oie elos seine cetieccieeeaseneteses 15, 000 


‘The products of the fishery are consumed principally in Sicily and on 
the mainland of Italy. A portion, however, is preserved in salt or oil, 
and sometimes exported. The flesh of the Sword-fish is excellent when 
fresh, and is not so liable to become soft when canned as that of the 
tunny or horse-mackerel. It, therefore, always commands a high price. 

“Tt has been claimed that, in order to prevent a decline in the fishery, 
hook-fishing should be prohibited from the middle of January to the 
first of April, and that a fine should be imposed on those who capture the 
young fish. It has been suggested also that no nets should be allowed 
to be set in the Straits of Messina within 200 meters from the shore. 

“The result of the experiments in artificial hatching of Sword-fish in 
certain inclosures and marshes in the vicinity of Il Faro appears to be 
somewhat uncertain ; but, at all events, they may open the way for more 
practical and successful operations in the future.” 


L—PRODUCTS OF THE FISHERY. 
57.—RECORD OF A GLOUCESTER SCHOONER FOR THE SEASON OF 1878. 


As an example of the manner in which a season of swordfishing is 
passed, and of the yield of a very successful period of work, a record is 
here given of the trips of the schooner “ Northern Eagle”, of Glouces- 
ter, Capt. George H. Martin. 


Trips of schooner ‘‘Northern Eagle”, Capt. George H. Martin. 


ea Date of start. a to! No. of fish taken. Where sold. | Price. 
Days: Oents 

DOM DMINO Wi Sats omiccice tee cess cases 10 16 (5,000 Ibs.) IBOBUON soccer se ve 3 
Spalehan lO eee we es 7 22 (6,600 lbs.) |....do....... ---- 4h 

Sw ePUNCIBO see tw osat celccccacicicceces 14 12 (3,700 Ibs.) Newport. .....-. 2+ 

SP OM cence can css soc oc 11 20 (5,800 lbs.) Boston.<<<<.sss- 3 

De WNULy Qi eccseeccecccclsc cmc ese 18 37 (9,000 Lbs.) S820) tecococces 5 

Ga PATOTISO OMe cst occcec bee cees.s 15 26 (6, 500 lbs.) weet AO cacsesaeaas 3 

TW ppeptember Lecescccccscesecs sess 16 16 (5, 600 lbs ) Best U0 se ccceces cs (2) 

8 | September 20................... 14 14 (4,500 lbs.) Bee OO nenoccneses (3) 


163 (46, 700 Ibs.) 


362 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [74] 
58.—RESULTS OF TRIPS BY OTHER VESSELS. 


Capt. Benjamin Ashby went swordfishing in the schooner “N. H. 
Dudley” two successive years, in 1859 and 1860. In July and August, 
1859, he took 108 fish; the next year 88. 

The schooner “‘ Yankee Bride”, of New Bedford, visited in Province- 
town Harbor, August, 1879, had already that season taken 60 fish. 

Mr. Earll reached Portland in the progress of the fishery census in- 
vestigation, July 29,180. On this day, he writes, 35 to 40 fish were 
brought in, and on the 1st of August 200 more were landed, 60 by one 


vessel. 
59.—STATISTICS OF CAPTURE. 


It is at present only possible to give estimated statistics of capture, 
though a year hence, when the returns of the fishery census, at present 
in progress, shall have been tabulated, much more accurate figures will 
be attainable. Putting the number of vessels regularly employed in 
swordfishing at forty, estimating their annual catch at eighty fish each, 
which is only half the quantity taken by the “ Northern Eagle”, as 
shown in the preceding paragraph, the aggregate number of fish taken 
would be 3,200. 

Competent authorities estimate that each vessel in the mackerel fleet 
captures and brings in an average quantity of eight barrels of pickled 
fish, or perhaps eight fish each. The number of vessels in the mackerel 
' fleet is at least four hundred. Allowing four fish to each, there is an 
aggregate of 1,600 fish. Estimating one for each vessel in the halibut 
fleet yearly, we add fifty more in the aggregate. 

Mr. Earll judged that in 1878, as for several years previous, 2,000 
Sword-fish had been brought into Portland, Me. Allowing 1,000 of 
these to the regular swordfishermen and the mackerel vessels, we have 
a remainder of 1,000 taken by the occasional fishermen of Portland 
already spoken of, and to be added to the aggregate, which now amounts 
to 5,850. 

Add 150 more for the coasters, sea-bass fishermen, and pound-tending 
vessels of Southern Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut, and 
the sum is 6,000. 

The average weight of a Sword-fish dressed is estimated by several 
persons, Captain Ashby, Mr. Earll, Mr. Thompson, and others, to be 
300 pounds, and that this is not far from the truth may be seen by re- 
ferring back to the records of the “ Northern Eagle”. If the average 
weight is assumed to be 250 pounds, the aggregate weight of a year’s 
catch of Sword-fish amounts to 1,500,000 pounds, valued at $45,000, 
the average price being estimated at three cents per pound. 

To estimate the number of men employed is almost impossible, since 
the season continues only four months, and many are employed for a 
much shorter period. The crews of the forty vessels number from 160 


[75] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 363 


to 200; the number of men employed for shorter periods it seems scarcely 
necessary to estimate. 

In 1874 the annual catch for the United States was estimated by Mr. 
KE. G. Blackford at 2,000 fish, weighing 1,000,000 pounds. 


M.—ECONOMICAL USES AND THE MARKETS. 
60.—SWORD-FISH AS AN ARTICLE OF FOOD. 


“The small Sword-fish is very good meat,” remarked Josselyn, in 
writing of the fishes of New England in the seventeenth century. Since 
Josselyn probably never saw a young Sword-fish, unless at some time 
he had visited the Mediterranean, it is fair to suppose that his informa- 
tion was derived from some Italian writer. 

It is, however, a fact that the flesh of the Sword-fish, though some- 
what oily, is a very acceptabte article of food. Its texture is coarse; 
the thick, fleshy, muscular layers cause it to resemble that of the hali- 
but in consistency. Its flavor is by many considered fine, and is not 
unlike that of the bluefish. Its color is gray. The meat of the young 
fish is highly prized on the Mediterranean, and is said to be perfectly 
white, compact, and of delicate flavor.* Sword-fish are usually cut up 
into steaks, thick slices across the body, and may be broiled or boiled. 

Considerable quantities of Sword-fish are annually salted in barrels in 
Portland, Gloucester, Boston, New Bedford, and New London. Sword- 
fish pickled in brine is in considerable demand in certain sections of the 
country, and particularly in the Lower Connecticut Valley, where a bar- 
rel may be found in almost every grocery store. By many persons it 
is considered much more palatable than salted mackerel. The follow- 
ing table gives the amounts of Sword-fish, by barrels, pickled and in- 
spected in Massachusetts from 1805 to 1877. It will be observed that 
before 1839 none were packed. In 1872, 1,245 barrels, or 249,000 pounds, 
were put up. The average amount to the year is 93,490 pounds, or 
about 467 barrels; the total for the thirty-nine years, 3,645,732 pounds: 


*The flesh, which is much esteemed by the better classes at Palermo, is dressed in 
almost as many modes as that of the tunny, and fetches a higher price. During our 
sojourn there it was as two to one, the price of the first averaging four pence per 
robolo, while the poroua: of the latter were disposed of at two pence or two pence-half- 
penny. The fiber is invitingly white, aud the round segments look, as they lie in rows 
along the stalls, like so many fillets of veal. Four to six feet is the usualrun of those 
taken off the Trinzrian coast and displayed in the fish markets of Sicily.—Badham. 


364 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [76] 


Number of barrels of Swordfish inspected in Massachusetts from 1839 to 1877, inclusive. 


£3 |/24/ fa | $s | fg £3 gsi[silelestia 

sd | od | ad |] ad | sd ~% a Pa o x xo 
Inspection ports. ET | cotati ecaieet a ecctentiel nates I 0 i) pn to i) 

ae oi! ig ra vg id A 2 q A : 

.a : : :a : : 2 2 5 | 

B65 Aas Bb Bb A6 Bi 

3 3 os Ci cs os QA AQ AQ Q fa) 

5 5 5 5 5 i) 


Rockport 
Newburyport 


Ate ch 5 
IOUNGERLOM <== > --.--s- enema ecceas 2 


Wiest Hisbury -wcccarcces| seca ae aeelcce tee lees alncweke ome alse mc cnl Semen ullnemhen| setae \tegaeeee | mena 
SWAN PCY foe Sac toc cece cee | ce | ee ene | ee ee ee cree | ren | a | Ses Sel ein oe Te nee || eee | 
Nantucl.et...... 5 


Old el ded Ce ee eg eg es ee ee ee errr ss 


Otal sc acssinecasoseiic os 92} 560 | 254 | 240} 428 452 477 | 5504 


1033} 8053) 474 


Dee. 31,1851. 


S 
ro) 
Lon 
Inspection ports. | 
d 
a 


During 1857. 
During 1858. 
During 1859. 
During 1861. 


Durin 
During 1856. 
During 1860. 


May 17, 1851,to 


MOCKPOrh}s se Soe vecede soe | teceee Ses cealleooseell aes ce leeeeee lea eeee aoe ee al oeeeee | poses coeeee | See ea| eee = 
Nowbury port. cose Siac as| Meee ae eae os eee oe | Pe ee a ene ee ain | AE I ae eee | ee | eee | eee 
IPB WACH (ss aistane seeese eltbeoee 


Boston.-..... 
Hingham 
Wohtssetasegscssccocctenclocmnee 
Scituate 

Duxbury 
Blymonthis ees calc eee oi fs oe S| eae a ae | eee ne ae | ee | ee ec 
Harwichport 
Sandwich 


Ce eee eg es ees eee eee ee 


Sd eg ees oe ees ees eee ee ee 


ee eee ee ees ee ees es ee ee 
ee ed eee eee ee ee ee ees ees ee ee ee 


PLM OMe 8 Seite acc coe cect 12 


WMENNISPEMA Coss eee oe secs 52 
PVATMON tH ee cc ecco ced ecse cls coees oo cee ee ee | teen eee | oe ee 
TWAVGE SUTS) at aye aera sae (rac eae [aera Bae aee Dl SS a posted Gaooae 
DWVAN Oye ne sce cogs cs |sccoecl ccc l lt Baced beded bocdes secess| escdce conser Sebosa Sebebe saad 6oansc 
PNamtUG Ke beeen secs cese eel cece olicccoocel lesen cell ee ee | eee ee ane [eee 


Totaleesesecnsee ss. dae. 144 | 1053 1,111 | 3214] 2843] 5343] 2163) 4643) 2363) 91§| 4454] 76% 


[77] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 365 


Number of barrels of Sword-fish inspected in Massachusetts, §c.—Continued. 


— 


1862. 


Inspection ports. 


uring 
During 1864. 
Jan 1, 1865, to 
Dec. 1, 1865. 
Dec. 20, 1866. 
Dec. 20, 1887. 
Dec. 20, 1868, 
Dec. 20, 1869. 
Dec. 20, 1870. 


D 
During 1863. 


Dec. 20, 1865, to 
Dec. 21, 1866, to 
Dec. 21, 1867, to 
Dec. 21, 1868, to 
Dec. 21, 1869, to 


Rockport ..... oitrace. Saal seamen as noses (eaecine:|sc'susie se sceaces | Melee aat| oo scree al aeetcme aluciceenes 
Rania fiort Seno aad Rocodsad Bodapé Ad badchadd Baspeooel Gera acesl Raccance| | ket Ac hee (Fea ee Se ee ee ee 
TS OOS oaa SEBS GEEHSEEs 6 Gosdoas lbbeedéec| ABOsOEsa HOBSON Gaearced Sanosrscel ai asses os Ae! al ees 
Gloucester .-.......s<.-. 94 Silanes D34h) cscecce 254 233 24 19 


Cohassetit2: 5... scestoeesoseess =~ 

SGlimacO te eee ee ese es aoete ho lece es aime os aticcwele cence ae acres claaer sees | come = 
LORS fear poe nnCKerdtn| SOU0OCra Maereed necnemne! Gecacmrcl emete ae pane 

Plymouth. . 
Harwic bport 5 
Sandwich ... 
Barnstable .... 
Provincetown . 


AVG CE SOKGA Seabcoebes docccod] Sacobued Moocoles cpooried lacepccrs 544 167 ; 
Marwichipessccsaccsenase 6 95 163 10d 1953 
Chatham \2s2ce sesh nce s 481} 494 423 35 28 
Moennig) 25252 2s cscecccess 61 1044 104 2935 703 1623 2143 123 87 
Warmouth<...-s-ccoce BSA Bocas ARGSHABE ISCAS SAA ISSAS CREE! SSS eer tet | ee i ee i eae (Pos EAS bs 38 a 
West Fisbury......... ds] Seowsecslicosac cul saees was| cane sce tasecose| case ens tlaoecceooonlhcec ure wolune ee me 
SWaneroygecs nes soeccas cee eee eae some tosl comet ccs |slaccietete| cama celhccoo ces tarmccc facies sae Wl ck com ¥, 
Nan tHCKetieo Macca cccs|occtcscslsececawelneseeeles 32 283 21 127 134 9 
Parton uMetsssenave cose sence eeslseeaecen| sae anes mses eles WT ececcoen PSEsaacees Eeeceoae 39h 
Motaleeeeteoss sclee Soe 565} oy 1723 8944 2253 538% L a 8453} 1,183 
84 | 84 | Ss | 84 | 8 | 8s | Se | 3 
ono i) ora or me wis rafter) 3 _q 
I co ta hen! es cA o 
BE Gat taat ase oy eee 3 
Inspection ports. Ra eRe eee Wt Uase” | Meese eae, lead Pies sf 
Seo Wos | ce | 28 fo 384 Sa") a) lg | iia 
g sa | & $A | 8A | 8 2A | 3 
aF da pela A ace A 8 
Rockport ..... ....- BCOC SEE COAG ooo aoc 5 5 |-----.-- 5 4 23 
INGWDNTYPOLE., csesee= cael ssncsee-|-sacecc- ZY | ease << ac|-\=sinc'sa|Focsenas|socnianis'a 23 
DpPSWICD c-2se0-ss055 Taan|pasacecs|sacieceins|Gatesccielecascices|ssivc- se] Ucar cese|somaccee| seers seals 
Gloucester’.......02 625% 904 2603 1024 36 404 304 344 978 
EWG ARES SSAA ReSepesog Pec ered Gpec-eod basset Sescesics| Sscccnog Sra oro Massaned lrecsiers 
DalemM soso cccec soassccces SIF ct oaeocs|socesesieoccocse 1 Fao eee Pee Ae 33 
Marblehead: -ea.scevsace|wecesees| case a-|secesesc|e ce cusige|-eoscer|pemenc-6|lscceeses|=secsce. 
WBoRtoniessioet eee secs e 974 953 104 574 | 14335| 763 563 | 1, 13% 
Tin HAM ss saskeceosecce fn eR ee ae] Rooeee BEGrenbs Caaconod HeAacoed Masacmsas 
Cohasset:sss.sc.0<5505 AOU |S cn esic cal sseewscs|acceee cs lemmcus =<] caaeciccs|seoeecas 207 
SOWUALOt ae cocsaeleeasee | acces os|caceciecc|cowrsinna| cc's os.cninleaiseienic|sciecesse|cisecieons 5 
DMRUULYrenscco ut ewes ete |-coccest| canscccs| ov ecisca|socase ac luevedecolaecee ssalseotorcelsaecs ces 
BIVMONU Nee eee este fa|seccscce Ghee oc|somensac|sceecetc|sismedees|teeesceslencccesslencecsae 
Harwich portsceerecdsane | ossenca|s ete eacelzstecsss|eqcteaze[tee stems lees cee | Bteetares 5 
BavGwyatheeseee sere nore an. tet Maan ee wel oie cata | as ciseanl jcmmeiae| eee teen Meee sacra 
Barnstable 224 89: 
Provincetown 334%) 1, 537 tp 
eran}. setae Seo eatia tel sae ates lace das) bowie Soe |smiccetena anon etoaa | temtamsinn emi ctenis 152 
Wellfleet .. 424 | 1, 4023 
Harwich .. : 3 ¢ 274 | 2, 038 
Chatham ess...ctesiscos. 4 ‘ y 22 2, 2714, 
EONS ese ee noe be oe eed 55 214 | 2, 560§ { 
PEATIMOU UN see teste aces seeee eae amaecacs| > cosiciaas| cose ciel comets | sacccetes| lee Scieacl colonies 
IWiEStTHISDULY,-.caceac sac |oece sons coat tecsl|oesescen| se ocuecs[ net emr od eaceceec|caace cor! ecensce 
DUN pa sudabdaSheesons Rasa5 aad EROCBEN eamererd peepecied bocoguce HSOEseHss Matnaees MenmeEere 
BAEC CG) CE] He Ape a eee Dinter ae BT Ae Vid ee ed ae SEO FEE “6A Be eee Gree 230% 
Dartmouth ............. 4 by a eae ee | 1043 5 OTe \Eeeeees 2153 
rr) Ue a ae a eo 8685! 1, 2 4544) 3073 | 41838 26728 B7T% 2055 (ae 18, 2283 


*10 barrels are marked No. 2. 


366 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [78] 
61.— MARKETS. 


Mr. Thompson remarks: ‘ Previous to 1862 the market for fresh fish 
was limited to New Bedford, Fall River, Providence, and the adjoining 
towns, and a large proportion of the fish then taken was salted and 
shipped to the West Indies and the Southern States. This was espe- 
cially the case with those taken about Noman’s Land and Martha’s Vine- 
yard. Now nearly all are consumed fresh, and the average price is 
somewhat higher than formerly.” 

The Gloucester Telegraph of September 7, 1850, contained fhe fol- 
lowing item, which shows that Sword-fish were eaten in Boston at least 
thirty years ago, and, highly esteemed : 

“A Sword-fish weighing about 250 pounds was caught near our cape 
on Tuesday. It was taken to Boston and retailed out from Quincy 
Market, by Messrs. Covill, at 124 cents per pound. The sword, measur- 
ing on the eye to the AD. is 37 inches in length.”* 

Mr. John H. Thomson writes: ‘At present the great bulk of the catch 
is sold fresh. Most of the fish are brought to this port, and a few are 
carried to New London. Until within a very few years nearly all were 
disposed of in this vicinity. About 1864 a few were sent to Boston on 
trial, and the consumption of Sword-fish in that vicinity has since rap- 
idly increased. Still, the principal market for fresh Sword-fish may be 
said to lie between New London and the eastern end of Massachusetts. 
Providence, R. I., consumes a large quantity.” 

Mr. Earll writes: “About 2,000 Sword-fish, averaging in weight 300 
pounds dressed, have been landed yearly in Portland for several years. 
Most of them are sent to Boston fresh, and the remainder are cut up 
and salted here.” 

Mr. Eugene G. Blackford informs me that Sword-fish are not much 
esteemed in New York market, and that in 1874 not more than 2,000 
pounds in the aggregate were consumed. 


62.—PRICES. 


Regarding the price of fresh fish at New Bedford, Mr. Thomson re- 
marks: “ When the first fish arrives here it is eagerly sought at 20 
cents a pound, retail. In 1873, within forty-eight hours of the arrival 
of the first one, fifty-two were brought in, bringing the general retail 
price down to 8 and 10 cents. At this price, clear of bone, they are 
usually retailed throughout the season. The wholesale price is about 
12 cents for the first catch, falling rapidly to 2 or 3 cents. This is for 
‘clean fish’, without head, tail, and viscera. Tish from George’s Bank 
are sometimes brought ie from Boston. They then retail at 15 and 
20 cents.” 

According to the record of the “‘ Northern Eagle”, the price in June, 


* A Sword-fish weighing over 700 pounds was one of the sensations at Faneuil Hall 
Market last week.—Gloucester Telegraph, August 13, 1870. 


[79] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 367 


1878, ranged from 2 to 43 cents, in July from 38 to 5 cents, and in 
August from 24 to 3. 

In July, 1879, Mr. Earll found the price in Portland, Me., 4 cents, 
but the arrival of 200 fish on August 1 brought the price down to 14 
cents. He estimates the average wholesale price at 2 cents. 

In New London, according to Captain Ashby, the price has varied 
within his recollection from 3 to 8 cents, the latter high price being paid 
in 1877. 

According to Captain Martin, the price of salt Sword-fish in Gloucester 
is always about the same as that of No.3 mackerel. In July, 1878, there 
being no mackerel in the market, they were valued at $7 a barrel. 


aa 


ot ara en tiitad 
tty Part Ari swan 
= a. a i 
poh 
Bitar, ; ‘he : 
; - ice ans ay ey UA 


per ee URE oa ant sath bhugalias adit yy 2 
EAM tt Ak Oy ie dant) en witeeG Ap pe ee 


hort 


. be 4 ‘* f 
ay eae ais fil % GR bins Rebel Ati. 3 ran {inlined git a 
7 ie 


tails 


APE EN DIVX: 


63.—LETTERS. Bs 


I, 
FROM E. G. BLACKFORD, COMMISSIONER OF FISHERIES FOR NEW YORK. 
NEw York, November 30, 1874. 
Prof. G. BROWN GOODE: 

DEAR Str: Your favor of 26th instant at hand this a.m. The fol- 
lowing information I received from an old swordfisherman, and he is a 
man whose statements may be relied on: 

The season first opens in the neighborhood of Sandy Hook about the 
first part of June, and continues along the coast as far east as Martha’s 
Vineyard, Nantucket Shoals, until about the middle of September ; have 
heard of their being caught as far north as Cape Sable. At the first 
cold wind biowing in September they disappear, and are not found on 
the coast again that season. They are like the mackerel, the first poor 
and lean, but as the season advances they grow fatter. They feed on 
fresh mackerel and herring. Largest ever caught, 1,200 pounds ; small- 
est about 50 pounds; the large ones about 20 feet long. Average weight 
of a catch, 500 pounds each fish. Largest number caught at one cruise 
of a smack, 350, in the full of 1872; they were carried into Portland and 
sold. F 

Most of the fish caught are salted. Principal markets for the sale of 
the fish are New Bediord, Fall River, Portland, and Boston; are not 
much esteemed in New York market, and not over 2,000 pounds sold in 
this market the entire season. Total catch from beginning to close of 
season estimated at 2,000 fish, weighing 1,000,000 pounds. 

Would advise you to write to some party in New Bedford if you de- 
sire any further details. 

The man I received my information from is full of incidents in refer- 
ence to the fish. He says the vessel he was in had been struck nearly 
twenty times by the Sword-fish, and the blades imbedded in the hull. 
It seems that if the fish is not killed by the stroke of the harpoon it be- 
comes enraged and goes for the vessel. 

The Bill-fish I know nothing of except the one I saw at Noank, in your 
fish-house. 

Of the Sail-fish I have seen only one specimen, and that was in bad 
condition, and came from Key West, Florida. 


tespectfully yours, E. G. BLACKFORD 


S. Mis. 29——24 369 


370 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [82] 


1G 
FROM C. B. FULLER, CURATOR PORTLAND (ME.) SOCIETY OF NATURAL HISTORY. 
Answers to questions relative to the food-fishes of the United States. 
A.—NAME. 


1. What is the name by which this fish is known in your neighbor- 
hood ?—Answer. Sword-fish. 


B.—DISTRIBUTION. 


' 2,3. Is it found throughout the year, or only during a certain time, 
and for what time? If resident, is ‘t more abundant at certain times of 
the year, and at what times ?—Answer. Rare in July and October; most 
abundant in August and September. 


C.—ABUNDANCE. 


5. Has the abundance of the fish diminished or increased within the 
last ten years, or is it about the same ?—Answer. About the same. 


= SVAny 


What is the greatest and least size to which it attains (both length 
and weight), and what the average ?—Answer. Heaviest, 800 pounds ; 
pounds; smallest, 10 pounds; average, 300 pounds. 

° 


E.—MIGRATIONS AND MOVEMENTS. 


11. By what route do these fish come in to the shore, and what the sub- 
sequent movements ?—Ansiwer. They appear first on the Seuth Shoals. 
12. By what route do they leave the coast?—Answer. As they come. 

15. When do the fish leave shore, and is this done by degrees or in a 
body ?—Answer. In October. 

16. Is the appearance of the fish on the coast regular and certain, or 
do they ever fail for one or more seasons at a time, and then return in 
greater or less abundance? If so, to what cause is this assigned ?— 
Answer. About the same; some years more caught than others. 


F.— RELATIONSHIPS. 


33. Do these fish go in schools after they have done spawning, or 
throughout the year, or are they scattered and solitary ?—Answer. Scat- 
tered. 

35. To what extent do they prey on other fish, and on what species?— 
Answer. Herring. 

G.—F oop. 


Qn 


37. What is the nature of their food ?—Answer. Mostly herring, some 
mackerel. 


{83} MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 371 


38. Are there any special peculiarities in the manner of feeding of 
these fish ?—Answer. By killing; striking with the sword. 


H.—REPRODUCTION. 


46. Where do these fish spawn, and when ?—Answer. Do not spawn 
here. 
M.—-PARASITES. . 


70. Are crabs, worms, lampreys, or other living animals found attached 
to the outside or on the gills of these fish ?—Answer. Lernez on body. 


O.—ECONOMICAL VALUE AND APPLICATION. 


t 


78. What disposition is made of the fish caught; whether used on the 
spot, or sent elsewhere, and if so, where ?—Answer. Sent to Boston. 

84. What were the highest and lowest prices of the fish per pound dur- 
ing the past season, wholesale and retail, and what the average, and 
how do these compare with former prices ?—Answer. From 4 to 8 cents, 
retail; $4 a barrel (salted). Ten years ago, $10 to $12 a barrel, salted. 


EL 
FROM MR. JOHN H. THOMSON, NEW BEDFORD, MASS. 


LN. B.—The numbers correspond to the questions printed under letter No. IL, 

‘preceding. | 
NEw Brprorn, December 5, 1874. 
G. Brown Goong, Esq.: 

Yours 30th November received. Having been for several years en- 
gaged in the fisheries of this vicinity, and also since then being located 
alongside of one of our principal fish-markets, I think [ can answer some 
of your inquiries. I will reply somewhat in the shape of answers to the 
questions named in the circular (the number of question on the margin). 

Nos. 3, 11, 12. They appear on our south coast, south of Block Island, 
about May 25 to June 1; they appear to come from the southwest, or 
just inside the track of the Gulf Stream; they gradually approach Vine- 
yard Sound and vicinity during June to July 10 to 15; they appear to 
leave, working to southeast, and are oft southeast of Crab Ledge about 
the middle of July. This school is of comparative small size, averaging 
about 150 pounds gross, or, say, denuded.of head, tail, &c., about 100 
pounds as delivered in market. These fish are of a. light plumbeous 
hue, darker on back and white on belly, the smallest being, say, 4 feet 
long (including sword), &¢., weighing 30 to 40 pounds; the largest, say, 
84 feet (including sword, &c.), weighing 300 pounds gross. At about 
that time (August 1), another school of late years has appeared south- 
east of Cape Cod and George’s Bank, consisting of altogether different 


372 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [84] 


fish, being much larger (weighing an average of 300 pounds), some as 
large as 800 pounds (gross), and entirely black.” 1 have this week con- 
versed with an old Soe (M. C. Tripp) who all his life has been a 
fisherman, and has this year captured about 90 fish, and his opinion is 
that they are not the same Gongen 

Nos. 5, 16. They appear to be of about the same abundance in average 
years; the catch depends on the weather, fogs, &c. 

No. 15. They come and leave in a general school. 

No. 32. Not in close schools, like other fish, but distributed over the 
surface of the water; the whole are called by the fishermen the annual 
school, OEE cannot strictly be so named. | 

No. 34. The Bill-fish (ranging from 6 to 12 feet in length) is their espe- 
cial enemy, appearing about the last of the season, and when they appear 
is a signal to the fishermen that the Sword-fish are about leaving. 

Nos. 35, 37, 38. They feed on blue-fish, mackerel, and menhaden. 
Their mode of catching these fish is generally to rise beneath the school 
ef small fish and strike right and left with their sword, so as to kill the 
fish, and I have seen them apparently throw the fish in the air and catch 
them on the fail. : 

No. 70. They are infested with a species of boring-worm, which bur- 
rows in their sides, say, 3 to 6 inches in depth. 

No. 7i. Captured with a species of harpoon named “ Sword-fish iron”, 
the peculiarity of which is the head is movable and connected with the 
shaft by a line, and being secured only by a peg, easily slips off and 
forms a “toggle” on the underside of the fish. Ordinary harpoons will 
draw out from the flesh, there being only one general bone, and that 
small in size, viz, the backbone. 

No. 78. At present the great bulk of the catch is sold fresh; the most 
of the catch is brought to this port; a few are carried to New London, 
but until a very few years since very nearly ‘all were disposed of in 
this vicinity. Some ten years since a few were sent to Boston on trial, 
and the consumption in that vicinity has rapidly increased; still, the 
market for fresh fish may be said to be from New Londor, Conn., to the 
east end of Massachusetts. Providence, R. I., is quite a large consumer 
of the fresh fish. 

No, 54. When the first fish arrives here (New Bedford) it is eagerly 
sought for at about 20 cents per pound, retail; but last year, within 48 
hours trom the arrival of the first fish, 52 were brought in, bringing the 
general retail price to 8 and 10 cents, clear of bone, at which price they 
continued to be retailed the season until its close, when fish were brought 
here from Boston, caught on George’s Bank, and then retailed from 15 
to 20 cents. The wholesale price is about 12 cents, first catch, falling 
rapidly to 2 and 3 cents per pound; this is clean fish, denuded of head, 
tail, viscera, &e. 

Nos. 82, 85. Previous to 1862 the market for fresh fish was limited to 
New Bedford, Fall River, Providence, and adjoining towns, and a large 


[85] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 373 


proportion of the fish then taken were salted and shipped to West In- 
dies and the Southern States; especially was this the case with the fish 
taken around Noman’s Land, Vineyard Sound; now nearly all are con- 
sumed fresh, and the average price is somewhat higher than then. 

It is impossible to say how many smacks, &c., are engaged in the 
fishery; there are about a dozen from here, but every Vineyard boat, 
packet, &c., carry the gear in the season, with outrigger or stand on the 
bowsprit for taking them. Captain Tripp told me yesterday he had 
brought in 52; some have caught 80 or 90 each. About 1,000 fish have 
been brought here the past year, and passed through the hands of our 
marketmen; about 500 more have been consumed on the Vineyard and 
Nantucket. The catch carried to New London and Boston I am unable 
to state. 

It will keep good packed in ice perhaps longer than any other fish, and 
is therefore more easily transported fresh to the surrounding towns and 
cities. 

Should any of the above statements be of account to you, I think you 
can rely on their general accuracy. 

Yours, truly, 
JOHN H. THOMSON. 


LY. 
FROM WILLARD NYE, JR., OF NEW BEDFORD, MASS. 


NEW BEDFORD, March 24, 1875. 

DEAR SIR: I find that the Sword-fish which Capt. Dyer caught was 
at the west, not east, of South America. He says they are very plenty 
off the Peruvian coast, a pumber being often in sight; the largest he 
ever saw was one caught by himself about 150 miles from shore; the 
ship’s crew lived on it for several days, and they then salted 400 pounds— 
supposed the fish must have weighed from 900 to 1,000. 

A few years ago Captain Dyerstruck aSword-fish from a30-foot boat, 
about 40 miles southwest of Noman’s Land, threw over the keg, tacked, 
and stcod by to the windward of same. When about abreast of it the 
man at masthead said, ‘“‘ Why, here he is, right along side.” @The fish 
was then about 10 feet from the boat, going in the same direction. On 
getting where he could see the splash of the water around the bow, 
he turned and struck her about two feet from the stem, just below the 
water-line. The sword went through the plank, 13-inch cedar, into a 
lot of loose iron ballast, breaking off short at the fish’s head. 

Captain Allen says, while cruising for whales, he has faund the 
Sword-fish very abundant off Peru and Chili, from the immediate coast 
to 300 miles out, beyond which they are seldom seen; are very plenty 
during the month of January, when they feed on the common mackerel, 
with which the waters at that time abound. The largest he has ever 
caught weighed about 6V0 pounds. Beth Captains Allen and Dyer 


874. REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [86} 


have been several voyages masters of whaling-ships, and are perfectly 
familiar with Sword-fish on our coast, and both speak of seeing plenty 
of Bill-fish in the Pacific Ocean, but never took the trouble to catch 
them. 

The Sword-fish appears on the coast of Massachusetts from the 8th 
to the 20th of June, and is first seen southwest from Block Island. They 
begin to leave in August, but stray ones are sometimes seen as late as. 
the last of October. The general opinion of their coming and going is 
that they follow their food, which swarms on our coast (between the 
seasons named) in the form of mackerel and menhaden; these fish are 
of course driven off by the approach of winter and rough weather. A 
number of boats, large and small, have been struck by Sword-fish on 
our coast but always after the fish has been struck. The people of 
Block Island sometimes catch them with hook and line, bait with fresh 
mackerel and throw just ahead of the fish, when he will stick it with his: 
sword and then swallow it, after which he is easily managed. 

Yours, truly, 
WILLARD NYE, Jn. 


‘Vie 


* 


FROM CAPT. WILLIAM E. SPICER, NOANK, CONN. 


NoANK, CONN., January 11, 1875. 

DEAR Srr: I made inquiry at Mystic concerning the question you 
wanted information on. I found that the crews of the two smacks were: 
all dead but one man, Mr. William Taylor, a man 76 years old, and he 
lived five miles back of Mystic. I went and saw the man. He says he 
was in the smack, her name was the Evergreen, Capt. John Appleman; 
they started from “ Mystic” in company with the smack “ Morning Star”, 
Captain Rowiand, for Key West, on a fishing voyage; they left October. 
3, 1832, and he thinks that on the 12th, off Cape Hatteras, blowing heavy 
wind northeast, under double-reefed sails, at 10 o’clock at night, she 
was struck by a Woho, which shocked the smack allover. They made 
a signal to the other smack to keep close by them, for she was leaking. 
badly. The next morning they found the leak; the same kept off for 
Charlest®h, both smacks. Took out her ballast, hove her out and 
found his sword had gone through the plank, timber, and ceiling. 
The plank was 2 inches thick, timber 5, the ceiling 14-inch white oak,. 
and the end of his sword 2 inches through on the inside of the ceil- 
ing in the after-run. It struck close by a butt on the outside, which 
split the plank and caused the leak. They took out a piece of the 
plank and proceeded on their voyage. 

Yours, truly, 
WM. BE. SPICER. 


[87] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 375 


64.—ON THE YOUN G OF THE SWORD-FISH AND SAIL-FISH.* 
By Prof. Cur. LUTKEN, of the University of Copenhagen. 
[Translated by Dr. TARLETON H. BrEAn.] 


For some years past I have had oceasion to occupy myself with the 


Sword-fishes and the requirements for a critical examination of the gen- 


era and species of this group.t Such an examination is certainly pre- 
carious, since the material for it must be sought to a great extent in 
the literature, and can be based only in small part upon an examina- 
tion of the Satire object itself. Without this it will, as a matter of 
course, be impossible, and the more meager the material at hand the 
more uncertain must the result be. This is one of the cases in which 
one cannot entirely neglect such examinations, but must prosecute them 
as thoroughly as possible; only one must always recognize clearly where 
are the limits of reasonable certainty and when these limits are over- 
passed. The approximate result at which I think we must arrive is 
this: that the genus Yiphias (with its single species, X. gladius) cannot 
be considered as the peculiar type of the Sword-fish, as the central point 
of the group, but rather as one of its more divergent, peripheral, or 
strongly “differentiated” forms; that of the round-billed Sword-fish fur- 
nished with ventral fins two genera may be maintained, Histiophorus 
and Tetrapturus, but that in each of these can be established with cer- 
tainty only two species, H. gladius and gracilirosiris, T. belone and 
Hersehelit ; that the genus Machera (round-billed Sword-fish without 
ventrals), on the contrary, must be regarded with suspicion and as re- 
quiring further confirmation. Whether the future will show that this 
reduction of species is too radical must be determined later; but if more 
species than those mentioned are truly valid, the limits between them 
must be detined by more positive characters than have been stated hith- 
erto; and to this end it is necessary that museums shall become richer 
in these forms than there is, perbaps, a prospect of for a long time to 
come. So much is then, at all events, certain, that the two examples 
4 and 18 inches long of the “ species” established as Histiophorus immac- 
ulatus, Riipp.,t and H. pulchellus, C. & V., cannot claim to represent dis- 
tinct species, but merely young forms, stages of development; and one 
may certainly with strong probability refer the little “H. pulchellus” to 
H. gladius or H. orientalis, and thereby unite this specific type with the 
much younger Histiophori, which Dr. Giinther has figured and described. 
In his first contribution (Journal of the Museum Godeffroy, second part, 
p- 170) Dr. G. describes and figures three small fish of 9, 14, and 60 mil- 


* Vidensk. Selsk. Skr. 5, Rekke, naturvidensk. og math. Afd. xii, 6, pp. 441-447. 

tIchthyographiske Bidrag, iv. On the Round-billed Sword-fish, especially on His- 
tiophorus orientalis, Schl. Vid. Medd. Nat. For. 1875, pp. 1-21, with a postscript, p. 243, 
1877-78. 

t A specimen 5 feet 9 inches long is mentioned by Day, Fishes of India, p. 199. 


376 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [88] 


limeters in length, which he at first supposed to belong partly to 
Xiphias, partly to Histiophorus, but in which he afterward (in another 
contribution, same journal, third part, p. 265) rightly recognized that 
he had before him only young Histiophori. I have before me such 
a series of young Histiophorus,* of from 54 to 21 millimeters in length, 
the smallest of them so little that they could have been only a very 
short time out of the egg. It is possible that they represent more than 
one species; however, it can scarcely be established with certainty. 
Not very much that is new can be added from this material to the in- 
formation contributed by Dr. Giinther, but since some of them are 
smaller than the least of Dr. Giinther’s examples, I have been able -to 
follow the history of the metamorphoses of the genus a little step farther 
back towards its starting-point. The largest specimen before me is 21 
millimeters long, and stands in this respect between the two examples 
figured by Dr. Giinther (2 and 3, p. 443), which were from 14 to 60 mil- 
limeters long. (H. pulchellus may be regarded as the next link in the 
series after Giinther’s largest [3].) Because of the somewhat dried con- 
dition of his example, he could not give full information about the un- 
paired fins, and I have therefore not figured it in the example measur- 
ing 21 millimeters. The head from the point of the snout to the margin 
of the gill-cover was 10 millimeters, or nearly the half; and of these 10 
millimeters the snout (that is, the upper jaw as far back as the eye) 
_again made the half, or 5 millimeters ; the portion of the lower jaw which 
extends forward in front of the eye equalled two-fifths of this, or 2 milli- 
meters. The supraorbital margin is strongly projecting and finely 
toothed; the forehead sinks abruptly towards the snout; the orbito-tem- 
poral crest is continued behind in a horizontal, backward-directed, 
pointed, three-sided, serrate nuchal spine. The spine arising from the 
angle of the preoperculum has a similar form and sculpture, but is some- 
what curved and much longer and more compressed; it reaches nearly 
half as far back as the pectorals. Far beyond both of these extend the 
venirals, apparently composed of but a single ray. The skin is smooth ; 
the caudal not forked; the jaw-teeth strong; the anterior teeth in the 
lower jaw are especially distinguished in this respect. Besides this ex- 
ample, the Museum possesses a series of young of 5} to 12 millimeters in 
length, which differ very little one from another. All these small fish 
(in which one, if he did not know the above description or the interme- 
diate link restored by Giinther, would have difficulty in recognizing 
Histiophori, but would more readily suspect a developmental stage of a 
Dactylopterus-like fish) have a marked frontal depression and a short, 
broad, pointed snout or “ bill,” of which the upper jaw, beset with strong 
teeth, is very little longer than the lower jaw; strong curved teeth dis- 


* The localities in which these small Histiophori or Tetrapturi were taken are: 37° 
30’ N. lat., 52° 15’ W. long. ; 23° 22’ N. lat., 31° 48’ W. long.; 14° 44’ N. lat., 61° 19’ 
W. long.; 4° N. lat., 29° W. long. 


[89] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 377 


short, and compressed. The smaller they are the broader and shorter 
the snout is, until at last its length is not greater than one eye-diameter. 
The preopercular spine in all of them is much longer than the short pec- 
torals. The ventrals appear only as the least little rudiment. Like the 
larger example, all have one or two small spines below, two above, the 
preopercular spine (of which spine nothing is seen in Figs. 1 and 2, p. 
443). The dorsal and anal fin in all of them is low, without evident 
rays, even if such are present in the caudal; in the younger one is seen 
very plainly the notochord curved upward at a right angle, but in the 
smallest of all (Plate I, Fig. 11) it is not yet curved upward, and all 
three fins are connate; in the very earliest stage of development of 
Histiophorus is seen finally, as in certain other young Scombroids, a 
little supraorbital spine, but it disappears comparatively early. 

Of Xiphias gladius Cuvier has described and figured the younger stages 
of 12 and 18 inches; Plates 225 and 226 of the great ichthyological work 
are in this respect exceedingly instructive. Young forms of 124 millime- 
ters and 24 inches are mentioned by Giinther (/. ¢.), who has given a brief 
account of their differences from the very young Histiophori. One may 
obtain from these data alone a very good idea of the history of the 
development of “the common Sword-fish”. There are before me, besides 
young Sword-fish of 27 and 414 inches (to the cleft of the caudal), a 
specimen 190 millimeters long found in the stomach of an albicore, but 
tolerably well preserved, besides the series of smaller specimens from 10 
to 46 millimeters long.* In the young Sword-fish of 27 inches t the keel 
is present on the tail; the gills have the Xiphias character, but the dor- 
sal is single, continuous; likewise the anal; and the skin is now rough 
from the close covering of rough scales, which will be immediately 
described more fully in a younger example, and between which the 
four series of large, pointed bone-bucklers on each side are now very evi- 
dent. Ofthe smaller, pelagic specimens the largest (190 millimeters) 
and the smallest (10 millimeters) are especially interesting; this last 
because it is so much smaller than any hitherto described, and makes it 
possible to give a representation of the appearance of the genus ata 
very considerably earlier stage of development, and at the same time to 


*The places where these young Sword-fish were caught, so far as recorded, are the 
following: 38° 53’ N. lat., 19° 37’ W. long.; 32° 50’ N. lat., 74° 19’ W. long. ; 23° N. 
lat., 55° W. long. ; 20° N. lat., 319 W. long.; 0° N. lat., 29° W. long. ; 25° 4’S. lat., 
27° 26’ W. long. Indian Ocean: 21° 30 W. iste, 57° 50! E. long.; 22° S. lat., 57° 40’ E. 
long. ; 23° 40’ S. lat., 57° 40’ E. long. 

a comparison W ith the measurements of the example 190 muillamerer rs iong, I give 
some measurements of the 27-inch Sword-fish : 


Inches. 
HE CrVELS SOLE So) Ta ey a ae PEL Ser 2 he 2g 12 
Heiehtiot body behind! the head... 3.2.5.5... 4.c2e taste ens+) ate sneees 6-22 2se-- 3h 
Length of dorsal ray near the middle ot the backee mes ee. acces. - nice eeees ces . 2b 
Monctiner peciinmliae: 2 os See oat sk SSS RUT Fete Bn Fo Ske ~ b's siSdale iene diee stb es 4 
Lower jaw (5} inches shorter than upper jaw).----- .--.-------------++e---2 eee 5 


From the front margin of the eye (socket) to gill-opening ...--..---.------------ 3k 


378 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [90] 


institute a comparison with the corresponding stage in Histiophorus. 1 
shall confine myself to a brief mention of the smaller and a little more 
extended one of the largest of these youthful examples. This is unfor- 
tunately somewhat obscured by the stomach juices, and on this account 
is not fit to be made the subject of an illustration, which is so much the 
more unlucky since there exists no representation of a young Sword-fish 
at just this stage of development. It has a much slenderer form; the 
height is only 10 millimeters, and is contained 19 times in the total 
length; the length of the head (from the tip of the upper jaw to the 
gill-opening) is 68 millimeters, over one-third of the total; the “ bill” 
itself (from the tip of the upper jaw to the anterior margin of the socket 
of the eye) is more than 3 times as long (52 millimeters) as the distance 
from the anterior margin of the socket to the gill-opening; the lower 
jaw is only 12 millimeters shorter than the upper jaw; measured to the 
angle of the jaw it is, however, only 4 millimeters shorter (48 millimeters) 
than the length when taken to the anterior margin of the socket. The 
upper jaw is arched above, flat below, nearly as in Tetrapturus, twice 
as wide as high (in the same place), and its form is very different from 
what it is later. The caudal is not deeply forked; the height of the 
dorsal appears to have been nearly double that of the body; the pec- 
toral is comparatively short (21 millimeters); no trace of ventrals is 
seen; the caudal keel is likewise invisible (see below); the skin is 
everywhere covered with pointed scales or shield-like plates, which he 
side by side, not imbricated; among which may be distinguished larger 
and smaller ones.* Of the larger a series extends parallel with the dor- 
sal outline on each side of the dorsal fin from the head to the root of the 
tail, and close below each of these series is a similar one formed of some- 
what smaller plates; also parallel with the ventral outline on each side 
of the anal fin extends such a series of larger plates, accompanied above 
at some distance by a somewhat smaller one; but in front of the anal, 
towards the under part of the belly, these two series of larger plates dis- 
appear gradually in the common covering of pointed, small scales, which 
here on the belly are larger than up towards the back; on the whole 
hind part of the body and tail is seen, on the contrary, quite plainly its 
four regular series of larger skin-tubercles, separate, along tbe sides of 
the fish, with a comparatively small belt of little scales. Its larger 
shields are strongly compressed, keeled and ribbed, so that the ribs 
radiate from the keel backwards and downwards towards the basal mar- 
gin of the shield; from each keel project three to six sharp, curved 
points, directed backward, of different sizes, the smallest of each group 
in front, the largest behind. The small scales, furnished in a similar 
manner with little points, extend out over the whole head and bill, as 
well as the upper and under jaw. The margin of the upper jaw is 


*The small scales repeated in Tetrapturus as a fine layer of diminutive roughnesses 
outside the bony scales, especially characteristic of this genus and the Histiophori 
(which likewise occur in Thynnidw), are not homologous with these. 


ee 


[91] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 379 


furnished, besides, with a like series of vertically placed, conical, strong 
teeth of a comparatively uniform size, alternating with smaller, 1 to 3 
pair between each of the larger; small teeth cover, further, the greatest 
portion of the palatal region. The teeth in the under jaw are somewhat 
smaller, but more closely placed; instead of the outer principal series is 
seen a belt of smaller teeth. The gills show nothing different from the 
ordinary fish-gills, neitber have they yet the Xiphias character. 

Very young Sword-fish 37 miilimeters long, of which the head eonsti- 
tutes nearly the half (17 millimeters), have the lower jaw 34 millimeters 
Shorter than the upper jaw; in a somewhat larger example (50 milli- 
meters), the height of the dorsal and anal fins equals that of the body 
behind the head (3 millimeters); dark cross-bands descend over the 
sides of the body and the unpaired fins; the two small keels of the tail 
are of like form and size, with a median keel; the caudal is rounded. 
(Plate IT, Fig. 10). In this small fish, in other respects, the armament of 
the skin and the jaws is essentially as in the above-described young 
Sword-fish four to five times as large; the larger pointed skin-plates are 
also here perceptible as such, likewise their above-described regular 
arrangement. The lateral margin of the forehead is toothed; the pre- 
operculum, likewise, in the smaller of these two examples is even furnished 
with a group of long spines, which in the space of this treatise will be 
described in various other Scombroids. In still younger examples the 
larger skin-plates diminish in namber, and each plate bears only two or 
three small points of equal size; there is here as little trace of ventrals 
as in the very youngest developmental stage (10 millimeters). The 
head, which constitutes nearly half of the total length, though the bill 
is still short, is here compressed, without the frontal depression of the 
Histiophori, and extends out into a comparatively short bill, broad at the 
root, the under jaw of which is just as long as the upper jaw, both being 
well provided with teeth. The frontal margins are serrate just as in the 
above-described larger young; likewise the opercular spines; the larger 
nuchal spine and the preopercular spine, which are so colossal even in 
the youngest Histiophort, are wanting. On the contrary the pointed 
skin-covering is already perceived like fine bristles which project from 
the skin; in the nuchal region, over each gill-opening, oceurs a little 
projecting pointed crest. 

Despite certain analogies between Xiphias and Histiophorus at their 
appearance from the egg, there are very considerable differences between. 
them in their very first conduect—differences which show well enough 
that the separation between these two genera is rather wide. To this 
result one must come also by comparison of the bony structure of a 
Histiophorus or a Tetrapturus with that of a Xiphias. The closest ge- 
neri¢ ally of the Histophori, especially of the Terapturi, we will, in a 
later section, find in the genus Acanthocybium, which presents decided 
resemblances. If these show tothing’ more than a very close relation- 
ship, they at any rate unite the tie too firmly for one to regard the 
Xiphioids as other than a subsection of the great mackerel family. 


380 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [92] 


65.—MARCGRAVE’S DESCRIPTION OF THE SAIL-FISH. 


GVEBVCV BRASILIENSIBUS: Lusitanis Bicuda; Piscis rostratus; ob- 
longo & ferme tereti est corpore ut Dorada; capite porcino, rostrato, 
cauda in duo cornua deducta ut Abacara rostrum acutum, osseum, 
durum: partis superioris longitudo tredecim digitorum: utramque au- 
tem rostri partem movere potest. Branchias habet amplas: os interius 
orbicularis figura, in medio sui hyperbolico foramine; lingua oblonga, 
alba, dentibus omnino caret. Oculos habet solidi magnitudine, pupilla 
erystallina, circulo argenteo. A rostri insertione caput in altum assur- 
git, ut in Dorada mare: est autem caput ab oculis ad occiput longum 
septem digitos, novem altum. 

[Length occiput to origin of tail 4 feet. Tail-lobes 18 inches; 2 flaps, 
6 fins. Pectoral 11 inches, 2 broad at base. Ventrals black, hard like 
cuttle-fish bone, whip-like, 19 inches, closed in furrow (received in fur- 
row). First anal 6 inches, second anal. 

Dorsal 3 feet base, membrane like parchment, with ribs, received in 
furrow, 14 feet high. Skin hard, brownish. No scales, but with spine- 
like bodies. Belly and throat white, sides silvery and ashy, back sil- 
very grayish brown. Fins grayish silvery. | 

Carnem copiosam habet, non spinosam, pinguem, non glutinosam, 
ideo ad commededendum aptiorem quam caro Marsoram. 


66.—DESCRIPTIONS OF TETRAPTURUS ALBIDUS AND T. 
AMPLUS. 


By Prof. FELIPE POEY. 


The type of Tetrapturus albidus is a male 2,150 millimeters in length; 
this is the ordinary size; the female has the abdomen a little more con- 
vex and the body slightly more elongated; the general form is length- 
ened; the nape elevated, so that the greatest height is about the oper- 
culum; this height is 2; less at the tip of the opercule, and the height of 
the body at that point is contained about 10 times in the total length of 
the body. The head, from the extremity of the lower jaw, is contained 
in the body-length more than 4 times; the eye is placed midway be- 
tween the margin of the operculum and the tip of the lower jaw. From 
the tip of the lower jaw to the end of the-upper jaw, or snout, the dis- 
tance is equal to the height of the head. The maxillary extends beyond 
the orbit a distance equal to 4 of the diameter of the eye; at a distance 
of 3 of the diameter of the eye, in front of it, are placed the nostrils, 
having two orifices, which are separated by a cup-shaped space, hut are 
contained in a commen cavity; the gill-membrane has a squarish open- 
ing below the suboperculum; the palatine bones have a narrow band of 
asperities upon them; the vomer does not project into the mouth, but 
the membrane which covers the palate is rough, the very minute points 


(93] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 381 


of its asperities being turned backward; there are also asperities upon 
the lower jaw. The intermaxillaries, which form part of the base of the 
beak and ali of its tip, have upon their sides very small denticulations 
which point forward, and are used by the animal in an offensive attack 
against an enemy, in case it has not been able to touch it with the sharp 
point of the beak, which pierces like a dagger; the beak is extremely 
hard, especially at its extremity; it is depressed in form, with rounded 
edges; its height is greater than half its width. The preoperculum is 
somewhat far back; it begins about midway between the eye and the 
extremity of the operculum; the other opercular bones are not visible 
externally, but may be seen in the skeleton. The lateral line is indi- 
cated by a series of little holes in a continuous series, and it commences 
above the operculum, and, after having traversed a short distance lon- 
gitudinally, it bends in a direction opposite to that of the line of the 
back, and reaches the middle of the body in the region of the tip of the 
peetoral. The scales of the body are bony, linear, and are absent upon 
the head, except upon the cheeks; those in the lateral line are not per- 

“forated, but they have upon their upper surface a groove which, in con- 
nection with the skin, completes the tube which opens at the exterior 
surface of the body. All the scales are covered by the “epidermis”. 
git) Deo, 09-0 + A.D. 19-6: P19: Vo-1,.42 C. 12. 

All the fin-rays are osseous, not articulated; those whicb are indi- 
cated in the above formula as bony are only distinguished from the soft 
ones by the fact that they terminate in a point, and this point is not 
free; the others, like those of the “pectorals” and of the “ventrals”, 
are flattened at their extremity, and are divided into fibers which are 
visible rather in the form of striations than of branches or digitations. 
The three first dorsal spines and the two first spines of the “anal” are 
so anchylosed to each other and to the ray which follows them, and so 
covered by skin, that, upon first touch, one would say that they formed 
but a single bone. Dissection demonstrates that the first dorsal spine 
is very small (20 millimeters); the second is twice and a half as high 
(50 millimeters); the third more than twice as long as the second (115 

-millimeters); the fourth extends to the tip of the fin, and is more than 
twice as long as the third; it is not articulated any more than those 
which follow it, but it is branched and much compressed towards its 
tip, like those which are posterior to it. This same arrangement exists 
in the two first rays of the anal and those which foliow them. The first 
is small (30 millimeters), the second 70 millimeters, the third corre- 
sponds to the fourth of the dorsal in form, and is twice and a half as 
long as the second. The greater part of these two fins is situated in a 
furrow, and their last rays ave so small that they can be seen only by 
dissection. The first ray of the second dorsal, like that of the second 
anal, is very flat and striated throughout its entire length; both these 
fins are emarginate in their outline. The fourth ray of the first dorsal 
and the third of the first anal extend to the tip of the point, which is 


382 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [94] 


slightly rounded. The first ray of the pectoral is very strong, and 
reaches clear to the extremity of the fin; the last eight are short, and 
make up the subbrachial dilatation. The ventral appears to be, at first 
sight, composed of a single ray, but there are actually five rays, the 
three first being anchylosed together; these fins are received into a ftur- 
row upon the belly, which extends back to the anus. The caudal fin is 
stiff, and its bifurcation is at an angle of 72°, measured from the middle 
of the two cutaneous caudal crests to the tip of the lobes; if the tips 
of the lobes, which bend forward, are ignored, the angle is 80°. At the 
beginning of the tail, above and below, there are slight nicks. The first 
dorsal originates above the preoperculum; the height of its tip, meas- 
ured along its anterior edge, exceeds by one-sixth the height of the 
head, measuring immediately below it. The length of the pectoral is 
one-sixth of the length of the body, measuring the latter from the tip 
of the lower jaw; the first anal 1s much lower than the dorsal. The 
two other vertical fins are small and opposite each other, though the 
second dorsal is slightly farthev back, a little higher in its anterior parts,, 
and a little more emarginate. 

The color is adeep blue above, a little lighter upon the sides, passing 
into white below. ‘The vertical fins are of a deep blue, the second anal 
a little lighter, as is also the outer side of the pectoral. The first dorsal 
has, along the dorsal line, round spots of a deeper color. The eye re- 
volves in every direction in its orbit upon the center which holds it; the 
iris is of a light blue, while the cornea is blackish. 

There are four double gills and an accessory gill; these are cancel- 
lated as in the Sword-fish; the pylorus is placed very high up, and has 
great longitudinal folds; likewise the duodenum, which is swelled, and 
receives, through two openings, the secretions of the compact and 
glandular mass which surrounds it. The intestine is slender, with two 
very short plications, in the course of the second plication embracing 
the spleen; the stomach contains many species of intestinal worms. 
The swimming bladder is cellulous, showing great puffs, which exiend 
far behind the anus. 

Sometimes an atrophied ray is found in the second dorsal on the 
Second anal; this also occurs in Tetrapturus amplus. 

The skull is permeated by cells filled with oil, especially the “eth- 
moid” bone, which has a spongy appearance, and parts of the pre- 
frontals; the anterior sphenoid bone exists. Cuvier could not find this 
in the 7. belone; for my part, I could not find the predorsal. The an- 
terior froutal bone forms the anterior wall of the orbit, but is not visi- 
ble from without. The lower jaw exhibits a peculiar feature, which has 
not been noticed in the Sword-fish nor in 7. belone; it is the single an- 
terior bone which forms the point of the beak; the two mandibular 
bones are joined to this bone, and hold it between themselves by pro- 
jecting denticulations, which call to mind the articulation of the denta- 
ries of the crocodile. 


{95] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 383 


The snout is made up of the ethmoid, the nasals, the maxillaries, 
and the intermaxillaries. The ethmoid, from above, appears only like 
a little wedge; the nasals articulate with the frontals, and are pro- 
longed above to the middle of the snout, where they join with the su- 
perior arms of the intermaxillaries. The maxillaries form the sides of 
the base, making up internally a cylindrical body, which extends through 
the beak and terminates a little beyond the tip of the lower jaw. The 
intermaxillaries commence in a narrow area below the maxillaries, in- 
crease by degrees in extent, and finally take up the entire upper part of 
the beak, as far as its tip, and all the lower part as well, for more than 
a half of its length; it is these bones which alone form the anterior 
half of the beak, and it is they that carry the denticulations whiche 
make of it a kind of rasp, as has already been described. This weapon 
varies in individuals of the same sex, in its length as well as in its 
height, in the shape of its transverse section. Figures are given rep- 
resenting the beak of a specimen of the 7. albidus, which is here de- 
scribed. 

I have, however, thought it necessary to consider this beak as not 
perfect, because it can be seen thot it has aecidentally lost its tip when 
the fish was young, although this has been replaced later. I give also 
another figure of a beak which belongs to another male. I have figured 
3 beaks cut across 30 millimeters behind the tip of the lower jaw. Letter 
A indicates the point at which the tip of the lower jaw terminates; the 
first is 270 millimeters long, and its section, in the place indicated, is 12 
millimeters in height and 19 in width, and denticulations are visible 
through half its length. Thirty millimeters behind the tip it is 8 mil- 
limeters high and 18 wide;.the point is obtuse and the base is depressed. 
The second beak is 300 millimeters long; its section is 10 millimeters 
high and 19 wide; toward the point it is 6 millimeters high and 10 wide; 
the point is sharp, the base high. The third beak, which is that of a 
female, is 330 millimeters long; its section is 11 millimeters high and 
18 wide; toward the tip, which is very sharp, it is 4 in height and 8 in 
width; the base is higher than in the two which have been already 
mentioned. The same variations occur in 7. amplaus. 


TETRAPTURUS AMPLUS. 


The smaller individuals, which are ordinarily males, weigh 150 pounds, 
and measure, in all, 24 meters, while those which weigh 250 pounds are 
at least 3 meters in length. Individuals of 600 pounds are ordinarily 
females; their ovaries weigh more than 30 pounds, and yield from forty 
millions to #fty millions of eggs, of which half at least seem to be capa- 
ble of fertilization. These eggs have an exquisite flavor; they are sold 
in the markets for from 24 frances to 3 franes per pound. 

The fishermen distinguish two kinds of Aguja de casta; one they des- 
ignate by the name Vareteada, because its body is vertically marked 
with stripes of pale blue, while the other is entirely black or blackish 


384 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [96] 


blue. The first, they say, has the smaller head, and is trabajadona— 
that is to say, “difficult to conquer”. The second grows much larger, 
and it has been seen to weigh 1,000 pounds to 1,500 pounds, and with 
a tail 6 feet in width; it is called bomba—that is, “‘easy to conquer”. 
I have never succeeded in characterizing these species. It is difficult 
for the fishermen to judge well, for the bands disappear after death, 
and it is probable that they also disappear with age. I have seen them, 
however, in individuals of 500 pounds. The size of the head depends 
upon sex, the females always having the largest. The opinion of Mes- 
sieurs Baretto and Dulzaides is that there is but a single species of 
Aguja de casta. This is also my own opinion, but not that of M. Jacome. 
glhis description is of the Vareteada. 

The T. albidus having been taken as a type, the description of T. 
amplus may be shorter. The individual described is a male, 2,453 mil- 
limeters long; the head is larger, and it is more depressed between the 
eyes; the nape and the back, in the neighborhood of the insertion of 
the dorsal, are more elevated; the total length of the body is less. The 
mouth is a little smaller, so that the tip of the maxillary is slightly less 
extended. D. 3, 38-7; A. 2, 13-7. The anterior edge of the dorsal is 
over the base of the pectoral fins; the length of the pectoral is one-fifth 
of the length of the body, measuring from the tip of the lower jaw. 
The spreading of the lobes of the caudal is a differential character, 
which is very remarkable, for the angle of bifurcation is 90°; if the 
tips, which bend inward, are ignored, at least 100°. The beak, which 
is much stronger, has permanent denticulations on its sides and asperi- 
ties below. There is no lateral line, and the scales are very frequently 
faleated in shape. The color is dark blue above and below, but the 
belly and the sides have a slightly silvery tint; the body is crossed 
vertically by fifteen bands or stripes of a light color, which are, how- 
ever, only visible upon the back, and when the fish is fresh. 

The skull i is harder than that of the 7. albidus, less cellular, less oily; 
the ethmdid is less spongy. The vomer is visible, covering a consider- 
able space in the roof of the mouth. It # upon this surface that we 
find the asperities such as have been mentioned as belonging to the 
vomer and the palatines; but these asperities actually belong only to 
the skin which covers it, for the vomer does not descend so low, and the 
palatines are exposed ane in a band 20 millimeters long and 3 broad. 
The beak is much more robust in proportion, and its denticulations are 
stronger; they also extend higher up. 

I have shown in figures three beaks of Tetrapturus amplus, drawn to 
their natural size, and it may be seen how much they vary. The first 
is that of a male; it is 420 millimeters long, and its section, taken at 
the same place as those already described, is 19 millimeters high and 
28 wide; 20 millimeters back of the tip it is 10 millimeters high and 
12 wide; its base is high. 

The second beak which has been figured is that of a female; it is 480 


[97] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 385 


millimeters long; its section is 22 millimeters high and 33 wide; toward 
the tip it is 11 millimeters high and 12 wide; its base is depressed. 

The third is that of a female; it is 540 millimeters long; its section 
is 23 millimeters high and 37 wide; toward the tip it is 11 millimeters 
high and 16 wide; the base is high. The beak, which has been described 
by me, cut at the same place, is 385 millimeters long; its section is 28 
millimeters high and 45 millimeters wide ; toward the tip it is 10 high 
and 24 wide; its base is depressed. 

S. Mis, 29-25 


386 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [98] 


‘ LIST OF PLATES. 


PLATE I.—The Sword-fish, Xiphias gladius. Length,8 feet 4inches. Drawing 
by H. L. Todd, from specimen taken on the coast of Rhode Island, 
now stuffed and preserved in the National Museum. 

PLATE Il.—The Mediterranean Spear-fish, Tetrapturus imperator. Outline from 
figure in Cuvier & Valenciennes’s Histoire Naturelle des Poissons, 

1. cexxviii. 

PLATE IJI.—The Cape Spear-fish, Tetrapturus Herschellii. Outline from figure in 
Annals of Natural History, vol. i, pl. x. 

PLATE IV.—The Western Atlantic Spear-fish, Tetrapturus albidus, Poey. Draw- 
ing by H. L. Todd, from cast of specimen taken on coast of Massa- 
chusetts, and preserved in the National Museum. 


PLATE V.—The Western Atlantic Spear-fish, Tetrapturus albidus. Fac simile of 
figure in Poey, Mem. His. Nat. Cuba, ii, pl. xv, fig. 1. 

PLATE VI.—The Cuban Spear-fish, Tetrapturus amplus. Fac simile of figure in 
Poey, Mem. Hist, Nat. Cuba, ii, pl. xv, fig. 2. 

PLATE VII.—The Indian Ocean Spear-fish, Tetrapturus brevirostris. Outline from 


figure in Day’s Fishes of India, pl. xlvii. 
PLATE VIII.—The Old World Sail-fish, Histiophorus gladius. Outline from figure 
in Cuvier & Valenciennes’s Histoire Naturelle des Poissons, pl. cexxix. 


PLATE IX.--The Japanese Sail-fish, Histiophorus orientalis. Outline from figure 
in Temminck & Schlegel’s Fauna Japonica, pl. lv. 
PLATE X.—The American Sail-fish, Histiophorus americanus. Drawing by H. L. 


Todd, from cast of specimen taken near Newport, R. I. Preserved 
in the National Museum, 


PLATE XI.—Skeleton of Xiphias gladius, from the somewhat imperfect specimen 
in the National Museum. 
PLATE XII.—Skeleton of Histiophorus americanus, from the somewhat imperfect 


specimen in the National Museum. 
PLATE XIII.—Skeleton of Tetrapturus imperator. From lithograph in Agassiz’s Pois- 
sons Fossiles, v, p. 89, tab. E. 
PLATE XIV.—Fae simile of figure of Xiphias gladius in Cuvier & Valenciennes’s 
Histoire Naturelle des Poissons, pl. cexxvi. 
PLATE XV.—Map showing geographical distribution of the species of the Sword- 
. fish family throughout the world. 
PLATE XVI.—Fig. 1. Young of Sword-fish, 37™™ long. Fac simile of figure in Liit- 
ken’s Spolia Atlantica, pl. ii, fig. 10. 
Fig.2. Young of Sword-fish, 12 inches long. Fac simile of figure in 
Cuvier & Valenciennes’s Histoire Naturelle des Poissons, pl. ccxxv. 
PLATE XVII.—Young of Sail-fish, 32; inch long. Fae simile of figure in Liitken’s 
Spolia Atluntica. 
PLATE XVIII.—Fig. 1. Young of Sail-fish, about 9™™ long. ) Fac similes of figures 
Fig. 2. Young of Sail-fish, about 14™™ long. in Giinther’s Fishes 
Fig. 3. Young of Sail-fish, about 60™™ long. of the South Sea, 
and in Liitken’s Spolia Atlantica, in Vidensk. Selsk. Skr., 5, 1880, 


p. 443. 
PLATE XIX.—Young of Sail-fish, H. pulchellus, 4 inches long. Fac simile of figure 
in Histoire Naturelle des Poissons, pl. ‘ccxxx. 
PLATE XX.—Young of Sail-fish, H. immaculatus, Riippell, 18 inches long. Fac 
se of figure in Transactions of Zodlogical Society, London, vol. ii, 
pl. xv. 
PLATE XXI.—Sword of young Sword-fish, taken from nostril of shark at Glouces- 
ter, Mass.: Magnified thrice. 
PLATE XXII.—Vertebrate parasites of Sword-fish. 
Fig. 1. Remoropsis brachypterus. The Sword-fish Remora. 
Fig. 2. Rhombochirus osteochir. The Spear-fish Remora. 
PLATE XXIII.—Swordfisherman in position for action. 
PLATE XXIV.—Sword-fish fishing in the Mediterranean. 


‘SoqOUl fF Jo0F g ‘YISueT ‘UINSNT_T [eUONeN 0g} UI paarosaid puv poynis mou ‘pavys] Fpoyy Jo ysvoo oy} Uo Toyv} UotmIOOdS MOL ‘ppoy, "TH Aq Surmviqg 


‘snipp)b sprydy ‘Ysy-piloag ot, 


PLATE I. 


Sword-fish. 


o 

ko} 

s 

ids) 

| 

Ss 

2 

a 

=) 

oe: 
ie 
b 
= 
£ 


va ae 


| 


"xIXx00 "[d ‘suossrog. sap ayjounjoyr aHOISUT SOUMIIU[ AW IOTAND UT ousy wor ourpyng 


‘Loppwadun snonjdvgay “qsy-mwadg uvourdsoj} pay oy, 


a 
H 
ea 
4 
Ay 


AY ay a 


PLATE III.. 


Report U. S. F. C. 1880.—Goode. Sword-fish. 


“x ‘[d ‘T [OA ‘A0jsT DUNQWN fo synUUY Ul oINSY uLory OUTTING 


“mpjpayosway snundnuyay Ysy-1reedg edvy et], 


appa 


naka yar 
fy 


Nig a 


‘MMaSN]T [LUCA UT poarosoad pur ‘syosayoussey_ JO ysvoo wo uoyv} uouTeds Jo 4svo wos ‘ppog, "TH Aq Sarmvrc 


“Soo ‘snpig)y sninjdyyay Ysy-rwodg oruvppy Us10qs0 A OTL, 


To 


.—Goode. Sword fish. 


1880 


ba 
. 


See Ce 


Hilt 
1 


aa 
Ast 


a 


why & 


a 


Ge Ae Pops 
- ; 


é Ph 0 
k Ss sh : 
ihe 


PLATE V. 


Sword-fish. 


Report U.S. F. C. 1880.— Goode. 


‘Toy ‘Ax ‘[d ‘i ‘nqng “Ww 7s wayy ‘ha0g Ul 9anSy Jo oprmis oy 


‘snpig)y sninjdpyay, ‘Ysy-ivedg o1jyuvpzV U19}s9 A, OTL, 


ee 
ye 


BH fue: 


ie 
Lega ry 


Vay) a 
Te Vouk ya bes 


fs *¢ ‘Sy ‘ax ‘Td ‘tr ‘vqno WN ysuT ‘way ‘Soog wr oansy jo as oR 
x 2 ssnpdup snangd@o.yor ‘ysy-avodg uvquy oy, 
4 
a Ay id 
‘aed f 


= 


ht, 


PT 


PLATE VII. 


‘Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Goode. Sword-fish. 


WAX ‘1d ‘wypuy fo soysrg 8 Auq Url aamsy wWoIZ OUIPNO 


‘sLupsolalg sningdpuar Ysy-rwedg wraoQ WeIpuy oy, 


i n 


rie 


A 
“ 7 


4 


lee Swordfish, PLATE Vie 


The Old World Sail-fish, Histiophorus gladius. 


Outline from figure in Cuvier & Valenciennes’ Histoire Naturelle des Poissons, pl. ecxxix. 


WEA, 


ee i 
wpe | ite 


a he 


PLATE Ix. 


“AL ‘TA st fp UND §, [980g ® xpuLNTTto 


JT Ul omnsy ators atttyjnO 


‘sypjuaiwo sndoydoysiyy “Ysy-[leg osourdesp om, 


PLATE X. 


The American Sail-fish, Histiophorus americanus. 
Drawing by H. L. Todd, from cast of specimen taken near Newport, R. I. Preserved in the National Museum. 


E : Md ‘MINOSNT [VUONVN 9} UL Uomdeds qoozrodurt YeT_MOUOS oy} WOT 
sae a ‘snipy) 6 spydiy ‘qSy-ploaMg vy} Fo UoZopayxG 
? < 
q 4 
| Ay 
: i ‘ s 
a 
ite 
eae 
i, a 
; z aa al a EY TRS ETE a 
a 


- oly 
vb. ss = 
ght ae Di 


a 


‘TUINOSNT [BUOYEN OY} UL toutroeds yoosrodut yoy MouL0s oY} TOIT 


‘snupoiuaup snuoydousiy ‘YSY-[1Vg oy} Jo Wojopeyg 


PLATE X1IL 


Sword-fish. 


ay ae 


; Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Goode. 


} ‘ 
s % 
4 


“a qey ‘63 ‘d ‘A ‘sapissoy suossrog §,zissedy ut ydvasoyqy mo. 


“Lopp.aQur sninpUAjaT, JO WO [IYS 


Sword-fish. 


| 


1880.—Goode. 


8. F.C. 188 


a 
12 


Report U. 


i i, ; 


. Sword-fish. 


PLATE XIv. 


‘TAXx00 ‘[d ‘swOssLOg Sap aaLNQVAT 2.0jS.FT SOUUSOUSTe A 2% IOTANH UT 


‘snipypb spriydry JO olUSY JO OWS 9B] 


SSss 
SS = 
= ——— SS 


807 ou" 


Bill 
J Sal 
ay XY Ske 


FRiyy Youmea 


x 

xe 
P\x 

en 

x 

nN 
iar 


| 
| 
| 


\ 


TRA 1A 


_—~ 
EST 


Cee 


VP 


se 


Kergucl{n 1a. 


- 


a 
~~ 


i ee eae 

A oe 
ES ah fos es a ey = 
11 Oa ow ¥ a ere 


Ne oh oe 


. 


“ve ae 
i i Ps fa a 


Bi > ice iro =. 
car 4) 


7 ‘ 74 a 
a im, Pa ba 
ee abs ae ie 
an 7 Vines a ee : 
* i 
Brus, | 4 ys ee 
ie rs << =. 
Mel 


an 


ee eas 


peed sor wor ave 30" to” yor ae for Cc yor 10° __ Ca 8 
c y2bU 
2 RF Vea i oa AY SP ae 
) 


el 
vot | Le) Ate A\ 


Ths “A Ks ; ee i 


SWORD FISH copeoc0c0-——-—-- XUPHIAS oF 
a: ee SAUL PISHES occu _HISTIOPHORUS | 


AAA KA ane SPEAR FISHES... _. JETRAPTURUS || 


9 


¢ 
é 
$ er 


\; 
wet 
Fate) 


; "Axxo0 ‘[d ‘swoss20g Sap 3)0..NQDNT 2.120j8U7T SOMMOTOMITV A 2 IATANY UI oanSy Jo ots ov, ‘OT oy ‘i 1d ‘nonumy Y nyody s,uayxywT ut oinSy Jo oprmts ony 
5 g ay 
zn ‘OUO] SOTOUL ZT ‘YSY-pIOMG FO SuNOX *% SLT ‘SUOT mmze ‘YSY-pIOMg Jo SunoxX ‘Tf “Sry 


== 


.S. F.C. 1880 —Goode. Sword-fish. 


/ 


rye 


Up Report U 


“‘payuny PY viyody 8. WayyWy] UL oansSy Jo ots OV YT 


‘SuOl our uv jo +4 ‘ysy-piIrg jo sun0X é 


PLATE XVII. 


Sword-fish. 


SL) Deen gti ARS 
SECRET 


* 


“4 


Report U. S. F. C. 1880 —Goode. 


- 


+ a aaah 


bet al Ca 
lel I 
a. ' 


te 
en = 2 ire 
ire “ha . 


ers 


‘a Pt 
nore aay 
qr As 


ae 

Te 2 ve af 
PRL ie i 

BL, we? * 


. 


= sy 
ce 
“AT A ta! 


wi 
fA ey ‘ 


ae pS has 


gr 
5 
— 


= 


ee 


Aly a Bondi d') — 
i . 1 ie 


mas 


‘VD 
ol ee hs 
ils : 


on 


chi 


aN 
Shy | 


ces 


; rr ore. 
Arty i a x 
= *. 


PLATE XVIII. 


Fig. 1. Young of Sail-fish, about 9™™ long. 


RE 
+ 

Fig. 2. Young of Sail-fish, about 14™™ long. 
7, 


Fig. 3. Young of Sail-fish, about 60™™ ton 
Fac similes of figures in Giinther’s Fishes of the South Sea, and in Liitken’s Spolia Atlantica, in Vidensk. Selsk. Skr., 5, 1880, p. 443. 


PLATE XIX; 


Sword-fish. 


Report U. S. F. C. 1880.—Goode. 


*xxx00 ‘[d ‘suossiog sop ayjainjnNy a.10jsiF7 BOUUELUOTRA %® JOLAND UT oANDY Jo o[Las oeT 


‘Suo] soyout p ‘snppayaynd snsoydoysyy “Ysy-[Leg Jo Sunox 


Cae 


Report U. S. F. C. 1880.—Goode. Sword-fish. PLATE XX. 


Young of Sail-fish, Histiophorus immaculatus, 18 inches long. 
Fac simile of figure in Transactions of Zodlogical Society, London, vol. ii, pl. xv. 


‘QO1IY) poylusvur “ssvpl ‘LaJseono][H JV YIVYS Jo [I4ysou wosz uayv} ‘YSY-pIOMG Sunok jo paoag 


PLATE XXI. 


be 
eel e te 7 
EGS 


Hee. 
BES E ce 
area 


< RS 
eto te Sees 2 
' g : CS he CSE TET 


Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Goode. Sword-fish. 


ge - 
, 
a 
4 - . 
= 
F ‘ 
~ i 
vs 
a Ge 4 
a : 
aN, 
Bat a 
° 
. 7 
=) 
: ‘ 
Bal S 
” ie = 
ee ; - 
' 
— , 
ig 


” 


/ 


Mi | Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Goode. Sword-tish. PLATE XXII. 


Fig. 1. The Sword-fish Remora, Remoropsis brachypterus. 
Fig. 2. The Spear-fish Remora, Rhombochirus osteochir, 
Vertebrate parasites of Sword-fish. 


PLATE XXIII. 


é 
FE 
n 
a 
=) 
- mH 
) 
E 
n 
Co) 
=) 
(>) 
° 
t 
S 
ive) 
iv 6) 
i | 
o) 
ea hs 
=u 
a “P 
~ 
ae .S 
be i 
i) 
Fa 


SSS 


WSS 


- 
“Sy % 


ETT 
NEN (i y 


f) 


if 


eS 


oN 
hy 
fr 
‘ 


Swordfisherman in position for action, 


HG. 1820, Goode” Swordfish? PLATE XXIV. 


— 4 
=e Git py 


Your a ee 
i See 


ee 


Sword-fish fishing in the Mediterranean. 


sh 

ce en ; 

i) t " 
yee 


INCI EGS 


A. 


Abdomen, parasite in walls of, 57. 

Abundance, of swordfish, past and preserft, 32, 
40, 82, 84. 

Acanthocybium, 91. 

Adriatic, swordfish in the, 17, 18. 

Aelian, 24, 26, 30, 44. ; 

Africa, swordfish on the east coast, 20. 

Africa, swordfish on the west coast, 22, 30. 

Agassiz, 6, 23. 

Aguglia imperiale, 19. 

Aguja, 5, 15, 28. 

Aguja blanca, 5 (?), 15, 16. 

Aguja de Casta, 5, 15, 95, 96. 

Aguja de Paladas, 5, 15. 

Aguja prieta, 5, 15. 

Aguja voladera, 15. 

Aguja voladora, 5. 

Agulha, 3. 

Agulhao, 3. 

Aldrovandus, 25. 

Algiers, swordfish in, 4. 

Alimentary canal, pesasites, 55, 

Allen, Captain, 29, 85. 

Alliveri, 71. 

Amboyna, 6. 

Ambrose, Rev. J., 28. 

Amsterdam, brig, 49. 

Annual school, 84. 

Antigua, swordfish about the island of, 28. 

Apparatus of capture, 60. 

Appendix, 81. 

Appleman, Capt. John, 49, 86. 

Aristotle, 3, 24, 54. 

Arrival, times of, 31. 

Ascaris incurva, Rudolphi, 55. 

Ashby, Capt. Benjamin, 3, 32, 35, 37, 40, 41, 43, 59, 
62, 64, 74, 79. 

Ashley River, fossil swordfish in, post pliocene of, 
23. 


Atlantic Ocean, 6,7, 17, 20, 22, 24, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 38, 


41, 42. 
Attacks upon vessels, 35, 36, 43-40, 64, 85, 86. 
Atwood, Capt. N. E., 53, 54, 67. 

Auckland, New Zealand, 5, 11, 29. 

Auxis vulgaris, 27. 


Azores, 45, 
B. 


Badham, 75. 

Bagnara, 70. 

Baird, Prof. Spencer F., 3, 18, 28, 45. 
Bait, 65. 

Baker, Captain, 34, 37. 

Balandia, a fishing vessel, 45. 


> [99] 


+ Bul. 


Baltic, 4, 24, 27, 30. 

Bankley, 44. 

Banks, Sir Joseph, 19, 21, 

Banquereau bank, 65, 66. 

Barbados, 18. 

Barcelona, 38. 

Baretto, 96. 

Barnstable, 76, 77. 

Barnstable Patriot, 67. 

Barrels inspected in Massachusetts, 76, 77. 
Bayonet-fish, 49. 

Beak. See Sword. 

Bean, Dr. Tarleton H., 5, 39, 87. 

Becasse de Mer, 6. 

Bedford Basin, 28. 

Beechy, Captain, 48. 

Bellon, 25. 

Belone truncata, 5. 

Bennett, Dr. G., 17. 

Bermudas, 5, 30,g0, 51. 

Berthelot, 26. 

Beverly, 76, 77. 

Bezaan-fisch, 6. 

Bicuda, 6. 

See Sword. 

Bill-fish, 5, 29, 31, 54, 81, 84, 86. 

Bibron, M,, 79. 

Blackford, Eugene G., 3, 18, 31, 35,.59, 75, 78, 81. 
Black Sea, 26. 

Bladder, 7, 9, 13, 94. 

Blake, J. H., 18 

Blanchard, 56. 

Bleeker, 5, 6. e 

Bloch, 4, 18, 23, 26, 38. 

Block Island, 11, 32, 37, 59, 60, 64, 65, &3, 86, 
Blue-fish, 3, 33, 41, 75, 84. 

Blue-shark, 54. 

Boats. - See Vessels. 

Boccone, S. Paulo, 55. 

Bomare, 25. 

Bomba, 96. 

Bonaparte, 18. 

Bonito, 27, 33, 41. 

Boohoo, 5, 6, 17. 

Boston, 48, 53, 73, 75, 76, 77, 78, 81, 83, 84, 85. 
Boston Society Natural History, 23, 49, 53. 
Bothriocephalus plicatus, Rudolphi, 57. 
Bothriocephalus xiphiae (Gmelin), True, 57. 
Bowsprit, 62. 

Brachiella ramosa, Richiardi, 58. 
Branchiae (see Gills), 6. 
Branchiostegals, 6, 7, 10. 

Brasiliae, Historia Naturalis, 16. 

Bray, F.C. 

Brazil, 5, 6, 17, 18, 31. 


387 


388 


Breeding grounds (see also Habits and Reproduc- 
tion), 42. 

Breeding season (see also Habits and Reproduc- 
tion), 42. 

Bremen, city of, 30. 

Brewster’s Journal, 4. 

Bridgeport, 38, 66. 

Bridgewater, 30. 

British Guiana, 49. 

British Museum, 4, 17, 18, 19, 79. 

British waters, 26. 

Broussonet, 17, 19, 21, 79. 

Brown's Bank, 27. 

Buckland, Frank, 46, 52. 

Buoy, 61, 62. 


C. 


Cabezona, 16. 

Cachelot, 25. 

Cadiz, 38. 

Calabria, 24, 42, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73. 

California, 29. 

California gray whale, 53. 

Callo, name for salted fins, 24. 

Canadian Naturalist, 4. 

Canaries, 26. 

Cape Breton, 27, 28, 30. 

Cape Cod, 32, 60, 66, 67, 83. 

Cape of Good Hope, 17, 19, 20, 22, 30, 42, 79. ell 

Cape Hatteras, 28, 38, 49, 86. 

Cape Horn, 31. 

Cape Lookout, N. C., 28. 

Cape May, 40. 

Cape Sable, 31, 40, 59, 81. 

Cape Town, 26. 

Cape St. Roque, 29, 47. 

Cape Smoke, 28. 

Cape Verdes, 30. 

Capo Palero, 70, 71. 

Capture (see Fisheries), 15, 34, 60, 63, 65, 68,74, 81 
84, 85. 

Caranx carangus, 27. 

Caribbean Sea, 27. 

Carnia, 19. 

Carolina, 23, 26. 

Catalogue of Fish, British Museum, 7. 

Catesby, 25, 26, 27. 

Caudal fin, 10, 12, 13, 14, 35, 58, 88, 89, 90, 94, 96. 

Caudal keel, 7, 90, 91. 

Cestoda, 55, 57. 

Ceylon, 26. 

Champion, schooner, 67. 

Charleston, S. C., 49. 

Chatham, inspection port, 76, 77. 

Chebucto Head, 27. 


Ue | 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES, 


Cheeks, 12, 13, 93. 

Cheeseman, T. F., 5,11. 
Chesapeake Bay, 28. 

Chili, 29, 31, 85. 

Cobb, Captain, 68, 

Cod-fish, 66. 

Ceelorhynchus, 23. 
Ceelorhynchus rectus, 23. 
Celorhynchus sinuatus, 23. 
Cohasset, inspection port, 76, 77. 
Collins, Capt. Joseph W., 28, 65. 


Collett, 30. 


| Eastern Island, 48. 


[100] 


Colombo, 46. 

Color, 13, 32, 94, 95, 96. 

Columbus, Christopher, 25. 
Connecticut, 74, 75. 

Constantinople, 26. 

Copepoda, 57. 

Cornea, 13, 94. 

Cornide, Don Joseph, 45. 

Coronados, 29. 

Coryphaena, 27, 41. 

Cotté, 44. 

Couch, 30, 45, 52, 54. 

Covill, 78. 

Crab Ledge, 32, 60, 83. 

Crabs, 55, 83. 

Crow, Captain, 52. 

Crustacean parasites, 54, 55, 57. 
Cuba, 3, 5, 15, 16, 18, 20, 28, 30, 31, 35, 59. 
Cuttyhunk, 66. 

Cuvier, 4, 11, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 27, 39, 42, 79, 94, 


. 


D. 
Dactylopterus, 88. 
Dale, 43. 
Danish explorers, belief of, 53. 
Danish waters, 27. 


' Danube, 24, 26, 30. 


Danzig, 24. 

Dard, 3. 

Dartmouth, 66, 76, 77. 

Day, 6, 20. 

Decrease in future, 40. 

DeKay, 4, 37. 

De la Blanchére, 30. 

Dennis, inspection port, 76, 77. 

Departure, time of, 31. 

Descriptions, 64, 90, 92. 

Devil’s Island, 28. 

Diesing, 55. 

Distoma elavatum, Rudolphi, 56. 

Distoma dendriticum, Rudolphi, 56. 

Distoma ventricosum (Pallas), True, 56, 

Distomum dendriticum, Diesing, 56. 

Distribution, 26, 27, 82, 83. 

Djetta, 21. 

Dog-fish, 68. 

Dolphin, 19, 24, 27, 53, 54. 

Dorsal fins, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 35, 39, 63, 89, 90, 
91, 93, 94, 96. 

Dover, N. §S., 28. 

Drafiiniera, 72. 

Draffiniere, 70. 

Dreadnought, ship, 45. 

Dudley, N. H., schooner, 74. 

Duhamel, 18, 70. 

Dujardin, 55, 56. 

Dulzaides, 96. 

Dundonald, Earl, 49. 

Duodenum, 13, 94. 

Duxbury, inspection port, 76, 77. 

Dyer, Captain, 29, 47, 85. 


E. 


Earll, R. E., 40, 60, 68, 74, 78, 79. 
East Indies, 17. 


[101] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 


Echeneis remora, 58. 
Edgartown, Mass., 37. 

Eel, 43. 

Egede, 53. 

Egerton, Sir Philip, 23. 
Eggs, 24, 35, 42, 43, 95. 
Elacate atlantica, 27. 

Ellis, John, 26, 27. 

Embryo, 43. 

Emperador, 15. 

Empereur, 3. 

Emperor of the Sea, 24. 
Enemies, 43, 54, 84. 

English sailors, 17. 
Enniskillen, Lord, 23. 
Enumeration of species, 18. 
Eocene, New Jersey, 23. 
Eolian Islands, 70. 

Epée de mer, 3. 

Epidermis, 12, 13, 93. 
Equator, 29. e 
Espada, 3. 

Espadarte, 3. 

Espadon, 3. 

Ethmoid, 94, 95, 96. 

Europe, 23, 29, 30, 43. 
Evergreen, smack, 49, 86. 
Eye, 9, 11, 12, 25, 55, 89, 92, 94, 96. 


¥F. 


Fall River, 66, 78, 81, 84. 

Faneuil Hall, 78. 

Fan-fish, 6. 

Fariere, foriere, or foliere, 72. 

Fasciola ventricosa, Pallas, 56. 

Felucca, 72. 

Feluccase, 71. 

Finback, whale, 33. 

Finmark, 27. 

Fins, 9, 12, 18, 24, 54, 88, 92, 94. 

Fins as food, 24. 

Fire Island, 47. 

Firth of Forth, 4, 52. 

Fisheries, 36, 38, 40, 59, 65, 67, 70, 73, 86. 

Fleming, Dr., 4, 41. 

Flesh, 19, 21, 26, 36, 55, 58, 73, 75, 84, 85. 

Florida, 5, 26, 81. 

Fluke worms. 9, 55, 57. 

Flying-fish, 19, 25, 27. 

Fetus, 43. 

Food of sword-fish, 19, 24, 29, 32, 33, 38, 39, 41, 53, 81, 
82, 84, 86. 

Food, sword-fish as. (See Flesh.) 

Force’s Historical Tracts, 50. 

Forehead, 11, 88, 91. 

Forest and Stream, 47, 64. 

Fortunate, brigantine, 46. 

Fortune, whale-ship, 48. 

Fossil forms, 23. 

Foster, Waterman & Co., 49. 

Fox sharks, 52. ” 

France, 3, 6, 26, 38, 42. 

Frankfort Museum, 21, 

Frontal bones, 58, 95. 

. Fuller, C. B., 3, 82. 


389 
G 


Galeocerdo tigrina, 54. 

Galicia, 45, 

Gall bladder, 7, 9. 

Garden, Dr. Alexander, 26, 27. 

Gar-fishes, 5. 

Gasterosteus aculeatus, 6. 

Gasterosteus noveboracensis, 6. 

Gay Head, 64. 

Gazzi, 71. 

Genoa, 38, 41, 42. 

Geographical range and distribution, 23, 30. 

George’s Banks, 27, 31, 32, 33, 34, 37, 40, 42, 46, 59, 60, 
68, 78, 83, 84. 

Gesner, 25. 

Gibraltar, 31, 38. 

Giglioli, Professor, 5, 59. 

Gill, Dr. Theodore, 4, 6. 

Gill-lice, 54. 

Gill-membrane, 92. 

Gills, 6, 13, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 63, 83, 89, 91, 94. t 

Gladius, 3, 17, 23. 

Glaris, 23. 

Gloucester, 9, 10, 33, 38, 60, 67, 68, 73, 75, 76, 77, 79. 

Gloucester Telegraph, 78. } 

Gmelin, 4. 

Gotta, 23. 

Grand-pisces, 25. 

Gray, John E., 79. 

Greeks, 68. 

Greifswald, 24. 

Green-bones, 5. 

Greenland, 30. 

Greenleaf, Captain, 66. 

Greenport, 66. 

Growth, 36, 38. 

Guebucu, 5. 

Guebucu brasiliensibus, Maregrave, 17, 21. 

Guérin, 58. 

Guichenot, 4. 

Guinea, 44. 

Gulf of Mexico, 15, 35. 

Gulf of St. Lawrence, 28, 60. 

Gulf of Spezzia, 41. 

Gulf Stream, 32, 48, 83. 

Ginther, Dr., 4, 6, 7, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, 29, 39, 87, 
88, 89. 


H. 


Habersham, Neyle, 18. 

Habitat, 34. 

Habits, 42, 43. 

Halibut, 26, 66, 75. 

Halifax, N.S., 27, 28. 
Hamilton, Chevalier, 4, 24. 
Hamilton, port of, 49. 
Hamorhynchus Des Hayes, 23. 
Hand-lines, 34, 65. 

Hanover, 24. 

Harper’s Weekly, 48. 

Harpoon, 19, 26, 60, 70, 84. 
Harpoon line, 61, 62, 64, 69, 70, 72. 
Hartmann, 24. 

Harwich, inspection port, 76, 77. 


390 


Harwichport, inspection port, 76, 77. 

Harwood, Capt. J. J., 46, 47. 

Hatching, artificial, 73. 

Havana, 15. 

Head, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 88, 90, 91, 96. 

Hebrides, 26, 52. ; 

Hector, Dr., 5, 29. 

Helminthes, 55. 

Herivo, 21. 

Herring, 25, 41, 42, 81, 82. 

Herring hogs, 25, 52. 

Herschel, Sir John, 79. 

Hill, 52. 

Hingham, inspection port, 76, 77. 

Hippuris, 41. 

Hirudo, 55. 

Histiogladius, 5. 

Histiophorinae, Liitken, 8, 22. 

Histiophorus, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 17, 20, 23, 39, 42, 49, 87, 88, 
89, 90, 91. 

Histiophorus americanus, 5, 15, 16, 17, 21, 31. 

Histiophorus ancipitirostris, 22. 

Histiophorus antiquus, 23. 

Histiophorus belone, 18. 

Histiophorus brevirostris, 20. 

Histiophorus gladius, 17, 19, 21, 22, 31, 36, 87. 

Histiophorus gracilirostris, 21, 87. 

Histiophorus Herschelii, 19. 

Histiophorus immaculatus, 21, 31, 40, 87. 

Histiophorus indicus, 8, 17, 21. 

Histiophorus minor, 23. 

Histiophorus orientalis, 18, 21, 81, 87. 

Histiophorus priscus, 23. 

Histiophorus pulchellus, 21, 22, 31, 40, 87, 88. 

Histiophorus rubustus, 23. 

Histoire Naturelle des Poissons, 11. 

History of British Fishes, 52. 

Holder, C. F., 64. 

Holland, 3, 23. 

Holstein, 24. 

Horny-fish, 51. 

Horse-mackerel, 54, 70, 73. 

Hurlbert, Capt. R. H., 3, 28, 32, 37. 

Hump-back whale, 53, 54. 

Hurricane, vessel, 5% 

Hutton, 5. 

Hybernation, 34. 


Ice, 85. 

Iceland, 30. 

Ikan jegan, 6. 

Ikan layer, 6, 36. 

Il Faro, 73. 

Imperador, 3. 

Indian dart, 61. 

India, 5, 6, 20, 87. 

Indian Archipelago, 27. 

Indian Ocean, 6, 16, 17, 20, 27, 30, 31. 
Indian River, Fla., 18. 

Indies, 21. 

Intestines, 7, 8, 9, 13, 55, 56, 57, 94. 
Intermaxillaries, 11, 93, 95. 
Ipswich, inspection port, 76, 77. 
Tris, 13, 94. 

Irons, 68, 72. 

Isle of Sheppey, 23, 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


Istiophorus, 8, 23. 
Istiophorus gladius, 21. 
Italy, 3, 25, 65, 70, 73, 75, 79. 


J. 


Jackson, Dr. J. B. S., 53. 
Jacome, 96. 

Jamaica, 28, 30. 

Japan, 21, 31. 

Jaws, 8, 31, 90, 91, 92. 
Jenyns, 4. 

Jones, J. Matthew, 28, 49. 
Jouston, 25. 


Joohoo, 5, 19. 
Jordan, 29. 
Josselyn, 25, 75. 
Juhu, 5. 
K. 
Key West, 18, 81, 86. 
Killer whale, 25, 50, 53, 
Kirby, Captain, 43. 
Kein, 24, 
Koelpin, 24. 
Koenigsberg, 24. 
L. 


Lacépéde, 4, 7, 17, 19, 22, 79. 
La Ciotat, 38. 

La Coruiia, 38. 

La Have bank, 27, 60. 
Lahontan, Baron, 51. 
Lamna cornubica, 38. 
Lance, 61, 62, 69. 

Land and Water, 36. 
Landmark of Norfolk, Va., 47. 
Lampreys, 83. 

Latin name, 23. 

Lateral line, 12, 93, 96. 
Lawrence, Chester R., 66. 
Leach, 5, 55. 

Le Have, bank, 65. 
Length, 19, 24, 29, 32, 36, 38, 65, 84, 88, 92, 
Leopard, 44, 48. 
Lepidopus argyreus, 27. 
Leptecheneis nancrateoides, 58. 
Lerneae, 54, 83. 

Letters, 81-86. 

Lewes Crag, 23. 

Lewis, Hattie, 28. 

Lichia glaucus, 27. 
Lily-iron, 60, 69, 72. 
Linneus, 4, 18, 26, 27. 
Liparian Islands, 71. 
Lisbon, 38. 

Little sword-fish, 6. 
Liver, 9. 

Liverpool, 46. 

Liverpool Mercury, 46. 
Lixus, 23, 44. 

Localities, 42, 59, 88, 89. 
Loligo Pealii, 9, 41. 
London, 17. 

London clay, 23. 

London Daily News, 45. 
Loutro, 72. 


[102] 


[103] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES, 


Lowe, H. T., 4, 15, 20. 

Lower California, 53. 

Lower jaw, 8, 12, 14, 88, 93, 94. 

Liibeck, 24. 

Lugger, 28. 

Liitken, 5, 18, 20, 21, 22, 27, 28, 40, 38, 39, 42, 87. 


M. 


Machaera, 87. 

Machaera vilifera, Cuvier, 22. 

McKenzie A. 29. 

Mackerel, 26, 29, 31, 32, 33, 34, 41, 59, 60, 65, 66, 69, 75 
79, 81, 82, 84, 85, 86, 91. 

Mackerel shark, 38, 53. 

Madeira, 15, 20, 28. 

Madragues, 69. 

Madras Museum, 21. 

Maine, 28, 60, 66, 67. 

Makaira, 79. 

Makaira nigricans, Lecip., 22. 

Malay Archipelago, 6, 31. 

Malays, 5, 6, 19. 

Mandibular bones, 94. 

Manigaulf Dr. G. E., 49. 

Mantell, 23. 

Marblehead, inspection port, 76, 77. 

Marcgrave, 6, 16, 17, 18, 92. 

Martigues, 38. 

Marion, schooner, 65. 

Markets, 75, 78, 81, 84. 

Martha’s Vineyard, 31, 59, 67, 78, 81. 

Martin, Capt. George H.., 3, 33, 37, 60, 65, 73, 79. 

Mary Ellen, schooner, 28. 

Maryland, 28. 

Massachusetts, 4, 27, 28, 29, 32, 48, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 84, | 
86. 

Massachusetts Bay, 5. | 

Mauritius, 19, 23, 31, 36, 44. 

Maxillaries, 6, 92, 95, 96. | 

Measurements, 89, 90, 91, 92, 95, 96, 97. 

Mecklenburg, 24. 

Mediterranean, 7, 8, 15, 18, 19, 20, 24, 25, 26, 27, 30, 31, 
34, 38, 40, 42, 43, 44, 59, 68, 71, 75, 79. 

Megaptera, 54. 

Men employed, 74. 

Menhaden, 3, 32, 34, 41, 59, 84, 86. 

Menzies, 56. 

Merchant, Capt. Epes W., 68. 

Messina, 19, 24, 70, 72. 

Meteor, schooner, 67. 

Munier, M. Victor, 40, 42, 68, 69. 

Michaux, Capt. J. H., 3, 37, 60. 

Midnight, schooner, 40. 

Migrations, 82, 86. 


Milne, Edwards, 58. 

Mitchill, Prof. S. L., 26, 27, 86. 
Montauk Point, 32, 33, 59. 
Morning Star, smack, 49, 86. 
Morrison, Capt. R. L. 
Mortimer, C., 44, 45. 

Motions, 35. 

Month, 11, 56, 96. 

Movements, 23, 31, 33, 35, 36, 82. 
Miller, Statius, 24. 
Myl-meen, 6. 

Mystic, 86. 


391 


Nie 

Names, 3-5, 82. 

Nantucket, 68, 76, 77, 85. 

Nantucket Shoals, 31, 59, 81. 

Nape, 11, 16, 92, 96. 

Nardo, Dr., 17. 

Nasal bones, 6, 95. 

National Museum, 18, 19, 36, 37, 61. 
Naturalist in Bermuda, 49. 

Needle-fish, 3. 

Nematoda, 55. 

Nets (see Fisheries and Capture), 19, 70, 71, 73 
New Bedford, 14, 29, 60, 66, 67, 68, 75, 78, 81, 84. 
Newburyport, 76, 77. 

New England, 31, 38, 40, 51, 60, 66, 68, 75. 
‘‘News from the Bermudas,” 50, 

New Guinea, 27. 

New Jersey, 28. 

New Jersey, Eocene, 23. 

New London, 32, 59, 66, 75, 78, 79, 84, 85. 
Newport, R. I., 18, 66, 73. 

New South Wales, 17. 

New York, 4, 18, 26, 28, 31, 37, 66, 68, 78, 81. 
New York Herald, 45. 

New York World, 46. 

New Zealand, 7, 11, 20, 29, 31. 

Nulazzo, 71. 

Noank, Conn., 32, 59, 66, 81, 86. 

Noman’s Land, 382, 36, 38, 47, 59, 68, 78, 85. 
Nomeus mauritii, 27. f 
North America, 25, 42. 

North Cape, 30. 

Northern Eagle, schooner, 60, 67, 73, 74, 78 
North Sea, 24. 

Norway, 27. 


| Nostrils, 92. 


Notistium Hermanni, 8. 
Notochord, 89. 

Nova Scotia Banks, 59. 
Nye, Willard, 3, 29, 32, 47. 
Nye, Willard, 85, 86. 


oO. 


Objects of essay, 2. 

O’Brien, Capt. Daniel, 27, 65. 
Ocean king-fish, 3. 

Oestrus, 54. 

Olearius, 24. 

Operculum, 12, 13, 14, 59, 91, 92, 93. 
Oppian, 24, 35, 41, 68, 69, 70, 72. 
Orbit, 13, 14, 94. 

Orca, 25, 50, 53. 

Orcynus thynnus, 54, 70. 
Oresembo, 62 

Orkneys, 25, 52. 

Ossipee, schooner, 27, 65. 

Ova (see eggs), 16. 
Ovaries, 16, 95. 
Ovid, 24. 

Owls, 25. 

Owen, Richard, 7, 35, 46. 


P. 


Pacific Ocean, 7, 29, 31, 48, 54, 86. 
Palamitara, 70, 71. 


392 


Palatal bones, 8, 12, 91, 92, 96. 
Paleorhynchus, 23. 

Palermo, 75. 

Palimadaras, 70. 

Palmi, 70. 

Parapophyses, 7. 

Parasites, 54, 58, 83, 84, 94. 

Parietal bone, 39. 

Paris Museum, 23. 

Parnell, 4, 52. 

Parrett River, 30. 

Patti, 71. 

Peacock-fish, 6. 

Pectoral-fin, 7, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 20, 52, 89, 90, 93, 94, 96. 
Pega de los Agujas, 59. 

Peito, 20. 

Pelamys sarda, 27. 

Perils of sword-fishing, 63. 

Pelvic arch, 7. 

Pennant, 25. 

Pennatula filosa, Linn, 58. 
Pennella costaii. Richiardi, 58. 
Pennella filosa (Linn.), Cuvier, 58. 
Peru, 27, 29, 31, 85. 

Pesce epada, 3. 

Peter D. Smith, schooner, 34, 37. 
Pez de espada, 3, 28. 

Pharos, 69. 

Pharyngeal-bones, 7. 

Philadelphia, 32. 

Philichthys xiphix, Steenstrup, 58. 
Phillips, Barnet, 3. - 
Philosophical Trans., 55. 
Phosphorescence, 24. 

Pickled, 67. 

Pike, Col. Nicholas, 19, 36. 

Pillan, 24. 

Piso, 16, 17. 

Pliny, 23, 51. 

Plymouth, inspection port, 76, 77. 
P. M. Tinker, brig, 47. 
Pocahontas, ship, 49. 

Poey, Prof. Felipe, 5, 15, 18, 20, 28, 35, 43, 92. 
Polibius, 72. 

Poronotus, 9, 41. 

Portland, Me., 6, 10, 37, 40, 60, 68, 74, 75, 78, 79, 81. 
Portugal, 3, 38. 

Portuguese, 6. 

Post-plocene, 28. 

Pound-net, 70. 

Powell, Samuel, 18. 

Prefrontals, 94. 

Premaxillaries, 6. 

Prenasal bone, 6. 

Preopercular spine, 6, 89. 
Preoperculum, 7, 12, 39, 88, 89, 91, 93. 
Prices, 67, 68, 73, 74, 78, 83, 84, 95. 
Priscilla. vessel, 45. e 

Prince Edward Island, 28. 

Proc. Bost. Soc. Nat. Hist., 49. 
Progtor, R. A., 45. 

Products of fisheries, 73. 

Profits to fishermen, 67. 
Providence, R. I., 78, 84. 
Provincetown, Mass., 53, 54, 74, 76, 77. 
Pseudo-branchiae, 6. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [104] 


Pugh, Captain, 68. 
Pugnacity, 43, 49. 
Pulpit, 62, 63, 66, 
Purchas’ Pilgrims, 44. 
Pygosteus occidentalis, 6. 
Pyloric caeca, 7, 8, 9. 
Pylorus, 13, 94. 

Q. 


Queensberry, English ship, 45. 
Quincy Market, 78. 


R. 


Rafiles, Sir Stamford, 36. 
Rafinesque, 19, 79. 

Range, 31, 37. 

Raynaud, 22, 42. 

Rays. (See Fins. ) 

Rectum, parasites, 57. 
Red-hot, yacht, 45. 

Red Sea, 21, 31. 

Relationships, 82, 84. 
Removas, 58. ; 

Remoropsis brachypterus, 58. ® 
Renard, 17. 

Renny, John, 26. 
Reproduction, 42, 43, 83. 

Rest, 62. 

Results of trips, 74. 

Rhode Island, 28, 74. 
Rhombochirus osteochir, 59. 
Rhuys, 30. 

Richardson, Sir John, 4, 27. 
Richmond, Va., 23. 

Rio de Vigo, 45. 

Rio Grande, 46. 

Risso, 4. , 
River, sword-fish entering, 29. 
Rochefort, 6. 

Rochelle, 22. 

Rockport, inspection port, 76, 77. 
Romance of sword-fishing, 63. 
Romans, 69. 

Roqual, 54. 

Rostrum. (See Sword.) 
Round-billed Sword-fish, 87. 
Round-worms, 55. 

Rowe, Capt. John, 3, 27, 37, 40. 
Rowland, Captain, 49, 86. 
Riippell, 40. 

Russia, 27. 


S. 


Sable Island Bank, 27, 60, 65, 66. 

Sagra, 18. 

Sail-fish, 5, 6, 16, 17, 18, 20, 30, 31, 36, 39, 42, 81, 87, 92. 
Saint John’s River, Fla., 28. 
Salted, 67, 75, 84. 

Salvatore dei Greci, 71. 

Salviani, 24. 

Sandwich, inspection-port, 76, 77. 
Sandy Hook, 26, 31, 59, 81. 
Sanguisuga, 55. 

Santa Catalina, 29. 

Santa Cruz, 38. 

} Santa Monica, 29. 


[105] MATERIALS FOR A HISTORY OF THE SWORD-FISHES. 393 


Sardinia, 71. | Spallanzani, 40, 42, 69, 70, 72. 

Savannah, Ga., 18. Spawning, 34, 40, 71. 

Scabbard-fish, 5, 28. Spear fish, 5, 11, 17, 28, 30, 31, 35, 36, 39, 49. 
Scales, 9, 12, 13, 19, 20, 25, 89, 90, 92, 93, 96. Species, 87. 

Scammon, Capt. C. M., 53, 54. Spenser, Edmund, 51. 


Schelhammer, 24. 


Spermaries, 9. 
Schlegel, 21. 


Sperm whales, 31. 


Schneider, 4, 18, 19, 55. : Sphenoid bone, 94. 
Schomburgh, 18. } Spicer, Capt. William E., 49, 86. 
Schoneveld, 24. Spines, 89, 93. 

Schooners. (See Vessels.) 


oe ) Spitzenbergen, 30. 
Schovten, William Cornelison, 44. Spleen, 13, 94. 


Scilla, 70. 


Spolia Atlantica. 
Scituate, inspection port, 76, 77. 


Squeteague, 33. 


Scomberoideae, 27. Squid, 33, 41. 

Scomber gladius, 17, 21. Staples, 52. 

Scomber grex, 27. Starbuck, Alexander, 3. 
Scomber scombrus, 27. ; Staristics of Capture, 74. 
Scombroides, 89, 91. Stay-ships, 58. 

Scoresby, 4. Steindachner, 5, 7, 11, 38. 
Scott, 51. Sticklebacks, 6. 

Scuppaug, 3. Stomach, 7, 9, 55, 56, 94. 
Seaconnet, R. I., 9, 10, 86, 41, 55. Storer, 4, 27. 

Sea-bass, 25. Strabo, 72. 

Sea-snipe, 6. . Straits of Magellan, 44. 
Season, 59, 71, 81. Straits of Messina, 19, 42, 69, 70, 78. 
Sepiae, 41. Sturgeon, 26. 

Seriola cosmopolita, 27. Sub-families of Xiphiidae, 7. 
Severn, 30. : Suboperculum, 92. 
Seychelles, 22. Subtropical Rambles, 36. 
Sharks, 15, 36, 53, 54, 58, 65. Sudsee, 4. 

Shaw, 4. Sumatra, 5, 6, 19, 20. 

Shelly Beach, 11. Swanzy, inspection port, 76,77, 
Sicily, 18, 19, 24, 38, 42, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 75, 79. Sweden, 27. 

Sidney, 28. Swingle-tail shark, 53. 
Sierra, 25. Sword, 7, 12, 13, 14, 19, 22, 23, 25, 36, 38, 44, 68, 78, 82, 
Sierra Leone, 44. . 84, 87, 89, 90, 93, 95, 96, 97. 
Sifio, 3. Sword-fishing, 62. 

Signals, 72. Sword-fish iron, 60. 

Silvery hair-tail, 5, 28. Synonymy, 3-5. 

Simpson, A. W., 28. Synopsis, 1. 

Singapore, 36. ; 

Sinnatia, 79. | 

Size, 36, 37, 38, 42, 81, 82. T. 
Skeleton, 18, 91. Table Bay, 19. 
Skeponopodus, 17. Tail, 13, 24, 79. : 
Skeponopodus guebucu, Nardo, 17, 21. Tape-worms, 55, 57. 
Skeponopodus typus, 17. | Taranto, 59. 

Skin, 7, 8, 24, 39, 79, 88, 90, 91, 92, 96. Targioni-Tozzetti, 41. 

Skull, 94, 96. Taso, 27. 

Sloops. (See Vessels.) Tauro, 70. 

Smith, Capt. Jerome B., 28. Tay, 4. 

Smith, Sir James Edward, 26. | Taylor, Capt. William, 45, 49, 86. 
Smuts, 79. Teeth, 6, 7, 25, 33, 39, 88, 91. 
Snout. (See Sword.) Temminck, 21. 

Sources of information, 2. Teneriffe, 28, 38. 

South America, 5, 29, 85. ; Terry, 51. 


South Channel, 32, 65. 
Southern California, 31. 
Southern Giorgio, 71. 
Southern States, 78, 84. | 59, 87, 90, 91. 

Southern Teressa, 71. | Tetrapturus albidus, 5, 11, 14, 15, 20, 31, 49, 54, 59, 92, 
Southey, 30. | 95, 96. 
| 
| 


Tertiary, 23. 
Tetrapturinae, 6, 7, 8. E 
Tetrapturus, 5, 6,7, 8, 16, 17, 19, 20, 22, 23, 36, 39, 43, 


South Sea, 7, 29. Tetrapturus amplus, 15, 20, 92, 94, 95, 96. 
South Shoals, 32, 33, 40, 50, 82. | Tetrapturus attenuatus, 57. 
Spain, 3, 11, 26, 38. | Tetrapturus belone, 8, 15, 18, 20, 31, 5S, 79, 87, 94. 


~ 


394 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [106] 


Tetrapturus brevirostris, 20. Vetrioli, 70, 72. 
Tetrapturus discophorus, 57. Vineyard (see Martha’s Vineyard), 64, 85. 
Tetrapturus Georgii, 15, 20. Vineyard Sound, 32, 60, 83, 85. 
Tetrapturus Herschelii, 19, 20, 79, 87. Viscera, 9. 
Tetrapturus imperator, 18, 19. Vision, pilot-boat, 68. 
Tetrapturus indicus, 19, 20, 31. Volier, 6. 
Tetrapturus Lessonae, 20. Vomer, 6, 92, 96. 
Tetrapturus minor, 23. Vomer Brownii, 27. 
Tetrapturus priscus, 23. ; w. 
Tetrarhynchus. Walbaum, 4, 24. 
The Antiquary, 51. Walrus, 53. 
Thompson, 67, 74, 78. Watchmen, 72. 
Thompson, John A., 54. Weight, 15, 19, 29, 30, 32, 36, 37, 38, 68, 71, 74, 78, 81, 
Thompson, John H., 3, 32, 41, 60, 78, 83, 85. 82, 83, 85, 96. 
Thrasher, 49, 50, 52, 53, 54. Wellfleet, inspection port, 76, 77. 
Thurlow, Capt. D. D., 47. Western Bank, 65. 
Thynnidae, 90. Weser River, 30. 
Thynnus pelamys, 27. West Tisbury, inspection port, 76, 77. 
Tinker, P. M., 47. West Indies, 3, 5, 6, 31, 44, 51, 78, 84. 
Toggle, 84. Westport, 66. 
Toggle harpoon, 6L Westra, 52. 
Toggle iron, 61. Whale fishery, 3. 
Tongue, 53. Whale harpoon, 61. 
Tozzetti, Prof. Adolfo Targioni, 70. Whale lance, 63. 
Traversay, 22. Whales, 25, 29, 50, 52, 53, 85. 
Trawl lines, 33. Whale spade, 63. : 
Trematoda, 55, 56. Whiting, 25, 41. 
Trichiurus lepturus, 5, 27, 28. : Wilkins, Col. N. D., 25. 
Trinacrian coast, 75. Wilson, 4. 
Trinidad, 29. Wixon, Capt. Alfred, 40. 
Tripp, Capt. M. C., 32, 40, 83, 85. Woho, 49, 86. 
Tristoma coccineum, 56, 57. Wolf, 24. 
Tristoma papillosum, 57. ‘ Wood's Holl, 14, 64, 65. 
Tristomum coccineum, 56. Woohoo, 5, 6. 
Tristomum papillosum, 57. Worms, 83. 
Tropea, 71. Wyman, Professor, 23. 
True, Frederick Wise 55, 70. - Wyoming, schooner, 46. 
Truro, inspection port, 76, 77. 
Tubercles, 56. x. 
Tunny, 21, 24, 33, 54, 69, 70, 71, 73, 75. Xipheini, 7. 
Type of group, 87. Xiphia, 43, 54. 
Type of Xiphiidae family, 18. Xiphias, 3, i6 8, 18, ile, 18, 19, 22, 23, 39, 46, 55, 59, 87, 
88, 91. 

U. ‘Xiphias, 4, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, 15, 18, 26, 30, 39, 87-89. 
Uanciates ductor, 27. Xiphias imperator, 18, 19. 
Uhler, 28. e Xiphias makaira, 22. 
Under jaw, 11, 91. Xiphias Rondeletii, 4, 5. 
United States, 15, 27, 31, 75. SE BNE OGG ES 
Upper jaw, 14, 88, 90. Xiphiidae, 5, 6, 18. 
Uses, economical, 75. Xiphiinae, 6,7. 
Uterus, 43. 

Vv. ag! 


Valenciennes, 4, 11, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 27, 39. 


; Yankee Bride, schooner, 60, 74. 
Valentijn, 17. 


. Z Yarmouth, inspection port, 76, 77. 
Value (see Prices), 83. Yarrell, 4. 
Vannes, 30. Yarrow, 28. 
ee 96. Young, 42, 43, 71, 73, 75, 87, 88, 90, 91. 
Velocity, 35: ° Z. 
Venice, Gulf of, 56. 
Ventral fins, 6, 7, 8, 9, 15, 13, 14, 19, 22, 25, 39, 79, 87, Zee-snip, 6. 
88, 89, 90, 91. Zeyl-fisch, 6. 
Vertebras, 7, 8, 14, 36. Zoological Society, London, 4, 15. 


Vessels, 60, 62, 64, 66, 67, 68, 69, 71, 74, 85. Zwaard-fis, 3. 


XII.—THE SPANISH MACKEREL, CYBIUM MACULATUM (MITCH. ), 
AG.; ITS NATURAL HISTORY AND ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION, 
WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF 
THE FISHERY, 


By R. EDpwarbd EARLL. 


SYNOPSIS. 
A.—NATURAL HISTORY. 

Page 
th Commonpmlamesta- 2228 Lo. see ee cane ci asiccs eisssisie Se cis sinless le creiuies sinisinie’e [1] 
Dee DESCripMoniombmaeiSPCCleS ts. st ostkes sek. He ose elecinele = aletactacimmicit eisccetaciaie [3] 
Sp GOOPrApiicnl distriPUGlOn .4. 05 siomacerie sc ae eu aos o\sesein® <2 Scio eeelaweya eee [4] 
ANG MIGROS ood GoootdS Costas Shas Sale DU aecee Coupon oSs noone ececuseac [5] 
5. Abundance, past and preene at Sore eRe Meee feat eet ie oe ere cree shee te ene aie [6] 
GEE EI OO Cleese rah peta Scie aisveees Slats = omit a Sanaa oclele fora arc ete Sine satis asia [9] 
Meme pLOdUGhiOmiass an sors yeh yo eset claslninin sce = oie,5 + wjelln iclceinitinelee wleisiala's [9] 

B.—ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE FISHERY. 

Spas hin OV OTOUNGS 2% care o) <te oe shale eet Mien t-iaiam ite wae sein Selenite n'cis) vnlncreisieteaialee [12] 
OA patabus alidumethodsOlCapuuler. yaoc1 sonic) a oct scl ie ce ace oes ee omar [14] 
10;) Hishinoyseasons\tor the diferent localities... «-.2' s<c:c<2c0j cece ae an eme sine [19] 
LOIS MOSIbOM Of CHE CALGH Soke cers citors ejaseinycv= crorokeiaaim aim temmes ieee aie ia iele mae [20] 
12, Ssavisties Of the fishery. 222.06 <6. o255 soso ~ ieee om sisine seine Saletan ee sere [21] 
C.—ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION. 

13. Causes that led to the experiments and objects to be accomplished ....-... [22] 
14. Preparation for the, Work «,2.c0.1i2scecise ates Sol Petes bod ade ie sale ocewisee con [23] 
lop Hatchin go Operations: 2-5 sec sc 2 2 tecsec ce ce ee celnayesiewisc cele cee classe [23] 
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HAMETACHICAINTESULIS:...0 oe a ieccie cecinie ties) «sims sisteicie aisisle/sisie-s aie «is a/e'ele(sleiefainiors) = [28] 

18. Relative merits of different localities for the establishment of a hatching 
RUDLI O Meee ele stonss leas cies & aeieteniale aievalcn cicsione siete eelemiesicaeesinisieeisi-talstice [29] 


A.—_NATURAL HISTORY. 
1.—THE COMMON NAME. 


The term Spanish mackerel is by no means an uncommon one. It 
has long been and is still applied to one or more species of fishes in 
nearly all countries where the English language is extensively spoken. 
As nearly as can be ascertained, it was first applied to the Scomber 
colias of Europe by the British fishermen, on account of the peculiar 

[1] 395 


396 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


abundance of the species on the coast of Spain. The name was intro- 
duced into the United States by the early English colonists, who, on 
reaching America found a great variety of fishes in the waters of the 
newly-discovered continent. Some of the species were entirely new to 
them, whiie others resembled to a greater or less extent the species with 
which they were familiar in their early homes. To all of these figh they 
must assign names, and it was very natural for the colonists to apply to 
them the names of the European species which they most nearly re- 
sembled. 

Those settling on the New England coast found a species of mackerel 
which was very similar in its general appearance tothe Scomber colias, 
and they at once gave toit the name Spanish mackerel, supposing it to 
be the common English species. In fact, so close was the resemblance 
that, until recently, most naturalists have considered the two species 
identical, though they are now generally acknowledged to be distinct. 
The colonists settling in the Middle and Southern States, where the 
species already mentioned was not found, applied the term Spanish 
mackerel to the Cybium maculatum; and it has, by many, been com- 
monly applied to the other members of the genus, namely, the C. regale 
and the C. cabella. 

The name, however, does not properly belong to either of the last- 
named fishes, for the adults of these species are usually known as “cero,” 
“king-fish,” or “ horse-mackerel,” though in localities where the C. macu- 
latum is taken the fishermen apply the term alike to all small fishes of 
the genus, few, if any, owing to the marked similarity in their general 
appearance, recognizing the difference between them. Even here, how- 
ever, the difference is recognized in the larger individuals, and the name 
is changed accordingly. 

The Northern species continued to be abundant along the New Eng- 
land coast up to 1855, when it entirely disappeared {rom our shores, and 
not a single individual is known to have been taken from that date until 
the summer of 1879, when the United States Fish Commission secured 
several specimens off Provincetown, Mass.* Since the disappearance of 
the New England species the Cybium maculatum has practically enjoyed 


* We find the following in the Fisherman’s Memorial and Record Book, which gives 
an idea of the abundance of the species in Massachusetts Bay in the early part of the 
present century: 

“Tn 1812 a large school of Spanish mackerel visited this bay, and so plenty and nu- 
merous were they that they woull bite readily at the bare hook, and seize upon 
small bits of line hanging from the vessel. Standing-room boats were then mostly in 
use, holding from 15 to 20 tons. These rooms held from 15 to 20 barrels, and the crews 
would catch them full in a few hours. Mr. Timothy Rogers, at Rowe’s Bank [at 
Gloucester, Mass.], bought most of these mackerel fresh, after being dressed, at 2 
cents per pound, salting them in his buildings, and the business, which lasted two 
months, was a lively one. These mackerel did not continue on this coast but .a few 
years, and have now almost entirely disappeared. There were a few caught with the 
other mackerel as late as 1825, since which time it is very rare to see one during the 
entire season.”—(Fisherman’s Memorial and Record Book, p. 61.) 


[3] * THE SPANISH MACKEREL. 397 


a monopoly of the name within the limits of the United States. But 
though this is the only species to which the name Spanish mackerel prop- 
erly belongs, it must not be inferred that the fish is always called by its 
right name. On the contrary, the fishermen have several names for it. 
In the Gulf of Mexico and along the Southern Atlantic coast it is univer- 
sally known as the “Spanish mackerel.” About Wilmington, N. C., it is 
occasionally taken by the fishermen, some of whom call it by its proper 
name, while others knowit as the “ horse-mackerel”. In Chesapeake Bay 
it is called “bay mackerel”, or, almost as frequently, simply “mackerel”. 
On the New Jersey coast it is frequently called the “spotted mackerel” to 
distinguish it from the Scomber scombrus, which is known as the “mack- 
erel” or “banded mackerel”. Again, Josselyn, who visited the New 
England coast in the early part of the sixteenth century, spoke of the 
‘speckled hound-fish” in such a way that Professor Goode thinks he 
could have referred to no other species than our Cybium maculatum. 
DeKay@escribed it as the “spotted cybium”. 


2.—DESCRIPTION OF THE SPECIES. 


Six species of the genus Cybium are found in American waters, but 
thus far only three of them have been taken within the limits of the 
United States, the others occurring about the West Indies. The species 
frequenting our coast, namely, C. maculatum, C. regale, and C. cabella, 
have already been mentioned. These are very similar in general ap- 
pearance, and were it not for the difference in size, few fishermen would 
recognize them as distinct species. 

The Cybiwm maculatum, the species at present under consideration (see 
Plate I) was first described by Mitchill, under the name of Scomber macu- 
latus. Later, Agassiz referred it to the genus Cybium, calling it the Cy- 
bium maculatum, a name that is now universally adopted. The species 
is similar in form to the common mackerel, though in size and color 
it is quite different. It is, without question, one of the most beautiful 
fishes of our coast, and few of the fishes of the tropical seas surpass it 
in brilliancy. Its back hasa greenish tint, which gradually shades into 
leaden or dove color on the sides. All of the under parts, including the 
lower sides, gill-covers, and ventral and anal fins, are pearly white. 
About twenty yellowish spots, varying from one-eighth to one-third of 
an inch in diameter, and forming a brilliant contrast with the leaden 
background, are scattered irregularly along the upper sides, ehiefly 
on the anterior portion of the body. A prominent lateral line begins just 
above the operculum, rising slightly at first, then bending downward 
and continuing in a crooked or wavy path almost to the tail. The head 
is long and pointed, the eyes large and yellowish, with double nostrils 
situated slightly in front of them. The mouth is very large and the 
powerful jaws are armed with strong, slightly compressed, or nearly con- 
ical teeth, except in their anterior portion, where these are rudimentary 
or even entirely wanting. The spinous dorsal has a black marking on 


398 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


the upper anterior margin, the remainder being pure white. The soft 
dorsal, like the dorsal finlets, which are eight in number, is slightly 
brownish. The somewhat acuminated pectorals are brown on the outer 
surface, and darker within. The ventrals are quite small, while the tail 
is peculiarly large and broadly forked, the extremities being several 
inches apart. The radial formula is Br. 5; D. 17-16; A. 18; P. 20; C. 
24; V. 4. 

The other species of the genus, though much less abundant, resemble 
very closely the one already described. C. regale, the king-tish of our 
southern coast, like the Spanish mackerel, has 17 spinous rays in the 
dorsal, and also similar black markings, but it is distinguished by longi- 
tudinal bands of gold along the sides. It often attains a length of 4 to 
6 feet, and a weight of 15 or even 20 pounds. The Cybium caballa readily 
distinguished by the absence of black markings on the first dorsal, as 
well as by its fewer rays, these being only 14 in number. The young of 
the species has indistinct circular markings, which entirely digappear 
with age. 

Spanish mackerel vary somewhat in size, according to the locality, 
the largest individuals, as a rule, being found farthest north or at a 
considerable distance from the shore. The largest specimens of which 
we have any record weigh about seven pounds. The majority of those 
seen in the markets weigh between 14 and 3 pounds, and their average 
length is from 17 to 22 inches. Those taken in the pounds-nets at Mob- 
jack Bay, on the western shores of the Chesapeake, do not exceed 14 
pounds in weight, while on the eastern shore, directly opposite, they are 
somewhat larger. Those taken at Crisfield, Md., in gill-nets, average 
about 2 pounds. Off Sandy Hook, N. J., they are larger still, the size ap- 
parently increasing as we proceed seaward, the largest individuals being 
taken 10 to 15 miles from land. The gill-net catch averages 34 pounds 
to the fish, but the average for those taken in the pounds along the beach 
is only 23 pounds. 


3.—GEOGRAPHICAL ‘DISTRIBUTION. 


The geographical distribution of the Spanish mackerel is still un- 
settled. Along our own shores it is chiefly confined to the coastal waters, 
and is less abundant in the open ocean, apparently preferring the shoal 
soundings, where its food occurs in greater quantities. It, however, 
pursues its prey to a considerable distance from land, and is often seen 
40 to 50 miles to seaward. 

The southern limit of the species has not yet been determined, and 
many claim that its northern range has been greatly extended within 
the last few years. Professor Goode, in writing of the species, says: 
“Spanish mackerel visit the north as marauders. Their home is among 
the reefs of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, and they come 
to us only to feed on the small fishes which frequent our waters in im- 
mense schools.” He gives their northern limit as Cape Cod, adding 


[5] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. 399 


that stray individuals have been found on the coast of Maine.* Narra- 
gansett Bay is, however, the most northern point where they occur in 
sufficient numbers to warrant a special fishery. Farther south, espec- 
ially off Sandy Hook, N. J., they are more abundant. They enter Chesa- 
peake Bay in great numbers, and quantities of them are secured by the 
fishermen. According to Mr. Thaddeus Norris, they occur in consid- 
erable numbers in the Gulf of Mexico, and are quite abundant along 
the Florida cgast; many being shipped from Cedar Keys to Savannah 
and other Southern cities. 


4.—_ MOVEMENTS. 


Spanish mackerel are gregarious in their habits. They are some- 
times seen in enormous schools, covering several square miles of ocean 
surface. A single school seen off Long Island a few years ago was 
a to contain several million individuals. The density of these 
schools, however, is very different from that of the schools of men- 
haden, on which they feed. The latter are usually found in compact 
masses, often many feet in thickness; while the former are considerably 
scattered, a large percentage of them being at or near the surface of 
the water. 

The fish make annual excursions to the coast of the United States in 
summer; starting from their home in the warmer waters of the South, 
or, perhaps, from the deeper waters along the inner edge of the Gulf 
Stream, in the early spring, and proceeding northward, or landward, 
as the season advances. After remaining for a few weeks, or months 
at most, they again move southward, or seaward, and at the approach 
of cold weather entirely disappear. They seem to prefer water ranging 
from 70° to 80° Fahr., and seldom enter that which is colder than 659, 

Off Charleston, 8. C., the fish are first seen about the last of March, 
and late in April they enter the sounds of the North Carolina coast. 
By the 20th of May the vanguard reaches the Chesapeake, and others 
follow in rapid succession, so that by the middle of June the capture 
of mackerel constitutes the principal occupation of the fishermen. Off 
Sandy Hook they are seldom seen till late in July,t though from that 
time they continually increase in numbers till the middle, or even the 
last, of August. Their time of arrival at Narragansett Bay is about 
the same as that for the New Jersey coast. In this northern region 
they remain till the middle of September, after which the number grad- 


*The Canadian fishery report for 1880 contains the following notice of the capture 
of aSpanish mackerel at Prince Edward’s Island, in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, which 
(if there is no mistake in the identification) extends by several hundred miles therange 
of the species. The report says: ‘‘An undoubted specimen of the Spanish mackerel, 
male, Cybium maculatum, of the United States, was caught by hook at New London, 
Queen’s County, on the 7th of September. It is rare to find this fish in so high a 
latitude.”— (Supplement No. 2 to the Eleventh Annual Report of the Minister of Ma- 
rine and Fisheries for the year 1880, p. 229.) 

t Mr. Scott states that the young of the species are sometimes taken off the Long 
Island coast in June. 


400 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. — [6] 


ually diminishes, and by the 1st of October the last individuals have 
disappeared. A little later they leave the Chesapeake, and few are seen 
on the Uarolina coast after the 1st of November. 

Their summer movements are doubtless affected to a considerable 
extent by the movements of the menhaden and other small fishes on 
which they feed, as they are usually most plenty in the localities where 
these fish are found. They exhibit great activity in the capture of their 
prey, darting through the water with great speed, and often leaping 
into the air in long and graceful curves, cutting the water neatly as 
they re-enter it. This peculiar leap is characteristic of the species, and 
by it the fishermen are enabled to distinguish the mackerel from their 
allies, the blue-fish, that atter jumping from the water fall back upon 
its surface with a splash. 

During the spawning season the mackerel enter the warmer and 
shoaler water of the bays, the individuals at this time being quite gep- 
erally distributed and the schools often considerably scattered. n 
entering the Chesapeake, they remain about ‘“‘ The Capes” for some time, 
but as the season advances, according to Mr. Sterling, of Crisfield, Md., 
they start for the upper waters, and distribute themselves over the large 
spawning grounds of the region. Some weeks later they reassemble, and 
proceed down and out of the bay on the way to their winter quarters. 

In moving along the coast the mackerel seem to avoid fresh or even 
brackish water, and for this reason are seldom taken near the mouth of 
the larger rivers. This habit is thought to account for their greater 
abundance on the eastern than on the western side of the Chesapeake. 
Along the last-named shore the saltness of the water is considerably 
affected by the enormous quantity of fresh water brought down by the 
large rivers of the State; no rivers of importance occur along the east- 


ern shore, and this portion of the bay is, therefore, nearly as salt as the 
ocean. 


During its stay on our coast, the Spanish mackerel may properly be 
Styled a surface fish. It seldom descends to any great depth, but rather 
remains at or near the surface, and may often be seen leaping into the 
air cr sporting at the top of the water. On a.calm, bright day the sur- 
face of the ocean is sometimes broken for miles together by the move- 
ments of a large school of these fish. 


5.— ABUNDANCE, PAST AND PRESENT. 


There are many and conflicting opinions with reference to the first 
appearance of the Spanish mackerel in our waters. Many sportsmen, 
whose opinions should be entitled to some weight, agree with the major 
ity of the marketmen and fishermen in saying that the species was 
seldom seen prior to 1850, and that it did not become an important food- 
fish till some years later. Others, who have studied the movements of 
the species more carefully, claim, and with-reason, that it has visited the 
coast of the United States each summer since the earliest settlement of 


[7] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. AQL 


the country. Professor Goode, in his Game Fishes of the United States, 
says: “The early chronicles of the colonists contain no references to the 
Spanish Mackerel under its present name; but it seems quite probable 
that this fish was the Speckled Hound-fish spoken of in that renowned 
work, ‘New England’s Rarities discovered in Birds, Beasts, Fishes, 
Serpents, and Plants, of that Country, etc. By John Josselyn, Gent., 
published in 1672. Josselyn wrote of ‘ blew-fish or hound-fish, two kinds, 
speckled hound-fish and blew hound-fish, called horsefish. The Blue 
Hound-fish can be nothing else than the common Bluefish of our coast, 
Pomatomus saltatriz, and no species in the Western Atlantic, other than 
our Spanish Mackerel, resembles the Bluefish closely enough to warrant 
the use of a similar name.” If this supposition be correct, the Spanish 
mackerel was very abundant during the seventeenth century. But 
the species must certainly have decreased greatly in numbers after 
that date, especially along the New England coast, for though it was 
not entirely absent, as shown by the fact that reference is made to. 
it by various ichthyologists from time to time, yet it was not suffi- 
ciently abundant to be generally known to the fishermen of the country, 
_or to be sent in any quantities to the principal markets. Mr. Scott, in 
writing of the species, in 1875, says it ‘‘is a comparative stranger to 
us, and though never known to venture as far north as the fortieth de- 
gree of latitude until about ten years since, yet his families are now as 
numerous on our coast as are those of most other estuary fishes.” 

The date of its first appearance in the New York market could not 
have been far from 1840; and as late as 1854 Professor Gill reported 
the species as having very little commercial importance. 

Prior to 1850 almost nothing was known of the fish about Sandy 
Hook. About this time, Mr. Robert Lloyd, a fisherman of Seabright, 
while engaged in trolling for blue-fish, secured quite a number of Spanish 
mackerel, these being the first he had ever seen. He carried them 
with the blue-fish to one of the hotels, the proprietor of which had 
entered into an agreement with him to take his entire catch; but that 
gentleman, knowing nothing of the mackerel, refused to buy them at 
any price. ; 

From this date they were taken more frequently, and soon came to be 
highly prized as an article of food. They were caught wholly by troll- 
ing, the average daily catch being from ten to twenty fish to the boat; 
the fishing being best when the water was a little rough. Later they 
continued to increase in number, or at least came to be more generally 
noticed by the fishermen, until 1866, when it is said they were often 
nearly as plenty as the blue-fish, though comparatively few were taken, 
owing to the lack of suitable apparatus, and it was not until the intro- 
duction of properly arranged gill-nets and pound-nets that the fisher- 
men were successful in securing any considerable quantities. 

Since 1875 it is claimed that their numbers have gradually decreased 
on the inshore grounds, though they are said to be as numerous as for- 

S. Mis. 29———26 


402 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


merly 8 to 10 miles from land, where they remain beyond the reach of 
gill-nets and pounds. 

Many of the fishermen of Chesapeake Bay never saw the species prior to 
1875, though there are authentic records showing that individuals were 
occasionally taken in the haul-seines along the Eastern Shore as early as 
1860, and hauls of between one and two hundred are reported by Dr. 
J. T. Wilkins in 1866. It is, however, very easy to explain the igno- 
rance of the fishermen as to the abundance of the species in that region, 
for, until recently, the fisheries of the Chesapeake appear to have been 
of small commercial importance, having been prosecuted only during 
the spring and fall by means of gill-nets and haul-seines. During the 
summer months, when the mackerel are most plenty, no fishing of im- 
portance was done. Pound-nets were introduced into the Chesapeake 
region in 1875, and it was through their use that the fishermen came to 
know of the abundance of the species in these waters. 

On the North Carolina coast most of the fishermen, and, indeed, a ma- 
jority of the dealers, are still unacquainted with either the name or the 
value of the mackerel, and when, in 1879, several thousand pounds of: 
them were brought to Wilmington the dealers refused to buy them, sup- 
posing them to be a species of horse-mackerel (Orcynus), which they un- 
derstood had no value as a food-fish. As no purchasers could be found 
for them they were finally thrown away. Farther south few have been 
taken, owing to the lack of suitable apparatus as well as to the fact that 
the fishermen seldom fish beyond the inlets. The smack fishermen of 
Charleston catch a few on troll-lines during the pleasant weather of the 
spring and early summer, but they fish only occasionally in this way. 

Though the fishing is at present limited to certain localities, there is 
no reason to believe that the fish are absent from other places; on the 
contrary, it seems probable that, should proper apparatus be employed, 
the species could be taken at almost any point along the outer shore 
where the menhaden are abundant. 

In the Chesapeake region there seems to be no diminution in the 
catch; on the contrary, it has increased rapidly from year to year, until 
in 1879 it amounted to fully 1,000,000 pounds, and in 1880 the quantity 
was increased to 1,609,663 pounds. The average daily catch for the 
pound-nets about Cherrystone, Va., is fully 500 fish; while as many as 
4,000 have been taken at a single “lift”, and hauls of 2,500 are not un- 
common during the height of the season. At Sandy Hook the catch 
is quite large; in 1879, 3,500 pounds were taken at one haul in a pound- 
net at Seabright, and the average stock for the pound-nets in that 
locality often exceeds $1,000 for mackerel alone, while the catch of other 
species is proportionately large. 

We see no reason for believing that the present enormous catch will 
have any serious effect upon the future abundance of the species; for, 
assuming that the fish are plenty all along the coast, the catch, though 
extensive at certain points, must be insignificant in comparison with the 


ij [9] 
immense number of individuals in the water. As has been shown, how- 
ever, there is good reason for believing that the quantity has varied from 
time to time in the past, and it may be that natural causes, of which 


we are still ignorant, and over which we have no control, may eause 
a like variation in the future. 


THE SPANISH MACKEREL. 403 


6.—Foop. 


No careful examination has yet been made of the stomach contents 
of the Spanish mackerel, and little is knownof his food, beyond the knowl- 
edge of its habit of feeding upon various small fishes, chief among which 
are menhaden and alewives, of which it consumes enormous quantities. 
It is an exceedingly voracious fish, its powerful jaws, armed with strong 
teeth, being peculiarly adapted to cutting and tearing its prey; and, like 
the blue-fish, it often mutilates its victims, biting only a small portion from 
the body, and leaving the remainder to be eaten by other fishes that follow 
inits wake. It seems probable that its food consists almost exclusively 

.of these small fishes, and that it seldom, if ever, preys upon the inverte- 
brates of the bottom, as it is inno sense a “bottom feeder.” In speaking 
of the foog of the mackerel, Mr. Scott says: ‘These fish surround a shoal 
of gar-eels, butter-fish, shiners, spearing or young menhaden, when the 
tiny bait—anxious to escape—rise to the surface, followed by the Spanish 
mackerel, which may be seen two miles distant, leaping, a thousand at 
a time, their forked tails conspicuous, and their bodies gleaming like 
miniature rainbows.”* 


7.—REPRODUCTION. » 


Prior to 1880 nothing was definitely known regarding the spawning 
habits of the Spanish mackerel. Neither the time nor place of spawn- 
ing had been discovered. Mr. Scott had surmised that they spawned 
in the waters of our Atlantic States in the spring, as small ones 
which he supposed to be the young of the previous year were oceasion- 
ally seen in June.t Prof. Goode, in his Game Fishes, had ventured the 
assertion that they probably spawned in mid-winter, in the Gulf of 
Mexico and about the West Indies. These were, as far we know, the 
only writers that had referred to the spawning habits of the mackerel. 
During an extended tour of the Atlantic coast, in company with Col. 
Marshall McDonald, the writer had an excellent opportunity for examin- 
ing the species in different localities, and succeeded in proving that the 
theory advanced by Mr. Scott was the more nearly correct, and that 
the Spanish mackerel spawn along many portions of the Atlantic coast 


*Fishing in American Waters, by Genio C. Scott, 1875, p. 129. 

+The following is the language of Mr. Scott on this point: ‘‘Both the Spanish 
mackerel and cero are spring-spawning fishes, and no doubt spawn in our bays, for 
there are occasionally small ones taken by the anglers in June, before the large ones 
visit our shores, and I argue, thererore, that the small half-pounders are of last year’s 
hatch.”—Ibid., p. 129. 


404 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


in mid-summer. The investigation of the Southern fisheries began in 
Florida in January, 1880, and when the fishery interests of that state had 
been sufficiently studied, we proceeded northward, visiting every im- 
portant fishing station along the coast of Georgia and the Carolinas, 
reaching the Chesapeake early in May. After spending some time at 
Norfolk, and at the fishing shore of Capt. W. E. Taylor, at Willoughby, 
we accepted the invitation of Mr. O. E. Maltby to visit his fishing sta- 
tion at New Point, 40 miles up the bay. Here we spent a number of 
days in examining the spawning condition of the different species taken 
in the pound-nets of the locality, and soon discovered that many of the 
male mackerel were nearly ripe, while the eggs in the ovaries of some 
of the females were well developed. A little later we succeeded in tind- 
ing thoroughly ripe males and one or two females from which ripe eggs 
could be taken. Appreciating the importance of this discovery, we con- 
tinued our investigation, and soon satisfied ourselves that the spawning 
time was near at hand, as the eggs and milt in all of the specimens ex- 
amined were well advanced. Later, the writer visited the Eastern Shore 
of Virginia, including the counties of Accomack and Northampton, and 
found ripe eggs and milt in a large number of individuals. Further in- 
vestigation proved that the spawning season, as in many migratory spe- 
cies, varies with the locality, being earliest on the Southern coast, and 
latest about Long Island. The temperature of the water seems to have 
a decided effect upon the spawning time of the mackerel, and the ova- 
ries and spermaries do not develop very rapidly until it has risen to 
upwards of 72° Fahrenheit. The time of spawning for the Carolinas 
begins in April, while the season at Long Island commences by the 20th 
of August, and continues till the latter part of September. On the ar- 
rival of the species in the Chesapeake, in May, a few of the males are 
nearly ripe, and the ovaries of the females are very much enlarged. By 
the Ist of June occasional ripe fish are seen. The spawning season 
proper begins about two weeks later, and continues during the greater 
part of the summer. The fishermen report many of the mackerel to be 
full-roed when they reach the Sandy Hook region, and claim that by the 
last of August the eggs begin to separate and run from the female. 
From this date to the close of the season numerous individuals are taken 
from which eggs or milt will run freely. 

e The limits of the spawning grounds have not yet been definitely ascer- 
tained, though enough has been learned to show that the mackerel spawn 
at numerous points between Narragansett Bay and South Carolina, and 
it seems probable that when a thorough investigation is made the south- 
ern limits will be found to extend as far as Mississippi and perhaps to 
Texas. It is certain that they spawn in some of the sounds of the Caro- 
linas, in Chesapeake Bay, off Sandy Hook, and along the southern shores 
of Long Island; the Chesapeake and Sandy Hook regions being visited 
by immense numbers of mackerel for this purpose. 


[11] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. 405 


As has been said, the spawning season for our coast continues through- 
out the entire summer, and, in any particular locality, it lasts from six to 
upwards of ten weeks. The time of spawning for individuals of the same 
school varies considerably, the ovaries of some of the fish being fully 
mature while those of others are still quite green. Again, a single indi- 
vidual is a number of weeks in depositing its eggs, as shown by the fact 
that when the first are excluded a large percentage are still small and 
immature. All of the eggs in the ovaries of a shad, salmon, or white- 
fish develop uniformly, and the whole number are deposited at about 
the same time, so that the spawning season for the individual lasts only 
a few days at most. Up to the winter of 1878~79 it had been supposed 
that all fishes were alike in this particular; but our study of the cod at 
that time proved that the individuals of that species were several months 
in depositing their eggs, and the same is found to be true, within smaller 
limits, of the Spanish mackerel. 

The number of eggs varies with the size of the parent fish, that for a 
one-pound mackerel being estimated at 300,000, while that for a six- 
pound fish can searcely be less than 1,500,000. To ascertain definitely 
the number for the average fish, an immature female, weighing one pound 
and thirteen ounces, and measuring 184 inches was selected, and the num- 
ber of eggs was carefully computed. The ovaries, when placed on accu- 
rately adjusted balances, were found to weigh 34.275 grams. These were 
then opened, and a 100 milligrams, selected from different portions of the 
roe-bags, so that all sizes might be represented, were weighed out. When 
counted this mass was found to contain 1,536 eggs. From these data it 
was found that the ovaries of the fish should contain 526,464 eggs. This 
number would be too great, as no allowance was made for the weight 
of the ovary walls; allowing for these, the number would be not far from 
525,000. Itis thus seen that the species is more prolific than the salmon, 
shad, or white-fish, though it is much less so than many of the gadoids, 
a 75-pound codfish yielding fully nine millions. 

The eggs of the Spanish mackerel are smaller than those of any other 
species with which we are familiar. During the early part of the season 
they can scarcely be distinguished by the unaided eye, and although 
they gradually increase in size, when fully ripe they have a diameter,— 
varying somewhat with the size of the parent and the condition of the 
eggs when pressed from the ovaries—of only one twenty-second to one 
twenty-eighth of an inch. Most of those secured by us were of the.last- 
named size, and taking these as a basis it will be seen that a cubic inch 
would contain 21,952 eggs, and that 1,267,728 could be placed in a quart 
cup. 

After impregnation the eggs have a specific gravity between that ot 
fresh and salt water, as shown by the fact that they sink in one and 
float in the other. When thrown from the parent they rise to the sur- 
face, and are driven hither and thither by the winds and tides during 
the earlier period of development. Many are lost from lack of fertiliza- 


406 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


tion, others are destroyed by the animals of the water, and considerable 
quantities are doubtless driven upon the shore during stormy weather, ~ 
where they soon perish. 

When first hatched the little mackerel is quite transparent, its length 
scarcely exceeding one-tenth of an inch, while its diameter even with 
the comparatively large yelk-sac is so small as to allow it to pass 
through wire cloth having 32 wires to the inch. For several hours after 
hatching it remains comparatively quiet at the surface in an almost help- 
less condition, a small oil globule attached to the yelk-sac keeping it from 
sinking and causing it to lie belly upper-most. Later the umbilical sac 
with its oil globule is gradually absorbed, and the little fish begins to 
manifest greater activity, and by vigorous and spasmodic efforts pene- 
trates to the depth of an inch or so below the surface. In a few hours 
it finds little or no difficulty in swimming at various depths and even 
lies at the bottom of the vessel in which it is confined, darting off with 
surprising rapidity when disturbed. 

So far nothing is known of the rate of growth. We know of but two 
instances where small mackerel have been caught or even seen along 
our shores. The first is that mentioned by Mr. Scott, in the passage 
already quoted, of half pound fish having been taken off the Long Island 
coast in June. A second instance was made known to us by Mr. Robert 
Bosman, superintendent of a fishing station at New Point, Va., who, in 
a letter dated Norfolk, Va., September 25, 1880, says: ‘I have recently 
noticed large numbers of young Spanish mackerel, varying from four to 
six inches in length.” Assuming that the fish referred to were the young 
of the Spanish mackerel, there still remains a difficulty in determining 
the rate of growth. Some species grow very rapidly, reaching the last- 
named dimensions ina few months, while others develop more slowly and 
would not attain a weight of half a pound for several years. From our 
limited knowledge of the growth of other species we would suppose that 
the fish mentioned by Mr. Bosman as being 4 to 6 inches long in Sep- 
tember were the fry of the previous year, and were therefore about four- | 
teen months old, while the half-pounders mentioned by Mr. Scott were 
probably nearly two years old. 


B.—ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE FISHERY. 
8.—THE FISHING GROUNDS. 


Spanish mackerel may be taken with trolling hooks along almost any 
portion of the coast between Key West and Long Island; but as this 
method of fishing is practically restricied to a few localities the troll-line 
catch is quite unimportant. Enough are caught, however, to show that 
the species occurs, and to indicate that the fishing grounds may be con- 
siderably extended in the future. 

Professor Goode states, upon the authority of Thaddeus Norris, that 
in the Gulf of Mexico they are sometimes taken by means of hook and 


> 


[13] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. 407 


line with shrimp bait, at the ends of the long piers where the steam- 
boats land in going from Mobile to New Orieans, and that they are so 
abundant on the Gulf coast of Florida, as to be shipped in considerable 
numbers from Cedar Keys. Since the statement by Mr. Norris, a care- 
ful study of the fisheries of the Gulf has been made by Mr. Silas Stearns, 
of Pensacola, Fla., under the direction of the United States Fish Com- 
mission and the Census Office. The reports forwarded by him lead us 
to believe that, whatever may have been the catch of the past, that of 
1880 was so small as to be of little commercial importance, though this 
is perhaps due to a lack of suitable apparatus of capture rather than to 
any scarcity of the mackerel. 

Off the east coast of Florida a few are landed by a smack fishing for 
the Savannah market. Off Charleston small numbers are secured by the 
crews of the vessels employed in the blackfish fishery, who claim to see 
occasional schools of mackerel, and think that in case they should make 
a practice of fishing for them considerable quantities could be secured. 

On the North Carolina coast there are no summer vessel fisheries, and 
but few boats fish along the outer shore, none using methods suited to 
catching the mackerel. Parties fishing with seines along the inner bays 
caught few of these fish prior to 1879. During this season they are 
said to have been quite plenty for a short time, and many were taken 
by the fishermen, who, being unacquainted with the species, did not 
recognize its value, and, instead of saving their mackerel, threw the 
greater part of them away. Some, however, were taken to Wilmington, 
but, as has already been stated, the dealers refused to purchase them, 
thinking them to be a species of horse-mackerel, which they supposed 
to be of little value for food. 

Chesapeake Bay has by far the most extensive fishery for Spanish 
mackerel in the United States; the other fisheries, in order of impor- 
tance, being those of Sandy Hook, Southern Long Island, and Narra- 
gansett Bay. Tew are taken on the southern coast of New Jersey, as 
little fishing is done along the outer shore. Some are, however, secured 
by the vessels trolling in the vicinity of Barnegat Inlet, and the men- 
haden fishermen of Tuckerton occasionally catch them in their purse- 
seines. 

The commercial fishery is of recent origin, and it is only within the 
past few years that any considerable quantities have been taken for 
market. The fishery practically began off the New Jersey coast in 1873, 
and the mackerel were first extensively taken in Chesapeake Bay in 1875. 
This fact has little or no significance in its bearing upon the abundance 
of the fish, for the increased catch is almost wholly accounted for in both 
localities by the change in the methods of fishing. 


9.—APPARATUS AND METHODS OF CAPTURE. 


Three kinds of apparatus are used in the Spanish mackerel fishery, 
namely, the trolling-line, the gill-net, and the pound-net. The trolling- 


408 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


line is more extensively employed off the Long Island coast and along 
the shores of Northern New Jersey than in any other locality. It was 
introduced into the region at an early date, and for some time was the 
most important method in the fishery. It has been less extensively 
used during the past ten years, and is now chiefly employed by parties 
- fishing several miles from the shore. Large open boats and small sloops 
carrying from two to five men each are used for trolling. ‘The trolling- 
hooks, or “squids,” as they are frequently called, differ greatly. Some 
are made of bright metals in the form of a fish, while others more nearly 
resemble the body of a squid, these being usually painted in brilliant 
colors. The number of hooks varies from one to three, according to 
circumstances. In the absence of manufactured squids, the fishermen 
frequently improvise vefy good ones by attaching pieces of red or white 
cloth to ordinary fish-hooks. In fishing, the hooks are attached to lines 
several fathoms in length, four or five of these being towed behind the 
boat, which spreads enough canvas to drag them through the water at a 
speed of two to four miles per hour. The fishermen are often successful 
in catching large numbers of mackerel in this way. 

At Sandy Hook gill-nets were first employed in the capture of mack- 
erel in 1866, but being “‘set taut,” they were not very successful, the 
fish usually detecting their presence and refusing to enter them. 
When it was found that, although abundant, the fish did not gill read- 
ily, schools were often surrounded by the nets, after which the fisher- 
men attempted to frighten them into the meshes by splashing with oars 
in the center of the circle. The majority, however, would pass under 
the lead-lines, or jump over the cork-lines, and escape, so that compara- 
tively few were taken. Still the nets continued to be used with varying 
success, though the bulk of the catch was taken by trolling. About 1872 
or 1873 it was accidentally discoverd that the mackerel would gill more 
readily in nets set in such a way as to present sharp angles, quite a 
number having been secured in a net that had become twisted and 
tangled by the currents. This fact suggested a change in the manner of 
setting, and various experiments were made by the fishermen of Sea- 
bright with good results. The first “sets” were somewhat crude, but 
experience enabled the fishermen to improve upon them from year to 
year. 

The figures in Plate II represent the principal methods of setting the 
gill-nets for the capture of Spanish mackerel off Sandy Hook from 1866 
to the present time. Figure 1 shows the first method, locally known as 
the “straight-set.” The other figures represent, in their order, the more 
important methods that have since been introduced. At the present 
time the three sets shown in Figures 6, 7, and 8 are commonly employed. 
These are locally known as the ‘“square-set,” ‘T-set,” and ‘“ harpoon- 
set,” the names describing, to a certain-extent, the shape of the nets 
as they appear in the water. In the square-set, Figure 6, two nets 
are employed, one being placed perpendicular to the shore to form a 


q 


Sy a THE SPANISH MACKEREL. 409 


leader, while the other is set in the form of a square at the outer end, 
openings of three or four feet being left on either side of the leader to 
allow the fish to enter. The T-set, shown in Figure 7, somewhat re- 
sembles the one already described, the chief difference being that the 
ends of the outer net, instead of being bent at right angles, are turned 
inward to form a triangle at the outer extremity of the leader. In the 
third set, Figure 8, the two nets are so arranged as to form a harpoon, 
from which the set takes its name. 

The gill-nets of this region are worth from $90 to $100 apiece. They 
are about one hundred fathoms long and one hundred meshes deep, the 
size of the mesh varying from 34 to 4 inches. The men fish in “gangs,” 
one net being owned by the crew of each boat. The nets are set on the 
best fishing grounds at daybreak, and are left fér several hours, while 
their owners fish with hand-lines in the vicinity. The catch is divided 
equally, the share for a single net being sometimes as high as five hun- 
dred dollars for a season which lasts from six weeks to two months. 

Gill-nets were introduced into the Spanish mackerel fisheries of Chesa- 
peake Bay in 1877, and proving fairly successful, they soon came into 
general favor among the fishermen of the Eastern Shore, though they are 
even now seldom employed by those living on the opposite side. There 
are, at present, about 175 men engaged in “ gilling” for mackerel be- 
tween Crisfield, Md., and Occohannock Creek, which is 30 or 40 miles 
from the capes. The nets were at first set only in the night, but during 
1880 the fishermen of Tangier Island obtained the best results by fish- 
ing from the middle of the afternoon until midnight. The nets range 
from 75 to 100 fathoms in length, and have a similar mesh to those 
already mentioned. The catch varies considerably, as many as 500 
mackerel having been taken at one set, though the average is only 
20 to 40 daily to the net. 

The pound-net is now the principal apparatus for the capture of 
mackerel in all localities where the fishery is extensively prosecuted. 
According to Mr. R. B. Chalker, of Saybrook, Conn., pound-nets were 
first used in the fisheries of New England at Westbrook, Conn., in 1849, 
and from that locality they spread rapidly to other portions of the coast. 

_ They were first introduced at Sandy Hook, N. J., by Mr. George Sne- 
diker, of Gravesend, Long Island, about 1855. Mr. Snediker has prob- 
ably done more to develop the pound-net fisheries of the United States 
than any other man in the country. It was from him that the fishermen 
-of New Jersey, as well as those of Chesapeake and Delaware Bays, ob- 
tained their first idea of pound-nets, he being the first to introduce 
them unto the fisheries of each of these regions. He has also engaged 
in the pound-net fisheries of Albemarle Sound, though he cannot claim 
the credit of introducing the net into those waters. 

The first pounds fished in New Jersey were very small, and being placed 
along the inner shore of Sandy Hook, they were hardly a success, as the 
fish are much less abundant there than along the outer shore. The same 


410 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


style of pounds were, however, fished with varying success until about — 
1873, when larger ones were placed along the ocean shore; and then, for 
the first time, their importance in connection with the Spanish mackerel 
fishery was discovered. The majority of the mackerel secured about 
Sandy Hook are now taken in this way. One hundred fish in number 
was considered an average daily catch for the fishing season of 1879, 
and 100 to 140 for 1880, though much larger catches were occasionally 
secured. The best day’s fishing for a pound-net in that locality occurred 
in the summer of 1879, when Mr. Robert Potter took 3,500 pounds, valued 
at $700, at a single lift. 

An effort was made as early as 1858 by Capt. Henry Fitz Gerald to 
introduce the pound-net into the waters of Chesapeake Bay, but his net 
was not properly constructed, and was so unsuccessful that it was soon 
taken up. No other attempt was made to fish with pound-nets in this 
region until about 1870, when Mr. Snediker and Charles Doughty, of 
Fairhaven, N. J., came to Virginia and located on the banks of James 
River, a few miles above its mouth. They fished chiefly for shad and 
alewives, continuing their work for about three years, after which they 
disposed of their property and returned to the North. In 1875 Mr. 
Snediker again visited the Chesapeake, located at New Point, Va., where 
he built a large pound in the waters of Mobjack Bay for the capture of 
shad and other species. The fishermen of the neighborhood being wholly 
unacquainted with the pound-net, were very jealous of the stranger that 
came among them with such destructive apparatus. They watched Mr. 
Snediker’s movements closely for several weeks, and after seeing the enor- 
mous quantities of fish taken by him, at once informed him that he must 
take his “‘traps” and leave the country. Refusing to comply with their 
demands, a number of them sawed off the stakes of the pound even with 
the water and carried the netting to the shore, assuring Mr. Snediker 
that if he attempted to put it down again they would destroy it. Seeing 
it was impracticable to continue the fishery here, he decided to seek some 
more favorable locality. Before leaving he sold the stakes that remained 
in the water to a resident fisherman, who obtained from them a pattern 
of the pound, and in a short time had one properly arranged for fishing. 
This was also destroyed by the fishermen, but not until enough had been . 
learned to convince them that pound-nets could be used with great 
profit; and within a year from that time 12 pounds were fished in Mob- 
jack Bay. In 1879 the number had been more than doubled, and on 
our visit to the region, in 1880, we found that every available site was 
taken up, and often three, or even four, nets were placed in line, the 
leader of one being attached to the outer end of another, for the purpose 
both of economizing space and of securing the fish that chanced to be 
passing at a distance from'the shore. 

Mr. Snediker on leaving New Point proceeded to the Eastern Shore of 
the Chesapeake, and associated with himself one of the most popular 
fishermen of the region, hoping in this way to prevent any organized 


[1 7] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. AI1 


opposition on the part of the residents against the use of the pound. In 
this way he was successful in avoiding any open hostilities, and it was 
not long before others adopted the new apparatus. 

Though the pound-net was introduced into the Chesapeake against 
the prejudice of the fishermen, it has entirely revolutionized the fish- 
eries of Virginia. Prior to 1870 the fisheries of the region were of little 
importance, being carried on almost exclusively by farmers, who fished 
with hand-lines and drag-seines for a few weeks in the spring and 
fall, their chief object being to secure a supply of fish for themselves 
and their neighbors; while to-day the Chesapeake is the center of one 
of the most important shore fisheries in the United States. The pound- 
net has not only more than doubled the catch of ordinary fishes, but 
it has brought to the notice of the fishermen many valuable species 
that were previously almost unknown to them, the most important of 
these being the Spanish mackerel. In 1880, 162 pounds were fished in 
Virginia waters, with two others located at Crisfield, Md., just above 
the Virginia line. 

As the pound-net is such an important apparatus in the Spanish 
mackerel fishery, a brief description will not be out of place. The accom- 
panying diagram (Plate III) represents the particular kind of net used on 
the shores of Northampton County, Va. All pounds are constructed on 
a similar principle, though they differ considerably in size and shape in 
different States. Few are provided with pockets, and many have only 
one heart. 

The leader and hearts are vertical walls of netting, extending from 
the surface to the bottom, and simply answer the purpose of directing 
the fish into the pound, which has not only sides but also a bottom 
made of netting, there being but one opening (A B) through which the 
fish can enter or escape. This opening is rectangular in shape; it is 
about three feet wide, and extends from top to bottom, the netting be- 
ing so arranged that the aperture can be entirely closed before the 
pound is lifted. The poles, M, N, A, C, D, &c., to which the netting 
is attached, are from 4 to 8 inches in diameter, each being driven from 5 
to 8 feet into the mud or sand of the bottom by means of a maul or pile- 
driver. The hearts and bowls are placed ‘in water 15 to 18 feet deep. 
From these the leader extends to within a few yards of the shore. It 
varies greatly in length according to the slope of the bottom, the average 
being about 150 fathoms. The netting is of ordinary material with a 
three-inch stretch-mesh. The hearts are made of stouter twine, having 
«a mesh of 24 inches. The opening to the “ Big Heart” is 25 feet across, 
while that to the “Fore Bay” is only 8 feet. The pound or bowl is a 
rectangular inclosure 45 by 60 feet. The netting of which it is com- 
posed is of heavier material than that used for either the leader or the 
hearts, the mesh being one inch from knot to knot. The pocketis simply 
a bag of netting, 15 to 30 feet square and 6 to 8 feet deep, in which the 
fish are placed when, for any reason, it is found desirable to keep them 


4 


412 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


alive for some time before marketing them. In many localities where ' 
the bottom is level or slopes very gradually, two, three, or even four, 
pounds are placed in line, one outside of the other, in order to inter- 
cept any fish that may be swimming beyond the reach of the first one. 
The fish, striking the leader in their migrations along the shore, at once 
attempt to swim around it by going into deeper water, and are naturally 
led through the hearts into the pound, their habit of moving in curves 
rather than by angular turns making their escape quite difficult. If, 
however, the pound becomes well filled with fish and they are allowed to ’ 
remain in it for a considerable time, some of them succeed in finding the 
opening A B and others soon follow them into the inner heart, from 
which they find less diffieulty in escaping. It is known that many fish 
pass out in this way, for large quantities are sometimes seen in the pound 
before the hauling time arrives, which when the net is lifted a few hours 
later are found to have made their escape. Another proof that the fish 
often escape from the nets is found in the fact that nets fished twice a 
day will stock a third or a half more than those that are visited but once 
jn twenty-four hours. In properly constructed pounds, however, only a 
small percentage of the fish are successful in reaching the outer waters, 
for even though they may pass out of the bowl, they are apt to be led 
into it again before they succeed in running the gauntlet of both hearts. 

The pound, as described, costs about $1,000, if we include the second 
set of netting, which must be used when the first is taken out to be dried 
and repaired. In the warm waters of this region the netting cannot 
remain down more than two or three weeks without being seriously 
injured. Three or four men are required for fishing a pound-net, though 
by adding one or two to the force several nets are frequently tended by 
the same gang.* 

The average stock for marketable fish during the season for this 
yocality is about $4,200 to the net; the marine species, named in order 


*The nets are usually fished at slackwater, as at this time they are more easily 
lifted. As the hour of low-water approaches, a boat with a crew of three or four men 
j8 rowed out from the shore to the pole P. A man at once unfastens the line that 
holds the bottom of the pound to its base; after which the boat is pulled to the poles 
G, Q, R, F, K, E, &c., in the order named, until a circuit of the pound has been made 
and the lines that hold the bottom of the net in position have been loosened. The top 
of the net at C is then lowered into the water and the boat passes over it into the 
pound, after which the netting is again raised and fastened. The boat then proceeds 
to the mouth of the pound, and two men, by means of ropes attached to the lead line 
at the bottom of the opening A B, raise this portion of the net entirely out of the 
water, placing the weighted line which forms the lower side over the gunwale of the 
boat, thus effectually cutting off all means of escape. The men then take position in 
either end of the boat and gradually raise the net toward the poles P and C, driving 
the fish around towards G and D. This work is continued until the fish have been* 
driven past Q and I, when the netting is pulled up on the opposite side of the boat and 
the fish are confined in the small basin between it and the outer side of the pound. 
The weighted line at the bottom of A B is now thrown off, and the boat is gradually 
pulled towards the outer end, the basin growing constantly smaller until the fish are 
brought into a limited. space at K, when they are at once transferred to the boat by 


[19] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. A413 


of value, being Spanish mackerel, tailors, trout, sheepshead, porgies, 
and mixed fish. If the value be neglected and the number of individ- 
uals taken be considered, the order should be changed so as to read: 
trout, tailors, mackerel, maxed fish, porgies, and sheepshead; in addi- 
tion to the refuse fish, which are either thrown away or used for fertil- 
izing purposes.t 

On the western shore of the Chesapeake the pounds are much smaller 
and the catch is proportionately less, while the fishing season is also dif- 
ferent. Here the pounds are put out in time for the run of shad, which 
begins early in March and continues till the last of May. After the 
shad season is over many of the nets aretaken up. Almost none remain 
down throughout the summer, though a number are fished in the fall 
for trout and other species. On the eastern shore the law allows pounds 
to be fished only between the 25th of June and the 1st of October, dur- 
ing which time they are lifted regularly every day when the weather 
will permit. 


10.—FISHING SEASON FOR THE DIFFERENT LOCALITIES. 


Owing to the enormous extent of sea-coast over which Spanish mack- 
erel are taken and to the variation of the fishing season with the locality, 
these fish may be seen in the New York markets during a greater part 
of the year. According to the report of the Fulton Market dealers, 
their first appearance in 1879 occurred in April, when 98 pounds were 
received. The quantity gradually increased till July, during which 
month 114,309 pounds were handled. From this date the catch fell off 
rapidly until in November only 657 pounds were received, and in De- 
cember but a single mackerel was seen in the market. 

The fishing season for Long Island and New Jersey extends over 
several months; but the bulk of the catch is taken between the 20th of 
August and the 20th of September; and, allowing for Sundays and 


means of dip-nets. When there is a large run of “scrap fish,” or when the catch is 
large, asignal is given and a flat-boat or scow is sent ouf from the shore to receive the 
surplus. It is taken to the point K on the outside of the net, and the worthless fish 
are thrown into it as fast as the marketable ones are sorted out. Frequently both 
boats are loaded and the fish are culled after reaching the shore. 

After the fish have been secured the netting is thrown off, and the fishermen proceed 
to re-set the pound, drawing the bowl into place by means of ropes which extend 
from the tops of the stakes through rings at their bases to its lower corners and sides. 
The boat first proceeds to the opening A B, and after this has been properly secured it 
passes out of the pound and visits the different stakes in their order until all the lines 
have been fastened. The pound is now ready for fishing, and is left to itself until the 
next slackwater, while the fishermen are icing and boxing their catch. 

tAccording to the best-informed fishermen, 100,000 trout, 40,000 blue-fish, locally 
known as tailors, 30,000 Spanish mackerel, 10,000 mixed fish, 3,000 porgies, and 1,000 
sheepshead represent the catch of the average pound for 1879. ‘The money value of 
the catch is divided among the species as follows: Mackerel, 36 per cent.; tailors, 24 
per cent.; trout, 21 per cent. ; sheepshead, 6 per cent. ; porgies, 5 per cent. ; mixed fish, 
§ per cent. 


414 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


stormy weather, there are ordinarily only 20 good fishing days, though 
small quantities are taken almost every day during the stay of the fish 
on the coast. 

In the Chesapeake the fishing season is sofewhat longer, owing per- 
haps to the warmer temperature of the water in the early spring. It 
begins late in May, and is at its height from the 10th of June to the 1st 
of September, when the mackerel start for the ocean. 


11.—DISPOSITION OF THE CATCH. 


Almost the entire catch of Spanish mackerel is consumed in a fresh 
state. A few are salted by the fishermen of North Carolina, who, owing 
to their ignorance of the value of the species in the Northern markets, 
as well as to the lack of suitable shipping facilities, seldom market their 
catch in a fresh state. Those salted are not considered very valuable, 
and the inhabitants are seldom willing to pay more than $5 or $6 a 
barrel for them, placing them on a par with the blue-fish and other 
common species. It is doubtless true that the fine flavor of the mack- 
erel is very much impaired by salting, and that as a salt fish it is infe- 
rior to the common mackerel (Scomber scombrus), with which every one 
is familiar. 

In 1879 the owner of the oyster and clam cannery at Ocracoke Inlet 
purchased small quantities of mackerel and put them up in two-pound 
cans, but the business was very limited, and no extensive trade was de- 
veloped, only a few hundred cans having been prepared. Recently, at 
the suggestion of Professor Baird, experiments were made in canning the 
Spanish mackerel at Cherrystone, Va., for the purpose of ascertaining 
their relative value as compared with other kinds of canned fish. The 
report from the canneries is to the effect that they were no better than 
fish of ordinary grades, though there seems to be a difference of opinion 
on the subject. However this may be, there is certainly no prospect of 
an extensive business either in the salting or canning of the species, as 
the demand for the fresh mackerel is sufficient to offer an outlet for all 
that can be secured; while the price ranges so high as to make their 
canning or salting entirely impracticable. 

As a fresh fish, the Spanish mackerel has few equals. It is one of 
the most valuable species taken in the United States, and is a great 
favorite with epicures. The price paid for the mackerel in the different 
markets is often extravagant. Instances are not uncommon where the 
wholesale price has exceeded one dollar per pound. The first fish sent 
to New York in the spring usually sell as high as 75 cents a pound, and 
the price does not tall below 60 cents for some time; but as the quantity 
increases the price is gradually reduced, until, at times of oversupply, 
when the market becomes glutted, they occasionally sell as low as 6 or 
7 cents a pound. The average wholesale price in New York in 1880, 
for all grades, is said to have been about 18 cents a pound. Mr. C. W. 


[21] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. 415 


Smiley, who has made a careful study of the Philadelphia market, puts 
the average price for that city at 164 cents per pound during the same 
period. The fish taken in the northern waters reach the market in much 
better condition than those shipped from a distance, and for this reason 
they sell more readily and at better figures. They are, as a rule, much 
larger and fatter than those taken in Chesapeake Bay, this fact alone 
making considerable difference in their value. While the Virginia fish 
are selling in New York at 15 cents, the larger ones from Sandy Hook 
and Long Island frequently bring more than twice as much. 

Many of the fishermen of the lower Chesapeake do not ship their own 
fish, but sell to the dealers in Norfolk and other places at 7 to 10 cents 
apiece. Others pack in ice and ship directly to Baltimore by steamer; 
but, as their facilities for packing and shipping are limited, the amount 
realized, after deducting the necessary expenses, is little, if any, in ad- 
vance of that received by parties selling in Norfolk. 

The principal markets, in their order of importance, are Baltimore, 
New York, Norfolk, and Philadelphia; from these points the catch is 
distributed to the larger cities of country, where the fish are consumed 
by the wealthy classes, few going into the country towns of the interior. 
Few cities keep any accurate statistics of their fish trade, and for this 
reason it is impossible to give the quantity of mackerel handled by their 
dealers. No figures can be given for the Baltimore trade, though it is 
safe to say that the merchants of that city handle fully three-fourths of a 
million pounds annually. The report of the New York Fish-Mongers’ 
Association shows that 274,913 pounds were handled in that city in 
1878. This quantity, according to the same authority, was increased to 
309,168 in 1879, and to 390,000 pounds in 1880. Mr. Smiley, in his re- 
port on the Philadelphia market for 1880, gives the quantity of Spanish 
' mackerel handled as 65,880 pounds, valued at $10,870. Mr. W. A. Wil- 
cox, secretary of the Boston Fish Bureau, estimates the quantity han- 
dled in Boston in 1879 at 15,865 pounds, while that in 1880 was about 
20,000 pounds. 


12.— STATISTICS OF THE FISHERY. 


It is not possible to state the exact quantity of Spanish mackerel 
' taken by the fishermen of the United States during any season, but a 
careful study of the fisheries in the interests of the Fish Commission 
and Census enables us to give the following table, compiled from the 
preliminary statistical reports recently prepared by Col. Marshall Mc- 
Donald, Mr. A. Howard Clark, and the writer, for publication by the 
Census Office. The catch for New York is obtained from the manuscript 
notes of Mr. Fred. Mather, while the figures for the Gulf of Mexico are 
gathered from data forwarded by Mr. Silas Stearns. 


416 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


Table showing by States the quantiiy of Spanish mackerel taken in 1880, ie the total 
catch for the United States. 


Pounds of 
State, mackerel taken. 
WES CEYe TEI) UT 1s So eate BOD a oon ceBCGeIGORS ae so5 US adscco=eoocsosnaetadsosscoacondegosee 60 
WhodeTsland =: <2 -. css. . ala nie oom wwe women = owes wien gees wieieennn= tnnninin wean 2, 000 
MW GUNE CH CUD Re So oc on <a o\miewlnininic neni nlelewie'e cin sn wl nim alnlalntsiaia(e ala) afastals| aiuto Ss alal=loteeieteleiatetalal sate ane 1, 200 
INN VORA | CBs opobennE non sq eeoreaoce SeeeeheCnoossanpacncds satorasosppesAse Seisiaiese 25, 000 
ENG Wad CXS OY ein islets «1 clsicie sian ota cre eminem nto tnlm min ofal oe lotelafotetmralotetatetatatalietel ale |e attetetaiaitate aieyeee ty tere ae 200, 000 
Wu eMby itl Reae aa taser co couc Sb CEEeS Sp emde Boece se Jeno 7 ocaoOnAnoNmon br Se cco ASHeEe Aes iSaecee 18, 000 
BURT UTA er ee So salar cote tac uray, Sa c/Sicte eect nee aoe ne ee 1, 609, 663 

INGrth Carolinas: .2 1.6 s2cese8-28,. seo see eee eee Ue eet Raa Nce, een as Ree ek) i 
POULM CATON A cic ocieisl-)n wloisielalaisiale slaislars eset eletatelsie et aielslaetaeaoaisininiate esta = eee eee cena er 1, 000 
MasternmeHlOnida © «ces oe cman seein elajaminiaiatele nate aels sialeia oe ert ats see tieee eeiaice serene 500 
NGdlt Of MOxiIGO" @ 5 '5)-'- ais’ oie. nidic\-clsicniem nicte oceania meee eee nee steerer eee amet 20, 000 
ROG i arotatese alo /aintaleia aiale o alate staal tolets olaapeitaletiateleteieiateel eels faneecter eno aaa a atte eee seen ee 1, 887, 423 


From the above table it will be seen that Virginia produces 85 per 
cent. of all the mackerel taken, and that the New Jersey fishermen catch 
over two-thirds of the remainder. ‘This, as has already been remarked, 
is largely due to the ignorance of the fishermen of many localities, both 
as to the abundance of the fish and to the proper methods of catching 
them. That the fishery will soon be extensively developed in other places 
seems quite certain. 


C.—ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION. 


13.—CAUSES THAT LED TO THE EXPERIMENTS, AND OBJECTS TO BE 
ACCOMPLISHED. 


The discovery of the spawning grounds of the Spanish mackerel was 
the result of an arrangement between Professor Baird and General 
Francis A. Walker, Superintendent of the Tenth Census, for gathering 
facts relating to the fisheries of the country, including notes on the life 
history of the more important species as well as the statistics for the 
different fisheries. To this end the writer visited the Southern coast in 
the winter of 1879~80 for the purpose of studying the marine fisheries, 
while Col. Marshall McDonald, fish commissioner of Virginia, went to 
the same region to gather material for a report on the river fisheries of 
our Southern seaboard, special attention being given by him to the fresh- 
water fishes and the more important anadromous species like the shad, 
alewife, and sturgeon. 

There are several localities along this coast where both the marine 
and anadromous species are taken together by the same parties. At 
such points it was found desirable to work together, and the fisheries 
of certain districts were carefully studied in this way. In the Chesa- 
peake the anadromous and marine species are taken in nearly equal 
quantities. In order to better understand the fisheries of this region, 
we spent a week together at New Point, studying the various questions 
that presented themselves. While engaged in this work we learned of 
the abundance of Spanish mackerel, and noticed that many of those 
taken were nearly ripe. A further investigation of the subject proved 


[23] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. ANY 


that the Chesapeake was an important spawning ground for the species, 
and that the spawning season continued during the greater part of the 
summer. Colonel McDonald at once communicated these facts to Pro- 
fessor Baird by telegraph, and a little later the writer reported at Wash- 
ington in person. 

The great success that had attended the work in the hatching of shad, 
salmon, and whitefish, had definitely settled the question of the prac- 
ticability of increasing the food supply by artificial propagation. Know- 
ing the value of the Spanish mackerel, Professor Baird was anxious to 
include this in the list of fishes to be propagated by the Commission. 
It therefore became necessary to learn more about the spawning habits 
of the species, and to ascertain how and in what quantities the eggs 
could be obtained, and the kind of apparatus necessary for successfully 
hatching them. Accordingly the writer was requested to return to the 
Chesapeake to gather the necessary information, and to undertake the 
work of actually hatching the fish. 


14.—PREPARATIONS FOR THE WORK. 


It was not thought desirable to arrange for extensive experiments, 
but rather to give particular attention to the questions which bore upon 
the practicability of the artificial propagation of the species, and as 
soon as these had been settled to return to Washington, after which 
the question of extensive operations could be considered. During the 
earlier observations almost nothing had been learned regarding the 
character of the eggs, and it was necessary to again visit the spawning 
grounds before any definite ideas could be formed as to the kind of 
apparatus necessary for the work. Accordingly, on June 21, I secured 
a quantity of nickel-plated wire-cloth, and with this simple outfit started 
for the fishing grounds, intending to improvise the apparatus after reach- 
ing the Chesapeake. On a previous visit it had been ascertained that 
several pound-nets were fished in the vicinity of CrisfieldpMd., and that 
considerable quantities of mackerel were taken in them as well as in 
the gill-nets of the fishermen of Tangier Island, only a few miles dis- 
tant. Crisfield is a city of some importance on the eastern shore of the 
bay, a few miles north of the Virginia line. It was, for various: reasons, 
selected as the most available place for the experiments. 


15.—HATCHING OPERATIONS. 


Arriving at Crisfield on the morning of June 22, [ immediately called 
upon Mr. J. KE. N. Sterling, thg owner of the pound-nets, and made 
known to him the object of my visit. He at once became interested in 
the work, and, besides giving every opportunity for visiting the pounds 
and examining the fish, instructed his men to render such assistance as 
might be desired. 

S. Mis. 29-27 


418 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


During our stay of ten days the run of mackerel was small; and the 
catch for this reason was very limited; but enough were taken to give 
an opportunity for settling most of the questions that presented them- 
selves, and to furnish an abundance of eggs for the experiments. A 
visit to the pounds proved that the relative number of males and 
females in a school varied considerably. At times the males were 
taken in greater numbers, while again the females were more abundant. 
It was further found that a large percentage of the fish taken were still 
green, though ripe males were not uncommon, and half a dozen or more 
were seen at every lift of the pound. Ripe females were less plenty, 
though many containing a few clear eggs, which were usually too im- 
mature for hatching purposes, were captured. 

On our first visit to the pound-nets one ripe female was found, from 
which about 50,000 eggs were taken and successfully impregnated. 
The manner of “stripping” the mackerel was similar to that employed 
with the shad and other species, the fish being held firmly with the left 
hand, while with the right the eggs were gently pressed from the abdo- 
men into a large pan partially filled with water, where they were easily 
impregnated by being brought in contact with the milt of the males. 

The eggs of the mackerel, and indeed of all other fishes thus far exam- 
ined, are covered by an outer shell or membrane which surrounds and 
protects the germinal mass. When first excluded from the female the 
egg is soft and shapeless, owing to the looseness of this covering mem- 
brane, which is always more or less wrinkled or folded. It has but 
one opening in its surface, this being a small porous disk called the 
micropyle, through which the spermatozoa find their way to the germ 
cells. When placed in water in which the milt has been introduced, 
an absorption of water begins, and soon the membrane becomes 
somewhat disteuded and finally expands to its fullest extent, being 
separated from the germinal mass by a cushion or layer of water, 
which serves to protect the embryo in its earlier stages of develop- 
ment, and in addition furnishes oxygen to sustain the life of the fetus. 
When fully distended by the water the egg is much larger than at the 
time of its exclusion from the parent, the relative increase varying 
with the species from one-fifth to over half of the entire bulk. ‘he 
egg-membrane becomes toughened during the process, and within half 
an hour after impregnation has assumed a globular form and is so 
strong that it can with difficulty be broken by pressure between the 
thumb and finger. This increase in the size of the eggs, due to the ab- 
sorption of water, is, as has been said, very marked in many species, and 
a quantity of eggs that before impregnation scarcely more than half fill 
a dish, will, when fully expanded, ofiert more than fill the vessel so that 
some will be forced over the top. When eggs have thus increased in 
bulk they are said by the spawn-takers to have “ come up,” and the vessel 
containing the milt should then be replaced by clean water, after which 
they are ready for the hatchery. <A slight absorption of water often, 


[25] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. 419 


though not always, takes place in the absence of spermatozoa, but in 
such cases the action is slower and the membrane is never expanded to 
its fullest extent. By this slighter expansion, as well as by the greater 
delicacy of the membrane, the spawn-taker usually knows that the eggs 
have not been properly fertilized. 

The mackerel were examined as soon as they were taken from the 
pounds, and when ripe females were secured they were at once “stripped,” 
and owing to the abundance of ripe males no difficulty was experienced 
in getting milt for impregnating them. As the pounds were some dis- 
tance from the harbor, the eggs were carefully tended during the journey 
to the wharf, clean water being added every half hour to keep them in 
good condition. 

It was at once seen that the eggs of the mackerel, like those of the 
cod, belonged to the class known as floating eggs, as after impregnation 
most of them floated at the surface, though a few remained suspended 
in the water at different depths, while others sank slowly to the bottom. 
When, however, there was the least current they were readily carried 
about by it, and became generally distributed throughout the liquid. 

A small oil-globule was noticed in each egg. This served to keep the 
egg in position, remaining constantly at its upper surface, while the fish 
formed with the curve of its back at the lowest point directly opposite. 

As the eggs were only a 22d to a 28th of an inch in diameter and per- 
fectly transparent it was difficult for one not accustomed to handling 
them to detect their presence, and it was not at all surprising that the 
fishermen had never noticed them floating on the surface of the bay. 
In fact, had their attention been directed to them, they would probably 
have had no idea of what they were. 

The number of eggs capable of impregnation that can be taken from 
a female at one “stripping” varies, with the size and condition of the 
fish, from 25,000 to 100,000, this being ,but a small portion of the num- 
ber actually contained in the fish; for, as has been said, the eggs ripen 
very irregularly, some being fully deveioped while others are still green. 
As soon as an egg has reached maturity it frees itself from the envelop- 
ing membrane and passes down through the proper duct, and is soon 
excluded from the fish, to make way for others. Thus the spawning 
season for a single individual probably lasts for more than a month. 
The fish from which eggs were taken by me were so roughly handled 
that few survived the operation, though with proper care it seems prob- 
able that they could be penned up and “stripped” from time to time, 
until a greater part, if not all, of the eggs were secured. The mackerel 
is, however, a delicate fish, and the question of penning and handling it 
is by no means settled. 

Our experiments with the eggs of the codfish had given us some 
experience in the treatment of floating eggs, which proved very valuable 
in suggesting the proper kind of apparatus to be used at this time. On 
reaching the harbor the eggs were allowed to remain in the pans until a 


420 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


crude hatching-box could be made for holding them during the night. 
This consisted simply of a small wooden box, with a wire-cloth bottom. 
When completed it was placed in the water, and, after being properly 
secured to the piling of a wharf, the eggs were poured into it. The fol- 
lowing morning a number of larger and better boxes were made. The 
one giving the best results was so arranged that the smallest waves would 
cause a flow of water into it, and thus keep the eggs in constant motion. 
It was very similar in shape to the boxes used in hatching the eggs of the 
cod, having, in addition to the wire-cloth bottom, openings on two sides, 
even with the water-line. Just below these, on the outside of the box, 
were wooden floats about three inches wide, these being placed at an 
angle with the surface of the water, so that a portion of each wave, as 
it came in contact with the float, would run up the slight incline and, 
after reaching the highest point, pass down through the wire-cloth into 
the box, giving a constant circulation, the water being introduced from 
above and passing out through the bottom, thus giving the best possi- 
ble motion to the eggs. Other boxes were arranged in the ordinary 
way to utilize the action of tides and currents; these were set obliquely 
in the water, so that the current would force the water through the 
wire-cloth bottom, thus keeping the eggs in constant motion. 

The first eggs secured were washed out of the box during a storm 
and were lost, but the other boxes were at once provided with covers, 
to obviate any further loss from this source. From this time little diffi- 
culty was experienced, and the eggs were easily hatched. The number 
of eggs taken during the experiments was about half a million, these 
being secured from 8 or 9 females, at different times, the largest num- 
ber taken from any fish being estimated at 100,000. The loss in hatch- 
ing, if we except the eggs washed out, was very small, and in one 
instance did not exceed 10 per cent., while 60 or 70 per cent. of nearly 
every lot developed into young fish. 

The time of hatching varied greatly with the temperature of the 
water, the embryo developing much more rapidly in warm than in cold 
water. The average temperature during the experiments at Crisfield 
was 84° Fahr. Under these thermal conditions the line of the fish could 
be readily seen by the unaided eye 10 hours after the egg had been 
brought in contact with the milt. In 154 hours the first fish were seen; 
24 hours later, or 18 hours from the fish, fully half of the eggs had 
hatched, and inside of 20 hours all were out. Later experiments showed 
that in water at a temperature of 78° 24 Irours were required for hatch- 
ing. It is thus seen that the eggs of the mackerel develop more rapidly 
than those of any other species with which the Commission is familiar.* 


*During the experiments with the eggs of the mackerel many moon-fish (Cheto- 
dipterus faber) were taken in the pounds. A number of spawning fish were found 
among them, from which I secured several lots of eggs that were successfully hatched. 
These fish spawn in Chesapeake Bay during June, July, and August. The eggs are 
buoyant, and though a trifle larger than those ‘of the mackerel they hatch in the 
same time. This is the first time that eggs of the moon-fish, or porgy, as it is more 
commonly called, have been artificially hatched. 


[27] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. AO 


Eggs of the sliad require an average of three to five days, while the 
period of -hatching for the other species handled is much greater. In 
water at 45° Fahr. eggs of the cod have been hatched in thirteen days; 
but when the temperature is reduced to 31°, as is not unfrequently the 
case in some of the bays and coves along the shores of Northern New 
England in mid-winter, the time of development is increased to fifty. 
days. The eggs of the salmon and whitefish require even a longer 
period. 

When first hatched the young fish are about one-tenth of an inch in 
length and are almost colorless. The food-sac, when compared with 
other species, is quite large in proportion to the body, the anterior mar- 
gin reaching nearly to the end of the lower jaw; and the tail is relatively 
much smaller. The food-sac, containing as it does the oil globule al- 
ready mentioned, is quite buoyant, and brings the fish to the surface of 
the water, where it remains belly uppermost for several hours. While 
in this condition it lies nearly motionless, though it occasionally indulges 
in spasmodic movements similar to those noticeable in its efforts to free 
itself from the shell. In a few hours it becomes slightly more vigorous, 
and moves about to a limited extent, going to the depth of an inch or 
more below the surface. When a day old the food-sac becomes less 
prominent, and also less buoyant, so that the fish experiences little diffi- 
culty in swimming at various depths. 

It is found that both eggs and fish are quite hardy, and that little 
difficulty need be expected in hatching the eggs or in transporting the 
fry to any distance desired. In one case eggs taken at six in the eve- 
ning were allowed to remain in a basin of water till the following morn- 
ing, when clean water was supplied, after which they received no fur- 
ther attention. A few hours later a large percentage of them hatched 
out, the fish being in excellent condition. 

About 40 young mackerel were confined in a goblet for two days 
without change of water before the first ones died. Others were placed 
in water that was allowed to cool gradually, and then suddenly trans- 
ferred to water ten degrees warmer, but this change of temperature 
did not seem to injure them in the least. In fact it seems probable that 
wrong impressions have prevailed for some time with reference to the 
care necessary for the eggs and young of different species, and further 
experiments in this line will doubtless prove that both are much more 
hardy than has been supposed. 

Haperiments in other places—When the necessary information had 
been gathered at Crisfield regarding the treatment of the eggs, it was 
thought desirable to proceed further down the bay, where the mackerel 
were more plenty, to find amore favorable locality for the establishment 
of a hatching station, as well as to enlist the sympathies of the fisher- 
men of that region. Accordingly we visited Hunger’s Creek, where the 
pounds of Dr. J. T. Wilkins are located, and spent a number of days in 
examining the catch and gathering additional information. Dr. Wil- 


422 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [28] 


kins at once manifested a lively interest in the experiments, and 
assisted us in every possible way, accompanying us to the fishing station 
and helping in the examination of the fish. During our stay the weather 
was somewhat stormy, and the pounds could not be fished with any reg- 
ularity. This interfered greatly with the results, as the mackerel seem 
to throw all their ripe eggs when remaining long in confinement. Plenty 
of males were seen with the milt running, but no thoroughly ripe females 
were secured. 


16.—CONFIRMATION OF EXPERIMENTS. 


Early in July the fish-hatching steamer Lookout, under the direction of 
Maj. T. B. Ferguson, proceeded down the bay, and made a number of ex- 
periments with the eggs of the species, all of which confirmed the results 
of my own observation. Mr. John A. Ryder, the embryologist of the Com- 
mission, accompanied the party, and, having a good microscope at hand, 
he improved the opportunity for making drawings of the embryos in 
different stages of development. Both Major Ferguson and Mr. Ryder 
watched the development of the species with considerable interest, and 
carried some of the young fry to Saint Jerome Creek, where their subse- 
quent growth could be carefully studied.* 


17.— PRACTICAL RESULTS. 


The experiments conducted by us naturally lead to the conclusion that 
the artificial propagation of Spanish mackerel is not only possible, but 
entirely practicable. The fish are very abundant in certain sections from 
the first of June until late in September, giving excellent opportunities 
for examination and study. 'he spawning season also lasts during sev- 
eral months, giving time for extensive operations; while the fact that the 
eggs are deposited gradually during a long period renders it highly 

*Tn the summer of 1881 a station was established at Cherrystone, Va., on the eastern 
shore of Chesapeake Bay, a few miles above Cape Charles, for the purpose of making 
a further study of the Spanish mackerel. The work was at first conducted by Lieut. 
Z.L. Tanner, of the Fish Commission steamer Fish Hawk, and Jater by Colonel Mc- 
Donald and Mr. Ryder. The Jast-named gentleman gave his attention to a most 
thorough and systematic study of the embryology of the mackerel. The advance 
sheets of Mr. Ryder’s report come to us as this article is going to press, and are there- 
fore too late to warrant us in making any extended quotations. We, however, take 
pleasure in referring the reader to the forthcoming Bulletin of the United States Fish 
Commission,“in which it will appear. 

In this report it is stated that comparatively few eggs were secured at the Cherrystone 
Station, and that, owing to defective apparatus, not more than 25 per cent. of any lot 
were hatched. He thinks that the spawning-grounds of the mackerel are farther up 
the bay, and that the eggs are deposited only at night. He does not give the temper- 
ature of the water in which the eggs were hatched, but says that the time required 
for the development of the embryo after the egg had been fertilized was 24 hours. 
He further states that the young fish begin feeding on the third day after they leave 
the egg, as traces of food were found in their stomachs at this time. Though unable 
to identify the food, he thinks it to be composed of several species of small articulates, 
animals that abound in the water in mid-summer. The microscope revealed the pres- 
ence of teeth in the jaws at the end of the first week. 


[29] THE SPANISH MACKEREL. 42 


oh) 


probable that many ripe fish can be secured. The number of eggs in 
the mackerel is also greater than that of most species to which the 
Commission has thus far turned its attention; while the number obtain- 
able for hatching purposes greatly exceeds that of either the shad, 
whitefish, or salmon. 

The short time required in hatching is also a strong point in favor 
of the artificial propagation of the mackerel. As has been said, with 
water at 84° F., but eighteen hours elapse from the time of the fertili- 
zation of the egg till the young fish comes from the shell; whiie the 
average time required for the development of the shad is about four 
days, and that for the codfish is fully six times as long. Thus five lots 
of mackerel can be hatched out in the time required for one lot of shad, 
and thirty-two lots in that required for one of codfish. In this way the 
Commission would be enabled to hatch a larger number of fish in a 
shorter time and with a smaller force. 


18.—RELATIVE MERITS OF DIFFERENT LOCALITIES FOR THE ESTAB- 
LISHMENT OF A HATCHING STATION. 


A number of localities are more or less suited for the establish- 
ment of a hatching station, in case such a step should be thought ex- 
pedient; the principal ones are: Mobjack Bay, on the western shore 
of the Chesapeake; and Cherrystone, Puncoteague Creek, Onancock, 
and Crisfield, on the eastern shore. 

The principal point in favor of Mobjack Bay is that the pound-nets 
are more numerous in that vicinity than in any other part of the Chesa- 
peake; the catch, however, averages only 150 mackerel daily to the 
pound, and a majority of the nets are taken up in July, while few, if 
any, remain after the lst of August. Another objection is the lack of 
a harbor affording comfortable anchorage for a hatching steamer in the 
vicinity of the fishing grounds. 

At Cherrystone the pound-nets, though less numerous than at Mobjack 
Bay, are larger and catch a greater number of Spanish mackerel, the 
average daily yield being from 500 to 600 to each pound, while the fish- 
ing season lasts throughout the entire summer. On account of the 
large yun of mackerel along this shore fewer pounds would have to be 
visited, and the work could be accomplished with a smaller force. There 
is also an excellent harbor with 9 feet of water at mean low tide; this 
being quite free from impurities, a condition very necessary to the suc- 
cessful prosecution of the work. 

Both of the places mentioned are, however, open to the same ob- 
jection, for, being situated near the mouth of the bay, they are some- 
what removed from the principal spawning grounds. The water is also 
much colder than further up the bay, and, for this reason, would be 
less suitable for hatching purposes. Colonel McDonald, who visited 
Cherrystone some time after our return to Washington, found the same 
difficulty in securing ripe fish that has already been mentioned. He 


424 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND VISHERIES. [80] 


explains this by saying that the eggs of the mackerel do not fully de- 
velop until the female has passed into the warmer water; his opinion 
being that the region was too near the capes. 

Puncoteague Creek, Onancock, or even Crisfield, Md., would scarcely 
be open to these objections, as they are considerably farther up the bay, 
and also nearer the spawning grounds. Any of these would furnish fair 
anchorage for the steamer, and would be a convenient point from which 
to visit the various fisheries. In case the tendency for the mackerel 
to throw their eggs when long confined should prove a serious obstacle 
in the way of securing sufficient quantities from the pound-nets, these 
places would possess a great advantage over those first named, as they 
are in the center of the gill-net fisheries, where the nets are hauled so 
frequently that the fish would usually be secured before many of their 
eggs had been lost. In case it should be found necessary to depend 
on the gill-net catch, no place could be more favorable than Crisfield 
or Tangier Island. 

The fishermen of the Chesapeake manifest the most friendly dispo- 
sition toward the Fish Commission, and fully appreciate the benefits 
already derived by them from the artificial propagation of the shad. 
They are thoroughly interested in the propagation of the mackerel, and 
realize the importance of this work. Many of them have not only con- 
sented to allow an examination of their fish for the purpose of securing 
eggs, but have kindly volunteered every possible assistance. 

Sandy Hook, N. J., presents some advantages for the location of a 
hatchery not offered by the Chesapeake Bay towns, though there are 
drawbacks that may render it less desirable. In the first-named lo- 
cality the mackerel are quite abundant; and those taken, being of large 
size, would yield a much larger number of eggs than the smaller fish 
of the South—a matter that may prove to be of great importance, for 
we must remember that thequestion of keeping the mackerel in con- 
finement, and of stripping them from time to time until all of the eggs 
have been secured, is still unsettled. If the question of the transporta- 
tion of the fry should become important, Sandy Hook would be especially 
suited for the work, for the young mackerel could be readily shipped to 
New York, from which point they could be sent to any portioneof the 
coast where it might be thought desirable to introduce them. 


SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, January 10, 1882. 


Report U. S. F. C. 1880.—Earll. Spanish Mackerel. 


PLATE I. 


The Spanish Mackerel. 


a 
1 


hy 


Oy bar 
Pa 


or 
ie 


Me ime Pama ie Ny et 
Ter ane 


Nate 
hor 
a 


tes 


ee ye 
Soil wee sre 


ear eal 
te 
ri 


ith tN 


Prd) vaya 
5 banues 


ae 
aba 
| 


ae 
y He 
Paty 


rere 


. 
ie 
a 
(nena 
Pe Hlvan 


Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Earll. Spanish Mackerel. PLATE II 


Fig. |, 


Fig. 2 


Se 


Fig, 4 


Fig. §, Fig. 6. 


ere ieee 


Fie. 7 Fig. 8. 


Different methods of setting Gill-nets off Sandy Hook. 


in 


PLATE IIL 


Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Earll. Spanish Mackerel. 


‘vA ‘Kyunog uojydueyyIoN jo qou-punog OWL, 


HOOH OUET 


fa N 
ee Bik ee ee eet) 
ioe yy big ssa apegs 


Ww 


Avg 040.4 
oq. Eig 


“alts 


Heal uae ie 
hy Oe) OM Shoal 
Py naeey eet 


rely bi ik 


Ro ieiele | 


aOR 


St 


TIN) ce Xe, 


Page. 
Abundance, date of greatest ..----..--..--- 7 
during the 17th century ....--- 7 
in various localities -.......... 13 
on Nortb Carolina coast --.-..--- 8 
oft Charleston: S.C! 22222222255 8 
periodical variation in.....-.-. 9 
season of greatest ........----. 19 
Activity in pursuit of other fish..........-.- 6 
PAF ASSI7Z slamestnas seine ec sbintieltiaais ects ciclcincieies 3 
Apparatus used in fishery.........-.-....-- 13 
appearance, firss, in Chesapeake Bay..-... 8 
in New York market -.. uu 
on our coast, conflicting 
views regarding .--.-- 6 
Arrival in Chesapeake Bay....--...-...---- 5 
in Narragansett Bay ...........--.. 5 
on North Carolina coast...........- 5 
Otis andy eH OOlec a sae esiow eaters arene 5 
Artificial propagation, practicability of . --- 28 
BAIT MerOL Obie ee seers esse seeeeses 22, 23 
Banded mackerel, name applied to Scomber 
scombrus in New Jersey.....-....-.------ 3 
SOS lieemyy eee wee me ee nci eae e ee elses i 
Bosman OPEL ematcaseas se ce eeccce oes « 12 
Brackish water avoided by Spanish mackerel 6 
Cannedifish, quality ofs2..\s2..2.2.222--252- 20 
Catch, as affected by kind of apparatus used. 7 
average daily, in various localities - . 29 
disposibiontoftass: vss-ccs ce) ce aetna cs 20 
in Chesapeake Bay .-..-....2-..0---- 8 
ImiGultof MexicOssoss-2s-.-s9-2sea st 13 
Of Sandy Ho00kt-..-.2sctseccee eee 8 
IMUPOUNA=NetS 24 ~ suas seoscice eee 18 
localities where most extensive...... 13 
table showing extent of, in 1880 ..... 22 
BUCO OLO Liters cot aan uke Ce lactate arco estas amiele 2 
ChalkereReBr ~ Sect conc sess pense cee 15 
Glankar Ac Howard! 2 ccnseeieaca Debs co bees 21 
Crisfield, Md., selected for experimental 
hatchineistations. 4. 2420sccesns sce ecceene 23 
Wrvblumicnbellacssseassceetto ae eect eh ceme 23 
description of 22... -...2-..:. 4 
name Spanish mackerel ap- 
HERO <Aate aie sedis atects:aie 2 
maculatum, common name applied 
UO}eartac sree rata e ais 3 
first described by 
Mitchill as Scomber 
maculatus .....-.... 3 
referred by Agassiz to 
the genus Cybium .. 3 
TOS AIG oases veers ae se sisiedns eae aie 3 
. GESCLIPLiON Olwese- sie e oe 4 
name Spanish mackerel ap- 
DHEA TO! Sacecsicies aamrtslece 2 
young of different species of, closely 
resemble each other .........-.-. 2 


[38] 


Page. 
Decrease on New England coast prior to 1850. 7 
recent, on in-shore grounds -...... 7 
De Ka yi Tames ise secon seneces eee aeee 3 
Description of Cybium maculatum .......-. 3 
Disappearance, time of ..................... 5 

Distribution of Spanish mackerel along the 
COAST cwcenelewelen sac aeies mee seine eae 4 
Doughty; Charles\-co.4-,-a-se-e-scceeeeecee 16 
Hees: color'ofy.cccssmencceceteea cee eee 25 
deposited gradually....-....-...-.-.- ual 
developmentiofic-.2 4-2: sssnensseseae 25 
fatality of, from various causes...-... 12 
lossior, im atchin gy jo, -2222 ee eee 26 
manner of hatching..-.......-.------ 24 
manner of impregnation ......--...-. 24 
no difficulty in hatching .....-...-..- R27 
Numberinione: fish? 2-2. ec. tsscsee 1 
number obtained at one stripping. - - 25 
number taken for experiments. ....-- 26 
oil:clobulewiny ce.sesot ose en cece aces 25 
outer protecting shell or membrane of 24 
BLZOVOL ea crate otmiatainystetctoicieusis See see Serer 11 
Specificioraviby OL, <2: -2)cc-seisacceece 11, 25 
time required for hatching.........-- 26 

temperature of water as affecting 
Lime:of hatchineecc2:a.2 ac sctecee = 26 
transported by currents -..-..--..--. 11 
water:swollenwac-(ccstascke-cceesseme 25 
of codfish, number in one fish ........ il 

time required for hatch- 
ING sss se eee sees eeee ee 27 

Embryological development, study of, by 
Mir, (Ry derse en o5 5. a ncateeeneaet cer cee 28 
Experiments at Cherrystone ........--..--- 28 
Hunger’s wharf....-. 3... 27 
confirmation ofs22- ssa-2s--ee2 28 
Ferguson, T. B..... HBr Brmaacnauaceconooee 28 
Fishermen, co-operation of .......----- cena 30 
HMishery, Origin Of o2sa.<ccss<2 = aetes oe cies 13 
SDparAtus NSeGuMia.==5.-- acces ee 3 
Fishing-grounds, extent of .........-. -.-.. 12 

Fishing season, length of, on New Jersey 
, CORSbE Ee aon 19 

in Chesapeake 
IBY Sere ecicise 20 
Fitz Gerald, Capt. Henry ....-....-.-.------ 16 
Flavor as compared with other species -.--- 20 
Food, consists chiefly of small fishes ....-.- 9 
movements in pursuit of.........---- 9 
OlsyOUNDaceciseisc aeons oa 8 ieee eieicie aint= 28 
FRG OG SHC meee eto staca oy cl ajeicisse =~ = aiaidane meme eis 27 
Gill wPheodore iN. je ec Sicicsccsecscceecese= Hf 
Gaill-nets!COStio£ <2 crc <r<.25.5 2256 osc esse nenr 15 

date of introduction of, at Sandy 
OO keys ccice-m.-3.seive oo seemainiss 14 

date of introduction of, into Chesa- 
peake Bay .-..<..-..2----.---<- 15 

425 


426 


Page. 
Gill-nets, dimensions of .........-....--.--. NS 
methods of setting, described... -.. 14 
SIZO\Of MESha 5.5.1. as5 2 soot ss 15 
GoodesGyBrowntncceceesececescemccect 3, 4, 7, 9, 12 
Growtbyrateotss--h5 5-22 scccccecter scoot ns 12 


Hatching-box, kinds used in experiments -. 26 
Hatching station, relative advantages of dif- 


enentilocalities tor. .245-—-eaca4-s-ce=ser 29 
HHOTSE-MACKELC! ecececcceesiscncceeeeseeneeee 2,8 
name applied to Cybium ma- 
culatum at Wilmington. . 3 
Honnd-fish blues ss - 2012 sae oes eee eee etc if 
speckled). ....-(ec(sti2 52 ete mesee ui 
Increase in Chesapeake Bay ...-..----..--. 8 
SInCOW850) S222 so. sncieceeteeenaes rf 
eOSSely Nid Gon aceac le eee ss ne Hoos eee eee a0 
PRIN PASH. oo acre wi gars sia nloastsieistcs nasbiee seme cee 2 
Mloyd VRoberti.t--22sosce «scan ees eee eee eee 7 
Mackerel, the name applied to Cybium ma- 
culatum in Chesapeake Bay ........--.... 3 
Markets, quantity handled in ---...-....... 21 
relative importance of............ 21 
McDonald, Col. Marshall..... 10, 20, 21, 22, 23, 28, 29 
Maltby Ot seeec cis sacateee cn eae eee 10 
Ma tGheri Hred!{-.1-.2 sts cee es sone epee 21 
MIS CLAD) fark ee eS RO Sree eed yee.G ac 15 
MACrOpY los Asest sho saud Weeseae assets 24 
IM oTAtIONG isc. seve ceee ene sere ace aes ete 5 
northern Jimitof.. ssesosenee ease 4,7 
southern limit of, undetermined. 4 
MGC CHI Sines ccd seeeace sent eeke a Perce 3 
Movements, affected by brackish water ..-. 6 
affected by food...-.-.2.:...224 6 
in Chesapeake Bay. --...-..-.. 6 
Name, introduced into the United States by 
English colonists............----.. 2 
originally applied to Scomber colias. al 
when first applied to Cybium macula- 
COM. S25 se 3 5) cola hae meena seer 2 
IN Oris; wChaddeuse so 42 concen aeons 5, 12 
Oil-globule, attached to yelk-sac in embryo. 12 
Orcynuseasenn-c cele che cree cee ceemate 8 
Overfishing as affecting supply........----- 8 
PR ONM IG soe eee en jaan Mea ae eae ee 25 
Bomatomus saltatrix...---sccceeseeeece-scls 7 
Potter, Robert ......--...--. Gq nin et avast 16 
Pound-nets : 
average Catch i 2c. -caceneccesoucsecies 16,18 
COSEO Le eee anionic Sasa eeee cao eee 18 
date of introduction at Sandy Hook .... 15 
in Chesapeake Bay 8, 16 
escanelormism trom eae-ces sce sae eee 18 
effect of introduction of, upon the fish- 
eries of Chesapeake Bay...........-.-- 17 
kindsioffish:takem in: 20.4... -ce.sece-tee 19 
methodiotsfishinewae-- 2 -scsescce nee fees 18 
number of fishermen required to handle. 18 
of Chesapeake Bay, description of. .---. 17 
opposition of Chesapeake fishermen to 
ANCLODUCULONIOL sate yee -tince seeeeees c 16 
OVISUIN Ore ctr see eines ance eis eis 3 15 


season for fishing, in Chesapeake Bay. . 19 


Page 
Pound-nets—Continued. 
size of, at Sandy Hook ................. 15 
LINGO Pe SHIN Seen ae eee 18 
02.9 Leet CRN C OES ia ie Eee ne BAB ASE G 8 
in: different markets\.-----.---s-2-ssn6 20 
salted: jo... o5 saseccinn cit ocaiaee eee 20 
Propagation, artificial, experiments in ..... 23 
Ripe females, difficulty in securing, and how 
OVOICOMC: <5 - is cisce cae nciee cies seme eeees eee 29 
Ryder, JOHN PA sss cma shecen ee eecncoeee 28 
Salted fish, inferiority of, to common mack- 
(02) FEA ER A Sean Reena a Sermon 20 
PIC OF 55 5,2 Se himnpeswia see's 20 
Schools, often scattered in summer......-.. 6 
S1Z00f J 226s 2e cee eae emeneee cee 5, 6 
Scombericolias | 22eecsaaseces ser se eee eee 2 
name Spanish mackerel orig- 
inally applied to.........-. i 
macilatus 265. s;<108-eetesaemawanace 3 
SCOMDIUS S2o-eeens era cecse eee nee 3, 20 
Scott; (Genio ©) ss52-csn ees wseeeeesceaces 7, 9,12 


Seines, the species occasionally taken in . -- 13 
Sexes, relative proportions of, in schools. --. 24 
Shoal waters, preference of Spanish mack- 


OrelfOr semen sa scGe aes eece eres eceeeeer 4 
Size of Spanish mackerel .........-.....--.- 4 
Smiley, | Charles Wi 22a. oc-cb ses eeeeasceeeee 21 
Suediker, Georvee-o-ctes secon eee eee eeceee 15, 16 
Spanish mackerel, name, now applied exclu- 

sively to Cybium maculatum.......-..--. 2 
Spawning habits, information concerning -. 23 

season for species.......-..--.... 10, 11 
time of, affected by temperature. 10 
time for individual, length of..-. 25 
Spawning-grounds, discovery of.........--- 10, 22 
limits of. 2-20 Fosse 10 

former theories regard- 
ing location of.....--. LY) 


Speckled hound-fish, name applied to Cy- 
bium maculatum by Josselyn in the 16th 


century ....-.. GanbnS Soon Geese seusebosaec 3 

Spotted cybium, name applied to Cybium 
maculatum by De Kay.........- 3 

mackerel, name applied to Cybium 
maculatum in New Jersey ..---- 3 
Statistics of:catchies-ceeoe seer cee ee eee ee 22 
Stearns: Silas ssc. 2 2 eee seeoc siactine ame eee 13, 21 
Sterling Jip yNie on. cae eccse see seer 6, 23 
Surface, Spanish mackerel swim at......... 6 
Manner Wieut. Zs.) seameniecteicje ce aie nate 28 
Taylor, Capt. \WalliamyH a... c- essence 10 
Teeth, first appearance of 2.o5.2ssq225- se 28 
Temperature of water preferred.....-...--. 5 
Troll-line, method of using..........--.---- 13 
used only in certain localities - .. 14 
Wralkertitrancist Av Rates. shea an eaennee 22 
IWALCOX: GW, .cAa sons cape esiciewine sce ete mene 21 
Walking *I0rid Dae eeasnies eens eee eeoeecees 8, 27 
Moune, appearance Ole sseseces eee seneeene 2 
movements Of:. sc-.cscee oss seeese ee 12, 27 
sizeof ojo) aot asaese eeenee eee 12 
tonicity of lifelines. - ea. cleo eceie 27 


XIV.—CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE 
SALMON.* 


By Dr. F. Mirscurer-Riscu. 
Professor of Physiology at Baset. 


[Reprint from the Swiss literary contributions to the International Fishery Exposi- 
tion at Berlin, 1880. |t 


The following description is based on various statistics and on— 

(1.) Measurements, weighings, and notices as to the external appear- 
ance of 1,933 Rhine salmon, taken between Basel and Laufenburg, and 
229 Lower Rhine salmon from Holland and Wesel, 2,162 fish in all; which 
obsefvations were continued without interruption from November, 1877, 
till the spring of 1880. 

(2.) Observations, weighings, microscopical, and also chemical inves- 
tigations relative to the condition of the muscles, intestines, and espe- 
cially of the growing sexual glands (made at all seasons of the year, 
during the years 1876-1880) of 97 male and 99 female salmon (196 in 
all); besides numerous observations—made for the sake of compari- 
son—on sea salmon. 

It is well known that the salmon caught in the Rhine at different sea- 
sons of the year vary greatly as to the looks and condition of the fiesh. 
In comparing, in December or January, a male salmon, the so-called 
winter salmon, with the well-known hook salmon—the former with its 
bright, bluish scales, its well-rounded body, its short nose (about 4 to 5 
per cent. of the whole length of the body, measured from the nostrils to 
the root of the tail), without the slightest trace of a hook and hardly dis- 
tinguishable from a female; the latter with its nose of twice the length, 
an entirely different physiognomy on the front part of the head, with its 
thick skin resembling in its red and black spots a tiger’s skin, made dark 
by the superabundant development of the epithelium, and with its flat 
body and thin flabby abdominal walls—it is difficult indeed to become 
convinced that these two fish are specimens of one and the same species. 


*Zur Lebensgeschichte des Rheinlachses im Rhein. Translated from the German by 
HERMAN JACOBSON. 

t Statistische und biologische Beitrige | zur Kenntniss | vom Leben des Rheinlachses, | unter 
Mitwirkung von | Herrn I’. W. Glaser, Sohn, | Fischermeister in Basel, | bearbeilet von | Dr. 
F’, Miescher-Riisch, | Prof. der Physiologie in Basel. | Separatabzug aus der schweizerischen 
Litteratur sammlung zur | internationalen Discherei-Ausstellung in Lerlin. 

[1] 427 


428 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


In the female the difference is less apparent. There is not much dif- 
ference in the length and shape of the nose; the red spots on the body 
and head, which are entirely wanting in the “ winter salmon,” are not 
as strongly developed in the female as in the male salmon; the skin is 
~ dark and looks as if it was covered with impurities, but is not as thick. 
The principal difference in the outward appearance is caused by the 
different development of the ovaria, which in the winter salmon weigh 4 
per cent., and in the spawning salmon fully one-fourth of the total weight 
of the body, so that they bloat the belly very considerably, making the 
back appear particularly thin. As soon as the eggs have been emptied” 
out, the thin, limber walls of the abdomen make the leanness still more 
apparent. 

it is well known that there is a considerable difference in the quality 
of the flesh, which in the winter salmon is peculiarly red (caused by 
coloring matter, which is soluble in alcohol and ether, but not in water, 
and which—partly at least—is inherent in the muscle-fibers) and inter- 
larded with strips of fat; im the spawning salmon it is of a dirty white 
color. After the spawning season it becomes more transparent. The 
intestinal canal of the winter salmon is covered with fat; the append- 
ages of the duodenum are actually enveloped in layers of fat, whilst in 
the spawning salmon it looks as if all the fat had been peeled off and 
at the same time the intestinal canal itself thinned, so that in the former 
the entire weight is about 24 per cent. and in the latter one-half to three- 
fourths per cezt. of the total weight of the body. 

Although it cannot have escaped an attentive observer that between 
these two extremes (the winter salmon and the spawning salmon) there 
are different intermediate varieties, the mutual relations of all these 
fish have not yet been perfectly cleared up. Although it was known 
long since that those salmon which immigrate from the sea do not reach 
their full maturity till they have reached the Rhine, some people think 
that their stay in the fresh water is confined to a few months. The cir- 
cumstance that in November and December there are caught, besides 
the mature fish, a few very fat fish, with very small and hardiy devel- 
oped sexual organs, has led people to suppose that besides those sal- 
mon which ascend the Rhine for the purpose of spawning, there are 
also found, temporarily or permanently, barren fish, which for some very 
Strange reason occasionally stay in the Rhine, and which, when caught, 
of course, do not thereby interfere with the propagation of the species. 

This opinion seemed to be further corroborated when Barfurth* brought 
to the attention of science a view which had long since been entertained 
by practical men, such as Mr, Glaser, and which had also been made 
known to the scientific world by His,t viz, that the Rhine salmon, during 
its stay in fresh water, does not take any food. Barfurth has reached this 


*TROSCHEL’S Archiv fiir Naturgeschichte, vol. xli, i, 122, 1875. 
tHais: Untersuchungen iiber das Ki und die Lientwickelung bei Knochenjischen. Leipzig, 
1873, p. 24. 


[3] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON, 429 


opinion by the examination of a number of intestines, and, in view of 
the enormous increase in the size of the ovaria, he reaches the conclu- 
sion that the winter and spring salmon and the spawning salmon do not 
belong to the same immigration. The stay in the Rhine of both kinds 
is much shorter than had been supposed hitherto. Immature salmon 
come and go, and are finally replaced by almost mature salmon, which 
ascend the river direct from the sea. 

For my own part I feel that, after having for 4 years examined the 
intestines of Rhine salmon of both sexes, at all seasons of the year, I 
cannot but agree with the opinion expressed above, that the Rhine 
salmon, from the time it ascends the river from the sea until it has finished 
spawning, never takes food, and that, as a rule, it does not take any food 
afterwards. Even in winter and spring-salmon from Holland I have thus 
far looked in vain for any remnants of food. In comparison with the 
wide stomachs of the salmon from the Baltic and the North Sea, which 
had thin walls and were generally stuffed with fish almost to repletion, 
the Kralingen (Dutch) salmon had universally a contracted cesophagus, 
and the walls of their stomachs were laid in folds; the opening was 
very narrow; the appendages, not taking into consideration the con- 
tents and the layers of fat, were likewise thinner and not nearly as large 
as in the sea salmon. Occasionally I found a small stone, a piece of a 
blade of grass, or a stalk of some plant, which had entered with the 
river water and had been swallowed. Once I found in the small intes- 
tines a tolerably large larva of an insect, but entirely undigested and 
intact. Of secretion I found in the intestines proper sometimes a small, 
and at other times a large, quantity of slime, of more or less bilious 
color, although the gall-bladder was invariably empty. The bile, there- 
fore, seems to flow from the liver direct into the intestines. The cesopha- 
gus and stomach did not, in most cases, contain anything, at least noth- 
ing but a faint trace of a sticky and almost transparent slime, which 
was only occasionally more plentiful and somewhat thinner, but never 
acid. The duodenum, with its appendages, occasionally (but not always), 
more especially in very flat fish which had recently come from the sea, 
contained a more plentiful secretion in the shape of a sticky, slimy mass, 
which, by numerous detached epithelium cells, had become turbid, and 
somewhat resembled pus. But in no case did I find traces of digestion, 
of a softening and dissolving influence on the walls of the stomach and 
the intestines, of these secretions. Although the glycerine extract from 
this pus-like substance, when dissolved in diluted hydrochloric acid, 
occasionally dissolved fibrous matter to a small extent, it must be said 
that, with the exception of the bile, no effective gastric juice is secreted. 

It is, moreover, worthy of note, that even in the Aralingen (Nether- 
lands) salmon there is no tendency whatever to early putrefaction, such 
as is found in the intestines of every animal which, with its food, intro- 
duces from outside germs of putrefaction. This seems to indicate that 


430 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


the salmon have not eaten anything for some time prior to their ascend- 
ing the Rhine.* 

So far I have only found one exception to this rule. On the 3d of 
January, 1879, I received from an Jstein fisherman a male salmon which 
had been caught in the Rhine. It weighed 1.5 kilograms, had emitted 
all its milt, and was exceedingly lean. The transparent flesh had the 
smallest percentage of dry substance ever found by me in any fish—but 
13.56 per cent. In its flabby, wide stomach it had two tolerably large 
fish, to judge from their scales, Cyprinoids (probably Leuciscus), whose 
forepart had been digested. In another male salmon, which had emit- 
ted its milt, I found no remnants of food, but at least a somewhat 
extended stomach, containing a small quantity of a thin secretion pos- 
sessing acid reaction. In the majority of male fish, however, as well as 
in all the female fish of this stage, I found nothing of the kind. Neces- 
sity, which is the mother of invention, and which occasionally teaches 
the male salmon to eat, is probably not felt so much by the female 
salmon, because at the time when they begin their homeward journey 
to the sea (December tothe beginning of February), they find a substi- 
tute for food in the numerous eggs which have not been emitted, and 
which often number several hundred. 

I have been repeatedly assured that during the spawning months 
salmon are occasionally caught with the hook and line in the small 
streams such as the Wiese near Basel, whilst otherwise they will not bite. 
Although T have not been able to obtain positively trustworthy data 
with regard to this subject, I cannot, when thinking of my own experi- 
ence, deny it entirely—only, however, for the time after spawning. t 

Although it has been settled beyond a doubt that the Rhine salmon 
does not take any food whatever during the time it is ascending the river, 
including the spawning season, the facts which are given below compel 
me to maintain that at least in that portion of the Rhine which extends 
from Basel to Laufenburg all Rhine salmon are of one and the same kind, 
and that all of them, from the (supposed to be) barren winter salmon to the 
emaciated spawning salmon, represent stages of one and the same develop- 
ment, which—without an interruption—is completed in the Rhine. 

I base this opinion upon the following facts: 

(1.) There are in the different stages of development of the male and 
female sexual organs of our Rhine salmon no gaps which might justify 
the supposition that the barren winter salmon are replaced by com- 
paratively much maturer salmon ascending from the sea. DBarfurth 
has noticed this fact, but he has not followed it up to its last conse- 
quences. The instances given herewith in Table I show how the ovarium 


* According to my experienee, I must urgently advise to clean all sea salmon which 
are destined for a long journey, whilst with river salmon this is not necessary. . 

t According to Mr. Glaser it seems to be more certain that in the basin below the 
falls of the Rhine, near Schaffhausen nearly every year 1 to 4 salmon are caught with 
the hook and line, sometimes as early as October. 


[5] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 431 


steadily increases in weight in geometrical progression. Table II con- 
tains an analogous tabular statement, relative to the increase in weight 
of the male sexual glands, in which statement small individuals, weigh- 
ing less than 4 kilograms, and actual giants among the salmon tribe 
are not taken into consideration, as they exhibit an abnormal propor- 
tion between the sexual glands and the weight of the body. 


TABLE I.—Growth of the ovarium.* 


| 
| 
| 


$43 | re 
BE. se 
Ss mac) | 2p 
re | BOs. 
Salmon from— Date. Se Es Salmon from— Date. iercy a ES 
pA oO I 
ee ie = rt) 
erie out) 
ase | iS BSS 
1 | Holland Ye 1877 0. 38 i5y | Basel.< seco tec | July 28, 1879 | 5. 30 
2 | Basel } 1877 0. 49 Ihe) | es Cee ee Aug. 24, 1879 | 5. 84 
Suleee-do: 1877 0. 52 17 4|e ose dOlsee Sot ewsess Aug. 7, 1879 | 318 
4°)|..--do 1880 0.77 18) 205200). ss50 555-22 Aug. 23, 1879 11. 63 
5 |.---do 1880 1.13 AON SG dOiecee es se ceee | Aug. 25, 1879 6. 52 
6 |..--do 1880 1.14 20) 3000) sccciccen cs Aug. 27, 1879 6. 69 
Ul Nose) 9, 1879 1.31 21 GO\V2eecccsc- ee Aug. 27, 1878 9. 81 
8 |22=-d0 1877 1. 93 22 Ore secant Sept. 4, 1877 | 8. 50 
9 |....do 1878 3.44 O5ulvewe: do hee meee eee Sept. 6, 1877 9. 89 
10 |.--.do 1879 2. 84 24 AOigccecseasz se! Sept. 6, 1878 | 9. 84 
Aisieee-do 1879 2037 by |2og Pada ceeesceeees | Sept. 51878] 10.39 
12) \e-~-00 1e@9 3. 09 W286) 1. 220 ONeee<cle cance | Sept. 10, 1878 | 10. 59 
L33|bee-d0 1879 3. 40 Wi ser GOl sence cceces Sept. 18, 1878 | 12. 49 
14, |... -do 1879 3. 32 28" | s5.5300)2.s sais aswel 2 Sept. 30, 1878 | 15. 23 


* As to the weighing of the ovaria of salmon in different stages of development see 
also His, I, 28. 


Mature ovaria, November 1 to 16, 1877-1879. 


euohs || eso G8 
iS B+ oe 1} oo, LS 
oons lI oftLl eS 
an og | qh 3 . 
SESEes eer 
Date. x) See Date. Sagevis 
Her 0207 Pn Oo On 
|} Sad ho gaa Aw 
| saugsq || Bing sa 
B RSS RS Sa Bo 
| | 
z = ss Z |) Jee 22 | 
BNO Wee Os LOU © ciciejer cin ncrereissiciisininee 19. 21 | INO Var 1) 1S 10a eteee sises cioani | 24. 37 
(iy bse Ae See ee ee 19. 23 SeISTBt cons eee sss Saree 25. 06 
Cok: yf) RSS e See ee ee 19. 24 TSO ceraccses cece oscsts 26.10 
akira Rey Ata eat See 8 lh eee 20. 12 B WS asso soeoeeesscscetoe 26. 36 
NG USTO ee cctac oslo ccs sceeece 23. 30 NOS LOT O proces eet je sateen 26. 72 
MO ASTO es oeninac coceac seats 24, 00 


Average of ‘he 11 ovaria = 23.09 per cent. of the weight of the body. 


432 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


TABLE II.—Jncrease of the male sexual glands in percentage of the total weight of the body. 


[Fish of 3,500 to 10,500 grams. ] 


Per Per 
Date cent. Date cent. 
Mar Ml oe OR sie cide nciisisisicsslociciy= seistel ania O\DOSY |W Sept. L879 cece cecisicie selec esiesis/ sce 2.07 
May 3, 1880....-...------------+2 2-07 --- 0. 182 LS OTS yao sees nee Mata n-iee mcs siseiecee ee 4.91 
12) TIE Wioceeaaccoti@cocenccdderte cacccc 0. 099 TO MBPS sete ste -sscescitarcsle sais ieieinteaatersters 1.34 
Tse TUT) Re ie 0. 106 LOU TOTO 1 es A Oe ced oe ie 3.90 
RUIN OMS el One nietene cleteice tates elel= ara aeetee tet 0. 26 QO Sd aiaisiste S/o sieiereteheislerae etre ores, seer 9, 43 
ih BT) eaectaeanoabocdcroncoenooaae 0. 26 DART. eStee see eae ce ates ne eeeeee 1. §9 
Oy TE odoo, Bets Snae aan Sra cEece: 0. 23 PLR hy ERE Ree ee ner ee eee CCE noe 1. 54 
FN Te a a pee Le ater 0.31 26-1879 fish ne ie Nee eee 4.75 
Stliye eM OTS Sacco celerete te eninin= em alaale ine 0. 41 ZAR AO eae aprieecMedosee oe aemoodscacc os 5. 58 
PANTO MD GUSTO ste cjerelccels aie) 21" miminim mia) swiein's eebsal| (U5aE 7p GTA eno SAORaCCOOS REE SorOnds taScbe 4, 28 
IBY dV Wh Resbed cepa auaee oe DaSArunUcTcde 0.16 QB TGTS. dacceSace ce nie eismnae eee eee 2.3 
30, 1877. Sees we ohare 0. 90 Oct IsI876 55522 oc eueecees dee eee eh ed 5. 00 
PS EY cose paasdesconacaE odebacod ar | 0.59 UST O ORR eaten cee seer Eee ee 28.31 
DOV LO Uilisicis wale lala wloielaietonelmiainie(ajslolsisialsiei=] aia 1.57 ANSTO sas Sac cctndeaeleklocewe cei 5. 58 
DAL Sid po eieee a sieieiataietetein le cletereleiereeiserena= 0. 86 Gr S79 soe Sains coesiciccloe selele sso eae ciniase ail 
OST aad aaonoscipoconoooraEasdccec TAS TH STGsastecacsecee eee eee 3. 86 
BOM Siitiicceiet cis csceic(ists ies esis meeieiere 0. 43 WT 1ST 2s we cack ssscces sco ticles csieeeer +5. 90 
SOW Siilise ate ctevesie wie oaeeie = elacisivalsiciniowle 1.45 TD STS ee ctence ccs occic ce stoic cope ciseie eels 4. 34 
SGiNiS. 7+ HellfsSonoosUCrOnOOeepae Ee oomeeD oc 10, 48 1G) 1872 hos ex selac Hes wise see ob eeassineeiate 6.10 
SOU ST OMe ere See sale eices ceieieeetate 0. 82 1S. V8 Sivecie eee = Bie 4 Wee ae Ue isie sles Beye D256: 


ASTIRTOMURRNES A hie RSs Uy cckes ears 1. 180 |} Now. 9-4, ITO LEE eo). oem tee oeeiep tons eseeaees 4. 64 


\Few spots; small hook. 2Fish only weighed 4,350 grams. “October 14, 1872, 3.33, 


The October weights are equal to the weights of mature fish, very 
probably even larger, but contain less firm substances. The highest 
grades of maturity (November and December) have not been taken into 
consideration on account of the loss of milt. 

From these two tables it appears that during summer both testicles 
and ovaria of almost the same stage of development can show very con- 
siderable differences of weight. But the greater and lesser weights, each 
classed by themselves, can be chronologically arranged, and it will then 
be seen that the differences gradually cease with the females in August 
and with the males at the end of September and beginning of October, 
leaving those differences, however, which are found even among mature 
fish, and which, especially with the males, are very considerable. 

According to Mr. Glaser’s experience, which extends over many years, 
and which is corroborated by my own observations, extending over a 
period of eight years, the normal spawning season at Basel for. the over- 
whelming majority of all fish may be said to last from the middle of No- 
vember till the middle of December. From about the 1st of November 
Mr. Glaser keeps his fish alive in fish-boxes (tanks); at that time their 
ovaria do not emit anything when pressed. Generally about the 10th 
to the 15thof November artificial impregnation may be begun. As early 
as the 16th to the 24th of December it will be hard to find many, if any 
full females, and the occurrence of eight full females from the 5th to the 
13th of January, 1880, and of one as late as the middle of February, 
must be considered as rare exceptions, caused possibly by some irreg- 
ularity consequent upon the unusally severe cold. The occurrence of 
an empty female on the 26th of October, 1877, must also be considered 
as @ very rare case. 

According to my own observations, the maturity of the males sets in 


[7] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 433 


somewhat earlier. Beginning on the 20th of October, some seed may 
be squeezed out of a few, and from the Ist of November out of nearly 
all normally-developed males, which, however, cannot be considered ag 
a sign of absolute maturity in the whole organ. All the data relative 
to the spawning season of both sexes have been fully corroborated by 
Mr. Glaser. 

To return to the development of sexual maturity, it is very instructive 
to compare the respective tables with the following table, showing the 
monthly results of the fisheries in the Rhine between Basel and Lau- 
fenburg: 


TABLE III. 
nent aaace | | Average of all 
the year, there | 1872. | 1873. | 1874. | 1875. | 1876. | 1877. | 1878 | 1879, | the monthly 
were caught in oer cr aie 
the month of— | Woe Se 
alle i 7 | al ee an 
Jannary-ae2cccssedlecsctcce | 0.58 | sees 0.14] 0.08| 0.61) 016] 0.49 | 0. 28 
February ..----.--- esti PnONOBsIC aS -k, rw pen 1.35| 0.32| 0.49 0.29 
March ......-.....- 1.60| 273| 0.36| 0.19! 0.55) 371| 1.69] 1.26 1.45 
Agia tes ke 1.52/ 219] 5.41| 0.371 234] 303| 3.98] 1.36 2. 52 
iyeeiiast secs: 4.57| 7.77| 5.78] 2.12| 4.72| 5.86] 804| 2.04 5.11 
iti ea 11.36| 18.77| 27.36] 13.40| 5.89| 15.99| 14.96°| 7.57| 14.24 
ices ew 91.32 | 17.97| 1834] 10.05| 19.57| 29.38| 19.32| 11.36 18. 41 
August d..2-.-4-.+ 10.78 | 7.18| 14.24] 12.01] 8.62] 10.18| 10.59| 24.08) 12.21 
September ......-.- 13.70 | 16.08] 19.64| 814] 29.94] 17.18] 1609| 21.46| 17.69 
October .....-..... 15.70 | 14.62/ 1.88| 24.80| 19.18] 3.17| 17.24| 19.42 14. 50 
November .-..-.... 15.06 | 9.69) 3.10| 20.89] 7.25] 4.45| 5.81| 9.03 | 9. 41 
December ......... 4.98 | 2.37 | 3 s3| 665| 2.57| 5.79| 2.59| 1.46] 3.7 


If, really, as Barfurth supposes, the spawning salmon ascend the river 
from the sea only a short time before the spanwing season, ‘‘ with eggs the 
size of peas,” why does the large increase in the number of salmon caught, 
amounting to six times that of April, appear in June and July, at a time 
when the ovaria have reached 1.3 to 5.3 per cent. of the total weight of the 
body—therefore only about 5 to.22 per cent. of their weight when fully 
matured—and not in September and October? Do these July salmon 
make way again for other salmon? If, furthermore, in August and Sep- 
tember, there is in the Rhine a mingling of returning salmon and new 
immigrants, why did the‘individual differences in the weight of the 
ovaria decrease instead of increase? 

I am therefore of opinion, and shall adduce further proof of my asser- 
tion, that our winter salmon, which arrive in the neighborhood of Lasel 
Jrom November to March, remain in this neighborhood all during summer 
and autumn, and that they reach their sexual maturity gradually, in com- 
mon with the large schools of later immigrants, which begin to ascend the 
river from May on, so as to spawn at the same time, from the middle of 
November till the middle of December. My. His, in his varied observa- 
tions, has reached the same opinion.* 

If we suppose, by way of approximation, that the majority of the 


*T, § 25. 


S. Mis. 29 28 


434 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


Basel spawning salmon* have again reached the sea about the middle 
of January, and if we, moreover, take into consideration the period of 
migration from Holland up the river, I feel justified in maintaining that 
the large majority of our Basel salmon stay in the Rhine between 6 
and 94 months, a small number staying 94 to 12 months, and a few even 
15 months, their sexual organs developing all this time, whilst they 
abstain from all food. I cannot, of course, positively deny that, in 
exceptional cases, a few individuals return to the sea in an immature 
condition; but nothing which has come under my observation points in 
that direction. ; 

I shall also, for the present at least, be careful not to apply my data 
to the Lower Rhine. As I have not been able to observe the Dutch and 
North Sea salmon during this season of the year, I cannot decide 
whether, as Barfurth says, numerous large salmon in an almost mature 
condition immigrate from the sea late in summer and during autumn. 
All I maintain is this, that such belated immigrants, with the exception, 
perhaps, of a few male fish, do not come up as far as Basel. 

The great differences in the degree of development of the sexual 
organs I interpret as indications of the dates of immigration. The 
later immigrants very possibly have entered upon the first stage of their 
ovarian development whilst still in the sea,t but still they seem to lag 
behind the earlier immigrants, and only catch up with them very grad- 
ually, but under all circumstances by the time the spawning season 
commences. ‘Thus, two Dutch salmon had, on the 31st May, 1879, 
ovaria weighing 0.61 per cent. of the entire weight of the body, there- 
fore less than half the weight of the ovaria of Basel salmon of the same 
period. The smallest fish furnished particularly numerous instances of 
this catching up of the young with the older immigrants. On the 19th 
of August, 1879, I found in three small salmon from Wesel ovaria weigh- 
ing 0.56 and 0.80 per cent. of the entire weight of the body (therefore 
corresponding to the Basel March and April salmon) and testicles 
weighing 0.91 per cent. of the weight of the body, therefore correspond- 
ing to the Basel June testicles. The hook-formation (according to 20 
measurements of the length of the nose) had been decidedly retarded. 
Five weeks later another batch of fish of the same size from Wesel 


*Mr. Glaser supposes that the time occupied by the salmon in returning is very 
short, because, owing to the impetus which they receive, many of them land on sand 
banks and in shallow places, and thus fall into the hands of man. 

+tHow far this development has advanced can only be decided by data from the 
Lower Rhine. How many per cent. of the total weight of the body are occupied by 
the ovaria of salmon caught near the mouth of the Rhine from the beginning of May 
tillthe middle of June? How many per cent. of the male organs from May till the 
middle and end of July? So far, only one individual (caught August 1, 1879) has 
give rise to the suspicion that it had finished a considerable period of its ovarian 
development while in the sea. This fish (differing in this entirely from other fish 
caught at the same time) had an ovarium weighing 7.2 per cent. of the total weight 
of the body, and muscle-flesh containing much (18.7 per cent.) albumen and fat. 


[9] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 435 


showed ovaria and testicles of at least the same degree of maturity as 
the Basel fish (testicles weighing 7.7 and 6.1 per cent. of the total 
weight of thebody); and the small male fish of the spawning period, 
which had reached us, were fully matured. 

The weights of the respective organs are not the only proofs in favor 
of the further development, in fresh water, of the semen and the oval 
rium. ‘The microscopic examination of these organs shows lively growth 
and transformation, the detailed description of which, however, does not 
belong here. As regards the ovarium: Mr. His has, as early as 1873,* 
described the different stages of development, from the protoplasm-net 
with pale pellets in the meshes of the small eggs of the winter salmon, 
through several stages, to the mature egg, the size of a pea, with its 
skin delicately marked with small vessels, with its germ ready for im- 
pregnation, and the live plasm skin, half-sticky and half fluid, which 
incloses the clear and highly concentrated egg-fluid. I myself have 
watched the transformations of the male organ through all the vary- 
ing seasons. When still resembling an insignificant, shriveled-up little 
strap, the testicles of the winter salmon often weigh only 755 to 335 
of the total weight of the body; with the first warm spring-days, how- 
ever, towards the end of March—sometimes not till May—new life 
seems to be imparted to this organ; more blood is introduced into it; 
the small one-grained cells, in the diminutive shriveled-up canals, sep- 
arate, become larger, form several grains, and finally form large bodies, 
full to repletion with numerous grains. From June to August we find 
dark-red organs, looking as if they were inflamed, and the looks do not 
deceive; for numerous pus-cells—probably originally colorless blood 
particles—are at this period found, between the seminal cells proper, in 
the canals; through their decay they furnish ample food for the further 
growth of the many-grained bodies, and for the further swelling of the 
organ. At the same time the inter-tissue and the walls of the canals 
grow luxuriantly. Rather late, in September, and even in the begin- 
ning of October, after the organ has reached a weight equal to one-half, 
three-fourths, and even more, of the total weight when matured (about 
5 per cent. of the weight of the body), the transformation of the imma- 
ture masses, of the many-grained cells to genuine seminal cells, takes 
place, not merely by bundles or ‘nests”—as occasionally in former 
months—but on a large scale. This is a very interesting process, and 
is accompanied by the most radical chemical changes, new substances 
making their appearance, whilst old ones vanish. In the beginning of 
November the testicles are snow-white, and consist of hardly anything 
but semen, which at every cut oozes out like cream; it is difficult to rec- 
ognize this organ as the same which was observed some months pre- 
vious, say about the beginning of October, when the testicles, though 
of nearly the same size, were a gray jelly-like mass; and still it is the 
same organ, which has only undergone a change. 


*In the work already quoted. 


436 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


From what has been said, it must be supposed that the early, and very 
immature, immigrants complete their entire sexual development in the 
Rhine. For the present, however, my assertion that this also applies 
as a rule to the later immigrants, lacks proof. ‘There, is however, still a 
possibility that, besides these, more mature fish immigrate from the sea. 


THE LOSS OF MATTER SUSTAINED BY THE BODY. 


In order to decide with absolute certainty whether this course of 
development in fresh water, applies to the Rhine salmon from Basel to 
Laufenburg, not only in many cases, but in all cases, we followed another 
course. 

The building-up of the mature ovarium of the winter salmon from very 
insignificant beginnings, is—viewed merely as a material process—a 
most astonishing performance. The weight amounts to from 19 to 27 per 
cent. of the total weight of the body, with 40 to 43 per cent. dry substance 
(at 110°), of which, taking the average of two fish, not quite one-fourth 
(equal to) about 9 per cent. of the fresh ovarium is oily fat. As at this 
period the muscle substance of the body contains only about 20 per cent.,, 
and often even less, dry substance, and as the fat of the intestines and 
the skin has nearly vanished, the assertion that fully one-third of all the 
jirm substance of the body is, during the spawning season, found in the ova- 
rium makes the proportion too low rather than too high. 

If the entire development of the ovarium, in fresh water, is going on 
while the fish is fasting, the body of the average spawning salmon, 
compared with the body of the average spring or summer salmon, must 
show a decrease of the matter in the other organs, at least sufficient for 
building the entire ovarium, and even (on account of the self-consump- 
tion) more than sufficient for that purpose. As during the few months,. 
from the end of July to the beginning of November, when the ovarium 
increases from 4 to 25 per cent. of the total weight of the body, the ver- 
tebral column of the fasting fish will hardly grow much in length, and 
as there are no indications (hyperdermic) to be seen in cuts, with the 
naked eye, all that should be done would be to examine fish of equal 
length at different seasons. 

Those -salmon, however, which bring a three-fourths or entirely ma- 
ture ovarium from the sea, produced by the ample and rich food found 
there, must, even if the muscle-flesh were somewhat leaner and reduced 
in weight, show a larger weight and a greater amount of substance (in- 
cluding the ovarium) than the spring and summer salmon of equal 
length and equal ovarium. | 

There would, moreover, be noticed a very decided difference between 
such spawning-salmon and those which (according to what has been 
said above) undoubtedly supply the substance for the entire ovalium 
from their own body. But this is certainly not the case. There are not 
two categories of Spawning-salmon. Whenever a spawning-salmon is, 
exceptionally, somewhat stouter when compared with its length than 


a 


ir] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 437 


the rest, its ovaria will certainly be found to be below the average size, 
and its eggs will in some cases be small, probably retarded in their 
growth. 

If, moreover, it could be shown that these salmon, which have reached 
their sexual maturity in the sea, constituted an anyway considerable frac- 
tion of all the salmon which ascend from the sea, it ought to be impossible 
to prove that the summer salmon, up to the spawning season, lose as much flesh 
as they gain in ovarium substance; there certainly ought to be a deficit on 
the side of the summer salmon. 

On account of the extraordinary scientific importance attaching to a 
certain proof of such a change of substance in the animal kingdom, I 
have for two and a half years (since November, 1877), as long as the 
salmon fisheries lasted, with hardly any interruptions, daily weighed 
and measured salmon, and portions of salmon, on the most extensive 
scale; the rich material on which I could operate being very kindly 
furnished by Mr. Glaser. In weighing I used altogether an admirably 
constructed pair of English spring scales, which through many years 
showed no sign of variance, and which in 10 kilograms distinetly indi- 
cated a difference of 20 grams. The measurements were made with a 
very simple apparatus, consisting of a board with a scale marked upon 
it, and another piece of board attached to it at a right angle, which 
could be moved up and down until it reached the back point of measur- 
ing (now recognized as the most reliable)—the point where the body 
tapers off and where it again begins to spread a little to form the caudal 
fin. From September, 1878, I also invariably determined the length of 
the nose (respectively, its horizontal projection, when the head is fixed 
in a horizontal position). In the male fish I considered as the “length 
of the fish” only the distance from the nostril to the root of the tail. 
The observations were taken very carefully every morning by Mr. Jacob 
Weidmann, the assistant of our Physiological Institute, generally in 
Mr. Glaser’s presence, and were tested by frequent observations of my 
own, which were entirely satisfactory. No error of any consequence 
was discovered among a hundred figures thus examined; and if ever 
statistical data deserve to be called reliable, this term must certainly 
apply to the data obtained in the manner described. 

T’rom among the female fish of one and the same year (1878), begin- 
ning with May or June, when the sex could be distinctly recognized, I 
selected specimens as nearly as possible of equal length, the greatest 
difference of length not amounting to more than 10 to 12 millimeters. 
The total number was divided into 2 to 4 groups, arranged in chrono- 
logical order, and for every group the average date was calculated. The 
comparison of the averages of the groups furnished the average change 
of weight of the fish in the periods included in the average dates. The 
same operation was gone through with six groups of as many different 
lengths, comprising in all 470 fish, all belonging to the same year (1878), 
and all caught between Basel and Laufenburg. From the changes of 


438 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


weight (in per cent.) of the six groups—the weight on the Ist of Novem- 
ber being counted as 100—the average weights of different periods were 
calculated, and from these data a curved line was constructed, showing 
the average changes of weight. 

The large figures are by no means superfluous; for from June to No- 
vember the individual differences ‘are very considerable, and salmon of 
the same length, the same date, and the same state of maturity fre- 
quently differ 25 and even 30 per cent. The question is not one of de- 
grees of emaciation, but of differences in the build of the skeleton. 
There are thick-set and slender figures among salmon as well as among 
men. Not until we compare all six groups are the differences sufficiently 
equalized, and do we realize the change of weight, which in its almost 
mathematical regularity bears the undoubted impress of absolute truth. 


439 


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[14] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


440) 


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[15] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 441 


The following table, with its different horizontal lines, will give a 
still clearer view of the subject. On these lines, counting from the 
starting points of the six groups, placed perpendicularly, the figures of 
the excess of weight (in per cents) over the final weight (=100), reduced 
for the 12th October, are given in intervals proportionate to the differ- 
ences of time: 

TaBLe V.—Average change of weight of female Rhine salmon, caught beiween Basel and 

Laufenburg, from the beginning of June till the 12th of October, six divisions, each con- 

taining fish of equal length, in 3-5 groups each, 470 fish in all. ’ 


GROUPS OR 
DIVISIONS. 


| | Division I. 


108. 05 106. 88 100 
June 19. July 29. Oct. 12. 
_ ae ee Division IL 
109. 83 103. 97 104. 45 105. 80 100 
May J June 6. July 6 Aug. 4 Oct. 12 
| | | | | Division IIL 
108. 80 108. 12 105. 81 105. 67 100 
May 22. June 26. July 19. Aug. 23 Oct. 12. 
| | Division IV. 


Division V. 


Division VI. 


June 2, July 26. 


The figures show the weights of the respective average date of a 
group when the weight on October 12 was 100. 

If, supposing that the change of weight between two average dates 
took place in a straight line, we calculate approximately the average 
proportion to the final weight (October 12 =100) for a number of suit- 
ably-selected periods of time, of all the six divisions, we obtain the 
following course of changes of weight, in which the individual differ- 
ences are very well equalized; so that, in spite of the retarding influ- 
ence of later immigrants on the emaciation (as indicated in figures) of 
the earlier ones, a slight decrease in weight may be perceived from the 
very beginning, which, resembling aparabola, describes a curved line con- 
vex towards the top.* If nothing else, this form, instead of the line (at 
first concave towards the top and then straight, indicating the emacia- 
tion by hunger), points to a connection of an organ growing in geomet- 
rical progression, with the demand for subsistence. 


* The large tables of curves have not been reproduced,—EDITOR. 


442 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


TABLE VI.—Average change of weight of female Rhine salmon. 


Date. May 22. June4. Junel9. July4. July 19. Aug3. Aug 23. Oct. 12. 
Days from May 22...- 0 15 30 45 60 75 95 140 
Wreighteessssscsa-e- 108.17 107. 74 107. 39 107. 08 106. 66 106.7 104. 61 100 


d=0. 0287=0. 0233=0. 0207 0. 0280=0. 0393=0. 0730=0. 0922 


The principal result, which is apparent in all six divisions, obtained 
from Tables IV to VI, is this, that from the end of July or the beginning 
of August, when the ovarium weighs on an average one-fifth of its 
mature weight, till the spawning season, there is, in spite of the growth 
of the ovarium, not only no increase of weight, but even up to October 
12 a decrease of weight of 6 per cent. (weight on the 12th October 
=100); for every pound of ovarium more than a pound of flesh has 
vanished. As the intestinal fat has mestly disappeared about the be- 
ginning of August, and as the changes of the intestines (as has been 
proved by numerous observations of weight) are of very little conse- 
quence, the muscle flesh alone must be the source from which the sub. 
stances come. , 

The quantity of albumen contained in the large side-muscle of the 
body was, therefore, determined by observations taken on a number of 
July and August salmon and compared with a series of similar obser- 
vations taken on November salmon (7. ¢e., the quantity of the dry resi- 
due which, at a temperature of 110°, remained, after complete ex- 
haustion by means of hot alcohol, ether, and water). 


TABLE VII.—Decrease of the quantity of dry substance and albumen in the large side-muscle 
of the female Rhine salmon from July and August till November and December. 


oon | Contents of the 
ae side-muscle. 
es 
bb HR H o 
B | Bs | a. | ge 
2 a a so 
SH 7 -o ne 
: = ey Bw | 28 
a om) =| =| 
= a AE Bo ae 
oo RS > BO H 
S01 Bulges ten aes 
A E S < A 
Milli- 
meters. | @72ms 
Muteh ‘salmon; March 18; 1880.20. -22. scence cco cooesee ne = 885 | 9,580 0.045 | 18.8 34. 6 
Basel salmon, March 30, 1880. .----..2..-2-2<2cccceecncce=ne 860 | 9, 030 0.077 | 18.1 32. 6 
BACVBP EE O)ieicinicinio S| <ic.ocwciwisisin's 25 cla & cid a ceia sane aie imeiniom mien enismlate ssremieleleinictatetstalaicteteta(aiettieetaiats | 18. 45 | 33. 6 
PLEO LS Niers lee cisinialateinle diormcais ticlohnicisie Men icce em aeerne eras 865 | 8,700 4. 04 17.2 | 24. 2 
QRS Ope eieteciam siatein ner wicin ete cin eis cals ete ate Cee eee eee 874 | 8, 560 3.40 18.2 | 27.5 
eel BO eetele stele nieielaicisjewsinis cia axle se late ee tase eae ee eres 908 | 10, 270 3. 32 Lie 28.9 
JNO Me Ue Sap op SOCK ESE DEPOEE BEDE Rea gadscsnpccoDdne 940 | 11,130 7.21 18.7 29.0 
POT k sac ccec ce asin Seabee s Get ecosseecemerineeinae 858 | 7,340 4.29 17.3 26.6 
RSTO ose memiwa = cise cc wFicinic sic’ cle wicln.c/e mers Se eee 878 | 8,930 3. 13 16.7 2007) 
POMS TO atecmcisiaicieniniviain(e sat). cu sic'sjs 5 — scien eeeray 883 | 7,740 6. 52 16.5 21.8 
Average of the Basel salmon during July and August ...----..------------ is 4.78 | 17.5 | 26.8 


iB 


eg BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 443 


TABLE VII.—Decrease of the quantity of dry substance and albumen, §c.—Continued. 


2. Contents of the 
Be side-nuscle. 
: os = 
b HO H an 
3 Ay = Suu 
om Bes “3 a 
iS) NEG a 2 ae 
a = Bis sa. | 38 
Eo ic} “aE 5 = ge 
g a BS | = Ee 
fs E 5 < A 
Milli- ; 
‘meters. | Grams. | | 
Empty, }| 
Dec. 8, 1876 5, 530 joven. nik 13.5 | 19.3 
iTS. | 
Nov. 3, 1879 7,740 | 26.87 | 13.6 | 19.8 
4, 187 9,620} 1890 | 15.2 | 21.4 
8,900} 19.21 | 13.0 18.3 
7,650 | 26.72 | 13.4 18.4 
7,290 |*Empty..| 13.4 20. 2 
5,805 § ior 127 16.8 
SFT 5 fn aed CE go |) Empty,?| | 
....| 846 4,900 15 gra 10 | 141 
Average of the salmon of November and December......-...-..-----------------0---- | 1352 18.5 


Considering all the circumstances, viz: (1) the positive decrease in 
the weight of the flesh, and (2.) the decrease of the remaining flesh of 
the body by 4.3 per cent. of its contents of albumen, we find, from a 
comparison with the composition of the ovarium, that the loss of albumen 
Srom the side-muscle ts sufficient to meet the entire consumption of albumen 
by the last four-fifths of the growing ovarium. 

In order to determine this matter more accurately, the weight of the 
side-muscle of two fish of average sizet was ascertained, its substance 
analyzed, and the decrease of its albuminous matter compared with the 
increase of albumen in the ovarium. 

Of these two fish the second may certainly be considered as an abso- 
lutely normal fish, weighing 8,930 grams. It had almost the average 
weight (8,926), and, measuring 878 millimeters, it had the average length 
of the group to which it would have been assigned according to Table LV, 
if it had been weighed and measured on the same day of the year 1878. 
This coincidence, though intended, had been reached only by an accident. 

The head, vertebral column, the bones of the shoulder, and the ven- 
tral fins of this fish were prepared, and freed from all the portions of 
the side-muscle attached to them, whilst the other muscles were left. 
To this must be added the heart, liver, spleen, and kidneys (according 
to the determination of another and very similar fish), The surface of 
the skin, apart from that adhering to the head, tail, and fins, was care- 


* The empty females had yielded their eggs a few days previous, for piscicultural 


purposes. 
tFor these and other experiments Mr. Schneider-Wirz, dealer in table luxuries, has 


very kindly furnished the fish during those seasons when Mr. Glaser only sold fish 
at wholesale. 


444 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] _ 


fully measured on the split fish, by laying a thick sheet of paper over it — 
and cutting this sheet so as to fit exactly. The skin, from a cross-cut 
ot the body, measuring 8 or 9 centimeters in breadth, was prepared and 
weighed; and, by comparing the weight of a piece of paper of equal size 
with that of the large piece of paper mentioned before, the approximate 
weight of the entire skin was determined. 


Grams 

Mhe weight of the fish was. -as. 322k ce see 89. 30 
Subtract the above mentioned portions (the blood which had run 
out being estimated at 47 grams, and the mature ovarium at 

BOW STAMS) 2s se aiid eee ows ae eee ee 25. 90 

And there remains forthe muscle.....4 . oo 2eee eee - 63. 40 


We will now endeavor to find whether the probable loss of substance 
which, according to our average figures, will be sustained by the muscle, 
is sufficient for building up the ovarium. The decrease of weight of the 
entire animal, with the exception of the loss of some intestinal fat and 
part of the liver, will almost exclusively be a decrease of muscle, as the 
skin does not show any visible layer of fat, and, as is well known, the 
head and fin muscles hardly decrease at all. 

Table VI shows us a possible way of calculating the probable de- 
crease in weight, at any rate till the 12th of October. From the 7th of 
August to the 12th of October its weight would probably decrease from 
105.78 to 100 grams. The spawning season, however, does not com- 
mence till the middle of November, and the fish which we had before 
fore us (with an ovarium weighing 279.5 grams=3.13 per cent. of the 
entire weight of the body) would be classed among his cotempo- 
raries which had been examined (see Table I), among the less advanced 
as to its sexual maturity, and would probably not have spawned till 
the end of November or the beginning of December. We may there- 
fore, further calculate the decrease of weight on the basis of the last 
period till the 11th of November = 30 days, all the more as just as many 
fish after the 12th October, as before that date, have been used for eal- 
culating the final weight. Going on this supposition, 2.77 per cent. will 
yet have to be subtracted from 100, and the final weight sought will be 

97.23 91.92 
8 T0578 1007 ee 
able loss of weight 8.08 per cent. of 8,930, would be 722 grams; the final 
weight at the spawning-period would be 8,9380—722 = 8,208 grams. The 
probable weight of the ovarium will be 23 per cent. of this final weight 
(Group V, Table 1), 1,888 grams. 


to the weight of the 7th of August (8,930) 


[19] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 445, 


The loss of weight of liver and intestines should also be taken into 
account : 


Liver. | Intestines. 
; Grams. | Grams. 
Weichtot theseorgans, August T oc: scsss2- .cisscce a sisctcccnvesestccescce sce 119 125. 5 
This makes, calculated in per cent. of the final weight, November 11.......... 1. 46% 1. 53%. 
From this subtract the average weight of the organ of mature female fish in | 
NOME MD Clemens sy meine aeteanis meinen claieinicimnte snes aera ie cislelnic saaeyteiecm tienes 1.06 0. 70 
Mossyou weightior, the body, in per Cent... 2.2. secce acceso esos cae 0. 40% 0. 83% 


In building up the ovarium the following muscle substance has dis- 
appeared entirely : 
e NCIO Mt Of LNG OVATINMY os. oo ce coe cia 01s ote oe ons Seu see sec 1, 880 
(2.) Decrease of weight apart from liver and intestines (722—92). 630 


MP Opaimeeee teas tated eee e.. See Oa ie Be ieee 2710 
With 16 per cent. albuminous matter ....-- Pore Re ea ese 452. 6. 


(3.) The remainder of the muscle (6,340—2,710) = 3,630 must, from 
16.7 per cent. albumen, go down to 13.2 per cent. Loss 3.5 per 
COMGIOL os OOo aces Mig (oie pe eee eee gay SRSA bronays sd Mane ae BLA & 


SUE ISLOSS cOn peROUIM EM 520 utcne cies, os chen, n/c cient yee One Rhone ate, 579. 7 

This quantity of albumen would very nearly correspond to the nour- 
ishing matter contained in 6 pounds (3,000 grams) of beef of medium 
quality. 

Of its total quantity of nourishing albumen (6,340 x 16.7) = 1,058.8 
grams, the muscle has lost 54.74 per cent.. or more than one-half; a 
result which will be interesting in many respects. 

Of 100 parts muscle (“salmon-flesh,” as understood by cooks) 43 per 
cent. have entirely disappeared ; the remaining portion has sustained a 
loss of albumen, and has therefore lost 21 per cent. 

Still greater is the relative loss of fat, whilst the loss of phosphoric 
acid is about equal to the loss of albumen. 

From this material there had to be formed the ovarium, calculated at 
1,880 grams, less that part of the ovarium already in existence (the con- 
tents of which, in firm substances, is almost equal to the mature ovari- 
um) 280 grams, leaving 1,608 grams to be added to the ovarium. 

Indeed, the demands made by the ovarium are very great! The clear, 
yellowish fluid, which forms by far its greater portion, is so Concentrated 
that it dries very soon, and forms a sort of amber-like substance, which 
possesses spch a strong refraction that the firm portions (little pellets 
and pieces floating about in it) look like holes (vacuolen). 

Chemically considered, this fluid is nothing but “liquid caviar” —an 
intensely concentrated solution of a substance entirely analogous to 
the little yolk-disks of the sturgeon and other fish; it produces the re- 
actions of albuminous bodies; by boiling it in alcohol about 20 per cent. 


- 


446 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


of a phosphoric fat (Lecithin) is produced, and by digesting it with 
artificial gastric juice, another phosphoric substance is obtained, viz, the 
nuclein, otherwise known to form the nucleus of the cells. This is of in- 
terest, in as far as both these substances, especially the last-mentioned 
one, are only found in the muscles in very small quantities. The forma- 
tion of the liquid part of the egg can, therefore, not only be accomplished 
when muscle substance is taken from the flesh and is deposited in the 
ege, but the new combinations peculiar to the egg need to be proéuced 
from the albumen, the fat and the salts of the muscles containing phos- 
phoric acid, by means of the most radical chemical changes. 

I do not, at the present time, possess a sufficient number of albumen 
calculations from the ovarium, which would be useful in this connection. 
Taking from the figures at my command (which are probably somewhat 
too high) 30.0 per cent. of substance not soluble in boiling alcohol, ether, 
and water, I reach the following result : 


Probable loss. of the muscle’. 5..05 5 s..cce ar ooeee eee sen eee oe ” 579.7 
Probable amouxt of albumen consumed by the ovarium ........ 482.4 
Albumen lett’ 22.573: se ece baste Bee eae eee See 97.3 


to be used either as food, or for increasing the ovarium beyond its av- 
erage size, or for spawning flesh containing more than 13.2 per cent. of 
albumen, not counting the loss sustained by the liver and the intestines. 

The other fish to be examined was a decidedly lean one (we had _ pur- 
posely selected such an one). It was caught August 4, 1879, its length 
was 858 millimeters, and its weight 7,340 grams; therefore almost 700 
grams less than the average weight of the division to which it belonged, 
according to its date (8,028). Ifin this case, where the conditions were 
less favorable, we could also succeed in showing a sufficient loss of sub- 
stance, our proof would be doubly sure. The results obtained in the 
same manner as with the first fish are given in the following table in a 
tabulated form. As the development of the ovarium was farther ad- 
vanced, I calculated the decrease of weight only to the lst November. 


TABLE VIII.—Albumen balance-sheet—Growth of the ovarium at the expense of the muscle 
in a salmon caught near Basel, August 4, 1879. 


MuscLE, Dr. MUSCLE, Cr. 
SA: Bete 
Ze: Beg 
= 5S S| 2 
4 io) < | 

Grams.| Grams. Grams. Grams.) Per ct. | Grams. 

Weight of body Angust:4 se. 2. sels ose ecleac| a ccen sista nelesn 7, 340 
Final weight, calculated for November 1: 
7, 340100 ’ 
a rns ie RC a ela ee ele ete oe eee ne Stee eecel eemearer 6, 806 
107. 84 

Total probable loss of weight of body up 

toyNovember l - 2222. -coese ose ace se cen ees sceernselsiscesass 534 
Liver of 108 grams=1.58 per cent. of 

weight of body, November 1, less 
1.06 average liver of the mature fish in per 

cent. of weight of body.....--.--:.--.--- eeespeoe | 0.42 


{21] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 447 


TABLE VIII.—Albumen balance-sheet—Growth of the ovarium, §-c.—Continued. 


MUSCLE, Dr. Muscie, Cr. 
AE ei 
ce} 5 5 = 
=) > = | t= 
<j ° | Se Nae 

— =— | = = —— | == 
| 
Grams. Grams. —e Grams. 7rams.| Per ct. Grams. 
Stomach, intestines, &c.—=1.21—0.70 per 
° cent. of weight of body.-.-..----..-...--|-...---- 0. 50 | 
Loss of liver intestines in per cent. of - | | 
Wie] OHULO LAD OC ie ore siete e wminrelamee seis erento 0. 92 63 
There remains, as share of the muscle, in ST; 
decreasctot welehtioL Ody esc.css-5- 22) scceec'sall cae'ets 471 | @17.3 81.4 
1,579 | Probable weight of mature ovarium—0.23 | 
x6, 864. 


430 | Subtract from this: Ovarium in existence | 
August 4. | 


344.7 | 1,149 | Ovarium still to be formed, @ 30 per cent. | | 
albumen (maximum). | | 
SSOSRLOPINUSCLOM eye ee ce wide come ns wie a =jeise elsieee ae |lerm's ve mie | 1,149 | @17.3 198.9 

Determination of the remainder of | | 
muscle November 1: | 


Wieiehtion body August4 2... 1.0.22 22 seecslocen-- a. | 7, 340 | 
Subtract from this: Heads, tins, ovarian | 
skin, various intestines + 30 ec. blood...) 2, 400 
Subtract from this: Reduced decrease in 
weight of body up to November 1..-..... 413 | 


Subtract from this: Replaced by ovarium.| 1, 149 | 


Total amount subtracted from weight of 
pody -eea- EEE Ee Bcc cedisestebescses seen ease | 3, 962 


There remains as remainder of muscle, 
November 1, with probable decrease of | 


the albumen from 17.3 to 13.27 per cent..|......-.|-------- | 3,378| @41| 138.5 

(fe bald eaameeen Balance in favor of muscle. 
—_—— | | | — 
418.8 Motaluloss OfmMuscles cz scstsecs cone oes sc eee cecllecmecet |sm evecare = siinicin 418.8 


In spite of the unfavorable selection of the fish used for the experi- 
ment, and an improbably high figure of the quantity of albumen in the 
ovarium, we also get in this case more than sufficient to cover the loss. 

As regards the fat, the relative decrease of the quantity thereof can 
be approximately determined from the difference between the quantity 
of albumen and golid substance, under certain highly probable condi- 
tions. If this difference is made the basis of calculation in very lean fish, 
we shall get very near the absolute truth by either making this differ- 
ence greater in proportion to the quantity of albumen, or by subtracting 
it from the total difference. 


| 


ogee bss | 8 
= op om on 
eau nom. aR 
eae rine mo on 
eaad wes Ran 
ese | sao" | 28 
AS elie re te 20 
s TAA "Bic Og qe of 
5 OS5em og an 2s 
Saas Broa © 
a ~ aD O Ay 
Average of two female March salmon (see Table V), one of them a H 
arf heii tere seen eee te in Sneniee tw ecisiomeclsiastaaie 15.1. | 4.4 10.7 
Average of female salmon during July and August (Table V)-------- 9.3 4.1 5.2 
Salmon of August 7, weight of body 8,980 .-.-...---------------++-++- 13. 0 4.0 9.0 
‘Salmon of August 4, weight of body 7,340 ...-.. --.-------------+----- | 9.3 4.1 5.2 
Average of female salmon during November (Table V) -------------- 5.3 3.1 2. 2 
Average of two exceedingly emaciated female salmon, in whose flesh, Re 
even under the microscope, no trace of fat could be discovered. .--. 2.7 2.7 0.0 


448 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


In the Jean salmon (Table VIII) there is, therefore, the following 


quantity (approximated) of fat: 
Decrease of 
Grams. percentage. 


Probable decrease in weight of body ....-. 413 at 93 = 334 
ineplacedaby"OVariumnt 6) neo geese ae 1,149 at 9.3 = D0GrS 
Remainder of muscle, November1........ 3,378 at 4.0 = 135.1 
Probable total loss Oftat i. .c2 cee et ees oe eee 280. 4 

Subtract consumption of fat of 1,149 ovarium, at 9 per cent. (max- 
AENUNTIO) © <2 ares fd SE eee eee eee ey ots, See a Nee aye ee ee 103. 4 
And there remains for self-consumption ...........-.... 177.0 


We cannot form an opinion as to the use made of the excess of albu- 
men and fat, or as to the formation of phosphoric fat from one source or 
the other, until we have reliable average figures showing the quantity 
of albumen contained in the ovarium. 

There is no doubt that the muscle contains more than enough phos- 

phorie acid to supply all necessary phosphorus for the ovarium, at 1.1 
per cent. phosphoric acid in the fresh ovarium against 2, 3-2, 6 per cent. 
of the firm substance in the muscle. 
_ By the agreement of all these figures with my hypotheses, I consider 
it proved beyond a doubt that our salmon of the beginning of August 
are identical with the November salmon, and that, with few exceptions,. 
there is no addition to their number of more mature fish with more sub- 
stance in their bodies. 

The microscopical examination fully corroborates the opinion that the 
side-muscle is really the most important source from which the food of 
the fish is derived, and which aids in advancing sexual maturity. Even 
the winter and spring salmon (especially the thin ones) show more or 
less distinct rows of little drops of fat between the fine elementary fibrils. 
of the considerably thicker muscle-fibers, such as are known as indica- 
tions of so-called deterioration of the muscular tissue. About midsum- 
mer, the very time when the ovarium commences to grow more rapidly, 
the number of these drops of fat increases considerably, and even goes. 
so far as tomake some of the fibers quite opaque. The most prominent 
example of degeneration is in a separate thin muscle plate, which lies. 
on the side of the body directly under the skin (the skin-musele). There 
remain, however, almost intact and free from fat, all the other muscles, 
pectoral. fin, neutral fin, dorsal fin, caudal fin, the muscles of the jaw 
and tongue, the upper and lower Jong muscle, and the tail muscles. 
proper. Only the ventral fin showed in some places faint indications of 
degeneration. 

With this, I find there agree the numerous figures obtained by me in: 


weighing the fin-muscles, of which I will give, as a single example, the. 


data relating to the pectoral fins. 


[23] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 449 


TABLE X.—Proportion of weight of the muscles of the pectoral fin (of one side) to the 
weight of body of female summer salmon and spawning salmon. 


’ : | 1,000 parts contain pec- 
Weight of body— Weight of |  toral fin calculated on 
muscles weight of body— 
of the 7 mE 
, : pectoral 
With Without fin. With Withont 
ovarium. | ovarium. ovarium. | ovarium. 
DUTCH FISH. 
May. 31, 1879; ovariaum.31,.......-........ 6, 800 6, 760 19.1 2, 808 | 2, 825 
SALMON CAUGHT BETWEEN BASLE AND 
LAUFENBURG. 
July 1, 1879, ovarium 198 ................ 9, 750 9, 550 34. 23 3, SLL 3, 584 
July 2, 1879, ovariura 300 ................ 9, 700 9, 400 32. 41 3, 341 3, 448 
July 9, 1879, ovarium 291 .............-.- 8, 560 8, 270 30. 45 3, 557 3, 682 
July 21, 1879, ovarium 341 ............... 10, 270 9, 930 | 35. 30 | 3, 437 3, 555 
duly 28; 1879, ovarium 394 .......:....... 7,440 7, 050 26.14 3, 513 3, 708 
August 1, 1879, ovarium 802 ............. 11, 130 10, 330 32. 72 2,940 3, 167 
August 4, 1879, ovarium 429 ............. | 7, 340 6, 910 25.10 3, 420 3, 632 
August 7, 1879, ovarium 279.5..........-.. | &, 980 8, 650 | 30. 03 3, 363 3, 472 
August 25, 1879, ovarium 505 ............ 7, 745 7, 249 26. 69 3, 446 3, 686 
Averavosser eats. 5.24003 Orisa Depa eey mice? | cal @eegeea ed eeeeararnaes 3, 392 3, 548 
November 3, 1879, ovarium 20.40......... | ol 740 5, 700 25. 99 3, 358 4, 560 
November 4,°1879, ovarium 18.18......... | 9, 620 7, 800 34. 30 | 3, 565 4, 397 
November 8, 1879, ovarium 20.44. ........ &, 900 7,190 34. 02 | 3, 822 4, 732 
November 10, 1879, ovarium 20.44......- | 7, 650 | 5, 610 | 24. 85 | 38, 248 4,429 
November 15, 1979, ovarium 16.10........ | 6, 750 5, 180 | 24.71 3, 661 4, 817 
November 22, 1879, ovarium 85........- | 7,510 | 7, 420 Sat | saceter cee. | 4, 462 
November 22; 1879) 117°5. 22-0. 0...002- | 7, 290 | 7,170 | Doe eea| weer a cme aaa 4, 494 
INOVOMDOT: 20 ye sec eccc as waceciae othaedere = | DT30V emereet aes JS1O6 Neeeeneeae 4, 967 
RV ORALO oes e2 pce bctecs deat esee | eo ee een ae eset, Sek | 3, 531 | 4, 607 
| | 


It will be seen from Table X that the muscles of the pectoral fin main- 
tain the same proportion to the weight of the body from summer till 
November, or even—corresponding to the decrease of weight of the 
fish—increase somewhat, thus furnishing proof that the ovarium takes 
the place of muscle-substance which has been used up. 

The decrease of albumen in the fin-muscles is either very small or 
there is no decrease at all. The very muscles, therefore, which are most 
necessary to the fish for its motions, remain singularly free from ema- 
ciation, and are even built up at the expense of substances furnished by 
the muscle of the body. On the other hand, the fact that the-fins re- 
main the same—in spite of the increase of the ovarium—furnishes an- 
other convincing proof that the ovarium cannot be considered merely 
as an addition to the existing body, but is really a substitute for sub- 
stance (belonging to the body) which has been lost. 

All the above facts prove, with absolute certainty, that (with very few 
exceptions) all the Rhine salmon caught between Basel and Laufenburg go 
through their entire sexual development, and the entire growth of the ova- 
rium, at the expense of the body, whilst in the Rhine. 

As regards the male fish I have not such full and accurate calcula- 
tions. The few given below will show, however, beyond a doubt, that 
from midsummer to October there is a very noticeable decrease of 
weight. 

S. Mis. 29-———29 


450 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


TABLE XI.—Average change of weight of male Rhine salmon, from summer till autumn, 
1878; two divisions of equal length, 79 fish in all. 


| 
| 


a oy oH | q SH | ey ~ lel ' 
lens z 2 - Sh ES Te £ S _|Daily decrease 
iS hae | 5 5 | ‘4 # _ ee of weight. 
Beer js 4 MS ee a Oe bei cio eel 
3 AS | Limitsof dates be-;, ¢ as ie Qe; 86 2 | S2 | Boe ; ales 
Sl 3“) 7 tween which the.|, Sle (SE) 9 [Fel ce | esel i) ates 
SWiaesee fish were caught. | 2s | At peal Weert) Seal | MONE des Pp Mey cite 
a nee ep one | & op en €° Esa | aPeS 
2 Sm oS | se | 2 R S Sof S a 
all 3 oe 3 5 g ago Ey ogs 
H| 8 > > | E Be & SSF pea Bes 
51 9 < q |% a | 1A AY G§ | ors 
i | = : | Ie | | . | 
ug_on= |§ June 4 to July 18..) June 26 } 22 | 850.4 | 9723 : 29 | § 106.95 | 2 
T..| 844-855 |} Tuty 22 to Nov. 4..| Sept. 15 | $819 |) 18 | s49.1| 9091 | § 2 |) 100. 00 | $ 7-80 | 9 858 
»9 ong |s dunel to Aug. 10..| July 41) 2 619 | 867.8 | 10657 | 2, 106.74 | 2. 
II.| 863-874 |} Sent. 5 to Nov. 4..| Oct. 4/$97)|} 20 | ses1| 9984 | § © | 2.100. 00 | 57-34 | 9-789 
| | | 


The average decrease of weight of the male fish would be still more 
striking if there did not arrive in the Upper Rhine (late in summer) a 
good many male stragglers, not quite as emaciated, and which some- 
what covered the decrease in older immigrants. But even in these fish 
a considerable decrease of albumen can be noticed in the muscle of the 
body. The flesh of two March salmon, caught near Basel, showed 17.9 
and 19 per cent. of albumen, just like the female fish of the same period ; 
a September salmon (caught September 19) which certainly belonged 
to alater batch of immigrants, and whose testicles were one-third formed, 
showed 16.6 per cent. albumen, and 25.7 per cent. dry substance. Three 
salmon of January, 1880, which had ejected their milt, showed (in 
their muscle) 13.0, 14.3, 13.3 per cent. albumen, respectively. The de- 
crease might, therefore, well be compared with that of the female fish ; 
possibly it was somewhat smaller. But, as the sexual glands need 
much less albumen for their growth than the ovaria, it seems that the 
male fish, corresponding to their greater animation and excitability, 
consume more albumen than the female fish. 

The influence—just referred to—of these stragglers .on the figures 
showing the degrees of emaciation makes itself felt with the female fish 
also, but at an earlier period. Whilst those groups which were com- 
posed of April and May salmon showed considerably greater average 
weights: than summer salmon of the same length, there was almost a 
stand-still in the average weights from June till the end of July or the 
beginning of August; in some groups there was even a slight increase 
(seemingly accidental); but from that time on a constant and consider- 
able increase was noticed. Infact there is among the salmon from these 
months—middle of July till beginning of August—a very distinct dif- 
ference between the older salmon (older as to the time of their arrival) 
and those recently arrived, such as is not found among early spring 
salmen. These last-mentioned fish have dark red and the former pale 
red flesh; the latter have considerable, and the former very little fat ; 
the duodenum of the latter is enveloped in fat, while that of the former 
shows but little fat. When the ovarium has reached one-fifth of its na- 
ture weight by far the larger mass of this fat has disappeared. This 


[25] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 451 


difference is often, but not always, caused by the differences in the de- 
gree of development of the ovaria; for the July salmon, which contained 
the smallest quantity of fat (of all those examined by me July 9, 1877), 
had an ovarium which was only developed one-half of that of a very fat 
salmon of August 1. 

This difference gradually vanishes from the beginning of August; the 
female September salmon, but still more the October salmon, are, apart 
from individual differences of bodily build, equally lean as to flesh and 
intestines. 

To follow up these data, as regards the male fish, the measure of the 
length of nose, which, since September 1, 1878, was taken in fish of 
both sexes, is important. While in the female fish the average length 
of nose remains the same, an elongation of the jaw can be noticed in 
most male fish at an early date, and makes it possible to determine the 
sex (with the exception of a small percentage of doubtful individuals) as 
early as April and May. 

Whilst in the male June salmon (length—exclusive of nose—8s00 to 
910 centimeters) the length of the nose, in nine cases out of ten, varied 
between 5.4 and 6.4 per cent. of the weight of the body, and once in an 
exceptional case rose as high as 7.0 per cent., the same or very,nearly 
the same minimum figures occur during the whole of July and August, 
although not very frequently, while the maximum figures become higher 
and more frequent. J'rom September on, and all through October, both 
the minimum and the maximum figures increase, whilst the difference 
of the extremes decreases tosome extent. But even in November there 
is a very considerable difference of length of nose in fully matured fish, 
whose size and shape are otherwise very nearly equal ; and Lam inclined 
to consider these differences as indications of different dates of arrival. 

This will be the proper place to make use of the data relating to the 
numerical proportion between the two sexes, which I obtained from the 
weighing-lists [ had kept without regard to individual differences. For 
1879 I have made my calculations with the aid of the length of nose 
from June 1 whilst for 1878 I did not do this until July 1, at which time 
the sex may easily be determined, even without this aid. The average 
of both years shows as the average proportion of the sexes: 62.6 per 
cent. females, and 37.4 per cent. males. 


452 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


TABLE XII.—Numerical proportion of sexes among the Ihine salmon caught semi-monthly 
between Basel and Laufenburg. 


1878. 1879. 
Of 100 salmon there Of 100 salmon there 
Number | Number are— Number | Number are— 
of of of of 
females. | males. females. | males. 
Females.| Males. Females.| Males. 
ae ee | =| | 
July 1to15........ | 97 44 68. 8 31.2 4 | 23 85. 2 14.8 
duly 16 to 31...-.-.. | 104 41 ed, 28.3 12 38 76.0 24.0 
August 1 to 15..... 78 22 78. 0 22.0 15 46 75.3 24.6 
August 16 to 31..-. 37 13 74.0 26.0 29 71 71.0 29.0 
September 1 to 15..| 52 29 64. 2 35. 8 17 37 68. 5 31.5 
September 16 to 30.) 37 42 46.8 53.25 34 41 54.7 45.3 
October 1 to 15... .| 64 33 66. 0 34.0 79 79 50. 0 50.0 
October 16 to 31. -..) 53 55 49.0 50.9 45 37 45.1 54.9 
November 1 to 30-.- 47 19 71.2 28.8 52 63 54.8 45. 2 
569 298 65.6| 34.4 311 460 59.5. 40.5 


From the above table a corresponding change will be observed in 
both years in the numerical proportion of the sexes. Till the end of 
August the female fish are in the majority ; during September the males 
gradually increase so that the numbers become almost equal, and in 
October the relative proportions are about the same. As there is noth- 
ing in the quality of the fish, in their color, length of nose, and qual- 
ity of the flesh, to point to such a late immigration in great masses; as 
the October figures show great irregularities, and as, moreover, the 
females are again more numerous in November, [ consider it probable 
that the females during the last stage of the ovarian development 
keep much quieter than the males, and are therefore not caught as 
frequently. Mr. Glaser shares this view. It is not impossible, how- 
ever, that a larger number of such males as have hitherto roamed 
about in the Central and Lower Rhine immigrate into our region at so 
late a period. 

There are instances of direct immigration of fresh fish. In 1877 and 
1879 I observed (as an entirely exceptional case, however) male fish 
which undoubtedly were late immigrants. They had the appearance of 
summer salmon; their skin showed red spots, but was not quite as 
thick and dark as that of summer salmon; the nose was short (5 to 6 
per cent.‘of the length of the body, instead of 8 to 11), the hook was 
less developed; there was a considerable quantity of intestinal fat, and 
the flesh was still red. But these fish, of which I took note during the 
period, November to January, were never (sexually) mature. (Notices 
regarding the testicles of 4 fish, among them 2 by Prof. His, 1870).* 
The weights and the degrees of. maturity, ascertained by microscopical 
observations, differed very much, and corresponded to the normal organs 
from August till the beginning of October. The question here was by 


*Mr. Glaser remembers only two cases in 19 years where he succeeded in squeez- 
ing a little semen from such late-comers, during a late spawning season. 


[27] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. ADd3 


no means one. of barrenness, but one of retarded formation of normal 
elements. These fish are, as a rule, called winter salmon, and fetch 
prices like these; but they must by no means be confounded with the 
genuine winter salmon described above, which do not spawn till Novem- 
ber and December of the following year. 

The observations which I made relative to these late-comers are, in 
my opinion, a certain proof that for the male fish the short migration- 
period from the sea to Basel does not suffice to complete the entire sex- 
ual development up to the point of maturity, much as the rate at 
which this development goes on may vary between individual fish. The 
probability, therefore, becomes still greater than would appear from 
what has been said above, that the entire spawning generation of one 
year consists of fish which have staid in the Rhine several months 
longer than the shortest period occupied by the migration from the sea. 

Neither during the spawning season nor later have I seen female 
fish whose general appearance stamped them as fresh immigrants ; it 
is a matter of doubt with me whether the very rare, fall-ripe female 
fish which occurred in January 1879 and (in 1880) even as late as Feb- 
ruary 20 belong to this category. I had my suspicions regarding a 
very lean fish, of the middle of November, 1879, which had a clear 
skin, and an ovarium only weighing 16.5 per cent. of the weight of the 
body, and containing comparatively small eggs; all this, however, 
might have been caused by the unusually small quantity of flesh. 

The different links of the long series of internal and external changes, 
by which the spring salmon is transformed into the spawning salmon, 
run, as a general rule, parallel, but not with mathematical accuracy. 
The gristle of the nose and chin begins to grow before there is any sign of 
development in the testicles; and before the testicles have reached one- 
eighth of their mature weight the skin oiten shows very distinctred spots. 
It would also frequently lead to mistakes if one were to determine— 
say in August or September—the stage of development of the sexual 
glands by the degree of development to which the hook formation has 
attained. On the one hand we see the influence of the different seasons 
of migration, and on the other hand we see the effort (notwithstanding 
this difference) to finish the sexual development for the same time of 
spawning. In short, the development of the sexual organs is not the 
direct cause of external influences, but is only indirectly connected with 
them. : 

Finally, I have to make brief mention of an internal organ which 
exhibits some very curious phenomena. The spleen, which is now gen- 
erally considered as a gland forming blood, appears in the winter sal- 
mon as a tough, brown, insignificant organ, weighing about yooe to 
soso Of the weight of the body. In May a swelling is observed to 
commence in the female fish, in the shape of dark-red raised knots, 
which increase ix size and number, and combine, till, about the end of 
June or sometime in July, the organ has reached 15 to 20 times of the 


454. REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [28] 


weight of the spleen, then at its smallest, and has become smooth, 
shining, dark-red, tender, and resembling coagulated blood. From that 
time on it shrivels again, and at the beginning of September is smaller 
than it ever was before, weighing now 37/55 to ss5p of the entire weight 
of the body. In this condition it remains till the spawning season, 
and begins to increase shortly before the fish return to the sea. The 
volume of the spleen likewise changes in the male fish, but not in as 
regular a manner as in the female; it decreases and increases several 
times during the summer, until the largest size is reached, in the begin- 
ning of October (as much as 74; of the weight of the body). During 
the spawning season it again decreases in size and weight. 

This swelling is nothing else than a filling up with liquid blood. Under 
the microscope we see a net-work of beams, which, combined, form a sort 
of sponge. The outermost branches of the arteries open (as has been 
proved by injections) into the meshes of this sponge, and from this very 
same sponge the capillary vessels of the veins receive their supply. But 
these meshes may be either nearly empty or filled to repletion, accord- 
ing to the degree of contraction of the muscles of the arteries. This 
blood (as has been shown by comparing the coloring quality of the 
watery extract from the spleen with blood from the heart) is much richer 
in blood-particles than the circulating blood from the heart; the sponge 
acts upon the bleod like an imperfect filter, partly retaining or keeping 
back the blood-particles, and at the same time, acts like a basin in the 
sea, in which the rapid current becomes slower, and drops its heavy accu- 
mulations. The whole mass of blood which is retained may, under differ- 
ent mechanical conditions, again join in the general circulation. As is 
shown by numerous comparisons between the veinous blood from the 
spleen and the blood from the heart, colorless blood-cells are formed in 
this stagnant blood, but, as it seems to me, not in such a degree as to 
thereby exhaust the significance of so remarkable an occurrence. 
Weighty reasons lead me to the opinion that such a temporary retaining 
of one-fourth to one-third of the entire quantity of blood, during certain 
phases of the sexual development, forms an important link in the chain 
of causes by which the great change in the internal economy of the en- 
tire body, described above, is introduced. This is not the place to enter 
more fully upon the discussion of this question. I only mention these 
curious phenomena of the spleen as further proof that the most radical 
changes in the formation of the saimon go on during its stay in fresh 
water. 


STATISTICS RELATIVE TO THE MIGRATIONS OF THE RHINE SALMON. 


The question of age.-—At what age do the salmon, for the first time, 
migrate and spawn? Do they spawn every year or at greater intervals? 
Do they perhaps only spawn once in their life, and die soon after? 

Such and similar questions have often been asked from a scientific 
and from a practical point of view; and I feel it my duty to examine 


[29] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 455 


whether the facts at my disposal—especially the numerous measurements 
—will throw any light on these questions. x 

For this purpose I divided the salmon caught between Basel and Law- 
Senburg, keeping the males separate from the*females, and also sepa- 
rating the fish of 1878 from those of 1879 into groups of 20 millimeters 
difference, accepting as a constant their length (counting this with the 
males from the nostril, and with the females from the front part of the 
head, to the root of the tail), and from these groups constructed curves, 
the abscissas of which corresponded to the lengths of the fish, and the 
ordinates to the figures indicating the dates of occurrence of these lengths. 
The regularity of these curves* shows that they rest on a reliable basis, 
and at the same time proves the accuracy of the measurements. 

The first thing to strike us, with both sexes, is, that certain sizes are 
either entirely or almost lacking. If any further proof were required 
that not a single salmon goes through its entire development while in 
the Rhine, this fact would furnish it. From the line indicating 0, or 
from a slight elevation above this line, the curves showing the periods 
of migration rise like finely-shaped mountains with a maximum height 
and slopes on both sides. With the males, three elevations may be 
recognized in both years, resembling each other. The first gives the 
small salmon, the so-called St. Jacob’s salmon, weighing 1,500 to 3,000 
grams. As will be seen from the Dutch market reports, these are mostly 
late immigrants, which do not occur on the price-lists until July and 
August, and which, though in comparatively small numbers, reach us 
in September or October. The height of this curve, therefore, does not 
furnish an exact standard for estimating the numerical proportion of the 
immigration of these young fish. The second elevation contains such 
sizes as are found with us in September and October, with an average 
weight of 3,800 to 6,600; the third elevation shows the fish for the same 
months, but with an average weight of 6,600 to 13,000. If we had more 
data we would probably be able to construct a fourth elevation. Before 
proceeding any further we give the statistics in tabulated form: 


* These curves are not reproduced in the translation.—EDITOR. 


[30] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


456 


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458 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [32] 


In examining the three elevations we are, first of all, struck by their 
very considerable breadth. This points either to very great individual 
differences of growth, especially in youth, or—which appears far more 
plausible—to an unequal age of the fish when they firstimmigrate. Per- 
sons who have raised trout will be better able to decide than I whether 
differences of 20 to 30 per cent. of length and 80 to 100 per cent. of 
weight occur in fish of equal age, or in younger fish of otherwise normal 
conditions of life. It is improbable that these differences are merely 
produced by differences of food, because (according to Mr. Glaser’s and 
my own observations) the smaller St. Jacob’s salmon appear to be well 
fed, to judge from their shape and the condition of their flesh. 

Is it, moreover, merely accidental that both the starting points and 
the maxima of the first curve are at an exactly equal distance from the 
second as the second from the third, and, therefore, show exactly the 
same increase in length? As it can only be a question of whole years, 
either the vertebral column grows between the first and second period 
exactly two or three times quicker or slower than between the second 
and third, or (which seems to me more probable) the increase of length 
of the vertebral column takes place at the same periods, and to the 
same amounts; and this equal distance would then be an indication of 
' equal differences of time between the three fresh-water periods. 

The heights of the curves likewise deserve some attention. The small 
St. Jacob’s salmon of the first curve are of no account in this calculation, 
as they do not come in our neighborhood. On the other hand, it is 
surprising that the third curve corresponds to twice as many fish as the 
second, whilst (by fishing and mortality) one would expect the older fish 
to be much Jess numerous than the younger ones. Is this caused by 
the greater ease with which they can escape from the net? In that case 
the St. Jacob’s salmon must be still more rare. Do not these male fish 
of average size migrate to the Upper Rhine as frequently as the larger 
fish, or does only the smaller portion of the St. Jacob’s salmon of one 
year which have returned to the sea again appear during the next sea- 
son? and does the greater portion come a year later, and perhaps make 
their appearance in the Rhine for the first time? Nothing but further 
observations as to the relative frequency of the different sizes, made on 
the Lower Rhine, can solve this problem. 

As regards the difference of time (always supposing that the same fish 
occur in two successive curves), mt will not be proper to class all fish under 
one and the same category. , for instance, the male fish of the 
spawning season 1878 (middle a November till middle of December) 
could hardly have again reached the Rhine before the beginning or 
middle of January, it is self evident that the exceedingly fat winter 
and spring salmon, with very short nose, which immigrate into Holland 
as early as November, 1878, to March, 1879, and reach Basel from Jan- 
uary to May, must have skipped the spawning season of 1878, This 
possibly also applies to one or two later months. On the other hand, I 


[33] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 459 


do not consider it impossible that among the later immigrants of 1879 
there are many male fish which have still gone through the spawning 
period of 1878. This supposition would be the easiest explanation of 
the fact that—the length being equal—the winter and spring salmon 
are so much fatter and heavier than those among the August and Sep- 
tember male fish (near Basel) which show indications of recent immi- 
gration in their color and nose, because the former have had more time 
to fatten in the sea. The same proportion would also apply to early 
and late salmon if the recent immigration of male fish from the spawn- 
ing period 1878 would be placed in the year 1880. Supposing that the 
majority of the male salmon returns every year, there results a lowest 
possible minimum age for a male salmon begotten on the Ist December, 
874, and hatched on the 1st February, 1875, which participated in all 

‘three migrations, viz: 
First migration (as young salmon) to the sea, spring of 

Meso) 3 Sg 2s |e ae a SAP ene About 1 year. 
First spawning season (as St. Jacob’s salmon), near 

Basel, partly in December, 1877, and partly in 1878. 23 to 33 years. 
Second spawning season (as salmon proper), weighing 


3$ to 64 kilograms, December, 1878, and 1879 ...... 33 to 43 years. 
Third spawning season (as salmon proper), weighing 
64 to 13 kilograms, December, 1879, and 1880 ..-.-- 43 to 52 years. | 


I must, however, consider it just as probable that every interval be- 
tween the three last stages is one year longer; for I must confess that 
I cannot willingly accustom myself to think that so fine a fish as the 
salmon should be destined to starve throughout the greater portion of 
its adult stage, antl should only eat with feverish voracity during short 
intervals between the starving periods, and yet grow during such peri- 
ods at an enormous rate. 

I think, moreover, that the influence of the feeding-process is rather 
overestimated, by supposing that, in 14 years, the small migrating sal- 
mon, weighing only 20 to 25 grams and measuring 7 to 9 centimeters,* 
should be transformed into the St. Jacob’s aot which returns in 
June or July, and is seven times as long and 100 to 150 times as heavy, 
whilst the two-year old salmon of our waters which has remained with us, 
and which I occasionally observed, weighs about 80 to 100 grams. We 
would, therefore, certainly have to allow 2} years for development from 
the a migrating salmon to the St. Saco s salmon, and for the large 
St. Jacob’s salmon probably one year more. 

But why should we trouble ourselves with suppositions regarding a 
size which can be accurately determined according to our methods? 


*AsI did not have an opportunity to personally examine any specimens, I make 
use of an estimate by Mr. Glaser, which may have to be corrected. 

+A very successful experiment was made to produce impregnation w ith the semen 
of such a salmon weighing about 100 grams. Ihave never seen mature females of 
this kind. 


460 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [34] 


About 100 or 200 small salmon should be measured in the sea, and near 
the mouths of the Rhine, at a certain season of the year, if possible in one 
certain month (as the length does not always remain the same). These 
fish would certainly—as to their length—be classed among those the 
catching of which is forbidden by law; but the result would justify an 
exception; as the arrival of the great mass of the young fish is limited 
to a certain season of the year, the different migrations would show on 
the curves constructed from such measurements, like annual rings. So 
far all attempts to obtain such a determination of the age by the mark- 
ing of young salmon have been in vain. But even supposing that fish 
thus marked are caught again, the result of the statistical method is 
much more valuable, because it alone ‘can select from among the numer- 
ous exceptions and variations which doubtless occur in the conditions 
of life of these fish with absolute certainty, those fundamental rules on 
which everything depends. 

Irom these and other reasons, to be considered later, I prefer to 
designate the time which elapses till the young salmon’ had been 
transformed from a small fish into the St. Jacob’s salmon simply by ¢; 
and by introducing this unknown quantity to designate the following 
determination of the age of the fish as the more probable one in most 
cases in as far as fish which participate in all migrations are con- 
cerned: 


Migration of the young salmon to the sea ...-..- 1 year. 
Kirst spawning period of the St. Jacob’s salmon: 
Smallispecimens. 4544).8.7756- ob Wiese hous 1+ ¢ years. 
hares Specimens +8224. Sete hls tee eee ee 2+ ¢ years. 
Second spawmins period. f5 85 se ee eee eee 3+tand 44 ¢ years. 
Phird spawning periods: 0), 2 Adeeee eee 5+¢ and 64 ¢ years. 


The curve indicating the sizes of the females is much easier to under- 
stand than that of the males. Here, likewise, three elevations may be 
noticed. Hemale salmon of the first migration are very rare near Basel, 
and the data had to be supplemented by measuring St. Jacob’s salmon 
from Wesel (September 23 to October 13, 1879). Here the females are 
likewise in the minority; the Wesel salmon referred to (which were, 
distinguished by the length of their nose) showed one-fourth females 
and three-fourths males. 

The curves of the second and third immigration are very distinetly 
Shown in the Basel salmon of both years. I am inclined to ascribe the 
considerable breadth of all three curves, just as with the male fish, first 
of all to differences of age in the first immigration which return at every 
succeeding migration, and to other differences of the intervals between 
the years of migration; and only in the second place to individual differ- 
ences of growth. Attention should also be directed to the circumstance 
that the maxima of the three curves are not, as with the males, equi- 
distant from each other, but that the proportion of the first distance to 
the second is as 10 or 11 to 7, or 3 to 2. Its proportion to the distance 


[35] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 461 


between maximum [and IT, with the males of 1879, is neither 1:1 nor 2:1, 
but nearer 3:2 than either of the two former proportions. This decid- 
edly favors the supposition that, with most males, the interval between 
the first and second spawning period is two, and with most females 
three years; the interval between the second and third spawning period 
being two years. It is also probable that the agé at which the first 
immigration takes place differs greatly. 

With the females the numerical majority of the third immigration 
over the second, and—considering the small number of female St. Jacob’s 
salmon—probably also over the first, is very, marked: 


Number of fish 
of the— To every 100 of 
the second curve 
l the third curve 
j Second | Third | contains— 
curve. | curve. | 


FER eke ee ee eet 642 | 86 | 748.0 
64 


In 1878 not less than 277 fish, or 58 per cent. of all the fish of that 
season, are found included in the narrow limits of length of 861 to 900 
millimeters (average weight on the 12th October about 8.0 to 9.3 
kilograms). 

Is thiseonly caused by the circumstance that the majority of these 
medium-sized fish do not go as far up the Rhine as Basel? My numer- 
ous measurements of Dutch salmon, taken at different seasons of the 
year during three years, do not seem to favor such a supposition. 
Although on two different occasions I found a small number of Dutch 
salmon measuring 700 and 800 millimeters, the large females were, next 
to the St. Jacob’s salmon, decidedly in the majority. Mr. Glaser, whose 
experience as an old importer of Dutch salmon gives considerable 
weight to his opinion on this subject, is prepared to corroborate my 
view. Until we obtain more exact data regarding the salmon of the 
Lower Rhine, therefore, I consider it highly probable that many of the 
females of the third curve (measuring 800 to 960 millimeters in length) 
had only migrated once before, or even were now visiting the Rhine for 
the first time. Such fish will, of course, grow into the limits of the third 
curve at an earlier age, because they escaped the disturbing influence 
(to their growth) of one or both of the former migrations. What they 
gain thereby will not, however, be sufficient in many cases. Some of 
them stop at this intermediary stage, and thus the lack of a deep de- 
pression between Curves IT and III (making it almost appear as if the 
sharp lines between the two main curves were obliterated by the inter- 
polation of a third and smaller curve) is explained by the supposition 
of such an immigration which has been retarded. one year. If these 
same fish immigrate once more, we shall find them in the right lower 
portion of Curve III. 


462 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [36] 


I therefore consider it probable that the spawning period of the 
salmon of the second curve (length, without tail, 680 to 790 millimeters) 
is for the majority three and for the minority four years later, and with 
the salmon of the third curve (from 791 millimeters on), four, five, and 
six years later than the spawning period of the St. Jacob’s salmon, to 
determine the age of which I feel utterly incompetent. On the other 
hand, it seems strange that everything comes to an abrupt close with 
this powerful third curvé and its steep slopes. Females of exception- 
ally heavy weight, weighing more than 12 kilograms (during the spawn- 
ing period), are very rare. I consider this as a proof of the truth of the 
assertion that the salmon fisheries certainly interfere with the keeping 
up of the species. J believe that but very few of those female salmon 
which have not gone through a spawning period as St. Jacob’s salmon 
spawn three times during their lives. The circumstance that most fish 
do not participate in every spawning period to which their age would en- 
title them is perhaps the only cause which has saved the salmon fisheries in 
the Rhine from complete decadence, and which has kept the average 
weight of the Basel Rhine salmon at about 8 kilograms. 

In reviewing this whole subject [ feel compelled to warn people not 
to apply the experiences gained in other rivers to the Rhine salmon, and 
vice versa. Among many imported river salmon (with empty intestines) 
which I had occasion to observe in the course of many years, and which, 
according to Mr. Glaser’s statement, came partly from the Oder and 
partly from the Elbe, the fish of the second curve were decidedly in the 
majority ; and this could hardly have been brought about by the char- 
acter of the orders for these fish. The Swedish salmon, on the other 
hand, were very much mixed, and among them I found more exception- 
ally large fish, weighing 16 to 21 kilograms, than among any other kind. 

The habits of migration, therefore, seem to vary in the different rivers, 
perhaps according to the length of the route traveled and the extent 
of distribution in the sea within which certain kinds are found. 

From what is known relative to the salmon fisheries of Scotland and 
Norway, the habits of life of the fish, even, seem to vary. Very prob- 
ably the flesh does in all cases furnish building material for the ovarium, 
but doubtless in greatly varying degree. 


WINTER SALMON. 


After the curves, showing the length of the fish, have led us to the 
view that the conditions of migration of the Rhine salmon can show 
various exceptions from the general rule (supposing, of course, that any 
such rule can be laid down), we shall feel justified in using this cireum- 
stance in explanation of various striking phenomena. The appearance 
of the so-called winter salmon has always been considered as a mys- 
terious problem in the biology of the salmon. These winter salmon 
immigrate from the sea simultaneously with the last spawning salmon, 
from September on, in small numbers (Dutch market reports), and from 


[37] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 463 


October on in larger numbers, and are nearly every year caughtin small 
numbers near Basel in November; they are fat fish, with red flesh, and 
fetch 24 to 3 times as high a price as the spawning salmon. These fish, 
with their diminutive testicles and ovaria, have by many people been 
considered as a sort of barren variety of the salmon. But I have said 
before, that already during the first spring months, March and April 
(when the salmon increase in number), the ovaria increase arithmetically 
slow, but in a very considerable geometrical progression, until the large 
schools of summer salmon, which appear from May till July, show them- 
selves as the undoubted candidates of the next spawning season. Soon, 
however, no former winter salmon can be distinguished from the sum- 
mer Salmon, at least not by any less development of the sexual organs. 

If we observe these winter salmon closer—from November to March— 
we are first of all struck with the fact that, with few exceptions, they 
are very large fish, belonging as to length to the fish of maximum length, 
and to the second half of the third curve (length exceeding 860 milli- 
meters). Also the Dutch fish—January and beginning of March—of 
which I have measurements, were, with few exceptions, within the same 
limits of size (861 to 970).* Among 99 Rhine salmon, the sex of most 
of which had not been determined (there being no decided difference of 
nose between males and females), from the months of January to March, 
1878 to 1880, only five measured between 835 and 860 millimeters, whilst 
all the others measured more (as much as 975, and one even $90 milli- 
meters); whilst during May and June, 1878 (just as in 1879), the salmon 
of the second curve came in large numbers, the St. Jacob’/s salmon mak- 
ing their appearance from July on. 

By comparing nine winter salmon, which (by opening them) have 
been found to be females, and which are all of one and the same size, 
with the highest average weight (of a group) of the next division or 
group, comprising salmon of the same size, I found (although there are 
of course slight differences of shape) an excess of average weight over 
the summer salmon (June, July, and August) amounting to 990 grains, 
or 10 to 11 per cent. 

That this cannot merely be ascribed to differences of ‘‘shape,” but to 
an accumulation of reserve matter will be seen by a determination of 
the muscles of the pectoral fin of a Basel female salmon, made on the 
5th April, which show these muscles to weigh 3.06 per cent. of the weight 
of the entire body (these same muscles in a Dutch salmon of March 15, 
weighing very nearly the same, viz, 3.03 per cent.), whilst otherwise 
the weight of these same muscles in eight Basel salmon (excepting, how- 
ever, the strange fish caught August 1, 1879) varied between 5.54 and 


* As higher prices are paid in the Dutch markets for large salmon than for small 
salmon, while in the Basel market there is no such difference, no mercantile interests 
can here come into play. 

tCould this fish (length 940 millimeters, entire weight 11,130, and weight of ovarium 
808 grams) be an individual which was intended for a winter salmon, but which im- 
migrated too late? ’ 


464 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [38] 


3.56 per cent. And still the great increase of the salmon fisheries in 
Holland during March and April, and near Basel from May to July, 
shows, without a doubt, that among the July and August salmon there 
must be many new immigrants, which is also indicated by the differ- 
ences in the degree of maturity. 


TABLE XIV.—Female winter salmon from the Rhine, near Basel. 


~*~ Wo 
= a8 BE 
& a) 8 
re ai aoe: 5 
a= : oe eh 
5 ‘=| bp 2a 
Slo eunlae ees ne 
Date. = eo By ot ae 
E 5 5 a ¥ 
a 4 =| | eee alemes 
| &D oo a. ® 
| 8 o ONS b0 a 
A | A 
December 10, 1877 .--- 875 10, 200 9, 190 1, 010 
January 30, 1878 .--- 878 11, 200 9, 190 2,010 
November 9, 1879... 907 11, 210 10, 233 977 
November 16, 1879. - 870 10, 140 9, 190 950 
November 25, 1879. - ae 888 10, 880 9, 790 1, 090 
March) 1318802 <2 33-26 ee epee aS 885 10, 860 9, 790 570 
March t20 C1880): aaciecoe este ecies secre amare eleinciniteelseiesie eh 884 9, 620 9, 190 430 
March, 20. LOs0se-< 6.08 Sere kat fetec whe aie Se eee ee | 897 | 10,090! 10,044 46 
PRTC DN 1680 be ae scence eer tee ett ry ines eee me | 885 | 10, 950 9, 190 1, 860 
Average difforenGes st... <sccciesce ceiieseossteece esceise eaten ie a oa | 994 
| 


In other words, the winter salmon and the early spring salmon are fish 
which, to begin with, have brought a larger amount of fat from the sea 
than the summer salmon. They need not, therefore, as Barfurth thinks, 
return to the sea, but their condition permits them to starve half a year 
longer. In view of these differences, the similarity (as to leanness) 
of the spawning salmon is very singular, as is (ignoring the rare late- 
comers) the relative constant difference between the amount of albumen 
and fat as compared with the greatly varying differences of the sum- 
mer salmon. The lowest figures correspond to those fish which have al- 
ready spawned, and which in consequence begin to grow lean very 
rapidly. I therefore agree with Barfurth that a certain degree of ema- 
ciation is, from causes regarding which we can as yet hardly venture a 
supposition, in both sexes a necessary, or at least profitable or favorable, 
condition of the complete development of the sexual organs, or of the 
act of copulation. And the different conditions of migration aim at 
reaching a comparatively normal spawning condition at the right time, 
and at the same time for all fish, no matter from what different points 
they have started in the race for life. The fat fish, therefore, as a 
general rule, immigrate earlier than the lean fish. 

’ As the causes, to which the constantly recurring typical differences 
of natural phenomena may be traced, become simpler as the statistical 
data, which show them, become numerically larger, I consider the differ- 
ent length of the fattening-period, viz, of the scjourn in the sea, as the 
simplest cause of the varying quantity of fat found in the immigrating 
salmon. 


P39] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 465 


The winter salmon are, in my opinion, therefore, fish which have been 
én the sea for alonger period of time, compared with the majority of their 
future companions in spawning, either— 

(1.) By having skipped the entire spawning period by a period of 
more than one year; or, 

(2.) By letting one more years intervene between two spawning peri- 
ods. Possibly both cases occur. 

The fish have thereby become longer than the majority of their future 
companions in spawning; they consequently belong to the right half of 
the third curve (showing size), but they have also become fatter, and 
therefore immigrate earlier, in order to reach their normal spawning 
condition. The gain in time which they have made is divided into an 
increasing and a decreasing phase, whereby they again reach the level 
of the rest.* 

There may also be smaller fish, which go through the same course, 
because during the normal period they had an opportunity to fatten to 
an extraordinary degree. It is also possible that some fish which, as to 
age, correspond to the winter salmon,t on account of not having ready 
access to suitable food, join the later immigrants. 

In reviewing this whole question one should not be led astray by dif- 
ferencs of shape, which may occasion great differences of weight in fish 
whose length is the same. I would therefore recommend not only an 
analysis of the flesh of the body, but more especially the proportion of 
the muscles of the pectoral fins to the weight of the body, as a standard 
by which to measure the amount of reserve substance contained in the 
body. 

It will also appear from the above remarks that it would be a mistake 
to determine the emaciation by two series of data showing the weights 
of fish at any two periods differing about two months. The influence 
of great masses of salmon coming in July would disarrange the curve 
still more, if the new immigrants were not somewhat leaner to begin 
with. We therefore (possibly) owe the plausible result, in part at least, 
to the fact that various mistakes neutralize each other. Not till the 
middle or end of July, when from other causes I must consider the 
immigration of females into our waters as almost finished, can I pay 
closer attention to the figures indicating emaciation; in my opinion it 
is only tfrom.that time that the actual change of substance (Stoffwechsel) 
commences. 

I have finally to direct attention to a sort of counterpart of the fat 
winter salmon. In reviewing the six groups (or divisions) of female 
salmon, each containing fish of equal length, considerable variations 


* Some exceptionally lean spring salmon had fallen off very much owing to an in- 
vasion of leeches; they had gatherings in various parts of the body, and the rays of 
the fins had begun to fester. Not every lean spring salmon can, therefore, be adduced 
as proof against the truth of my view. 

t Only those muscles which form the bones of the extremities extend to the basis of 
the rays of the fins. 

S. Mis. 29-———30 


466 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [40] 


must be looked upon as perfectly natural, but in some groups (not till 
July, however) some individuals attract attention by their exception- 
ally small weight, whilst there is no difference of length. Such fish, 
(some of which I myself have seen) occur only in isolated instances, 
one or two being found in a group, and they differ from the next small- 
est by 500 to 1,000 grams. We evidently have here extremes not pro- 
duced by natural causes, but by some extraordinary cause. I have 
sometimes thought that these fish are possibly the counterparts of the 
winter salmon—impatient fish, which, after their return to the sea, | 
do not skip the spawning period, but which immigrate as early as the 
summer of the same year, though their quantity of substance is as yet 
incomplete. Against this, however, speaks the very small weight of 
the pectoral fins (5.26 per cent. of the body) in a November salmon 
which I examined. If, moreover, we take those fish from all groups 
which differ very considerably from the average weight, and place them 
in groups, each varying from the other by 100 grams, we find no tend- 
ency whatever in these figures to form an independent curve; they are 
and remain scattered and disconnected figures. I therefore consider it 
probable, at least for the present, that these are pathological cases— 
fish which, during an invasion of leeches (much feared in early sum- 
mer, especially when the water is low), or owing to some disease, have 
lost some of their substance. Supposing this to be the case, I have 
excluded these scattered figures from the calculation of the averages. 
Their number is very small (about 15 among 470). 

The emaciation of the Rhine salmon in fresh water, which is really 
the main point of our entire investigation, has now been viewed by us 
from two standpoints, viz, as self-consumption, in its relation to the 
length of the starving condition, and as a yielding of substance for the 
building up of the ovarium. Both these processes require albumen and 
fat; both draw albumen and fat from the muscle of the trunk, which in 
March salmon, and even in winter (December) salmon, shows distinct 
traces of fatty degeneration. But whilst the self-consumption uses 
much fat, but very little albumen, as is shown conclusively by a com- 
parison of the spring salmon with the midsummer salmon, the growing 
demand of the ovarivum for substance makes considerable inroads on 
the albumen of the muscle of the trunk in a progression which is not. 
quite regular, and has the same effect as a wasting disease, no matter 
whether there is much fat or not. Where, therefore, are we to look for 
the analogy, and where for the difference of these two processes? 

The solution of this problem is, in my opinion, found in the condition 
of the muscles of the fins and of the head, regarding which I have nu- 
merous data, showing weights and quantities of albumen; these mus- 
cles but rarely share in the fatty degeneration, and they decrease but 
little, if any, in weight and albumen. What can be the cause? That 
it cannot be a so-called ‘morphological cause” (which, to me, is an en- 
tirely vague idea, though some other people may be able to fathom it) is 


7 


[41] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. AGT 


~ elearly shown by the circumstance that the muscles of the ventral fins, 
_ which most assuredly are not homologous with the muscles of the trunk, 
form an exception to the rule. The muscles of the ventral fins degen- 


erate in a moderate degree; and, though they show a marked decrease 


of albumen, it is by no means as striking as that of the muscles of the 


trunk. 
At first sight one would feel inclined to think of the nerves on which 
the condition of the muscles depends to a large degree. But in vain 


_have I sought for degenerated nervous fibers; and, moreover, how can 


it be possible that primitive bundles, some of which are greatly and 
others but little or not at all degenerated, should be found close to- 
gether, as—considering the very small number of nerve-fibers entering 
from the spinal marrow—large masses of muscle are supplied by 
branches of a primitive fiber? 

It therefore seems necessary to turn in another direction for the de- 
sired explanation. In soaking portions of different muscles of a salmon 
(which have been carefully weighed), such as those of the pectoral, ven- 
tral, dorsal, and anal fins, and those of the tail and the tongue, in equal 
quantities of water, we find—as the result of nnmberless experiments— 
that, without exception, the muscle of the trunk produces the extract 
having the least color of blood. Next to it comes the ventral fin, whilst 
the reddest extract, often possessing a threefold coloring power, is pro- 
ducedfrom the pectoral fin.* The same result is obtained with sea sal- 
mon, whose trunk muscle shows no signs of degeneration. It is the ex- 
pression of the varying wealth of blood-vessels, which is also noticed in 
preparing fish. 

As the fish in question is a starving fish, the blood cannot be con- 
sidered as a food-giving liquid, but can only come into play in as far 
as it is of importance for breathing. 

Here the accepted axioms of physiology leave us in the lurch. When- 


ever it was reported that the organs of a famishing animal decreased in 


varying degrees, these were principally supposed to be differences in 
the self-consumption of the organs. In view of this, the grand effort 
of the Rhine salmon—the building-up of its ovarium from the muscle 
of the trunk, will hardly be considered by any one as an isolated bio- 
logical curiosity. Essentially analogous occurrences probably take place 
a thousand times under circumstances which are far more difficult to 
understand. In my opinion the experience which we have gathered 
with regard to the Rhine salmon is destined to extend our knowledge 
of the dependence of the life of the cells on external causes, by adding 
another fundamental principle, in which, possibly, one of the most im- 
portant laws of nature as to the formation of portions of the animal body 
may lie concealed. 

There is a period in the life of the cells of active animal tissue in 


*The muscle of the skin cannot be considered in this connection, because its fibers 
contain the coloring matter of blood. 


468 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [42] 


which this tissue decreases in quantity, not only by self-disintegration, 
but by protoplasm (organized albumen), being transformed to not or- 
ganized, soluble albumen, which is absorbed by the juices of the body 
(‘liquidation’). 

The same tissue may to-morrow absorb, under different circumstances, 
the same substances which it has given up to day, and grow at their 
expense. 

The conditions of the giving up of albumen are insufficient breathing, in- 
sufficient in proportion to the energy displayed in the dividing processes 
(Spaltungs-vorgdnge), and, more than anything else, an insufficient sup- 
ply of oxygen; this supply must not, however, go below a certain mini- 
mum for any length of time.* If this is not the case, the decrease con- 
tinues until the equilibrium has again been restored between the de- 
mand of the decreased quantity of tissue and the conditions of breathing. 

The conditions of growth and absorption of substances are, amongst 
the rest, an ample supply of oxygen and the proper evacuation of the 
products of disintegration. 

The substance which is formed is, besides salts containing phosphoric 
acid, principally albumen, for I have never found pepton either in 
the muscle of the trunk or in the blood of the summer or autumn sal- 
mon; whilst I have found in the serum of the blood more globuline than 
could in any way be supposed to come from the colorless blood-particles. 
This albumen may play the same part in the organism as the albumen 
contained in food which is absorbed by the intestines. Wherever the 
conditions favor disintegration it becomes disintegrated, and wherever 
the conditions favor new formation it forms new tissue. 

The former (disintegration) is more frequent in male salmon, especially 
late in summer and in autumn, when the products of disintegration 
(protamine, guanine, sarkine) gather in considerable quantities in the 
seminal ducts. 

The latter (formation), ¢. ¢., the economical use of albumen from the 
muscle of the trunk for building a new organ, is more frequent in female 
salmon, as their absolutely necessary consumption of albumen is very 
small. 

We, therefore, have here ‘“stock-albumen,” as Voit terms it, contain- 
ing substances which became disintegrated, if there are no organs which 
quickly absorb them and draw them away from the current of juices. 
I have always favored the distinction which Voit makes in this respect. 
It only became open to objection when, more through Voit’s pupils than 
through himself, they became unnecessarily mixed with rude mechanical 
hypothesis, relative to the ‘“‘current of juices rushing through the cells,” 
&e. Whenever this “stock-albumen” becomes rapidly disintegrated 


*The insufficient evacuation of carbonic acid or of other products may possibly be 
one of the principal causes of sudden death. Tissues with strongly alkaline reaction, 
such as the immature testicles of the Rhine salmon, can at certain periods stand an 
extraordinary loss of blood, which continues for some time as a normal phenomenon. 


7 


[43] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. 469 


we cannot tell whether this process takes place in the liver or in the 
colorless blood-particles. It is not at all necessary that the bulk of it 
should circulate through the blood, if only it is capable, when required, 
of being rapidly absorbed by the blood, like the “glycogen” of the liver 
or the fat of the fatty tissue. However this may be, there is in the body, 
independent of nutrition, a certain quantity of albumen which, owing 
to the locality where it is found, becomes quickly disintegrated, unless 
there are organs which rapidly assimilate and, so to speak, saveit. Simi- 
lar in its course to nutrition is the “liquidation” of a large organ con- 
taining plenty of albumen, if this process can be carried on in such a 
manner as not to affect the vegetative functions of the heart, nerves, 
and breathing apparatus. 

In the salmon, therefore, it is not only the growing sexual glands 

‘which derive advantage from “liquidation” of the muscle of the trunk, 
but even the gristle of the nose grows, large wounds become cicatrized 
and all the muscles of the fins which are necessary for moderate motion 
and proper steering decrease hardly at all; they seem to live on sub- 
stances from the muscle of the trunk. In short, apart from the muscle 
of the trunk, the fish lives like an animal which is scantily fed. The 
cause of this is that it has in its body genuine “stock-albumen.” 

And still we cannot speak of it as of a ‘‘ reserve substance,” for there is 
in the muscle of the trunk hardly any intermediate tissue. It is the 
excitable and contractile fibril of the muscle which, from its protoplasm, 
supplies substance. It is not a falling to pieces of entire elements of 
tissue and an absorption of their broken remnants, but the fibers of the 
muscle remain alive. With the exception of a few places (the convex 
portion of the tail-part of the vertebral column) I have, even in cases 
where degeneration had far advanced, never found entirely empty mus- 
cle fibers. Nor have I ever found in large sea-salmon—even when, by 
the length of their nose, or by the ovarium, they showed traces of hay- 
ing recently passed through a spawning period—any signs of the new 
formation of entire muscle fibers. Perhaps not a single fibril is com- 
pletely assimilated with the muscle of the trunk. 

I do not think it has been proved beyond a doubt that the fatty 
degeneration and the “liquidation” of an organ always go together, 
even if, according to the weight of the fins, this seems to be the case 
with the Rhine salmon. 

We may well ask here: What is the principal cause which, when the 
starving period commences, compels the muscle of the trunk to act as 
a feeder ? 

I am here reminded of the technical rule laid down by physiologists, 
that frogs should be fed on meat if the circulation through their various 
organs was to be clearly demonstrated. What is the faint pulse of sick 
people, accompanied by serious disturbances of the process of nutrition; 
but an indication that, insufficiently elastic, owing to the tension of the 
vessels, but little blood flows into the heart before every pulS&ttion, and 


470 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [44] | 


is expelled by contraction, so that the entire quantity of blood requires 
a longer time to pass through the heart? i 

I am, therefore, of opinion that when the starving period commences, 
circulation first of all becomes less energetic, and continues in this 
course until in some organ or other, owing to insufficient respiration of 
the tissues, a state of “liquidation” is produced. As soon as vital 
organs are attacked in this way, death takes place. But if there is a 
solid organ which does not contain many vessels, but is rich in albumen, 
‘and may, comparatively speaking, be easily spared, it serves as a 
feeder, first: of all to the vegetative central organs, and in the second — 
place to the rest of the body, thus making it possible to maintain life. 
Besides the innate energy of the dividing processes, which is depend- 
ent on the temperature, conditions like the ones described above are, 
in my opinion, mainly instrumental in imparting to animals the greatly 
varying ability to stand hunger. 

Such nutrition, however, must never reach a degree which would 
again render the energy of circulation normal, for in that case the state 
of “liquidation” would come to an end, and the food-supplying source 
would cease. 

We thus find in the spring salmon, and more especially interpersed 
with the thin muscle fibers, rows of fine grains of fat, until in the early 
part of summer the growth of the ovarium in geometrical progression 
leads to a positive monthly consumption of substance, the demands of 
which, in addition to the self-consumption proper, become very urgent. 
If indications do not deceive, the swelling of the spleen, the extension of 
its arteries, the filling up of its net-work with blood, are powerful aids 
in causing the pressure of the blood to sink further, of increasing the 
state of “liquidation,” and extending it to a constantly-growing number 
of muscle fibers, even such as are ina relatively favorable position with 
regard to the blood-vessels. At the time, therefore, when the monthly 
erowth of the ovarium has risen from the thousandths to the hundredths 
per cent. of the weight of the body—from the middle of June till the 
end of July—we notice that the filling up with grains of fat becomes 
inore intense, some of the fibers becoming almost opaque; and we see 
those black, shining, jelly-like spleen, resembling large clots of blood, 
which cause a decreased circulation of blood, less abundant in blood 
‘particles. 

Meanwhile the ovarium is growing steadily, and the capillary nets of 
the follicle, numbering 10,000 to 20,000, begin tomake such an abundant 
collateral blood-channei that its influence on the pressure of the blood 
renders the spleen superfluous. We thus see the spleen gradually dimin- 
ish again, beginning in August, and remain at its minimum size from 
September till the spawning period. The ovarium, owing to its chang- 
ing quantity of blood, is now able to regulate the intensity of the process 
of “liquidation.” This seeming change of the phenomena, however, has 
this rule m common, that, in some way or other, the pressure of blood 


[45] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. AT1 


sinks till the consumption of matter and the loss of matter are equalized, 
still leaving something for self-consumption. 

Sometimes, however, circulation sinks very low, like fish which in spring 
have been entirely sucked out by leeches. Some salmon show shortly 
before and during the spawning period small and large ulcers, with lim- 
ber undermined bands and adhesive yellow scabs, at the bottom of which 
muscles and bones are laid bare. Such ulcers are not only, as in former 
times, found back of the lower jaw (where they may have been caused 
by constant rubbing against rocks or stones), but more particularly at 
the basis of the rays of the fins, at the tail, and sometimes on the oper- 
culum. Sometimes an entire ray becomes gangrened and falls off. In 
other parts of the body, especially on the jaws, there may be seen raised, 
yellow, opaque spots, void of blood, which are probably the forerunners 
of the ulcers. Fish in this condition are positively sick, and the epi- 
thelium, gradually tearing to shreds, indicating a disturbance of its pro- 
cess of nutrition, may well be compared to the tongue of a patient who 
is very low witha fever. The flesh of the trunk is entirely opaque, whit- 
ish, and full of little grains of fat. Even the heart, which has long re- 
mained intact, shows in many cases numberless fibers filled with little 
grains of fat, and to the naked eye shows a brownish color, whilst the 
inner layers of its flesh are quite tender. 

What a different appearance is presented by fish which have passed 
the spawning period ten days, or, better still, some weeks (empty female 
fish, caught at the end of December or in January; but also one speci- 
men from Mr. Glaser’s fish-boxes, which certainly had lost its eggs not 
longer than ten days ago). The skin is again bluish, clear, and shining; 
the ulcers have become cicatrized or are healing; the flesh is transpar- 
ent, entirely or nearly free from grains of fat; even the fibers of the 
heart are beginning to be purified, and in the intestines there is no trace 
of food. The ovarium contains more or less eggs, which, imbedded in 
a serous and occasionally somewhat suppurated secretion of the follicle 
skin, shrivel in the most manifest manner, and become absorbed. It is, 
therefore, a sort of nutrition, as it were—a little pocket-money for the 
return voyage. The greatest importance, however, I am inclined to 
ascribe to the pale, shriveled-up follicle skins. The collateral blood- 
channels of the ovarium have become closed (by contraction of the ves- 
sels). The salmon resembles a patient who, after Hsmarch’s bandage 
has been placed on his leg, has had that limb amputated. Its blood 
circulates within narrower limits, therefore with a higher pressure, and 
supplies a smaller quantity of substance than ever before with oxygen; 
the circulation again satisfies all @emands upon it, and the muscle of 
the trunk again becomes normal. But the difference of color of the 
extracts with water, between the greatly reduced muscle of the trunk 
and the muscles of the fins which have remained intact, has become 
alarmingly small. Vital organs are now attacked, and what little nu- 
tritive matter is furnished by the ovarium is partly consumed by the 


472 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. ([46} 


convalescent muscle of the trunk. To all appearances hunger, in its 
most threatening aspect, does not make itself felt till this time, and com- 
pels the fish to enter upon its return trip. These late travelers, on their 
return to the sea, often show little knots in the spleen again, sometimes 
even considerable swellings. We know now what this means; some 
organic albumen has to be “liquidated.” 

Mr. Glaser is inclined to consider the period of this return journey 
as very short (shorter than I have estimated it), because these fish, in 
their haste, dash against the sand-banks near Ste in, and there run 
aground, which at other times does not occur. We must also remem- 
ber that nearly the same weight of fin-muscles has to move a much 
smaller mass of body, and, what is also in its favor, down the stream. 

As regards the male fish, the spleen, owing to their greater self-con- 
sumption, seems to be drawn upon as early as May and June, when not 
much weight can be attached to the increase of the testicles. During 
the summer, and up to September, there are many changes; we some- 
times find small, and at other times average-sized spleen, with various. 
intermediate sizes, as it seems to me, in some way corresponding to 
the varying quantity of blood in the sexual glands; but my investi- 
gations of this matter are not far enough advanced to lay down any cer- 
tain rule regarding it. It seems somewhat singular, especially when we 
compare with it the striking regularity of this change from small to 
large spleen in the female fish; which regularity remains the same, no 
matter whether some of the female fish are more belated than others. 
Could varying conditions of sexual excitement have an influence on 
the consumption of matter? One thing, however, is certain: in Octo- 
ber, generally early in the month, we find as a rule large (and the largest) 
spleen. All the maximum weights (as high as 0.86 per cent. of the 
weight of the body, or sixteen times the smallest weight observed in 
males) belong to this period. During the spawning period the weight 
of the spleen again decreases gradually. 

The maturing of the sexual gland of the male fish does not require as 
large quantities of albumen and fat as the ovaruim of the females, but 
as far as my experience goes,* the sexual gland needs all the more 
phosphoric acid salts to form the various substances of the semen which 
contain phosphorus. Taking the weight of the mature testicles as 5 per 
cent. of the weight of the body, with 25 per cent. dry substance of 11.3 
per cent. phosphoric acid,t we find that the growing testicles must take 
away from the blood 0.141 per cent. phosphoric acid; a larger quantity 
than is contained in one-half of the mature ovarium of a female fish of 
equal size. Why should not the hunger for phosphorus with the male 
fish produce similar effects as the hunger for albumen with the female? 


* Die spermatozoen einiger Wirbelthiere (The spermatozoa of some vertebrates), in the 
Transactions of the Pasel Society of Natural History, vol. vi, part 1, p. 147. 
tThe same work. 


[47] BIOLOGY OF THE RHINE SALMON. AG3 


This Homand can only be met by the “liquidation” of muscle- substance 
containing phosphorus. 

* The falling off and the degeneration of the heart of the females de- 
scribed above I have also occasionally noticed in males, but not nearly 
as frequently. The purification of the skin, however, and especially the 
disappearance of the little grains of fat from the muscle of the trunk, 
I have often met with in a more or less advanced stage. One of the fish 
made an exception from the rule (as has been mentioned before), and 
had taken food. Though to a less extent, similar conditions may have 
to be taken into account, as with the females. I am inclined to lay con- 
siderable weight, as regards the improvement of the respiration of the 
tissue, on the reaction and consequent decrease in the consumption 
of oxygen and substance, which certainly follows the strong excitement 
of the spawning period.* The low temperature of the months of De- 
cember and January, following close upon the spawning period, may 
also do its share of the work. It may safely be asserted, moreover, 
that when the season of extraordinary excitement is over, the blood- 
vessels of these lean fish have to supply only about two-thirds or even 
only one-half the original quantity of muscle, and that the demand and 
supply of oxygen have become nearly equalized. 

The proof of the “liquidation” of organs and the description of the con- 
ditions under which this process takes place, which have been furnished 
by the investigations relative to the Rhine salmon, will, I think, very 
soon bear fruit on a more extended physiological and pathological field. 
Many interesting facts are scattered all through the literature of the sal- 
mon, but they were disjointed, and there seemed to be no proper connec- 
tion between them, because the important element of “liquidation” was 
wanting; and because whenever there was a question of the dissolution 
of dead elements of tissue, the positive loss of matter by an organ was 
erroneously considered identical with a change of matter. I will here 
only remind the reader of the intensification of the disintegration of 
albumen by phosphorus, as shown by J. Bauer,t which fact has been 
corroborated by the investigations of O. Frankel.t Bauer attempts an 
explanation by speaking in a somewhat vague manner of ‘an equilibrium 
between organs and juices.” Frankel quotes an attempt at an explana- 
tion.by L. Traube, which very correctly lays stress on the difference in 


*An observation made by Mr. Glaser, about 15 years ago, shows how high the passions 
of these fish run during the spawning period. He had placed a trap containing a 
male fish in the Rhine, directly above Basel, near to a spawning female salmon. A 
male salmon of medium size, prompted by jealousy, made violent attacks on the fish 
in the trap, and was caught, the iron prongs piercing his body. But as the trap was 
old and did not work very well, he succeeded in getting loose. He returned three 
times, however, and tore himself loose as many times, until a new trap was set, in 
which he was finally caught, his whole body being torn and bleeding from twenty 
wounds. 

t Zeitschrift fiir Biologie, vii, viii. 

t Virchow’s Archiv., xvii. 


474 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [48] 


the disintegration of living and dead albumen, but only supposes that 
there is an increased mortification of elements of tissue. How much 


easier can these and other phenomena be explained, as soon as we know . 


for certain that it is not a question of life or death, but only one of dis- 
turbance of the equilibrium of normal conditions of life; and as soon as 
we take into consideration the circumstance that even organs like the 
obliquely-striped fibers of the muscle, without losing their excitability, 
and without—so to speak—making much stir, throw enormous quanti- 
ties of albumen into the juices delivering them to disintegrating pro- 
cesses, under conditions which can at any time be fulfilled through the 
system of the vascular nerves? Is it certain that the few milligrams of 
phosphorus really produce the well-known and extensive fatty degener- 
tion by exercising a direct influence on every fiber and cell of a mass of 
muscles and glands weighing many kilograms? May not this influence 
be exercised by means of the system of vascular nerves, and by a radi- 
cal disturbance of the circulation? And, finally, we should seriously 
inquire if this same anomaly in the distribution of the blood—caused by 
a feverish process and in a nervous way affecting the retention of heat 
in the body—does not also produce the state of liquidation of the mus- 
cles, the consequent intensified disintegration of the albumen, the di- 
minished desire for food, and the consumption, which no feeding can 
check. 

These hints will sufficiently explain why I have made the conditions 
of life of the Rhine salmon the subject of exhaustive investigations. We 
are here confronted with the strongest and most effectual tendency to 
starvation known to physiology; owing to the supremacy exercised by 
the mass of one organ over all the rest, we are favored with a clear view 
of the internal economy of the substances of the animal body, such as 
we shall rarely find in any of the other animals which are generally made 
the subjects of such experiments. To find such objects as will aid in 
solving the different dark problems of life is, in my opinion, the proper 
aim of comparative biology. 


APPENDIX F. 


PROPAGATION OF FOOD-FISHES. 


GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 


XV.—REPORT ON THE CONDITION OF PISCICULTURE IN FOR- 
EIGN COUNTRIES FROM DOCUMENTS COLLECTED AT THE 
INTERNATIONAL FISHERY EXPOSITION AT BERLIN, 1880. 


3y M. C. RAVERET-WATTEL.* 


THE UNITED STATES. 


To this day pisciculture has nowhere produced results which can be 
compared to those obtained in the United States. In no other country 
has this industry attained to the same degree of development, perfec- 
tion, and success. Butit must also be said that perhaps no other nation 
has so fully understood the great importance of pisciculture, and that 
in no other country have such great efforts been made. Nowhere, cer- 
tainly, has so much been accomplished by private enterprise ; nowhere 
has the government given so much enlightened care to the rational cul- 
tivation of the waters, and afforded such efficient protection and gener- 
ous encouragement. 

At present thirty-six States or Territories of the Union have each an 
official piscicultural organization, called a State Fish Commission, gen- 
erally composed of three members, whose services are, in nearly all 
cases, given gratuitously,! and whose authority is generally limited to 
a period of three or four years. These Commissioners may, however, 
at the expiration of their term, be reappointed for another term; and 
their official position somewhat resembles that of the commissioned In- 
spectors of Fisheries of Great Britain. Their authority, however, is in 
no case very great. It is their duty to instruct fishermen, to stock the 
waters with young fish from the State piscicultural establishments,’ to 
act as experts for the government, to point out desirable changes in 
legislation, to repress abuses, to adopt protective measures,* introduce 


*Rapport | sur la | situation de la pisciculture a Vétranger, | d’aprés les documents recueillis 
a& V Exposition internationale | de produits et engins de péche de Berlin | en 1880, | par M. C 
RAVERET-WATTEL. | Bulletin mensuel | de la | Société nationale | d’acclimatation | de 
France, | 3¢ série, tome ix, | No. 2, February, 1882, | p. 69.—Translated from the French 
by HERMAN JACOBSON. 

1They are only reimbursed for their traveling expenses, and for expenses incurred 
during scientific researches or technical labors performed by them. 

2The management of each establishment is generally confided to a superintendent, 
who draws a salary, and who is responsible for his administration. 

3In the United States legislation affecting fishing differs in the different States. In 
the Northern States it generally resembles, more or less, the English legislation. Nearly 

[1] A477 


478 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


improvements, &c. Every year they submit to the legislature a statis- 
tical report, showing the work done during the year, the progress at- 
tained, and the observations made respecting pisciculture or fishing in- 
dustries, the quantity of eggs or young fish distributed, &c. 

Twenty-one States have State-hatcheries for the production of young 
fish, destined to restock the public waters. Some States, like Michigan, 
possess as many as three of these hatcheries. There are, therefore, in op- 
eration thirty-eight of these establishments, not counting those created 
for the piscicultural work undertaken by the Federal Government, be- 
sides that done by the States on their own account. In Connecticut 
the commission, which does not yet possess a hatchery, has made a con- 
tract with two private establishments for producing the young fish 
which it needs annually, and pays to the owners of these establish- 
ments a dollar for every thousand eggs which it hatches. 

To the State of Massachusetts belongs the honor of having officially 
introduced pisciculture in the United States. This State was the first 
to intrust to a commission “ the duty of studying facts relative to the 
artificial propagation of fish, and the ways and means of causing this 
industry to contribute, under the protection of the law, to the wealth 
of the State.” Various experiments were made (in 1856) by this com- 
mission, which published a report on the condition of pisciculture in 
foreign countries, including a translation of the remarkable article pub- 
lished by M. Jules Haime in the Revue des deux mondes in 1854. 

But the idea was not yet fully matured;* the public did not fathom 
the full importance of these experiments, which passed almost unob- 
served; and it was only in 1865 that Massachusetts definitely consti- 
tuted her Fish Commission on the present basis. 

Vermont and New Hampshire, and later, Connecticut and Pennsyl- 
vania followed the example set by Massachusetts, and created Fish Com- 
missions whose duty it should be to restock the public waters. In 1864 
Mr. Seth Green founded, near New York, the first American piscicul- 
tural establishment, on thorough business principles, and he soon found 
many imitators. 

The results obtained by private enterprise proved the importance of 
similar establishments for rapidly restocking water-courses, and, in 
1867, the State of Massachusetts established at South Hadley Falls, on 
the Connecticut River, a hatchery for the artificial propagation of shad. 

In the same place and the same year Mr. Seth Green, who had also 
occupied himself with the propagation of shad, invented his hatching 
apparatus, consisting of inclined boxes floating in the water. These 


everywhere, even in the largest rivers, such as the Mississippi, the right of fishing be- 
longs to the inhabitants of the banks, but only to the point where the tide makes itself 
felt, and where the maritime domaincommences. In the Southern States, on the con- 
trary, the right of fishing in the great water-courses belongs to the State. 

*It is only three years since Mr. Theodotus Garlich and Prof. H. B. Ackley of Cleve- 


land, Ohio, the two pioneers of American pisciculture, made their first attempts at ar- 
tificial fecundation. 


i 


\ 


[3] A FOREIGN REVIEW OF AMERICAN FISH CULTURE. 479 


boxes bear his name, and are as simple as they are ingenious, easy to 
manage, and inexpensive, and have ina very short time been adopted 
throughout the whole of the United States.® 

A beginning had been made. The States of Maine (1867), New York 
(1868), California, New Jersey, and Rhode Island (1870), Alabama, 
(1871), Ohio and Wisconsin (1873), &c., soon possessed their official pisci- 
cultural service. 

The year 1871 marks an important era in the history of pisciculture 
in the United States; from this year date two institutions, which have 
exercised a very beneficial influence on piscicultural industry through- 
out the entire territory of the Union, viz., The American Fisheulturists’ 
Association, and The United States Fish Commission. 

William Clift, A. S. Collins, Fred. Mather, Dr. J. H. Slack, and Liv- 
ingston Stone, all distinguished pisciculturists, well known by their writ- 
ings and their practical labors, were the founders of the association, which 
has rendered such enormous service by influencing public opinion, and by 
giving a powerful impetus to piscicultural enterprise. 

The useful character of the work accomplished in many States by the 
Fish Commission had not escaped the attention of the Federal Govern- 
ment, which, advised of the decrease of the results of both river and 
sea fisheries in all parts of the Union, did not hesitate to institute inves- 
tigations as to the causes and remedies of this evil. A law passed 
by Congress on the 9th of February, 1871, authorized the appointment 
of a “United States Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries.” The law 
empowered the President of the Republic to appoint said Commissioner 
with the sanction of the Senate, and stipulated that his services should 
be rendered gratuitously. 

The President appointed to this important position Prof. Spencer F, 
Baird, then Assistant Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, well 
known by his valuable works on zoology. No better selection could have 
been made; a vast knowledge, a prodigious capacity for work, great 
perseverance, enlightened zeal, indefatigable activity, a devotedness to 
his purpose bordering on self-denial, such are the eminent qualities which 
Professor Baird has brought to the exercise of those useful and absorb- 
ing duties which have been confided to him, and by the fulfillment of 
which he has justly become entitled to public gratitude, not only in the 
United States, but also in foreign countries benefited by the investiga- 
tions and labors of the United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries.° 

As soon as Professor Baird was appointed, he began work by conduct- 
ing on the coast of New England for several months during the year 


5A description of these boxes, and of other apparatus employed in America, will be 
found farther on. 

6 We will here only recall the large number of embryonated eggs of various kinds of 
salmonoids (Salmo quinnat, S. fontinalis, S. sebago, Coregonus albus, gc.) which so fre- 
quently and liberally have been sent to France, Germany, England, Austria, the 
Netherlands, Russia, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, &c. 


480 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES [4] 


1871 exhaustive investigations relative to the condition of the fishing 
industries, and the causes which influence the development thereof. 

In 1872, Congress added to the duties of the Commissioner of Fisheries 
that of restocking the waters, and his labor was henceforth divided into 
two distinct branches, viz: 

(1.) Investigations relative to the fisheries: Statistics, zoological re- 
searches, dredging, sounding, &e. 

(2.) Piscicultural operations. Artificial increase and propagation of 
the principal kinds of food fish’ throughout the whole extent of the 
Union. , 

Each of these two branches of work has its special appropriation, the to- 
talamount of which, in 1872, amounted to $20,000, and has been gradually 
increased, so that at present the annual appropriation exceeds $80,000." 

The strictest economy is constantly practised in the expenditures. 
The Commissioner receives no salary whatever. Only a few assistants, 
charged with special duties (voyages of exploration, superintendents of 
the hatcheries, stocking operations, &c.), receive salaries. Specialists, 
who are occasionally employed, receive some remuneration, but only tem- 
porarily. Three or four clerks constitute the entire force of the Commis- 
sion,which every day receives and dispatches a considerable amount of 
correspondence. 

The establishments founded by the Commission are liberally supplied 
with all the necessary material, but no concessions are made to luxury 
and elegance. 

Since 1872 eight zoological stations have been successively organized 
on the coast of the Atlantic for the purpose of carrying on researches 
in the interest of the fishing industries.2 These investigations have been 
carried on in different localities each year, and the arrangements are 


7A report on the work accomplished and the results obtained is every year made to 
Congress by the Commissioner. This annual reportis always accompanied by appen- 
dices (various treatises concerning the fisheries and pisciculture), which are generally 
documentsof exceedingly great value both from a scientific and practical point of view. 
Six large octavo volumes of these reports have, so far, been published. 

8 For a period 1871 to 1880 the total expenditure of the Fish Commission has been 
$476,200 

3 eine the same period sounding and dredging operations have been carried on in 
more than 2,000 different localities by government vessels placed at the disposal of 
the Commission. These investigations have been productive of many good results. 
Besides a large number of very interesting observations respecting the temperature 
of the water, the currents, the nature of the bottom, &c., very important collections 
have been made and numerous species of crustaceans, mollusks, annelides, &c., have 
been studied and described. Two new kinds of food fish have been discovered in 
depths to which the fishermen had not yet extended their researches, viz, the Lophola- 
tilus chama@leonticeps and the Glyptocephalus cynoglossus. The first mentioned is found in 
considerable quantity on a bank where its presence was not even suspected; the sec- 
ond, which belongs to the family of the Pleuronectes, had so far been entirely unknown, 
because the small size of its mouth did not permit of its being caught with lines, and 
because, owing to the great depth at which it lives, it can only be taken with very 
strong nets. 


[5] A FOREIGN REVIEW OF AMERICAN FISH CULTURE. 481 


essentially of a temporary character. Some of the establishments are 
specially devoted to various experiments in pisciculture, such as the arti- 
ficial propagation of the shad, of the codfish, the herring, and some 
other fish. But there are, besides, some permanent establishments, 
nearly all of which are each devoted to one special kind of fish, producing 
the embryonated eggs or the young fish needed for stocking the waters. 
Four of these establishments are of special importance; these are the 
one at Bucksport, Me., for common salmon; the one on the McCloud 
River, California, for California salmon; Grand Lake Stream, Maine, for 
lake salmon, called “land locked salmon”; and Northville, Mich., for 
fish of the Coregonus species. 

The first of these establishments is in charge of Mr. Charles G. Atkins, 
formerly Commissioner of Fisheries of the State of Maine, who has made 
the raising of salmon the subject of special studies. We are indebted to 
him for treatises and observations of great practical utility, of which we 
Shall have occasion to speak below. The establishment, located on the 
Penobscot River,” is entirely constructed of wood, with double walls, 
the space between being filled with sawdust, which shelters the interior 
equally well from the heat and cold. The large incubating room, 23 
meters long and 9 meters broad, is occupied by 40 long wooden troughs, 
placed parallel with each other and lengthwise of the room, in groups 
of four, and furnished with wire frames for receiving the eggs to be 
hatched ; 4,500 liters of water every 24 hours feed these troughs. This 
hatching establishment annually produces 6,000,000 to 7,000,000 of em- 
bryonated eggs, and hatches 4,000,000 to 5,000,000 young fish. 

Two interesting facts must be mentioned respecting the Bucksport es- 
tablishment, viz, (1) the application of the so-called “dry method,” which 
its director, Mr. Atkins, has applied from the very beginning to artificial 
fecundation; (2) the system of “ parking” salmon, also practiced by the 
director, so as to insure, at the proper time, a sufficient quantity of eggs 
and milt. 

According to Mr. James W. Milner," an assistant in the Fish Com- 
mission, a note on pisciculture in Russia, published in 1870 in the Bul- 
letin dela Société Wacclimatation” had at the time drawn the attention of 
American pisciculturists to the happy results obtained by Mr. Vrassky 
with his method of fecundation, which consists in placing the eggs dry 
in a vessel, and moistening them with milt diluted in water. This is 
the so-called ‘‘Russian” method. Mr. Atkins conceived the idea of 
pushing the application of this system still farther by moistening the 
dry eggs with undiluted milt, and adding the water afterwards. The 


10This establishment is not maintained entirely at the expense of the Federal Gov- 
ernment; several States generally subscribe a certain sum for the annual expenditure, 
and receive a number of. embryonated eggs proportioned to the sum subscribed by 
them. 

uJ. W. MILNER: The progress of Fish-culture in the United States. 

PAUL VE@LKEL: L’établissement de Nikolsk pour Véducation des poissons de luxe. 
Bulletin 1870, p. 508. 


S. Mis. 29——31 


482 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


result was excellent, as very few eggs failed to be fecundated. This 
mode of procedure, which constitutes the so-called “dry” method par 
excellence, is at the present day generally employed throughout the 
United States.“ Its advantage over the ‘‘moist” method will easily be 
understood when one calls to mind the rapidity with which the sperma- 
tozoa of the milt lose their vitality when diluted with water." 

In operating on so large a scale Mr. Atkins occasionally found it dif- 
ficult to procure the number of male and female fish, ready to spawn, 
which he needed for his artificial fecundation. He therefore took care 
to “park” in advance (according to the necessity of the case five or six 
months, and according to the number of fish caught in the Penobscot 
River) a large number of salmon.” These salmon are kept imprisoned 
till the moment they begin to spawn, when they are caught again for 
the purpose of gathering eggs and milt. At first they were placed free 
in a pond of an area of 24 hectares, but with this extent of water it be- 
came very difficult to catch them at the exact time when they were 
needed. It therefore became necessary to “park” them in a more lim- 
ited space. <A wire barrier extended across the pond only left them 
about 4 hectares; but as this barrier was not strong enough to offer 
resistance to powerful fish, which always found means of forcing a pas- 
sage, it had to be replaced by a permanent barrier or wall of clay. 

More recently, a small watercourse, a tributary of the Penobscot 
River, the Dead Brook, has been used for “ parking” these reproducing 
fish. In this water-course an inclosure has been made by means of two 
barriers across the stream, formed of poles, placed in such a manner as to 
keep the salmon imprisoned whilst leaving a free passage for the water. 
In this inclosure are placed all the live salmon which can be procured 
during the season when fishing is permitted. These salmon are bought 


13Tt is, as we have seen before, also very generally employed in Germany, and is the 
only method actually followed at Hiiningen. 

It should be mentioned that several practical pisciculturists have by their experi- 
ments been led to identical resnlts. Mr. Seth Green one of the veterans of American 
pisciculture, has followed the ‘‘dry” method for a long time, the process of which he 
has for several years kept secret. The employment of this method gave him a de- 
cided advantage over other pisciculturists who followed the ‘‘moist” method, and in- 
variably sustained losses by large numbers of their eggs not becoming fecundated. 

44From experiments made by our eminent vice-president, M. de Quatrefages, it ap- 
pears that the vitality of the spermatozoa only lasts— 


imetheimiltiof the: barbell. seu. sids-cdhles ona tastaese sae eeleainee tice ie ce eeaeee 213.0!" 
Infthe niiltiof the perch...../.0tc25.ssectes geepeeae sec as seeeioase eeeeeseieeee 2' 40” 
Inythewmilt of, the carp’. ...s<..6io5..\ aja Se eee ene eee ena eee eee By 

Inithemiltio£, theiroach «20.4 24.606 e ebses cae see e eee Se eee ee Eee rte 3/ 10” 
Inithe:milt-of the pike... oc. sce. sci as cee case tases eaeysonisseye tees eee ae 8’ 10’ 


The above figures, however, must be considered as maxima, which are 10t always 
attained. (Memoir read at the Academy of Sciences May, 1853.) 

1° In Switzerland live salmon are sometimes brought in close proximity to the places 
where they were to spawn; or salmon ready to spawn have been kept “‘ parked” for a 
few days so as to procure eggs or milt for artificial fecundation; but nowhere, as far 
as we know, have grown salinon been kept captive as long as at Bucksport for the 
purpose of procuring a sufficient number of reproducers. 


[7] A FOREIGN REVIEW OF AMERICAN FISH CULTURE. 483 


from the owners of the weirs or permanent fisheries, and are taken to 
the inclosure in boats furnished with fish boxes. The depth of water 
in this “ park” varies from 70 centimeters to 5 meters. An abundance 
of aquatic plants and shrubs on the banks, whose branches overhang 
the stream, furnish ample shelter and protection from the rays of the 
sun, for even in places where the water is deepest the temperature at 
the surface during the hot summer days only reaches 75 to 80 degrees 
Fahrenheit. 

Throughout the whole extent of the inclosure the bottom is covered 
with a thick layer of mud, so as to prevent the salmon from spawning, 
which many of them would undoubtedly do if they found a sandy bottom. 
_ The upper barrier is located in a place where the stream is shallow 

and only 4 meters broad. A small shed, close by, holds the necessary 
material for gathering the eggs and transporting them to the incubat- 
ing establishment, which is located at a distance of about 5 kilometers, 

When, in October, the days begin to grow cold, the instinct of repro- 
duction makes itself felt in the salmon, which begin to seek favorable 
places for depositing theireggs. They leave the deep places where they 
have spent all summer and go up the stream until they reach the upper 
barrier, near the shed or pavilion above referred to. Twenty meters 
below this barrier a solid net stretched across the stream only leaves in 
the middle a narrow passage, on the principle of the fish-pot, permit- 
ting the salmon to enter without difficulty, but preventing their getting 
out again. They are thus kept prisoners within a very small space 
where they can be caught without the least trouble. 

They are thereupon distributed, according to sex, in floating boxes, 
from which they are gradually taken by the operators whenever they 
are needed for artificial fecundation. These fish generally number five 
to six hundredyand are capable of furnishing five to nine million eggs. 

The fecundated eggs are immediately placed on wire frames and car- 
ried to the hatching establishment, where, without delay, they are im- 
mersed in the incubating troughs. At the end of sixty days they are 
embryonated and may be sent to any distance.!® 


16 Eggs have thus been sent as far as Australia, where, at the present day, there 
are several water-courses which have salmon that originated in the Penobscot River. 
When all the eggs have been gathered, the total number is ascertained, which isan 
easy matter, as every incubating frame having a single layer of eggs contains about 
2,000; so you have only to count the frames. According to the total expenditure of 
the establishment during the current year the retail price per 10,000 eggs is fixed, and 
this price serves to determine the quantity of eggs to be given to each subscriber in 
proportion to the amount of his subscription. In 1881 the subscription and the pro- 

portionate quantities of eggs were as follows: 
Proportionate 


Sabscription.| quantities of 


eggs. 


ederale GOvernmentecere aca tat canon soceeted us cic calswcioeaee coe cose $1, 757 950, 000 
Sép toloue Mane ks Meee kets se foie sb oo tose b LSARES becled sic eibemalere 2, 000 1, 080, 000 
Stator te VlLASsaGhiuse bls senescence cele nce basen crac ceeeececes ceeds 590 270, 000 


eater faConnechiCuGercse tse aa scts oa ek ate cines cas cee cota n tb bceceb er 300 162, 000 


484 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


At first, tin boxes of various sizes were employed for transportation, 
but the high price of these boxes caused them to be very soon replaced by 
boxes made of light wood, where the eggs are kept wrapped up in cloths 
and moist moss, according to the method generally adopted in Europe. 
For long distances a double box is used, with an intermediary and iso- 
lating layer of sawdust between the two walls which protects the fish 
both against heat and cold. 

The results of the experiments in stocking water-courses with fish by 
means of eggs from the Bucksport establishment soon became evident. 
While the common salmon (Salmo salar) were formerly unknown in most 
of the streams of the United States (only being found in some rivers in 
Maine, the Penobscot, the Kennebec, &c.) they are, at the present day, 
found in many rivers andl streams where they have been artificially in- 
troduced. In fact they are found in nearly every water-course from the 
river Denny in Eastern Maine to the Susquehanna in Maryland. The 
Merrimac, the Delaware, and the Pemigewasset are particularly rich in 
salmon. The same applies to the Connecticut River, where fish weigh- 
ing 10 to 20 pounds are caught by hundreds and are sent to the New 
York markets. Such are the results which have been attained within 
the short space of six years. 

The introduction of the common salmon, however, cannot be accom- 
plished everywhere; for only in sufficiently fresh and clear water will 
there be any chance of success. The Fish Commission has, therefore, 
endeavored to find a species of fish which is less exacting as to the nature 
of the water; and its attention has been directed to a species of salmon 
(Salmo quinnat) found in a number of streams flowing into the Pacific 
Ocean," and particularly abundant in California streams, notably the 
Sacramento and McCloud Rivers. This species of fish is robust and 
endowed with a remarkable power of resistance to heat, and seems 
specially designed for introduction into those water-courses where the 
Salmo salar could not live, either on account of the temperature of the 
water or on account of its being muddy. 

We have in a former article’ pointed out the great interest which 
attaches to the propagation of the California salmon, and given some 
information regarding the labors of the Fish Commission to spread this 
valuable kind of fish as much as possible. We think, however, that 
we must add some details caleulated to give an idea of the gigantic 
scale on which the labors of the Fish Commission are carried on. 

The first experiments were made in 1872, at the suggestion of Mr. 
Robert B. Roosevelt, Member of Congress. Mr. Livingston Stone, who 


The so-called ‘ California salmon” is considered to be absolutely identical with the 
Sacramento salmon (Salmo quinnat, Richard), one of the largest members of the salmon 
family. The salmon caught in the Sacramento River generally weigh 20 pounds; but 
there are some weighing 100 pounds. The flesh of this fish is equal in quality to that 
of the Salmo salar. 


'SRAVERET-WATTEL: Le gaumon de Californie. Bulletin de la Société d’acclimata- 
tion, January, 1878, 


[9] A FOREIGN REVIEW OF AMERICAN FISH CULTURE. 485 


was placed in charge of these experiments, went to California during 
September of that year, thinking that he would arrive before the begin- 
ning of the spawning season, but he was too late, and it was only possi- 
ble to gather a few thousand eggs, because the California salmon spawns 
much earlier than the common salmon, towards the end of August. 

Mr. Stone, however, did not make his first journey entirely in vain, 
as he gathered much valuable information which enabled him to repeat 
the experiment during the following year under more favorable circum- 
stances. The river McCloud was selected as the center of operations. 
This river, fed by the melting snow of Mount Shasta, has plenty of very 
cold water; which is not, like many other California rivers, made turbid 
by the washing of auriferous minerals. The hatching places are there- 
fore always visited by numerous salmon. 

On the banks of this river, and surrounded by Indian tribes, who, if 
not openly hostile, are at any rate not very kindly disposed towards the 
“nale faces,” Mr. Livingston Stone pitched his tent, and laid the foun- 
dation of a fishing and piscicultural station,'® whither he goes every year 
for four or five months, to gather salmon eggs, to fecundate them arti- 
ficially, and to submit them to the beginning of the incubating process‘ 
because only when the eggs have become embryonated can they be sent 
to great distances without much difficulty. 

On account of the large number of fish operated upon,” and the 
equally large number of eggs harvested (often nearly 10,000,000) these 
different operations represent a considerable amount of labor, A bar- 
rier stretched across the river stops the salmon in their ascent, and 
permits their being captured by means of immense seines. It is neces- 
sary that this barrier—a sort of palisade composed of poles placed 
close to each other—should be very solid, for the legions of salmon, 
often of enormous size, which throw themselves against it sometimes 
force a breach and succeed in making their escape. The labor of re- 
pairing such breaches, which of course ought to be done just as quickly 
as possible, is very difficult, obliging men to stand in the water, some- 
times up to their neck; and this water, produced by the melting snow, 
is always very cold, even in summer resembling ice-water. 

For the purpose of storing the captured fish, a “park” or corral has 
also been constructed here, by means of a row of palisades in the bed 
of the river. From this “corral”, containing the direct products of 
the fisheries, the men in charge of the fecundation, draw the salmon 
which they need. But it is no easy matter to free these fish from their 


19The encampment has been called Baird, in honor of the distinguished Commissioner 
of Fisheries. 

2 The eggs and milt which are harvested are all furnished by 5,000 or 6,000 salmon ; 
but, in order to procure that number of fish ready to spawn immediately, forty or 
fifty times asmany have to be caught. It isnot a rare occurrence at Camp Baird, that 
from 7,000 to 9,000 salmon are caught a day; for a single haul of the seine often 
brings up 1,200 to 1,400; but it likewise often happens that, among several thousand, 
only a few hundred are able to furnish spawn immediately. 


486 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


eggs or their milt; for they nearly all weigh from 15 to 20 pounds (often 
more) and are not easily managed. <A veritable struggle with the fish 
has to be gone through; a struggle all the more fatiguing, as the back 
has to be bent in order to be able to gather the spawn.”!_ Frequently 
the men have their hands lacerated by the rays of the fins or by the 
hard teeth of the male fish, which inflict painful and slow-healing 
wounds. 

It should, moreover, be remembered that this operation has frequently 
to be carried on during the night, when the air is quite cool; for in this 
mountainous region the nights are, during the summer season, as cold 
as the days are hot. The station men who have often, during day time, 
to do hard work in a2 broiling sun, at a temperature of 54° C., are fre- 
quently at night while engaged in fishing or in artificial fecundation 
subjected to a cold air of +11° C., and, moreover, with their clothes con- 
stantly soaked in ice-water. Very few of them escape the consequences 
of such fatigues and exposure to a rapidly changing temperature; and 
this generally shows itself even during the first week by attacks of 
fever and rheumatic pains. Onty men possessed of very strong consti- 
tutions can stand this work and carry it on without interruption. 

‘In spite of all these difficulties the number of eggs gathered and 
fecundated every day generally exceeds 300,000, and often goes as high 
as 800,000 or 900,000. The gathering, that is the spawning, commences 
generally about the 20th of August, and comes to a close about the 15th 
or 18th of September. 

The incubating process takes place in wooden troughs arranged par- 
allel to each other on a scaffolding about breast high, and sheltered 
by a vast tent 20 meters long and 10 meters broad. These troughs, to 
the number of ten, are grouped two by two, leaving sufficient space 
between them to allow the watchful care and the manipulations which 
the eggs require. Each large trough is formed of three smaller ones, 
five meters long, placed end to end, with a difference of level of a few 
centimeters, to give fall to the water which is necessary to keep it 
fresh. In spite of the rapidity of the current and a sufficient quantity 
of water, the eggs at the end of the troughs are sometimes exposed to 
a lack of oxygen, the water having yielded to the eggs higher up the 
greater portion of the air which it contained.” 


“But as the object is not to keep the fish, and as it consequently does not matter 
even if the fish are a little hurt, skillful operators often manipulate only small salmon. 
They hold the head of the fish tightly between their knees, hold the tail in the left 
hand, and with the right extract the eggs or the milt. Large fish often require two 
or three men to manage them. The salmon which have thus been operated upon are 
abandoned to the Indians of the neighborhood, whose friendship and even aid in this 
difficult work is thus gained, at least to a certain point. 

Mr. Livingston Stone states that, especially towards the last period of the embry- 
onic evolution, the eggs need plenty of oxygen in the water. At the beginning of the 
batching process, the eggs may, without any detriment, be heaped up in the appa- 
ratus and exposed to a feeble current; but from the time the embryo becomes dis- 
tinctly visible, great care should be taken to spread the eggs on the frames, and to 
make the current as rapid as possible, 


[11] A FOREIGN REVIEW OF AMERICAN FISH CULTURE. 487 


In each trough the eggs are arranged on wire frames fixed in an in- 
genious manner (the Williamson apparatus) which we shall describe 
below. This method economizes much space (which is particularly 
useful when large quantities of eggs are to be operated on), and thor- 
oughly aérates the water by keeping it constantly in motion. 

Long boards, forming covers, should be placed over the troughs; for 
the light which, by daytime, penetrates the canvas of the tent would 
be sufficient to destroy the eggs. 

The water which feeds these hatching troughs comes from the river. 
It is raised to a height of 3 meters and led into the apparatus by means 
of a hydraulic wheel, supported by two boats in the middle of the river, 
and furnished at its circumference with large buckets which at each 
revolution pour their contents into a wooden aqueduct raised on poles. 
This wheel, placed in the midst of the rapids, is thus driven by a very 
strong current, and is sufficient to raise and supply the apparatus with 
about 300,000 liters of water per hour. 

The water of the river McCloud, which is almost always limpid dur- 
ing the fine season of the year, becomes generally turbid during the 
spawning season of the salmon, as these fish root in the sand to make 
their nests. In order to serve for the incubating process, this water 
must be considerably filtered. The filter used consists of three wooden 
boxes, the one of which, larger than the others, forms a first receptacle. 
The water flows through it, first through a vertical wall of coarse cloth 
or canvas, doubled, and firmly extended on a trame, and afterwards 
through four similar walls of flannel or some woolen fabric; each wall 
presenting a filtering surface of 1 square meter. In the two other boxés 
it flows through a triple canvas and seven flannel filters. 

As the temperature of the water in the hatching troughs averages 
12 to 14 degrees C., the eggs are generally embryonated at the end of 
sixteen days; when they have reached that degree of development de- 
sired for their transportation, they are packed in damp moss and placed 
in boxes measuring 60 by 15 centimeters. This packing in itself in- 
volves considerable work, considering that 10,000,000 eggs represent a 
volume of about a hundred decaliters. More than 200 decaliters of 
moss are required for packing these eggs in an almost equal number of 
boxes, which are packed two by two in hay in open cases, having an 
upper compartment destined for the ice which is supplied during the 
journey. The whole thus packed makes a hundred packages, weighing 
in all more than 20 tons. On account of the heat the packing must be 
done very rapidly, and requires a great degree of activity. 

At last everything is ready, and nothing remains to be done but to 
forward the packages to their destination. They are (care being taken 
to shake them as little as possible) by a rather rough road of 35 kilo- 
meters, taken to Redding, Cal., the nearest station on one of the branch 
lines of that gigantic railroad (the Central Pacific Railroad) which unites 
the coasts of the Pacific and Atlantic, climbing the solitary heights of 
the Rocky Mountains and crossing the immense prairies of the ‘Far 


488 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


West.” After a journey of almost 4,500 miles the eggs arrive in the 
Eastern States, where they are distributed in accordance with the 
demands made by the various State commissions. Those destined 
for Europe are sent to New York, where, under the care of Mr. Fred. 
Mather, assistant of the U. S. Fish Commission, they receive, before 
being shipped, a new, special packing according to the method invented 
by that skillful pisciculturist. They are placed in thin layers on a sort 
of rectangular tray formed of light wooden frames, over which a kind of 
cotton fabric is extended. These frames are thick enough to allow of a 
number of them being placed one above the other without crushing or 
pressing the eggs. A solid box incloses the whole, leaving at the top, 
and sometimes also at the sides, an empty space sufficiently large to 
hold the ice needed for keeping the temperature low and retarding the 
embryonic evolution. Thanks to this ingenious arrangement, and by 
taking the precaution to have the ice renewed as soon as it is melted, 
eggs could safely be sent longer distances than across the Atlantic. 

In spite of the very large and constantly increasing number of eggs 
annually distributed, this number is still insufficient to supply the 
steadily increasing deniada for them, which is caused by a growing ree- 
ognition of the merits of the Galitonnis salmon.” 

Of all the salmonoids this one is certainly best adapted to artificia] 
propagation. When properly packed and kept at a sufficiently low 
temperature, eggs may be transported with hardly any loss. The loss in 
the hatching apparatus during the period of incubation is generally very 
small. As regards the young fish they are exceedingly vigorous and 
STOW rapidly, and the mortality which takes off so many young fish of 
other kinds is hardly noticed among them. Every one who has raised 
them has been struck with the robustness and vigor of these young fish, 
and particularly with their excellent appetite, all of which are very 
favorable symptoms in young fish. When grown these fish easily adapt 
themselves to the most varied conditions of life. They ascend the Sac- 
ramento when the waters of this river have become muddy from fre- 
quent rains and the washing of minerals. In July and August they 
enter the San Joaquin River in large numbers, and ascend that stream 
a distance of 150 kilometers, thus traversing the hottest valley in Cali- 
fornia, where the temperature of the air, rarely lower than 26° C. at 
noon, often rises to 40° C. The temperature of the water of the river 
varies from 28° C,. at the surface to 27° C. at the bottom. Leaving 
the hot and turbid waters of the San Joaquin, these fish full of vigor 
will enter, for the purpose of spawning, the tributaries of that river, the 
Merced, the Stanislaus, &¢., which are principally fed by the melting 
snow among the mountains. 


The total number of eggs gathered and distributed up to date is about 80,000,000. 
In order not to exhaust the McCloud River by thus constantly drawing upon the 
products of its spawning places, the establishment annually hatches from 1,000,000 
to 1,500,000 eggs to supply the river with young fish, which is therefore always full 
of salmon, though possibly not to the same degree as in former times. 


[13] A FOREIGN REVIEW OF AMERICAN FISH CULTURE. 489 


To judge from the nature of the waters which are continually inhabited 
by the California salmon, it seems certain that these fish could be sue- 
cessfully introduced in a large number of water-courses. In the United 
States these salmon seem to spread very successfully in the Eastern 
States, where few rivers have as turbid waters as the Sacramento, or as 
hot water as the San Joaquin. Furthermore, the long journeys annu- 
ally undertaken by the California salmon, the strength and energy ex- 
hibited by these fish during their migrations in the waters of the Sacra- 
mento and McCloud Rivers, all prove that no other kind of fish equals 
them in the capacity of ascending the rivers for a considerable distance 
from the sea for the purpose of spawning. 

The Shoshone Falls on the Snake River, one of the tributaries of the 
Columbia River, is the point where the salmon stop and where large 
numbers of them spawn; and these falls are more than 700 miles from 
the sea. It does not seem impossible, therefore, that the California sal- 
mon might live and flourish in the Mississippi, the tributaries of which 
river would afford spawning-places at a shorter distance from the ocean. 
As for waters of the Gulf of Mexico, where its annual migrations would 
take this fish, they are not any hotter at a certain distance from the mouth 
of the Mississippi than the waters of the sea along the coasts of New 
England. These considerations have induced the Fish Commission to 
make vigorous efforts to propagate the California salmon in the South- 
ern States, where a special establishment will soon be created for the 
artificial propagation of these fish. 

So far this salmon has been introduced into a large number of water- 
courses; and also into several lakes having no communication with the 
sea, where they have nevertheless begun to increase. It will hardly be 
necessary to point out the great importance of acquiring for our own 
waters a species of fish so remarkable and valuable in every respect. 


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XVI—THE ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 


By J.%Psgd.. KOLrz.* 


CHAPTER I. 
§ 1.—The artificial fecundation of fish-eggs. 


Whoever desires to engage in the artificial propagation of fish should 
endeavor to take nature for his guide in his manipulations. In the 
present work we shall do everything in our power to explain every 
principle by an example froi nature, and shall refer to the results of 
experiments made in other places, without, however, entering into a use- 
less and detailed examination of the different methods which so far haye 
been recommended. We shall above everything else limit ourselves to 
indicating those methods which, after repeated experiments, promise cer- 
tain success, directing attention at the same time to those points which 
are still somewhat dark and on which positive observations must throw 
further light. 

When the spawning season has commenced one procures some males 
and females of that kind of fish which he desires to propagate artifi- 
cially or to cross with other breeds. These fish are placed in tanks of 
sufficient size, keeping if possible each kind of fish separate, and taking 
care to give to all kinds those conditions of life which their nature de- 
mands. Thus trout, salmon, 
barbel, &c., which live in run- © 
ning or cold water, and prop- 
agate in it, should be placed 
in basins or tanks fed from 
springs, or by clear water re? 4. 
which is renewed from time to time; whilst the carp, tench, &e., which 
spawn in stagnant waters, should be placed in such water. These tanks 
have a double bottom, the upper one being of open wicker-work, whilst 
the lower one is amovable hair sieve. The young fish can then be taken 
out by means of a fine net shaped like a dipper and furnished with a 
long handle (Fig.1). If itis impossible to obtain tanks like those above 
described, the female fish are placed either in a fish-box (a kind of per- 


* Traité de la multiplication artificielle des poissons. Brussels, 1858.—Translated from 


the French by HERMAN JACOBSON. 


492 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


forated box), placed in the water, or it a large cage furnished with floats* 
(Fig. 2), which is so placed as to insure all the conditions necessary for 
the health of the fish. One may also use the box depicted in Figure 
17 after having taken 
out the hatching frames, 
“which are no longer 
needed. 

In case it should be 
impossible to procure 
live fish for the purposes 
of propagation, it will be 
necessary to operate 
with fish which have 

Fic. 2. been dead for two or 
three hours or more. It is well known that the milt contained in the 
genital organs retains its fecundating property for a long time, and 
does not even lose it through frost; but we still lack positive and exact 
data as to the length of time in which eggs will retain the faculty of 
being impregnated by spermatozoa with regard to changes of temper- 
ature and to the different kinds of fish. Nothing but continued obser- 
vations will lead to the solution of this problem.t 

Towards the time when it may be assumed that the fish which are to 
be propagated are ready to lay their eggs, they must be watched so as 
to take them in the exact moment when the eggs are about to be laid. 
The following external signs indicate the near approach of this moment: 
The belly of the female is slightly distended, the anal opening is very 
moist and swollen and protrudes like a hemorrhoidal tubercle; the eggs, 
surrounded by an abundant ovarian secretion, are free from all connec- 
tion and may by the slightest pressure be moved about in the cavity in 
which they have fallen. These eggs do not change color until they have 
come in contact with the water. 

These symptoms are less pronounced in the male, but the slightest 
pressure on the abdominal walls provokes the emission of the milt and 
leaves no doubt as to the approach of the spawning period. One can 
now proceed with the fecundating process, which may take place in 
two different ways, according to the distinction made between fish lay- 
ing free eggs, such as the trout, salmon, &c¢., and those whose eggs adhere 
to other bodies, such as the tench, carp, gudgeon, &e.t 


*J. Lamy: Eléments de pisciculture, Paris, 1855. 

tIt has been stated that eggs extracted from dead female trout and salmon, although 
beginning to show a change, were still endowed with the faculty of being fecundated 
by the milt from a male fish in the same condition; and the Munich piscicultural es- 
tablishment frequently works with eggs bought in hotels or from fishermen. The re- 
sult, however, is never as complete as with eggs from live fish. 

fCosTE: Comptes-Rendus, 1852, i, 985, 


[3] ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 493 


§ 2.—Artificial fecundation of free eggs. 


For this purpose one may use any vessel of glazed clay, porcelain, 
stone, wood, W&c.; the circumference of the upper edge should almost be 
equal to that of the bottom, which ought to be flat, so the eggs can 
spread over a certain surface and not be crowded. Water is poured into 
this vessel so as to cover the bottom to the depth of about 10 centimeters. 
This water, which should be clear, may be taken either from the stream 
or pond where the hatching apparatus is to be placed, and where the eggs 
ought to develop, or from those waters where the fish about to be propa- 
gated generally live. It is necessary to ascertain if the water has the 
temperature observed at the time of the natural spawning. When the 
water of those rivers is used in which a fish about to be manipulated pro- 
pagates naturally, its primitive temperature should above everything 
else be preserved. For this purpose, and if one operates in the open air, 
as near a trout-brook, it will be preferable, in order to accelerate the 
manipulations, to operate only on small quantities and to use fresh water 
every time. 

As soon as these preliminaries are finished, one takes up a female 
fish with the left hand and holds it perpendicularly by the fins of the 
head over and as close as possible to the vessel. When the fish is in 
this position the eggs which are 
near the anal orifice are emitted 
through their own weight. If this 
is not the case, the belly of the fish 
ought to be pressed very gently by 
moving the thumb and forefinger 
up and down. (Fig. 3.) 

As soon as the eggs, which have 
been extracted in the above man- 
ner, form a thin layer at the bot- 
tom of the vessel, one takes a male 
fish, treating him in exactly the 
same manner as the female, until 
= the water becomes slightly turbid, 

r assumes the appearance of milk 
which has been violently stirred. 
This mixture is thereupon stirred 

rita either with the tail of the male fish, 
held in the water during the operation, or with the hand, or with the 
beard of a brush ora feather. After letting it stand for 5 or 10 min- 
utes fecundation is accomplished. 

If the strength of the tail of the fish operated upon necessitates the 
employment of an assistant, the above manipulations are modified; the 
assistant holding the tail of the fish whose convulsive and irregular 
motions inconvenience the operator. The fish is then, necessarily, in 


494 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


an almost horizontal position, and the pressure on the belly is exer- 
cised in the manner indicated in Fig. 4. 

The following are invariably the essential conditions of success in 
the above-described operation: Perfect maturity of the eggs, suitable 
temperature of the water, and rapid execution of all the manipulations. 

We have above given the signs by which the near approach of the 
spawning season may be recognized. The degree of resistance met 
with in the operation of expelling the eggs furnishes the most certain 
indication in this 
respect. If a first 
attempt should be 
without result it will 
be necessary to re- 
turn the fish to the 
water or to their 
basins and to renew 
the experiment one 
or several days later. 
The experiment will 
not succeed if one 
has waited too long 
in freeing the fe- 
males from their 
burden. This may 
be recognized by the 
simultaneous emis- Fic. 4. 
sion of a purulent yellowish matter, among which may be seen some 
eggs, which, when brought in contact with the water, first become 
opaque and then turn white. 

The habitual spawning period can, inthe present case, only afford 
very little aid, as it not only differs in the varieties of one and the same 
family, but also, according to circumstances, in the individuals of one 
and the same variety. To this peculiarity must be ascribed the great 
difference between the data relative to the time of spawning of one and 
the same species of fish. As an instance of such differences in the data 
which we possess, we will mention the common trout (Salmo fario), which, 
according to the location and temperature of its different stations, spawns 
from September to March. The Netherlands Commission of Pisciculture* 
gives as the spawning season of this salmonoid the months of Septem- 
ber and October, whilst M. Costet gives the time from November to Feb- 
ruary. In the streams of the Vogelberg, in Germany, spawning com- 
mences about the end of September and seems to come toa close about 
the 1st November, as about that time no more trout containing eggs are 
caught. In the Grand Duchy of Luxemburg spawning generally com- 


*Handleiding tot de kunstmatige vermenigvulding van vischen, p. 22. 
+M. CosTE: Comptes-Rendus, 1852, p. 139. 


[5] ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 495 


mences about the end of November and is finished about Christmas. 
The spawning season for Southern Germany is during the months of 
November and December, and during these months the greater number 
of experiments in fecundation have been made by Mr. Detzem. J. 
Lamy* says that trout spawn from the 15th of December to the 30th of 
January, and Grand Forester Wagener of Detmold? reports that in 1853 
he succeeded in the artificial fecundation of the fish in question as late as 
March.t These facts prove sufficiently how necessary it is to have strict 
regard to the above-mentioned indications for recognizing the maturity 
of the spawn, as it is not safe to be exclusively guided by the indications 
as to the time when spawning takes place. 

The preservation of a suitable temperature during the process of arti- 
ficial fecundation is just as important as the perfect maturity of the 
eggs. Although we still lack complete and positive data relative to 
the extremes of temperature between which the fecundation of the dif- 
ferent kinds of fish can be more or less successfully accomplished, it 
my be considered as definitely settled that the success of the experi- 
ment dépends essentially on the temperature of the water, and that, 
owing to differences of temperature, it is often retarded or accelerated, 
and even in certain cases does not take place at all. Every piscicul- 
turist knows that fish never fail to spawn in certain waters presenting 
every favorable condition but that of the temperature of the water, but 
that not the slightest trace of young fry could be discovered, simply 
owing to the absence of a suitable temperature. 

According to the average period when fish spawn they are divided 
in “inter fish,”—the trout, salmon, burbot, &c.; “carly spring fish,”— 
the pike, &c.; ‘late spring fish,”—the perch, &c.; ‘summer fish,”—the 
tench, the carp, &c. From experiments made in France by M. de Qua- 
trefages it appears that the temperature most favorable for fecundation 
is, for fish spawning in winter from 4° to 6°, for early spring fish from 
S° to 10°, for late spring fish 14° to 16°, and for summer fish 20° to 25° 
Celsius. A difference of 4° to 5° in the above temperatures may thwart 
the success of fecundation. We will not attempt to disprove this asser- 
tion so far as the winter and early spring fish are concerned, although 
we have successfully fecundated trout eggs at a temperature of 4° to 
8°, As regards the other two classes of fish, we take the liberty to 
entertain doubts, whilst maintaining that the determining of the ex- 
remes of temperature should be made the subject of continued and care- 
ful observations. 

The necessity for executing the different manipulations of the pro- 
cess of fecundation as xapidly as possible is already explained by what 
we said above regarding the temperature of the water. But this rapid 


*J. Lamy: Eléments de pisciculture, Paris, 1855. 

tDr. Fraas: Ueber kiinstliche Fischerzeugung, p. 59. 

t The ordinance of 1669 fixes the spawning season of the trout from February 1st till 
the middle of May. 


496 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES, [6] 


manipulation is also necessitated by the circumstance that the milt of 
most fish loses its fecundating property very soon when brought in 
contact with the water. The same applies to the eggs, which when 
first laid are united and surrounded by an alinost invisible mucilaginous 
covering. When brought in contact with the water this covering be- 
comes bloated in a few seconds: the fecundating spermatozoa can no 
longer reach the egg, and are thus, by the sheer force of circumstances, 
prevented from performing successfully the process of fecundation. It 
appears that the substance which unites and envelopes the eggs acts 
in the same manner as the spawn of frogs which, according to experi- 
ments made by Messrs. Prévost and Dumas, cannot be fecundated as 
soon as the glutinous matter which envelopes it has become bloated 
by water. 


§ 3.—Artificial fecundation of eggs which adhere to neighboring objects. . 


In order to accomplish the fecundation of eggs of fish like the carp, 
gudgeon, barbel, &c., which, by means of a glutinous matter, attach 
their eggs to any objects near them, the above-described practiée must 
be somewhat modified. One takes a small quantity (a few handfuls) of 
well-washed aquatic plants, such as the water ranunculus, vessels of the 
form and size above described, and a trough. Three persons must as- 
sist at this experiment; one takes the female fish and relieves it of its. 
_ eggs in the manner described above, another takes the male fish and 
extracts the milt, whilst the third stirs the water with a small bunch 
of herbs and thus facilitates impregnation. The eggs, which are of a 
viscous nature, adhere to the plants, and when these are sufficiently 
charged with them, one lets them lie in the spermatized water for three 
or four minutes in order to give them time to absorb the fecundating 
molecules. In order that the eggs adhering to the bunches of plants 
may not dry, these bunches are gathered in a trough, where they are 
covered with pieces of wet cloth. This manipulation does not offer as 
many difficulties as the preceding one, but it nevertheless requires con- 
siderable attention. Thus it is essential to allow only a quantity of 
eggs proportioned to the surface which one desires to cover with eggs 
to fall in the vessel; otherwise they would become conglomerated on 
the plants, which would be very detrimental to their development. 

If there is no other way, two persons may go through this operation. 
In that case one will extract the eggs whilst the other gathers them on 
the bunches of herbs. When the eggs have become attached to the 
plants they are placed in a vessel to be subjected to the influence of 
the milt of the male fish. The water is gently stirred with the plants 
in order to subject aJl the eggs to the influence of the fecundating liquid. 
After the bunches of plants with the eggs have remained in the water 
impregnated with milt for 5 or 6 minutes the operation is finished, and 
the eggs are put away for the purpose of being hatched, either in an 


[7] ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 497 


apparatus especially prepared for this object or in a tank or basin hay- 
ing the desired conditions of safety and temperature. 

Natural spawning places may suffice for everything which has been 
recommended in the above. 


§ 4.— Artificial spawning places. 


As has been indicated at the end of the last paragraph, the simplest 
means of multiplying those species of fish whose eggs adhere to foreign 
bodies is to make the fish deposit their eggs in a place provided for 
them in a pond or water-course, &c. This may be done by means of 
very simple and inexpensive apparatus which are generally composed of 
wooden frames (Fig. 5) of different shapes and sizes, covered with aquatic 


Fic. 5. Fic. 6. ° 


plants, brush-wood, &c., arranged in such a manner as to resemble a 
small roof for sheltering things (Fig. 6). Their size, which varies from 
1 to 2 meters, their distribution and position, of course, depend on the 
different localities. It is always 
necessary that one end of the ap- 
paratus should be weighed down 
by a sufficiently heavy weight to 


apparatus under the water (Fig. 7). 
One or two months before the 
Fic. 7. presumed time of spawning, these 
apparatus are placed on the banks of the water where the fish live, and 
are taken out again after spawning is over. The bunches of herbs are 
then carefully taken off, and are, in order to insure the hatching, placed 
under the same conditions as the products of artificial fecundation. 
For those fish which deposit their eggs free on the gravel, or hide them 
in the spaces between the stones, as is the habit of the salmonoids, it 
will be best to select brooks with clear and not very deep water, and 
S. Mis. 29-———32 


498 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


to cover the bed with a thick layer of stones, gravel, and sand, so as to 
induce the females to come and hide their eggs there. 

These measures cannot in all cases replace artificial fecundation unless 
there is no danger of the spawn being destroyed in its free condition, 
and thus there is no ground for the objections Peay against the natur al 
restocking of our rivers. 


§ 5.—Crossing of different breeds. 


It rarely occurs in nature that different breeds of fish will cross,* 
which is easily explained by the circumstance that the milt soon loses 
its fecundating property. Guided by their instinct the male fish de- 
posit their milt in close proximity to the eggs laid by the females of 
their kind. The short duration of the fecundating faculty of the sperm- 
atozoa, when brought in contact with the water, does not allow the 
milt to attach itself to other eggs than those for which it is destined. 

The possibility of producing cross-breeds is beyond a doubt. Thus 
at Hiiningen a cross-breed has been obtained from the common trout 
and the salmon, from the salmon-trout and salmon, and vice versa. <At- 
tempts made in Bavaria to cross the trout and the pike have not proved 
successful, whilst the crossing of the common trout and the blay (there- 
fore two different families) was successfully accomplished.t Cross- 
breeds have been produced from different species of trout among them- 
selves, and specimens of these crosses are found in large numbers in 
the fish-ponds of the veterinary school at Munich. In crossing differ- 
ent breeds of fish, especially salmon, the object is to obtain fish able to 
live in those shallower waters in which those among them which live 
near the bottom of the lakes do not prosper. 

We only mention these facts briefly, as our experience so far does 
not justify us in passing a final verdict as to their absolute reliabil- 
ity, and as to the profit which might be derived from crossing different 
kinds of fish. We have very good reasons for this; the majority of 
these cross-breeds are deprived of the faculty of reproduction, and if 
this is not the case they gradually return to their original types. The 
alleged fact of the sterility of certain cross-breeds is beyond a doubt; 
it is proven by the hybrid products of various kinds of salmonoids often 
met with. These cross-breeds, in which Dr. Fraas of Munich invari- 
ably found only a few sickly-looking eggs, can never spawn. But there 
are cross-breeds which can do it, as the cross between the carp and 
the crucian. Future experiments must show what are the species be- 
tween which a cross can be effected and the conditions under which 
this can be done successfully. The objections raised against the pro- 
duction of cross-breeds is well founded, and in order to overcome it 


* We occasionally meet with a cross-breed of the crucian and the common carp, and 
of the latter with the Chinese gold-fish. These cross-breeds may be recognized by 
having smaller scales and a shorter and thicker head. 

- +Dr. FraAas: Die kiinstliche Fischerzeugung, p. 57. 


[9] ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 499 


one ought to endeaver to confine the crossings to their reasonable 
limits, and to repeat them through several generations, always cross- 
ing the primitive kind with cross-breeds. 


CHAPTER II. 
HATCHING APPARATUS. 


After the eggs have become fecundated they are placed in the hatch- 
ing apparatus. For this purpose perforated boxes, resembling sieves, 
baskets of different shapes, boxes of wood, stone, earth, metal; sieves 
of every kind &c., have been proposed, and the only trouble is which 
to select among so many different kinds. 

The long, open boxes described by Jacobi have for a long time been 
successfully employed in Germany, and have been replaced by the cir- 
cular boxes of tinned iron, perforated like sieves, of Messrs. Gehin 
and Remy, which are still used in Germany, owing to the high praise 
bestowed upon them by Dr. Fraas, of Munich. He explains his prefer- 
ence for the apparatus of the two fishermen of La Bresse by stating 
the inconveniences presented by wire sieves, which easily rust and favor 
the generation of parasitical conferve. Zhe experience of allages, 
however, has demonstrated that perforated boxes can only be success- 
fully employed in very pure running water, as the holes easily become 
stopped up and are rendered useless by the oxidation of the tin of 
which they are made. The open wicker baskets recommend themselves 
by their cheapness, but they offer too little resistance to the enemies of 
the spawn; boxes made of coarse hair present the same inconveniences 
without even the advantage of being cheap. 

These considerations have induced Mr. Coste* to find some method 
which would always enable him, whenever he deemed it useful, to 
manipulate the products inclosed in his apparatus and to pass them 
from the hatching-brooks to the fish-ponds. The incubating apparatus, 
consisting of artificial streams of continually-running water, were the 
result of Mr. Coste’s researches. Their simplicity and their evident 
usefulness were immediately recognized, and facilitated the adoption of 
this system in a more or less modified form. We will first describe the 
apparatus in use in the piscicultural establishments in the Nether- 
lands. ; 

At the bottom of a common spring, with a capacity of 30 to 35 liters, 
beds are prepared of gravel, sand, and charcoal, The water, after hav- 
ing passed through the filter, flows through a faucet into a wooden 
tank, clothed on the inside with zine or lead (a vessel of glazed clay is 
preferable) ; at the end of this tank there is an opening through which 
the water flows out into a small pond or tank. 

The fecundated eggs are placed on hair frames and immersed in the 


*CosTE : Comptes-Rendus, pp. 43 and 46. 


500 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


water of the vessels to a depth of one or several centimeters, according 
to the different kinds of fish. These frames have raised edges which 
rest on the sides of the apparatus. Their dimensions are as follows: 
Length, 1 meter; breadth, 0.10 to 0.20 centimeters; depth, 0.05 to 0.10 
centimeters. 

Fig. 8 represents the incubating apparatus and Fig. 9 the hair frame. 


YUE) qa win _! a 


: pe 


Ves Z 
LY 


7, 


Yi IG yj ay 2 
OM Lyf i bob Lf Uj; 
VE bh. 


Fie. 8. 


This apparatus may be considerably enlarged by adding more vessels, or 
by placing them one below the other in the shape of steps, as indicated 
in Fig. 10. 


At one end or in the bottom there is an opening for a tube to let out 
the water, with a stop-cock, so that the water can be let out at any 
time. 

For the incubation of trout eggs M. Coste uses an equally excellent 
apparatus, which is shown in Fig. 11, and therefore needs no further 


ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 501 


[11 
description. The outer portion, which is necessary to support the frames 
with glass-sticks (which here take the place of the hair-frames), is not 
seen in the drawing. The dimensions of the different troughs or ves- 
sels which compose this apparatus are as follows: Length, 0.52 meters 


breadth, 0.15 meters; depth, 0.10 meters. 


be iw 


i : -- i i il 
cons 


He 


Fic, 11. 


These troughs, which have been in use for a long time in Detriotds 
Germany, are placed in different ways according to the fancy of the 
operator. The hatching apparatus of the College of France, repre- 
sented in Fig. 12, will show the utmost use to which this apparatus 


has been put. 
i i i — = rays =, au sii ly hy 
iH i | i iy all Me re y, iy — Pr aes 
rc pry 
lt Lf Loy Ie lit . 
Ine | Zs ae alll Mee i Ni (in i 
: Vio | —— i. i i Ti 
i yA ae 3 eo a 2 


i I 


ai me i ga aa 
= = 


ll uu 


————— 


SS 
SSS 
SOFT 


———— 


E— 


= 


\ ry 
\\ 
1 Y < 


EEE 


| 


| in i es 


Fic. 12. 


The incubating apparatus is placed under a shed, supplied on all sides 


with hatches opening outward. 


These openings are intended to let air 


502 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


pass through and to admit heat and light, all of which are necessary for 
the development of the eggs. 

In case it should be impossible to construct any of the apparatus de- 
scribed above, and to carry on the incubating process in water-courses, 
one may, in pure run- . 
ning water which 
leaves no sediment, 
employ boxes like the 
one shown in Fig. 13, 
or the boxes of Messrs. 
Genin and: Rem y. 7 
These last-mentioned ——= 
boxes are used at 
Scharnhouse. In order 
to avoid the dangers 
threatening the spawn from the oxidation of the tin, Professor Rueff 
has had them made of zine, and supplied them with floats. Vessels 
of glazed terra cotta are also employed, which have all the advantages 

= of the Rueff boxes, and are less ex- 
pensive (Fig. 14). Some piscicultur- 
ists prefer, in spite of the disadvant- 
ages mentioned above, flat wicker 
baskets, with or without floats (Figs. 
15 and 16), according to the habits 
=. of the fish whose eggs are to be incu- 
= bated. 
== Coste * has also constructed an in- 
= Se raat, cubating-box which will remedy all 
the defects of the other boxes. This box (Fig. 17), which is an improve- 
ment on the Jacobi box, measures about 1 meter and one-half meter 
breadth and depth. Its sides and bottom are of solid wood. Its top is 
formed of a lid in two parts, 
in the center of which there 
is a grating of metal wire; 
and each end is closed by a 
door, whose opening is larger 
than that of the lids, and is 
also supplied with a grating. 
Both doors and lds move on 4 
hinges, open outward, and are ® 
closed simply by means of two 
small bolts fastened with Fie. 15. 
strings, and, for greater safety’s sake, supplied with padlocks. There 
are no subdivisions in the inside of this box, but there are running along 
the sides small ledges to support the frames. These frames are of wood 


Fig. 13. 


*CosTE: Comptes-Rendus, p. 55 et seq. 


[13] ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 503 


and glass sticks. But as these frames are intended to be put one over 
the other, the box must be somewhat higher than in the trough appara- 
tus, and at the ends there must be large notches for the free passage 
of the water. To render the process 
easier, their surface must not (if the 

» box has the length mentioned above) 
ii) represent more than one-fourth of its 
He a \\\|4 capacity, so that four of them may be 

SEE” on the same floor. 

Fia. 16. This box, which should be used inrun- 
ning water, can be used for free eggs and for eggs adhering to foreign 
bodies. In spite of its small size, it can hatch a very large quantity of 
eggs, and permits manipulations, which in the ‘sieve apparatus” are 
. difficult or hurtful. For 
the purpose of observing 
what is going on inside, and 
to clean the gratings when 
they have become ob- 
structed by sediments, the 
lidsand doors can be opened 
as often as desired, without 
taking the apparatus out 
of the water and without 
disturbing the frames and ==== 
the eggs. Whether at- === 
tached to a floating frame 
by clamps or by strings at- 
tached to pegs driven in the 
ground, it must present to Fic. 17 
the current one of its extremities when the current is moderate and one 
of its angles when it is very rapid. A bed of pebbles and fine sand 
placed at the bottom receives the young fish, which either fall or de- 
scend on it as they are hatched, and offers them favorable conditions for 
their further development, till the time arrives when the gates can be 
opened and they can be set at liberty in some river or pond. Fish of 
small size will escape through the meshes of the wire grating and dis- 
perse through the water. 

When the hatching process is finished, all the frames are removed 
from the box, so that it can be cleaned, and better care can be bestowed 
on the young fish imprisoned in it. 

Whenever it becomes necessary to place one or the other of the above- 
mentioned apparatus in stagnant water, the bottom should be covered 
with aquatic plants, to prevent this water, which of coutse is notrenewed, 
from spoiling, and form an inexhaustible source of oxygen, which is so 
useful for the development of the embryo. 

Wherever propagation is to be carried on on a large scale, it will be 


504 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


preferable to bave hotching-canals, which should have solid walls, so 
as to exclude water-rats, as well as the Disticus marginalis and Hy- 
drophilus piceus (both as larve and in their perfect state), and a good 
covering, and be provided with wire gratings, both to protect the fish 
from the voracity of other inhabitants of the water and to prevent their 
dispersion. . 

These coverings also prevent the appearance of the greenish mold 
which generally forms on the stones at the bottom, and which is com- 
posed of diatoms and other small alge. 


CHAPTER III. 
§ 1.—Hatching eggs in incubating apparatus. 


After the eggs have been fecundated either near or in water having 
the same temperature as that in which the hatching apparatus is placed, 
they are carefully put in this apparatus. By observing these condi- 
tions no disturbance need be feared from any sudden change in the 
temperature of the water. For incubating the free eggs of salmon and 
other winter fish, the specific weight of which is much greater than that 
of the water, and which consequently descend to the bottom of the 
apparatus, it will be necessary to furnish the apparatus with a layer of 
gravel several centimeters thick, and to see to it that this layer is uni- 
formly covered with the eggs. Mr. Detzem and several other practical 
pisciculturists put a layer of fine sand on these eggs; others again avoid 
doing this, so as to be able to constantly watch the eggs, and to remove 
any spoiled eggs or causes of destruction. 

As regards those eggs which adhere to foreign bodies, like those of 
the carp, &c., which are lighter than the water in which they float, it is 
necessary to place them in the apparatus with the plants on which they 
have been deposited, as has been described in Chapter I, § 3, of this 
treatise. It is necessary to avoid currents which would carry the eggs 
to one single part of the apparatus. It will, therefore, be best to select 
the stagnant and tranquil waters of ponds or canals where the effect of 
strong currents can be mitigated by using apparatus with very close 
wire gratings. In thiscase the apparatus must not be entirely submerged 
but should be placed in such a position that there is an empty space 
’ between the water and the lid. A few centimeters of water suffice for 
apparatus in which the water is easily and regularly renewed. 

It should be mentioned that with Coste’s apparatus and the one 
used in Holland, the eggs are deposited on glass or wire frames, and 
that no gravel is required; whilst the ingenious system of artificial brooks 
with constantly running water, invented by Coste,* regulates the dis- 
tribution of the water in the most suitable manner. 

It should also be observed that eggs which have been transported, 
or which come from a distance, should be gradually accustomed to the 


* Comptes-Rendus, 1852, p. 301. — 


[15] ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 505 


temperature of the water in which they are to be hatched, and that in 
that case it becomes necessary to place them for 24 hours with the 
boxes in water which has the same temperature as that which feeds the 
apparatus. 

We must finally direct attention to the practice introduced by some 
German pisciculturists, to place the eggs, immediately after they have 
been fecundated, in those waters where they are to stay during the 
period that elapses between the two extremes of their life. The only 
precaution they take is to place the eggs in the most suitable location 
and to shelter them as much as possible from hurtful influences.* 


§ 2.—Rules to be observed during incubation ; maladies and enemies of the 
eggs. 


During the entire period of their development the eggs require con- 
stant and watchful care. In the first place care should be taken, as has 
___ already been recommended above, that the eggs, no mat- 
ei ter in what apparatus they are kept, are not piled up too 
high, but are evenly spread over the whole surface. If 
8 this is not observed, it would not only be impossible to con- 
stantly watch the eggs, but they would not develop evenly 

ria.is, and their development may be indefinitely delayed. Piling 
up the eggs too high is also apt to produce those maladies which attack 
fecundated spawn. Confervee and pa rasitical plants (Fig. 18) produced 
by the constant moisture in which the eggs are kept are particularly 
injurious to the spawn. They first : 
attack the spoiled eggs, which may be 
recognized by their yellowish color, and 
by being opaque, and cover them with 


filaments of different colors. \ 
A small alga (Leptomitus clavatus, | | 
Fig. 19) is particularly active in car- i 
rying on this work of destruction. It } 
is true it can only grow on spoiled or / 


dead eggs; but it will envelop healthy 
eggs in a thick and fuzzy net, and will 
thus choke them. The only remedy 
against these parasites, the propagation . 
of which would be diminished or hindered if the eggs had been evenly 
spread, or if the apparatus had been cleaned at the proper time, con- 
sists in immediately removing, by means of a pair of pincers, (Fig..20) 
all the eggs which show the slightest trace of infection. It would -not 
only be a useless trotble, but the evil would only be increased, if, in- 
stead of removing the infected eggs, one would endeavor to save them. 
by attempts to destroy with the pincers the parasitical plants which 


* Von SCHEWEN: Zeitschrift des landwirthschaftlichen. Vereins fiir Rheinpreussen 1897, 
No. 1. 


506 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


cover.them. Infected eggs are hopelessly lost, and in the attempt to 
clean them detached germs of these parasites might transfer the malady 
to eggs which so far have been spared. 

Another very dangerous enemy of the spawn is found in the family 
of the diatoms, some of which attach themselves in enormous quantities 
to the stones and gravel at the bottom of the apparatus and cover it 

with a brownish or yellowish- 
J green covering; they there- 
) upon attack the eggs, exclude 

Fic. 20. them from the air, and thus 
cause the death of the spawn, no matter to what degree of development 
it has attained. The species most to be feared are (Fig. 21) Meridion 
circulare (f), Synedra angustata (a), parvula (b), acicularis (c), VAUCHE- 
RLA, palea (d), mucida, and the diatoma pectinale. We possess two very 
excellent remedies against these plagues of the pisciculturist. These 
are: rapidly running water and the exclusion of light; but whilst the 
first can only be applied to fish of the salmonoid species, the second 
will, under all circumstances, prove effective, is not at all hurtful to the 
spawn, and can be applied anywhere. The exclusion of light hinders the 
propagation of the diatoms and conferve, whilst the eggs can be suc- 
cessfully hatched even in the densest 
darkness.* Several authors also rec- 
ommend in such cases to transfer the 
eggs to other vessels. The crooked 
and straight pipes used for this pur- 
pose can only be employed in small 4% 
establishments, and they may -be re- 
placed by the first glass tube near at 
hand, provided that it can be hermeti- 
cally closed with the thumb when the 
eggs have entered its lower portion. It 
will be necessary, however, to have due 
regard to the state of development of 
the spawn, and only to employ this remedy when it is absolutely neces- 
sary, and even then only when the eyes of the embryo are visible. 

The intervention of man is also required when the eggs are attacked by 
the larvie of insects, and particularly by those of Disticus marginalis 
and Hydrophilus pisceus ; nothing but constant watchfulness can prevent 
the ravages which they would cause. Another small insect, probably 
in its larva state (Ascarides minor ?), and which probably comes from 
fish used in the operation, is very dangerous to the eggs at the time 
when the embryo has almost reached its full development. It pierces 
the outer shell of the egg and devours its contents. As the presence 
of this animalcula can only be recognized by the shells of the eggs float- 
ing near the surface, there is no time to think of its destruction. 


xh: le air nen: ates : j 
This observation is based on positive and repeated experiments. The hatching 
process takes place in a regular manner, but is somewhat delayed. 


[17] ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 507 


Water rats are also extremely dangerous to the embryo. They may 
be destroyed (though with considerable difficulty) by means of wire 
traps. In order to prevent as much as possible the approach of these 
unwelcome guests one should be careful not to destroy the damaged 
eggs near to the hatching apparatus, as thus the odor of putrefying 
animal matter which attracts the rats will be avoided. 

We must once more direct attention to what has been said above re- 
garding the temperature of the water. We believe that, if the water 
in the incubating apparatus is kept at the temperature which we have 
given above as being most suitable for fecundation, the first condition 
for a natural and rapid development is fulfilled. The person in charge 
of the apparatus should always watch the thermometer; by opening or 
closing the apparatus, or by adding cold or hot water, an even degree 
of temperature may be maintained. 


§ 3.— Transformation and development of. the egg. 


There are various changes in the appearance of eggs which have been 
fecundated; one might almost say that their contents become turbid and 
that they become less transparent than when they left the opening near 
the anal fin; they again, and almost imperceptibly, assume their first 
transparent appearance, whilst in the inside there may be observed a 
small circular spot which was not seen there at first* (Fig. 22,1). This 
change has erroneously been considered a certain sign of fecundation; 
it takes place both in fecundated and non-fecundated eggs, but it de- 
velops more slowly and irregularly in the latter (Fig. 22, 2). 

During the first moments and even during the first days it is (with 
certain kinds of fish) impossible to distinguish with the naked eye fee- 
undated from non-fecundated eggs, but when examined under the micro- 
scope there can no longer be any doubt. 

After a certain time an arched line makes its appearance in the fec- 
undated eggs (Fig. 22; 3, 4,5). This time differs not only according to 
the different species of fish to which 
the eggs belong, but also accord- § 
ing to the temperature of the water 
in which they are placed. Farther 
down we shall point out the causes 
of this (Fig. 22). 

This line increases in size with the gradual development of the eggs; 
whilst one of its ends is prolonged in the shape of a tail, the other as- 
sumes the form of a spoon. This latter part is the future head of the 
young fish; the eyes, which now appear like two brown pointst (Fig. 22, 
6), prove this sufficiently. 

The motions, particularly of the tail, of the young fish become more 


Fic. 22. 


* This fact has already been observed by ARISTOTLE. Hist. anim. ., lib. 6, cap. io 
t Also noticed by Aristotle. 


508 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


and more noticeable according to the degree of its development. These 
motions, which cause the bursting of the shell which incloses the embryo, 
increase in violence till the moment when theyoung fish leaves the egg. 

Finally, there is formed in the shell of the egg a small opening which 
allows the young fish to slip out of his place of imprisonment. 

Hither the tail or the head generally appear first; sometimes the um- 
bilical bladder makes its appearance before either of the above-men- 
tioned members, But whatever part of the body emerges from the shell 
first, the young fish is not yet master of all its motions. 
It remains partly inclosed in its shell, and only gradually 
and by repeated efforts does it succeed in enlarging the 
opening of its prison; after a few hours it is entirely 
rige 23) free (Fig. 23), and can divest itself of a membrane which 
_ was only intended to protect it during the early stages of its develop- 
ment, and which was of no use whatever in forming any of the organs 
of the body. 

The space of time which elapses from the moment of fecundation till 
the fish is freed from its protecting cover is different with the different 
kinds of fish. With the pike, it is eight, ten, or fifteen days; with others, 
like the salmon, it is one or two months. 

The development of the fish progresses slower or quicker according to 
the temperature in which incubation takes place. Pike eggs placed in | 
water exposed to the rays of the sun, and which has not been renewed, 
are hatched after nine days, whilst other eggs which have remained in 
the shade in water which has been constantly renewed would require 
eighteen to twenty days for their entire development. 


CHAPTER IV. 


RAISING YOUNG FISH, AND THE CARE WHICH SHOULD BE BESTOWED 
ON THEM. 


§ 1.— Dissemination. 


During the first period after the fish has torn its protecting membrane, 
it is useless to give it any food, as the umbilical sack, which in certain 
fish, like the carp, is found in the abdominal cavity (whilst in others, 
like the trout and salmon, is outside this cavity and can be plainly seen) 
furnishes it with food until it is entirely absorbed. The time required 
for this differs in the different species of fish; thus the carp goes with- 
out food for two or three weeks. Salmon remain one or two months 
after being hatched in the incubating apparatus without taking any 
other food but that furnished by the umbilical sack, or perhaps by mi- 
croscopic animalcule found in the water. 

The necessity for other food asserts itself with the disappearance of 
this sack; and the further preservation and raising of yonng fish will 
have to follow one of the two methods described below, until further ex- 
perience has shown which of the two is positively to be preferred. 


[19] ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 509 


(1.) Some pisciculturists begin to disseminate the fish in the water 
which is to be stocked with them as soon as the umbilical sack has been 
absorbed; they maintain that the young fish, which at that time is par- 
ticularly lively and active, can escape 
dangers better than when it has grown 
larger. 

The fish, moreover, becomes accus- 
tomed to the water in which it is to 
grow, and will not have to undergo a 
change of water and food, nor be sub- 
ject to transportation, the expenses vi 
and difficulties of which increaseas the — |}\'///[ 
fish grows older. \ Mie 

(2.) Other pisciculturists feed the | 
fish for some time, and place them in 
special basins of different size, among |} 
which we would choose those of the yj} 
piscicultural establishment of Enghien- || | 
les-Baines, as modified by the Nether- +) 
lands Fish Commission (Fig. 24), 
which combines all the advantages of 
salubrity and easy management. 

We give only those explanations 
which are absolutely necessary for un- 
derstanding our sketch. The wooden 
sluice or the lead pipe A leads the 
water into the square basin b, which 
serves to filter the water; it is filled 
with stones and has a lid. 

On the opposite side of this basin 
there is the lead pipe C, which opens 
into the transverse pipe D, of the 
same metal; the four tubes E lead 
the water from the tube D to the 
upper basin F, whence, by means of 
faucets, it can be conducted into four 
lower basins, and even further, in such a manner as to allow it to flow 
with ease. 

Between the tubes F there are joined to the transverse tubes D the 
longer tubes G, which empty into discharging tubes; on these latter 
there are placed perpendicularly other tubes destined to form little foun- 
tains. These fountains may be provided with stop-cocks. The fish are 
placed in these basins, the water of which is continually renewed, until 
they have reached a certain size. 

In order to prevent the little fish from getting into the faucets by 
which the different basins communicate—which, of course, would very 


; 


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510 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


seriously interfere with such communication—small wooden boxes are 
used, which are partly filled with stones, and which are placed in the 
basins at some little distance from the faucets (Fig 25). 
, . The faucets are placed 
vin the walls of the large 
\ basins, which are put in 
Fic. 25. communication with the 
small basins by means of a discharge pipe; one or several holes oppo- 
site to that of the discharge pipe serve to prevent the water from flow- 
ing out too freely. 

In Fig. 24, H indicates the place where one of these small boxes is 
located, whilst Fig. 25 gives the profile of the two basins placed one 
within the other. The little fish would have to pass through the entire 
mass of stones before they could reach the stop-cocks. 

In case the rising of the water should fill the basins too much, it will 
become necessary to draw off the surplus water by means of tube L, and 
lead it to some convenient place. 

Figs. 26 and 27 give the elevation and ground plan of these basins 
rising one above the other like steps. The scale is 1 to 600. 


FiG. 26. 


The dotted line indicates that part of the apparatus which is under 
ground. : 

In case the level of the water is not high enough above the ground on 
which the basins are to be constructed, it will become necessary to lead 
the water, by means of pumps or other contrivances, into a common 
reservoir destined to feed the entire establishment. The basin B can 
very well be replaced by a filter placed in the common reservoir. 

Itis probably not necessary to demonstrate that the young fish should 
be fed as nearly as possible in the same way as they would feed if they 
were entirely free. 
We therefore think | 
itadvisable to plant 
someaquatic plants | 
in the basins where = 
those fish are which } 
feed on plants and 
insects; they ought 
also to have all the Neo Ee 
worms and larvze that can be procured, as well as insects of the species 
Cyclops, Cypris, and Cythera, which in spring are plentiful in fresh 
water; boiled peas, hemp cakes, bread, &e., may also be given to them. 


[21] ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. oll 


Those fish which live on their congeners may be fed with the spawn 
and young fish which they have produced. If it is not possible to do 
this, the following articles may be used to advantage: whiting, reduced to 
a paste; frog meat, cut, dried, and made into a very fine powder; veal or 
beef cooked and chopped up fine, or blood dried and pulverized. If 
this kind of food is used, the basins should be well cleaned from time to 
time, so as to prevent any accumulation of decaying animal matter. 

As soon as the fish are large and strong enough to encourage the hope 
that they will not fall a prey to their worst enemies, they are let loose 
in the water which is to be stocked with them, or they are forwarded to 
those places where that particular kind of fish is desired, in kegs filled 
with water. 

We are not in favor of any prolonged stay in the piscicultural estab- 
lishments, except where foreign breeds of fish are to be acclimatized, 
where rare species are to be multiplied, or where continued stocking of 
waters necessitates the constant production of young fish; and even in 
this case it will be necessary to consider whether it is not preferable to 
place the young fish in basins specially set aside for that purpose. 


§ 2. Sickness of young fish. 


When fish-ponds are established in much frequented localities, it often 
happens that dead fish are found at the bottom. They generally sink 
to the bottom with their mouths wide open, and when examined the en- 
tire buccal cavity is found to be filled with blackish flakes. These are 
produced by small atoms floating in the air, which fall into: the water 
and gather into small flakes, which the movements of the fish scatter 
throughout the whole pond. This detritus, which is too light to be swal- 
lowed, enters the respiratory organs, obstructs them, and finally causes 
asphyxia. 

This evil may be remedied by supplying the apparatus with a double 
bottom, either by means of a wicker frame, or some tissue with large 
meshes, which is placed between the bottom of the basin and the space 
reserved for the fish. 


§ 3. Acclimatization. 


The possibility of acclimatizing fish was demonstrated a long time 
ago. Among the ancients, the Chinese* and the Romans hatched the 


* Several authors tell us that the Chinese have from time immemorial pursued a 
method which only now begins to be known in Europe. Inquiries relative to this 
subject show that their whole merit consists in having transplanted eggs from one 
water to the other. For this purpose they gather spawn which has been fecundated 
in a natural manner on mats, which answer the same purpose as our artificial spawn- 
ing-boxes, and which aresold by measure. No one willseriously consider the method 
recommended by their authors, to put spawn in egg shells, to seal these up hermet- 
ically, and have them hatched by a bird!! 


512 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


spawn of salt-water fish in fresh water, and succeeded in acclimatiz- 
ing them. In the sixteenth century Marshall imported carp into Eng- 
Jand.* 

A hundred years later the gold carp (Cyprinus auralus) was introduced 
into Europe from China, and at the present time is a frequent ornament 
of our ponds and of glass globes in our parlors. ‘Towards the end of the 
last century the celebrated Dr. Franklint gathered fecundated spawn 
of the Norfolk herring on marine plants, and successfully transplanted 
these fish to the inland waters of America, &c., &c. M. de Lacépéde, in 
his Traité des effets de Vart de Vhomme sur la nature des poissons ;t 
and Backwell in his Travels in Tarentaise and in the Edinburgh Review 
of 1822, demonstrated the usefulnesss and possibility of such acclima- 
tizing experiments, and directed special attention to the salmon family, 
which also at the present day forms the principal subject of our experi- 
ments. Itwas reserved for our modern piscicu lturists tomake this ques- 
tion the order of the day, and to hasten its solution by the facility and 
certainty which the artificial methods have brought to the propagation 
of fish. This facility of multiplying rare or foreign species of fish opens 
out a wide field of profitable speculation. No one will deny the great 
benefit which agriculture has derived from the introduction and the 
crossing of foreign breeds of domestic animals, and which horticulture 
has derived from the acclimatization, cultivation, and hybridization of 
rare and exotic fruits and plants. These facts show what we may justly 
expect from pisciculture; and the experiments which have been made of 
late years prove that these expectations have not been disappointed. 
The large quantities of fecundated eggs which have been transported 
in France and in foreign countries by Coste, Fraas, and by the Hiinin- 
gen establishment, and the satisfactory results of all these experiments, 
are aS many guarantees for the practicability of this method. 


CHAPTER Y. 


MEANS USED FOR TRANSPORTING EGGS AND FISH. 


Our knowledge of the methods of preserving and transporting fecun- 
dated eggs of fish is based on observations made in France in connec- 
tion with the practical experiments in artificial propagation. Although 
it has been known for some time that aquatic birds, and particularly 
ducks, often become the propagators of fish, the fecundated spawn of 
which had become attached to their feet, no conclusion had been drawn 
from this circumstance relative to the subject of this chapter, nor to the 
solution of the question how long eggs can remain out of the water with- 
out endangering their ulterior development. 

* LACEPEDE: Cuvres. Paris, Duménil, 1836, ii, 255. 

t VON EHRENKREUTZ: Das Ganze der Angelfischerei. Quedlinburg, 1856, 6th ed. 

tLACEPRDE: Cfuvres, ii, 253. 


[23] - ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 513 


The means which have been recommended for transporting fish-eggs 
are very numerous. The one which recommends itself on account of its 
simplicity, and which is invariably successful, is to use flat boxes, meas- 
uring 10 to 12 centimeters in height, which have been previously fur- 
nished with a piece of moist linen or muslin, to spread the free eggs on 
them, and to cover them well. These pieces of cloth are moistened from 
time to time. Of late years cloth has been replaced by aquatic mosses 
(Sphagnum), between which the eggs are placed in layers. This way of 
transporting eggs will invariably prove successful if the eggs do not 
touch each other, and if the pressure of the upper or the lower layers of 
moss is not too great. 

As regards glutinous eggs, like those of the perch, it is reeommended 
to place them with some bunches of aquatic plants in glass globes about 
three-fourths full of water. Eggs adhering to foreign bodies, like those 
of the carp, should be wrapped with the bodies to which they adhere in 
moist cloths and be placed in a box or basket, on a layer of moist plants, 
in such a manner as not to bring any great pressure to bear on them. 

The forwarding of spawn in glass globes filled with water, which has 
lately been recommended by some, is fraught with great danger to the 
life of the embryo, and this method should, therefore, ouly be employed 
in the cases indicated above. The shell of the egg is easily broken by 
the motion of the water in the globe, and the germ is thereby destroyed. 

In all cases, and whatever means of transportation are employed, it is 
essential not to pack the eggs immediately after their feeundation. Ex- 
perience has shown that the most favorable time for transporting spawn 
is the period when the embryo is far enough developed to show the eyes like 
two black spots on the membrane of the shell.* 

The forwarding of fish is regulated by the age of the fish which are 
to be transported. The younger the fish, the easier it is to transport them 
a great distance.t Fish which have been recently hatched are inclosed 
in vessels filled with water, in which a few aquatic plants are placed. 
When still in the state of young fry they are placed in large buckets 
three-fourths filled with water, the motion of which is deadened by 
means of a board or a wreath of straw placed in the water. Spring or 
autumn are the seasons most favorable for transporting fish. 

In summer the heat and thunder-storms may kill the fish. If they 
. have to be transported during this season, they should be forwarded by 
night, and fewer fish should be put in the vessels. Care should be taken 
to keep the water constantly in motion, even when the vehicle convey- 
ing the fish stops. 

During long journeys it is necessary to renew the water from time to 
time, in such a manner as not to produce too great a difference of tem- 
perature between the old and new water. It is also necessary that air 
should enter the tubs at all times. 


*M. CostE: Comptes-Rendus, p. 109. tM. CosTE: Comptes-Rendus, p. 110. 
S. Mis. 29 33 


514 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


CHAPTER VI. 
EXPENSES OF THE ESTABLISHMENT AND OF RUNNING IT. 


The cost of the first establishment of piscicultural apparatus, and of 
their maintenance, will depend on the object for which they were estab- 
lished and on the extent to which the work is to be carried on. If the 
operator wants to have recourse to artificial means of propagation only 
for stocking small sheets of water, for which he would only need 30,000 
to 40,000 eggs, the expenses will be very small. 

An intelligent workman can, even during a very severe winter, take 
care of an enormous quantity of successfully hatched eggs, whilst his 
work will be greatly simplified in spring and during summer, because 
the fish belonging to these seasons are very prolific. These expenses 
may, on the other hand, amount to a considerable sum, according to the 
greater or less extent of the operations and the degree of development 
to which the fish are to be brought. 

The expenses will, in all cases, comprise the ground, sheds, canals, 
water-courses, and will be regulated according to the location. 

The establishment should comprise the following: (1) Fecundating 
vessels; (2) hatching apparatus; (3) pincers; (4) thermometer; (5) nets, 
&e.; (6) different vessels. 

The principal and regular expenses of the establishment comprise: 
(1) Wages of the persons in charge of the propagation and the surveil- 
lance of the spawn; (2) cost of spawn and its transportation, fish, &e. 
These expenses are, comparatively speaking, very small,-so that for 
4,000 to 5,000 francs a year one would have an establishment which 
would be able to supply on the most liberal scale all the fish needed for 
stocking the waters of a country like Belgium. With this sum several 
inillions of eggs of the finest kinds of fish could be produced every year. 

The operation becomes expensive only when one wishes to raise young 
fish of a certain age, instead of placing them as soon as possible in those 
waters where they are to live. In that case a sufficient quantity of the 
proper food should be procured, their development should be watched, 
they should be regularly fed, and protected against the attacks of their 
enemies. All this would in the end amount to more than the value of 
the fish in its wild state; for it should be remembered that pisciculture 
will only yield a certain profit, proportionate to the capital invested, if 
the means employed are simple and follow nature. It would therefore 
be profitable to scatter the young fish throughout the open waters im- 
mediately after the umbilical sack has been absorbed, and to consign 
propositions, for the permanent and prolonged maintenance of fish to 
the domain of laboratory experiment. 


CONCLUSION. 


All the above regulations are based on the principle that small pisci- 
cultural establishments, founded in those localities where the need of 


[25 | ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION OF FISH. 515 


restocking the rivers makes itself felt, are preferable to establishments 
on as large a scale as the one founded by the French Government at 
Hiiningen. In order to justify this assertion, it will suffice to state that 
one is very apt to make a miscalculation in concentrating all fhe means 
for stocking water-courses at his command on a single poinf. Fish are 
subject tomany contagious diseases. Parasitical conferve, which attack 
both the eggs and the young fish, and even at times tolerably large 
fish, may at a single stroke destroy all that which has been prepared at 
great expense. 

Small establishments will also occasion smaller losses, and can easier 
be removed to some new locality ; one can, moreover, hatch the eggs in 
water which suits the species, and the expenses incidental to the trans- 
portation of fish are saved. 

The art of propagating fish artificially is of too recent date to expect 
that the rules and hints given above are not to be modified or changed 
in many respects, and that they may not possibly be entirely replaced 
by other rules based on more recent experiments. 

We have indicated those methods which, in our opinion, are the best, 
and which agree most with those principles which practice and nature 
have, so far, pointed out to us. The possibility, or rather the certainty, 
of changes and improvements which may considerably modify these 
principles, is still another reason in favor of cheap establishments. 

In conclusion, we must make the following remarks: A somewhat 
lively imagination may see in the artificial propagation of fish an un- 
limited source of production, which may render applicable to our rivers 
and lakes what is said of the river Theiss in Hungary, that it contains 
one-third water and two-thirds fish. We consider artificial propaga- 
tion of fish simply as the means of bringing the finny population of our 
rivers and water-courses back to that degree of prosperity which they 
enjoyed before steam navigation, various industries, and other causes 
of destruction threatened our fisheries with slow but gradual ruin. We 
look upon the artificial propagation of fish simply as a means of stock- 
ing our rivers with fish quicker than nature can do it; but this object 
can only be attained if sufficient care is bestowed upon the preservation 
of the young fish, thus artificially produced, after they have been placed 
in the water. It should not be forgotten that it would, be useless to 
stock our waters with choice kinds of tish if these were left to the mercy 
of the ignorant and indolent inhabitants of the river banks. 

The artificial propagation of fish, is not, and cannot be, a substitute 
for a well-regulated management of the water courses and their fisheries, 
but should only be considered as a powerful aid to pisciculture; it can- 
not, therefore, render unnecessary legislative provisions protecting and 
restricting the fisheries. Establishments for propagating fish artificially 
are to pisciculture what nurseries are to fofest culture; and as forest 
culture would be useless if the irregular and destructive management 
of forests continues, thus the artificial propagation of fish would not aid 


516 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. ([26} 


in restocking the water-course. if the young fish are not protected by 
every means within reach of the law. It will, therefore, not only be 
necessary to see to it that the existing fishery laws are carefully ob- 
served, but that the production, catching, transportation, and sale of 
fish shouldbe properly regulated. 

It will hardly be necessary to observe, in conclusion, that the spe- 
cies of fish which are to be propagated artificially should be carefuily 
selected. This is very important, for if, as an example, one should stock 
waters with pike, all the other fish would soon disappear. 


XVII.—THE TRANSFORMATION OF SALT MARSHES INTO FISH 
PONDS. 


By M. DUCASTEL. 


{From “‘ Bulletin mensuel de la Société @acclimatation,” iii series, vol. vi, No. 2, Febru- 
ary, 1879. ]* 


SALT MARSHES. 


The waters of the sea on several points of our western and southern 
coasts are left to evaporate in a natural way in vast basins which are 
called salt marshes (les marais salants). These basins vary in shape and 
depth, and the water of the sea passes successively from one to the 
other. In the last basins (those nearest shore), where the water is only 
a few centimeters deep, the salt is deposited under conditions which 
vary in the different localities. Thus, in the salt-pits of the west the 
first deposit of salt is gray, and in order to give it a white color it is 
necessary to subject it to a refining process, whilst in the south the 
salt obtained from the salt-pits is white and pure. 

The salt harvest depends altogether on atmospheric influences, such 
as the heat of the sun and the winds which more or less favor the evap- 
oration of the water. In many places, especially in the West, the salt 
harvest will be almost an entire failure when the season is rainy or cool. 

Vast pieces of ground, on which considerable sums of money have 
been spent, therefore become almost entirely unproductive. For this 
reason, and in view of the constantly-increasing demands for food for the 
masses, people have in many places been led to abandon the manufact- 
ure of salt by the spontaneous evaporation of the sea-water, and have 
begun to utilize to greater advantage the grounds once devoted to this 
industry by transforming in them into fish-ponds. 

The ponds of this kind which have been constructed on the coast of 
the basin of Arcachon, in the department of Gironde, are excellent models 
of such fish ponds, and cannot be too highly recommended to the atten- 
tion of the owners of salt marshes. 


THE PONDS OF THE ARCACHON BASIN. 


By ministerial order of August 6, 1852, Mr. Coste was commissioned 


* Transformation des marais salants en réservoirs a poissons. Translated by HERMAN 
JACOBSON. 517 
{1 


518 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


to visit the coast of Italy and ascertain under what conditions experi- 
nents might be made, on a large scale, in the way of propagating ma- 
rine animals. 

The result of Coste’s visit to Italy was his interesting work on Comac- 
chio. Comacchio, a colony of fishermen located in the midst of the la- 
goons of the Adriatic, has solved the interesting problem of cultivating 
the domai of the sea, “the fruits of which,” says Coste, ‘are gathered, 
ripened, and multiplied in vast fish-ponds, and somewhat later har- 
vested with as much profit and less labor than those of the soil.” 

Does not this way of characterizing the industry of Comacchio apply 
in almost every particular to the ponds of the Arcachon Basin? Whilst, 
therefore, the famous scientist envied Italy on account of her piscicult- 
ural industry, this very industry flourished in our own country, in the 
Arcachon fish-ponds, where, on a smaller scale, it is true, and under 
other, but no less favorable conditions, the fruits of the sea ripen and 
are harvested with as much profit and less labor than those of the soil. 

It would be difficult to mark the exact time when these ponds were 
constructed, or to trace to any one man the invention of this ingenious 
system of cultivating the sea. The Marquis de Cirac was the first per- 
son who conceived the idea of utilizing the vast alluvial grounds of 
his domain. He inclosed them with dikes, and thus constructed salt 
marshes. The salters soon noticed that with the water destined to sup- 
ply their salt-pits there came young fish; they saw them grow and 
flourish. The fisheries, at first only carried on to supply the wants of 
the family, soon became a business which extended from the hamlet to 
the city. The manufacture of salt was abandoned for the new industry, 
and people studied how to improve the apparatus which was to assure 
jts success. Every year some progress was made, and the fish-ponds 
have now arrived at that state which, without being the height of per- 
fection that-might be attained, nevertheless justifies us in designating 
their arrangement as a model to all who desire to devote themselves to 
marine pisciculture. And it is of this arrangement that we now intend 
to give a brief description. 

The fish-ponds were, as we have already re marked, originally salt 
marshes. They may still be recognized by their general appearance, 
there being vast sheets of water, separated from each other by pieces 
of ground equally large and devoted to agriculture. These last-men- 
tioned pieces of ground are called ‘‘bosses” (protuberances), and have 
been formed by soil taken from the diggings which constitute the deeper 
portions and have been assigned to the fish. By means of sluices con- 
structed in convenient places in the dikes which separate the fish-ponds 
from the basin of Arcachon, the water in the ponds is renewed, and 
the young fish, when still in the condition of small fry, are introduced 
into the ponds. These sluices are generally constructed of wood, and 
consist of four principal parts, viz: In the middle the bridge, which is 
placed at the higher part of the dike, and which serves as a passage- 


s 


519 


[3] 


TRANSFORMATION OF SALT MARSHES INTO FISH-PONDS, 


way; towards the right, and adjoining the bridge, a post, with slides 
for a large sluice-gate; farther on, another post with slides for the 


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“sleeve”; and on the left, towards the Arcachon basin, a third post, 


with slides for a net. 


520 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


The “sleeve” is a net in the shape of a truncated cone, 7 meters long; 
its opening is underneath the frame to which it is fastened; it must, 
under all circumstances, have from 550 to 600 meshes of 11 to 12 milli- 
meters all round, and 120 for the small opening; the large opening is 
fastened on a wooden frame, either with nails or with a cord passed 
through holes in the frame. 

Filling and emptying.—The ponds are filled with sea-water for the pur- 
pose of renewing the water, of providing food for the fish, and of ob- 
taining young fry for the ponds. 

The filling process, as a general rule, does not commence till the 15th 
of March, and lasts till the Ist of November. This period is subject, 
however, to slight changes occasioned by the temperature and commer- 
cial necessities, such as the sale of fish. Easter is generally the time 
when the filling process commences. 

This process is only carried on twelve days in the month, and twice a 
day, in the evening and in the morning. These twelve days are divided 
into two periods of six days each. The filling process is carried on for 
six days during every tide of the syzygies (new moon and full moon). 
These tides are always very strong; their height, however, varies accord- 
ing to the east and west wind. A south wind causes the tide to rise the 
highest, whilst a north or northeast wind makes it rise the least. 

In order to cause the fry to enter by the “sleeve” (manche) system, 
the frame with its “sleeve” is let down, so as to prevent the fish from 
escaping; two hours before the sea is on a level with the water of the fish- 
pond, the gate of the sluice is raised about 7 centimeters, so as to cause a 
small current of water to flow from the fish-pond into the sea, which is 
intended to attract the small fish towards the sluice. In proportion as 
the tide rises the gate is raised a few centimeters, to increase the force 
of the current. When the sea and the water of the fish-pond are on a 
level, the gate is raised entirely; there will then be a current of water 
from the sea into the fish-pond; the higher the tide rises, the stronger 
will be the current; at this period the precaution should, however, be 
taken to lower the gate, for the current might otherwise break the 
“sleeve.” When the current has attained its greatest force, the gate is 
lowered, so as to leave below an open space of only 0.25 to 0.30 millime- 
ter. The small fish are thus drawn into the “sleeve” and thence into 
the fish-pond. 

In employing this method several precautions have tobe taken. When 
the current coming from the seais still weak, the “sleeve” is kept closed 
at the narrow end, and is not opened until the current becomes strong, 
or when the level of the sea, raised by the tide, is 30 centimeters higher 
than that of the water of the fish-pond; because, if this is the case, the 
fish in the pond cannot rise with the current or escape. 

Species of fish which enter the sluices—The species of fish which, by 
means of this contrivance, enter the fish-ponds are as follows: 


[5] TRANSFORMATION OF SALT MARSHES INTO FISH-PONDS 521 


(1.) The mullet (biack mullet, white mullet, and “Jand-jumper”—saut- 
euri du pays); the black mullet is much more frequent than the others. 

(2.) The barbel only comes in small numbers. 

(3.) Occasionally the plaice and the dorado. About fifteen years ago 
the dorado came in great numbers; but it seems now to have almost 
disappeared from these coasts. 

(4.) The sole only comes acvidentally; and the gurnet and turbot, &e., 
never enter the fish-ponds. 

(5.) Hels come in large numbers in spring, when the sluices are first 
opened. 

In April, fry enter the ponds in large quantities; in September they 
come in tolerably large numbers. They never enter the ponds until they 
have reached the thickness of a quill; those which come in April are 
Jarger than those which come in September. 

The draining process.—By the draining process we understand the 
process by which a portion of the water of the fish-pond is caused to flow 
into the basin of Arcachon. 

For this purpose the frame with the “sleeve” is let down when the 
tide is low, and the gate of the sluice is raised about 0.07 centimeter; 
this causes a slight flow of water into the basin of Arcachon not strong 
enough, however, to draw the young fish from the fish-pond. When 
young fish show themselves near the “sleeve,” through the meshes of 
which they could slip, the gate is closed and the draining process is 
stopped. 

The keeping and fattening of young jfish.—When the young fish have 
entered the fish-ponds, they must be kept there under those conditions 
which are most favorable to their preservation, development, and fat- 
tening. . , 

(1.) Preservation.—Atmospheric influences play a very important part 
in the preservation of fish, especially of those species which are kept in 
captivity; cold winds often cause large numbers of mullet to perish. 
Northeast or southeast winds are particularly dangerous; northwest 
wind is harmless, and south and southwest winds are very favorable. 
Any sudden change from high to low temperature, frost or ice is less 
dangerous than unfavorable winds. In constructing a fish-pond, care 
should, therefore, be taken to protect the fish against these hurtful in- 
fluences. 

For this purpose shelters have been provided in the following manner: 

(1.) The basins are dug in such locations as will afford shelter to the 
sheet of water from the northeast or southeast winds. This object is 
attained by having regard to the natural configuration of the ground, 

by artificial shelters or by trees. 

(2.) If these conditions do not exist, the dikes are made as high as 
possible, so as to form ramparts against the northeast and southeast 
winds, and in every case trees are planted on the banks of the fish- 


522 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


ponds; the tamarind is the only tree capable of resisting the force of 
the wind on the shores of the basin of Arcachon. 

(3.) Pits are dug in the shape of holes or trenches, thus creating de- 
pressions in the ground, 1.30 to 2 meters (and more) deep, where the 
mullet can take refuge either during great heat or severe frost. These 
pits are particularly beneficial to the fish when they cause fresh water 
to flow into the ponds. The temperature of this subterranean water, 
which is nearly always thesame, 8 to 12 degrees, hasavery salutary effect, 
by cooling off the water of the fish-ponds in summer, by keeping up a 
suitable degree of saltness, and by preventing the sheets of water from 
freezing in winter. When the surface is frozen, care should be taken to 
break the ice at regular intervals, so as to establish the proper circula- 
tion of air. For this purpose holes are made in the ice, and fagots or 
bundles of sticks whose ends are mixed with straw, either in small 
quantity or in sheaves, are stuck in the holes. Without these precanu- 
tions one would run the risk of losing a large number of mullet, which 
often gather in the pits in dense masses, and there die from asphyxia. 

(4.) Fresh water is brought into the ponds from neighboring water- 
courses, or from ponds or wells dug in the neighborhood. Such water, 
by reason of its composition and temperature, produces the same result 
as subterranean water obtained by digging. 

Raising and fatltening.—The deep places of a pond are specially in- 
tended to afford shelter to the fish, but they would not answer the 
purpose of raising fish, the rapid development of the fry and the fatten- 
ing of the grown fish, especially the herbivorous kinds, like the mullet. 

With the view of supplying the necessary conditions for raising fish, 
pastures are provided for them—shallow portions of the pond where 
those plants will grow which serve as food for the fish. These pasture- 
lands generally occupy vast plains on the bottom of the pond, where 
the fish can rest and feed, and where they are exposed to the direct 
influences of air, light, and sun. The best pasture-lands are those por- 
tions of the pond which present an extensive plain, very deep, and with 
scanty vegetation. 

On these pasture-lands the fish might be surprised by cold winds, 
and might perish in large numbers. In order to protect them, and pre- 
vent them from straying away, the water of the fish pond is lowered 
from the lst November to about the 15th March. This causes the fish 
to seek the deep and sheltered places, where they are protected from 
hurtful winds, and where they can easily be caught, whenever there is 
any demand for fish. 

The vegetation of the pasture-land and that of the pond in general is 
of great importance for raising fish. 

Aquatic plants not only afford shelter to the fish, but also supply 
them with food, both in a fresh condition and when decayed. These 
plants also contribute indirectly to the food of fish by serving as shel- 
ter and nourishment to a very large number of small aquatic animals, 


[7] TRANSFORMATION OF SALT MARSHES INTO FISH-PONDS. 523 


especially larve and shells, which certain kinds of fish will eagerly 
devour. 

For raising mullet, and particularly for fattening them, the Ruppia 
spiralis and Ruppia rustellata are the plants which should be particu- 
larly cultivated in fish-ponds ; for by observing the mullet when on the 
pasture-lands and by examining its entrails one will find that this fish 
consumes a large quantity of ruppias and a large number of microscopic 
shells adhering to this plant. This food gives to the mullets from most 
fish-ponds a peculiar flavor, which can be specially noticed when one 
takes care to preserve the detritus of this plant in the body of the fish. 

Another plant has also been noticed, called by the country people 
‘“lége”; it is really an agglomeration of conferve. which makes its ap-— 
pearance in loose threads, forming a sort of green moss on the surface 
of the water. When this plant grows too extensively it has a hurtful 
effect; but otherwise it contributes to the nourishment of several kinds 
of fish, for it nearly always contains a large number of small bivalves 
and diminutive crustaceans. 

For raising and fattening mullet, old fish-ponds are preferable to new 
ones or to those which have been but recently constructed. In these 
last-mentioned ponds the fish grow very little during the first three 
years; after that time they develop in proportion as the pond becomes | 
older. The yield of a pond, which is very small during the first few 
years, increases in proportion as the fish-pond is filled with ooze, plants, 
shells, &c. Careful observations have taught men the method which 
should be adopted to increase the productiveness of a pond during the 
first years and to aid the action of time, which is never very rapid. It 
will be sufficient in most cases to introduce and propagate suitable 
plants which the mullet likes, such as the ruppia, also those marine 
shells which live on these plants, and which are found in great abun- 
dance in old fish-ponds. It might also be advisable to raise only car- 
nivorous kinds of fish during the first year, such as the barbel, the 
dorado, the plaice, the sole, &c., providing them with the food necessary 
for their development by propagating small crustaceans, shells, &c. 

After some years have elapsed, when the time appears to have arrived 
for substituting mullet for carnivorous fish, these latter must all be 
caught, because their presence, at least in large numbers, would cause 
serious ravages among the mullet. 

In order to obtain fish of good size and possess a tolerable degree of 
fatness, the quantity of fry and young fish of different ages should be 
proportioned to the size of the pond and its ability to supply a suitable 
quantity of food. Without observing these precautions it will be diffi- 
cult to obtain fish of the size and quality which are in demand in the 
market. 


THE FISHERIES AND PRODUCTS OF THE FISH-PONDS. 


(1.) Sluice-fishing.—Sluice-fishing is carried on when the level of the 
sea is higher than that of the water in the fish-ponds; at the extreme 


524 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


end of the sluice, towards the sea, there is placed a frame made of wire, 
with meshes 11 millimeters in width, and when this has been done the 
gate is raised entirely. The water of the sea rushes into the sluice, and 
creates a current. The fish which are in the pond are drawn towards 
the sluice by the movement of the water and by its freshness, and as it 
is always their tendency to go against the stream, they enter the sluice. 
When a sufficient number of fish have entered, the gate of the sluice is 
quickly closed, so as to prevent the fish from returning to the pond. 
They may then be caught in the water with a line, or one can wait till 
the water of the sea has receded, when the fish can easily be taken out. 
Fish of small dimensions are thrown back into the pond. This method 
of fishing is generally employed only in September and October. It is 
employed particularly for catching eels, called ‘“‘mouregains” by the coun- 
try people, by proceeding in the following manner: 

Beginning in October, and all during winter, when the weather is bad 
and there is much wind and rain, one drains off the water. for three to six 
hours during the early part of the night, especially during very dark, 
moonless nights (these are the times and conditions when the eel is 
liveliest), in order to attract the eels towards the sluice. 

When the sea has completely receded, generally after two hours, 
the wire frame is placed outside the sluice, as I have described above, 
and the gate of the sluice is raised about 14 centimeters; a strong cur- 
rent is thereby established from the fish-pond to the sea, and the eels 
pass with this current underneath the gate and gather in the sluice. 
At daybreak the gate is let down again to prevent the eels from re- 
turning to the fish-pond. Generally about 500 kilograms of eels are in 
this way caught in one sluice. This is a very excellent method of fish- 
ing, as it does not involve any expense. As a general rule, only full- 
grown eels are caught. Care should be taken not to drain off the water 
from the pond, or to catch full-grown eels during the month of March, 
for during that month the young eels would escape from the pond and 
would pass through the wire grating. During the other months the 
young eel is very quiet; it remains in the pond and shows no desire to 
escape. 

(2.) Trammel-fishing.—For trammel-fishing one uses an ordinary tram- _ 
mel with lead and cork. The fishermen who manage it are in a boat, 
and row about, describing circuits or labyrinths, all the while making a 
noise, in order to frighten the fish which become entangled in the meshes 
of the net. On account of the large size of the meshes, one only catches 
large or medium-sized fish. This method of fishing is only employed 
during the day, from the end of August till Easter. 

Pond-mullets are only caught from the end of August, for the follow- 
ing reasons: 

During the hot season the fish grow most rapidly; if, therefore, they 
were caught during this period of the year, this would occasion a con- 
siderable loss, not only in weight, but also in quality; for fish, trans- 


[9] TRANSFORMATION OF SALT MARSHES INTO FISH-PoNDS. 525 


ported during the hot season, often undergo a change; they lose much 
of their freshness, and cannot be sold to advantage. The fisheries of 
the basin of Arcachon are, moreover, very abundant during summer, 
and the sale of fresh vegetables interferes considerably with the sale of 
pond-fish. These are the reasons which have determined the owners or 
farmers of fish-ponds not to commence fishing until the weather gets 
colder. The fisheries generally extend till Easter, because the Holy 
Week is very favorable for the sale of fish. 

Fishing with the fish-gig.—This method is exclusively employed in 
catching the various kinds of eels, from February till Easter. The rea- 
sons for this are as follows: 

In order to use the fish-gig advantageously, the water in the ponds — 
must be very low, so that the eels may be gathered in larger or smaller 
groups. The fish-gig should only be used when frosts need no longer 
be feared, for, on account of its troubling the water, the fish-gig would, 
in case of a severe frost, increase the danger to the mullet. The ooze 
is carefully gone over in all directions with the fish-gig, and its five 
prongs are inserted in innumerable places. The eels which are caught 
in this manner are, therefore, partly lacerated. 

Fishing with the fish-gig has this advantage, that in this way even 
the bottom of the pond is made to yield a profit; but, on the other hand, 
it involves considerable expense in the way of wages to the fishermen; 
and, after all, it only yields dead or torn eels, which cannot in that con- 
dition be sold to advantage, and which cannot be kept alive. 

Production of fish-ponds.--In its present condition pond-culture only 
occupies itself with eels and mullet, called “mules” in this part of the 
country. The mullet constitute the more important object of these 
fisheries. 

Pond-mullet belong mainly to three different kinds: 

(1.) The “‘negrott,” or black mullet. 

(2.) The “ saoultott,” or sand-jumper (the golden mullet—Mugil aura- 
tus). 

(3.) The ‘blancheou,” or white mullet (the “ramado” or Mugil capito). 

Of these three kinds the black mullet, or the “mullet with thick lips,” 
is found more frequently than the two other kinds. It enters the sluices 
in very large numbers, and seems to flourish better in the ponds than 
the other kinds. Its size is, generally, one-third greater than that of 
the other two kinds, more especially than the white mullet (Mugil capito). 

The average annual yield from the mullet and eel fisheries may be 
estimated at 300 kilograms per hectare. 

The establishment of fish-ponds, therefore, offers positive advantages, 
not only by increasing the quantity of food for the people, but also by 
being more profitable than the cultivation of the soil; for in these parts 
the average annual yield of a hectare of ground, set out in wheat or 
beans, is 100 franes; of meadow-lands which are not irrigated, 120 
francs; of meadow-lands irrigated by fresh water, 250 francs; and of 


526 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] | 


salt marshes, 150 francs; whilst fish-ponds, when properly cultivated, 
will yield as much as 300 frances per month. 

It must be borne in mind that this result is obtained in a perfectly 
natural manner, without using any artificial food. The fish are actually 
left to themselves in the ponds, where the ruppia, which grows spon- 
taneously, is sufficient for their nourishment. 

The construction and cultivation of fish-ponds cannot, therefore, be 
too highly recommended. Our population is constantly increasing, and 
its luxuries and actual needs increase still more rapidly. All classes of 
society eagerly seek enjoyment of every kind, and the scarcity (every 
day greater) of delicate meats, such as fish, threatens at no distant future 
- to make many articles of food almost unattainable, food which is eagerly 
sought by all classes, absolutely necessary for weak and sick people, 
that it becomes a matter of great importance to place it within the reach 
of those (especially the last mentioned) who are not favored with a super- 
abundance of this world’s goods. 

Two objections, however, have been raised against the fish-ponds. It 
has been said that they are a cause of insalubrity because their waters 
are often stagnant; and, secondly, the objection has been raised that 
they create a competition which endangers the privileged fisheries of 
the enrolled mariners. 

Insalubrity.—The first of these objections shows an entire ignorance 
of the manner in which fish-ponds are managed, for their water is re- 
newed twenty-four times per month; for example, during the three days 
which precede and the three days which succeed the new and the full 
moon, during the double day and night tide. Can water be called stag- 
nant when it is renewed twenty-four times per month? 

It has also been said that the mingling of fresh and salt water is pro- 
ductive of insalubrity, whilst this mingling is certainly recognized as 
favorable to the development of fish, improving the flavor and quality 
of their flesh. 

Without entering into a scientific discussion of this assertion, we will 
confine ourselves, by way of refutal, to presenting the sanitary statistics 
of the country—statistics taken among those classes of people which 
are most exposed to the alleged fever-breeding miasmas of the fish- 
ponds; I mean the salters, lock-keepers, and the customs officers, the 
last mentioned being often compelled by their duties to pass their nights 
near the marshes. It must be granted that the salters are the most ro- 
bust people in that part of the country; and as far as the customs offi- 
cers are concerned, we point to the report of the inspector of customs, 
which says that of all the customs officers scattered along the coast of 
the basin, those of the district of Aude had the smallest number of sick, 
even less than the healthy district of Arcachon. 

- The fact that the mingling of fresh and salt waters, when the latter 
are not stagnant, is perfectly harmless, has been fully corroborated by 
Mr. Coste’s observations in the lagoons of Comacchio. This famous 


[11] TRANSFORMATION OF SALT MARSHES INTO FISH-PONDS. 527 


author says: “Intermittent fevers to which people living in a marshy 
country are generally exposed are not frequent at Comacchio ; and when- 
ever there are in the neighboring country any young people with a 
feeble constitution or threatened with consumption, they are sent into 
the marshes for the purpose of gaining strength, and are made to share 
the work and food of the fishermen.” 

Competition.—In a petition addressed to the minister of marine, the 
proprietors of fisheries, especially those of the district of La Teste, have 
thus expressed their grievances: 

“During winter, when the scarcity of fish would allow us to realize 
some profit, we are deprived of this advantage by the number of fish 
from the fish-ponds which are brought to the Bordeaux market.” 

This was followed by a request to have the fish-ponds abolished, so 
that with them all competition might disappear, and the greater scarcity 
of fish bring about a corresponding rise in prices. 

To expose such pretensions means to denounce them. Without seek- 
ing to refute them, we feel nevertheless constrained to say that this com- 
petition which has been denounced in such a manner does not exist at 
‘all, neither in the fish-market nor in the fisheries. 

As regards the fish-market, it must be said that the ponds only furnish 
fish during winter, therefore at a time when bad weather has rendered 
fishing impossible, or at least prevents the fisheries from fully supplying 
the demand. 

As regards the fisheries, it must be said that when the mullet enters 
the fish-ponds it measures, generally, only 6 centimeters in length and 8 
millimeters in breadth. If caught by the fishermen these young fish 
would uselessly perish on their hands; it has, therefore, been found 
necessary to probibit the fishing of young mullet. In the fish-ponds, 
on the other hand, the mullet is left in peace, and finds all those con- 
ditions which favor its preservation and development. Left to itself in 
the basin of Arcachon, the young mullet is often thrown by. the tide on 
the shore, where it invariably perishes, and in’ nearly every case falls 
a prey to voracious animals, most of which are of no use whatever to 
man. 

The fish-ponds, therefore, tend to utilize for the food of man products 
which otherwise would, to a great extent, be lost. 

The young fry of the mullet, during the first stages of their devel- 
opment, remain in the basin of Arcachon. As soon as frost sets in, 
they leave this basin and seek deep and sheltered places farther out at 
sea. Their migration commences in November, and at that very time a 
large number of fish of prey are observed, notably hake, which, by 
their instinet, are led to the entrance of the Arcachon Basin, where they 
find an enormous number of young fry, especially of the mullet kind. 
On opening these hake their stomachs are found filled to repletion with 
young fry, particularly with young mullet. Before the migration of the 


528 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


mullet, the hake were thin, but after a few weeks they have grown very 
fat. 

There seems no way of counteracting these powerful causes of de- 
struction but to place a certain quantity of fry in the fish-ponds. This 
destruction of the fry is very much to be regretted, for actual observa- 
tions regarding the growth of fish of prey in the coast-waters, and that of 
mullet in the fish-ponds, show the following result: A thousand young 
mullet left in the basin of Arcachon are, when quite small, devoured 
by fish, whose flesh may be used as food, but which at best only fur- 
nishes half a kilogram of flesh fit to eat; whilst the same number of 
young mullet, placed in fish-ponds and raised there, furnish, when grown, 
more than 1,000 kilograms of the most delicious food. 

Under these conditions, and in view of the constantly rising prices 
of all articles of food, especially animal food, we must say once more, 
and in the most emphatic manner, that. the development and cultiva- 
tion of fish-ponds cannot be too highly recommended, and that where- 
ever they do not yet exist they should certainly be established. 


SLUICES. 


Introduction of young jish—By means of sluices, constructed in con- 
venient places in the dikes which separate the fish-ponds from the Ar- 
cachon Basin, the water of these ponds is renewed, and the fish, when 
still quite young, are introduced into the ponds. 

The sluices are constructed of wood, and consist of four principal 
parts, viz: In the middle, the bridge which is placed against the high 
part of the dike, and which serves as a passage-way; to the right, to- 
wards the fish-pond and leaning against the bridge, there is a post with 
grooves for a large gate; farther on, another post with grooves for the 
“sleeve”; to the left, towards the basin of Arcachon, a third post with 
grooves for a fishing-net. 

Use of the “sleeve.”—The “sleeve” isa net in the shape of a truncated 
cone, 7 meters in length; its opening is exactly underneath the frame 
to which it is attached; it must always have 550 to 600 meshes of 11 
millimeters’ width, on its sides, and about 120 for a B 
the small opening. The net-makers are permitted |------+---++-- 
to make the meshes larger for a portion of the net, | - 
measuring about 3 meters from the small opening; 
but they must gradually decrease in size until they 
have reached 11 millimeters; the small opening 
measures about 30 centimeters in circumference. 

The large opening is attached to a wooden frame, 
cither by nails or by a cord which is passed through 
holes made in the frame. : 

A B=1.10 to 1.30 millimeter. Le Pie¥= if ister ts 

C D=1 to 1.20 millmeters. E F 

A Ei=-The legth or height is proportioned to the depth of the sluice. 


® 


[13] TRANSFORMATION OF SALT MARSHES INTO FISH-PONDS, 529 


Tn all cases, however, the line EK I’ must touch the bottom, and the line 
A B must rise 0.50 millimeter above the level of the water, so as to pre- 
vent the mullet from leaping over the frame and escaping in that man. 
ner. The frame runs in two posts with grooves. ; 

Manufacture and preparation of “sleeves.,—At Bordeaux sleeves” 
are prepared by the process employed for preserving awnings and sails. 
This process imparts to the the twine a greenish color. It costs, per 
“sleeve,” from 1 frane 75 centimes (54 cents) to 2 franes (39 cents), ac- 
cording to the weight, and makes a “sleeve” last one-third as long 
again as it would have lasted otherwise. A “sleeve” without prepara- 
tion costs 25 franes. 

This apparatus is made at bassens (12 kilometers from Bordeaux) by 
women and children; the twine is manufactured at Tonneins (Depart- 
ment of Lot et Garonne); in making a “sleeve” 10 frances’ worth ($1.93) 
of twine isused; the maker gets 10 francs, and theprofit of the merchant 
is 5 frances (96.5 cents). 

If a “sleeve” has been well prepared it will last one year; this will 
greatly depend on the quantity of detritus, refuse, and plants floating 
in the sea and drifted towards the “sleeve”; sometimes a “sleeve” 
will last eighteen months; but as a general rule a “sleeve” without 
preparation becomes worn out in about eight months. 

It will be good to immerse the “sleeve” from time to time in tan (an 
infusion of the bark of oak), which gives to the twine a reddish color. 


STOCKING THE FISH-PONDS. 


Process of stocking.—The following kinds of tish when quite young are 
made to pass from the sea into the fish-ponds by means of sluices: 

Mullets, commonly known as “mules,”: enter in large numbers and 
form the most important part of the population of the ponds. 

Barbels, commonly known as “ brignes,” only enter in small numbers. 

Eels enter in large numbers in spring, when the sluices ave opened. 

The introduction of young fry into the ponds by means of a net 
(“sleeve”). placed in the sluice often causes too large a quantity of 
barbels and eels to enter at the same time, which is not desirable, as 
these fish are exceedingly voracious, and are apt to devour all the 
young fry of the mullet. The only means of warding off this danger 
is to gather but few young mullet in the “sleeve,” and to raise young 
mullet by artificially impregnating their eggs, which are generally emit- 
ted by the spawning process at the end of June or the beginning of 
July. By replacing the “sleeve” with a metallic frame (not letting any 
sea-water enter), and by hatching fecundated eggs only of the better 
kinds of mullet, the pond will be exclusively stocked with these fish, 
the cultivation of which is far more profitable than that of the barbels 
and eels. It may be well to state, in this connection, that the mullets, 
more especially the black ones, can easily stand saltness varying from 
zero to 8 degrees of Baumé’s areometer, and a degree of heat and cold 
which would cause most other fish fo perish. 

S. Mis. 29 o4 


530 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


Rules to be observed in transforming sali marshes into fish-ponds.—In 
transforming salt marshes into fish-ponds the following rules should be 
observed : 

A request should be addressed to the minister of marine asking for 
the privilege of converting into fish-ponds the whole or part of a salt 
marsh. Such a request is never refused. 

The water of the sea should be allowed to flow off by means of 
trenches. 

The saltness should be taken out of the ground by rain-water, either 
by allowing the rain to fall on it, or by gathering the rain-water on the 
neighboring land. 

Whenever there is a sufficient quantity of water from wells or water- 
courses, it is used for watering the ground and for freeing it from the 
greater portion of the sea-salt with which it is impregnated. 

The ground should be allowed to dry until it has reached a degree 
of consistency sufficient to permit of its being worked with a spade. 

The soil gained by digging is used for constructing large and solid 
dikes intended to retain the water in the fish-pond and to prevent the 
water of the sea from flowing into it. 

In these dikes sluices should be constructed for renewing the water 
of the ponds, and for introducing the young and fry of fish. 

By all possible means the growth of Ruppia spiralis in the ponds 
should be encouraged. 

Deep places should be dug in certain portions of the pond, pastures 
should be established, and shelters should be constructed. Rain-water, 
wells, and water-courses should be utilized for the purpose of rendering 
the water of the ponds brackish. 

Regulating the fish-ponds.—These fish-ponds, being fed from the basin 
of Arcachon by means of sluices, were classed among the coast-lisheries ; 
and, although they are located on private property (they were formerly 
salt marshes), they come under the general law of January 9, 1852, for 
regulating such fisheries. 

Before the regulation of July 4, 1853, went into effect, the sluices 
were at their inner opening furnished with a “sleeve” or bag-shaped 
net, 7 meters in length, the meshes of which each formed a square of 11 
to 12 millimeters; the fry that came with the tide were drawn into this 
net and thus carried into the reservoir. The “sleeve” was used {for pre- 
venting both the fry and the young fish, fattened in the ponds, from leav- . 
ing the ponds; and the size of the meshes was arranged accordingly. 

The above-mentioned iegulation has raised these dimensions to 25 and 
15 millimeters: ‘The sluice or way of communication will be closed at 
its inner opening by a wire grating or by a net, the meshes of which shall 
each measure at least 15 millimeters square from the 1st of October till 
the 31st of March, and 25 millimeters from the 1st of April till the 30th 
of November. 

“At the moment when the sea-water enters the ponds there may be 


[15] TRANSFORMATION OF SaLT MARSHES INTO FISH-PONDS. 531 


substituted for this grating a bag-shaped ‘sleeve,’ or net, the meshes 
of which, throughout its whole length, shall measure at least 18 milli- 
meters from the Ist of October till the 1st of March, and 25 millimeters 
from the 1st of April till the 30th of November.” (See Article 27 of the 
above-mentioned regulation.) 

This provision might cause the ruin of the ponds. When the fry enter 
the inner basin, they generally measure only 6 centimeters in length and 
8 millimeters in breadth; meshes of 25, and even of 18, millimeters would 
therefore not only allow the fry to escape, but also, as has been observed 
repeatedly and under different circumstances, liberate those fish which 
have been raised in the ponds, and which have reached the size of 20 cen- 
timeters. 

For ordinary fishing, as in those fisheries which are carried on in the 
sea and in the basin of Arcachon, the prohibition of apparatus with 
narrow meshes is perfectly justified. Narrow meshes, in fact, would 
either injure or capture the fry, which would thus perish uselessly in 
the hands of the fishermen; the use of nets with narrow meshes has 
therefore been prohibited. 

The ponds, on the other hand, which are guarded by apparatus with 
narrow meshes, keep the fry, and furnish them with all the conditions 
which are essential for their preservation and development. 

These facts have been taken into serious consideration by the min- 
ister of marine. Article 9 of the decree of May 10, 1862, contains the 
following: ‘ Fish-pits or fish-ponds may, after proper authority has been 
granted, be constructed on private property which receives water from 
the sea. The licenses granted by our minister of marine and the colo- 
nies will determine, according to the character and extent of the ground, 
the conditions upon which these ponds are to be managed.” 

At this day the size of the meshes of the nets (‘‘sleeves”) placed at 
the opening of the sluices is no longer regulated by law, but the owners 
of fish-ponds adopt the size which suits them best. Only one condition 
is imposed on them, viz, not to bring to market fish which do not have 
the regulation size—barbels 0.10 millimeter in length, mullets 0.14, and 
eels 0.25. 

Under these conditions, the transformation of salt marshes into fish- 
ponds has steadily increased; at the end of 1876, there were 1,022.50 
hectares of such ponds; and there is every reason to hope that this 
number will be increased tenfold, 


um 


iG sayy ith | 
| a + on ihe 


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nae tae ih 


5 


XVIIT.—POND-CULTIVATION ON THE KANIOW ESTATE (DISTRICT 
OF BIALA, GALICIA), THE PROPERTY OF HIS IMPERIAL HIGH- 
NESS, ARCHDUKE ALBRECHT OF AUSTRIA. 


Paper prepared for the International Fishery Exposition at Berlin, 1881, 
By ADOLF Gascu, the present farmer of Kaniébw.” 


It is not my present intention to write a manual of pond-cultivation. 
The sole object of the following monograph is to present a sketch of 
pond-cultivation at Kaniéw as it is actually carried on, with all its de- 
fects and excellencies, for exhibition, criticism, and, possibly, imita- 
tion; and, in presenting this sketch, I shall treat the subject principally 
from an agricultural point of view, as the Berlin Agricultural Club will 
mainly view the subject from that stand-point. 

The special data relative to pisciculture have reference only to carp, 
as the principal object of fresh-water fisheries, although they will apply 
more or less‘to all fresh-water fish, at least to all those fish which form 
objects of special cultivation. 

The domain of Kaniéw (and Mirowec) which belongs to His Imperial 
Highness Arch Duke Albrecht of Austria, lies north of the Beskiden 
range in the lowlands of the Vistula, on the right bank of the river Bi- 
alka, which forms the boundary line between Galicia and Austrian 
Silesia, and near its confluence with the Vistula. On its territory, 
comprising 1,000 Austrian acres (575.46 hectares,) it shows all the char- 
acteristics of old alluvia of a large river and a mountain stream com- 
bined; clay alternates with occasional rocky strata, sand, loam, and 
humus in this bottom land, from which the water has receded. Fully 
one-half of the estate has a heavy clay soil, one-fourth is composed of 
peat-bogs and sand, and the rest has a light loamy humus-like soil. 
With the exception of the sand all these soils contain iron. ‘They are 
damp, and, in some places, even marshy, but show a rich vegetation of 
erass and clover, probably owing to their strong alkaline qualities 
caused by the decay of the carpathian sandstone; and this peculiarity 
is still more favored by the exceedingly moist climate. Till within four 
years the estate was frequently subject to inundations. Since, more- 
over, the water of the Bialka, which passes the manufacturing towns of 

* Die | Teichwirthschaft | auf dem | Sr. Kaiserlichen Hoheit dem Herrn Erzherzog Albrecht 
ron Oesterreich | gehdrigen Gute | Kaniéw, | Bezirk Biala, Galizien. | Zur internationalen 
Fischereiausstellung in Berlin | im Jahre 1880, | dargestellt rom gegenwéirtigen Pachter | 
Adolf Gasch.”—Translated by HERMAN JACOBSON, 533 


534 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


Bielitz and Biala, often contains a considerable quantity of fertilizing 
matter, nature has very clearly indicated that stock raising and pis- 
ciculture must be the principal objects to which attention should be 
paid at Kaniéw and Mirowec. 

From time immemorial the Kaniéw estate had large but badly wa- 
tered ponds, which, in former times, occupied almost the entire terri- 
tory, and which, even now, after having been regulated, occupy 450 
acres, or 45 per cent. of the total area. Of this pond area, 250 acres 
are on the heavy clay soil, 50 on the marshy soil, and 150 on the light 
loamy soil. In many cases, however, two of these soils are found in 
one pond. All the ponds are fed by the Bialka water which, especially » 
during seasons of violent rain-storms, carries with it a great deal of fer- 
tile mud, so that the ponds actually serve as mud reservoirs. But as 
pond cultivation is carried on in these parts on an extensive scale, the 
Bialka water is often insufficient, especially in midsummer, when there is 
so much evaporation from the large sheets of water. This, of course, 
injures pisciculture, and does not allow it to be carried to its highest 
; perfection. Nearly all the ponds in this part of the country are shal- 
low, and invariably incline towards the Vistula. In former times they 
were badly watered, and a system of regulating was inaugurated 
by my predecessor, Herr Potyka (who deserves great credit for his en- 
ergy and perseverance), and has been completed by me at my own ex- 
pense, so that at present nearly the entire pond area is covered with 
water. All the ponds can be drained so thoroughly as to allow of their 
being plowed and planted throughout their entire extent. In these 
parts it has, fortunately, long been kuown that it is not sufficient to 
provide the ponds with an ample supply of good water, and to keep 
their soil fertile, but that it is absolutely essential that the ponds can 
be entirely drained at any time for the purpose of fishing or plant- 
ing. Wherever this cannot be done, there can be no systematic and 
profitable pond cultivation, but merely irregular lake fishing. The 
most profitable part of pond cultivation, viz, their agricultural utiliza- 
tion by planting, is thus entirely lost. 

Of the 450 Austrian acres of our pond area, 400 acres are occupied 
by nine main ponds, one of which has twice the average size; 3 acres 
by five spawning ponds, and finally 47 acres by eight pondsfor the 
young fry, to which, since 1877, there must be added 22 acres occupied 
by three ponds for young fry which were rented from a neighboring 
farm, so that the total pond area of this estate is 472 acres. 

Of the above-mentioned nine main ponds, which are equal to ten 
medium-sized ponds, Mr. Potyka, who deserves great credit for his zeal 
in carp culture, only had the smaller half under the water, the re- 
mainder being either planted by himself or rented out for the same 
purpose. The young‘carp were always left in the main ponds two full 
years, which produced a very fine marketable fish of about 14 kilegram 
average weight. The average yield per acre was, according to the 


[3] POND-CULTIVATION ON THE KANIOW ESTATE, 535 


official reports, 103 kilograms of fish, each fish weighing on an average 
1.594 kilograms. These fish even at that time enjoyed the reputation 
of being the finest carp in the whole neighborhood, and were nearly 
all shipped on the Vistula to Cracow and Warsaw. After a pond had 
been under water for 4 years, it was entirely drained, and served agri- 
cultural purposes for 5 or 6 years. 

When in August, 1873, I took Kaniéw and Mirowec on a lease of 
twelve years, the ponds contained a fine well formed species of carp, 
and pond cultivation had been carried on systematically though per- 
haps not as vigorously as it might have been. I immediately took 
steps to extend the pond cultivation, by allowing one year to pass, and 
then, in 1875, planting or renting out for the same purpose one-half, 
and fishing in the other half after the first summer. From that time on 
one pond was plowed and planted every autumn, whilst at the same 
time one pond was freshly watered. This system I have maintained 
ever since, in spite of the difficulty experienced in the beginning, of 
obtaining the very large quantity of young fish required, because it 
offers imany and great advantages. At present the greater half of all> 
my ponds are under water, and I confine myself to plowing and plant- 
ing one pond, either main pond or pond for young fry, a year, with 
the view of providing a sufficient quantity of fodder of the very best 
quality for my valuable herd of cattle. All the ponds are of course at 
present managed by myself, and none are rented out. 

It is well known that the carp grows most rapidly during the first 
year of its life, and slower as it grows older. If the main ponds are, 
therefore, drained of their fish annually the most favorable result will 
be obtained. By avoiding one wintering the risk is greatly decreased 
and the stock of fish is under more frequent and better control. This 
system, moreover, offers the advantage that one has a certain regular 
annual income, which will vary but little; and thereby that point is 
reached which, owing to the slowness of all agricultural processes, is 
after all mainly to be aimed at, viz, to decrease the working capital 
and to obtain a rapid sale for the products of the farm. 

I did not rest satisfied with this change, but aimed at a further im- 
provement of our breed of carp by selecting the breeders very carefully, 
having special regard to their build and to rapid growth (if this can be 
considered a peculiarity of any breed of fish). Herein I was guided by 
the view that a fish possessing a well-shaped body is apt to develop 
a larger quantity of flesh, thus obtaining not onlya greater total weight, 
but also a more even proportion between the valuable and valueless 
portions of the body, which of course increases the worth of the fish. I 
therefore principally look for a comparatively small head, a well-arched 
full back, and a broad and well-rounded body. In other words, a good 
carp of pure breed is to be among the fish what shorthorns are among 
cattle, particularly as, in all probability, the carp will, for a long time 
to come, remain the principal fish bred and raised in our ponds. 


536 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


I begin to:select my future breeders among the one-year-old fish, and 
continue to select some from the two-year-old fish, as well as from those 
which have reached a marketable age, 3 years, so as to have on hand 
a considerable number of breeders from among which I then select 
the best. 

Following Dubisch’s method, I only place one spawner and two milt- 
ers in one and the same pond. These are fully able to supply my demand 
for young fish, which at present amounts to 60,000, for stocking the 
original Kaniéw ponds and those I have rented from Prince Pless. 

It is not necessary, but even injurious, to place a larger number of 
breeders in one pond, because they are apt to produce too large a num- 
ber of young fish, which might suffer from want of food; and if carp 
are to grow rapidly, it is very essential that the growth of the young 
fish should be favored as much as possible by supplying them with 
ample food, which can be done even without having recourse to artifi- 
cial food; so that by merely furnishing a sufficient supply of natural 
food one can, during the first summer, obtain fish 5, 8, and even, in ex- 
ceptional cases, 10 inches. With these young fish I stock my ponds for 
young fish during the second summer, allowing 240 to 360 per acre 
(about 420 to 630 per hectare) according to the size of the fish and the 
nature of the pond. In this manner I obtain carp weighing 4 to ? kilo- 
gram, and even reaching in some cases the weight of 1 kilogram. Of 
these I place 90 to 120 in the main ponds during the third summer, and 
thus obtain carp weighing 1 to 2 kilograms a piece, when ready for 
market. . 

T have not always been able to supply the necessary number of carp 
for raising, and as there are no spare ponds for young fish near Kaniow, 
and as unfortunate accidents will sometimes oceur, even in the best 
piscicultural establishments, I have repeatedly been obliged to supply 
the places of the lacking fish by placing selected fry of unusually large 
size in the main ponds, and in these cases I have invariably obtained 
fish weighing about 1 kilogram each and having particularly fine and 
tender flesh. I have also observed that young fry, which have grown 
rapidly, will continue to grow fast till they are ready for. the market, 
and actually grow faster than young fish of the same age which have 
been somewhat retarded in their growth; but that the latter, although 
of equal size, will weigh heavier, when they have reached a marketable 
age, than fish raised from young fry, because their flesh has a greater 
consistency. 

It should therefore be the aim to accelerate the growth of the fry 
and the young fish as much as possible, because fish which have grown 
rapidly are apt to continue this rapid growth; and it would be very 
bad policy to be stingy with the extent of water allowed for the raising 
of fish, because the final result will amply compensate for this. 

As regards the stocking of the main ponds, it is an old experience 
that in stecking a certain extent of water with a small number of fish, 


[5] POND-CULTIVATION ON THE KANIOW ESTATE. bot 


finer and more valuable specimens will be obtained; whilst the stocking 
of the ponds with a larger number of fish, if kept within reasonable 
bounds, will result in a greater total weight, but in an inferior quality 
of fish. Stocking ponds with a small number of fish is therefore to be 
recommended, but, like everything else, it should be kept within proper 
bounds, and a correct calculation will herein form the safest guide. 
No more than 90, and never more than 120, fish per acre are placed in the 
Kaniow ponds. The result has been that our breed of carp has steadily 
improved, and the number of kilograms of fish caught per year and per 
acre has been as follows: 


Kilograms. 
OM setters se iosita tod ateins wc adie t cute othe Soleo aS cient sr ataheaas 51.5 
JL Seo de ee cen ee a ay ae OOM LE ety 76. 76 
AS ie AMO OMS) 22 Pee A in ate iets cles wert ee a eae 83. 00 
ee Omir rth LN ean cel She wa av ts 2 AS Ie ee ee 104, 50 


thus, the yield of the ponds has more than doubled in six years, and re- 
garding the quality of our fish I can state that in one year we raise 
very fine carp, weighing 14 kilograms and more, which enjoy an excel- 
lent reputation in the Breslau and Hamburg markets. 

In favoring the growth of carp from their earliest youth, one has the 
special advantage that the fish, in spite of their size, remain slender in 
figure (that is, do not have those monstrous stomachs which are seen in 
some fish), and that they begin to grow fat at an early age, whereby, as 
in all animals, the development of the sexual organs is often entirely 
stopped, and the favorite fish of all gourmands, the ‘ barren carp,” is 
obtained. 

With the view of increasing the natural food in the ponds, they are 
allowed to lie dry during the winter, in order that the frost may de- 
prive the mud of its acidity, thus making it, by atmospheric influences, 
a suitable breeding-place for insects and infusoria. For the same rea- 
son I never allow the bottom of a fresh pond to be hoed before its first 
watering. This method has stood the test of a number of years. It 
seems best, however, if during winter the larger portion of the pond is 
exposed to the frost, leaving a small portion under water to serve as a 
place of refuge for valuable aquatic animalcule, where they may be 
sheltered trom the destructive cold, so that with the beginning of spring 
they can breed all the more rapidly and numerously in the freshly filled 
pond, and in this way be of great benefit to the carp. I have demon- 
strated with two of my ponds, which were treated in this manner, that 
by wintering some of the fish in the deepest places the result will be a 
steadily increasing number of fish during the fishing season, which is 
not the case when ponds have been under water for a long time. 


*The years 1874 and 1875 being transition years, have not been taken into account. 
t The greater portion of the fish of the year 1877 were not sold, but were kept in 
tanks. They were recently placed in ponds with the other stock of fish of 1578, and 
were finally sold with these. 


538 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISUERIES. [6] 


In order to dispel the erroneous idea that I obtain the above-men- 
tioned results only by going to a great expense, I will mention that for 
tending the Kanidw ponds of 450 acres I only employ one assistant, 
and that for the 22 acres of ponds which I rent I only employ one per- 
son as awatchman. During autumn, when there is more danger from 
fish thieves, and during winter, when holes have to be cut in the ice, I 
generally employ an extra assistant for the Kanidw ponds. 

Even while under water the ponds do not merely serve piscicultural 
purposes, but also, in a narrower sense, assist agricultural objects. 

As soon as spring sets in, and the ponds are released from their icy 
yoke, varied life begins to stir in the water; manifold aquatic birds 
begin to make their appearance with the first warm rays of the sun; 
insect-life begins to awaken, and a grand and mysterious activity is 
developed in the ponds. Long before the land casts offits wintry mantle, 
the ponds as far as the water reaches are clothed with verdure, as a 
welcome indic¢ation to the farmer that the time is near, when after a hard 
winter he will, as stock-raiser, derive advantage from his ponds, in the 
cheap, profitable and ample pastures they will furnish. As soonas the 
water has lost its icy temperature, which does not agree with cattle, they 
may be allowed to go into the ponds, where, wading about, they seek 
their food. They are thus not only benefited themselves, but through 
their excrements, dropped here and there, they indirectly benefit the 
fish. By treading about in the muddy bottom they stirit up, and thus 
enable the fish to catch more readily worms and other aquatic animal- 
cula which serve as fish-food. Cows generally become accustomed to 
these pond-pastures very quickly, and actually show eagerness to go 
into the water, which from a sanitary point of view, also, is beneficial to 
them. No one, who has not seen it himself, would believe with what 
delight cows take their bath, eagerly eating all the while, until they are 
satisfied and seek a place of rest in the higher portions of the pond. 
Even if the number of cattle is very large, they are not able to destroy 
the luxuriant growth of grass and reeds; and the farmer will soon have 
to place them in another pond where the grass is younger and more 
tender. As soon as cows enter a new pond, they will act like boys just 
let out of school. The new pond, a veritable terra imcognita for them, 
is eagerly explored in every direction, until they seem to have taken all 
its bearings, when their appetite returns and they begin to graze. The 
wild ducks, scared away by the first noisy approach of the cattle, again 
enter the pond and boldly swim about close to the grazing animals, 
whilst the carp peacefully seeks its food, without being inthe least 
frightened by either ducks or cattle. Such a pond therefore resembles 
a small but harmonious and happy community, whereevery one is doing 
well and feels contented, and lives on the most friendly footing with his 
neighbor, much as he may differ from him in nature and habits. Below 
‘the surface, however, and hidden from the eyes of the humam observer, 
‘a terrible war for existence is waged among the diminutive animalcula 
which fill the water of the pond. 


[7] POND-CULTIVATION ON THE KANIOW ESTATE. 539 


These pond-pastures not only supply the cattle with pleasant and 
healthy food, but actually become a source of profit to the farmer. My 
cows, always well fed, give better milk when grazing in the ponds, than 
when they are stable-fed with fresh clover. There is no fear that the 
reed-grass (Polish, ‘‘odymka”) will make the cattle bloated; for this 
quality of the reed-grass—which it undoubtedly possesses—is entirely 
lost when it grows in the water. Altuough my cattle have pastured in 
ponds for seven years, I have not had a single case of the kind. Who- 
ever has time and opportunity to mow the reed-grass before it blossoms, 
and dry it, will thus obtain excellent hay for the winter. On account 
of the large quantity of nitrogen it probably contains, of its fine texture, 
and finally, on account of its tough character, it easily becomes heated 
and to some extent begins to ferment; great care should be taken to 
avoid this. The same applies to the remnants of grass, &c., which are 
‘left after a pond has served as pasture. The best way is to let this. 
grass lie for a considerable time, and then to put it up in stacks or small 
heaps, only using it mixed with harder winter straw, when it will make 
a good and effective fertilizer. 

It would doubtless be profitable to make experiments with feeding 
cattle on hay from the ponds, mixed with winter-straw and rape-stalks, 
for this would in all probability furnish excellent food for the young cat- 
tle during winter. Unfortunately I cannot speak in this matter from 
personal experience; but it would be very gratifying to me, if my re- 
marks would encourage others to make the attempt. 

I need not dwell on the utilization of the mud from the ponds, as be- 
ing too wellknown. This manner of utilizing ponds will only be profit- 
able in cases where the mud can during winter be taken direct to a 
neighboring field, to be used as manure, such as for clover, or for making 
the hot manure from the cattle-yard somewhat milder; for if the mud 
is to be transported any great distance, the expense will exceed the 
profit, as is often the case when heavy manure is sent any distance. 

All these small protits yielded by a pond whilst still under water are 
insignificant if compared with the vast benefit to accrue froin a pond 
which, after having served piscicultural purposes for a number of years, 
furnishes the farmer with a rich and well-manured soil, fit for almost any 
kind of plants. 

A farmer who is ableto drain his pond entirely and plow it thoroughly 
before winter sets in, will find it easy work in spring to plant the muddy 
bottom of the pond, transformed by the frost into the very best of soil. 
If he does his work carefully, he may confidently look forward to a. 
rich harvest, which will fully repay him for the considerable trouble in- 
volved in the first plowing, and which will prove beneficial to his entire : 
farming operations. Let no one say that it is too difficult, or even im-- 
possible, to plow large ponds in autumn, after the fishing season has | 
come to a close; for if it is possible to plow the large Rosenberg pond near - 

Wittingau, in Bohemia, measuring 1,500 acres, where fishing does not 


540 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


commence till the beginning of October, it will be an easy matter in small 
ponds, especially if one takes care to get a number of extra oxen‘ for 
this extra work, to beemployed, of course, only temporarily for this specific 
purpose. It will be found most profitable to employ for this work oxen 
which, being well fed during the season of labor, may often be sold with 
advantage, after the work is done, to butchers for fattening. The cap- 
ital invested will thus be profitably reduced. 

Possibly it would be found advantageous to use a steam-plow in very 
large ponds, but this will of course depend on the locality, the means 
at the farmer’s disposal, &e. 

Under all circumstances it is not only a short-sighted policy, but 
actually an injury to the national wealth, if any farmer, who has the 
means, does not drain at least those of his ponds where this can be done 
easily, and periodically devote them to agricultural purposes, thus de- 
riving the greatest possible benefit from every part of his property.. 
There are many farmers who are unfortunately compelled to obtain their 
manure from abroad, partly on account of insufficient harvests from 
poor fields, partly because industrial enterprises necessitate a greater 
production. Many farmers who possess arable ponds, unfortunately 
have recourse to the comparatively easy system of buying artificial con- 
centrated fertilizers, before they have made careful and repeated exper- 
iments, to determine whether these fertilizers will suit their peculiar 
soil, and the consequence is that they soon become convinced by bitter 
experience of the mistakes they have made, which, moreover, in most 
cases has proved a considerable expense. 

In my opinion it would be far more practical, and, at least as long 
as agricultural chemistry, owing to the great and general ignorance of 
the nature of soils is not able to give absolutely reliable advice as to 
the application of fertilizers, much more rational, to make use of those 
advantages furnished by every locality, 7. e., to use that fertilizer which, 
so to speak, has grown on the same soil (the mud of ponds is nothing 
but a portion of the soil), and will, therefore, be particularly suitable, 
can easily be assimilated, and with very little trouble can be transferred 
from the ponds to the neighboring fields. No harm will be done, even 
if in some cases this fertilizer is mixed with other substances not hav- 
ing such strong fertilizing qualities. In using mud from the ponds as 
manure, the plants growing on fields, whose soil has thus been improved 
will of course draw from the ground only those substances needed for 
their growth. In this manner a circulation, on a small scale, of the most 
valuable mineral substances serving as food for plants, is inaugurated, 
atmospheric influences uniting with these during the growth of the 
plant ; whilst the mineral substances above referred to, during this pro- 
cess, again return to the inexhaustible source whence they came, of 
course excepting that small portion which was taken away in the fish, 
or which, during the flooding of the upper portions of the pond, does not 
return to it. 


[9] POND-CULTIVATION ON THE KANIOW ESTATE. 541 


What wealth of excellent food for plants may eventually be secured 
by the pond-harvest, may be gathered from the observation that the 
water of the ponds is, even in its original condition, the bearer of dis- 
solved fertilizers, which become a portion of the mud at the bottom and 
increase its existing wealth of food for plants, to which are added the 
valuable refuse, &c., from the manifold animal life of the water. The 
correctness of this view is proved beyond doubt by the exceedingly lux- 
uriant vegetation of the ponds. 

As long as the ponds are not plowed and regularly planted, a greater 
or smaller quantity of plant-food lies almost idle in the mud of the ponds, 
as only a very small portion of it is utilized as pasture, hay, &c. Every 
farmer, therefore, who has the opportunity, should aim at the greatest pos- 
sible utilization of the mud in his ponds, by regulary plowing and planting 
their bottoms. For my part I do not hesitate in the least to derive the 
greatest possible profit from my ponds, by benefiting my other fields 
through them, and I feel convinced that even Justus von Liebig would 
have sanctioned this system, because during the very next period of 
flooding or filling the ponds, all those substances which were removed 
with the mud, would gradually be replaced by fresh accessions thereof. 

As to the manner in which the hidden treasures of the mud may best be 
secured in various localities, ¢. e., what kind of cultivation will best suit 
the different ponds, we must say that no doubt every intelligent far- 
mer will find this out for himself, and all that is necessary is to give a 
few hints. 

The following method has, after a number of timid experiments, proved 
eminently successful in the Kaniéw estate: in poor ponds I plant, the 
first year after the pond has been drained, oats, the second year again 
oats, or, applying a small quantity of manure, wheat mixed with clover, 
followed in the third and fourth year by clover which, mixed with grass, 
furnishes excellent pasture during the fifth year, unless I prefer to fill 
the pond after the fourth year. I do not hesitate to apply some manure 
to such ponds, especially in the higher places which have not been thor- 
oughly flooded by water, which I can easily do, as I have always some 
manure to spare. Whatever I have planted in such ponds has thriven 
better than, or at least as well, as on the best fields on my farm, and 
moreover, I thereby furnish a suitable breeding-place for the insects and 
infusoria which, when the pond is again full of water, will have their 
home there. : 

In better ponds, however, all other agricultural plants may be suc- 
cessfully cultivated, with the exception of barley, which in Kaniow 
(though reaching a relatively heavy weight per standard measure) only 
gives a medium harvest, and does not furnish a fine quality of malt. As 
regards wheat and clover, my ponds often produce richer harvests than 
my fields. In these better ponds I hardly ever use any manure. I find 
that the following method will yield the greatest profit, both in money 
and in additional fodder for my numerous cattle: the first year I plant 


542 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


peas (a small early variety of green peas); the second year, rape, and 
in exceptional cases, potatoes; the third year, wheat (on heavy soil, 
Galician wheat, and on loamy humus soil, Frankenstein wheat) mize 
with clover, so ae deine the fourth and fifth years clover finishes the 
agricultural period.of the pond. I take the special precaution to add 
some grass-seed to the clover for those portions of the wheat-fields 
which lie on the higher portions of the ponds, with the view of furnish- 
ing better pasture for my cattle when at some future time they will seek 
their food in the ponds. 

I prefer to close the agricultural period of my ponds with clover, 
because the remnants of clover will furnish a very large quantity of 
vegetable food for insects, and will thereby supply a large amount of 
food for the fish, which eventually will benefit me by producing larger 
and finer fish. 

After all my experience I can say that my safest harvests have always 
been those gathered from my ponds, and that I have found pond-culti- 
vation productive of a decided addition to my annual income. 

Although I cannot but highly recommend to all farmers the plowing 
and planting of their ponds, I must caution them to be careful not to 
plow too close to the dikes, because by doing so they run the risk of 
destroying the reeds, which are of primary importance to the safety of 
the dike. J always leave about 2 to 4 meters from the base of the dike, 
which the plow never touches, and wherel do not even mow, because in 
stormy weather the waves will be broken by the reeds, especially if by 
the growth of years they have become very dense. It is, under all cir- 
cumstances, a2 much cheaper way of saving the dikes and keeping them 
in repair, than to erect stone dikes or walls (as in the Rosenberg pond). 
Where no reeds are growing below the base of the dike they can easily 
be supplied by cutting some reeds in the pond deep under the water 
and laying these in the water near the dike, where they will soon send 
out water-roots towards the bottom and thus grow and flourish near the 
dike. 

I will also mention here that localities which, probably owing to the 
lack of forests, suffer from aridity, may have their climate changed in 
a very cheap and profitable manner, vy the filling with water of a num- 
ber of large ponds. 

I will here close my communication, which has come from the unprac- 
ticed pen of a practical farmer, and which does not in the least claim 
the merits of a literary production. Nor will this be required of a work 
like the present, because it simply intends to add another contribution 
to the experience of those who have given some attention to fresh-water 
fisheries (pond-fisheries) and the farming operations connected there- 
with. I know very well that I am still far from the limit of the possible 
in this line, but I honestly claim that, as far as my experiments go, they 
have been very successful. I shall of course not rest contented on my 
laurels. I would, in conclusion, direct attention to the circumstance that 


pL 11] POND-CULTIVATION ON THE KANIOW ESTATE. 543 


most practical farmers have, as a general rule, been but little benefited 
by the grand results of scientific investigation, and that, unfortunately, 
they lack a thorough knowledge of the aquatic fauna which is of such 
great importance for the feeding of fish. In the interest of pisciculture 
I herewith express the justified wish that scientists may give us still 
more practical advice. By carefully raising the respective aquatic 
animaleulz for fish-food, we should, perhaps, sueceed in favoring the 
growth of the fish during the second and third year in a similar way as 
is done during the first year. 

I cannot too strongly urge all farmers who take an interest in pond- 
cultivation to make—in their respective localities—further observations 
and experiments relative thereto, and I sincerely hope that their expe- 
rience will be published for the general good. It is one of the beauties 
of agriculture, that it knows no professional envy, and dare not know 
any, for even if the greater experience of one man benefits another, the 
first one will not deem his interests endangered thereby, since a larger 
production, by creating a greater demand and better markets, will in the 
end again prove a benefit to him. 

As far as Tam concerned, I shall also in the future gladly make known 
to the general public the results of any further experiments in pond- 
cultivation. I shall rejoice at every success obtained by other farmers 
and pisciculturists, and in anticipation of such happy results I herewith 
hid them, from the depth of my heart, a sincere God-speed. 


Ae a it Wane 
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mislaea Vitel sev 1, 60) Lee i eT a enh 
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XIX.—THE INJURIOUS INFLUENCE ON PISCICULTURE OF THE 
RETTING* WATER OF FLAX AND HEMP.t 


By E. RetcuHarprt. 


The question of the injurious character of the refuse water from the 
retting of flax is still an open one, inasmuch as opinions differ widely. 
lax and hemp retting aims at a partial decomposition of the vegetable 
substances, during which process especially the outer parts of the plant 
(the bark or rind) soon become brittle, whilst the inner (glutinous or eas- 
ily solvable) vegetable substances begin to ferment, whereby decompo- 
sition is furthered, but which, however, must not extend to the firm 
tissue of the plant. This tissue offers stronger resistance to the process 
of decomposition; but the action of the so-called retting process must 
be interrupted, as soon as repeated tests show thatthe outer (brittle) parts 
can be removed by simple rubbing, and that there is danger of the 
inner (firm) tissue being torn asunder. To continue the retting process 
any longer would injure the fibers of the tissue by likewise rendering 
these brittle and tender, and would therefore frustrate the object in view. 

Retting is carried on differently in different parts of the country, either 
by the dry or by the moist method. Ifthe dry methodis employed, the plants, 
after having been pulled, are in the beginning of autumn spread over 
the empty fields and exposed to the alternating atmospheric influences 
of moisture and heat, to the dew of the night and the glaring rays of 
the sun by day, these natural influences being artificially assisted by 
occasionally sprinkling the plants with water. Whatever substances 
are dissolved and withdrawn from the plants assimilate with the soil 
on which they lie, and the whole process may be termed decay. 

In the moist method of retting, the plants are soaked in water which 
is stagnant, or which is agitated as little as possible. Stones are placed 
on the bundles of flax or hemp, in order to keep them under water, and 
the process of putrefaction very soon commences, and is indicated by the 
solution of various vegetable substances, which imparts a dark color to 


* [The literal meaning of the German verb ‘‘rdsten,” ‘‘ to ret,” is retained in the trans- 
lation. The word isexclusively applied to the process of heating and fermentation pro- 
duced in flax and hemp by laying these plants, after being cut, either on the fields, 
exposed to the dew and the sun, or in water.—EDITOR. ] 

t Mittheiluagen zur Gesundheitspflege. Von E. Reichardt in Jena, Schddliche Wirkung 
des Ristwassers von Flachs und Hanf fiir die Fischzucht. Archiv der Pharmacie, vol. 219, 
part 1, Halle, 1881.—Translated by HERMAN JACOBSON. 

Age 545 
S. Mis. 29-——35 


546 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2)4 


the water; and by the development of gases, whose presence may be 
perceived by the smell. As soon as the necessary degree of brittleness 
has been reached, the plants are taken out of the water and dried in the 
air, during which process these decaying vegetable substances fill the 
entire neighborhood with miasmatic exhalations to such a degree as to 
cause animals to refuse to pass by. The impure water is frequently 
poured into the nearest running water, and the sanitary authorities 
have in most cases vigorously opposed this method. 

The Thiiringian Fishery Association therefore passed a resolution at 
its last annual meeting to cause an investigation of the disputed ques- 
tion of the injurious character of this retting water, and commissioned 
me to conduct this investigation. This fact had hardly been mentioned 
by several of our papers when I received from Chief Forester Mr. Wilke, 
of Waltershausen, a report on the subject, which he voluntarily placed 
at my disposal, portions of which I shall, with his consent, embody in 
this article, as communications of this kind are exceedingly acceptable 
in giving a practical insight into the matter. 


Mr. Wilke was for a considerable time stationed near the River Nesse, 
along the banks of which flax is cultivated on a large scale, and where 
the moist method of retting is universally employed. Mr. Wilke says: 

‘¢ Although it is prohibited by law to ret flax in rivers, I have every 
year seen large masses of flax, both in the bed of the Nesse and more 
especially in its small tributaries, where the water has been dammed 
for the purpose of retting flax. In these tributaries pestiferous pools 
are created. When such pools have been used for retting for any length 
of time, they are opened, and the whole mass of foul and putrid water 
is emptied into the river, and every living being coming within its 
reach is doomed. 

‘As soon as the retting of the flax commences, the water begins to 
assume a brownish color and to emit an offensive odor. This color and 
odor increase in intensity from day to day, till the water has the color 
of coffee, and the odor becomes so repulsive that I have often gone one- 
half league out of my way so as not to be obliged to pass near such 
water, especially in the morning and evening. The drier and warmer 
the temperature the more intense will be the odor and the infection of 
the water. 

‘¢ Whenever the water has attained a certain degree of putridity all 
the fish will strive to reach the bank, gasping for air, and in such a 
state of torpor that they can easily be caught with the hand. If they 
do not speedily get fresh, pure water, they die, and remain lying on the 
bank, where they serve as food for birds, or are caught in the grates of 
mills, from which they are gathered, only to be thrown away. 

‘‘At one station I have known years when fish of all kinds were 
picked off the mill-grates by the hundred weight, some dead and some 
alive. ‘The dead fish were immediately thrown away, and the live ones 


[3] RETTING WATER INJURIOUS TO FISH. 547 


wereeaten. I myself once partook of such fish, which had been allowed 
to lie in fresh water for several hours before they were killed. But even 
after they were cooked they still smelled and tasted of the retting water, 
and all who ate of this dish felt the bad consequences. 

“The inhaling of this pestiferous air for weeks and weeks certainly 
requires the attention of the health authorities. 

‘Mortification of the spleen, which is so frequent in the valley of the 
Nesse among sheep, cattle, and hogs, and which is exceedingly conta- 
gious, is quite probably produced by the drinking of retting water.” 

The above valuable communication by Mr. Wilke directs attention to 
the injurious influence of retting water on public health, and very justly, 
for we know now that putrefying substances are most effective in 
spreading contagious diseases. I have personally convinced myself of 
the very disagreeable impurities with which the air is tainted by the 
retting of flax, and which became especiadly noticeable during the slow 
drying process of the decaying flax. 

In order to subject this matter to chemical tests, I obtained a con- 
siderable quantity of retting water, which, however, was tolerably clear 
and odorless, so that it could hardly possess many injurious qualities. 
These are not developed till the last stage of decomposition. Experi- 
ments made on a large scale to obtain vegetable poisons from this water 
led to no result. This determined me to obtain fresh flax-plants and, 
on a small scale, to go through the whole retting process. 

For this purpose I laid a bunch of flax in water; after a few days 
gases began to develop, the water began to assume a brownish color, 
and finally complete decay set in, accompanied by the development of 
offensive gases, &c. As soon as the flax had reached this stage of de- 
composition, and the fiber could easily be separated from the outer 
(brittle) portions of the plant, I made the following experiments : 


I.—WITH LIVE FISH. 


In these experiments I used both kinds of whiting, such as are found 
in the river Saale, and which on the whole are an exceedingly tender fish, 
and bastard carp, weighing about 3-500 grams. The last-mentioned kind 
of fish is better able to stand a change of water. These fish had been 
living in running water of a temperature of 7° to 9° C., which is the 
usual temperature of water in spring time. In these experiments I 
therefore endeavored to keep the water at exactly the same temperature 
as that from which the fish had been taken. Some of the fish were put 
aside in the water in which they had been living, and some were placed 
in water mixed with retting water. In the fresh water the fish kept for 
several days without undergoing any change, so that they could again 
be transferred to the running water. The retting water was obtained 
by soaking flax for five days. ~ 

One part retting water and three parts running water mixed.—The fish 
placed in this water immediately showed signs of uneasiness, gasped un- 


* 


, 
«{ 
ih 


548 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


interruptedly for air, and were found dead the next morning. The ex- 
periment had commenced towards evening of the preceding day. 

The second experiment, made the following day in exactly the same 
manner, led to exactly the same result. The fish died within three 
hours. 

One of the large bastard carp lived in this mixture of fresh water and 
retting water for two days, but soon began to lose its color, gradually 
grew weaker, and, although again placed in running water, died after 
eight days. 

One part retting water and nine parts running water mixed.—The fish 
immediately began to be sick, showing this by their motions and their 
gasping for air; lived for twenty-four hours in the mixture, and began 
to recover when again placed in fresh running water, but finally died 
after a few days. 

One part retting water and two parts running water.—Small fish died 
very soon. A large bastard carp kept alive for one and three-fourths 
days, but was on the point of death when at that period again trans- 
ferred to pure running water, from which time it began to recover, but 
only to die within two weeks. 

Retting water fourteen days old.—In a mixture of one part of this ret- 
ting water and four parts fresh water the fish died after one and one- 
half days. 

The same retting water three weeks old.—Fish placed in it (one part ret- 
ting water and four parts fresh water) grew sick immediately, gasped 
for air and changed their color, but managed to keep alive for several 
days, so that they could again be transferred to fresh running water. 

As all these experiments led to the same expected result, they were 
brought to a close. The conclusion was as follows: 

hetting water, when in a putrid condition, kills fish within a few hours, 
even when mixed with three to four parts of running water which is 
otherwise well adapted to pisciculture. When mixed with a larger pro- 
portion of fresh water the fish can stand it better, but are nevertheless 
considerably injured. 

Retting water which is allowed to stand for some time, and which 
thereby loses its strongly putrid character, does not therefore hurt the 
fish so much. 

These experiments fully corroborate the facts observed in rivers on 
a larger scale. Wherever actually putrid retting water mingles with 
pure water, a poisonous juice, which is positively injurious to fish, exists 
in the water, and shows its destructive character in proportion to the 
degree of putrefaction and its quantity. 

I was not able to obtain water in which hemp had been retted; in 
such water one might have looked for positive vegetable poisons, as such 
substances have been shown to exist in hemp. Repeated experiments 
with water in which I had laid hemp and allowed it to putrefy did not 
show any substances of an alkaloid or acid nature in the water. The 


[5] RETTING WATER INJURIOUS TO FISH. odd 


usual offensive decaying process took place, developing substances 
whose composition is well known. My attention was, therefore, directed. 
to the gaseous matter developed during the process of decomposition, 
and as these gases withdraw the oxygen from the water they are highly 
injurious to the life of fish. 


IIl.—TO DETERMINE THE GASES. 


Frequent experiments as to the gases contained in spring and running 
water (see this Journal, vol. 202, p. 258) showed the proportion found by 
Regnault, Bunsen, and others, viz, oxygen and nitrogen as 1:2, whilst 
the proportion of oxygen to nitrogen in the air is 1:4; 7. ¢., the solution 
of these two gases in water corresponds to these fully established pro- 
portions. 

In 1,000 cubic centimeters of water taken from the river Saale during 
spring (see this Journal, vol. 206, p. 206) I found 30 to 31 cubic centi- 
meters gas; these contained, at a temperature of 3° C., 6.2 per cent. ear- 
bonic acid; this percentage rose, when the temperature of the room 
grew warmer, to 16.5, without any noticeable change in the total quan- 
tity of the gas. One experiment showed that the water of the river 
Saale, at a temperature of 3° C., contained one part oxygen to 4.78 parts 
nitrogen, whilst a second experiment showed the proportion of these 
two gases to be 1:1.91. After the water had become somewhat warmer 
in the room the proportion was 1 part oxygen to 2.2 parts nitrogen; 
therefore the same as the one given above. 

Water in which hemp had been retted, and which had attained a con- 
siderable degree of putridity, was found to contain in 554.3 cubie centi- 
meters of water, 35.5 cubic centimeters gases, which might be expelled 
by boiling ; this would make about 64 cubic centimeters gases in 1,000 
cubic centimeters water. Calculating the percentage I obtained the 
following result: 


LSE SUECETT Ve SIS a nee mee rN De rer ego y Sn n> ROR eat 
Lele De Og aan ae eae ee reer rer er ot 29,9 7.0 
“DTP DDT YE" CCT Pe een Oy rnin Sire yee © 65.9 

100. 0 


While river water mixed correspondingly shows a proportion of 1: 2, 
this mixture shows a proportion of 1 : 7. 

Carbureted-hydrogen gas, hydrogen or carbonic-acid gas could not 
be discovered, which may possibly be owing to the degree of putridity 
and to the difficulty of solving these gases in water. But these pro- 
portions must also be considered in connection with carbonic acid, which 
is just as hurtful to fish as nitrogen. 

The percentage of gases in two different specimens of water trom the 
river Saale (the temperature of the room being 20° C.), was that given 


550 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


under No. I and No. IT, whilst retting water, at the same temperature, 
showed a different percentage: 


Saale water. Retting water. 
it 10 
Oxy GON s jai. i. ss 2) LOS OMe 25.9 =1 4.2) =i 
JS FUG OY S01 Ae ee Gdn1-Qu ae, 57.6 CAR ATI Pe 
Carbonic acid ........... Bape 116.5 } =2. 86 | 65.9 } 22, = 


The proportion of oxygen to the other gases which can be expelled 
by boiling and which produce suffocation, has therefore been decreased 
ten fold. Taking finally into consideration the fact that 1,000 cubic 
centimeters retting water contained 64 cubic centimeters gases, whilst 
repeated experiments with river water showed that the same contained 
only 30.32 cubic centimeters, the fatal character of the mixture will be- 
come still more apparent in its relation to the breathing and life of fish. 

It cannot be doubted, therefore, that retting water will kill fish by 
its lack of oxygen, if from no other cause. In this all observations 
made on a large and small scale will agree. The fish immediately gasp 
for air until they become tired, and finally suffocate. Even leaving 
this hurtful mixture of gases out of our calculation, it must be granted 
that putrefying substances must exercise a hurtful influence, both di- 
rectly by producing changes which are injurious to life, and indirectly 
by rapidly absorbing oxygen and thereby depriving the surrounding 
objects of this gas which is so essential to all life. 

If only small quantities of retting water are mixed with large quanti- 
ties of running water there may be no immediate evil consequences, 
whilst if this proportion is reversed the injurious consequences will 
make themselves felt very soon; in either case, however, poisonous 
substances are introduced in the water which had better be kept out 
of it. 

The introduction of retting water into fishing waters should therefore 
be strictly prohibited, and has actually been prohibited in many places. 
The retting water may be employed much more suitably in irrigating 
meadows, where, owing to the loose soil, it loses its putrid character 
very soon, and aids in forming good food for plants. It would be still 
better if the moist method of retting could be altogether abandoned, 
and the dry method adopted in all cases, or if other and less injurious 
methods could be discovered and come into general use. 


APPENDIX G. 


PROPAGATION: OF FOOD-FISHES. 


SPECIAL APPLICATIONS. 


XX.—REPORT OF OPERATIONS CONNECTED WITH THE PROPA- 
GATION OF WHITEFISH (COREGONUS ALBUS) AT THE NORTH- 
VILLE STATION, NORTHVILLE, MICH., FOR SEASON OF 1880-81. 


By FRANK N. Cuiark, in charge. 


PREFACE. 


A brief notice of the hatchery, together with its immediate surround- 
ings and facilities for the work under consideration, may properly pre- 
cede an account of the work of the season. 

The Northville hatchery was built by the late N. W. Clark, its nucleus 
being collected from a similar establishment formerly located at Clarks- 
ton, Mich., thirty miles distant. The latter building was torn down and 
removed, together with the appurtenances of fish-hatching contained 
therein, to its present site during the summer of 1874, and the erection 
of a building double the size and capacity of its predecessor immediately 
begun. 

A description of the hatchery as then completed and of its surround- 
ings will suffice in the present instance, as no material changes were 
made until August, 1880, at which time the United States Fish Com- 
mission assumed control. Under their direction many needed improve- 
ments have been made and some new features added, which will be 
noticed in the proper place. The hatchery as built and as it now 
remains, is a one-story frame structure, 80 feet in length by 30 in width, 
containing a 9 by 11 office in front, also an 8 by 30 tank-room in the 
rear. Its interior arrangements were designed more especially for the 
accommodation of the hatching appliances to be used therein, viz: hatch- 
ing troughs and the “Clark” hatching box. No new apparatus was 
introduced, neither was its capacity increased previous to the present 
season. The main or hatching room was provided with three parallel 
tanks, each 50 feet in length and uniformly 9 inches in depth. One tank 
was 42 and either of the others 28 inches in width, the larger being 
divided into 96 and each of the others into 64 compartments for the 
reception of the boxes, making a total capacity of 224 hatching boxes. 
Although as many as 75,000 eggs of the whitefish can be brought for- 
ward successfully in each of these boxes, usually but 48,000 have been 
incubated therein, it being possible to hatch a greater percentage with 
less trouble and expense when the latter number is not exceeded. Of 


the éggs of Salmo fontinalis or Salmo iridea not more than 24,000 should 
[1] 553 


554 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


be placed in each box to obtain the best possible results. A description 
of the “Clark” hatching-box is given in Report of United States Com- 
missioner of Fish and Fisheries for 1872~’73, pages 583 and 584. 

The hatchery is located at the foot of a gentle slope of land, and 
ascending this declivity about 200 feet we find issuing forth within a 
circle of a hundred feet numberless little springs which furnish in the 
aggregrate about 175 gallons of water per minute. <A public highway 
running directly in front of the hatchery and between it and the spring, 
by intercepting the flow of water from the latter, serves incidentally as 
a dam, thereby creating a pond having an area of one-eighth acre, aver- 
aging 4 feet in depth and extending back.a few feet beyond the spring 
area, thus incorporating the whole of the latter. The surface of this 
spring pond is 7 feet above the level of the hatchery floor, which gives 
an ample fall of water. This spring, called the upper spring to distin- 
guish it from a second one underneath the hatchery, is the sole feeder 
of the spring pond, and not only furnishes all the water used in the 
hatchery, but a considerable excess for which other avenues of escape 
have been provided; but the demand for water to develop eggs of the 
whitefish in the hatchery is not supplied directly from the spring pond, 
as the temperature of the latter during the hatching season is suffi- 
ciently warm to bring forth the fry earlier than is usually deemed de- 
sirable. The temperature of the water at its immediate source is 479, 
never fluctuating more than a small fraction of a degree, while in the 
spring pond it is variable, depending, of course, on the temperature of 
the atmosphere; but, owing to the constant and abundant influx of 
spring water, is kept warmer than is desirable for incubating eggs of 
the whitefish, except during brief periods of extremely severe weather. 
The average temperature of the spring pond, then, through the winter 
season will approximate 43°, which would bring forth the fry in from 
80 to 90 days, or about the 1st of February. Aside from the considera- 
tion of the existence of food for the young fishes at the period indi- 
cated, about which there may be no uncertainty, the advisability of 
allowing a too rapid development of the embryos may be considered 
questionable from the fact that when brought forward in this manner 
they suggest prematurity, shown by their vague and shadowy outlines, 
which present a decided contrast as compared with the fruit of 120 to 
150 days’ incubation, the latter having black and fully developed forms, 
evidently better fitted to survive or escape the vicissitudes necessarily 
attending their infantile period. 

At the time of the construction of the hatchery no information con- 
cerning the temperature of the spring pond during the winters season 
could be obtained, no record having been made; however, as it was 
known to contain but little ice even in the most severe winters, steps 
were taken with a view to aid in securing the desired reduction in tem- 
perature. The water must be exposed still further to the influence of 
cold winter air; an artificial pond must be arranged, and into this must 


[3] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 555 


be drawn barely enough water to supply the actual necessities of the 
hatchery. Accordingly a pond 12 feet wide by 100 long was constructed 
on a narrow plateau. situated across the road diagonally from the 
spring pond, and running nearly parallel with the hatchery. The sur- 
face of the plateau is nearly level with the spring pond, and thus the 
requisite fall of water is maintained. <A trunk fitted at its mouth with 
an adjustable gate runs under the road and conveys the water to the 
cooling or ice water pond, as it is called. 

With the limited amount of water used in the hatchery up to the 
present season, and consequently the comparatively small quantity of 
water to be cooled, this pond proved equal to the requirements. The 
first severe weather of November coated it with ice, which soon increased 
to several inches in thickness, and remained until the following March. 
Water which issued from the earth at a temperature of 47° was thus 
reduced to an average temperature of 35°. The good results obtained 
by the use of this cooling pond have been substantially the same each 
succeeding season up to the present, when, as operations were to be con- 
ducted on a much larger scale, and as the Chase jars, requiring a greater 
volume of water than the hatching-boxes, were to be introduced, it was 
thought to be inadequate. Subsequent events verified the prediction, 
and the additional measures adopted in the premises will be alluded to 
again. 

The trout ponds at the station, six in number, and constituted in one 
series, are situated immediately in the rear of the hatchery, and are sup- 
ported by a spring yielding 200 gallons of water per minute, located 
directly beneath the hatching room. They have contained at various 
times since their construction Brook trout (Salmo fontinalis), McCloud 
River trout (Salmo iridea), California salmon (Salmo quinnat?), Lake 
trout (Salmo namaycush), and Grayling (Thymallus tricolor), but at pres- 
ent are occupied exclusively by the first two varieties named, the latter 
being the property of the United States Fish Commission. 

A feature of both the upper and lower springs, and which indicates 
that their origin and conducting strata are far beyond surface influences, 
is their uniformity of flow and temperature; even the “ oldest inhabit- 
ant” failing to remember any perceptible increase or diminution in their 
yield. They are perpetual fountains, inasmuch as they are uninfluenced 
by protracted droughts, while the variance of temperature between the 
extremes of winter cold and summer heat is less than one degree. 

The amount of water furnished by the lower spring, allof which new 
runs through the ponds in use, is abundantly ample to sustain a second 
series, while the waste from the upper spring could be utilized by sup- 
porting a third series of ponds. 

It will be readily perceived, then, that these springs, both as to their 
relative position and fecundity, are peculiarly fitted for trout propaga- 
tion and culture on an extensive scale; but for whitefish work of sufti- 
cient magnitude to demand the use of more than half the product of the 


556 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


upper spring, the reduction and maintenance of the temperature of the 
water to that degree of coldness necessary to delay the hatching until 
early spring is a work not easily accomplished, evidenced by the results 
of the season just closed. If it is considered immaterial whether white- 
fish are hatched and planted in February or in April, then a more suit- 
able locality would be difficult to find; for with an adequate quantity of 
ova to consume the entire yield of the supplying spring the water would, 
even against the adverse influences of the ice-water pond as now used, be 
still warm enough to bring forth the fry as early as February, thereby 
shortening the season by two or three months, with its attendant ex- 
penses. 


PREPARATORY WORK. 


During the month of August, 1880, instructions were received from 
United States Fish Commissioner Prof. Spencer F. Baird for the pros- 
ecution of the work of propagating whitefish at the Northville station 
for the season of 188081. As provisions were made for conducting op- 
erations quite extensively, preparations commensurate with the contem- 
plated extent of the work were essential. Preliminary work, then, was 
immediately begun, and consisted for the: most part of the following; 
Cleaning and enlarging the spring pond ; devising and introducing some 
plan of drawing the surplus water immediately from its source at the 
head of the pond, instead of from the foot, as had previously been done ; 
enlarging ice-water pond; providing increased facilities in the way of 
conducting pipes and trunks for conveying the water from the spring 
pond to the ice-water pond, and from thence to the tank room ; repairs 
to the hatchery and a thorough overhauling of the appliances of the 
hatching and tank-rooms; providing increased facilities for carrying 
spawn; and, finally, the construction and arranging of feeding troughs 
and equipping the same with the Chase hatching jars. 

The object, of course, of drawing all the waste water from that por- 
tion of the pond fed directly by the spring or springs was to obtain the 
minimum quantity of spring water to be cooled, allowing only enough 
of the latter to mingle with the pond to maintain it against the counter 
draught of the ice-water pond for consumption in the hatchery. The 
plan originally intended to secure these results contemplated a division 
of the spring pond into two sections by the erection of a wall or dam, 
thus separating the spring area from the remainder. With the springs 
thus cut off and confined within the smallest possible space, provisions 
for drawing from them the actual quantity needed and also for the dis- 
position of the surplusage could be easily made. But a careful inspec- 
tion of the premises and a complete investigation of the character of the 
bottom of the pond disclosed the fact that this plan could not be carried 
out Save at an expense greatly in excess of the estimates, and it was, 
therefore, abandoned and substituted by a simple arrangement, the 


[5] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 557 


results of which proved ‘quite satisfactory. An open trough, resting on 
stilts driven just beneath the surface of the water and drawing from the 
upper or spring-fed part of the pond, was laid the entire length of the 
pond. This being the only exit allowed for the discharge of the super- 
fluous water, the entire waste was thus drawn from the immediate 
vicinity of the springs. 

The dimensions of the ice-water pond were then increased to 150 feet 
in length by 18 feet in width, with its boundary maintained by a wall 
of masonry backed up on one side of the pond by the natural elevation 
of the ground, on the other by a layer of clay of sufficient thickness to 
prevent leakage. The trunk from the spring pond discharges into an 
open, Shallow trough, which carries the water to the farther end of the 
ice-water pond for the purpose of cooling as much as possible by ex- 
posure to the air while in transit, the two conductors for the tank room 
tapping the opposite end of the pond. The additional precautionary 
measures adopted for cooling the water were thought to be sufficient, 
but, as a result of the increased work of the season, the demand of the 
hatchery required fully one-half of the product of the spring, and, not- 
withstanding the unusual severity of the winter, it was found necessary 
at times to use considerable quantities of ice in the tank room to keep 
the temperature of the water down to the desired point. The cooling- 
pond rendered efficient service, but did not fully meet anticipations. 

The repairs to the hatchery included a new roof and new floors for 
the hatching and tank rooms. A small temporary apartment was 
arranged in one corner of the hatching room adjoining the office, which 
was occupied as a sleeping room by one of the employés during the 
hatching season. This precaution was adopted upon the supposition 
that the sleep of the occupant would be interrupted as quickly by the 
cessation of the noisy monotony of running water in the hatching room 
as by the sudden intrusion of noise under ordinary circumstances. 

One double row of hatching boxes were removed, and replaced by a 
tier of tanks for feeding the hatching jars. These tanks, three in num- 
ber, are placed one above the other, and consequently occupy but little 
more floor room than a single row of hatch boxes; they are uniform in 
size, viz, 40 feet long by 15 inches wide and 14 inches deep, the top one 
being fitted with 50 and the middle one with 56 No. 8 faucets, or 106 
altogether. The jars rest on narrow shelves placed crosswise of the 
tanks, one shelf sufficing for two jars, one at either end, the water 
entering the top tank feeding the upper rows of jars, which, in turn, 
supply the middle tank, from which the lower rows of jars are fed, the 
water from these emptying into the bottom tank, which, at present, 
serves only as a conductor for the waste water. The five rows of hatch- 
ing boxes remaining were thoroughly examined, and given the needed 
repairs, in the way of caulking &c. Some of the wire trays were 
repaired, while others were supplied with new screens entire, and all 
were given a coat of asphaltum varnish. The picking trough was 
lengthened to 50 feet. 


558 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] _ 


For carrying the spawn, nine boxes, each containing 20 canton flan- 
nel trays 16 inches square, were made, also one large can for the same 
purpose. This can is 24 inches high by 16 in diameter, cylindrical in 
shape, and filled with a system of wire trays fitted around a central 
tube, funnel-shaped at its mouth, through which the water is intro- 
duced and conducted to the bottom of the can before being freed, the 
bottom of the tube having a conical flange attachment to diverge the 
water, which then flows upward through the trays of eggs (or fish) and 
out of the ventricle provided near the top of the can! It is undoubt- 
edly superior to the boxes for carrying spawn, but is much more expen- 
sive, and, when in transit, requires extra attention as to frequent changes 
of water. 

The Chase hatching jars, 100 of which had been ordered of the Dor- 
flinger Glass Company, White Mills, Pa., had not yet arrived October 
20, although advices of their shipment September 29 had been received. 
Considerable uneasiness was felt on account of their non-arrival, as the 
anticipated time for using them was near at hand, and steps were at 
once taken to locate their point of detention. They finally arrived 
October 28, without the loss of a single jar or tube by breakage, and 
were placed in position as soon as possible. <A full head of water was 
turned on to search out any leaks or disclose any defects that might 
exist in the trunks, tanks, &¢., and in time to make any needed repairs 
or changes before eggs were received. The preparatory work was now 
soon completed—none too soon, however, as subsequent events will 
show—and everything placed in readiness for the reception of spawn. 


SPAWN-GATHERING OPERATIONS. 


While the preceding operations were making, a visit to the ‘‘ Bass” 
Islands of Lake Erie, viz, North Bass, Middle Bass, and Put-in-Bay 
was made in the early part of September for the purpose of arranging 
for the privilege of collecting whitefish eggs from the catch of the lead- 
ing pound-net fishermen. Usually, it is ‘first come first served”; but, 
in the present instance, several net-owners were found who were quite 
unwilling to allow their eggs to be taken for the benefit of the United 
States Fish Commission, preferring to give them to the Ohio State com- 
mission, whose work, being more of a local character, would naturally 
include deposits of fry in their vicinity. A sufficient number, however, 
cheerfully offered to co-operate in the work. 

While on this trip I engaged the services of Mr. P. Wiers and Mr. 
S. W. Downing, residents of North Bass Island, and experienced spawn- 
takers, to assist in that work during the season. 

A second visit was made to the islands October 25 and 26, to complete 
the preliminaries and note the condition of the fish, which were then be- 
ing caught in considerable numbers. Many of the large females showed 
indications of early spawning, while several ripe males were found— 
always reliable evidence that ripe fish of the opposite sex will soon 


[7] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 559 


appear. Instructions were left with Mr. Wiers to keep a close watch, 
and report by telegram the first appearance of mature spawners. 

Meanwhile, correspondence with some of the leading fishermen of Al- 
pena elicited information from which the conclusion was reached that 
jarge numbers of eggs of the whitefish could be secured at that point, 
although no precedent for this conclusion had been established by pre- 
vious operations of private parties or State commissions. The fisher- 
men, too, here, unlike many at the islands, were not only willing but 
anxious to render all reasonable aid to the State and United States com- 
missions in their efforts to propagate the whitefish. 

Large numbers of the lake trout (Salmo namaycush) are also caught 
at this point, but the fishermen, claiming they are a deadly enemy of 
the whitefish, a much more valuable fish, strenuously object to, and will 
not permit, so far as they have the power to prevent, the collection of 
their spawn for the purpose of perpetuating the species. But this claim 
of the fishermen is not supported by the investigations of the late Mr. 
J. W. Milner (Report of United States Commissioner of Fish and Fish- 
eries, 1872~73, pages 38 and 39), and it is altogether probable that the 
destruction of the young whitefishes to any great extent by the trout 
exists only in the imaginations of the fishermen. Nevertheless, the 
opposition of the latter, including the boat and net employés, as well 
aS proprietors, is an element to be conciliated by the spawn-gatherer, 
as the net-lifters have it in their power, and with but little effort on 
their part, to greatly increase or decrease the numerous difficulties 
against: which the operator must always contend under the most favor- 
able circumstances, it being an easy matter to carelessly or accidentally 
(2) overturn the pans or pails of spawn when throwing the fish from the 
pound-nets into the small open pound-boats, or likewise equally as easy 
to assist by throwing the spawners near the operator and avoid cover- 
ing the same with subsequent “dips” of other kinds of fish. 

Notwithstanding the favorable outlook for collecting spawn of the 
whitefish at Alpena, it was thought best not to place teco much conti- 
dence or reliance in this direction, as its remoteness and inaccessibility 
as compared with the Lake Erie islands were sufficient reasons for de- 
pending mainly on the latter to furnish the desired supply. Accord- 
ingly but one man was stationed at the former place, Mr. A. W. Root, 
who was instructed to engage the aid of one or more assistants, as cir- 
cumstances might require. 

At the time of the first visit to this place, November 3, the gill-net- 
ters were catching many whitefish, but no ripe spawners were found. 
Leaving operations here under the immediate supervision of Mr. Root, 
I returned to Northville, arriving November 6. Arrangements were 
made with the porters of the Bay City line of boats to receive the boxes 
of spawn of Mr. Root and deliver the same to messengers previously 
sent on to meet them at Bay City, who would of course bring them on 
to Northville with all possible dispatch. While at Alpena word came 


560 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


to Northville from Mr. Wires, at North Bass Island, that he had taken 
eggs from six fish October 31. On receipt of this Mr. Bower repaired 
to the islands as quickly as possible, equipped with pails, pans, dippers 
and four of the carrying cases for eggs, arriving November 3. 

As will be seen by referring to the subjoined table, the number of eggs 
secured by Wires and Bower up to November 6 amounted to nearly 
two and one-half millions. They were then conveyed to the hatchery 
by boat and rail in charge of Mr. Bower, leaving the islands at 11 a. 
m. and arriving at Northville 7 p.m. same day. Eggs were in prime 
condition when deposited in the hatching boxes the following morning. 

At 4a.m., November 8, I started for the islands, accompanied by assis- 
tants Bower and Donnelly, arriving at 12m. The results of each day’s 
efforts for the season of procuring the ova at the islands will be found 
in the special table of spawn-taking operations. All eggs were taken 
by what is known as the dry method, wherein impregnation is accom- 
plished by mixing the spermatic fluid undiluted with the eggs before 
water is added. 

Notes and instructions to spawn-takers and those having the care of 
Spawn included the following: 

Take eggs only from ripe fish, 7. e., those yieldin g their eggs by a gen- 
tle pressure of the hand on the anterior of the abdomen, including, of 
course, those from which the eggs are oozing. 

Reject the entire yield of any female when more than 3 to 5 per cent. 
of her eggs are spotted or milk-white when taken ; likewise throw aside 
all females bearing broken eggs. 

Do not try to force all the eggs from each female manipulated, but 
only those which can be extruded by a gentle pressure or stroking of 
the abdomen, each stroke commencing just forward of the pectoral fins 
and extending towards the ventricle, releasing the grasp about midway 
between these two points. This will, however, expel nearly all the eggs 
if the fish is in the proper condition. 

The manipulation of the male is a pinching or stripping process, but 
the female should be neither pinched nor stripped, the process or opera- 
tion consisting of a Slow, gentle, and crowding movement upward and 
forward with the whole hand adaptin g itself to the natural curve of the 
belly. 

Hold the vent of the female as near the bottom of the pan or receiv- 
ing vessel as possible, as the eggs are very soft and tender when first 
taken, and may be injured by dropping. 

Incline the fish to an angle of about 45 degrees ; the eggs will then 
naturally settle towards the orifice and require less pressure for expul- 
sion. The males, however, should not be held in this position, as in 
many instances the vital fluid will not stream directly into the pan, but 
cling to the fish and follow down to the end of the tail, mixing with 
slime and water before dropping, wasting the entire yield of the male 
sometimes, as many will furnish but a few drops, which may not find 


[9] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 561 


their way into the pan at all. This loss can be obviated to a certain 
extent by holding the male in a horizontal position, when the result of 
each titillation will usually be driven directly into the pan. When there 
is an abundance of ripe males the observance of this precaution is not 
material ; but when there is a scarcity—frequently the case—the saving 
of every particle of this fluid is of great importance, as each drop may 
represent the future life of thousands of fishes. 

If the first or any subsequent ejection of milt from any male is streaked 
with blood, cast him aside. 

Not more than one large or two small females should be handled be- 
fore using the males. It is a good plan to alternate one or more males 
with each female, adding milt to the eggs as soon as possible after they 
are taken, having a few of the former selected and placed within easy 
reach before manipulating the latter. No definite rule can be given as 
to the number of males to be used for each female, owing to the great 
variance of yield in both sexes; still it is evident that a sufficient quan- 
tity of the male principle has been mixed with the eggs if, when the pan 
is tilted, a milky coating is seen crawling on the bottom, for, when used 
as freely as this it seems impossible that any eggs could have escaped 
contact with the spermatic fluid, all that is necessary to accomplish im- 
pregnation. <A feather or the tail of a fish—nothing harsher—should 
be used in mixing the milt andeggs. The same end may also be secured 
by swaying the pan, but the first plan is preferable, as a complete dif- 
fusion of the milt can be effected in much less time. 

After thoroughly fertilizing the eggs allow them to stand three to five 
minutes before adding water; then add about a half dipperful and mix 
with a feather or by tilting and swaying the pan. But do notdelay the 
addition of water much beyond the time specified, as a portion of the 
eggs will, if neglected but a short time, adhere to the pan and collect 
in twos, threes, and bunches, subsequently requiring considerable extra 
labor for their separation. Continue to add water as before at intervals 
of five minutes until the pan is nearly full; then pour off, rinse the eggs 
well through two or three waters, and transfer to one of the large pails 
previously filled with fresh water, filling no pail, however, more than 
half full of eggs, giving them an hourly change of water thereafter— 
oftener if practicable, the oftener the better—until removed to the float- 
ing boxes or carrying cases. As soon as water is given the eggs they 
immediately begin to absorb it with gréater or less greed, depending on 
the temperature of the water—the warmer the water the more rapid the 
process—the impregnated eggs, also, absorbing water more readily than 
the unimpregnated. This Sbuoriien of water also causes them toswell 
proportionate to the quantity so imbibed, and harden gradually, grow- 
ing firmer for several hours. They may be deposited in the floating 
boxes any time afier being thoroughly washed, but should not be placed 
on trays for at least four to six hours, by which time they will become 
sufficiently hardened to spread in single layers. A greater depth than 

S. Mis. 29 36 


562 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


this would at this juncture distort many of the eggs on the bottom 
layer; but when they are eight or ten hours old, so to speak, they may 
be transferred from the water to the trays and arranged two or three 
layers in depth. 

Spread with a feather and always tilt the tray for a moment or two 
to drain off any water that may remain. The eggs should be damp, but 
not saturated—in short, should never remain in contact with water not 
subjected to frequent changes or aération. " 

Guard well your air temperature, never allowing eggs on trays to get 
below 30°; 28° will prove fatal to them. On the other hand, although 
they will live for several hours on trays at a temperature of 60°, they 
are imperiled at this point and should be removed to a cellar or some 
cool place, or surrounded by ice. If circumstances make any of these 
subterfuges impracticable, then return them to the floating boxes to re- 
main until cooler weather. The nearer they can be kept down to 3329, in 
air or water, the better. 

Of course strict compliance with some of these hints is not necessarily 
essential so far as the well-being of the eggs is concerned ; for instance, 
changing the eggs from the pans to a pail or larger vessel is not neces- 
sary, although it is quite important that they should be taken in a pan 
or shallow dish for obvious reasons; but a considerable saving of time 
is effected by concentrating into fewer vessels, no more time being con- 
sumed in changing the water in a pail of 250,000 eggs than in a pan of 
50,000, while the former will occupy less room and is less liable to be 

_overturned by the fishermen in the prosecution of their work, and also 
to lose its contents by the lurching of the boat in a heavy sea. 

Again, a fixed routine cannot always be observed in regard to the 

* treatment of the eggs while on the pound or tug boat. For example, in 
fair weather, with the boat quiet, an active operator, with anabundance 
of fish, will often have six or seven pans containing eggs in different 
stages of progression scattered about; but in a heavy sea, with the boat 
tossing violently, only the pan receiving the eggs, and this held with 
the greatest difficulty while manipulating the fish, can be used. Insuch 
cases the eggs may be transferred at once to a pail or larger vessel, 
which may have to be secured to its place. 

It will be seen, then, that no accurate or specifie rules can be given (or 
observed) for every contingency likely to arise, for many times the ope- 
rator will meet with annoyances and difficulties not anticipated, and 
which, to overcome, will require expedients his own ingenuity must sug- 
gest; while the extent to which any given instructions may be violated 
must be determined by his knowledge of the requirements of the case. 
It is well to bear in mind, however, that the sooner the fish are used 
after taken from the water, the greater the percentage of impregnation 
to be obtained; that the greater the care with which the eggs are 
handled and the more frequent the changes of water, the smaller the 
percentage of loss; and that the nearer the eggs are kept at a tempera- 


{11] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 563 


ture of 33° in air or water, but not lower in air, the farther their removal 
from danger. Knowing that good results depend largely upon the near 
observance of these ‘first principles,” the operator must be governed 
accordingly, remembering that the object of taking eggs is to hatch fish ; 
that fish can be hatched only from live, impregnated eggs, and therefore 
it is better, under all circumstances, to strive not so much to see how 
many but how well they can be taken and taken care of. A half million 
eges secured in this way will produce more fish than a million carelessly 
taken and indifferently cared for. 


FLOATING BOXHES. 


The floating boxes referred to in the following tables are a simple con- 
trivance for retaining the eggs for a short time at the spawning grounds, 
and are usually made of the following dimensions: Twenty-four inches 
in length by fifteen in width and twelve in depth, having a screen- 
wire bottom, and wide boards fastened edgewise to the ends to insure 
their floating. For the safety of the eggs they should be placed in har- 
bors, or some suitable place protected from violent storms or heavy 
seas. In the present instance they were floated under the docks, whence 
they were not subjected to the force of sharp seas, and yet were suffi- 
ciently influenced by the smaller waves and tide-currents to give the 
eggs constant changes of water. As the presence of dead (or unimpreg- 
nated) eggs is not specially hazardous to the others, previous to fungus 
growth, and as this growth seldom, if ever. appears on eggs less than 
seven days old, and usually ten to twelve—depending, of course, on 
the temperature of the water—their removal during this period is not 
material, and for this reason the floating boxes are found very conven- 
ient for retaining the eggs until a sufficient number for shipment has 
accumulated, requiring no special care in the mean time. 


[12] 


564 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


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[13] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 565 
Diary in connection with the preceding table. 


October 25.—Weirs examined fish at Snide’s pounds. Ripe males 
numerous, but no ripe females. 

October 26.—Fish handled as before. No appreciable difference to be 
seen. 

October 27.—Examined about 1,000 whitefish, lifted from seven pounds. 
Milters plenty, and large females softening. 

October 28.—Pounds not lifted; high winds. 

October 29.— Abundance of ripe males, but no ripe spawners. 

October 30.—Females getting quite soft. 

October 31.—Six ripe females found. About two males caught to one 
female, and nearly half of them ripe. Eggs placed in floating boxes. 

November 1.—High westerly winds, in consequence of which only two 
of Mr. Snide’s pounds lifted. Eggs obtained were placed in floating 
boxes. 

November 2.—Very pleasant day. About one in fifteen of the females 
ripe. Eggs deposited in floating boxes. 

November 3.—Warm and pleasant. Three pounds visited in forenoon 
by Weirs, and four in afternoon by Weirs and Bower, the latter of 
whom arrived from Northville at 12 m. The best day of the season for 
operations, as lake was very calm. Eggs secured in good shape and 
well milted. Those taken in the forenoon were placed with those pre- 
viously deposited in the two floating boxes on hand. Eggs obtained in 
the afternoon excecding the numbers on hand, it was feared that injury 
might result from having them too deep in the floating boxes; accord- 
ingly two more boxes were hastily improvised, the eggs, however, being 
allowed to stand in the pails six hours, with changes of water every 
forty minutes, becoming almost perfectly hardened before being trans- 
ferred thereto. But when all were taken up for shipment, no noticeable 
difference was apparent between these and the others that had been 
deposited in the boxes immediately on arrival of the pound boat at the 
dock, and while the eggs were yet quite soft. 

November 4.—Egegs obtained to-day were retained in pails six hours— 
water changed ten times—and then spread in double layers on the flan- 
nel trays for shipment. A narrow margin of flannel was left unspread, 
so that eggs did not come in contact with the tray frames, and the trays 
were thoroughly sprinkled or immersed before receiving the eggs—pre- 
cautions that were observed with all subsequent shipments from this 
point. 

November 5.—Eges taken to-day, after standing seven hours, with 
hourly changes of water, were, together with those in the floating boxes, 
transferred to the carrying cases, the next day being regular boat day 
for Detroit. Eggs were dipped from the floating boxes with a small tin 
strainer into a pail partially filled with water, then transferred in like 
manner to the trays, being held in the strainer until pretty well drained, 


566 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] _ 


and still further drained after spreading, by tilting the tray and insert- 
ing a knife blade between the flannel and frame at the converging cor- 
. ner—a routine adopted with all shipments. 

November 6—Lake so boisterous that no pounds were lifted. Eggs 
on hand, nearly two and one-half million, taken to Northville in charge 
of S. Bower, leaving the island (North Bass) at 11 a. m., and arriving 
at Northville at 7 p. m., without special incident. 

November 7.—Still blowing too hard to lift pounds. Weirs made six 
floating boxes. 

November 8.—Best day of the season thus far, as regards number of 
eggs taken. Plenty of ripe fish of both sexes. Eggs consigned to 
floating boxes. Clark and Donnelly arrived at Put-in Bay, and Bower 
returned to North Bass. Five floating boxes sent from latter place 
over to Put-in Bay. 

November 9.—Large numbers of eggs obtained to-day. All placed in 
floating boxes. A few spent females found. 

November 10.—Heavy wind and rain storm, nearly destroying one 
of Mr. Snide’s pounds. Nevertheless, five pounds were visited at the 
two islands. Mr. Clark came over to North Bass on Sandusky boat, 
bringing with him in pails and eases all eggs that had been obtained at 
Put-in Bay, nearly a million and a half, those collected same day in 
pails, and remainder, gathered the day previous, in cases. The following 
morning the cases contained nearly three millions ready for shipment, 
those in pails and in the floating boxes at North Bass having been 
placed therein in the meantime. 

November 11.—Blustering wind and heavy sea prevented Detroit boat 
from landing at North Bass, and the Sandusky boat ran no farther 
north than Put-in Bay, five miles distant, thus necessarily deferring the 
intended shipment of eggs. No pounds lifted at North Bass. At Put-in 
Bay Messrs. Morrison & Delichy lifted two pounds near shore, off the 
leeward side of the island, and Mr. Donnelly succeeded in gathering a 
few eggs, which were deposited in floating boxes. 

November 12.—Very high wind; no boats to North Bass, nor no pounds 
lifted. The trays of eggs were removed from the cases, sprinkled by 
pouring water through the strainers previously alluded to, thoroughly 
drained, and then replaced in the cases; all in excellent condition, 
apparently, in the warehouse at dock. Temperature of room, 33°. 

November 13.—Detroit boat stopped at North Bass and eggs were 
conveyed to Northville in charge of Mr. Clark. Ten pounds visited 
altogether to-day. At North. Bass, Mr. Snide’s pounds not having 
been lifted for three days, a heavy catch of fish was secured, the great 
bulk of which, however, were herring. About 100,000 eggs were taken 
after boat hed reached dock, the fish used having been out of water 
about thirty minutes. From another pound boat a female and two 
males, out of water forty-five minutes, were used. The eggs in these 
instances swelled as rapidly as those known to be thoroughly fertilized, 


[15] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 567 


_thus showing a good impregnation. The fish, though, were not yet 

dead, as the air was down to 33°, in which temperature they will hold 
their vitality much longer than in air at 45° to 60°. However, a good 
percentage of impregnation can be obtained with a live male, if female 
has been dead three or four hours; but, if the case is reversed, a very 
small percentage will be fertilized. All eggs gathered to-day were de- 
posited in floating boxes. 

November 14.—High wind and frequent squalls. Plenty of ripe 
females, although about one in four is spent; but males, not spent, are 
quite scarce. Probably about one in six of the females yet unripe. Eggs 
consigned to the floating boxes. 

November 15.—As milters were in the minority, the experiment of using 
a less quantity of milt was tried. The eggs were crowded from one 
large and one small female and the wmilt from two small males 
immediately mixed with them; they were then set aside and treated 
the same as those known to be sufficiently milted; about 10 per cent. 
died within twelve hours. There were about 50,000 eggs to be impreg- 
nated with not more than six drops of milt—enough, perhaps, under 
favorable circumstances, but the males used in this instance had been 
dead a few moments, or long enough so that the milt, instead of being 
emitted in jets, as usual, had become sufficiently hardened to be ex- 
pelled only in drops or clots, which required considerable stirring with 
the eggs to effect a complete solution and diffusion. 

November 16.—Snow-squalls and cold westerly winds. Lake rough; 
no pounds lifted. Messenger arrived from Northville, via Sandusky, 
with empty egg cases. 

November 17.—Best day of the season as regards number of eggs ob- 
tained ; over one and one-half million secured from all sources. Eggs 
on hand at North Bass taken to Put-in Bay in the evening and placed 
in warehouse at dock; temperature cf room 28°; cases covered with 
blankets. 

November 18.—Temperature of room this morning 25°; temperature 
inside the cases, 31°; eggs unharmed, though many were incased in a 
thin shell of ice, which, upon being taken in the hand, would roll from 
the egg, leaving it moist and perfect in form. Mr. Bower procecded to 
Northville, via Detroit, having in charge nearly three and one-half mill- 
ion eggs arranged in six cases. No pounds lifted to-day. 

November 19.—Wind high and very cold. Boat and rigging coated 
with ice. Eggs in pans soon freeze; frequent changes of water and 
motion of boat prevented ice from forming in the pails. 

November 20.—One pound lifted at North Bass, but lake was so rough 
and boat so icy that no eggs were taken. 

November 21.—High winds, no pounds lifted. Ice forming in the lake. 

November 22.—Fishing practically stopped; fishermen taking up nets 
as fast as possible and d—(enounc)—ing the weather and season in very 
vigorous language. Many nets destroyed. Navigation from islands, 
via Detroit, closed. 


568 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [lo| 


Eggs on hand, except those at Kelley’s Island, brought on to North. 
ville by Bower via Sandusky November 25. Eggs at Kelley’s Island, 
taken by Carpenter, brought to Northville November 27, by F. L. Don- 
nelly. Hight inthes of ice in Sandusky Bay on November 24, and 
navigation suspended except with the Eagle, a boat designed especially 
for breaking ice, and which was making daily trips to the islands. It 
may be stated in this connection that fishing at the islands is confined 
almost entirely to pound nets, set within a mile of shore. 


AT ALPENA. 


No record of the spawn-gathering work at this place having been kept 
by Mr. Root, it is, of course, impossible to furnish a table or daily record 
of observations and operations. Suffice it to say, however, that Mr. 
Root, with but little assistance, obtained five million and sixty thousand 
eggs, a much greater number in proportion to the days of actual work 
than was secured at the islands of Lake Erie, a result due partly to the 
greater numbers of whitefish caught at Alpena, and partly to the eggs 
being taken mostly from gill-net fishing, by which method the fish are 
taken into the boat one at a time, thus affording the operator an oppor- 
tunity to examine each fish as fast as taken from the net, a privilege 
necessarily inadmissible with the pound-net, where the fish are cornered 
and scooped in as rapidly as possible. However, although in the pound- 
boat many desirable fish may be lost sight of or covered up with the 
hundreds of smaller fish caught in a pound-net, and thereby escape ex- 
amination, yet on the whole the pound-net is the best field for opera- 
tions, as the fish are always alive, fresh, and uninjured, and conse- 
quently their eggs will invariably turn out better than those from gill- 
nets, in which the fish are found exhausted, frequently injured, and 
sometimes dead—all caused by their violent struggles to free themselves 
from the mesh of the net—and which is also a fruitful source of spent 
fish, the efforts causing many of the females to emit their eggs. But 
on the other hand, again, a greater number of eggs can usually be secured 
daily from gill-nets than from pound-nets; that is, when the former are 
set in gangs of two to five miles—many extend this length at Alpena—as 
it gives the operator from six to twelve consecutive hours’ labor, whereas 
the pound-net is generally lifted in less than an hour, and one boat rarely 
visits more than four or five pounds daily. 


CONCLUDING REMARKS IN CONNECTION WITH THE SPAWN-TAKING 
OPERATIONS. 


The fishing industry of Alpena, a rapidly growing city now having a 
population of seven thousand, is a very important one, second only to 
its lumbering interests. The bulk of the catch is secured by gill-nets, 
many gangs of which are set on the reefs from five to thirty miles out; 
a number of pound-nets, however, are located inshore and off the adja- 
cent islands. 


{17] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 569 


The eggs of the whitefish at this point, as also the fish themselves, 
present a decided contrast when compared with those from Lake Erie. 
Eggs from the former place are a bright orange color when first taken; 
from the latter a pale straw color. 

The Alpena fish average larger in size than those from Lake Erie, 
while their difference in appearance is so marked that New York and 
Philadelphia dealers detect their source at sight, and make, as I am 
credibly informed, a difference of a cent a pound in favor of the latter. 
Just why this commercial discrimination is made against the Alpena 
fish is not easily understood, unless we charge it to the distinction in 
their external characteristics being taken advantage of for speculative 
purposes, for surely the Lake Erie whitefish in no wise excel their 
brethren from the deep waters of Lake Huron in firmness, flakiness, or 
delicacy of flavor; in fact, if any difference in their table qualities 
exists, the epicure must decided in favor of the latter. 

‘The Huron whitefish have dark fins, very dark backs, almost black 
down the spinal column, shading to a dark green at the sides, the 
color line extending farther down than on the Lake Erie fish, while the 
latter are not so highly colored in any part of the body. 

Many millions of eggs can be obtained at Alpena, but the railway 
facilities now wanting must be supplied before there can be any cer- 
tainty of delivering them’ to hatcheries located elsewhere, and for the 
reason that navigation is liable to close early and abruptly, even before 
gill-netters are obliged to suspend operations, as witnessed the past 
season, thus cutting off all communication, so far as the transportation 
of whitefish eggs with safety and economy is concerned, the nearest 
railroad point being 48 hours distant by stage. But when the much- 
needed railroad facilities are secured, as they undoubtedly soon will be, 
Alpena will present inducements for spawn-gathering hardly equaled 
by any other point on the lakes. 

The islands of Lake Erie also furnish whitefish spawn in large num- 
bers,*but must always be subject to the same restrictions in regard to 
boat communication, though in a much less degree, as they are but 
twenty five miles from Sandusky and sixty from Detroit; consequently, 
trips to these points, although often irregular or delayed at this season 
of the year, are seldom discontinued for any length of time. 

The season now under consideration was a very disastrous one to 
shipping as well as fishing interests. Ordinarily the same number of 
men employed in collecting spawn would have secured double the num- 
ber of eggs; but bad weather compelled many idle days and necessi- 
tated an early suspension of operations by the fisherman, thus forcing 
the spawn-gatherer to discontinue operations when the meridian line of 
the spawning season had barely been passed. The result of their efforts, 
then, should not be the standard by which ealculations for future work 
should be made. It must not be inferred, though, that the severity of 
the weather was so much responsible for the deficit in the number of 


570 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


eggs obtained as the brevity of the season, for it has been equaled in 
this respect by many of its predecessors, and probably will be by many 
successors. It should be understood that procuring eggs of the white- 
fish is invariably attended with labors, exposures, difficulties, and dan- 
gers not met with in similar work with any other kind of fish; but, owing 
to their great fecundity, large numbers of eggs can be obtained with 
adequate help. Local causes alone are responsible for the hardships 
frequently experienced in their procurance. The spawning seagon of 
the whitefish occurs at that time of the year when the great lakes, pro- 
verbially rough and treacherous, are seen at their worst; squalls are 
common, severe storms frequent, and high winds prevail. But the 
fisherman, as well as the spawn-gatherer, must ‘‘Make hay while the 
sun shines,” and the little tug-boat or pound-boat often puts out in a 
heavy sea, the attempt appearing almost foolhardy to the ordinary 
landsman. Under these circumstances, with the boat tossing about so 
violently that equilibrium is maintained only with the greatest diffi- 
culty, spawn-taking is necessarily a slow and arduous work; but when 
the wind, that is strong enough to almost deluge the boat and its occu- 
pants with spray, is cold enough to convert the spray into ice, existing 
difficulties are magnified and multiplied, the situation becomes perilous, 
and the suffering from cold and exposure, from which there is no escape 
in the pound-beat, is intensified almost beyond physical endurance. 


OPERATIONS AT THE HATCHERY. 


As will be gathered from previous notes, the total number of eggs 
shipped to the hatchery was 14,780,000; all of which were received in 
prime condition with the exception of the last lot of 1,000,000 from 
Alpena, which were thrown away as soon as received, as but very few, 
if any, were free from the little white spot, the death mark. The actual 
number, then, deposited in the hatching boxes and jars was 13,780,000, 
and this is the number, of course, on which the hatching percentages 
are based. They were daeneuies as follows: 


100 hatching-boxes, 6 trays each, 8,000 to the tray. . --- 4,800, 000 
40 hatching-jars, 150,000 tothe jars cose wone se ee 6, 000, 000 
15 hatching-jars, 125,000 to the jar................. wwe e SL STS O00 
10 hatching jars, 100,600 to the jar. !4e 245 sel a ee 1, 000, 000 


ihatehine-jar, ‘105,000 2.7. ssc ee eee 105, 000— 


13, 780, 000 
With the exception of five jars of mixed eggs, those from the Lake 
Huron fish were kept separate from the eggs of the Lake Erie fish, and 
none of the fry of the former were planted in Lake Erie or the Detroit 
River. 
All the eggs taken at Kelley’s Island (Lake Erie) were procured in 
one day, November 17, by Mr. L. Carpenter, who, having no floating 
boxes, spread them on flanne] trays after keeping them eight hours with 


[19] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 572 


hourly changes of water. The trays were then removed to a cellar, 
where they remained until November 26, when they were brought on to 
the hatchery via Sandusky, arriving the next day at ll a.m. Eggs 
looked well when received, but some doubts as to results were felt, no 
record of the temperature to which they had been exposed while in the 
cellar having been made. They were placed in two of the Chase jars, 
and watched with considerable interest. The percentage of loss was no 
greater than the average, and the fish began hatching at precisely the 
same time as other eggs of the sameage. The length of time that white- 
fish eggs of this age may be retained on trays without material injury 
has not been fully determined, and experiments in this direction, as well 
as others in regard to their treatment at this, their most critical period, 
were intended to have been made, after having secured the complement 
of eggs for the hatchery, but the season terminated abruptly and before 
the desired numbers had been obtained. 

The regular employes of the hatchery at this time were Mr. I. Slaght, 
Mr. A. W. Root, and Mr. S. Bower, and the respective duties assigned 
to each were well performed. Mr. Slaght was given the immediate 
supervision of the eggs in the hatching-boxes; Mr. Root was employed 
as carpenter and general assistant ; and Mr. Bower was intrusted with 
the immediate care of the eggs in the jars, and also attended the office 
work. 

The principal and most important of the work of the latching-room 
from this time on, consisted in protecting the live eggs from the fatal 
presence of the dead egg of confervoid growth, and from the per- 
nicious influences of slimy coatings and sediments. Other general work 
included a periodical cleaning of the tanks, troughs, trays, hatching- 
boxes and flannel screens, to remove slimy deposits and accumulations; 
making shipping cases and shipments of eggs; the construction and 
operation of a refrigerator; confining the temperaturé of the water to 
certain limits by the use of ice and snow when necessary; repairing old 
and constructing new tanks, and fitting them for the reception of the 
fry; and finally the general distribution of the young fishes. 

In the artificial propagation of whitefish, if the eggs have been taken 
with a greater regard for quality than quantity, and are given special , 
care and attention under favorable circumstances until received at the 
hatchery, 85 to 95 per cent. may be hatched. If the eggs have been 
secured under the conditions just indicated, nearly accurate calculations 
as to the number of young fishes to be shown at the end of the season 
can then be made; results can be anticipated with confidence. But ap- 
proximate estimates cannot always be made from the appearance of the 
eggs on arrival at the hatchery, their aspect at this time generally giv- 
ing no clew upon which to base computations, as the fruits of prior 
neglect: or defective treatment may not yet be apparent; neither does 
the unimpregnated egg exhibit any distinguishing marks visible to the 
unaided eye, by which its presence may be detected. The lapse of a 


572 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] ~ 


few days, however, will tell.the story, for the greater part of the loss 
during the period of incubation, be it much or little, will oceur within 
thirty days; the “ good,” “bad,” or “indifferent” lots received at dif- 
ferent times and from diverse sources, if kept separate, will soon be 
searched out. So it was in the present instance. The eggs from Al- 
pena, although a good lot, were decimated in numbers within the time 
above noted, while those from the islands proved to be unexceptionably 
good, the loss within the time mentioned not exceeding 5 per cent. Of 
the total loss of a million and a half in round numbers, during the sea- 
son, nearly one million died within twenty-five or thirty days. 


THE HATCHING-BOXES. 


There seems to be but one way to rid the hatching-boxes of the dead 
eggs, viz, pick them out one by one as they appear. For this purpose 
a shallow picking trough running parallel with the rows of hatching- 
boxes, and of the same length, is arranged along the side of the hatch- 
ing-room facing a row of windows. The little nippers or tweezers for 
removing the eggs are spherical at the picking end, so that when closed 

they are just large enough to hold the egg without crushing it. Girls 
were employed for picking the eggs—as many as were needed to look 
over all the hatching-boxes at least once in two days. 

The eggs, boxes, and trays received a weekly washing, a process ac- 
complished with the eggs by simply agitating the tray in a tub or tank 
of water. The tray is then transferred to the picking trough, a clean 
tray fitted over it and the whole quickly overturned and immersed in a 
tank of clean water, when the eggs will be changed to the clean tray. 
The compartments containing the hatch-boxes are provided with plugs, 
which, being removed, the whole is quickly washed and cleansed, a waste 
trough underneath running the entire length of the rows of boxes. 

It is of great importance that the dead egg should be removed very 
soon after the little white spot—the first positive evidence of its death 
visible to the naked eye—is apparent. This is rendered imperative from 
the rapidity with which confervoid growth develops on dead eggs lying 
motionless on the trays, and which, if undisturbed, soon reaches out 
* from an individual egg and embraces within its deadly grasp the circle 
of eggs surrounding it, and these again in turn soon destroy another 
circle, and so on. This growth starts much quicker and creeps out 
faster from eggs of the whitefish than from any of the large eggs of the 
Salmonide, as Salmo fontinalis, Salmo quinnat, Salmo iridea, &c., and 
the same rule holds good with respect te eggs of the whitefish incubat- 
ing in the jars, in which the morbid growth is usually delayed from 
five to ten days after the death of the egg, doubtless due to the con- 
stant motion imparted to the eggs by the upward current of water. 

From about the tenth to the thirty-fifth day the eggs in the hatching- 
boxes require special attention, for not only does the greatest mortality_ 
occur during this period, but.the contact of diseased growth is espe- 


‘ 
[21] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 573 


cially destructive to the live eggs at this time, it being the most critical 
period in the life of the egg, so far as the influence of confervaceous 
growth is concerned. During the period just mentioned, and with a 
temperature of water ranging from 40° to 45°, ten dead eggs scattered 
equidistant on a 7 by 12 tray, containing 10,000 live eggs (in water) will 
soon accomplish the destruction of the remainder, if allowed to remain 
undisturbed. Eggs thus neglected are doomed. 

From the thirty-fifth to the forty-fifth day the eyes of the embryo be- 
come plainly visible, and the egg from this time on may remain in con- 
tact with fuagous growths much Icnger than previously without injury. 
From this time on, too, the work of caring for the eggs continually 
lessens. 

THE HATCHING JARS. 


With reference to bringing forward eggs of the whitefish in hatching 
boxes and applicable more particularly to the earlier stages of develop- 
ment, it may truthfully be said that “eternal vigilance” is the price of 
success. But this statement cannot be made concerning the develop- 
ment of embryos in the Chase hatching jar; for, while incubating in this 
manner, the eggs are not subjected to critical periods, and thus the 
necessity of a constant surveillance at certain times is obviated. Hap- 
pily, too, the introduction of the jar does away with the primitive one- 
by-one-picking process with nippers, unavoidably a slow and tedious 
operation requiring the persistent patience of a Chinaman. The jar, 
then, greatly lessens and simplifies the work, thereby reducing the 
expense to a nominal figure. Safety and economy constitute its chief 
points of superiority over any hatching device in which the eggs are 
stationary, or,at best, have but very little movement; more economical, 
because one man having but little experience or instruction can readily 
care for 20,000,000 eggs; and safer because the dead eggs are separated 
by the natural operation of the jar as soon as confervoid growth begins. 
Previous to this growth, however, separation of the dead from the liv- 
ing eggs by any mechanical arrangement of currents or counter currents 
would seem to be impossible as there is no apparent difference in their 
specific gravity; but the spongy filaments of morbid growth, without 
materially increasing the weight of eggs thus affected, present a greater 
surface to the influence of the current which, having an upward tend- 
ency, carries and retains them either against the gate or just above 
the surface of the mass of eggs whence they are easily syphoned away. 
Unless great care, demanding considerable time, is observed, and which 
is not at all essential, the syphon will draw away many good eggs, and 
frequently good eggs will be found with the bad ones at the gate; but 
when all such are transferred to a separate jar, a solid layer of varying 
depth of the worst eggs will soon rise to the surface and can then be 
drawn away without disturbing the remainder. 

During the early part of the season, the eggs collecting at the wire 
gate and those hovering over the mass of.eggs were removed twice daily 


574 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


and placed in a separate jar or jars, conveniently named “ hospital” or 
+‘ pest” jars; while later on only a daily treatment was needed, and dur- 
ing the last six weeks preceding the hatching season a weekly manip- 
ulation in this manner sufficed to keep the eggs in excellent shape. 
The “hospitals,” of course, were relieved of: their extraneous eggs when- 
ever a sufficient number had collected in bunches or layers to be drawn 
away unaccompanied with good ones. 

The wire gates were cleaned at least once a day throughout the season 
until the eggs began hatching, when they were removed to allow the 
fry and sheHs to float off, the supply of water for each jar being slightly 
decreased at this time to prevent eggs from being thrown overboard 
also. If the jars could be made exactly perfect, thereby compelling a 
uniform current of water to flow from all points of the base of the tube, 
the upward current might probably be so nicely adjusted as to throw 
off only fungoused eggs, in which event the gate and syphon could be 
dispensed with, thus making a complete self-picking apparatus; but 
the slightest imperfection in the jar or tube—found to exist in every one 
in use during the season—will create unequal currents, the stronger 
ones throwing good eggs against the gate, the weaker having strength 
barely sufficient to carry the light eggs to the surface but not enough to 
expel them; hence the necessity of a little assistance to complete the 
elimination, and which is undoubtedly accomplished more readily by the 
syphon than any other way. 


NOTES, ETC. 


One convenience, and probably the only one, of the hatching boxes 
over the jars is, that eggs in the former receiving a tri-weekly picking are 
nearly ready for shipment at all times, it being important of course in 
shipping eggs that all dead eggs should be removed; this the jar will 
not do; it separates only those made buoyant by confervoid growth, 
and the picking trough must be resorted to to complete the work ; hence 
a few trays and nippers and the picking trough will be found almost 
indispensable accessories, and should be retained in the hatching room 
where jars have displaced the boxes. : 

Although the collection of eggs of the whitefish is attended with 
hardships seldom if ever experienced in gathering eggs from any other 
kind of fish, yet from the date of their introduction into the hatchery 
they can be brought forward with much less trouble and expense (when 
the jar is used) than the eggs of any other member of the salmonoids ; 
and, furthermore, greater percentages can be hatched than from any 
other salmonoid, or from the shad. As compared with the latter, which 
are equally as well adapted to bulk methods of hatching, the difference 
in the temperature of water in which they are incubated must be charged 
with the difference in mortality, the rapidly growing fungous of the 
warmer water necessarily destroying a greater number of embryos. As 
compared with the former, over which they may have no advantage in 


{23] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 575 


water temperatures, the difference in favor of eggs of the whitefish must 
be credited to their ready adaptability’to the bulk method of hatching; 
for not only can eggs be developed in this way at a greatly reduced 
outlay of labor and expense, but it is a safe assertion to make, suscep- 
tible of proof by any one who will make a fair trial, that the jar will 
hatch 5 per cent. more eggs than any hatching box now in use, other 
things being equal. The deficit with the latter method may be charged 
to the frequent handling of the eggs, changing from the boxes to the 
picking trough and return, but more than this, to the quick thrusts of 
the nippers amongst the eggs when picking, and which alone unavoid- 
ably injures or kills outright throughout the season nearly 5 per cent., at 
a low estimate. 

The average yield of eggs from the whitefish may be computed at 
20,000 for each female spawner, although as many as 75,000 were taken 
from single specimens in two instances at the islands; but this was a- 
very extraordinary yield, as such extreme fecundity is rarely found. 
Eggs on trays were estimated on a basis of 64 to the square inch and 
in bulk on a basis of 36,800 to the quart, this number being almost ab- 
solutely correct, having been determined by actual count of a fractional 
part of the quantity taken as the standard. 


RETARDING EGGS. 


For the purpose of experimenting with a view to retarding the devel- 
opment of eggs, about 10,000 taken October 31 were spread in double 
layers on flannel trays December 8, and the whole arranged in a small 
refrigerator previously charged with ice and placed in the corner of the 
hatching room farthest removed from the stove. No special care was 
given them other than to keep the chambers well filled with fine ice and 
to give the eggs a weekly picking and sprinkling, care being taken to 
thoroughly drain the trays before replacing, and also to avoid exposing 
the eggs to a greatly increased temperature while being picked, a work 
usually performed in the morning before the room had become too warm 
for the purpose. Very few eggs had died up to December 29, fewer 
probably than if they had remained in water, but of course this is simply 
a matter of conjecture. A record of the temperatures both inside and 
outside the refrigerator was made three times daily. The extremes 
previous to December 29 were: inside 30° and 313°, and outside 30° 
and 46°, The eggs were in splendid condition on the date mentioned, 
when the temperature of 30° was recorded at 8 p.m.; but the next 
morning the temperature of the hatching room had fallen to 21°, 9° 
colder than the refrigerator had been subjected to, while inside, the ther- 
mometer marked 27° and the eggs were all dead. The fact that not a 
single live egg could be found, proves conclusively that eggs of the 
whitefish will not live in an atmosphere of 27°. 

Meanwhile, a larger refrigerator was made, having seven chambers 
fitted with slides of the proper size to admit the flannel trays of the 


576 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


carrying cases, thus avoiding the expense of new trays by utilizing those 
on hand. This was completed December 22, and the following day 
1,000,000 eggs from a lot received at the hatchery November 6, were 
placed in chambers 1 and 2; January 5, 1,500,000 from lot received No- 
vember 13, were transferred to chambers 3,4,and 5; and the remaining 
chambers were filled January 12, with 1,000,000 eggs from lot received 
November 13. The eggs were treated the same as those in the smaller 
refrigerator in regard to sprinkling and picking, but the temperature 
inside the larger one was maintained one degree higher on an average, 
while 29° was the lowest limit allowed the atmosphere surrounding it. 
The temperature inside ranged from 31° to 34°, averaging 32°. The 
eggs from section one, one-half million, were removed January 10, for 
shipment tolowa. Section 3, containing the same number, was likewise 
emptied January 13, for Kentucky and Minnesota shipments. The two 
and one-half million remaining were retained in their respective sections 
(2, 4, 5, 6, and 7) until February 1, when all were transferred to the 
hatching jars. A jar of eggs from section 2 began and completed hatch- 
ing almost simultaneously with eggs received at hatchery, November 
18, showing a retardation of twelve days. By comparison with eggs 
of various ages continuously developed in water, sections 4 and 5 showed 
a detention of ten days, and sections 6 and 7 a retardation of 94 days. 
The fry from ail these were equal in vigor and development to those 
brought forward in the usual manner. Previous experiments in retard- 
ing eggs of the whitefish have given substantial evidence that the eggs 
should be taken from the water earlier in the season to secure the longest 
possible postponement of the hatching period. 


SHIPPING EGGS. 


The following table includes all shipments of eggs made during the 
season, except a few sample lots to Prof. S. F. Baird, Washington, D. 
C., Prof. S. A. Forbes, Normal, Ill., and John A. Ryder, Philadelphia, 
Pa.: 


Liggs shipped by express. 


‘ Number of | RECA iC 
Date of shipment. | eges shipped. | Destination. 
| 
Mecemberhad esl us sees occ ae ee ee | 250, 000 Fred. Mather, Newark, N. J. 
Mecember 22 1880.0: eee Lo ee ee | 500,000 | E. M. Stilwell, Bangor, Me. 
AMA LO WISSL coe co seice scene San eee ee | 500, 000 | LB. 1. Shaw, Anamosa, Iowa. 
VABUATVlSWUSSl, ates be toceelot kL ee en | 250,000 | R. O. Sweeney, Saint Paul, Minn. 
ANAT wlOs S Sits Sie sett ae eaeion | 250,000 | Wm. Griffith, Louisville, Ky. 
SANNA Vel OS lien a esta ck eo cicc hee ce ee | 250,000 | B. B. Redding, San Francisco, Cal. 
DANIAN VM OM RSLs lene Sa clersinircance cael ee | 500, 000.| E. M. Stilwell, Rangeley, Me. 
MER or Aye oC [es ee ee A le BS S| 250,000 | Wm. Griffith, Louisvilie, Ky. 
Heb rmany ose lyeer se on serene. ocean ae 25,000 | Mrs. H. C. Fenstermaker, Eureka, Nev. 
HebruaryNO OBEN nko etc e ak. Sok s a eee nee | 250,000 | B. B Redding, San Francisco, Cal. 
Webruanyale WSS lees sles tec ce aedcu neues 100, 000 | S. Weeks (for H. B. Wright), Corry, Pa 
erie 1250 > 
AGO cos cSee cere aan ue Maem aes s | 3, 125, 000 | 


All eggs prepared for shipment were subjected to a critical picking, 
and were spread and packed in an atmosphere ranging from 29° to 35°. 
The first lot, to Mr. Mather, were spread in double layers on trays of 


[25] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 577 


Canton flannel with a piece of the same material corresponding in size 
to the inside of the tray frames spread over the eggs; the trays were 
throroughly soaked in water before receiving the eggs, and a narrow 
margin left unspread so that no eggs came in contact with the frames; 
the flannel covers were similarly saturated in cold water and partially 
wrung out, but were allowed to retain all the moisture possible without 
dripping; the trays were then placed one above the other in two equal 
_lots for the two cases in which they were to be shipped, each lot resting 
on an inch board on which was spread a piece of wet Canton flannel, and 
having a second board and flannel on top for a cover (the Aonsoll of 
course, being on the under side of the cover), and all held to aihon 
by strips on the ends and sides tacked to the top and bottom boards. 
The packages were then removed to their respective cases and entirely 
surrounded with a 6-inch coating of fine, dry, hard-wood shavings, quite 
firmly packed in by stamping with the feet. This consignment of eggs 
was repacked and shipped to Germany by Mr. Mather. 

The following extract from a communication from Mr. von dem Borne 
to the Forest and Stream of February 17, 1881, concisely states the con- 
dition of the eggs on arrival: “The whitefish eggs recently sent over by 
favor of Professor Baird arrived almost without loss. They are very 
healthy, and are now developing in my hatching troughs.” 

MAINrE.—Reports from the two shipments of one-half million each to 
Maine are not so favorable. The first was packed precisely the same 
as those sent to Mr. Mather, with the exception of using trays twice as 
large, to carry twice as many eggs in the same number of cases, the 
latter being made larger to correspond. Notwithstanding the fact that 
‘whitefish eggs” was displayed in large letters on the covers of the 
cases, coupled with a special request to express messengers and em- 
ployés to exercise great care in handling, and to “keep this side up 
under all circumstances and place the case as far as possible from the 
stove in the car,” they were evidently subjected to rough treatment 
while en route, and were probably allowed to get too warm in the ear. 

Commissioner Stilwell wrote, January 12, in reference to their appear- 
ance when unpacked, that “the eggs had undoubtedly been roughly 
handled on the route, as they had been, apparently, rolled from one side 
to the other, and were piled together in the corners of the trays,” and 
that they were looking so badly that less than 40 per cent. could be 
saved. 

The second lot forwarded to Maine, packed in one large case, arrived 
in better shape than the first. The following letter addressed to I’. C. 
Hervey, to whose care this shipment was made, shows the manner of 
packing: 

‘¢ NORTHVILLE, Micu., January 19, 1881. 

“DEAR Sire: In accordance with instructions from the United States 
Fish Commission, I ship you per express to-day 500,000 whitefish eggs, 
and trust they will reach you in better condition than the former lot. 


They are packed as follows: The first ten trays on top have the flannel 
S. Mis. 29-———37 


578  REBORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


coverings drawn down close to the eggs and secured by strips tacked 
to the tray frame. This ought to prevent rolling or accumulation of the 
eggs in case the box is overturned while in transit. The next five trays 
have moss in addition to the cloth covering; the next four are precisely 
the same as all were in the preceding lot sent you, and the last tray is 
covered with snow. 

‘‘ Please note carefully the condition of the eggs in each method of 
covering and communicate the facts to me. 


“Yours, very truly, FRANK N. CLARK.” 
Cy SS aes 


Unfortunately, the eggs preceded the arrival of the letter, which was 
forwarded the same day, and no accurate note of their precise condition 
was reported. It is fair to presume, however, that there was no marked 
difference in results, or the party opening the case doubtless would have 
noticed it. 

The following extracts from letter of Commissioner Stanley, dated 
February 28, embrace the facts relative to their condition when received: 

‘In appearance they were in very good condition when they arrived 
at their destination, although they were considerably shaken up and had 
apparently received very rough usage on the route. After being placed 
in the hatching-boxes the loss has been large. I should judge by appear- 
ances now that .1f we can save 50 per cent. of them we will do well. 
* * * They must have been in good condition when packed, as I have 
examined them carefully and could find none but what were impregnated 
and well developed.” 

And, again, from letter of April 19, in reference to the disposition of 
the fry : 

‘““Your favor inquiring about our whitefish eggs received this day. 
Would say we have just deposited the fry into the Mooslucmaguntic 
Lake, one of the Rangely chain of lakes. Both lots were placed in the 
same lake. Of the last lot, about 50 per cent. hatched; of the first, 
about 25.” 

lowA.—The half million eggs to Iowa were prepared exactly the same 
as the first lot to Maine, except being placed in one large case instead 
of two smaller ones. The following from Commissioner Shaw shows 
their condition on arrival at destination: 

“{ found the whitefish eggs in fair condition on opening at Spirit 
Lake, except that some of them were a little matted with fungus. I 
was delayed two days by a very bad snow-storm, but kept the eggs in 
a cool place, however, and succeeded in getting them safely through. I 
was much surprised to see nearly 10,000 young fish hatched out the 
next morning after eggs were put into the water, all the more so as the 
water was only just above freezing. There were quite a number hatched 
in the box upon opening, and I am of the opinion that a portion of the 
eggs were a little too far advanced when shipped.” 

Some of the eggs being matted together with fungus indicates that 
they were exposed to a considerable warmth during their journey; for 


[27] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 579 


eggs in the refrigerators—arranged practically the same as those in- 
tended for shipment—although exhibiting fungous growth a few days 
after dying, in a temperature of 32° or 33°, exerted no baleful influence 
on the live eggs within a much longer period than that occupied in 
making this shipment—due to the very slow formation of fungous 
growths on dead eggs out of water, in the temperature above noted. 

From the reports of the careless handling and treatment which the 
cases of eggs had evidently undergone at the hands of express employés, 
it was very obvious that but little heed was paid to the precautions 
conspicuously lettered on the cases; and concluding that a special 
order from the superintendent of the express company would be more 
effectual, a personal interview was held with that courteous official, Mr. 
J. S. Hubbard, with the result of receiving his indorsement to the fol- 
lowing, which appeared on all subsequent shipments; and by his in- 
structions the Northville agent was required to attach a duplicate te 
the way-bill accompanying each consignment: 

‘6 To express messengers and employés : 
— “You will observe the following regulations in regard to the care and 
handling of cases containing fish eggs: 

‘“¢Place the case as far as possible from the stove in the car. 

“The case must never, under any circumstances, be overturned, but 
kept right side up with care. 

“Do not delay or detain, but forward as expeditiously as possible; 
but where detention for any length of time is unavoidable, as in case of 
accident or non-connection of trains, place the eggs in a room contain- 
ing no fire. 

“This order must be countersigned by Frank N. Clark, superintend- 
ent United States fish hatchery, Northville, Mich. 

“J. S: HUBBARD, 


“6 Superintendent American Express Company.” 
‘¢ Countersigned: 


} 
“Superintendent United States Hatchery.” 


Thereafter but one instance of carelessness in regard to rough hand- 

ling of the cases was reported (second lot to Maine), but protection 
from too great a degree of warmth was not secured in every instance, 
for which, however, messengers could not be held accountable, their 
whole duty having been performed when the eggs were placed as ‘far 
as possible from the stove in the car,” a point not necessarily removed 
from too great a degree of heat for the safety of the eggs. 

MINNESOTA.—Eggs shipped in one case of ten trays, 25,000 to the 
tray, packed as usual. A communication from Commissioner Sweeney 
in reference to these eggs contains the following: 

“The eggs came on the 15th instant and were, except two trays, in 
good order. These two trays were frozen, and we feared all the eggs 
were killed that were on them, but now they are hatching very freely, 
and the frosted ones seem as vigorous and forward as the others. The 


580 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [28] 


outer eggs on the two frozen trays were killed, but those in the center 
seem all right, notwithstanding they were frozen or caked together.” 

Tt will be seen from this that a little freezing is not so disastrous as 
overheating. 

Later on, Superintendent Watkins reported on the aapeciion of the 
fry as follows : 

“ January 25, deposited in White Bear Lake, Ramsey and Washing- 
ton Counties, 80,000 whitefish fry; January 29, deposited in Minne- 
bonka Lake 100,000; February 8, deposited in Gervais Lake 50,000; 
total, 230,000. Some of the trays were frozen around the edges when 
received; loss, including the frozen ones, 20,000.” 

KeEntucky.—First lot packed precisely the same as the one forwarded 
to Minnesota same day (January 13). The following is from letter, 
dated January 15, from Wm. Griffith, President of Kentucky Board of 
Fish Commissioners : 

‘The whitefish eggs arrived yesterday, and were placed in troughs 
at hatch-house yesterday evening. My man has just reported to me 
that the eggs opened in better condition than any lot he has ever before 
received. He reports 293 dead eggs, and the embryo moving, and 
thinks they will soon commence hatching.” 

Again, from same source, January 17: 

‘““A messenger just in from hatch-house reports all the whitefish eggs 
dying. These eggs were received Friday, the 14th instant, at noon, and 
were placed in troughs at hatch-house late same evening; water, 38°. 
They appeared in splendid condition Saturday, but yesterday the 
weather moderated, with a drizzling rain, and the temperature of the 
water rose to 44°. The eggs commenced dying, and this morning about 
two-thirds of them were dead. * * * This misfortune is to be re- 
gretted, and is a matter of great surprise to me, as my man reported 
that he had never ie: a lot of eggs in sueh apparent good condition.” 

Again, January 22, in which the dente loss is reported, as follows : 

‘“‘] herewith annex a statement of condition of the eggs from date of 


receipt to present time: White-fish received and opened in apparent 
splindid condition. 


White-fish eggs received and opened in apparent splendid condition. 


Dead eggs. 


January 14, temperature of water 38° .............--. Meee 183 
15, temperature.of water/38° Sse 5. oe teenies sae 110 
16, temperature of ‘water 440° .2 222. Gop eee seas. 5, 000 
17, temperature of water 40° 232... Poe es 28, 000 
AS, temperature of water 400) 0222. ee ce ee 39, 000 
19, temperature of water42° ............--.- EMA GE 55, 000 
20, temperature of water'44° 22.222 sesceanees 12, 000 
21, temperature of- water 40°"). s. 4. se aoe nee 7, 000 
22, temperature of water 440). 23520. ieee eee 3, 400 


Mota CO ates ie si. o:3, we 5.saechayes Seat eldlele ole tele ae eee 149, 693 


[29] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MIcH. 581 


“The eggs commenced hatching January 16, and about 10,000 are 
now hatched. I think we will save about 75,000 of them.” 

Without attempting to assign a reason for this great mortality, or 
whatever the cause may have been, certainly the rise in temperature 
from 38° to 44° cannot be charged with the loss, for this change should 
have produced no decided effect, except perhaps to hatch them out very 
freely, the eggs being quite well advanced. 

A second lot of a quarter of a million equally distributed on twenty 
trays was forwarded January 22. The first fifteen trays were covered 
as usual, z. ¢., damp canton flannel spread loosely over the eggs: On 
tray No. 16 the covering was drawn down so closely as to exert some 
pressure on the eggs, and secured to its place by cleats tacked to the 
frame; No. 17 was covered with flannel as usual, and the intervening 
space between it and the next tray above—about one-half inch—filled 
with moss; No. 18 had nothing whatever over it, that is, in the way of 
a cover; No. 19 contained a compartment 2 inches square, which was 
filled with eggs to the level of the frame, or about six layers deep; and 
No. 20, the bottom tray, was covered with flannel and one-half inch of 
_ snow firmly packed in. 

The following extract from letter of President Griffith, dated January 
29, shows results: 

“The last lot of white-fish eggs arrived in Louisville Tuesday the 
25th instant, at 84 a. m., and at hatch house 11 a. m., same morning. 
Temperature of air 26°, water 41°. Packing on top of trays dry, 
around trays damp. Temperature of trays 48°. Eggs all in troughs at 
2p.m. In trays from 1 to 15 inclusive were 17 dead fish and 183 dead 
eggs; in tray No. 16 were 2 dead fish and 12 dead eggs; in 17 were 2 
dead fish and 12 dead eggs; in 18 were 2 dead fish and 12 dead eggs; 
in 19 were 3 dead fish and 14 dead eggs; and in No. 20 were 7 dead 
eggs.” 

The loss throughout the case being merely nominal—a small fraction 
of 1 per cent.—and so uniformly distributed, the inference might be 
drawn that the manner of covering, or, indeed, the presence or absence 
of any cover at all, has but little bearing on the successful transporta- 
tion of eggs. The principal object of a damp cover being to supply 
additional moisture the evidence would clearly indicate that it might be ~ 
dispensed with for shipments designed to reach consignees within three 
or four days, the damp trays on which the eggs are spread and the eggs 
themselves retaining all the moisture essential. 

However, although in the present instance there was no manifest dif- 
ference in results due to any special feature in the cover or between the 
several methods and the absence of any covering, except possibly tray 
No. 20, covered with snow, and on which there were no dead fish and 
only 7 dead eggs, or a trifle over half the average, still, the conclusion 
can hardly be drawn that the absence or presence of a damp covering of 
some kind would be immaterial for eggs conveyed long journeys; and, 
as it can do no harm under any circumstances, and makes provision for 


582 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [30] 


insuring the proper degree of moisture in the event of a delay, and as 
it would seem to be quite essential for the retention of requisite moist- 
ure for long journeys, it may be regarded as nominally indispensable. 
But snow, which in the present instance was dry and frosty when 
packed, and hence exercised a salutary influence by maintaining a low 
temperature, can hardly be considered a safe covering either for long or 
short journeys, for the chances are all in favor of its melting in transit, 
thereby completely saturating a portion of the trays and their contents, 
a condition which repeated experiments have shown to be deleterious 
or even fatal to eggs thus situated for any length of time. 

Far better results were obtained from the second lot of eggs. Two 
hundred and sixty thousand fish were hatched from the two lots and 
planted as follows, according to report of President Griffith: 

‘¢White-fish fry deposited as follows: February 3, 1881, Barren River, 
tributary to Green River, tributary to Ohio River, near Bowling Green, 
Warren County, 100,000; March 5, same place, 160,000; total, 260,000.” 

CALIFORNIA.—The first case to San Francisco was started January 
17, and contained ten trays, 25,000 to the tray, with the flannel spread 
securely fastened with strips same as in last shipment to Maine. They 
arrived in excellent shape as the following from Commissioner Redding 
indicates : 

“The 250,000 whitefish eggs received in good condition, not to ex. 
ceed 1 per cent. loss. After regulating the temperature of the water 
they were placed in it and within twelve hours commenced hatching 
out.” 

A second lot of 250,000 packed precisely the same as its predecessor, 
shipped February 5, arriving 9 days later, was almost a total loss, as 
the following from Commissioner Redding will show: 

“The last lot of 250,000 whitefish eggs arrived a few days ago in a 
terrible condition. The top layers were entirely decayed, and there 
seemed to be hardly any life remaining in the lower eggs. All that ap- 
peared to have life have been put in the water. Ido not know of any 
reason for this result except probabiy they were detained by the snow 
blockade and the car was kept too warm.” 

The following is from a subsequent communication from Mr. Redding 
in reference to these eggs: 

“The eggs arrived on the 14th instant. * * * The messenger 
in the express car usually has two stoves, one in each end of the car, to 
keep himself warm, and the temperature is kept too high-for the trans- 
_ portation of fish eggs.” 

Mr. Redding’s supposition that the eggs were allowed to get too warm 
is undoubtedly correct. 

The report of Superintendent J. G. Woodbury, San Leandro (where 
the State hatchery is located), contains some interesting notes, and is 
given in full: 

“Whitefish shipments.—February 5, Tulare Lake, 125,000; February 
10, Mountain Lake, 10,000; February 12, Merced Lake, 10,000; Febru- 


’ 


[31] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, micu. 583 


ary 14, Tahoe Lake, 100,000; March 25, to Judge McShalter, Warm 
County, 2,500; total, 247,500. 

“The temperature of the water in which the whitefish were hatched 
was about 54°, ranging from 51° to 56°. The first lot of 250,000 came 
in splendid order, better than any ever before received from the East. 
After being put into the water and during the hatching, also up to and 
including the last shipment, the loss did not exceed 14 per cent. Most 
of them hatched out very soon after being put into the hatching baskets, 
but were vigorous and shy, and at the end of one week began to eat 
pounded-up crab which they were fed on. They appeared to be very 
fond of this, taking in their mouths pieces of the fiber a quarter of an 
inch long, swimming around trying to swallow it. The white meat of the 
crab could be seen in their stomachs through their transparent bodies. 

“The last lot of 250,000 whitefish eggs arrived (being delayed, I sup- 
pose) in very bad condition, all the top layers rotten and smelling 
badly. Of those put into the water only a few hatched out (four or five 
thousand), and in a very sickly condition. These few would not eat, 
and at the end of three weeks they were quite attenuated, with their 
heads and gills covered with fungus. During the hatching and feeding 
time of the first lot the water was quite muddy, so much so that the 
little fish could hardly see their food.” 

NEVADA.—February 3, a case containing 25,000 eggs was forwarded 
to Mrs. H. C. Fenstermaker, a lady considerably interested in piscicul- 
ture, residing at Eureka, Nev.; but for some unaccountable reason no 
word has ever been received as to whether they reached their destina- 
tion or not. Three letters of inquiry have failed to evoke any response. 

PENNSYLVANIA.—One hundred thousand eggs, packed as usual, were 
shipped February 12 to Corry, Pa., with the following results, embraced 
in a communication from the Hon. Hendrick B. Wright: 

“The eges arrived safely at Corry and were hatched and the fry de- 
livered to me on the 18th instant. I succeeded in putting some 70,000 
of them in my lake in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, so that the mat- 
ter is, so far, asuccess. The lake where they were deposited is known 
as Harvey’s Lake, containing about 1,000 acres, ten miles in circumfer- 
ence, and in places over a hundred feet deep; it is pure spring water, 
and about 1,000 feet above the sea level.” 

Two small packages, each containing about 500 eggs, were sent by » 
mail to Mr. John Ryder, Academy of Sciences, Philadelphia, but eggs 
were all dead when received by Mr. Ryder. 

The results of shipping eggs of the whitefish the present season, as 
well as of moving them much greater distances in previous seasons, 
have demonstrated beyond a doubt that they can be transported to the 
most distant points of the globe with almost absolute certainty of a suc- 
cessful issue, provided the proper limits of temperature are guarded, 
and the eggs are not too far advanced when shipped. The essential 
conditions as to the means of securing the maintenance of the proper 
degree of moisture and of the admittance of air, can be so completely 


584 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [32] 


satisfied in the preparation of packages of eggs for extended journeys 
as to render their inspection or repacking at intervening points entirely 
superfluous. But with many shipments, notably those by rail, it is not 
so easy to provide for guarding temperatures; that is, of course, when 
they are to be unaccompanied by a special messenger. Very rarely 
indeed will the eggs be exposed to a dangerous degree of coldness, and 
practically the opposite extreme is the only one to guard against. The 
clear, cold atmosphere produced by ice seems to be the best adapted to 
the preservation of the vitality of the embryos; hence, a roughly con- 
structed refrigerator would answer every purpose, but would require 
special arrangements as to replenishing the ice at intermediate points 
along the route, and would also demand ample provisions for the dispo- 
sition of the drips, otherwise the water slopping or draining in the car 
would doubtless subject the whole affair to extortionate express rates. 
The ice rooms of vessels, being uniformly cold, are especially suited to 
keep fish eggs in excellent condition; and for this reason foreign ship- 
ments can be made (from port to port) with a far greater degree of cer- 
tainty of success than can those inland even for a short distance; in 
fact, the ordinary carrying cases used to convey eggs from the spawn- 
ing ground to the hatchery, filled with eggs not too far advanced, and 
snugly ensconced in the ice room of a vessel, could safely be intrusted 
with a voyage across either ocean. 

To obtain the best possible results, shipments should be made before 
the development of the embryo has proceeded too far, and pheretere 
applications should be sent in earlier in the season. 


DISPOSITION OF THE FRY. 


The work of distributing the young fish was greatly facilitated and 
the expense materially lessened by the gratuitous assistance of several 
railroad companies, to whom acknowledgments are due, as follows: The 
Flint and Pere Marquette Railroad Company for special car from North- 
ville to Bay City; special car, and round trip passes for messengers, 
from Northville to Ludington; hauling Michigan Central car from 
Detroit to Northville, and from the latter place to Wayne Junction, 
where connection is made with the Michigan Central Railroad; special 
car from Northville to Toledo (terminus of the line), and allowing car 
to go on to Sandusky; and conveying cans of fish in baggage car from 
Northville to Detroit. The Michigan Central Railroad for special car 
and round trip passes for messengers from Wayne Junction to Chicago. 
The Lake Shore and Michigan Southern for hauling Flint and Pere 
Marquette car from Toledo to Sandusky and return. The Chicago and 
Northwestern for transporting cans of fish in baggage cars from Chicago 
to Waukegan, and from Chicago to Milwaukee. 

In addition to favors above noted all empty cans were returned 
gratis, and the first-named company carried all eggs over its line during 
spawn-gathering without charge. 

Following is the table of distribution : 


[33] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 585 


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586 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISE AND FISHERIES. [84] 


FOOD OF THE YOUNG FISHES. 


On December 31, a few hundred whitefish eggs taken November 1 
were arranged in a perforated tin box, and placed in the spring pond in 
a temperature ranging from 43° to 45°. These began hatching January 
15, and were all hatched out by January 24. The fry were then divided 
into two lots, one of which was removed to the lower spring near its 
source, where the water ranges from 45° to 47°. The others were set 
free in a tank in the hatchery, the water being quite variable, but 
averaging much colder than the spring. Those in the spring were offered 
no food, but those in the tank were given the privilege of partaking 
of shrimp (Gammarus) pounded to a pulp and diffused into the water 
two or three times daily. Specimens from both lots were, from time to 
time, sent to Prof. S. A. Forbes, Normal, IL., who made a thorough mi- 
croscopical examination of their stomach contents, and reported the 
results of his investigations as follows: 


NORMAL, ILu., March 29, 1881. 
F. N. CLARK, Esq., 
Northville, Mich.: 

DEAR Sir: Having now finished work on the young whitefish sent 
me since February 1, I wish to make a connected statement of my ob- 
servations and conclusions, to take the place of the rather confused 
memoranda I have sent you heretofore. 

Ihave been carefully over the slides a second time, and think that 
there is little, if anything, more to be learned from them. 


1. FRY FROM THE SPRING. 


a. Received February 9. 


One hundred specimens were examined from this lot. Only one had 
lately taken food, and this had eaten some filamentous alga and a 
minute fragment of the parmchyma of some higher plant, with a few 
scattered diatoms. 

b. Received February 17. 


There were also one hundred in this lot of the fry. All were passed 
under the microscope, and food was found in but one. This consisted 
of a few particles of vegetable parmchyma, doubtless derived from the 
decaying plant structures in or about the water. 


c. Received February 25. 


In this lot there were but forty-two specimens. Six of these showed 
traces of food in the intestines, consisting almost entirely of filamentous 
alg and a little vegetable parmchyma. Desmids and diatoms were 
observed in trivial number, associated with oscillatoria, &c., in a single 
specimen. Total from the spring, 242; containing vegetable food, 8; 
containing animal food, none, 


_ [85] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 587 
2. FRY FROM THE HATCHERY. 


a. Received February 9. 


Ninety fishes were examined—all but four without result. In three, 
mere traces of dirt were seen in the intestine, and these were not dis- 
sected. In the fourth was a fragment of Gammarus. 


b. Received February 17. 


One hundred and eleven fry, of which seventeen had taken food. I 
dissected nine of these, and found fragments of Gammarus and nothing 
else. 

c. Received February 25. 


\ 


Ninety specimens examined. Food was found in fourteen. Four of 
these had eaten fragments of Gammarus ; seven, small particles of the 
leaves and stems of vascular plants; two, larvae of gnats; and one, 
a small Hntomostracan (Cypris) entire. 


d. Received March 15. 


There were thirty-nine specimens in this lot, and food was visible in 
fourteen. I dissected nine of these, finding fragments of Gammarus in 
four, larve of gnats in three, and a minute vegetable fragment, a 
Cyclops, a Cypris, and some undetermined Kntomostracan each in one. 

Thus there were 340 fry in all examined from the hatching house, in 
47 of which (14 per cent.) more or less food was discernible. Of the 35 
dissected, 15 had eaten fragments of Gammarus; five, minute insect 
larvee; four, Hntomostraca ; and eight, small particles of vegetation. 

Taking these facts in connection with the appearance of teeth on the 
lower jaw at the time the egg-bag is entirely absorbed, I am very well 
satisfied that the earliest food of this fish consists of Hntomostraca, 
with probably some admixture of filamentousalgaw. As the gill-rakers 
are not developed at this early age, I don’t think that any smaller ob- 
jects could be separated from the water, except by accident. 

The Gammarus “hash” evidently makes a very good substitute for 
the Entomostraca. It is, however, less nourishing, as much of the soft 
tissues of the Gammari must be lost in pulverizing the crust—a fact in- 
dicated also by the greater quantity of oil found in the intestines of 
those fishes which have taken Hntomostraea entire. 


Very truly, yours, S. A. FORBES 


The following, from a previous letter from Professor Forbes, is very 
valuable and interesting in this connection: 

‘“ An observation made to-day practically settles to my mind the ear- 

liest food of the whitefish. As you are of course aware, the adult fish 

_ is quite toothless. The young are likewise without teeth until the egg- 


588 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [36] 


sack has nearly disappeared. At that time the lower jaw develops 
four strong, sharp canines, which curve backward and inward, forming 
stout hooks, two on the front of the jaw and two at the sides. It is evi- 
dent that these hooks are for the seizure and retention of a living prey. 
Such a provision would be useless for protozoa or rotifers, or any other 
animals as minute as these, and the fish itself is too small to eat any- 
thing as large as an amphipod crustacean. The whole apparatus is, 
however, well adapted for the capture of Entomostraca and minute 
insect larva, and it is very probably upon these that the little fish 
depends for its principal food.” 

The egg-sac of the fry in the warmer spring water disappeared some 
faster than with those in the hatchery, the fish developing in size to 
correspond; but their growth, however, was very slight. Buta few days 
after the absorption of the egg-sac the fish began dying, and by March 
1 were all dead. 

Those in the hatchery fared somewhat better. After the last lot were 
sent to Professor Forbes (March 14) about 40 or 50 remained, some of 
which lingered along until April 10, when the last one disappeared. The 
nourishinent derived from the scant animal life found in the water, sup- 
plemented by the meager sustenance afforded by the few particles of 
Gammarus eaten, although prolonging their lives several days after the 
egg-sac was gone, was quite insufficient to sustain life for any length of 
time. 

On March 18 about 200 young fish (hatched March 5), having their 
egg-sac nearly absorbed, were placed in a tank 24 feet deep by 14 in 
width and 4 in length, supplied with water from two one-inch spigots. 
These were offered Gammarus, as before; but as soon as the sac was 
entirely consumed they commenced dying quite rapidly, until only about 
20 remained on the 25th of April. These had grown a trifle in length, 
but were quite attenuated. A change of diet was then tried with bet- 
ter results to date (May 25) and prospectively. Liver and kidney, chop- 
ped into very fine particles, was substituted for the Gammari. The 
chopping process of preparing the food seems to be much better than 
pounding (the only way practicable with the Gammarus), as a minute 
subdivision of the mass is obtained without destroying the nutritious 
value of the particles by pounding out the soft tissue, leaving nothing 
but fiber. 

The fact that fragments of, Gammarus were found in the stomachs of 
the fry dissected by Professor Forbes would indicate clearly that their 
food must not be too impalpable before the gill-rakers are developed. 
This is corroborated by the conduct of the little fellows when fed the 
Gammarus “hash.” They would invariably attack the larger particles 
first—those quite too large to be swallowed; these would be heid by 
the mouth of the fish for a second or two, then spewed out and almost 
immediately seized again—an operation that was repeated until the 
particle had subsided to the bottom of the tank; then the smaller par- 


[37] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NORTHVILLE, MICH. 589 


ticles, more perfectly held in suspension by the water, would be taken 
in the mouth as before, and many of these they succeeded in swallowing, 

At the present writing (May 25) eight of the twenty specimens fed on 
liver and kidney since April 25 remain. Seven of these have attained 
lengths varying from ? to 1} inches, while one has grown to fully 14 
inches in length. 

From the fact that the fry in the spring, being deprived of animal food, 
lived but a short time after the consumption of the sac, and also from 
the fact that @ portion of those supplied with animal food are to-day 
alive and growing, the evidence is clearly established that animal life 
is absolutely essential for their subsistence in early life, whatever the 
adult fish may feed upon. 


< 


SUMMARY. 
Number of eggs deposited in hatching boxes and jars...... 13, 780, 000. 
Number ofieres shipped... .... 0. ....0 eee ee sos 3, 125, 000 
iINumber of fish’distributed.. 25....-.---..-2.4-- 9, 265, 000 
DOSS ie SEARO SS Ion ae a 1, 390, 000 
—— 13, 780, 000 
Expenses of the work, including repairs to hatchery and 
ponds, and expenses of distribution of fry............. $4,003.35 
Lessinventory of property on hand paid from above amount. 459.80 
$3, 543.55 


Comparing the number of eggs shipped and fish distributed with the 
number of eggs procured, it will be seen that the average percentage 
- brought forward was, approximately, 90, and the average cost per mil- 
lion, $286. 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [38] 


590 


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‘ponurm0g—'a.P “yore ‘ayprayywonr yy apow suoynasasgo aunjpodadua, fo pLooay 


2 THVILLE, MICH. 593 
[41] PROPAGATION OF WHITEFISH AT NOR ; 


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soaks ay ele a ue aoe : : aieane “AN Ss er Ysoty ae slelele a gee et ; GP 88 PP OF sue ez a ON rahors = Avpsoupo 
vee] tee op <"/""=" op -=/ ODE Pema eter: Se aae eB heal cae op--"| “MS |r | Fe | or | ce ce | er awn [o-7 7 epson. 
Seon ap See OS Nes fg) ! Se electro alee oe ipo 
erga poe (emer fe SECON A epee ae = Vee a aca pee soi 
sacceee : : “7 Sod jE a |S Sorvenre : 6e ee g I “aie pans Seaeeans 
es[eesee opee-|--- & mor [7+ 8 N01) itera “A's "T7ORWOD | A'S [o> sen ae OF v8 or |8¢ |6e joe | at cee segadeecen Avplay 
“seelboeed ayn “re ee ae eh ag as weANG | eee Ysot yt ae Seer Gy fee AGE NI cP a3 oF 66 a te ot “LETL aes ie Aepsanty T, 
rel fou hn Sooper Ted [2 i aE INE ees ee te, oii 10 pa =| eae OF +P LP 8g oe 6° “ae ass Avpsoupa At 
ae ae mol) |--- Apnoly Neg [Pea U wee etENT Ieee OUE caltat 6 |r 6 em | ae SS RAE se Aepson 
Mog |--- <pnofy |--- <pnopa ane ears pero rece eerie ela ip nei ann Sie on 
meeagny te sea teal) ‘SN |7779tep | “a |-77-- op fer [op | ep | ae Ege (20 S| 2 ESS | pecs ee 
etetel= op'--+}-7-> Apnopg STANGH y ssh O Dike 27 ee HANG - =  SARNENS) F ae faa 9¢ oP Te 1p 8 9 nen SS pees 
SSS TBO LO ed anaeyo) | Paes Bait) f@) oS ae leans MST acl 29g ae Ysony aS G2 Té OF 8E 86 8T S Sere he ea pee 
so=*}--* Kpnoro |--- Apno[o |--- Apnol9 Se ediae |Pecss Op: 2231 Sti N= | eee es “MS | OF oe 68 Fe 98 #1 ; ot Se ge eet 
Jsisl=aas EOC) [eas LOO) om - i) 06) M. {S). |e op-7"! “MS NES) MA Me of a us a rh , a0 ryan 
saoaas 555 op----|--- Apnorg |-- > Apnop9 i Seu | te OD Ss é “ysoay | eo Be te of ne oe aE : “at W [9 Ae oP OAL 
eoeel--- enor SCOR Gy soma ae Se op "'g |---*c op'--| ag aes Sik es 8 fa a6 08 ee at |¢ en 
Leal: obo sey |PBeEE Gees age eC Dima) VA el lieOl UL. c), ells 9[}uer) 
Mion eae ws Bese opts |s p 
CSN OGIO 3 479) fay op 


S. Mis. 29——38 


wall, 


MO 
aa 


ASTRON 


AAT 
AH 


a NA i 
eH 
By) 


MITT ia ee 
Wale, 
Mh 

{ 


Hl 


ae 


i 


Tuy 


INDEX. 


Page 
Alpena fishermen, co-operation of......... i 
spawn-taking operations at ...... 16 
SW MIL@tS Nes tiee spec itele cele = casidinie Ss 17 
American Express Company, regulations. 27 
Artificial ponds at Northville hatchery .. 2,3 
Baird, S. F., propagation of whitefish... .. 4 
whitefish eggs sent to ....-.-. 24 
Bass Islands, spawn-taking operations ...12 et seq. 
Borne, Max von dem, whitefish eggs for .. 25 
BOWELS: \SCLVICES Of. -2- 2-064 veacecncce 8, 12,19 
temperature observations. ..38, 39, 40, 41 
Boxes for carrying spawn.....----.-.---- 6 
California, whitefish eggs sent to ...... eos 30 
Calculations based on condition of eggs-. 19 
Carpenter, L., eggs from Kelley’s Island .. 18 
Cedar Lake, whitefish deposited in....... 33 
Chasewhatonine sans comme sacs sa site cese 6, 19, 21 
Clark, Frank N., whitefish eggs to Maine . 26 
report on whitefish work 1 
Clark, N. W.. built hatchery...........-. BI 
hatching box. s455-----2- 1,2 
Coregonus albus, propagation of....-..--- 1 
Cyclops found in whitefish .............-.- 35 
Dead eggs, removing of .........--.5----- 20 
Detroit River, whitefish deposited in ..-. 33 
Diary of spawn-taker at Bass Islands .-.-.13 et seq. 
Donnelly. FG) services of---.2-.----+---- 8 
Downing, 8S. W., services of........-....-. 6 
Eggs of whitefish, average yield of .....--- 23 
difficulties in obtaining. 18 
condition of, a basis for calculation. 19 
deposited in hatching boxes.......- 18 
from Welleys\[sland = +22: cc. cc5- 18 
of various fish kept separate ....-.- 18 
TELAT CINGCoH Oi lsese sere eee sine arena 23 
shipped to hatchery, number of..-.. 18 
Shippin Plo fee eec cisco ee seems cee an 24 et seq. 
trestiment Of sccm. =ticel-cieccese wees 8, 9, 10 
Entomostraca (cypris) found in whitefish. 35, 36 
Experiments in retarding eggs........--- 24 
Fenstermaker, Mrs. H. C.,whitefish sent. 24, 31 
Fishes, young, food of the................- 34 
Floating boxes at spawning grounds ..--. 11 
Hoodsofithe whitetish +-s.ss- 2... 2 seh ss © 34, 35 
Forbes, 8. A., whitefish eggs sent to ..-... 24 
earliest food of whitefish ... 35 
dissection of whitefish ..... 35 
Wry disposibiomOhecwer can. tone =-12= so 33 
Saginaw Daye caces ses caes wi ece scence 33 
TakewMichipanse ec. ce csiscec ss cceisis.< 33 
TQKE PHM Obetae cs cissasc cst ce oss 3s onic « 33 
MetroityRiversasecesaceicce se scice cece 33 
Codarnmiakes sa tenho aaccvcs se resce 33 
fromthe SpMin os sees ence sciseses = ss 34 


[43] 


Page. 

Fry from the hatchery ..........0--+.-2s- 35 

Gammarus, fragment of, in whitefish.-.... 35, 36 

Gill nets in use at Alpena ................ 16 

Griffith, Wm., whitefish eggs sent to..24, 28, 29, 30 

Hatching boxes afs22. sana: coeeeeaeee oes 20 

cleaninrie..ee- sess neseee 20 

removal of dead eggs. ... 20 

care required 32-25 += 20 

number of eggs placed in. 18 

JOEB bocwso chica oases coe weenie 21 

jars, number of eggs placed in . 18 

whitefish easy and inexpensive. 22 

room, important work of the... 19 

station, account of.......... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 

tanks employed in place of boxes 5 

Hervey, F. C., whitefish eggs sent to...- 25 

FLOspitalyjana- 2 sceeer- lien 27s eccrine sence 21 

Hubbard, J.S., circular letter of......... 27 

Huroniwihitefishse:---.2 s2--6e <1 poe ser 17 

Lce-Wwater, PONG ees. joe scene sees ce easeee 3,5 

Instructions to spawn-takers..-.......-.. 8, 9, 10 

Iowa, whitefish eggs sent to .......-..-.. 26 

Jars, for propagation of whitefish...-.... 5, 21 

number of eggs deposited in......-. 18 

Kelley’s Island, eggs from .........-.---- 18 

Kentucky, whitefish sent to -............ 28 

Lake Erie whitefish....-J-..../5---12.-20- 17 

whitefish deposited in ......-.. 33 

Lake Michigan, whitefish deposited in.... 33 

Maine, whitefish eggs sent to ............ 25 

Mather, Fred., sent eggs to Germany..... 25 

whitefish eggs sent to..-.. 24 

| Milner, J. W., investigations ............ 7 

Minnesota, whitefish eggs sent to.--...-. 27 

Mortality among eggs of whitefish. ...... 20 

Nevada, whi-efish sent to................ 31 

Northville station, account of ....-.... 152 doo, 6 

temperature observations at 38,39,40,41 

Operations at the hatchery........ . .... 18 

Pennsylvania, whitefish eggs sent to ..... 31 

PestijSre~ sleet mite sce eee ee cee ects 21 

Ponds, artificial, at Northville, Mich..... 2,3 

Pound-nets in use at Alpena... .......-. 16 

Propagation of whitefish, first work .-... 5 

report on...... 1 

Redding, B. B., whitefish eggs sentto.... 24,30 
Report of operations connected with the 
propagation of whitefish at the No: th- 

ville, Mich., station. By Frank N. Clark. 

(OUTS) ac) Sagas ENS ARUBN Reeob cob oenoee 1 
Retarding eggs, experiments. -.-.-..-- Roa. 24 
Root yAtawe SCLVICOSIOL 5. aaci- cree taiale 7,16, 19 

tyder, John A., whitefish eggs sentto... 24,31 
Saginaw Bay, whitefish deposited in .-..-.. 33 
595 


596 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


Page. 

Salmo fontinalis at Northville hatchery -. 3 
eggs for hatching box... 1 

Salmo iridea at Northville hatchery... --. 3 
eggs for Clark’s hatching box 1 

Salmo namaycush at Northville hatchery - 3 
inimical to whitefish - - . iz 

Salmo quinnat at Northville hatchery ---. 3 
Separation of eggs -..-.--.--------------- 18 
Shaw, B. F., whitefish eggs sent to. ------ 24, 26 
Shipping of eggs..--..-.-.-------------- 24 et seq. 
Slaghtwleydutieslofee--eetaes--neee noses 19 
Spawn, arrangement for transportation - - i 
Spawn gathering at Alpena, Mich..-..--- 7 
difficulties encountered. if 

operations. .-...-=.-..---- 6 

takers, instructions to....--......- 8, 9,16 
taking operations at Alpena...-.. 16 

at the Bar’s Islands. ..-.-.- 12 et seq. 

concluding remarks ..-...-- 16 

Stilwell, E. M., whitefish eggs sent to.... 24, 25 
Sweeney, R. O., whitefish eggs sent to... 24, 27 
Temperature observations at Northville 38,39,40,41 
Thymallus tricolor, at Northville, Mich.. 3 
Trout ponds at Northville hatchery..-..-. 3 
Water-supply at Northville hatchery .... 3 
Watkins, S.S., disposition of eggs -...... 28 
Whitefish, report on propagation of....-. 1 


Whitefish, preparatory work .........--- 
propagation, first work...-.. c 
spawn-gathering operations. . 
floating DOXES sas «cisen'<sianie'nioe 
record of spawn-taking .....- 
spawn taking at Alpena....-- 
Comparisoniotens jee sso 
eggs, difficulty of obtaining... 

operations at hatchery .- 
hatching boxes .-....--.- 
hatching jars.....-..- 5 
hatching, comparatively easy - 
yield of eggs ..----- 
retarding eggs -....- 

Weeks, S., whitefish eggs sent to......... 
shippinovee gst peace as eee eree 
disposition of the fry.--.--.--- 
food of the young fishes. .-.--- 
fry from the spring ....------. 
fry from the hatechery.......-.. 
earliest food of the .......---.. 
SUMMALY eos eee ea see ese ee 
temperature observations ...-- 

Weirs, Peter, services of ..-....-.---..--- 

Woodbury, J. G., whitefish shipments - --. 

Wright, Hon. H. B., whitefish eggssent to 

Yield of whitefish eggs ...............-.- 


[44] 


Page. 
4 
5 

6, 16 
11 
12 
16 
17 
18 
18 
20 
21 
22 
23 
23 
24 
24 
32 
34 
34 
35 
35 
37 
38 

6,8 
30 
31 


3) 
“ 


XXI.—REPORT OF OPERATIONS AT THE UNITED STATES SAL- 
MON-HATCHING STATION ON THE M’CLOUD RIVER, CALI- 
FORNIA, DURING THE SEASON OF 1880. 


By LivinGston STONE. 


CHARLESTOWN, N. H., December 31, 1880. 
Prof. SPENCER F. BAIRD, 
United States Commissioner : 


Str: I beg leave to report as follows: I reached the McCloud River 
this year on the 22d of June and found everything at the salmon fishery 
in as good condition as could be expected after eight months exposure 
to the heat and cold, rains, snows, and droughts of a California mount- 
ain climate. The country looked beautifully, owing to the late spring 
rains. The McCloud River was still 18 inches above the usual summer 
level, and the water was unusually cold for the season, being only 53° 
against 57° of last year at the same time. 

The salmon were more abundant than ever, the river seeming to be 
full of them. As an illustration of their abundance I mention the fact 
that on the 21st of July, before the rack or any obstruction had been 
put in the river, we caught 150 salmon at one haul of a very small net. 

The piers of the last year’s bridge remained in position in the river, 
though in a somewhat damaged condition. The current wheel and the 
flat-boats on which it rests had been drawn inshore during the high 
water by Mr. James A. Richardson, who had charge of the salmon- 
hatching station through the winter. The wheel and boats had sustained 
very little damage. 

Our first labors this season consisted in doing the necessary white- 
washing and painting, in caulking and pitching the flat-boats, and in 
putting the wheel in thorough repair. We next proceeded to build 
the usual rack and bridge across the McCloud River. My instructions 
being to take five or six million salmon this year, I did not hurry to get 
the bridge in as early as usual. For the last two or three years the 
river has been bridged by the 4th of July. This year I did not close 
up the river to the salmon till the 1st of August. 

Another change in regard to the bridge and rack this year consisted 
in using stakes split out from old-growth fir instead of the small round 
pine poles used hitherto. Poles are getting so scarce now in the vicinity 
of the fishery that we have had to go several miles for them the last 
two or three years, which was of course a great disadvantage. Being 

[1] : 597 


598 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


saplings, also, the poles became weak and very brittle after one season’s 
use, and could not be relied upon to do service more than one year, 
which was, of course, another disadvantage. By making the rack of 
fir stakes cut from old-growth trees we hope not only to save expense, 
but to make the rack wear a year or two longer than the former mack 
have done. 

I cannot speak in too high terms of the chabaetey of the work which 
some of the Indians do for us. There are now nearly a dozen of them 
who have been with me, more or less, since I came to the McCloud River, 
who are splendid workers. They are faithful, steady, industrious, and 
very intelligent. During my first year here I gave all the Indians the 
same pay; now I discriminate between the best workers and the others, 
and give the higher class 25 or 50 cents a day more than the rest. This 
little addition to their pay, or probably the distinction which it implies, 
affects them perceptibly, and it becomes quite conspicuously a matter 
of pride with them to make their work correspond with their increased 
pay. 

After the closing of the river to the ascending salmon was made 
secure beyond a doubt, we turned our attention more particularly to 
the special preparations for catching the salmon and putting everything 
about the place in satisfactory shape. The California climate is such > 
that a great deal of whitewashing and painting, and that very often, 
is necessary to keep a place of this sort looking as itought to. Then there 
are the necessary repairs incident upon keeping up a half a dozen build- 
ings and the thousand and one things to be done to put flumes, hatch- 
ing-troughs, trays, filtering tanks, &c.,in order. Besides doing all these 
things we built a wagon road to the garden and another from the house 
to the stage road. The corrals were putin the river at the fishing 
ground, and the spawning-house built with its apparatus for taking sal- 
mon eggs. Wealso did a good deal of hard work on the river trail 
opposite the house. This narrow trail, which in the Eastern States, 
would be called a bridle-path, extends along a rough, rocky, and pre- 
cipitous hillside for fifty rods or so, and was positively unsafe. I my- 
self have seen a horse and rider fall headlong over the cliff just opposite 
our front door. The horse fell fifty feet down to the water’s edge and 
was killed. The rider fell about 20 feet and was saved by being caught 
against a tree. 

By some hard digging and by the free use of giant powder we con- 
verted the trail into a safe and easy path. 

On the 20th of August we found the first ripe female salmon. To 
save the trouble of taking small lots at a time, I postponed the taking 
of eggs until a sufficient number of spawning salmon appeared to 
authorize the beginning of steady work. This occurred on Monday, 
August 30, when we began the season’s regular fishing for spawning 
fish. We did not begin to take eggs, however, until the next day, when 
we inaugurated the spawning season by placing 130,000 salmon eggs in 


[3] SALMON-HATCHING STATION ON M’CLOUD RIVER, CAL. 599 


the hatching-house. From this time the taking of eggs proceeded with 
unusual steadiness until the night of the 14th of September, when we 
had taken 6,000,000 eggs, which was all that we wanted for the large 
hatching-house. 

The men having worked for over two weeks, Sundays and all, we took 
a holiday on Thursday, September 16, which was passed in rifle-shooting, 
ball-playing, boating matches, and the like. On the morning of Sep- 
tember 17 we began fishing again for the small hatching-house, but did 
not fish long, for we caught 167 spawning females at the first haul, and 
this being all that we wanted to keep in the corral through the day, we 
quit fishing until evening. In the evening we caught 108 more, and 
took a quarter of a million eggs. The next day we alternately fished 
and took spawn all day, taking three-quarters of a million eggs, which 
made one million in all for the supplementary hatching-house, which, 
being all that were needed for that house and making seven millions 
eggs in all as this year’s harvest, we hung up our net and stopped fish- 
ing and taking eggs for this season. 

I depended entirely this year upon horses for pulling in the lower 
rope of the seine, and have no hesitation in recommending their use 
for this work. After the season’s regular fishing begins it requires nine 
men to pull in the lower rope properly, and even with this force it does 
not come in always as steadily or as quickly as it ought to. With two 
horses only two men are needed at this rope, so that the expense of em- 
ploying seven men is saved, against which you have only to offset the 
use of two horses. 

From this time till we began to pack eggs for distribution to their 
various destinations the time was taken up in making packing-boxes 
and crates, in washing and picking over the moss used for packing, in 
gathering ferns, and in attending to the maturing of the eggs. One 
other thing we did during this time which must not be forgotten. This 
was putting up the telephone, a memorable event in this unsettled In- 
dian country. The telephone material arrived Tuesday evening, Sep- 
tember 28, and the next evening we were talking between headquarters 
and the post-office building. The Indians were in great glee over it, 
and were soon talking to each other over the wires. They have been 
in the habit of calling our hydraulic ram “mame debbil” (water devil) 
They call the telephone “teen klesch” (talking spirit). 

On Friday, October 1, we packed and crated 2,200,000 eggs, on Sat- 
urday 800,000, and on Sunday morning 800,000 more, making 3,300,000 
in all, occupying 76 packing-boxes and 38 crates. These were taken in 
wagons to Redding, Cal., where our stage road connects with the Cali- 
fornia Pacific Railroad, and where I had a car waiting for them with 
several tons of ice. The crates of eggs having been safely stored away 
in the car and the ice chambers filled with ice, the balance of the ice 
was placed on the tops of the crates, and the car shackled on the train 
which left Redding for Sacramento and the East early Monday morning, 


600 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


October 4. I accompanied the car to Chicago, where I turned over the 
car and eggs in good order to Mr. Ellis and other representatives of the 
United States Fish Commission who were there to receive them. 

Below will be found the following tables, viz: 

I. Table showing the temperature of air and water at the McCloud 
River station during the season of 1880. 

II. Table showing the number of fish, &c., caught at each haul of the 
seine during the season of 1880. 

II. Table showing the daily number of salmon eggs taken. 

IV. Table showing the distribution of the eggs. 

V. Table showing the actual planting of young California salmon 
hatched from eggs taken in 1878. 


TaBLeE I.—Table of temperatures taken at the United States salmon-breeding station, 
McCloud River, California, during the season of 1880. 


Air. Bs 
Wat Ey 
Bier #5 | Wind. 
Month. Shade. Sun. aa Weather. 
pr 
Z 
7am.|3p.m./7p.m.|3p.m.|7a.m.|3 p,m.) 7 p.m. < 3 p.m 
° ° fo} Oo ° ° Oo ° 
DUNE) Pe ys s ase SES eis bate eke eles | ectele sell daere sevellateieiee [erate se 
JUNE: [Avs] oo esate occccedlllacre Mess | cael hater es ire Sa rea fhe ae al ae 
PUN! YOu leah oodeelewisecs | Sse ss csi eee] soso ete |leecise alice soe ere (eee ee ae 
JUNE 4.4 A see es || es eeeelt sd asi ed coca se alinaece ee [Messrs Meese ee eeane ec meres 
PUNE) \'D5 = Hoc Soe leooels cl Secieae'sl leeteeeal eaaoee a | wets ene ae enlace nase | eee 
SUNG 3G cea it Soni Seca|'soeieh <<] 22 See cca] Sec ete eel eae aloe Baee eet eee ames aneeee ereees 
DUNG: Heisacal stasis H|swnisivie o] cates ocks || Se aeverem | wreseyeel | ice ate Mace ell eee [eee oe 
PUNE) Bo ..5-) sce se |se tc scncsseet | Ss cU a Sess seal acse ei| eoeme alee re ome oe 
PUNO!» 9-265] boo. ce ca cekta| tae caw ol scceeera see tsoe loc ome | sera. mas cel leer 
UME) MO tec] eee ee E Ss ec Se ents Gee ere ne fe 
SUNS eA) Ease se FEES eres Sts Scie areca Baer an Kime cee lls anes 
JUNO 19 es eae ee | seece eal (ceences seen Br ARREARS aia al era 
JUNO 13 esl lojsenal ches wel ewe bine sl sates og allseme ected Re cma ts lee aeee eel hae tees | ene 
Samen Mas 2.5 seese ee Sela eee ene ches salt eres = aa noes eva erro ea see eee 
sune; Lh es2e|\seser alten esecleecee cal ameeae SR SO acetone ct ial laeeerna| taseece 
SNS 1G sec 8 | EUS So STR Al ece SSeS Se Paes | Oey trance | 
JUNO UG Sea Ss ee Sc te ee RSs, Me Sa RT ee Ga Te ee | er 
TUNGHLG Me rE aes OES ecto e ae miele th ORC i aN yea RU | a | FL ea Pa 
SUIT OO ee Me OR SI aH eh Sel Se | SUT ara etre aoe ae 
JUNE: 2Oes sls seeks alee ee [eee ccc isi| a case ae] Bre when | Gk Be feet Eee ivray| eee eee 
Sune wal Seas hsv seat Scopes See oalE Joicrers ctsece Sate | Sere erate eee cen | ete oral ee eee 
June 22.... 58 ileeceee TO} al eeeenenes BPRS LEe poe Lay Ea (ee gE Clear. 
June 23-...| 58 alessesce|| aay 52 Bd milecee ea [este lence Do. 
June 24 ... 57 87 70 112 54 54 5G) Weeeecaleeeeues Do. 
June 25.... 58 88 70 114 53 54 56a ssecaleecate Do. 
June 26.... 62 94 76 116 54 55 SOey |e rok eemel| eiiomces Do. 
June 27.... 64 O55 Neesabesy|) ois 54 EG aa ee sia sre pee |e Hae Do. 
June 28....1 62 90 72 115 54 54 Biv beposcleeoreee Do. 
June 29.... 54 92 71 116 54 53 GTi By fee ceae Ipesen tare Do. 
June 30.-.. 56 96 79 | 119 54 56 eu Beason tseecoe Do 
Asm ee Sell cosseoe 96 79 Pen Pee Baa 56 BGss eee eal seeeias Do 
Avil 0) Re ee ae 98 75 OD ali eon 56 56lr eee eealsee eee Do 
July 3 63 100 77 124 54 57 56 ges baw Do 
July 4s 69 94 79 120 54 56 Bilao eee oe faces Do. 
Sully 52252 56 94 75 118 55 57 Die eee ciel tea Do. 
July 6... 58 93 75 114 54 58 See coal earns Do 
July 7 58 93 79 118 55 58 Gaul e eel he bai Do 
heirs 43} Boal deseose 91 76 nue Wise sone 58 Ge eee oleae oe Do. 
July 9232) 2 162 OB Oise. 116 55 yA eee J an ap ea | _, Do. 
Orally OR e| eee Sis ae hal ASE ec vel Peedseal oseeel eeeeee Light clouds in p. m. 
July 11..-.| 60 83 65 112 53 56 SMe eeiae a eee ae Clear. 
July 12....| 65 94 (PW abt 53 56 BG Resets Sac Light clouds ina. m. 
July 13:--. a Bp ; gone see 191. | 54" haze oe (ae el Clear. 
dys 4 eee GY SiS nas IDG Bae 2 Balt ee nee scutes Se ae in sun reflected 
heat. 
srk We cellesakoos OTE Nees ASO ee ee 5S) wee selec aeeGL ad | Clear. 
July 16.... 64 O83) | NEas2t - 102 56 58) Bi Srasc alte cenieere ones | Decidedly cloudy near- 
ly all day. 
Can be Bly/ ote eee ncan LOOT Ee eesen D280 tesees 5S) hic teaee eenaGe meee | Clear. 
Afuibye wal Sea Ree as ys (eae eee 122 tna BOs wa eee Bie neha I Reais | Do 


{5] 


SALMON-HATCHING STATION ON M’CLOUD RIVER, CAL. 


TABLE i.—Table of temperatures taken at the United States salmon-breeding station, 


Continued. 
Air. g 
ee 
Water. s . | Wind. 
Month. Shade. Sun el Weather. 
2 ; 
a 
Tam./3p.m. 7p.m.|3p.m./7a.m./3 p.m.) 7 p.m. E 3 p.m. 
[e) fo} oO | o Qo Cc ° ° 

Duly, 19:2. -\22—- 2. 95% \leeeeee: 1A orepec BOP Sea os liete eae 8 Do. 
daly, 202-2. | oseno: 93 57 119 |------- 58 Die bated ele oe Cloudy. 
gat 21 auollonssee 99 58 122 |--- Seo 58 SOU see eae Clear. 
July 22... 62 103 59 123 5 59 1! Viel (nee ag | a NS Licht rai ig 
Minliy, 83... |... <6. 108) |eaese. iby oa | eee GON etek Cr rar a et 
July 24.. 62 105 59 128 a7 60 SEES here es | eae Se | Do. 
July 25....| 62 | 105 59 | 123 58 60 5Or eae een Do. 
July 26.. 76 94 59 | 120 58 60 Onn ees | eee Do. 
July 27.. 60 UbyeY eeeeee 110 56 che | Basanridlea ane Sone oe Do. 
July 28.. 64 92 56 | 109 55 57 561g | Pox eae: |’ «Do 
Anni? Bandages" 96 Bye || aie) eeueeoe 58 Sy Wee Gos [eee i Do: 
July °30.- 54 95 58 118 54 58 NF We Ae aAlls ee Do. 
July 31... 56 Cp ees 112= 56 59 Do. 
Ato; aire 55 92 74 116 56 59 A Do. 
Aug. 2.. 51 92 95 114 59 59 =e Do. 
Aug. 3..- 51 92 78 115 595 58 A Do. 
Aug. 4.. 50 87 ag) 110 54 58 A Do. 
Aug. 052-.| 50 87 75 109 54 GY S. Do. 
JAnase es 51 96 74 120 54 58 5 Do. 
INTO Ge 55 98 76 118 54 58 .W. Do. 
Aug. 8.. 55 95 77 120 54 58 8. Do, 
ANG Oe a OF 95 78 115 54 59 : Do. 
Ap: 102. 53 93 i) 114 54 58 i. Do. 
Aug. 11.:- 54 90 75 112 54 58 bd Ds Do. 
Ame TAb- 2. 50 90 73 112 53 58 Ss. Do. 
Ames Woe) 345) 93 72 116 52 57 Wis Do. 
Aug. 14.... 49 94 75 112 52 58 ; Do. 
Aug. 15.. 54 96 80 | 117 52 58 .W. Do. 
TAG AGhe Sal) 55 97 iene! 53 58 . | Cloudy 5 p. m. 
Aug. 17... 51 88 75 102 52 56 . | Cloudy a.m. 
Ae scene 49 93 71 112 52 57 Wie Do. 
PATOL O Ser! 49, 97 75 119 52 58 Cc: Clear. 
Aug. 20... 55 101 76 118 54 59 : Do. 
J Xoyek palem 54 97 75 117 53 ,| 58 C. Do. 
Aug. 22... 56 95 72 114 53 60 S. W. Do. 
Aug. 23... 54 86 74 104 53 58 Ol eee Saavie Do. 
Aug. 24.. 54 85 75 106 52 58 fl eae S. | Cloudy p. m. 
Aug. 25.. 50 85 56 105 50 56 DONE Eocene. N. | Clear. 
Aug. 26.. 60 90 72 107 51 56 Ga) lees C. Do. 
Aue. 27/22 54 93 74 114 52 58 iy aS eee oa N Do. 
TAU. 282755 50 79 75 96 52 55 Del ates C. Cloudy a. m. 
D Nantes PAYEE 4 75 62 94 51 54 Oo eee Cc. Clear. 
Aug. 30.. 45 83 64 | 102 50 54 Sy a) Geom S. Do. 
Aug. 31.. 46 84 64 100 50 54 54 . | W. Do. 
Sept. 1-. 50 95 65 118 50 56 54 49 ING Do. 
Sept. 2.- 50 96 69 120 50 56 55 50 N. Do. 
Sept. 3.-. Sol) 99) 74 130 52 58 56 54 N. Do. 
Sept. 4...2| 52 100 | 72 120 52 58 | 57 52 N. Do. 
Sept. 5.2.- DD, 98 | 75 118 54 58 |. 57 | 50 Ss. Do. 
Sept. 6-.- 48 97 | 72 116 53 58 | 56 46 INT Do. 
Sept. 7.. 50 90 70 104 52 Df 57 49 S. Do. 
Sept. 8-. 46 94 67 106 52 57 56 45 E. Do. 
Sept. 9.. 48 94 74 104 52 56 55 47 ING Do. 
Sept. 10-- 50 97 73 112 52 57 56 49 ys Do. 
Sept. 11- 49 97 70 108 52 57 56 48 Ye Do. 
Sept. 12. 46 93 72 99 52 57 55 45 8. E. | Cloudy. 
Sept. 13-- 48 88 66 98 52 57 3/106 47 S.E. | Clear. 
Sept. 14.. 50 91 68 108 52 56) | 55 49 | N.E. Do. 
Septe 1525.2 51 95 69 110 52 56 | 55 50 ©. Do. 
Sept. 16-.. 50 89 65 99 52 56 56 49 S.E. | Cloudy. 
Sept. 17-- 45 81 63 96 52 56 56 44 C. Do. 
Sept. L8ee-s| = (by 86 62 112 51 55 54 44 S. | Clear. 
Sept. 19-.-. 45 90 64 116 51 56 55 44 C. Do. 
Sept. 20.. 44 85 64 100 50 54 54 43 E. Do. 
sept. Ys. -- 43 85 63 100 50 54 54 42 S.E. Do. 
Sept. 22....| 46 78 62 93 50 54 54 44 C. | Cloudy 
Sept. 23.. 39 76 58 100 48 53 52 57 S. Clear. 
Sept. 24.. 54 78 58 110 49 53 52 53 N. Do. 
Sept. 25....) 41 85 63 110 48 54 53 35 | N _E. Do. 
Sept. 26.-.-. 41 88 62 114 48 53 52 40 C. Do. 
Sept. 27....| 39 82 62 110 47 52 50 38 | N.E. | Cloudy 
Sept. 28.... 39 84 61 94 47 52 50 38 Shi Do. 
Septe2ouees | 42 75 (Sil pa ae 47 52 50 | 49 Cc. | Do. 
Sept. 30-. 45 68 (hy erasees 48 52 57 44 C. Do. 


602 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


[6] 


TABLE II.—Jecord of salmon-seining operations conducted at United States salmon-breeding 
establishment on the McCloud River, California, from July 2, 1880, to September 18, 


1880, inclusive, on account of the United States Fish Commission, by Livingston Stone. 


Date. 


* A few ripe males. 
{Not counted, but usually much more numerous than the females. 


+ Ripe males more numerous. 


co! 
venue oF Lee 2 =. |Fishtaken.| Ripe fish. 
; 8 Z g > as Bi a 
Hour. H ap oe Ad eh : 2 : 2 
ne oF rie 22 3 3 a a 
Mle ees S A= el a A 
== o i a | & BI ras 
143 7 | None. | None 
See | None. | None. 
10 2 | None. | None. 
Pp Ee on None. | None 
Gee ee None. | None 
46. 4 | None. | None 
12 3 | None. | None 
2 3 | None. | None 
40 3 | None. | None 
mee Be Sees None. | None 
me 1 |......| None. | None. 
ym 20 3 | None. | None. 
ppaslae 3 1 | None. | None 
ner 40 3 | None. | None 
wine 3 1 | None. | None 
oe 20 3 | None. | None 
m= 17 3 | None. | None 
Snes 40 | 6 | None. | None 
Peay 700 62 | None. | None 
eines 70 3 | None. | None 
ener 40 1 | None | None 
a 70 4 | None. | None 
” 100 2 | None. | None 
ser 400 25 | None. | None 
.m.!. 18 2 | None. | None 
ane 20 eee ae None. | None 
5 pnts 70 9 | None. | None 
We00;psmls once 56 sae eceyoaee dose ie 150 20 |..-. | None. | None 
Los osinsalpedase Wes | Haocsosasenc dO) shoes sar 150 30 3 | None. | None 
MOO ame feces Tee Se salcsee (BR ec soe 150 50 3 | None. | None 
Loewy Osawa boesoe DG) wl ets aie te Oss hi sase 150 70 5 | None. | None 
O0ps Osos stoi Bsa Ae bee and Geguaseae 150 50 2 | None. | None 
ei S0 sp ye | ese La fied xy ey ee Oe ee ctr 150 SOK eae None. ; None 
MeoOipeamMenilece see EY Sam fags ee Fea de SV Si 150 9 9 | None. | None. 
W225 pees |) (54m (50) 4] eon dose eae 150] 640! 60] (+) 13 
8.30p m..| 54 GUE ER Bisel LEO Ne ee 150 450 50 (*) 1 
9.30p.m..| 51 SON a ets seats ye GOs ers cance 150 134 16 (*) 3 
10.10p. m..| 51 GLU heey este Le Os arigoeriee 150 | 130 20 (*) 2 
(11.00 p.m..| 47 50} ye eae SAGO tn smnconee 1509) 145 10 (A) Mtlsa pees 
'11.45p.m-..| 46 BOF) |e aa Gor fee ees 150 85 15 (*) 1 
PREM Thre dee scollssoe cdl ee pests 2200 jenn es 150 720 80 (*) iG 
6: 30ipiime sess coon es |p eeeateee WOOL j-midese ae T500)/2270 30 (*) 8 
CoB Pa Mee ce sare (ee a] Se eee eel eta doy saeoceee 150 | 260 40 (*) il 
SLOOP sane sce ets |e oer aiSGOnee a aceees 150 | 130 20 (*) 5 
SBC LO) Opt sal estes eecisa taasesie. TACO) sere 150 90 10 (i) aloarerteect= 
9.45 p.m.. es ere ae eee T5ON SON emOl (*) un a eee 
4.00 a.m.. sad Oy gee see ee 150 18 2 (t) 1 
4) 45)am. Piet d (i eee ie 150 70 10 (Gp) 2 
5.45a.m.. LON We seeeice 150 72 8 (F) 2 
6.15 a. m- BGO. astisbe ce 150 12 3 (t) 4 
| 7. 00a, m.. Sai GO! 2b cease 150 14 6 (Di ikeete eee 
8.15a.m.- doesn 150! 13 Pa WI Gap he SV 
| 8.45a,m.- iO sebessace 150} 10 2 t) 2 
10.15a.m.. bdOy. Sheds en WALSOINI i527 RM eBaIl <8) 5 
5. 30 p.m... POS saisectaes 150 | 374) 22 (t) 4 
7.30p.m..| 60 55 | Calm -.do eal THOM ON eee (1) sal eee 
| 8.00p.m..| 60 | 53 N. Ma Oweeet esse 150 | 125} 25) (b) 4 
HRS 345 perm 2 teacicie sonics N. Sidon wees TOM ODuLe LO! (G9) MilSoob bess 
Oy45 pam een lees aus N. dO t seeeses 150 50 10 (69 AIG eoe 
S00 ae menos ee ere N. SO On-eie see 150 | 267 3 (}) tf 
DV4 Daemon sess | ome ae NG LEO) sn. cocseeis 150 185 15 (p) 7 
Gsa0 ase ease Emme N. Er Vath Weta 150 | 54 6| 3 
Seeley M I oes ers etere| eres ae N. BECO Sree 150 28 2 (1) 1 
BasOspsanen | peace. |nane ae Calm dou ae AAs 150 | 267 33 «) a 
Gs00t peice ace see] oeen oe Calm OM ea lee 150 | 236 10 (t) 4 
(6230 p> merle ee ale. n et Calm sedOmnmee nee 150 | 283 17 ({) 9 
TACO pare ese oe | nee Calm NidOmies uated 150| 384] 16 (t) 12 
Se sOppe Mee eer sen ao ee Calm UN ow ae aes 150} 266; 9 (t) 7 
(iW M\yay ra Calm?) eidoe esas TS OI) L4H 6) |) 4 
QU 50Ip eer |e sn ee| See eee Calm |S dow seen 150 39 9 (t) 6 
Alabranmce eee ne eae ook N. -. do ald 150 | 270] 30 (1) 7 
Ov a0 an Myers sepwcie clcic N. Bay 0 Ko ees ner 150 230 20 (t) vs 


[7] 


SALMON-HATCHING STATION ON M’CLOUD RIVER, CAL. 


TABLE II.—Record of salmon-seining operations, §-c.—Continued 


Date. 


4 
5 


| Tempera- 
ture of— 


Hour. 


. M..|- 


m 
m 
m 
m 
m 
m 
m 
m.- 
m 
m 
m 
m 
m 
m 
m 
.-m 
m. 
-m 
m 
m 
-m 
-m. 
.m 
-m 
-m 
»m 
-m.. 
- M.. 
-M..- 
ytd 
. MM. - 
.-m.. 
.m..- 
. Mm.. 
.Mm..- 
-m.. 
Catt t se 
-mM.. 
.»~mMm..- 
m.. 
Ml. . 
- M.. 
-m.. 
om. . 


78 

69 

68 

5 65 
9.15 p 64 
4.454 52 
5.10 a 52 
5. 35a 52 
7. 00a 52 
7.15 a 67 
9.45 a 87 
10.10 a 87 
5. 30p 83 
6. 00 p 80 
6. 30 p 73 
7.00 p 69 
9. 00 p 68 
9.30 p 67 
4.45a 52 
5.10 a 52 
5. 30a 50 
6. 30 a 51 
7. 00a 61 
9.00a 74 
10. 00 a 77 
5.45 p 78 
6.15 p 66 
8.10 p 64 
9.00 p 62 
4.30a 55 
5.15a 53 
5. 45a, 53 
6.15 a 53 
7.454 54 
9.35a 81 
10. 15a 85 
5.40 p 76 
6.00p 65 
6.30 p 65 
7.30 p 64 
8.00p.m..| 64 
9.00 p.m-. 2 


538 
58 


Direction of 
wind 


AAAAAIQOIAOOAAAA 


CAAA AAA cacccaZAAAAAddddawocacoaaacscay 


Gao 


‘s ce Fish taken.| Ripe fish. 
g aa 
ee Eh i bles : EB 
a oo n S 2 a 
=| = o ca) 
8 ae es hatha a 
n A cr a Fx 
Feet. 
Clear sess = 150 | 225 25| (*) 6 
edo nee 150 | 230 20} (*) 7 
SAO tase ae ae 150 85 15| (+) 1 
edo heey 150!) 2751) 625i) .(*) 5 
Bei (meena Ae 150 | 139 11] (4) 4 
te COM 150 | 110 13 | (*) 2 
ERO teens ae 150 | 116 7\| (4) 2 
Hie donee arenas 150 | 244 31] (*) IL 
donee ees 150 | 183 17} (+) 2 
doses 150 | 112 13 | (*) 3 
odo hose ees 150 90 10 | (*) J 
Ee edOee ame 150 | 185 15| (*) 5 
Rid opie ae 150 | 350 50] (+) 21 
es dOkee nee ane 150 | 180 20] (*) 6 
Pe Oveen ee sion 150 | 180 20 (*) 4 
ieee ee 150 | 178] 20] ¢*) 7 
es 264 25 | (+) 1 
43 5| (*) 2 
53 7| (*) 4 
12 8| (*) 3 
30 Bye eke ee eee ae 
26 10 | (*) 4 
210} 40| (*) 9 
| 180 25 (t) 5 
123 20 (t) 7 
160 8 (t) 2 
163 37 | 4t) 12 
123 27 (t) i 
166 32 (t) Uf 
11 7 (t) 2 
19 8 (t) 3 
130 20 (t) 11 
350 50 (t) 12 
350 50 (t) 17 
170 25 (t) 5 
230 15 (t) 5 
175 20 (t) 5 
107 30 (t) 13 
122 35 (t) 19 
258 42 (t) 17 
200 50 (i) 19 
D0 a leetee al ect coches eaeee 
130 20 (7) 1 
350 50 (t) 11 
175 25 (t) 5 
36 83 (t) 1 
229 50 (t) 19 
222| 25] (t) 8 
181 3 (t) 4 
181 44 (t) 14 
36 14 (t) 4 
96 52 (t) 12 
34 5 (t) 1 
180 10 (t) 10 
76 25 (t) 10 
95 30 (t) 12 
630 70 (t) 38 
430 W (t) 20 
318 82 (t) 21 
293 7 (t) 5 
360 40 (t) 12 
260 40 (t) 16 
215 | 35 (t) | 16 
175 25 (t) | 10 
150 50 (i) | 21 
133 17 (t) 3 
117 23 (t) 11 
367 33 (t) 13 
250 50 (t) 19 
260] 40] (t) | 15 
260| 40) (ft) | 12 
175 O54 ea 6 
1301) 220s nh) eal 7 


| 


* Not counted but usually much more numerous than the females. 
t+ Not counted, but numerous. 


[8] 


* 


ost all ripe. 


604 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 
TABLE II.— Record of salmon-seining operations—Continued. 

ue = % 3 _ | Fish taken.| Ripe fish. 

& zz g i 5 a n 5 

Date. Hour. | sede £4 ota eee 3} : 3 

£ OE eh ao w a be a 
: & H A pet aS 

Bey S ra) iS) oI a Gi g 

< S a Pa fiale2 a “ 

° ° Feet. 
EDU OER s asc 4.00a.m..)/ 48 58 C. Clear. 2452-254 150 | 175 28 (*) 
TULA Meteapeneeo 4.30a.m..| 48 54 C. ee CO eaasecoe 1508 S65) eu o: (G3) 
siti Gi aooeense 5)25.a.m-.| 48 54 C. SOs oseeas5 150 | 180; 20 (*) 
Sopusesiesea ee 6.00a.m..| 48 54 C. WdOwee ese 180 | 8&8 12 (*) 
Se0R) tl Gorenode 8.30a.m..| 58 54 C. BS Ole as aeeese 150 80 20 (®) 
Septiorsmeccescs 9.40a.m..| 80 54 C. Sep Ole care tse 150 160 alts) (G4) 
Spt sais ae 2 10.30a.m..| 80 | 56 G tdi Beg. 150} 188/ 12] () 
lait te)isBheso0ec 5.50p.m-..| 70 56 C. EGOje eseeee 150 | 380 20 (*) 
Sie eieaeesee 6.05p.m..| 62 | 56 | GC. Tae Ae 150/ 110! 15] (*) 
Sepiss Opec eecs 6.50p.m-..| 58 56 C. =. JON sacueey 150 128 12 (*) 
Sepia sieee asses 7.30p.m..; 56 56 C. - do ae 150 130 20 (*) 
Sept sce a 8:50 pamie| 256 lesder\ (Os ee dopiecesases 150] 185| 15] (*) 
Sept Sires fer.s 9.30p.m-..| 54 54 C. Sen CLOWN: eer Stars 150 88 12 (*) 
fio OSs ssa60e 4.30a.m..| 53°) 54 | N.E. MAO Sdausadicc 150 | 160 40 (*) 
SEI 1 asosoeee 5.15a.m..| 53 54 N. E. 2.0: .c28 4-022 150 160 40 (*) 
Soptaa9 es eeaan6 6.00 a.m-.| 53 54 N.E. S100! zoe sense 160 35} 15 (*) 
Septs9)s--ecee: 6:30)2: me] 453 54S NG eset Ors ee cee 150| 340| 60) (*) 
NeptseOun safe. 8.00a.m..| 74 | 54 CONG Doe ae 150} 250} 50} (+) 
Wepha Glens eseis 8.30 a.m. 76 54 C. 22 QO ec sete tes 150 250 50 (*) 
Sept. .95.s..5..- 10: 15'a, m-.| 785 Do Niece -.do secealh JISC Bie) 50 (*) 
Senta oveuietess 11.00a,m..| 90 | 55 | N.E. | .-:do : 150 | 55 5 | (4) 
Septic 9s scene 5.50 p.m-.-.| 78 56 C. =@O) Sesaee 150 | 270 30 (*) 
Sept aaitete.: 6.10p.m.| 65 | 56 Cc Bars pe aD 150| 270; 30| (*) 
see OB) esacos 6.25p.m..} 65 56 C. Sarl) Soe couoss 150 50 10 (*) 
Sept adpeactoos 7.15p.m..| 65 | 56 CI eer ee art 150} 50/ 10] (+) 
Nept. 19)22-2 4.- 8.15p.m-..| 60 56 C. DPRK erase 150 80 20 (*) 
Sept. 9....8...| 9.00p.m..| 60 56 C. ={GOlssckicseae 150 60 15 (*) 
Septey Qlesseee=c 9.35 p.m..| 60 56 C. : A508 25 25 (*) 
Soptel0m seen: 5.15a.m..| 48 | 52 | N. : 150| 230} 20| () 
moepts LO. osha. - 5.55a.m-..| 48 52 ENE 5 150} 175 25 | (*) 
Sept. 10... 2.: 6.25a.m..| 50 | 52 | GC. : 150| 113| 12] (*) 
Septs 102 o4--715- 6.55a.m..} 50 52 C. é 150 12 3 (*) 
SentlOmeeenes 8.50a.m..| 66 | 52 Ch 2 150 | 270| 30] (*) 
Sept diese sa 9.10a.m..| 66 | 54 | N. ; 150 | 135| 15] (4) 
Septe 10 saecsece 11.05a.m..| 84 | 54 | N. : 150 | 180} 20] (*) 
Sept. 10 .--..-5- 11.25a.m..| 84 56 N. . 150 | 159 25 (&) 
Nepts lO a-s-e- 5.30p.m.-.| 77 56 C. oe 150 | 250 50 (*) 
Opus se e5se- 6.00p.m-..} 77 56 C. : 150 | 220 30 (*) 
Sept. 10 ........ 6.40 p.m-..| 70 56 C. ad 150 | 125 25 (*) 
Sept. LO esse" 7.00p.m..| 64 56 Cc. 150 | 125 25 (*) 
Sept. 10 1...2-.. 7.35p.m..| 64 | 56 | C. : 150| 140/ 10] () 
Sept. LO) ceeecce 8.10 p.m-..| 64 56 C. Ne 150 95 5 (*) 
Deptsel Oeeeaee 9.00 p.m-..| 58 56 C. ae 150 69 6 (*) 
Septs L0gentele: 9.45p.m..| 56 | 54 C. ies 150} 90| 10] () 
SEH al) #Bseeone 10.10p.m..| 56 | 54 C. a 150 | 45 5] (*) 
Sept. 10iee ce cc.- (11.30p.m..| 54 54 C. ey 150 22 3 (z=) 
Sept, dliteace | 8.30a.m..| 76 54 aN; SIdOs sees es 150 | 450 50 (62) 
Sepa lueeeeoe te 8.55a.m-.| 76 54 ING WO Ole ences se 150 138 12 (*) 
Septe washes 9.45a.m-..| 79 54 iN: doer Ue: 150 35 15 ‘@) 
Nepty ile ce 11.00a.m-..| 86 56 N. -do mitete seal) 117 8 (G9) 
Sepbsmllsee aa 5.55 p.m..} 76 56 N. GO! ieee 150 | 175 25 (&) 
SEP usileesee sane. 6.15p.m-..| 76 56 N. aO Guat os ace 150 70 5 (&3)) 
ste) Un ab Eee eae 7.00p.m..| 62 56 Cs ai-ee dor cesses 150 85 15 (*) 
Sept 1 8.00 p.m-..| , 60 56 Ci ceed on eeem ieee 150} 80 200 |e) 
pepe ds 228 2 8.45p.m-.) 60 56 Cs ietndoee saat 150 80 20 (*) 
Sept. 12/2. 7-2... 6.20a.m..| 48 52 C. S2dOneee acca. 150 | 215 35 (4) 
Sept. U2! vs..25.- 6.45a.m-_.| 48 52 C. OOneee case 150 175 15 (*) 
Septiwia ness s 5 8.35a.m..| 64 53 C. Se Olen 150 | 355 | 45 (*) 
ep haplateeee eee 10.25a.m..| &2 53 OPN eset ny. Ceoensictge 150 | 270 30 (*) 
SG, 1D 5 shseee 545 poms.|' 80 | 54 ||" Wi seeedome eens 150| 180| 20; (4) 
Songer ys che. 605 p:m..|| 76 | 54 ||) Wi |el2edo see ueeeme 150| 140] 10| (4) 
Sept, 12 ~. 222-2 6.45p.m..| 64 54 Wit edo es 150 90 10 (*) 
Sept: s12552 sas 7.15p.m-..| 64 54 C. ore “AO oe eae": 150 100 50 (3) 
Sopieta eee 8.40p.m..| 62 | 54 | CG. fh doe a ameat 150} 96| 12] (4) 
Sept. 12 ........| 9.10 p.m.-.| 60 54 C. 2d Oee se aeee 150 85 15 (3) 
Septyd3 Gy secee 6.00a.m..} 50 52 N. TO oee 150 | 265 35 (*) 
Sept. 13 ...--...| 6.40a.m-..} 50 52 N. 28d O Meese eee 150 | 450 50 (®) 
Sept: 13 .2-22-0. 8.30a.m..} 58 52 (Ot = A100 pasteesse 150 | 270 30 (*) 
Sept. 13) seases6. 10.20a.m..| 78 54 C. BA Over aaaric 150 | 185 15 (@) 
Sept dsmevcssee 11.00a.m-..} 78 54 C. Beet Vee seee ere 150 85 15 (*) 
Septs Wsistees see 6.05p.m..| 72 54 C. as rteiciane se 150 | 135 15 (*) 
Septal seeeeeee 6.40 p.m. 60 54 C. (iy evan te 150 88 12 (*) 
pS 1:) 0) A 7.30p.m..| 58 54 C. Seid O Seiecenee 150 | 170 30 () 
Sept: Loeeeesese 9.15p.m..| 58 54 C. = a GO aa secce 150 | 550 50 (*) 
Sept. 14 ........ 6.25a.m..| 52 52 N. =f ones daa: 150 | 275; 25 (*) 
Alm 


meno 
Nae 


a lod 
APPAANSCUANWA DOM 


is = 
BRONSHNAWWNDOAS 


bt et 
ow 


[9] SALMON-HATCHING STATION ON M’CLOUD RIVER, CAL. 605 


TABLE II.—Record of salmon-seining operations, §-c.—Continued 


iy Fs 
eeces 3 3 3 _ | Fish taken Ripe fish. 
(=l5 gq =] a 
Date Hour i $5 3 a A be : g : é 
O\a OR = eu ieeseee Merhreah as 1" a 
. oOo 3 oS 
q/PF|A 5 come ee as j| Ge 
) o Feet. 
Sept. i oa aaaS 6.50a.m..| 52 52 N. 150 | 185 15 (*) 12 
Sept..l45ss-caa=- 8.25a.m..] 74 52 C. 150 270 30 (*) 26 
Sept lies eso 8.45a.m.-.| 76 52 C. 150 | 265 35 (*) 27 
Sopty baereas.. 10.20a.m..| 80 | 54 | N. 150/ 142} 8] (*) 5 
Poepuslipe sae se 9.00a.m-.-| 68 54 C. ae 150 825 175 (*) 167 
Septy 17 sn. ee. 5.30p.m..| 80 | 56 C. ee 150 | 350} 50| () 40 
Sents 17) oe 9.15p.m..| 60 | 52 C. i 150| 425| 75) (*) 68 
Sept. 18)-.....2. 9.30a.m-.-.| 68 52 ING Hie peed One eee eee 150 | 860 140 (*) 85 
Sent. 1s) en ee! Dey petiee|) 80h 54) NG |c. edomatsdcsa 150| 420] 80] (*) 50 
* Almost all ripe. 


Eces OsTaIneD.—As the eggs are not taken from the spawning salmon as they are caught in the 
seine, tut as all the ripe fish of the whole day’s catch are put together and the eggs taken from the 
whole the next day, it is not known how many eggs are obtained from each separate haul of the seine. 


TABLE II].—TZable showing the daily number of salmon eggs taken at the United States 
salmon-hatching station on the McCloud River, California, during the season of 1880. 


nN Q 
F o . C9) 
a a ba as 
&0 EIS ef eke 
Date. aa = 6 Date. < mB 
GH +) = 
eee eae 
° 5 ° 62 
A 5 A A 
RANI PTISU oleae sect cistse sisle 156, 600 Sil PATT OSE Ua oe at Me cece meel= 270, 000 84 
PATS MLS cetsicinere tases telat 286, 800 Or Amgustl 2 eescccjeeamaceecene 570, 000 171 
PATI SUS tater eeceaieccce secic net 192, 600 Ooi ANGUSE LO Nase saceeccescnees 519, 000 167 
PATIOUISt jobs octets teisisere cote 358, 800 98) (PAM PUst 14 occ cecicisicjatecinioe 403, 200 126 
IN URS ee se BapeGdodosceds 356, 400 89" | Amomst 1b sos ecco 4 eee ceten||\mstieete saree | aisisemninte 
PAT CUS tig perenne an ea 420, 000 LO7E|| Acoust 16s eso eee eee |e eee ameocae 
PATI MUST NG Se encesecmeccee see 532, 200 NS 7A PAU PUSU i nesemactte neato eaate 291, 000 92 
PATIOS binds eames ciscise esis 408, 800 DAT. | PATI CUSbAS Seances see oseeee 909, 600 291 
PATI OMS bivGh sence eee naeeecs sei 513, 600 MAT) A oUSta OM cosemeccecrcaste oe 286, 800 89 
EAT SHE OMe eee none 386, 400 115 a 
PACD US UO nse eee eee eee sce 540, 000 159 Totalecrie-aesenest- cece 7, 396, 800 2, 164 


TaBLE IV.—Table of distribution of salmon-eggs from the United States salmon-breeding 
station, McCloud River, California, during the season of 1880. 


ro] 
oO =) 
¢ | Be [ee ie 
State. Commissioner. Ad ‘2 ia Destination. 
a a & 
3 C) e) 
A A A 
Minoisteee sees N. K. Fairbank...| 200,000 | 100,000 | 100,000 | Geneva Lake, Wis. . 
Keansas\eseose = DPB Long =-n =. 100,000 | 100,000 | 100,000 | D. B. Long, Ellsworth, Kans. 
Maryland...... T. B. Ferguson...| 300,000 | 200,000 | 200,000 | Oakland, Md., Garret County. 
Maryland....-. Thomas Hughlett.| 200,000 | 250,000 | 200,000 | Druid Hill Park, Baltimore, Md. 
Missouri------.- Silas Woodson....| 200,000 | 200,000 | 200,000 | Silas Woodson, Saint Joseph, Mo. 
Missouri. .-.--.- J. Ed. Humes..... 5, 000 10. 000 10,000 | J. E. Humes, Versailles, Morgan 
County, Mo. 
Minnesota. ....| R. O. Sweeny..-.. 200,000 | 200,000 | 200, 000 a: Su cet en ae ss 
x ivingston. - 50,000 | 400,000 | 400,000 | ‘‘Nebraska Fish ommiss 2 
ee ae ie pi South Bend, Cass County, Nebr. 
New York..--. SamMeseAmi ones jee |e eL 0) OO0N e semcnee ae easel ae ae H. Slack, Bloomsbury, 
New Jersey ...| E. J. Anderson..-| 300,000 | 300,000 | 300, 000 James A nnin, jr., Caledonia, N. Y. 
North Carolina.! S. G. Wortle...--- 200,000 | 200,000 | 200,000 | S. G. Worth, Morgantown, N.C 
South Carolina.| A. P. Butler...-.-. 200,000 | 200,000 | 200, 000 Do. 


. 


606 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


TABLE IV.—Table of distribution of salmon-eggs, §-c.—Continued. 


| 3 
3 & 
Z & a 
State. Commissioner. 4 a zB Destination. 
~ n m °o 
3 3 om 
) } 6 
A a A 
West Virginia.) H. B. Miller ...... 150,000 | 150,000 | 150,000 | C.S. White. Romney, W. Va., care 
agent, Green Spring Run. 
Canada ........ S:sWilmot.-.-<<c 50, 000 50, 000 50,000 | S. Wilmot, Newcastle, Ont. 
iNrance!s.-2 == Rea wWeattel- ssc. - 100,000 | 100,000 | 100,000 |} Fred Mather, for Societé d’Aceli- 
mation, Paris. 
Germany ...... Von behreaeseentee 300,000 | 300,000 | 300,000 | Fred Mather, for Deutsche Fis- 
cherei- Verein, Berlin. 
Germany ...... FW. Busse. -...22.. 50, 000 50, 000 50, 000 Hired Mather, hatching ponds, 
remen. 
Germany .....- Carl Schuster..... 30, 000 30, 000 30, 000 trea } piaabers hatching ponds. 
reiburg. 
Holland .-...<- Von Pestel ...-.-- 100,000 | 100,000} 100,000 | Fred Mather, Government of the 


Netherland, sin charge ot Zoolog- 
ical Society of Amsterdam, 
Holland .......| C.J. Bottemann ..| 100,000 | 100,000 | 100,000 | Fred Mather, hatching ponds, 
Bergen-op-zoom. 

UeSi-cs- wise seen nied See emacicosanecs oc ameteeeeas 810,000 | 810,000 | William P. Sauerhoff, for Upper 
Potomac River. 


3, 800, 000 |3, 800, 000 


SALMON-HATCHING STATION ON M’CLOUD RIVER, CAL 607 


[11] 


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[12} 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


608 


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SALMON-HATCHING STATION ON M’CLOUD RIVER, CAL. 609 


[13] 


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REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


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APPENDIX TO SALMON-HATCHING REPORT, 1880. 


NEWCASTLE, March 4, 1880. 
LIVINGSTON STONE, Esq., 
Deputy Commissioner United States Fisheries : 


My DEAR MR. Stone: In addition to the information asked in your 
note and blank form, sent to be filled up in regard to the California 
eggs, I beg to send you the following statement, in detail, so that you 
may draw your own conclusions from it: 

In October, 1874, first lot of 20,000 eggs received; May, 1875, turned 
out as fry. 

In October, 1875, second lot of 80,000 eggs received; April, 1876, 
turned out as fry. 

In October,*1876, a small California salmon, about 15 inches long, 
came up the stream and into the house, full of milt. 

in October, 1876, third lot of 8,000 eggs were received; in April, 1877, 
turned out as fry. 

In July, 1877, a beautiful 5-pound California salmon was taken in my 
nets along with our salmon in Lake Ontario, and during my absence 
two other smaller ones were taken in like manner. 

In October, 1877, three California salmon came up the stream into our 
reception house, all males; the largest one was 23 inches long, very 
slim, and very dirty looking. 

In October, 1877, fourth lot of 40,000 eggs were received; April, 1878, 
put out as fry. 

In July, 1878, J. J. Robson, esq., had charge of the nets in my ab- 
sence, and he reported a Gaievnin salmon of 15 pounds being taken in 
the nets; also two or three small ones. 

In Oooh, 1878, fifth lot of 500,000 eggs received; all turned bad but 
2,000. 

In April, 1879, put out 1,700 fry. 

The above is the history of the California eggs got by me from Pro- 
fessor Baird. The salmon taken in July, 1877, of 5 pounds’ weight, was 
as beautiful, fat,and finely-developed a fish as I ever saw of the salmon 
family. I skinned and mounted the fish, and have him now in my pos- 
session. This fish must have come from the first lot of eggs got by me 
in the fall of 1874 and turned out as fry in April, 1875; therefore it was 
only two years and three months old from the hatching out from the 
egg, or rather from the time of turning out as fry, as the eggs hatched 
out during the winter were retained in the hatching-troughs till April. 

[15] 611 


612 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


Now, what has become of all the rest of these fry I cannot tell, per- 
haps you can; if you can’t, Seth Green surely can tell all about them. 
One thing is certain, they have not peopled Lake Ontario in the count- 
less myriads that Seth’s shad did the next season after they were turned 
out as fry. 

I must confess that I am quite upset on this question of where these 
fry go to, I have never seen a “parr” or a “smolt” of these Califor- 
nians yet in this stream, but I have raised large numbers of them to 
those stages of their growth in spring-water tanks and put them out, 
but have never seen any afterwards, except the ones described as above, 
which were, I should say, in the grilse stage (except the first one) in 
October, 1876 (I did not see the one reported by Mr. Robson of 15 
pounds’ weight, in July, 1878, and cannot, therefore, say anything 
about it, only simply expressing a doubt of its being a “Simon pure” 
Californian). But, then, here comes in the rub, if any “ jfive-pounder” 
(a thoroughbred one, too) attained that size and weight in twenty- 
seven months, why havn’t some others done the same thing? and if 
they have, where are they? I believe in perseverance upon the princi- 
ple that ‘ Faint heart never won fair lady,” but then there are lots of 
people the antipodes to myself who say ‘Hope deferred maketh the 
heart sick,” and do not believe in “‘ Hope on, hope ever.” 

I should like very much, indeed, to have a long confab with the Pro- 
fessor and yourself about these truant fish. My own private opinion 
(but never expressed before) is, that these California fry will not stand 
as high a temperature of water as our own; this, I think, will be some- 
what verified in your own reports of the temperature of the McCloud 
River, which in July, August, and September averaged about 579, 
55°, 529. This is colder by some 15 to 20° at these periods than our 
streams in Ontario. Ona trip I made last July up our most famous sal- 
mon river, the Restigouche, I found the temperature thus: 60° some 80 
mniles up from tideway and 52° 130 miles up. I don’t know how far your 
works are up from tide-water on the McCloud, but I should infer they 
are not that distance; if not, the McCloud water must be very much 
colder than any of our Atlantic rivers. In fact, looking at your record 
of temperature and comparing with some of ours, the McCloud is many 
degrees colder than any of our New Brunswick or Nova Scotia rivers, 
and far, far colder than any of our Ontario streams. Therefore, by 
this comparison the California salmon are natives of colder waters than 
ours, and consequently it is much less suitable to their growth than for 
our own salmon. Farther observation on my part will go to prove this 
still more, that whilst I have raised plenty of California parrs and 
even smolts in spring water at 40° to 50° and 559, where they thrive very 
well, I have never yet seen a single one in my creek from the thousands 
[ had put into it as fry. Again, I have taken some of the parrs and 
smolts from the spring-water tanks and put them into a small pond 


[17] SALMON-HATCHING STATION ON M'CLOUD RIVER, CAL. 613 


with a flow of the creek water through it, and shortly afterwards they 
got covered with small black specks, as if dotted all over with ink. 

The spots or specks protruded a little, and the fish in handling felt 
like a rasp, and soon died, in a lean, lank condition; some were put 
back again in the “spotted” state to the spring water of 50°, and 
after awhile recovered. This occurred with our own salmon, parrs and 
smolts also, but not to such an extent as with the Californians. I 
am therefore almost constrained to say that the Californians must be 
natives of colder waters than our own salmon. I notice that the “sun 
heat” at your works is at times almost beyond endurance, running up 
to 100° or 125°, far beyond what it is with us. That, however, has 
nothing to do with my present statement, viz, that your recorded 
temperature of water where you gather your eggs is infinitely colder 
than any of our river waters at that period of the year. I therefore 
fear very much that the Pacific salmon don’t thrive in our Ontario 
waters (though there may be exceptions, like my “five-pounder”), 
and I should judge that the waters in most of your States is not unlike 
ours; and I almost go further in giving it as my belief that even the 
Atlantic andethe Wilmot salmon must give way to the increased tem- 
perature of our Ontario streams and their consequent impurities, which 
is growing upon us annually from the clearing off the forests, which re- 
duces the volume of water in the creeks and rivers and gives them 
greater exposure to the influences of the sun’s rays. 

May I ask you this question: Do the salmon of their own accord 
spawn in the river as low down as where your works are situated on the 
McCloud River? or, if they do, is it not because they are prevented 
from going farther up stream on account of your weir across it? 

You must excuse this literally long scrawl, for it is written in the most 
hurried and impromptu manner just on the eve of my going away fora 
few days from home. When I sat down to write you about the blank 
returns sent me I did not dream of entering into the subject of this 
California question, but when started I could not well knock off, and so 
have extended it perhaps beyond decorum. The subject is a very large 
one, and I should, as before stated, like much to have a few hours’ talk 
with you, who are so well acquainted with this Pacifie fish. 

Believe me to be yours, respectfully, 
SAMWL WILMOT. 


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XXII.—REPORT OF OPERATIONS AT THE UNITED STATES TROUT 
PONDS ON THE M’CLOUD RIVER, CAL., DURING THE 
SEASON OF 1880. | 


By LIvINGsTon STONE. 


BAIRD, SHASTA COUNTY, CAL., 


December 31, 1880. 
Prof. SPENCER F’. BAIRD, 


United States Commissioner. 

Smr: I beg leave to report as follows: My last report closed with 
the 31st of December, 1879, up to which time no trout eggs had been 
taken. Very soon, however, after the new year began, the breeders in 
the ponds commenced to show signs of preparing to deposit their spawn, 
and on the 12th of January, 1880, the first eggs were taken to the num- 
ber of 25,000. The spawning season lasted from January 12 to May 2, the 
eges being taken at intervals between these dates. Even after the 2d 
of May a few straggling spawners were manipulated, the very last eggs 
of the season being taken on the 26th of that month. 

- There being a fine supply of water at the trout ponds and every 
facility for hatching, very little difficulty was encountered in maturing 
the eggs for shipment. 

The method adopted of manipulating the breeders was the same as 
that in common use among trout-raisers, viz., that of pressing the eggs 
from the fish by hand without the aid of any apparatus. The eggs are 
taken directly from the fish into a dry pan, and, after being impregnated 
and washed, are placed in deep wire trays or baskets, like those used 
at the salmon fishery for hatching salmon, 15,000 being placed in each 
tray. The eggs of the California trout are so large that the same bas- 
kets were used for hatching the trout eggs that are used for hatching 
California salmon eggs. 

The actual shipping of the eggs was a much more difficult matter than 
taking and maturing them. To get an idea of the difficulties of this 
part of the work, it should be remembered that the trout ponds are four 
miles from the stage road, and that the only path to the road is a rude 
Indian trail, over a very rough and broken country. The mud in some 
- parts of this trail is in winter knee-deep, and the intervening streams, 
at that season swollen torrents, have to be waded by the horseman or 
footman, as the case may be, who carries the eggs. 

After reaching the stage-road the eggs must be carried to the railroad 
station, 22 miles, over a road that is almost impassable on account 


[1] 615 


616 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


of the depth of mud. In the course of this ride Pit River must be 
crossed at a season of the year when it is such a swollen and violent 
stream that for several days at a time only the Oregon mail is taken 
over, and that at no little peril to the boatman. After reaching the 
railroad a journey by rail of 3,500 miles still remains for the eggs before 
they arrive at their distant destinations. 

Ail these difficulties were successfully overcome last winter by the 
energy and skill of those who had the work in charge, and in almost 
every, if not every, instance the transportation of the eggs across the 
continent was a success. 

The total number of eggs distributed from the station was 261,000. 

Mr. Green returned to the McCloud River and tributary creeks 68,000 
fish left over after all the eggs were distributed. There was a loss of 
15 per cent. from want of impregnation and other causes, which makes 
the total number of eggs taken at the trout ponds in 1880 as follows: 


Actual number of eggs distributed. .... PU why eR IE Be cera 261, 000 
Number of eggs returned to river as young HERSEY bois die a Ge 68, 000 
Number leftiover at end Of season.2 2. a seanhs aoe ee ees 2, 000 
Hoss trom unimpreguated esos Ses hoe che ata | in) le ees 57, 000 

Total number of eres! takemy yo%25 cacy ste ae 2s eae 388, 000 


The eggs were distributed as follows: 
Distribution of trout eggs, 1880. 


Jan: 30, ‘Vo TB: Ferguson, Baltimore, (Md) oo) 0) ah clos nore 40, 000 
Reb. 1 3.7 fort. Bi Kersason, Baltimore, Wades os) Sent. eee 17, 000 
Feb. 20. To T. B. Ferguson, Baltimore, Md..-.....-....- Jee 205000 
Feb. 28. ToL. B. Ferguson, Baltimore, Mdic: 3-. 2s toe 22, 000 
Mar. 13. To T.B.. Ferguson, Baltimore,,Md. ic. j252 25 oeeath oe 30, 000 
Mar. 16. To T. B. Ferguson, Baltimore, Md........-....... .- 22, 000 
April “2;/Toe"T. B. Ferguson, Baltimore, Mdiie 3.) ae se aoe 24, 000 
Mar. 15. To M. Metcalf, Battle Creek, Mich... .............. 1, 500 
Mar., 19: To R..Q. Sweeny, ‘St; Paul, Minn 2.227... 22 2, 500 
Mar. 19. To B. F. Shaw, Anamosa, RO Gate cone a 3, 500 
Mar. 19. To W. Welsher, Was G2 Ne Netley cheuiiee See “snen) 2000 
Mar. 19. To S. Webber, New Hampshire 22% ose dees ae eters 2,500 | 
Mar. 19. To F. N. Clark, Michigang: 330 2e uae ee ie mame 2, 500 
Mars 19. To: J.G. Portman, PokagonsMachs cto eos oe. = 2, 500 
Mar. 20. To N. K. Fairbanks, Chicago, UT Sas ois Sicente create cre te 2, 500 
April 8. To C. 8S. White, Green cous ant Baltimore and 

Ohio Railroad...... Be : Dey ok seh vLOROUG 
April 10. To Seth Weeks, Corry, Penne ecewe cece: -- 4,000 
April 10. To Potter. oc pieeey ie ei eracra ees ae 4, 000 
April 17. To J. G. M. Steedman, Saint Louis, Mo:..-...-....-. 18, 000 
May 3. To J. G. M. Steedman, Saint Louis, Mo........ exes, 9000 
May 12. To J. G. M. Steedman, Saint Louis, Mo............ 12, 000 
May 22. To R. Klotz, Shasta County, LOL Me Ve ealisares sar nes 10, 000 


As soon as the eggs were all shipped we turned our attention to making 
improvements about the place. A stable was needed, for it is im- 
practicable here to get along without horses, and the winters are too 


[3] TROUT FISHERIES ON THE M’CLOUD RIVER, CAL. 617 


severe in these mountains to make it safe for horses unprovided with 
shelter. Many additions of various sorts were also needed in and about 
the dwelling-house, as everything was done last year almost exclusively 
with a view tomake the trout-egg season a successful one, regardless of 
personal inconveniences. Accordingly we proceeded to build a commo- 
dious stable and a woodshed, and to make additions inside of the dwell- 
ing-house in the way of closets, &e. This, with the fishing for parent 
trout to add to our stock, took till about the Ist of September, when 
Mr, Redeliff and Mr. Loren Green came to the salmon fishery to help 
take salmon eggs. 

The trout did not bite as well this year in June and July as they did 
in the same months of last year, possibly because we had taken out 
about 1,500 from this locality in the river and put them into the ponds. 

We dad some talk about building a wagon road from the salmon fish- 
ery to the trout ponds this summer, but it proved to be too expensive 
an undertaking, and was given up; but as a substitute I sent for a Bell 
telephone with wire enough to connect the trout-breeding station with 
the salmon fishery on the California and Oregon stage road, which now 
enables us at the trout ponds to hold direct communication with the out- 
side world. 

As not much is yet generally known about the natural history of the 
California trout (Salmo iridea), I will venture to present the follow- 
ing rather fragmentary notes, most of which have been furnished me 
by Myron Green, concerning the eggs, the fish, and the manner of 
catching them. The eggs of the McCloud River trout (Salmo tridea) 
are about one-fifth of an inch in diameter, twenty-five averaged-sized 
eggs, one layer deep, just covering an area of a square inch. There is 
quite a wide variation in the color of eggs, some being of a light straw 
color and others of a deep salmon red. A two-pound trout gives about 
800 eggs. 

At 54° Fahrenheit the eggs hatch in twenty-six days, and the eye 
spots show in twelve days. Seth Green’s formula, in regard to the hatch- 
ing period of the New England brook trout (Salmo fontinalis), is that. 
these eggs hatch in fifty days at 50° F., and require six days less for 
every degree’s increase in the warmth of the water. According to this 
formula the fontinalis eggs, in water at 54°, would hatch in twenty-six 
days, which happens to be precisely the time required by the eggs of 
the McCloud River trout (Salmo iridea) to hatch. 

The empty eggs of the iridea do not turn white as soon as the empty 
salmon eggs do, consequently one is more likely, in packing and ship- 
ping, to get empty eggs mixed with the impregnated ones than in pack- 
ing salmon eggs. The empty or unfertilized eggs can, however, usually 
be made to turn white by running a somewhat violent stream of water 
through the hatching troughs after the eye spots are plainly apparent 
in the rest. This will turn the empty eggs white while it will not injure 
the eggs which have fish in them. 


618 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


The California trout eggs seem to be peculiar in one respect, namely, 
that they will stand a great deal of sediment in the water without ap- 
pearing to suffer from it. 

Mr. Green, and Mr. Woodbury who hatched trout eggs for the Cali- 
fornia fish commission, both say that the eggs can be completely cov- 
ered with sediment for three days and come out all right. These eggs 
possess another peculiarity, viz, the embryo, previous to the develop- 
ment of the choroid pigment (eye spots), can be seen quite clearly 
through the shell, and the form of the fish is distinctly apparent for four 
or five days before the eye spots show, which usually happens about the 
eleventh day in water at 54° F. 

The California trout (Salmo iridea), which is the same fish as Suck- 
ley’s Salmo Masoni, is described by him under the latter name as fol- 
lows: ® 


SaLMo MAsont, Suckley. 


Sp. ch.—Body subfusiform; head well developed, forming the fifth of 
the total length. Maxillary shghtly bent, extending to a vertical line 
drawn inwardly to the posterior line of the orbit. Jaws equal. Anterior 
margin of dorsal fin a little nearer the extremity of the snout than the 
insertion of the caudal fin. Back brownish gray; upper surface of head 
blackish gray; sides silvery gray; finsash gray; dorsal and caudal spot- 
ted; upper regions of head and body studded with irregular black spots 
or specks; tail emarginate. 


I will merely add to this description that the McCloud River trout 
have a broad red stripe on their sides extending on each side of the 
lateral line from the mouth to the caudal fin. In the spawning season 
their silvery-gray color assumes a much darker hue, and the broad 
stripe turns to a deeper red. During the spawning season the trout get 
white and flabby and very poor, though they quickly recover when they 
begin to feed again. The tridea in the McCloud River, probably owing 
to more abundant feed and better water, grow to a larger size than in 
most other waters. The males in our ponds averaged last January 
about three pounds in weight and the females two pounds. There were 
several individual fish that weighed five pounds and six pounds, and 
even more. : 

Mr. Green describes them as being good feeders, hardy and well able 
to hold their own among other voracious fish, while at the same time 
they are not as destructive to smaller fish of their own kind as many 
other varieties of trout, notably the fontinalis, the common speckled 
brook trout of the Northern Atlantic States. Large and small fish can 
consequently be kept together in the same pond with comparative safety. 
Their favorite food is salmon eggs. After that come the caddis worms, 
with which the McCloud River abounds. These trout also feed on the 
dead salmon in the bottom of the river. Mr. Green says he has never 
found any smaller trout in the stomachs of the McCloud River variety. 
In other streams, however, when feed on the bottom is less abundant, 


[5] TROUT FISHERIES ON THE M’CLOUD RIVER, CAL. 619 


they may possibly devour their own kind to some extent. The artificial 
food which we give our trout in the ponds consists, chiefly, in the sum- 
mer, of boiled salmon. They eat this voraciously, but they like fresh 
meat better. When salmon are not to be had we give them venison, 
and occasionally kill a steer for them in the winter. The trout that are 
in the ponds at the present writing will eat a whole deer at two feeds. 
We also give them dried salmon and the dead salmon eggs picked out 
of the salmon-hatching troughs, which we dry for this purpose. Of 
course it is impossible to purchase any food for them from the markets 
in this remote region. 

As the number of trout in our pond increases it is obvious that more 
food will be required for them, and the question of furnishing food to 
the parent trout promises, at no distant day, to be quite a serious one. 
We probably have now in our ponds upwards of two tons of live trout. 
They will certainly eat five times their weight, or ten tons in a year. 
We can easily manage this amount of food, but what shall we do when 
we have ten tons of fish and they require annually fifty tons of food? 
Fortunately the salmon which they subsist on during the summer costs. 
nothing, but an allowance of several hundred dollars a year wil! proba- 
bly have to be made to supply the trout with food in the winter, when 
the trout ponds at this station are being carried on on the scale which 
is now contemplated. 

Mr. Green thinks that the males have milt when they are two years 
old, but that the females do not spawn till they are three years old. He 
says he never saw a spawning female of less than one and a half pounds 
weight. In this respect they must be very different from eastern brook 
trout (Salmo fontinalis), as the writer has taken eggs from an eastern 
trout that weighed only an ounce and a half. Mr. Green is of the opin- 
ion that the McCloud River trout do not cross with the salmon unless. 
in rare instances, and if they do at all that the progeny are barren. 


FISHING FOR TROUT. 


One of the most essential tasks when we began to operate here with 
trout was of course to catch breeders for the ponds. The fishing has 
been entirely under the management of Mr. Myron Green, who has 
shown great sagacity in discovering the ways of the fish and in using 
his knowledge in capturing them. 

Mr. Green’s method has been almost entirely to use set lines. These 
horizontal lines are 150 to 175 feet long when the nature of the water 
will permit the useof so longa line. The eddies and the comparatively 
quiet pools of the river are used to fish in. The short vertical lines 
attached to the long horizontal line are 5 feet apart and are themselves 
2 feet long. 

We use No. 1 and No. 14 Sproat’s hooks in the spring and summer 
and No. 2 and No. 3 in the fall. The reason for using a larger hook in 
the spring and summer is that the salmon, which are so abundant in 


620 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


the river and which occasionally, indeed very often, get hold of the 
hooks, would break a smaller size. In the fall the salmon are all gone 
and smaller hooks can be used. We file off the beard of the hook to 
some extent to make it easier to extract the hook from the fish’s mouth 
without killing it. Sometimes when the hook cannot readily be drawn 
out the usual way, Mr. Green saves the fish by cutting the line and 
drawing the hook out the other way. Sometimes in clear pools (and the 
McCloud is a very clear river usually), the trout will take alarm at the 
line and will not bite, though they can be seen in considerable numbers 
about the hooks. When this happens, Mr. Green hides the lines under 
the sand on the bottom of the river and leaves only the hooks and bait 
visible. Then the trout will bite. When the trout are suspicious of the 
bait they disturb it with their tails and examine it before biting at it. 
Mr. Green is quite sure that these trout are all in the habit of stirring 
up the bottom of the river with their tails when they are foraging for 
food. They also have this peculiarity, so different from the eastern 
trout (Salmo fontinalis), viz, that they swim partly on one side when in 
search of food, with one eye inclined downward so that they see what is 
on the bottom. 

When a new place has been selected for setting a line we usually 
“salt the ground” pretty well with bait—that is, scatter salmon eggs 
over it for three or four days before we begin to fish the place. This 
attracts the trout to the spot and gets them familiar with it. The only 
bait we ever use is salmon eggs. This is by far the most “killing” bait, 
to use a sportsman’s term, which is rather inapplicable here, as we do 
all we can to avoid killing the trout. No other bait for trout begins to 
compare with salmon eggs in effectiveness in this river. It is used alto- 
gether here when it can be obtained, not only by usin capturing breed- 
ers, but by all the sportsmen who come here to fish. As fish culturists, 
however, we should feel some compunction about destroying so many 
salmon eggs did we not recall the many millions of them which we 
annually batch for the benefit of this river. 

When the dried eggs are used for bait Mr. Green puts two on each 
hook. This is in the fall when the small hooks are used. At this sea- 
son and with these hooks we do not lose over one trout in twenty from 
injuries in catching them. In summer, when large hooks are used, we 
kill about one in eight in getting the hook out. As soon as the fish are 
caught they are taken as rapidly as possible to the nearest corral. These 
corrals, of which we have a good many along the river, are temporary 
ponds made merely to hold the trout until we are ready to bring them 
to the regular trout ponds, and are used to save making a journey to 
the trout ponds every time a fish is caught at a long distance off. When 
the fishing is over, for the night or day, as the case may be, the trout 
which have been placed in the temporafy corrals are collected together 
and taken to the trout ponds, where they are deposited. 

We use for carrying the live trout the common five-gallon rectangular 


[7] TROUT FISHERIES ON THE M’CLOUD RIVER, CAL. 621 


tin cans which turpentine, alcohol, and other liquids come in. We save 
all these cans for this purpose and rig them with a bail and a lid, and find 
them very convenient and safe to carry the trout in, as well as economical. 

We have had one set of lines, twenty in number, extending at inter- 
vals over nearly four miles of the river, which makes it quite important 
to have a system of convenient temporary corrals to confine the fish in 
when they are first caught. We fish somewhat with a rod, but not to 
any great extent. ; 

The trout fishing lasts from the middle of May till the last of Novem- 
ber, June and July being the best months for fishing. Indeed the trout 
bite very well till the salmon begin to spawn in August, when, till the 
salmon-spawning season is over, the trout fishing is very poor. In the 
very hot weather the trout feed mostly at night. 

During the spawning season the wild trout in the river sometimes run 
up the tributary creeks in great numbers when they are swollen by the 
rains. Taking advantage of this peculiarity of theirs we have taken 
them in traps placed in the creeks, but the more experience we have of 
this method of getting breeders and eggs the less we like it, and shall 
probably not rely much upon it in future. 

Owing to the powerful current in the river, which indeed is a succes- 
sion of cascades and rapids, great inconvenience has been experienced in 
using the heavy wooden boats which we have at present. I therefore 
sent for one of Osgood’s patent-folding canvass boats this summer for 
tending the lines with. This boat is extremely light and can be easily 
carried by the rapids and falls in ascending and descending the river, 
and saves a vast deal of time and severe labor. With this boat we were 
enabled to extend our fishing this fall more than ten miles above the 
trout ponds. 

The fishing this fall was conducted with so much success that we were 
enabled to nearly double the number of breeders in the ponds, and next 
year (1881) we hope to take half a million eggs. 

In concluding, I will say that we now have at the United States trout- 
breeding station, on the McCloud River, a large and commodious dwell- 
ing-house and stable, a hatching-house, with a hatching capacity of sev- 
eral million trout eggs, four large and very substantial ponds, and over 
two thousand breeding trout, averaging three pounds in weight. 


‘ 
, 


OK. « 
dt 
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2 
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5 
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4 


XXIII.—REPORT ON THE PROPAGATION OF PENOBSCOT SALMON 
IN 1880-81. 


By CHARLES G. ATKINS. 


1. IMPROVED FIXTURES. 


The disaster of August, 1879, whereby we lost nearly all our breeding 
salmon, had taught by a severe lesson that nothing less than a very sub- 
stantial structure could be relied upon to withstand the force of such 
floods as occasionally swell the volume of even so small a stream as 
Dead Brook. Accordingly, the first business of 1880 was to construct 
two stout barriers to our inclosure, one at the upper and one at the lower 
end. Heavy piling was driven across the stream to secure against un- 
dermining, and this, cut off at the proper depth below the surface to 
avoid impeding the current, formed the foundation of a superstructure 
of stout sawed slats, which were inclined to the stream and surmounted 
by a walk on which workmen could pass constantly to and fro to clear 
the rack of rubbish. The lower’barrier had, in addition, a capacious 
swinging gate for the passage of loaded boats, and was secured by a 
heavy ballasted pier in mid-stream and a pavement of heavy boulders 
on the muddy bottom on the lower side to prevent washing away, and 
though the substratum is so soft that piles driven into it 20 feet rise 
with their own buoyancy as if from thin porridge, unless ballasted, 
there is good reason to believe that a far greater freshet than that of 
1879 will now assail our works in vain. 

This was about the only important improvement that was made dur- 
ing the year in the inclosures or at the hatching house, though there 
was, as ever, many a little job to be done to increase the efficiency of the 
works, such as traps for catching the fish at the spawning season, ceil- 
ing up the walls of the hatching house, relaying the floor, adding new 
troughs and hatching fixtures, improving the water conduits, &c. The 
towing cars received considerable attention; improvements were made 
in their fittings and new ones added of models that it is hoped will prove 
better than the old. 

[1] 623 


624 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2} 
2. BUYING SALMON. 


The same arrangements for our supply of salmon were made as the 
previous year. The fishermen furnishing them brought their catch 
every tide to Mr. Whitmore at the lower end of the island of Verona, 
and thence, after counting and weighing (by Mr. Whitmore’s eye), they 
were sent up the river to the inclosure. The first fish were received 
June 10 and the last July 2. The total purchase was 522, of which 42 
died in transit. There was a serious loss soon after inclosing them, 
65 having died and been found up to July 28. Nearly every one of 
these had sore eyes, and to that cause I attribute their death. The cause 
of the sore eyes is a problem not yet solved. I am inclined to attribute, 
it to something occurring during their capture or transportation, as the 
effect followed so speedily on their inclosure. After July hardly any 
died, only two being found in August. No other trouble occurred, and 
the bulk of the fish came in good condition to the spawning season. 


3. TAKING SPAWN. 


Floods interfered with the count of the fish at this season, but it is 
known that 227 females were manipulated. 

The work of spawning began October 25, and closed November 10. 
The whole number of eggs taken was afterwards computed at 1,930,561. 

Theimpregnation of the eggs was very satisfactory, as is almost always 
the case with this variety of Salmo salar. But 50,854 were taken out 
known to be unimpregnated, and the total of pickings was but 80,061, 
by actual count. 

The most of the females and a good. many of the males were marked 
for future identification by attaching platinum tags to their dorsals, as 
formerly practiced at Bucksport. They were then turned loose in Dead 
Brook below the inclosure. Many of them are known to have staid 
in the river above Orland village all winter, as they were seen in con- 
siderable numbers in the early spring. 


4, SHIPMENT OF SPAWN. 


As in 1879, the warm water of Craig’s Brook hastened the develop- 
ment of the eggs, so that we were compelled to begin shipments early 
in December; but the water cooled rapidly after that date, so that the 
final shipment was not made until February 28. 

The allotment pro rata with the contributions in money gave the 
United States about 1,264,000; Maine, 340,000; New Hampshire, 45,500; 
Massachusetts, 225,000; these being the only contributors. The actual 
division will be seen by the appended Table II. 

The packages of spawn reached their destinations in excellent condi- 
tion, and the aggregate result was a large number of healthy salmon fry, 
whose hatching and planting are detailed in Tables III and IV. 


[3] 


In Table I, I give, as usual, a statement of the weights of the sal- 


PROPAGATION 


‘mon Fee hased. 


There being no requirement to reserve any part of the stock of eggs 
for the benefit of the neighboring waters, the whole of the spawn is 
yearly shipped away, and at the end of February the establishment was 


closed for the season. 


‘The personnel of the establishment has remained as the previous 


OF PENOBSCOT SALMON. 


year, Mr. H. H. Buck, of Orland, being in charge as foreman. 


Date. 


June 


June 


June 1 


TABLE I.—Statement of salmon bought alive at Bucksport in 1880. 


| 

S 

| 
Whence | 3 
received. | @ 

eH 

°o 

tH 

Oo 

E 

A 
IASI Wieaclh' 2 
Oe Wisacbes 3 
OW es ae 2 
IP MAS soe ctec te 
WrpASncsies 3 
EAH Wreee| 9 
HS Ween 4s 
A ALHAL Sab 
DeiWiesseee 5 
IPHAUEE. Sos 5 
WreAne 2 2 
AE W ieee ad 
EE Sin Wi) a0] 2 
D; ALA‘; 3 
DEP eae er 3 
Dl Wise ecce 3 
AW cna ce 5 
AVE Wes} 7 
Oe Wistaces 9 
DA SIAC. 3 
PRAG Cee. 2 16 
dc ns Appears 3 
EW 14 
WieAoee2e: 8} 
HivAee se 3. 6 
A, 6 
J. 2 
14 11 
H. 1 
WwW 1 
D. 3 
H. 6 
A, 4 
J. 5 
DAC 5 
Peat 4 
iFEpALs 2 
W.A. 2 
ER i 8 
Meee 1 
A. H. W 21 


Weight of salmon. 


Several weights. 


1} 21, DU USIOL AD Gruen aa le ac ke aann 
LOS APATOSIS Gee ooo see eke ee 
21,11 


AON OU WAS ane ctsisemoeclowia mere cierela (a eeiace 


OAT LOPZO! LOO ee austell cece aie 


TO-T 1119: 19912 1905 ae eee | 


12,9, 10 
24, 21, 16, 13, 12, 12, 22, 8, 9,10, 11, 12, 
16, 18, 10, 12. 


10, 10, fe 


13, TQM elec a sae een, 


12, LOMA OEE Eo ceo eines eee 
FA aT) A i Ce ae 


24, 13, 9, 15, 14, 11, 12, 1 
10. 


12. 


12, 


iu bal 


22, 18, 12, 9, 
10,10, 11, 


, 10, 12, 9, 13, 11, 13, 
1 15, 9, 11, 13. 


ice 
NS 


S. Mis. 29-——40 


| Aggregate. 


1183) 14. 81 
384! 12. 83 


66 


11. 50 
13.17 
11. 00 
14. 86 
13. 67 


13. 20 


Daily summary. 


| Number of salmon. 


17 


28 


61 


31 


31 


Weights. 
| 
g 
C7) 
oe 
e Bq 
oe io) 
o0 & 
q | 4 
| 
229% | 13.50 
| 
4014 | 14.34 
285 | 12.39 
821 | 13.46 
3904 | 12. 60 
406 | 13.10 


| Date. 


June 10, 


| Juneil. 


June 12, 


June 14, 


June 15, 


June 16, 


626 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


TABLE I.—Statement of salmon bought alive at Bucksport in 1880—Continued. 


Weight of salmon. Daily summary. 
| A Weights. 
el El 
Whence | 3 = 
Date. | received. | 2 F ; oF 5 
8 Several weights. 2g ana sates Date. 
5 &| &/8) & | & 
2 2 S 2 2 3 
q 5 bs) I 3) a 
i=] oN i t= | of b 
A q/4+sa|]d4 <q 
1880. Pounds. 
June 17 | J. W------ CURE Re Beh iss b Paes ee t eee et eae 45 | 11.25 
7) || ACeAL S25] LON OTST ONO SOM TO TON Testo tte eee 105 | 10.50 - 
TWA Ab JEAN Bode 4) 1012 eke: : 
7Al| oe Awe eemrere 9 | 10, 11, 13, 20, 9, 10, 13, 11, 10 
T7alnwvice Acne 3 | 11,13, 10 
yee 60 eee WOU BE ieeat elec esee acs 
ATi el. Avs eee LL OR as crete eats css ott ouue 
17 | nS Gas bate Pl 6 PU es es aS a RS a , 647 | 11.76 | Junel7. 
June 18 | A. H. W...| 12 | 24, 22, 12, 11, 84, 10, 10, 11, 11, 11,113, |153 | 12.75 
noe 
Bal cdee Wis cereree (beac aby abl baleen eeceesero aces 90 | 12.86 
18) | ELS We ezenie 4 | 16,21, 11, 20. Re ee een ee ee eae 68 | 17. 00 
TS peeseAG sees | 6 | 9,10, 10, HONDA a ae Sts Sea rents meee 69 | 13. 80 
18 | D. A. A 161) aby 12, 10, 12, on AD IBC area cecasse sans 90 | 12.86 
18 | W.F.A Mh 3) ORE ae eR es te E 11 | 11.00} 36 | 481 |.13.36 | June i8. 
June 19 ; A. H. W...| 24 | 12,19, 11, 10, 23, 11, 9, 12, 11, 22, 10, 22, '328 | 13. 67 
12, 11, 11, 12, 11, 15, 20, 12, 19, 11, 12, 
10. 
Te TEGAN Cosas DO) T3 OF DLO seeeeses ce case ae een 52 | 10.40 | 
LOW eWee eee 5 18, hls 10, 10, TOS FS) ce cttaple oe stale sicleins 61 | 12.20 
194}, Ds AlAs (04 | 12, 19 TT Oe ere enya eta 45 | 11.25 
19 | H. H...... 4.) 10; 10,111 2eeees oases one we eeee 43 | 10.75 
NOEL Se Wee Selle (Gr ETS. UT TOA O Malte O alee ee ree eee 63 | 10.50 | 
AOE ACHE Wiss a|c3 | 12.51: OMe e ese ras eern eaten 33 | 11. 00 
AO esrAC ee case Dy] LO STD Ss is AD ee ae eae epee 57 | 11.40 
1) |- ds bs Pea eee ABT I: es es tae Se SS hed a 9 9. 00 
19) | PdkaWieecoee 7 Weal (7a IC Je ae ian ses i Ee a 22 | 11.00 
TOI | WAL CAUSA Oe. ce lo Basaran sna e fetes 32 | 10. 67| 62 | 745 | 12.02 | June 19, 
June 21 | A.H. W..-.| 17 | 22, 12, 12, 11, 23, 12,12, 11,11, 10,10, |238 | 14.00 
10, 12, 22, 20, 16, 12. 
OBI UB jerseee Bi |, 2, Vist eee sen ae otto eee ee 39 | 13.00 
21 | D.A.A....| 17 | 23, 21, 11, 11, 20, 10, 22, 19, 20, 11,11, |237-] 13.94 
11, 9, 9, 9, 10, 10. 
318 Ps Acs ee 12 | 22,10, 11, 12, 14, 18, 10, 12,15, 14, 9, |151 | 12.58 
9. 
it els Ween as ay i fa Daa a as gg OS ee ee 44 | 11.00 
Dies cate Ses aU li eee a ee eee i a hte eg eae 14 | 14.00) 54 | 723 | 13.39 | June2l. 
June 22 | A.H.W...| 6 | 22, 20) 9) 12 Od Dr. eee eee mecca 94 | 15. 67 
DON IMELS \Wreseetee 5)| 20;1913. Selon. sae ae ieee gmuean anes 79 | 15.80 
22| DAA 2514, 12 £24 cal eae enon oie ONE a em 26 | 13. 00) 
CPN MERON IGS Sal po a bp (He Lea bs a eee ees ee Rs Oe 72 | 14.40! 
OOF HAG es 2 13, AN sa St Pies al a ee aS ed 28 | 14.00) 20 | 299 14.95 | June 22 
JNO 24H ACs Wisecltarer | (2410 e so eee a 34 | 17.00 
OAT PEW: ooo. 9 18, 14, 12 Be OMT a2 1 lS Saptoreroe teres 109 | 12.11 
24) J. W---.-. ANI" 920) 11, 192. + aa ne aa 40 |, 10. 00 
Dan AS Ate Ve} 100.225.0528 ee See ee ee 10 | 10.00 
OA HecE eee oe P jit 6 Keene Spe ESF Rd heh Tyo 22! 11.00) 18} 215) 11.94 | June24. 
ayn; 20H) (eA leWe ea 4112.01 101 a 44 | 11.00 
D6 leeenWaeee. M2010, 1851200909 sit: 87 | 12.43 
26); P.A 6 22, 9, 12 
26 | HA 1 
26.) Wor. 2 
26") D. A. 1 273 | 13.00 | June 26. 
‘June 28 | A. H. 2 
28 | D. A. 1 
28; PA 2 
28 | H. AL. 2 
28 |. We Fe mrt 127 | 15.87 | June 28 


[5] 


PROPAGATION OF PENOBSCOT SALMON. 627 


« TABLE I.—Statement of salmon bought alive at Bucksport in 1880—Continued. 


Date. 


Number of salmon. 


Weight of salmon. 


Several weights. 


Daily summary. 


Number of salmon. 


Aggregate. 


Weights. 
ZL E Date. 
3 o 
cL cs) 
o io} 
i iol 
ist) o 
0 > 
<{ 4 


gPH 


Prab = 


ban < 


qPReSe Shibhey Shop 
4 


tay 


5 O06 (hy boa 135 eae eR 
PUG OO Sti oon 5 lg oc cen 
POMS HIS 19: cage sce 
AGO WOe lo secon te ns Cun 


DSTONOS ee oat Nee? asian es a | 


Guiness ae Rae EE BE 
ZT a (8 i ae oe ee 


9099; 10;19°18-10/ 10,19). 0.255222 
IS CS Be al only SR oS 


| 254 | 12.70 | June29. 


252 | 14.00 | June30. 


19 | 238 | 12.53 | July2. 


522 |6,7874| 13. 00-4 


[6] 


a 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


“9880 
FO 47510 A 


628 


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629 


PROPAGATION OF PENOBSCOT SALMON. 


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[8] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


630 


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631 


PROPAGATION OF PENOBSCOT SALMON. 


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Nat ; Re 


XXIV. —REPORT ON THE PROPAGATION OF SCHOODIC SALMON 
IN 1880-’81. 


By CHARLES G. ATKINS. 


1.—GENERAL SUMMARY. 


The only important changes or improvements in the fixtures at this 
establishment this season were the construction of two short aqueducts 
at the old house in the woods and the beginning of a new house at a 
cove on the west side of the lake close by the dam. The latter was at 
first intended to be used as supplementary to the other two houses, but 
it has proved so useful and to possess such facilities that it may yet 
become our headquarters. 

This has been, on the ee the most prosperous season we have 
experienced. We caught 2,171 Schoodic salmon of uncommonly large 
size; 1,473 were females Gn unusually large proportion), and 1,427 of 
these yielded 2,326,740 eggs, an average of 1,630 each, twice aN yield 
common ten years ago. There has been an increase in the vigor and 
hardiness of the embryos as developed in the hatching houses, due, 
possibly, in part, to the greater health and vigor of their parents, but 
probably in greater degree to the better treatment, the greater supply 
of water, and its better aeration secured by our new facilities. Result- 
ing from this was a greater degree of success in the transportation of 
the eggs shipped and in their subsequent hatching and rearing, and a 
marked improvement in the vigor of the fry hatched from the reserved 
eggs. The new house in which the latter were hatched stands on a 
hillside, and affords abundant facilities for aerating the water, which 
we so much needed at the old house. I expect this increased vigor of 
the young to tell on the future supply of adults in the lake. 

The losses sustained during the development of the eggs were only 
such as ordinarily oceur here. As determined by count or careful 
measurement, they amounted to 218,240, or 9 per cent., reducing the 
entire stock to 2,108,500. The 25 per cent. reserve still further reduced 
the number available for shipment to 1,581,500. A pro rata division 
gave the subscribers the following shares, viz: The United States, 
527,000; Maine, 124,000; New Hampshire, 124,000; Massachusetts, 
310,000; Connecticut,496,500. Allof these were shipped except 10,000 

[1] 633 


, 


634 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [214 


out of the share of Maine, and 30,000 donated to Maine by the United 
States, which were retained to be hatched for private parties to whom 
they had been allotted. 

The shipment of spawn was made between January 10 and March 28. 
All were packed in wet bog moss inclosed in dry moss or leaves, in ¢a- 
pacious wooden boxes. They were transported on a sled or “ pung” to 
Princeton, 12 miles, and after a stay of a night, thence on the rack of a 
sleigh 284 miles further, to Forest Station on the European and North 
American Railway. Severe weather was often encountered, but only 
in one instance, or at most in two, does there appear to have been any 
injury done to the spawn. 

The subsequent development and growth of the eggs were very gen- 
erally satisfactory. 

Further details of operations are given in the subjoined notes from 
my diary, and the tables of ‘‘spawning operations,” “shipment,” and 
‘transportation ” of spawn. 


2, TEAMED Noe 


Grand Lake Stream, 4th November, 1880.—Arrived from Bucksport at 
9p. m. last night, having come through in one day. 

Mr. Munson ard Mr. Ripley have been at work steadily since my former 
visit. The aqueducts are all done and in working order. The nets 
have been maintained at the head of the canal and at the old coffer-dam 
near by, 270 feet above the driving dam, but no attempt has been made 
to put in pounds or take any fish. From time to time considerable nuin- 
bers of them have been seen above the nets, sometimes coming down in 
heavy schools to the nets. M. told me last night that he had seen no 
nests made anywhere, but had not looked yesterday. Had looked often 
before that. 

No fish have got into the stream or canal except on one occasion. 
On the night of October 2, Forbes watched till half-past twelve o’clock, 
and then went to bed. During the night some one came and plugged 
up two of the aqueduct logs that Cavanagh had bored, and then took 
our boat, went to the canal net, cut it down from top-line, inclusive, in 
one place 4 feet, and in another a boat’s length away, 5 feet, and then 
passed on down the canal letting the boat drift down to the bridge. 
The net straightened out on the bottom flat, and let fish freely down 
over it. Munson examined the canal and thinks sixty or seventy ran 
down at that time. From that date on, Forbes has watched all night long 
and has, he says, been over by boat to the canal net about once an hour. 

The lake has risen, M. thinks, about 4 inches from the lowest stage, 
now standing at 1 foot 10 inches. 

November 4.—I find on examining that several salmon nests have 
been commenced on the bar above our nets. 

We begin to-day early to put in the pounds, very nearly as on last 
year’s plan. We got three of the pounds ready for fish, and they began 


[3] PROPAGATION OF THE SCHOODIC SALMON. 63D 


to come in before the work was done. They came in very freely in the 
evening. 

November 5.—As usual, the most of the fish came in in the early part 
ot the night. This forenoon we got in the remaining pounds and in the 
afternoon commenced taking spawn. 

The fish taken last night are remarkable for size, and are fully up to 
the average of former years in plumpness and health. Thisis the evi- 
dence of the eye, and so far as the measurement goes, it bears out this 
conclusion. 

November 6.—Not so good a run last night as the night before. The 
size of the fish is, however, fully up to the first. I went down to the 
bark-mill and examined the whole length of the canal. Counted thirty- 
four Schoodic salmon, probably nearly half females. There may have 
been some that escaped me, but I do not think there are forty in all in the 
eanal. I think they are making nests a little more than two-thirds of 
the way down. It is possible that some fish get through our net now 
from time to time, where it goes round the main pier, for Ripley and 
Munson have found some holes in it. 

Just above the dam I saw this afternoon three females spawning, and 
six to ten males fighting over them; one little yearling or bi-yearling, 
with bars. Below the dam I looked the gravels and rapids over carefully 
and found no evidence of salmon having been there this year. Nor any- 
where below the dam could I see nest or fish, except one male fish in oid 
channel at head of saw-mill flume. 

It does not follow that these fish at the dam and below escaped 
through our net, for it may be that they have lain below our nets all 
the season. 

I have seen two yearling or bi-yearling salmon—one at the dam, one 
at the pounds; the latter showed the bars and spots plainly, but was, I 
think, fully 8 inches long. The new nets of which our pounds are 
this year largely built will hold a fish of this size. 

November 7.—The run of salmon last night was smaller than either of 
the other two nights, probable not over 100. The rain continued with 
a southerly wind all night. Between 6 and 7 a.m. we drove the fish 
- intothird pound. During the forenoon others came in, more in number, 
Munson thinks, than during lastnight. These were driven through with 
the others into pound 3, and so was another good drive late in the 
afternoon. In the evening I stood for an hour quite still by the weir, 
watching for fish to enter, but only four came in during that time. I 
saw two females spawning just outside the entrance within 10 feet of 
me; those that came in and others that lingered about did not manifest 
any fear of me; I think. they did not see me. Forbes says that last 
night the fish all about, both within and without our pounds, were very 
quiet; to-night he says they are much less so. 

Munson put a whole net around the pier. 

At the hatching house [ find that Mr. Munson has the water from the 


636 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


west aqueduct running into the troughs, and it is strongly colored, 
but not roily—a good deal of it. Temperature of water of both aque- 
ducts 48°, of spring water 46°. 

We looked at a number of the trays of eggs already in the house, and 
selecting one appearing to contain about average number of eggs Mun- 
son and I counted them out with spoons. They counted 2,087. This 
calls for an increase of estimated number of eggs. The tray was more 
than covered. 

In taking eggs I do not think we have thus far exercised due care in 
the agitation of the eggs and milt to secure contact. We took, as the 
record shows, pretty heavy panfuls of eggs before washing off, and we 
did not agitate constantly enough to suit my idea. I think I shall 
establish it as a rule never to have the eggs in a pan more than two lay- 
ers deep. Perhaps one layer would be better. Then as soon as one 
layer was impregnated they could be turned out into another pan, and 
when several of these have been collected thus together we could weigh 
them, thus avoiding frequent weighings. 

In former years we have used every male that came to hand. This 
year I have begun the practice of putting all poor looking and small 
males directly over into the final pound. It is convenient to pass out 
all less than 19 inches in length. That would leave us plenty for use 
this year. But I have not thus far followed this or any other strict 
rule. 

November 8.—A large run of fish yesterday, a small one during the 
night, and another large one to-day. Both these days have had clear 
weather, so that in these instances the salmon have run into our inclos- 
ures best in daylight and clear weather. 

We have from the first, each day (except Sundays), handled over the 
fish taken the previous twenty-four hours, and immediately taken the 
spawn of those ripe. We have in no case up to date counted or assorted 
any of the fish caught until we took them in hand for spawning. 

November 9.—They have not been scowing bark down the canal for 
some time, much to our satisfaction; but to-day they began again, and 
we must lower the net for them. I saw an eel in the second pound last 
night, and several nights ago I saw one of large size outside the en- 
trance of the first pound. Have begun the building of a little jetty from 
the west bank, just above mouth of Ripley’s Brook, to keep the water 
of the brook from mingling with that of Grand Lake in the pool that 
supplies our aqueduct. I shall merely throw out a narrow mole of 
earth and face it with stones—two or three days’ work. 

November 10.—Overhauled the main pound. Find exactly the num- 
ber of full females that we put there. Don’t think any of them have 
laid any eggs, though there have been a good many attempts at digging 
in the pounds. The greater part of the females are still unripe; the 
most of them very hard. 


I have now one man all the time ready to take the pans of eggs im- 


[5] PROPAGATION OF THE SCHOODIC SALMON. 637 


mediately from the spawn-takers, to stir them up thoroughly, and then 
immediately weigh them and wash them off. 

November 11.—At the old hatching house I find temperature in the 
troughs 43°; of the west aqueduct, 41°; of the spring, 46°; of the north 
aqueduct, 44°. In the west aqueduct we get highly-colored water. It 
is unfiltered, but we propose to fill up the large collecting tank with 
gravel to form a filter. 

November 12.—In old hatching house I find fifth faucet running two 
fifths of a quart per second—6 gallons per minute—and for four troughs 
30 gallons per minute. This includes the spring and the west aqueduct, 
the brook not having been admitted and the east aqueduct being tem- 
porarily shut off on account of roily water. The east aqueduct is deliv- 
ering 74 gallons per minute. ‘Total for whole house, 374 gallons per 
minute. There was a half inch of rain last night, and the brooks around 
the hatching house are running full. The fish taken now are almost 
wholly females, which indicates that the run is drawing to a close. 

We have taken now (7 p. m.) from 417 females, say, 760,000 eggs; 759 
females on hand will yield, say, 1,200,000; total, 1,960,000. I think we 
have a good prospect of catching 400 more fish, of which 324 females 
will yield, say, 480,000, making total for the season (estimate) 2,440,000. 

November 16.—I calculate our trough capacity thus: 

At oid hatching house: 


Hight troughs; at 80,000 each? s 22s... ves. b- = soe + 640, 000 
Pwo troughs, at 100/000 eachii. 2. 25-0. sca ec accesso 200, 000 
840,°000 


At new hatching house: 
(Already in use) two troughs, deep, at 360 M.. 720, 000 
(To be fitted to-day) two troughs, deep, at 320M. 640, 000 
(To be brought from old house) one long shal- 


low trough (10 inches, nine stacks)......-..- 180, 000 
(To be brought from old house) one short shal- 
low trough (6 inches, 6 stacks) ........-... - 120, 000 
1, 660, 000 


2, 500, 000 


To fit these out we need 34 deep frames; on hand, 27; the remainder 
supplied by repairing. three frames and making four new ones. We have 
in the new house and in the storehouse, including those in use, 882 
trays, with capacity of 1,646,000 eggs, proper allowance having been 
made for covers. The hatching trays with oblong meshes have not yet 
been brought into use, but shall have to use them. 

Iam reckoning 2,000 eggs per tray. Have had three trays (appear- 
ing to contain average) counted, and have got the following results: 
First tray, 2,087; second tray, 2,040; third tray, 2,025. I think it would 


638 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


be safe to reckon 2,030 per tray; that would increase our estimate 14 
per cent. 

We have now by our original reckoning, 1,574,000 eggs; on a basis of 
2,030 per tray we should add 23,610—making 1,597,610. 

Blodgett counted the eggs of a large female on yesterday’s record and 
found 1,950. 

Munson tells me of having discovered a copious spring about half 
a mile back from the old hatching house; the water from it flows in the 
other direction, and he thinks the land is ‘too flat” to bring it to the 
hatching house. 

Now that we are threatened with a very large crop of eggs, I am be- 
ginning to consider the facilities existing within our reach for the hatch- 
ing out of the 25 per cent. reserve. The trough-room in the old hatching 
house will hardly suffice for the hatching of 300,000; indeed I think 
250,000 quite enough; that is what we had last winter. We could put 
in extra troughs on the floor so as to accommodate, say, another 100,000 
or 150,000 by occupying the aisles. But this would be very inconven- 
ient, and it would be much better to put all the extra troughs outside 
the present building, under a temporary roof. It would also be practi- 
cable to put in a house near the east spring. 

But after all is it desirable to hatch these fish out here in the woods? 
The carrying them out to the stream is a laborious job, and very un- 
pleasant in fly and mosquito time. It goes on so slowly, too, that when 
we have a large number of fish we can hardly get them out in sea- 
son except by putting on an extra force, and that would necessitate 
the employment of a less careful man than Munson. Munsonsays that 
he brought them all out last year by hand in tin pails pretty nearly full, 
I suppose holding two gallons of water each. In each pail he took, he 
guesses, about 500 and made eight trips per day. Thus with two pails 
a trip it would take 500 trips and over sixty-two days to carry out the 
500,000 young fish which we hope to turn out next spring. 

I am anxious to save part of this labor and risk, and am thinking of 
putting in a hatching house, cheap and temporary, near Forbes’ Cove, 
into which I can lead the water near at hand; and also the spring back 
of Calligan’s house if at some future time it appears worth while. 

November 17.—To-day we overhauled pound 5, containing the unripe 
fish on hand trom ecatchings previous to.to-day. Wetook alarge quantity 
of eggs. Having now spawned all but 154 of our females, we are going 
to proceed immediately to boat the spent fish up the lake. This even- 
ing madea beginning by taking up two boat loads (one trip) to a point 
on the west shore nearly opposite Half Moon Island. They were turned 
out on a shore of cobblestone. We have discussed carrying them to 
Mayberry Cove, and all think it would be a fine place to let them out, but 
apparently it is too far. 

Last year the fish were all taken up on the other shore and let loose 
near Munson’s Island. Munson tells me of a deep cove, where part of 


[7] PROPAGATION OF THE SCHOODIC SALMON, 639 


the fish were turned out and where he afterwards saw traces of their 
having scratched about. He thinks they do not linger on arocky shore, 
but do ona sandy shore. I think that on a shore of proper grade, say 
fine gravel (or coarse sand, like Mayberry Cove), the fish might find bot- 
tom on which they might be satisfied to finish their digging for the sea- 
son, instead of returning to the stream. The men got back this trip a 
little after 11 o’clock. 

November 18.—This morning quite a number of fish in the outer 
pound, and among them undoubtedly some of those that were carried up 
late last night. We know them by their abraded noses, which a great 
many of the males had. 

November 19.—Sent up four boat loads of fish to-day. 

November 20.—Sent up four boat loads of fish to-day. 

November 22.—Windy and cold. The ice has prevented our doing 
anything at boating fish since 20th. Have not given up hopes of being 
able to dosomething more in that direction, but don’t expect to get any 
more good fish. Have therefore lifted the nets around the first and 
second pounds, and let all the fish hereafter coming in escape. 

November 23.—Lake closed last night for half a mile up. 

November 24.—This morning I heard the ice cracking and snapping 
about 4 a. m.,and after. This did not attract my attention at first, but 
when it did I merely supposed that the saw-mill had been started at an 
early hour, and had, as usual, drawn down the water near our house. But 
between five and six o’¢lock it occurred to me to go down to the stream 
and look. I found the water very low, and could hear no sound of 
rushing water from the dam. Iran up to the dam and found that all 
the gates (seven, and all open) were clogged up with anchor ice so that 
no water could be perceived running through. Weimmediately turned 
to with shovel and pick and soon had the water running again. This 
was Similar to the jam of two years ago. I thought then that the ice all 
formed above and merely came down with the wind, but I amsure that 
inthis instance the ice must have formed in the gates or close above 
them, for there was a sheet of ice across above at the old coffer-dam and 
nearly all the way as far as we could see. Apparently the water did 
not cease to runin our hatching troughs, and no harm was done. 

November 25.—Lake frozen almost as far as we can see. All the fish 
on hand (say 500) let loose. Nets all submerged (except the cross-net, 
to prevent fish running down to the dam and the canal net). They 
were so frozen to stakes and encumbered with ice that I could not hang 
them on stakes as I had intended, so sunk them and kept them down 
with the chains and stones to thaw out. 

November 26.—1 find at old hatching house 20.33 gallons of water per 
minute. Of this the north aqueduct furnishes 4.28 gallons; west aque- 
duct, 6.00 gallons; old spring, 10.05 gallons. Temperature of water in 
the hatching troughs 41°. Tested the Widdifield thermometer in use 
there, and found the mercury to sink 4 degree below the mark at freez- 


640 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


ing point. Plunged it in snow and water. The long Wilder thermom- 
eter in use now at the house is just right at 329 F. The oil-testing 
thermometer of Widdifield also shows 4° below the 52° mark. The 
latter will hereafter be used at the stream-hatching house. 

November 27.—Drageged the nets, except cross-net, out of water, and 
hung up in spawning: shed. 

November 30.—Left for Bucksport early in the morning. 

January 7, 18381.—Returned from Bucksport yesterday. The new 
hatching house at Forbes’ Cove is boarded, roof shingled, single upper 
floor laid, upper windows in. S. S. Sprague and George Macartney 
have been at work at it most of the time since I left, and at that time 
I had had perhaps $15 worth of work done on excavation. The water 
appears to be in fair supply, and the little pool under the rock, near the 
corner of the hatching house, has not frozen over at all. : 

At the old hatching house the water is getting very low. The meas- 
urement to-day gives 8.919 gallons per minute. Of this I find by meas- 
urement that the north aqueduct yields 1.875 gallons (or say 1.919), and 
of the remainder I judge from temperatures that the brook gives one- 
seventh and the main spring six-sevenths (say one gallon and six gal- 
lons per minute. In the rough, one gallon, six gallons, and two gallons). 
Temperature of main spring to-day, 42°; of north aqueduct, 39°; of 
brook water, 35°; of water in troughs, 41°. All the eggs are appar- 
ently doing well. I looked at several lots from both upper and lower 
ends of trough, and could distinguish no difference. All the embryos 
that I saw were strong, with good color and well marked veins. They 
are all fit to ship, ‘but I think the oldest can wait two or three weeks. 
safely. I shall, however, try to send some away immediately, for we 
have somany that we must send in two or three batches, first clearing the 
house, and then bringing out another lot from the stream to develop, and 
finally a third batch. I hardly dare to bring out next time as many eggs 
as we have now in the old house (855,000), for I am not satisfied that it 
is safe with 9 gallons of water—the present limit. 

This afternoon Mr. Munson turns some of the earliest eggs, prepar- 
atory to picking out unfertilized. He performs the operation thus: 
He brings the stack to the table, capsizes them into a long, shallow 
pan of water, pours them from this pan into a common milk-pan, and 
then pours them from milk-pan to milk-pan five times, holding the pan 
about 8 inches high each time. He says this is sufficient, according to 
his observation, and does not injure the good eggs. [I find subsequently 
that there is quite a percentage in some of the trays of unfertilized eggs 
remaining clear after this operation, and think it would be better to 
have the pan held 1 foot high each time, but Mr. Munson thinks these 
instances were on trays turned by some one else than himself.] After 
turning, the eggs.are replaced on the trays and remain a day or two, 
when they are picked over, Those turned to-day will be picked to- 
morrow and packed Monday. 


[9] PROPAGATION OF THE SCHOODIC SALMON. 641 


January 10.—To-day began packing. Packed lot 1 (except 2,000 kept 
for hatching), allof 2 and 3, and 64,500 out of lot 4. Sent away 50,000 
to Grand Falls, N. B. 

So far as I am able to see, these eggs are in prime order. The fish 
are not very large—apparently not very near hatching (not so near as 
I expected to find them, but perhaps as near as I ought to expect; last 
year the record showed lot 1 was half hatched February 23, and all out 
March 1). The veins show well, and those at lower end of trough 
appear as good as any. I have seen no prematurely hatched fish; 
scarcely any defective ones. All in this house are ready to ship; not 
much difference in their stages of development, to be sure; only six days 
difference in their ages. 

The picking of eggs has been every three days in the old house and - 
every six days in the stream house. 

The eggs in the stream house are very backward. The trunk of the 
fish can be discerned by close examination, but that is all; not near col- 
oring yet. 

January 11.—The packing proceeded to-day until near 2 p. m., when 
we had three cases ready, all of which went to H. J. Fenton, Windsor, 
Conn. The first was a 50-thousand case packed with dry moss; the 
second and third were 80-thousand cases and packed with dry leaves. 
We have in all cases 3 inches space around the inside boxes. 

January 13.—Munson and Macartney worked yesterday all day at 
“turning” the eggs in the old house and.turned 174 trays. To-day they 
and Forbes worked all day at picking them (and a few others) over; 
=400,000 turned by two days’ work and picked by three days’ work; and 
only one of these men is an adept. 

The results of picking pretty satisfactory. For instance, lot 7, esti- 
mated originally at 276,000, picked to-day 12,700 = 4.6 per cent., but 
some lots much worse. 

On 12th in packing I observed just two collapsed eggs in lot 4; no 
others. 

On 11th we shut off water from faucet 1 in old house and shut off 
most from faucet 2, which feeds now only the remnant of lots 1 and 5 
and part of lot 6, not over 20,000 in all. 

We measured the volume of water and found 8.103 gallons per min- 
ute, which showed a falling of one-eighth, or 124 per cent., since 7th. 

The weather is mild to-day and cloudy, with indications of speedy 
rain. 

At stream hatching-house Blodgett finds 109 gallons per minute. This 
is the highest head, the head trough being nearly full. When saw-mill 
is running the amount of water is less. This all runs through without 
seriously disturbing the eggs. 

January 18.—The packing of spawn is waiting until I receive Pro- 
fessor Baird’s schedule, which I expect to-morrow. All the eggs in the 
old house have been picked and are all ready. None have been carried 

S. Mis. 29 41 


642 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


out from the stream yet. The eggs in the stream house very backward. 
One day last week a man dropped one tray, and out of it Mr. Munson 
has since picked 1,800, which shows that they are very tender. 

January 19.—Having the unimpregnated eggs picked out ahead as 
far as lot 12 (and all but 14 stack of that), Munson, Forbes, and Macart- 
ney began packing this morning for shipment. During the day they 
put 195,000 into the packing-boxes, and put 130,000 of these in the cases. 

I got Professor Baird’s schedule to-day and immediately began to 
fill it. 

January 20.—Yesterday evening I took a deep (34-inch) packing- 
box and filled it with damp moss and put it out in the wood-shed of the 
old hatching-house on an empty three-quarter-inch case, covered it with 
an empty packing-box, and left it from 8 p. m. till 8 a. m. to-day. 
Meanwhile the temperature at dwelling-house was +7° all night, and 
at shed on the top of this box the thermometer stood at'9° at 8 a. m. 
On opening, I found that the moss was frozen into a solid mass on top 
and sides and a little on bottom; by careful measurement, .85 inch on 
sides, 1.2 inch on ends, 1.6 inch diagonally at corners, one-quarter inch 
on bottom, and five-eighth inch on top. The moss was from under 
the bench, the same that we are using constantly in packing eggs; was 
fully as damp as average; received no extra water; was pressed in 
hard, much harder than we press with eggs. Had a three-fourths-inch 
board under it and a one-fourth over it (packing-box bottom). The 
sides were three-eighths inch thick, ends a little over one-fourth, bottom 
one-fourth; temperature of moss originally about 35°. 

Up to to-day we have used for outside packing only leaves, except 
in the case sent to Mr. W. H. Barber, Grand Falls, N. B. But to-day 
we used moss only and packed eight small cases. 

To-day I tried the temperature of moss under the table and found it 
35°, Also temperature of heap of dry moss up aloft, and found it 37°. 
The moss was all gathered on a bog on the south side of Princeton road, 
about 13 miles out. The dry was dried by spreading out on the open 
ground near our dwelling-house, after hauling green from the bog. 
The bog near our hatching-house used to furnish our moss, but we 
pulled it all over, and the new growth is still too short for use. 

I am going to try comparative efficacy of leaves and moss for outside 
packing. Would like also to try cat-tail-flag down, if I could find 
enough of it. 

In packing the eggs sent to-day we put snow on moss under each layer 
of spawn—light, dry snow, grated or scattered on. We got on from 1 
pint to 1 quart in each deep box (10,000 eggs). Besides this the eggs 
were rinsed off, before packing, in the coldest water at our command 
(from brook end of bulkhead, temperature 35°). 

January 24.—Packing again to-day. We find now and then a bursted 
shell, but few. 

Last Saturday we packed up, out of lot 7, one deep and one shallow 


[11] PROPAGATION OF THE SCHOODIC SALMON. 643 


packing-box, making about 15,000 eggs in all, in the same style as 
usual for shipment, and let them stand in the back part of the room. I 
suppose there the temperature stood at about 34° or 35°, and that they 
were as wet as those sent away. This a.m. we opened them and found 
that they have kept well, except that about 10 per cent. of them have 
shrunk some and are indented on the side; a few were burst. Not 
likely to send these away again without some picking. We took out. 
what shrunken ones we could see after turning them out into pans of 
water. Those taken out, numbering about 1,000, we place upon a tray 
to keep and hatch. After several hours in the water they seem to have 
about all swollen out to original size. During the first hour in water 
but few of them swelled out completely. These weak shells have a 
greater transparency than the others. Ihave not yet perceived any- 
thing inferior in the appearance of the embryo. So far as I have ex- 
amined, they appear of good size, good color, and with strong veins. 

After the plump eggs (from which the shrunken ones had been taken 
out) had been in water a few hours they were packed up again and 
went to McDonald, whose package was made up from lots of 8 and 9. 

I do not think this shrinking is due to the water being exhausted by 
an overstock of eggs. Were this so, the eggs at the upper ends of the 
the troughs would be good and those at the lower ends bad. However, 
to test this, I have packed up two small trays from lot 9, of which 5,000 
same from the lower stack, in trough 8, and the other 5,000 from upper 
stack, in trough 9. These are appropriately marked and stand in the 
back part of the hatching-house. 

I also overhauled three boxes put up to test modes of packing against 
cold. They were packed Saturday afternoon and left in the hatching- 
house till near 10 p. m., when I put them outdoors on the tops of some 
old hatching troughs arranged right side up, so that the air had access 
to them on all sides except merely the edges of the sides of the trough. 
These were packed as if containing eggs for shipment. Inside were 
trays full of wet moss, and around them 3 inches of dry protecting ma- 
terial, one of dry sawdust, one of dry leaves, and one of dry moss. The 
first (with sawdust) was a good deal frozen—I think an average of 
three-eighths of an inch from all sides into the inside moss. In the 
other two the frost had penetrated, as near as I could judge, an average 
of not over three-sixteenths of an inch from all sides—in some places a 
good deal less, of course—this average including the edges and corners, 
where the frost had penetrated much deeper. I cannot say surely that 
there is any difference between the dry moss and leaves. If eggs had 
been in these boxes they would not have frozen, but part of those in 
the sawdust would. 

These boxes were put outdoors Saturday at 10 p. m., temperature 
then being +14°. Next morning temperature was +11°. As soon as 
the sun was high enough the boxes were put under a shed, in the shade, 
but were brought out again after sundown, temperature +119; at 7 


644 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


next morning it was +2°. So I should say that the average tempera- 
ture for the whole 36 hours was about 103° F., or, that being 214° be- 
low freezing, I may call it (214 by 36=) 774 degrees of frost. I think 
I can say that these packages would protect eggs against 1,000 degrees 
of frost. I am surprised that there should be no showing in favor of 
dry moss over leaves, and also that sawdust should have done so well 
compared with them. One of these boxes I had packed in p. m. in same 
manner with dry moss, and put out in same place at 4.45 p. m. 

January 25.—This p. m., at 2.15, I took in and opened the box put out 
at 4.45 p. m. yesterday. I find that the inside moss is frozen on top 
about one-eighth of an inch. Without examining further, the boxes 
were repacked and put out again. This had been out for 213 hours. 
Temperature at 7 this morning was—2°; same at 10 a. m.—say an aver- 
age of about 0 for 214 hours. Eggs would not have been reached by the 
frost had the box contained them. Quite a number of the shrunken 
eggs picked out of lot 7 have been hatched—weak fish. Lot 1 has not 
yet begun to hatch. | 

January 26.—This p. m. Munson carried out from stream to old hatch- 
ing house eight deep stacks of eggs, making sixteen common stacks, or 
about 320,000 eggs. They are all out of lot13. They have just reached 
the stage of sensitiveness; no color in the eyes yet. We handled them 
very carefully. They were hauled out on the “ toboggin.” 

January 27.—This morning measured water at the old house. It is all 
flowing in the fourth and fifth faucets, only those troughs being now 
occupied by eggs. 

I find of this the north aqueduct furnishes 1.67 gallons per minute. 
Temperature of bulkhead 40°; that is from main spring. Temperature 
of north aqueduct, 374°. 

Last Monday, 24th, we packed a box with wet moss inside, dry moss 
outside, and put it out at 4.45 p.m.; examined it next afternoon on the 
top (see that day’s notes) and found frost had penetrated about an eighth 
of an inch, or a little less. It was then put out again and left. To-day 
I take it in at 9 a.m., and open and examine it allthrough. I find frost 
has penetrated on top about one-half inch, and on bottom about three- 
eighths of an inch; outsides about three-eighths of an inch; in corners 
14 to 2 inches. Had there been eggs in this box the top layer of upper 
box and bottom of lower box would probably have been frozen, and the 
corners of other boxes a little, enough to make three layers in all, or a 
loss of 7,500 out of 35,000 eggs. The temperature meanwhile has been: 
Monday, 7 a.m., +2°; Tuesday, 7a. m. —2; Wednesday, 7 a. m., +124; 
Thursday, 7 a.m., —1; and the days have been cold throughout. 

January 30.—On the 24th I packed up in two shallow packing-boxes 
(5,000 each) two selections of eggs from lot 9—5,000 from lower stack 
of trough No. 8, and 5,000 from upper stack of trough No. 9. They were 
packed as for shipment, and placed on the shelf on the back (west) side 
of the old hatching house. To-day we unpacked them and put them 


[13] PROPAGATION OF THE SCHOODIC SALMON. 645 


into trays again. We found some indented, but by no means so many 
in either of these lots as in those of lot 7, packed for two days, on 22d and 
24th, nor were they so seriously indented as those. 

Without doubt the indented eggs were most abundant in those from 
lower end of trough. We picked out 300 of the indented and put them 
by themselves as lot 27. The eggs from lower end of trough are num- 
bered 25; those from upper end, 26. Lot 24 consists of the shrunken 
(indented) ones of lot 7 that were picked out from those picked for ex- 
periment on 24th. So far as this goes it rather indicates that the water, 
after passing through a good many stacks, has lost part of its nourish- 
ing powers, and from this cause the shells are weak; but this single ex- 
periment is by no means sufiicient to settle the question, for there may 
have been, even in this case, some other difference in the eggs, or some 
difference in the packing, that would account for it. I think these were 
packed better than on 22d. Don’t know about the pressure. I am in- 
clined to think dryness most favorable to indentation, and that great 
pressure may favor it some. As to exhaustion of water, this presents 
the worst case in our house, lot 25 being from lower stack of fullest 
trough, which also had the smallest supply of water. I have directed 
that in refilling the house fewer eggs be put in this than the other 
troughs. . 

February 1.—Returned to Bucksport, leaving W. H. Munson in charge 
of the Schoodic station. 

The remaining shipments of eggs, amounting to 792,000, were made 
by Mr. H. H. Buck and Mr. Munson in March, after which Mr. Munson 
conducted alone the hatching of the 25 per cent. reserve, and the plant- 
ing of the fry in Grand Lake, which was brought to a very successful 
issue in June. 


[14] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


646 


Sdensove z £ I Zz 0 ZS ¢ “aT Curd 09 “ur "8 CG's WOAy I SNLD 
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; Ajsnoraoid 9so0qy “jo qavd Surneys0ag 
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ce Coe | eae Peis erie | gjss ose ain lele ial [mises i= Breen on |i Samer eases ane = - sevieg seeiriniea Se ee heed SL 
* 000 ‘9 eee OSG 69 T SZ &F +I €8 “UIT “urd F 04 ‘WOT “ud g Mos gYySnRD | TT 
8390 €89'T me SOTBULOJ LT |------|->--- “*! 000 ‘Z0L OIF LI¥ 8z0‘T | OT ro PLL 119 G19 'T 
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seeeee z 000 ‘OT ce sisicasicl=tche| cleiajeleiej=in||(eimi=eleleielei|sie!ersiciel=/=ilialeirivie'mimini| “/aies>eiciec||cicieisicinci-)/e>oisics-oo- umn ® Aupaoison- JO SULMABOSOST= || 
dejacmisic baistoiele sasbianelnuisisiinsciee secs 3G Jo 
a Salle 000 ‘s¢ te as Gg SIT 0 sé 8 9LT ¥66 "UL "8 G pus qYF Jo “urd F MoeMJoq YYSNVD | G “AON 
99 “q “O88I 
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647 


‘oTVMeZ TOV IOJ OEQ‘T SI 8550 Jo pork oSvi0Ae OY} so}eUTS0 peel ae e804} 0} SuUIpIONDW “8380 OFL‘9zE'Z 02 [wq02 
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PROPAGATION OF THE SCHOODIC SALMON. 


[15] 


«8830 $£9'T 
qova plork soyemoy pop‘y |---77° "77555"! 000 ‘Bes ‘Sx | S68‘'T | Lep‘L | eLF‘T | ez | 66€ €c0‘T | 869 
ssicrsics® &% 000 ‘z SUL CG i ¢ SEE ST OE ROCRIRGE S| RONG OGD BGA CRSA MESO SCGo "Tus" "=" 9917 POTLINY 1B TOU ‘YST 
odl10n ¢ UlBMOL OLeY—"o7%” ‘Surpuvyory | ¢z 
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; Seo S080) “pas “urd F 04 ‘q30% ‘Ue L WHOIS FUSNED 
seeeee iz 000 ‘ez SSH G5I Mit: edjiun e10joq sy Sulpuvyqery 
BF [ter eraser erect ease ae = oie nici neem meme ec mecinne|. cic cacinerivinivicis cin ogm icin siemens suiumedsay | 7z 
[rseee ---| 9 ~~ 9diiun oroyoq Ysy SulTpueyaxy 
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HEQG so cana cian ele} sin\eialeieieie|| [setae eiminia)||-tia\—se)oi~'< |\etn!=[ee[e\~||v.~/eln'e\eiel|\slninrals v= |ulolalelnja/m(ninian\sy=n)~lalofn1=\s[aeis /atoialsiare Suse 02 
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qove prerk sereuey 2ez‘T |-----*|-------- 000 ‘280'% | 9ea‘t | ugz‘T 
seeee-| gy 000 ‘29 Z63 sgoosano a[eiaiaaleir oie teiatetetelvieve cisiere Gore Veie ae Suyumedsory 61 


[16] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


648 


SB ee ee Oe ee ton ho on on AAANNNTS 


“So8Bo JO ‘ON | 


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649 


PROPAGATION OF THE SCHOODIC SALMON. 


[17] 


» 

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[18] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


650 


9F oe eee OP |e Mg gp Tee | Cos Pel tele | Gek LT |. EPL. |S rie totes Messrs 000 ‘sg j-** WUT ‘avg yureg |-*---* -AomoaAg ‘OY 
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XXV.—REPORT ON THE PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF 
SHAD (ALOSA SAPIDISSIMA) IN THE SPRING OF 1880. 


Two stations for propagating shad were established and maintained 
during the season of 1880; one of them in Spesutie Narrows, near Havre 
de Grace, which had been so successfully operated in previous years by 
the United States and Maryland Fish Commissions jointly ; the other a 
new one at the Washington navy-yard, through the courtesy of Commo- 
dore Richard L. Law, Chief of the Bureau of Yards and Docks, and 
Commodore John C. Febiger, commandant of the yard. Their hearty 
co-operation in placing the facilities of the navy-yard at the disposal of 
the Commission evidenced their interest in the work. 

Nearly 30,000,000 of young shad were produced at and distributed 
from these stations—an increase of about 14,000,000 over the aggregate 
result of the several stations operated the previous year. 

It was not thought practicable to continue the work on Albemarle 
Sound during this season, but early information of this intermission 
‘was given to the State Commissioners of North Carolina, that the sta- 
tion might be occupied by them. Mr. 8. G. Worth, the efficient Super- 
intendent of Fisheries of that State, pushed the work with creditable 
zeal and flattering success, depositing the fish hatched at this station 
by his corps, in the adjacent waters and in the other rivers of North 
Carolina. 

Havre de Grace Station.—Mr. John 8. Saunders, of Baltimore, who had 
with so much fidelity and zeal administered the work at the Albemarle 
Sound Station during the operations in North Carolina last season; and, 
later, had been transferred to the charge of machinery barge No. 2 with 
its accompanying equipment as a branch of the station at Havre de 
Grace, was placed this year in charge of the entire work at the mouth 
of the Susquehanna. The result of the hatching and distribution from 
this station will appear in the appended tables. 

The two barges containing the machinery, and the two furnishing 
quarters for the operatives, were towed, on the 29th of April, from Bal- 
timore, where they had been kept during the winter, to Spesutie Narrows, 
the entrance to this harbor having been improved by dredging. The 
towing of these barges was performed by the revenue steamer “ Ewing,” 


which had been kindly detailed for the purpose. 
[1] 653 


654 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


On the 3d of May the first eggs were taken, and the production was 
gradually increased until about the middle of the month, when the max- | 
imum yield was obtained. The operations were carried on with varying 
success up to the 10th of June, the time at which the Maryland law re- 
quires fishing to cease. Up to this date 13,355,000 eggs had been pro- 
cured. 

As the eggs were procured only from those fish taken for market, and 
as none were taken for the express purpose of obtaining their eggs, the 
production was dependent upon the fishermen, and when the local laws 
required a cessation of fishing, there was, of course, no other source of 
supply, and the operations at this point were necessarily discontinued. 

The excessive drought during the month of May, and the prevalence 
of southerly winds, caused the salt or brackish water to extend unusually 
high up the Chesapeake Bay, the water becoming so brackish at the sta- 
tion as to make it advisable to move the entire equipment from Spesu- 
tie Narrows to a point above Havre de Grace where the water was en- 
tirely free from salt. This was done on the 30th of May. The advantage 
of having such floating apparatus as this station was provided with was 
demonstrated on the occurrence of this abnormal condition, as the equip- 
ment was moved without loss of fish, eggs, or time, to a locality some flve 
miles distant. 

The aggregate results of the season were materially lessened, how- 
ever, aS during the period when ripe breeders were most plentiful the 
gillers declined to let the agents of the Commission handle their catch 
on account of some dissatisfaction caused by a reduction in the price 
paid for the fish utilized for hatching purposes. The magnitude of the 
work having so materially increased, and the number of fish handled 
being so much greater than in previous years, it was found advisable 
to lessen the price offered for ripe shad, which, however, was always 
maintained above the ruling market rates. The fishermen, without due 
consideration of the subject, refused for a few days to allow their fish 
to be handled unless they were purchased at the same rate as in previ- 
ous years. However, after a temporary interruption, the fishermen ac- 
cepted the conditions, and the results of the season, although somewhat 
influenced by this interruption, were most gratifying, as the yield of this 
station, as already stated, aggregated between 12,000,000 and 13,000,000 
of young shad, an excess of over 2,000,000 in production beyond the yield 
of the two stations operated in this locality the previous year. 

On the 25th of May the first car-load shipment was made from this 
station, the car having been furnished by the Philadelphia, Wilmington 
and Baltimore Railroad Company. Over a million of young shad were 
transferred from Havre de Grace to the Nanticoke River and deposited 
in that stream near Seaford, in Delaware. This was effected without 
loss. 

On the 12th of June, while the fish on hand were being transferred 
from the hatching vessels to the depot for a shipment to Maine, a terrifie 


[3] PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF SHAD. 655 


wind storm, accompanied by heavy rain, broke the barges away from 
their moorings and cast them ashore, causing a loss of between 800,000 
and 900,000 fish and eggs, or rather the involuntary deposit in the Sus- 
quehanna River of that number. Suflicient, however, were saved to 
make a good car-load, with a few additional fish which were sent from 
the Washington Station. Nearly a million shad were taken on this trip 
to Maine and divided between the Penobscot and Kennebec Rivers. 
The Commission is again indebted to the Philadelphia, Wilmington and 
Baltimore Railroad Company for the car in which this shipment was 
made and for the arrangements with the other companies for the move- 
ment of the car by fast passenger trains to Bangor. Mr. Stillwell, one 
of the State Commissioners of Maine, met the car at this point and 
selected the places of deposit. 

During the month of May, Mr. J. P. Creveling, of the Pennsylvania 
Commission, by direction of the Commissioners, procured from this sta- 
tion nearly half a million of young shad, which were deposited in the 
upper waters of the Susquehanna River. 

At the close of the season, half of the equipment was transferred to 
Baltimore to be remodeled, and from thence taken to Tangier Sound to 
be used in the experiments in the artificial propagation of the oyster in- 
augurated by Major Ferguson, Commissioner of Fisheries of Maryland, 
the barges finally to be transferred to Washington for future service on 
the Potomac River. The rest of the equipment—that is, one machin- 
ery barge, and one barge occupied as quarters—was left at Havre de 
Grace, to be used again the succeeding year. 

The disposition of the fish produced is shown in the tables appended, 
the yield of this station being incorporated with the distribution of the 
fish hatched on the Potomac. 

Washington navy-yard station.—In order to determine the feasibility 
of hatching shad by the use of hydrant water, and for the purpose of 
producing them in large numbers at a convenient center of distribution, 
a station was improvised at the Washington navy-yard by permission of 
the Navy Department, and through the courtesy of the commandant of 
the yard. 

At the western end of the ‘“ship-house” a number of cones, arranged 
according to the Ferguson system, were set up, a few at first, afterwards 
more and more, until about forty-six were in place. The number was 
increased as fast as the vessels could.be manufactured, and they were 
kept to their full capacity during most of the season. It was necessary 
that this apparatus should be operated outside of the ship-house in the 
open air, as it was deemed imprudent to have lights within the building, 
and they were a necessity for the proper conduct of the work. 

The water was supplied to this apparatus from a hydrant connection 
near by. The eggs were nightly collected 15 or 20 miles down the river 
and brought up upon the “‘ Lookout,” a small steamer in the service of 
the Maryland Fish Commission, which had been provided with apparatus 


656 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


for the purpose. On arrival they were at once placed for final develop- 
ment in the cones above referred to. As soon as the fish were ready 
for distribution they were placed in transporting cans and then trans- 
ferred to the railroad depots for shipment. 

The experiment proved entirely successful, so large a percentage 
hatching out that the loss of eggs was scarcely appreciable, and the dis- 
tribution was readily made to all parts of the country. 

During the progress of the work, it was found that that sectior of the 
Potomac River immediately adjacent to Fort Washington was the most 
productive of ripe shad, and it was therefore deemed advisable to sta- 
tion a portion of the spawn-takers at this point. Permission having 
been obtained from the War Department, a building on the reservation 
was occupied as quarters for this portion of the force. The eggs when 
collected were placed in vessels suspended in the water, which kept them 
in good condition until they could be transferred to the hatching appa- 
ratus at the navy-yard. 

This sub-station was occupied until the 19th of June, when it was 
abandoned, as shad were no longer taken in sufficient numbers to in- 
duce further work at this point. 

Advantage was taken of the peculiar facilities of the navy-yard sta- 
tion for conducting several experiments for determining the minimum 
amount of water necessary for keeping young shad in good health and 
condition, as very often it is necessary to economize water both in the 
production of the fish and their transportation. These experiments de- 
monstrated that the eggs could be as successfully hatched with less than 
one-fourth the amount of water if an abundance of atmospheric air was 
introduced with the water. 

Many other experiments were conducted during this season which 
have resulted in material modifications in the forms of the apparatus 
used in the production of, and the vessels for transporting, young shad. 

On the 23d of May the first large car shipment was made from Wash- 
ington. Mr. George C. Wilkins, superintendent of the Pennsylvania sys- 
tem of railroads at Baltimore, having provided a commodious baggage 
car, and arranged for its movement on the passenger train as far south 
as the standard gauge roads extended, and also obtained from the con- 
necting lines a similar car at this terminal, about 2,000,000 of young shad 
were loaded in the car at Washington from the navy-yard station. One- 
half of these were successfully deposited in the rivers of South Carolina 
and the other half in those of Georgia. 

On June 6 another car-load, consisting of about 700,000, was shipped 
to Cincinnati in a car kindly loaned by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad 
Company. There the fish were turned over to Dr. Griffith, the president 
of the Kentucky State Commission, who met the car in person and su- 
perintended the deposit of the fish in the rivers of Kentucky. 

The success at these stations in procuring shad in large numbers led 
to the inauguration of this system of shipping young shad by the car- 


[5] PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF SHAD. 657 


load, in place of the single messenger shipments, limited as they were to 
one or two hundred thousand fish. 

Although in previous seasons the production amounted to many mill- 
ions of fish, this was the aggregation of only one or two hundred thou- 
sand daily. Large shipments of one or two millions were impracticable, 
as before this number could be produced the earlier hatched were so 
far developed that they would require a much more abundant supply of 
food than that found in the limited amount of water to which they were 
necessarily confined. 

The production of previous years was necessarily scattered in com- 
paratively small Jots throughout the country, no streams except those 
on which the hatching stations were located receiving a sufficient num- 
ber to have their presence decidedly marked. 

Far greater results can be anticipated from the deposits of one or two 
millions of fish in a stream during a single season, and this is entirely 
within the possibilities, so great has been the advancement in the meth- 
ods employed in collecting the eggs, their development, and the trans- 
fer of the young fish produced. 

Shipment by car-loads was, therefore, a marked feature in the opera- 
tions of this season. By this method, it is confidently hoped that the 
work of distribution, not only of shad, but of carp and other fishes, can 
be made much more systematically, much more efficiently, and at much 
less cost. 

Having demonstrated the practicability of securing young shad of 
uniform ages in sufficient numbers to warrant shipments by car-loeads, it 
now becomes necessary to secure properly arranged cars for this pur- 
pose. The essentials of a car for this duty are: 

First. Arrangements for maintaining even and constant temperatures. 

Second. Capacity for conveniently storing special carrying vessels. 

Third. Automatic arrangements for change and circulation of water 
and aeration. 

Fourth. Comfortable living, accommodations for the messengers at- 
tending the fish, so that they can be constantly at their post of duty. 

Designs are being prepared for the construction of such cars, which . 
will be built as the work develops and the means are provided. 

The detail of operations at this station with accompamying tables, by 
Mr. F. N. Clark, who was in charge, will be found in the following pages. 

The fish produced at Washington, as well as the yield from the Havre 
de Grace station, were, as heretofore, transferred to various parts of the 
country. The places of deposit are given in the accompanying tables, 
which have been arranged both geographically and chronologically for 
easy reference. 


S. Mis. 29-——42 


658 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


[6] 


TABLE 1.—Record of temperature observations at Spesutie Narrows, made 
May 3 to June 15, 1880, wnder the direction of the United 


Date. 
A 
3 
id 
ia} 
< 
n°) 
Monday, May 3 ...... Here 
Tuesday, May 4 ..... 60 
Wednesday, May 5 ..|| 62 
Thursday, May 6..-.-.. 61 
Friday, May 7...--.-- | 643 
Saturday, May 8..... 63 
Sunday, May 9....... 63 
Monday, May 10 ...-. 73 
Tuesday, May 11..... 71 
Wednesday, May 12..|/ 66 
Thursday, May 13 -..|| 61 
Friday, May 14 ..-.... 58 
Saturday, May 15..-..|| 52 
Sunday, May 16.-...-.. 62 
Monday, May 17 ..--. 63 
Tuesday, May 18..-.-. 70 
Wednesday. May 19..|| 61 
Thursday, May 20*.-.|| 714 
Friday, May 21.....-. 73 
Saturday, May 22 ..../| 73 
Sunday, May 23...... 68 
Monday, May 24...-. 71 
Tuesday, May 25..-...|| 76 
Wednesday, May 26..!| 76 
Thursday, May 27 ...|| 83 
Friday, May 28 ..... 79 | 
Saturday, May 29 ....|| 68 
Sunday, May 30....-.. 73 
Monday, May 31..... 73 
Tuesday, June 1 ...-.. 73 
Wednesday, June 2..|| 58 
Thursday, June 8.-. || 63 
Friday, June 4....... || 72 
Saturday, June 5..... || 69 
Sunday, June 6 ....--. 73 
| 
Monday, June 7...... || 84 
Tuesday, June 8..... ee 
Wednesday, June 9..|) 68 
Thursday, June 10 -..|| 67 
Friday, June 11...... | 64 
Saturday, June 12.-...|| 82 
Sunday, June 13 ..... 1) 83 | 
Monday, June 14..... || 75 
Tuesday, June 15 ..-..|| 64 


‘ ° | Surface water, 7. m. 


Temperatures. 

A 
s 
w . 

SN teh (ie 

B/S] 8 
eo) a 
a |§\= 
Eelnoaites 
nan |\Aid 
° ° ° 
66 | 63 | 65 
66 | 63 | 72 
67 | 67 | 72 
68 | 68 | 64 
684 | 67 | 75 
714 | 69 | 79 
724 | 714) 78 
73 | 7241 79 
69. | 71 | 72 
70 | 69 f 61 
67 | 65] GL 
64 | 647 63 
64 | 634) 76 
67 | 664) 7 
71 | 714-79 
70 | 684 75 
73 | TL | 80 
73k | 73 | 79 
734 | 7331 69 
72% | 7244 69 
75 | 74 | 80 
77 | 764) 82 
82 | 79\) 83 
80 | 793} 87 
804 | 8034 73 
78 | 78 | 70 
78 | 78 | 68 
77 | 764 80 
77 | 75 4 74 
74 | 74976 
69 | 68 | 78 
7. | 71980 
75 | 749 74 
74 | 7331 76 
77 | 754 79 
19 aS 
m2. 

Le WPA) West 
74 74 § 69 
72 | 714) 80 
79 | 77 § 82 
79 | 78 | 80 
79 | 47473 
75 | 71 | 65 


° | Surface water, 7 p.m. 


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70 


Depth of water at station. 


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--do -.| S.W. |.-do - 
..do ..| N.W. |Strong 
Light .) S.E. |..do .~ 
Strong] N.E. |-.do. 
Light .| N.W. |..do 
-do ..J N. E. |Light 
-do ..] S. E. |Strong 
Strong] S.W. |High 
Gentle} N.W. |Light 
Light .] N. E. |..do . 
..do ..{ S.E. |..do - 
-do ..J S. E. |..do 
.-do ..] S.E. |..do 
.do ..|/ N. W. |..do . 
oi --G0)- 22S. Wied] s2GOr. 
.|Strong# N.W. |..do .. 
|--do..— E. |Strong 


(7] 


PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF SHAD. 659 


by John S. Saunders, on the United States Fish Commission barges, from 
States and Maryland Commissions of Fish and Fisheries. 


Wind. 


Direction, 7 p.m 
Intensity, 7 p.m. 


TN 


DRAIN A 


fnqna444 Pret 
= 


AnAnnnn'A 


S. E. |--do ..|/Clear .../Clear ...|Clear -... 

N. |Strong||..do ..../|Overcast Squall ..|/.- 
ING Hele-do)se}kain..-.|-.d0 ..--|Clear <..]| 
N.W. |.-do ..|/Clear ...|Clear ...,Stormy .- 
N.E. |Light .||--do ..../.-do .... Clear -..),.- 
S.E. High .| Overcast Overcast... 
S.W. |Light .|\Clear ages SUES 
N.W. |Gentle||!..do ....)--do ....].. 

E. do .. Clear, -23|--do!--- | <do\--- 

S. E. |..do ..||Overcast Overcast Overcast]... 
IN. Wie} -.do:-2||Rain...2!=- dort Rainy ssii2- 
S2we, |-2G0) 2||--@0). <>. |Clear-... (Clear .<.|l|-- 
Saws: |--d0) =-||Clear™ =-|2-do...--|--do .-<- 
N.W. |-.do ..|/-.do ....|.. do ..- 

RA COlaaea||-- d0ce. 42 


. Gentle 


PRAAnD ¢ 
44nagn4q 4 
= 


™M 
Gh 
43 
Ms 
3 
o 


24a! 
He 


naa 


Sky. 


7%.m. 


Overcast|..do .... 
BGO eee ssQOr nee 
EadO ww en 200 oo5 
5005-55-00 


BEC! Cie ses) Mek) Cees 
Rat Cs Soe Cs Ce Se 
dovecest=-dOsoc 
Smoky..|-.do ... 
Clear ...|..do ..-. 
SEG rye se Bei one 
Raines. -|.-00vss— 


Overcast|..do ..-. 


.-do ..../Showery 
Clear ...|Clear -.. 


ek Ka Vice ses eK i ah eine 
Se AOt sree <0 ae. 
SPedojeeen| ee dOisc.. 
.||--do ..../Overcast} - - 


Raine neiaine. 2 


iClear .../Clear ...|Clear ...|| 


eek Ce ess esta Ca etree eee Keyser Poe 
‘Cloudy |Cloudy .|-- 
-||Clear ...|Clear .-..}.. 


SEG yee Overcast Wy 
pClear...|Clear =. 2). - 


ee |Clear tes) c.do= anle2 
.||\Overcast|..do ....]-. 


pSdOe = s7|22dOw aa 
Cloudy .|Rain.-..|Rain 


Remarks. 


No thermometer to take tem 
» perature. 


Very low tide. 


‘lr Very high tide and water 


brackish. Rainabout 3 p. m. 


Rain abont 5 p.m. 


‘|| Moved barges to Watson’s 


Island,above HavredeGrace, 
on account of salt water, at 
10 a.m. 


| Very little tide; caused by 
river backing it down. 


‘ Terrible stormat2.15p.m.,with 


terrific wind, causing bargesto 
go adrift, losing 3anchors.and 
bedriven high on rocksashore. 
Moved alongside Cochran's 

ice-house wharf, having lost 


4 anchors in gale. 


Heavy N. E. storm all day. 


660 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [Ss] 


TABLE 2.— Record of temperature observations at Navy- Yard station, Wash 
from May 4 to June 18, 1880; under the direction of the 


Temperatures. Wind. 
3 Je 3 3 .[a || © © a a 
fie : Bs = 5 = is 
Date. Be ole alee eee. Neseee ecole 
lo] ics Sala Sa Sais 3g FAVe| = B= 
© /Z°/SAI x lant ZO\S all oF a 25) aa 
aH [Beis ales BES a ese 4 aS 
4 i=} f=) -— =| o — _ 
4d ja~iA fa nr an | A KI A pa 
ie} ie} oO ie} ° fe} fo} 
Tuesday, May 4 ...-.-------.--- eee eee Been een Cees 68 | 67 || S. E. |Light 
Wednesday, May 5 ...........- 67 | 67 | 66 | 82 | 72 69 | 68 E. |..do 
(Lhursday, May 6.252. -5 5.5.2.2 68 | 67 | 66 9 84 | 73 71 | 70 AWise \|eedo.e 
IAG BING 7, Seecosaee Saedeoce: 65 | 67 | 66 # 80 | 71 72, | 70 || S. W. |..do 
Saturday, May 8..:--..-......4. 61 | 68 | 66 | 85 | 73 72 | 70 || N.E. |..do ~ 
Sandays May 9). oases saeesceel 72 | 70 | 67 | 90 | 74 76 | 75 SS. eedove 
Mondays-Maiy 105 ssi se saan 72 | 71 | 70 § 91 | 76 75 | 74 S./ [edo 
Muiesday May, IS soseen-es-a5 =e 71 | 73 | 72 } 82 | 76 74 | 73 || S.E. |.-do. 
Wednesday, May 12.........-.- 62 | 71 | 70 75 | 74 73 | 72 Wey edor 
Thursday, May 13.-............ 61 | 70 | 70 | 73 | 73 LEAN IOTN We Niles Missy 
Hridny: May,14 ¢.2s8c0ucee eee 57 | 70 | 70 | 67 | 70 69 | 69 | N. W. |Fresh. N. W 
Saturday, May W5issc css seceae 52 | 65 | 65 7 70 | 71 71 | 71 || N. E. |Light 
Sunday, May 16............--.. 68 | 67 | 67 | 84 | 72 72 | 71 || SW. |..do. 
Monday; May 172 -2s20- oan ten. 71 | 70 | 70 9 90 | 72 73 | 72 | W. do 
Tuesday ,May 18: .---.22.:..2-.. 69 | 70 | 70 | 86 | 74 75 | 74 || N. W.|..do 
Wednesday, May 19) <2 ceecsceee 66 | 73 | 72 f 88 | 75 76 | 75 || N.E. |..do - 
Mhursdaywaiysa0we een ce sees 78 | 75 | 74 | 87 | 76 76 | 75 || S. W.|--do . 
Mriday,; May. aie 5. 52 2ko se aeeeet 71 | 74 | 748 88 | 77 76 | 75 San snore 
Saturday, May 22.............- 71 | 74 | 759 73 | 75 75 | 75 || S. E. |..do . 
SundayyMlay, 23) ses.s- sees 70 | 74 | 75 § 68 | 74 74.| 75 || N.E.|..do..JN. E 
Monday, May 24..............-. 71 | 75 | 75 4 88 | 75 | 75 | 75 || N.E. |Calm 
Tuesday, May2o.cs.ce022 eee 80 | 76 | 76 #1 85 | 76 77|76 || S. |Light 
Wednesday, May 26.........-.- 75 |77 | 77187 | 79 TTBB AN Se a le date 
Thursday, May 27 ......-------. 72 | 79 | 789 89 | 82 79|78|| S. |..do 
| R ' 
Friday Mav IZ8in babes eee 75 | 78 | 78 | 85 | 80 | 79 | 78 Soe aleaGgor 
Saturday, May 29........12...-. 75 | 79 | 78 | 75 | 80 78 | 78 || N.E.|.-do. 
Sunday, May 30..............-- 73 | 78 | 78 74 | 77 77| 78 || SE. |.-do. 
i | 
Mondays Miayeslvccesesececese 72: | 77 | 77 9 78 | 77 78 | 78 || N. W.'Fresh 
Tuesday. June 1... 22.222... 75 | 77 | 7 | 94 | 78 | 78 | 78 || S. W. Light 
Wednesday, June 2 ............ 60 | 73 | 73 § 68 | 73 73 | 73 || N. W.\Fresh 
Al nTsd ayn OMNe lei. -cco5 sess oe. 60 | 75 | 74 9 78 | 77 77 | 77 || N. W. Light 
Tidy O Aes Cl a 62 | 75 | 74 § 7 | 76 | 77.| 77 || N. W.|.-do 
paturday, une O-. seeee2 neo. 7) | 74| 75 8 79 | 76 TOA MGM Sec ||aad0, 
Sunday dunelGy---. ssc esos... 69 | 75174478 | 76 76 | 75 Saa|esdo 
Mond ainnteUNO Wi eon eo neocon 76 | 74 | 74 4 88 | 79 76 | 75 SS. |.-do 
MiresdaynwUMe! esses tesee ee on. 73 | 74 | 74 8 83 | 79 79 | 77 || N. W.,--do - 
Wednesday, June 9..-.--....... 70 , 75 | 749 78 | 75 | 15.519 ||| IN, He |22do.< 
Rhursday.dumenlOsesee seen. 68 | 75 | 75 4 72 | 75 FATAINCLEINN Ms iaa Seal feo) 
MiTdavve Neste seems ce nee 5. 74 | 74 | 74 f 88 | 77 | Oi Siulll aps isis Calm 
Saturday nine 2eesesen ses eee.. 76 | 77 | 779 94 | 79 | 79 | 78 8S. Light 
Sunday, dunedset nos cenesee- | 80 | 78 | 77 f 95 | 79 82 | 81 || N. W.|..do ..[|. N. W. ‘Fresh 
Mondays dine ls ne eae aia: 77 ' 98 178.885 | 79 78/78 || N.W.|.-do..J N. |Light -| 
‘Tuesday, June 15 ..-...--..---- 67 | 78 | 78 | 66 | 77 76 | 77 || N. E.|..do ..|N .E. |Fresh § 
Wednesday, June 16 .....-..--. 65 | 76 | 76 4 74 | 7 77 | 77 || N. E.|:-do ..f N. E. |Light J 
Thursday, June? - 3-2 225.6-- =: 70 | 75 | 76 | 85 | 77 78 | 78 || N. W.|--do ..JN. W. |.-do -.f 
Friday, June18 e222. -.5 22.0243 68 | 75 | 75 | 86 | 77 79/78 || S do..f S. |..do ..f 


[9] 


PROPAGATION 


AND DISTRIBUTION OF SHAD. 661 


ington, made by W. P. Sauerhoffand Wm. Hamlen, on the steamer Lookout, 
United States and Maryland Commissions of Fish and Fisheries. 


Wind. 


Direction, 6 
p.m. 
Intensity, 6 
p.m. 


SaiWiet=<G0!ece |= 


4 


mrs ta 
4 Hae =: 
ke 
fe") 
= 


Rw 4 ne 
4 
= 


S.E. |Fresh..| Cloudy . 
N. W. |Light ..| Clear ... 


SAW: i|S2do 2: 
INSWis)|e200) 22: 
Ss --do 


eee Calm ..|| 
N. W. |Licht 

N. E. |.-do -.-|\Cloudy 
S.E. |--do .. 

S. do ..-||--do 
S.2H.|-2dor. 2-1; 

Wis |sodoi~ ce 
INGE |/5-dOw.- 
INGE, ee G0; 2 
Sheen Calm 2s 
N. 


W. |Light ..| Clear ... 
} 


| 


SH alesdore calls 


12 m. 


Cloudy ; 
-|'Clear ... 


.|Cloudy |Cloudy |; ..do -..||-- 


d |) & 
2 8 
S 
Clear . .|| Muddy 
22 00)e/ee|l2200) 2. 
doi ...||5<do:. 
doves |ls200.- 28 
Cloudy ||-.do -. 
Clear ..||..do 
22C0yenc||2=00> 22 
Cloudy ||..do -. 
Clear ..||..do 
-|Cloudy ||..do ...||-- 
Clear ../|..do 
200) 54 |-2G0i4- 
eaia|!Ss do ...||Clear 
do ...||..do - 
--do ...||Muddy 
[do eee ||eedo 
do .:2\\-.do 
do seo. 
Cloudy ||..do . 
-do .. do 
-|Clear ..||..do ... 
edie) salls- Gora call 
Clear ..||..do ...||-- 


-|Cloudy Clear Slee 


- Cloudy Ssd0/ceatlecdo = 22 |e 


--do ...| Muddy | 
| 
Rae ales Scalise 
.|Clear .. Clear x 
Cloudy | Muddy 
-do . |--do -. 
Clear ..||..do - 
Ol ses | Sedov ae 
Cloudy | Clear -. 
SieSallectikihoce 
Clear .- 
Cloudy 
redoee 
edo: 
dese 
alee OOveee| (cea! see 
i Be do ...||--do --.||.- 
“Clear <.||--do -.-|<* 
B00 ees a0 ce lee 


Tide. 
: | 
g : 
Se Ue 
Flood Ebb - 
Slack |..do . 
Ebb -|Flood 
=|2 400) =| 200: - 
alee toy leer (ever 
-|Flood Ebb - 
-|Ebb -|Flood 
a|sedomle<doe 
--do .|..do . 
dois. dor. 
.-do .|\Slack 
--do ./Ebb . 
Flood|..do - 
EeOys||scG0r. 
edo e-G0- 
2.0. -|.-00'. 
pedo) s2do)s 
22d0)2 2200... 
\Ebb .|.-do 
..do |Flood) 
22d0%.|-.do:* 
--do .|..do - 
=2d0/.|--d0'- 
Sdoi2|=2dor 
.-do .|..do . 
-|Flood Ebb . 
:.do+|-.d0 - 
..do .|..do 
.-do .|..do 
2<do).|2=do 2 
2.00) -|'s-d0 
eed01| 2200... 
do do 


Remarks. 


Left navy-yard12.45p.m. Re- 
turned at 9.50 p.m. 650,000 
eggs. 


Thermometer 98° at 2.30 p. m. 


Left navy-yard 5.40 p. m. 
Returned to navy-yard 1.20p.m. 
Left navy-vard 4.15 p.m. Re- 
turned 11.10 p. m. 
Left navy-yard 12.50 p. m. 
Rain 5.30 p.m. Stopped7 p.m. 
Returned to navy-yard 8.53 a. 
m. Left navy-yard 3 p.m. 
Returned navy-yard 9.25 a. m. 
Left navy-yard 4. p. m. 
Returned to navy-yard 11.35 a. 


m. 

Left navy-yard1.35 p.m. Re- 
turned 10.30 p m. 

Remained at navy-yard. Left 
navy-yard 1.22 p. m. 

Returned 12.30 p. m. 

Left navy-yard 5.40 p.m. Re- 
turned 11.15 p. m. 

Remained at navy-yard. 

Left navy-yard 3.27 p. m. 

Returned to navy-yard 9.05 a. 
m. Leftnavy-yard 4.10p. m. 

Returned to navy-yard 7.20 a. 
m. Leftnavy-yard 5.30 p.m. 

Returned navy-yard 9.10 am. 
Left 5.55 p. m. 

Returned navy-yard 8.05 a. m. 
Left navy-yard 6.15 p. m. 
Returned navy-yard 6.25 a, m. 

Left navy-yard 6.30 p.m. 
Returned navy-yard 6.45 a. m. 
Left navy-yard 8.17 p. m. 
Returned to navy-yard 7 a. m. 
Left navy-yard 12.50 p. m. 
Returned to navy-yard7.15a.m. 
Left 3 p. m. Returned to 
navy-yard 9.05 p.m. Rain. 
Left navy-yard 3.20 p.m. Re- 
turned navy-yard 9.40 p. m. 
Rain. 
Left navy-yard 4p. m. Re- 
turned navy-yard 10.10 p. m. 


.| Left navy-yard 6.30 p.m. Re- 


turned navy-yard 12.25 p. m. 


-| Left navy-yard 5 p. m. 


Stationed at Fort Washington, 


.| Rain 6.30. Stopped 11 a.m. 
‘| Rain storm 3 p.m. Stopped 


4.30 a. m. 


:| Rain 9.30 p.m. 


Rain. 


‘| Rain stopped 7.30 a. m. 
_| Strong current with the ebb 


tide. Water very muddy at 
HDS 


m. 
.| Water very muddy. 


pe ease SA ls i ent 


662 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. , [10] 


TABLE 3.—Record of hatching operations at Spesutie Narrows, Md., con 
from May 3 to June 10, 1880, under the direction of the United 


Ee aa Fish taken by haul- | Fish || Ripe fish. 

Ag ee seines— taken 

=2 So by gill- 

ag an “nets— 

Date. mr a tno ‘ 

eee | eae le 

a a a ee ee a = cs 
ee) J ara a e 

No. Ibs. No. No. 
Monday, May 3 ...-.--.--- P8600 he see ee 220 uliee DOMOOOM tes se. feels 4 2 
Tuesday, May 4......----- LS S60) lee arcte ciate 354 15, 000 Q5 OME Ss oonnee 10 13 
Wednesday, May 5.--...--. 2, 060 850 396 SOPS00y| Ses eae 38 13 9 
Thursday, May 6..--...--- iweeeSholOule- sees AGA MOGOOO A eaten eases 33 20 
Friday, May 7.......-:---- SxG104| eect once 689 | 36, 300 Sa Seed 26 174 
Saturday, May 8 .........- 2, 600 2, 200 258 23,,000)|co4-05- 316 49 303 
Sunday, May 9 snieceoe sellin nonce 2 LOOK amas sce eee aee Rees aatsen 271 21 15 
Monday, May 10......:.... 2,010 225 201 8, 835 49 11 16 113 
Tuesday, May 11.......--. 1,110 1, 825 199 650 20 110 11 10 
Wednesday, May 12.......||........-. BH Ay eee Borsa aocecueee Gee caer 230 17 13 
Thursday, May 13.........||....-.---- YE Beestose tscoon baad psascasr 159 19 13 
rid ay Maye] 42 coc ssicas=cs|\teicdesesce 2 A100n lee teeeas| ese esec cel eeeeeeets 316 26 17 
Saturday, May 15..........||.......--- 4° S00) ieee coc emacisctees lanes ces 329 57 40 
Sunday, MayAGi os. oc0||doowentss a1 2) S50) ll sceosseeleacser acre tessa: 232 24 17 
Monday, May 17 .......... 2, 010 3, 195 172 748) ses oce. 380 53 39 
Muesday, Mayid8..-.occss||-coccecess 2, 650 Bie cosa | Sees x bi oe a 167 24 21 
Wednesday, May 19.......]].......... B150)||sstatealceceueatee) een 252 | 40| 30 
Pharsday, May 20: s.cesccc||ecccocees 8,300. || eesecetelesetesoees house see 249 40 32 
I 
Friday, May 21......--.---||...... sesel 2/100 By alae eee [A a 180 30 24 
| 

Saturday. Miayvio2\ceteesson| loose c sc pA Pla I Seater 9a pele Rd 219 33 27 
Sunday, May23 eecnetes ellen eee 2°57 5Nlleeaeeeee | sohowdl uve seualeg 257 | 33 26 | 


[11] 


PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF SHAD. 663 


ducted by John S. Saunders on the United States Fish Commission barges 
States and Maryland Commissions of Fish and Fisheries. 


Loss. 

rd 

oO 

=| 

& 

er 

° . 

& rs a 

tot i} an Slont 

25 5 a 
40,000 || 30,000 |......-... 
275,000 || 25,000 |.......... 
190,000 || 27,000 |......._.. 
475,000 || 75,000 |.....-.-.- 
420,000 || 175,000 |.,...---.. 
600,000 || 60,000 |.......--. 
300,000 || 30,000 |....--.-.. 
230,000 || 15,000 |...-...... 
200,000 |) 10,000 |........-. 
260,000 || 25,000 |.......--. 
220,000 || 10,000 |........-. 
345,000 || 20,000 |........-. 
790,000 || 40,000 |..........| 
340,000 || 15,000 |.......--. 
7sv,000 || 20,000 | 300, 000 
420,000 || 40,000 |.......... 
600, 000 |! 40,000 |.......... 
640,000 || 40,000 |.......... 

| 

480,000 |; 30,000 |.....-.... 
540,000 || 15,000 |.......... 
560,000 |! 15,000 J.......... 


Fish hatched. 


10, 000 


250, 000 
163, 000 
400, 000 
245, 000 


540, 000 
270, 000 
215, 000 


190, 000 


235, 000 


210, 000 


325, 000 
750, 000 


325, 000 
760, 000 


380, 000 


560, 000 


600, 000 


450, 000 


525, 000 
545, 000 


Results. 
os So 
os os 
~ = 
7g ig 2 e Remarks. 
se <] 
Be oe 
ook don 
SRS = Bi) 
ey i) 
MOWOOOs Saas emi Eggs badly impregnated and a great 
many taken too young. 
250; G00 2s cescss ne 
163,000) |io occ esce 
400%000F | esaeeeces 
245;000M teonae secs 150,000 eggs lost by some one drop- 
ping coal oil in cone. Placed 
10,000 young fish out in the Nar- 
rows from eggs taken on 3d. 
540, 000 |..... 
270, 000 
215, 000 Placed 413,000 fish in Spesutie 
Narrows on evening of 1€th, 
petched from eggs taken 4th and 
th. 
eases 200, 000 || Placed 250 000 fish in Spesutie Nar- 


rows. Placed 150,000 fish above 
Havre de Grace, from eggs taken 
on 6th. Delivered to Mr. Crevel- 
ing on 17th. 
225, 000Geoscns cate Placed 190,000 eggs in Spesutie Nar- 
rows. Placed 145,000 fish above 
Havre de Grace from eggs taken 
on 7th. 
210: 0000 tee. cece Placed 190,000 eggsin Spesutie Nar- 
rows. Placed 300,000 above Havre 
de Grace from eggs taken on 8th. 
Shad taken very hard and not 
yielding full number of eggs. 


325 1000s Pesecceaes Placed 270,000 above Havre de 
Grace from eggs taken on the 9th. 
MoOsO00N eeseeeee Placed 215,000 above Havre de Grace 


from eggs taken on 10th. Shad 
taken small and not yielding full 
number of eggs. Scarcity of 
males reported by some of men 
taking spawn. 

75,000 | 250,000 || On 21st delivered to Mr. Creveling. 
460000) | 25.5.5. <6: Delivered to Commissioner of Fish- 
eries of Pennsylvania 200,000 
young fish at 6 p. m. from eggs 
taken llth and 12th. Lost 300,000 

oung fish by salt water being 

acked up by heavy southeast 
' storm on 21st. 
240,000 | 140,000 |, Placed in cylinder overboard on 22d 
to keep, as per Major Ferguson's 
order. 
| Placed 225,000 young fish in Spesu- 
tie Narrows about 6 p. m. from 
eggs taken on 12th. 
Se aitaemintal= 560,000 | Placed 250,000 young fish above 
Havre de Grace from eggs taken 
on 13th and 14th, at 10 a. m. 
Bal Sa aitoren tieisiosisernice | Placed 285,000 young fish above 
Havre de Grace from eggs taken 
on 14th, atl0 a.m. Placed 200,000 
young fish above Havre de Grace 
from eggs taken on 15th. Placed 
! 200,000 young fish in Swan Creek 
from eggs taken on 15th. 
SS Sn A IECH| bnosocoder | Placed 350,000 young fish above 
Havre de Grace from eggs taken 
on 15th. Placed 50,000 young fish 
above Havre de Grace from eggs 
taken on 16th. Delivered 25,000 
young fish to Pennsylvania com- 
missioner on 16th. 
525 (000K acces Placed 460,000 young fish above 
Havre de Grace from eggs of 17th. 


BES MOONEE S assess) 


664 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


[12] 


TABLE 3.—Record of hatching operations at Spesutie Narrows, Md., con 
Jrom May 3 to June 10, 1880, under the direction of the United 


343 


6, 109 


Boa | Sei ’ ; 
a7 rahae Fish taken by haul- Fish Ripe fish. 
ad note seines— taken 
Oo me) by gill- 
ox 15) 
aa Sen nets— 
Date. te of Ch. : : 
5 5 ada I ra 0 g 
I ae = nS A a= j : n 3 
& g wa est 3 wa a es 
No. Lbs. No. No. 
Monday, May 24 .-..-.---.||---.-...-. CAD) ScesceSs|easbesaca5 Soassace 38 7 5 
Tuesday, May 25 ........-.||/..-..0..-. D900 |Reeeaecel|smssite site| ean 131 14 12 
Wednesday, May 26.......||.......... p45): | legodouod||codondcsanlecaasocd 52 6 4 
Thursday, May 27 2- soc -accttesmce sissies UAC We oog5ad odeoocsod|Sdachcad 143 5 5 
Hriday; May 28c-- sc acoseal|\cs~nd soca |tseemereiel [taecse sallsseetessqnc|(qeesncce pasa sec] Conmeene | eeeeeee 
Saturday, May 29). 20.0.5. ol!/2--ss2ces- DF A00) Passe aise soeseetecen| <seeisciee 169 13 11 
SundayaMayid 0c see ceral sseeeeasee AON |Seeoeses|acoae QoasdbossqGse 50 6 4 
Monday, Wlayi3ll cose ct a5||eeceieceee 2.100 | leeteeeesercas cee lsecenees 229 27 254 
Tuesday une eso. sse s(t ecee conn GET tl bh oS. c|jooddoccdcd| |pesasaoe 58 10 9 
Wednesday, June 2 .......]|........<- 2:00 | ROSS aoe Pool lseeeeriak 179 20 17 
Thursday, Sunes ---scec-lleosseeeeas 400! ||| So srercictcs||natcia'saterll satcriemie 45 3 3 
Mriday,;uUne4 2.25.6 -4525\||poe ee eee 5; 000 Pee ccecc| ste cats culeoaeeetee 210 37 34 
Saturday, duneyo---2-2 5c] eee ee ee Ts 700} bess choc me ce sewatclleaaciceee 62 12 8 
] 
Suday,,dune 6-2. -ostsacnullooeassase- pyr ea Pee rsa al Pc en 241 29 22 
Mondayaviuneiecssss soe aallaeee eee A600] |S 2S 5 SSeS PO Bee oe 557 40 32 
Muesday, dune 8':..-.225.-||-s2.50 2. 1400 Coon aewclnooeloclsctiag|seeeceee 52 13 11 
Wiednesday,; June 9.2... -/|.2-......- 1580s] Pe sees lineceteortes|| seat 91 17 11 
Thursday, une 10)-s- sc sccl lecs see 2: 400i | eka sess | Gasemeeiaete se cteeee 86 24 19 
| 
| f 
! | 
| 


20, 730 | 48, 201 


2, 953 | 161, 333 


amt | 660 


| 


[13] 


PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF SHAD. 


665 


ducted by John S. Saunders on the United States Fish Commission barges 
States and Maryland Commissions of Fish and Fisheries—Continued. 


Eggs obtained. 


100, 000 


240, 000 


80, 000 


100, 000 


220, 000 
80, 000 
510, 000 


180, 000 


340, 000 
60, 000 


680, 000 


160, 000 


440, 000 
640, 000 
220, 000 
220, 000 
380, 000 


13, 355, 000 |/1, 297, 000 


Loss. 


25, 000 75, 000 


70, 000 50, 000 


425, 000 


Results. 
; =r =a 
5 Se | Ss 
3 | 2 By 
~ os oo 
3 aS ts 
4a Te wo, 
a fal ets a_f 
“4 ZA nA oO 
ey ae ae es 
75000) eee see eee eens 
150, 000 /1, 050,000 | 150, 000 
PAUSE) 0)M eee a A a 
B0K000) |e net ene ee 
210,000 |..........| 210,000. 
TOAOQOOR seems aeons 75, 000 
485,000 | 485,000 |.......... 
160,000 | 160,000 |._........ 
300,000 | 300,000 |.......... 
So O0Or ae bon O00) | Mame eae ase 
650,000 | 650,000 |........-. 
140,000 | 140,000 |.......... 
400,000 | 400,000 |......-... 
G00; 0008 |seeeee ae ee 600, 000 
2O0K000n | eaeec ce eee 200, 000 
200,000 | 100,000 | 100, 000 
860,000 | 360, 000 |.........- 
42,058, 000.19, 148, 000 [2aseo7 080 


Remarks. 


Strike among gillers for 50 cents 
apiece for ripe fish, which ac- 
counts for few eggs taken. Placed 
240,000 young tish in Narrows 
from eggs of 18th. 

Sent to Havre de Grace for ship- 
ment 1,750,000 young fish from 
eggs of 18th, 19th, 20th, and 21st. 
Great scarcity of male fish re- 
ported. 

Eggs taken, very bad, being badly 
impregnated by scarcity of males. 
Lost good quantity by new hatch- 
ing boxes of Mr. Wright. 

Placed out in Narrows 1,070,000 
young fish from egys of 22d and 
23d. Could not send above Havre 
de Grace for wantof cans. Eggs 
badly impregnated. 


| Sent 150,000 young fish for distribu- 
tion to Lush River from eggs of 
25th. 

| Storm at night; few gillers out. 
Moved barges to Watson’s Island 
on account of salt water at 10a. m. 


| Heavy storm preventing many gill. 
ers from going out. 


Heavy squall preventing gillers 
from laying out. 

| Placed 285,000 young fish in Bush 

River from eggs taken on 29th 

and 30th May. 

| Lost out in river 485,000 young fish 
by overflow of cylinders and break 
in wire bottom, from eggs of 31st 
May. Heavy gale from southwest 
prevented gillers from going out. 

Placed in river 460,000 young fish 
from eggs of 1st and 2d. 

Placed in river 55,000 young fish 
from eggs of 3d. 

Placed in river 650,000 young fish 
from eggs of 4th. 

Placed 140,000 young fish in river 
from eggs.of 5th. 


Placed 400,000 young fish on flats 
opposite Watson’s Island on 12th, 
from eggs of 6th. 

Shipped 900,000 young fish at 2 p.m. 
on 12th, to go to Maine, from eggs 
of 7th. 8th, and 9th. 

Turned out 100,000 young fish, which 
were intended to be shipped to 

"Maine, but storm prevented. 

Had terrific storm on 12th at 2.15 p. 
m., causing barges to drag anchor 
(and break chains of three), c2us- 
ing us to lose eggs of 10th, which 
were nearly out, and barges to go 

ashore. 


[14] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF. FISH AND FISHERIES. 


66 


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qv suoynsado Duryoiny fo proooy— fF ATAVL 


667 


PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF SHAD. 


a 


[15] 


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--- 92 Avy ‘Kepsoupa Ay 


sse-- og Avy ‘Atpsony, 


[16] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


668 


‘morMRy 2 Joysoneg 
“MUBULION| IS "Ay “OD 
‘gsuopuneg “g Tyor 
“SUI[AAIIO “qd “£7 
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RO Se a EY ES Ba oes Cpe purjioqumn{) |-----"--""- op--=") 000 ‘008 000 ‘00g =| eT Avy |--*-7-- op = eG 
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—Jo Areynqry, midcenale ONT T "29819 
*poyooys ulvedj}s “m0ly 
“USE JO L9Q UI WT -cj8 Suravol jo oyeq 


669 


[17] 


PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF SHAD. 


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50 Olijis al | Poste ars BOD Bags peers ca DONT SOI TU qo |e neces ee O Dems pegs OD es O00K0G 
“SIT WL [oT Oper frre t cree toany puvsry | SutssorD peospreyy |----------* op----| O00 ‘0z 
“KONIG S| eee essai Opps 24" =s5"*22>" OPeuoosex) |2 +> Gas OUIOIOL IBVON |°"°""°"""""" OP'="*! QOD ‘OF 
"od. |ttooo ERNLOSS Ua | cet gece OO TERT G) ii eats siaeeeene eee O Peto ce enemas OD Sees NO00R0G 
“SIN “Wf [777° Wddississypy |-*7+7*++--** JOALY 9IVS | SUIssorN pwoaprey |--*+-++++-* Op--e- 000 ‘0% 
‘q10dmaaeq “9 ‘9 °° °° 7-7" Tamossiy |**-**°°"** JoaTy osesG |-°" 7° “77 AYO Teg [77 **t**EmossrpT | 000 ‘oF 
“od sefe'ele\a\e ise Opi -"|*ronessessse==27- Opssies lai cues ns OP een | reese orton Diss -ae | KOOOKOS 
SHICTO Nude ls see wae ovuloyog |* -ovml0j0g ‘Ig U1oysen | O'q ‘WoySuyse MA |*---- pace OD z= | OOOs00G 
“AOL W'S |-* Auoysorysnox |--AuoysorysnoZ oyqy |" *° he teers ie O Duman! O00K0G 
“‘smOMIUIIG TOJAONT |" Avg oyvodusoyy |-**7*°"**** JoaATY Ysng | -sueafiI9g IvONT ssee"e-puepthiepr | 000 ‘oct 
ONS PO |e sicinennieeinimn@iniciais Seis efeisiel esc | esas “""")""BuTporey WyN0g 000‘008 
“HACIO NA | “77° *** OvUtoZO |° “ovMOJOg “Ig U1oysey | OM WoPouryse A |*----""---- OP'--+| OOO ‘OST 
‘od peepee cen O cael: | Pamir ig a ae, cisiSteS ODS a tiieereee fo ey OD ies tae pone ae O Dern  OOORGL 
‘srapuneg “§ uOr | Avg oyvodesoqy |--**"**-- euueyenbsng | SMorIIeNT OFJNSEdg }--"-""""--- Op----| O00 ‘010 ‘T 
STCETOUNO AM ios ao a USSR ie eve Reta 2) Lae eee al ees Diss lsens se anes ODern a000,0GP 
‘MUBUILONTIS “Al “OQ |°° "77" OVMTOJOY | -ovmMojJOg “Ig W19yseq |°O'q ‘WozRSuTTSU AA peretagen nO Deyn ROOOKUOP 
Heb: (54) 2 POT O 6 Vil PIO II IEC} bo Cr Geos UGXNG Hie | eae ni yemegT j----*7*"°"" op--°"| 000 ‘00S 'T 
‘MO[UIRA, 3 Youreneg |-------- aries ODE crlletae "ro" IOATY OVMIOJOT |°""FUIOT 8,AO[XOTT |----7*- puvpArey_ | 000 ‘oe 
‘od “keg oyvodesayy |----7**">-* OMOoTJUE NT PLOPGO CS | eee ie op’ ~~") 000 ‘0c0 ‘T 
SOG. jae eet OD ee | iis eae OO0() SOUP Seas ao TORO [esses SSS elope n ili qnn oT 
“STOUT *N |" JOATY OIVAV[OC |°*"-"YoorD vruvysrayH |---°"* Woysurempray |--7--*- ereMeVyog | oco ‘Ozt 
SUUBULIORYOG. AN °O) | Soe ss OD aie: | sae ces en ONT Boye oes OO RARG| | osicnen se Fone =i) ing ond 
‘uo[ULy y Poqsoneg | Avg oyvodusayy |--*7 ttt oro ovmojog |°""gUulog 8, AoTxoyy |*--""***"*- Op--° "| QO ‘ONG 
SHALES NG Ge |e ae toes ovm0j0g | “9BMOJOT “Ig U1ojseq {Od ‘Wopsuryse my |---7-"--7"- Op'-**| O00 ‘OOF 
*siopuntg ‘g uyor |-Aeg oxvodesaqg |------- "> euuvgonbsng | sMoileN orynsadg |----**----- op -7"| 000 ‘OFZ 
“UUBULION TIS Y YAO |*"" "°°" = OVULOJOT |" “OVMOJOT “IG W1I9}suq |-Y ‘ql ‘Woysurysv Ay |-°**-*- pueysaep_ | 000 ‘008 
‘od “**epoorqovred y |---"----oaqoooyeayeyy |--oT[TAUOJ[og awaNy [o> 7 op -~*| 000 ‘96% 
HY 0 fie al COR et Cie Fa} 14811 G79) POC OO CRORES AOT[IA | 7° WOYSULAOD AvaNT |---777°"--- Op *] OOO ‘967 
“BIT “AL | VYVUINAPY |" - "7" "eee" GQMIODO |-SuIss0I peosryiersy |---------e1S1094) | 000 962 
“WOT? 
‘og “*** 9OPdd WILD |°""""""*"" COPS OFITT | -VIS STOMON wo NT |---*" "7" Op---"| ONO ‘OF 
0d “77 Avg MeAUIT A Sczenes eees Oped ota ore is ene Se ODES lasaiciaice “= op--""| 000 ‘OF 
‘og 3p OODUG: WOLE)) Fo 525 sa OOLD 8 TOUAT, |psecro esses Opes icin sic cic 25° 0pss=*|''000"0F 
“ROXIE | <2!) "772 QOJMBG |--" 7777" OD1OIV AA | SUISSOID peorprey |°-----"---* Op--- "| 000 ‘OF 
STH WL )9 552% Sart eben a T ibeie g Tani aa cae oh eR | (ip SRA i eae, Sat ees Testes OD ian! O00) OFF 
“STI WL“ |" 57" * COTOPEM oom m eee BqQMeIey |" " TTA HOY AON |---"-°°"" 7 Op-=""! 000 ‘a9 
‘od “MOANT YVUUCARG |-*~""""°* JOAN BooMaGg |*-~* MOT}eIG VoaTIAg |*~***---""- Op----] OND ‘CLE 
SOS SILT Tia fn) ) | meee QOIVSTOD |-*°"**" "7" JaATY prorg |-woryeyg s,Aougesy |--eurporeg qgnog | 000 ‘exe 


- keg oyrvodrsoyo 


‘IOTING_ [OWOTOD 07 19A0 pouwNy, » 


MoT UU acy go OLUR) eesieecensing Op sian |e abs eateins esac Qp en =|*esea5 = s6eain on inn =|"Seinn=e— mig? =" = -onniag 


000 ‘009 
000 ‘SLT 
000 ‘00¢ 
000 ‘Ss 


000 ‘esz 
000 ‘G12 
000 ‘oS 


000 ‘00z 
000 ‘08 
000 ‘00% 
000 ‘0g 


000 ‘OST 
000 ‘00% 
000 ‘OST 
000 ‘SL 
000 ‘0L0 ‘T 
000 ‘ocr 
000 ‘00F 
000 ‘00S ‘T 
000 ‘00 


000 ‘000 ‘Z 
000 ‘Sz 


Avyy 


“°° Kepangyeg | 


One 
“kepsoupa Ai 
Gaeta op 

op:**- 
“*- Avpmnyreg 
pees. op 
stesess opts: 
terest s oper 
stress oper 
rorees KEPT 
<-> Aepsangy, 
terete opts 
steeees Opete 


--- epmyrg 
terest open 
treeees opere: 
cccces KBDILT 
stress opt 
- + Aepsingqy 
trees Op 
tteeees opie 
- Aepsoups AA 
Saws op.7* 


tsetse opie 


*-++ Lepsony, 
terete opts: 
---* Avpuopy 
steee oper 
steeees opie 
---+ Lepsony, 


teeeee opie 


op:**: 
steers ope: 


teres opette 
sree op ct 
tereess opt 
reese: operee 


aN WH 


ounp |*-** Avpanyeg 


ouny 
ounr 
euny 


oune 
ounp 
oun 


orp itia 
sme = sO 


ase"? AUpIIiT 


“+++ vpsinyqy TL 
ESOC 
-- Lepsoupo Ay. 


stesso 
in'eieks Aepsony, 
eeies “og 
ee ed 


se Lepingeg 
Se at 
oer ys 
voces: AUDIT 


eer ye 
--- epsanyqy, 
tte Og 


er Yet 
-+ Lepsoupoa A 


trees og 
stesso 
oenyed 
soo Lepsony, 


stesso 
sse0+ AVpPUOPL 


Avy |---- Avpuoyy | ez Avy |------ oT 
Auqy '----- Avpang | ez Avy ----** Avpung 


[18] 


/ 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


670 


eS1vyo Ul Jojsuery, 


‘S]UOMLIOd xe IOJ WOLNAIZSUY WeImosyITUTY 0} Posoyy} 


‘ponuryM0j9—'a-P ‘Ogel ‘2g aur 02 ‘ogel ‘2 Angry wmowf opow poys fo 


000 ‘962 ‘6z 
"od weer teem ewe meses em | ewww nnn seecesce Sue meesl see etree ewes ese seeeesi sees eeeuese Oprses 000 ‘OOT4 
‘og we me wwe tm mt wwe ee wee eee eee eel eee Ce ld op’ aed 000 ‘O9L x 
LPET OU Nee pbc caesar seaman se SS SIRS C0 a0e nisheicicleleisigelsiniclniasir|ecicc ses purysueyy | 000 ‘00Tx 
“MUNG “A A °° AOATY, ONY [ovr sequay |--7 777" 0990hUT eT |= *-"- vuerpuy | 000 ‘00g 
"WUBOLIODYOS “Al 'D |- °°" OLIG, OMT ovr so so Aysnpurg |-°°*r**" guomeTy |*""*"*""""-- OLN | 000 ‘00Z 
‘0d SS OE arg ra Mend Sistema ree ne Pee ee ep | ee Seo unica es mae tse Ee ae |e 7 000 ‘0G% 
SMTVIO EN is | Sears tesic ee sieriein's seis clnsie se sicieine wc cle wn'- | cic Sen aovesce sem ice crores pueyAreyy | 000 ‘c8y 
od cess" qoosqoueg |-°°°"** SeaHMeMeEyeyy |" Svoymemeyyepy |------ "°°" Op -- "| OOS ‘ZE8 
uUInd “A |" We900 OUR} Y |--o7 osqouuey j-"“"""** OT[TATOIV AA |" "77° °t* OTLETT | 00G ‘zee 
SO (ieee: | ceciees OVULOJO |" “OVNIOJOT ‘Ig WIEST ‘0'a ‘WOPULTSY AA pcmceemmen ODE k 0002 008 
“ATED NL ee ey re [oe oe ee ear ed er oe ae Re a voeree-puvpAIvyy | 000 ‘CLT x 
‘qr0duoavd 2 STA | oostouvig wUeg|-ccces**"-- oJWOMIEIORS |--°7 7°" > VUMITNOT, |--****eTMIOJTTVD | 000 ‘GTZ 
“SUIUOL "A UVTI | Avg oyvodesoyy |---+*+-+--+--- ovuloyog |°""°"""" STC OFT [77777277 * Op" "| 000 ‘00g 
HIE ONG lessee OVULOJOT |" “OVULOJOg “Ig Wleyseq | OQ‘ ‘WoysuTYSv A, |--"°*"*"""* OP" "| OOO ‘GL 
*puu 
‘od aucmesscc.s* Op iso's |e vieecs seseisiceac Onser:| 187. eee puaseneee ODEdes|(ON0O0T 
‘s1opuneg ‘sg uyoL |-<egq oxvodeso 9 sroeeess eaUEyonbsng | -[S[ §,W0s}7 A, FO crorte puey repr 000 ‘00F 
od poet eC LOU OBI B OW es ee ange nas oA 4 6S [fs ee ona Aucqiy SG Fig eC OL 000 ‘OST 
“UUVUMIONIS “AA “OD | VYVUILYTW |--°° °°" JOAN OOU0DDH |°°"~" oTttaas POTMAL [7° BIT1004) | 000 ‘OST 
‘oqsonvg gq UVTI | oot Op -s\"= sorereooee-* OpmOJOg |" WOpsuryseAA FIO |-°°°°"""* ° Op'--*| 000 ‘O0T 
pure 
SSLOPUNBG CTO? |PasceseessciOpzscs| re ssee**> euuvyonbsng | -[sf §,wose A, YO |--7"777""** Op'--*| 000 ‘OFT 
SINS 4 SG 5 oH i ea) ad aaa pesive= =? DBULOFO [ea Se ot pee rPa==ts5-OD==="1 000 i008 
‘pur 
“SIOPUNVS "G UGOL |=" ----°""* OP's s-|---***"** VUUBGonbsng | -[T SOSH CAN On ieee cnianeee OD a7 000 ‘oc9 
Ge 4 68 1G ATS POOP COCROUET) ay SIO CeO Scio quexnyeg |--*""° “Ce ODEABO es sererorclgns- 1 Qng<ce 
- “pus 
‘s1opuneg *g UTOL |-Aeq oyvodeseyy |--****°-- euueqenbsng IST 8.m0sze My BO |7°7°7** puer: Srey | 000 ‘og 
SUP EL) LOC STOLL erase TO ATM EOUG Oil cee ara TIAN 18S, “olttaspzoydoys poe a Ayon}uo yy 000 ‘00L 
“YIVIO "NW | -TOATY ovulojzog |- ovwmojog ag wWioyseq | Od ‘WoySULYSU AA [terre op’ -~-| 000 ‘00g 
‘pus 
‘siopuneg “g ugor |- keg oyvodesoyy |------**- euuryenbsng | -[s—T 8,mos}eAy BO | 77 op’-"*| 000 ‘09% 
Os UD RO) INE Ey OPO ORIIS OvVUlOJO |“ ovUloJOg “Ig Wiaysvgy | OC ‘WoysuLyse AA |-"-" "7" purysreyT | 000 ‘008 
“poquryd 
‘ Ay[enjoVv 
sea. —yjo Areynqry, much atl ‘00UL “0721S 


‘sosodimd peyuomrsedxo 10s pos » 


000 ‘ELF ‘6% 


000 ‘oot 
000 ‘091 


000 ‘oL9 
000 ‘00g 
000 ‘SLI 


000 ‘OFZ 
000 ‘00g 
000 ‘SL 

000 ‘O0T 
000 ‘00F 


000 ‘00g 
000 ‘OT 


000 ‘OFT 
000 ‘00% 


000 ‘oc9 
000 ‘SLE 


000 ‘sg 
000 ‘00L 
000 ‘008 


000 ‘09% 
000 ‘008 


“mayvy 
Ayeurs11O 


‘Ysy JO Ioquinyy 


12 oume |-**"° Aepung 
az oung |---- Aepsony, 
61 oun |--- Aepangeg 
0¢ SUL |"" ~*~ epuus 
gT oun |--"7"- Aepray 
pl oun |--** Acpuoyy 
cL oun |fr=<-=- op ~ 

cI oun |*-~* Aepsony, 
eT COUN P|==2==""op-==- 
gl oung |----- Aepung 
gt oun |------ Aeprng 
CE OBD fi eee O Dies 

eT OUNpl|FS=*2= > Oprce 
GE OUR Pe OR a 
eI oung |--- Aepmyeg 
6 Sun) = OP 
6 oung | Aepseupe AA 

SG, ounip eases. op’-- 

g oung ~** Avpsony, 

} oun p)|-S>2-"- op’*- 

(oun e.|s*=s°2: op: =-" 
L oun |-*"* Aepaoyy 

9 oune |-"=""": op'*- 

g oun |---*- fepung 

Gg oung|--- Avpanjzes 

SusecE -yooas Jo Leqr 

*pexyo0js m1ee148 
9} ut peovyd ysy oe 


LZ oung |-*"""* Aepung 
Gz euur |*"77" Aepsony, 
61 oung |"--- Aepanzeg 
SP COUN PT ie od 
ST oun |""""" Seal 
RT oun |-°7*** Aepray 
FL oung |-°"* ~Aepuoyy 
ET OUD Lis eesure od 
(HEC AU (ene og 
gT oung |---*"" Avpung 
gr oun |--7°77- 0" 

Slr Are nt ps [a oSOOe om 
GEOUD CN === 20: 
GT OUND L | "°° """" Od 
gr oung |°--- Avpanzeg 
TT oun |"7-7° *- Lepr 
6 oun |-"*"**-0q 
6 oung |-- Avpseupo A, 
8 Ounipic-= === od 
g oung |--~*- Avpsong, 
PROUNE)|iclascs. od 
J eunp)|7-<°" Avpuoyt 
9 ,ounp |-" +2 od 
g oun |*-**"--0qd 
Qmounigi irises Avpung 
¢ oung |--*- Avpanyeg 

‘Gyo |, ee, 
jo Seq yoom yo Aug 
"M01? 


248 SULAvI[ JO 0} 


woyng.ysip fo plovos [pr hojpoUuo4syO—'G WIAVI, 


671 


[19] 


PROPAGATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF SHAD. 


‘od 


“STITL “VL 
“OXI “W'S 
“od 
“ST “AL 
‘qr0du0aeq “9D 
“1014 
“KIS SOLID “N UW 


“AoxTy ‘T'S 
oa 

*SUOULUITS 109AK9 AT 
oc 

“HILO 'N A 

“slopunes *g ugoLr 
od 

“uUINd “WH 


“Tag 
JID 1ouoTsstuMIOD 
murat) “et 
“OT 
‘MULOIIONTIS “AA “O 
‘od 
“od 


“STIG “HL 
Od 


“STMLOULUITS “NI 


‘q1odusavq 2 Sia 


moe 
ODIVYO Ul LOJSULAT, 


geese ne SSeS OD! =o ere AOA TOT da] a0 ee tgs Oper ies LOD” 000 ‘02 serecnese2<iig AQUI EP |<°"SAUDINIEG [>= "-°Ses|s2=eseceresas|screnenisecess/jrr 
“DUr 7 
ecSenrsrse Op -=*|"="*/ JOAMT PUIx);|-GE0IQ pPvollrey: |*=="Op==|-0000g~ [rsa = 7523 NE Pes 8 a i OO 1) 9 A IOI KS DESO ISIC COC “od 
pocsicie se setO)us5| O-ce"= On bKOURE Y= OMOua(TTGO NTF 77 7 OD a000) OP: woilces task ore POUL ees Op-tsa| see ars = |secn ces Spawn anc serene od 
sereres = TINOSSIYL See AOR LIG TA) he ope ede op egeailne es op*- 000 ‘02 chee as tee rice lek, oun aire ODE So Bae ae oe ot | cabana etc Media teh Pallas Se Or Peer Oo” 
“Dut 
ate tddisstserpy |- °°" OAT YY | -S801Q propery |'-7* Op-*| 000 ‘OZ pena seces oop OU (| ceecne OD ioc: pacer tsc [sc ciseciceessens lcs ce ssaece sas (cr 
“eo 2="° TINOSSIPL |-" °° “AOATY, OSES |~ °° °°" 49TH Tous |°° 37° OJX | 000 ‘OF 000 ‘00 7 ounge.|---°<*Keping | ~ eunp|*--- Sepseny, |---°°"- 7" =""* om 
‘ ‘ : Ur ciece tata Medenias eliescrcescereceleones erro 
Snape ocean one gece | inc el taeineie, ele olo.cieis| miele Since cimisie Sissi a OD mn 000 c0L0«=5|| O00n0L9 ; a Suni 5 od 
“uoys 
~- AuoySorysnoX | -orgysnox opp |--"°7* He 199qZ |°*** Op~*| 000 ‘0S 000 ‘og CG ACH cine cise coma | amnion S| freceworsrey **“HOTZ}S OVUIOJOT 
“oul 
gatccclss 2 <(ODs + SISOS GOST (Fis | 88019 prosper SRC 1 000 ‘gr 000 ‘eer — oun 2wslcsleisis cca e esl cic eelaecleiw| sce eccccccccce BOBIOCOGICOOCT Tg 
“moTy 
gece 22*°*/Op'---|-"-*=""9x00IgUU NT |--2°"= "°° propos |’*=* yeq| 000 ‘0S0 ‘LE | 000 ‘oso ‘T: |. ee; Aer | eooo tote toms eee sire ones =e escss =| <ensieoBIH Op eLVeTy 
‘ 
emis OD aera eee LORD C TH orc yeaa, LOL e pat now Diag 000 ‘SLL ‘8 ovo‘sez'e } @ ow Peg eral he a Sage a cates ea he me tO 
rresreserss Oprres[-sceees* ovulojog |g'q ‘uozSuryse A, |°--* Op--| 000 ‘cse ‘6 ooo'sss's § Hk Kew Suenos ago Fade ™|| (Poca Semis os | me OLIG) 9 OC ULOTO cr, 
“keg oyvedesoyg |----euuvyonbsng |- covry op oravy |-*-" “pr | 000 ‘e98 ‘2 ooo'eas's § de pore pend seeess se sisielsisis's |je-cie celzic= soso 9 sence wssieee = OC 
PEC EES joosqoueg |" svoyuIvALpeyT | SvoyueAyyeT |-"-" Op] OOS ‘LEG | GL oun |--"""* Opes 
“mOTT 
-" 08900 OIVULIYW |" -" "°° DeqoUUay |-"~"** OTTATOyw AK [7 >> 7” em | 00¢ ‘zee 000 ‘eL9 cl oung |---- Avpsony, | gf oung |--"°""* Op’-~*| -v7s OovLD op OLAvTT 
sosrecserss OM ms|-ess9*IGATY FCG |-* O[TASproydoys |-"--" Ay |} 000 ‘00L 000 ‘002 L oung|-----Aepuopy | 9 oun |-°°*° Aspung |*o"--2°s*2">- od 
Rome COATT: ONO)! a searess Wsequay j-7777" eyjekeug vy |-"* puy | 000‘00% | 000'002 =| 02 PUNE |---*- Avpung | gt ouuL |***""- ODE ten oe od 
“= --epoorqoupud y |-" ttt ttt qua |--7°7777* Auvqry |---* Op*-| 000 ‘ost 
Jee nars SUSU Ye --"JOATY 99N00Q9 |" OTTAOS par |---* Op--| 000 ‘OST OOOMO00G Saltese ec alckse es ne ALOUD? |aeeoAGD Ey coer sae" <.OCT: 
--*- gpoorqouledy |-- gata00yv7z9VyyD | oTAuo}og ven |--"* op~*| 000 ‘96Z cB ACT Siebd. ne OD ee 
see" QOFNUIOY |" 7" JOATY AVO[[I MOU U AOD) EON: pa OD sziC 000; 00G%. liters wie ee || SOS UIA s coe ODE =: 
“Sur 
pisabess eye} [Vy |"---19aNy 99090 | -ssorQ prosper |*--- “wD | 000 ‘96% | 000'888_ | oa AeW|----7"" op'-**} es AvpT |-**-* Aepung |--*- ores ovmojog 
---Augq olvmepoq |°--" yae1g souor |----- See ceeLOAO (rei 1OC(: | O0OKUS Dame iat emene re aE | SCL ACH, eam tame OD are 
“m0Ty 
SOAUE ORB M NIG. YOoIQ vitersrigyg |-**-woySurmypr Ay |--"" Taq | 000‘0ZE_ | 000‘ocr =| os AvyT |---- Avpsony, | cz Avyq |'--* Avpsony, | -v7s cowry op oravyT 
“Keg 
OosloUvLy Ug |-"°"* OJMOMIBIONS | "°°" BUY, |" --TeDQ | 000 ‘STZ 000 0FZ += | ST oUNL |------ Avprag | ZI ounp |----Avpangeg |---- worye}s OvUIOJOT 
Fe Sen ee ee ||! ae) a ene a ee ae ae 
‘paquryd ‘uayvy =| “yyuou | “qyuour | , 
Aqyenyoy | Stpeuztz9 | Jo Sec | 24FLCC | yo" ge | WOAIO ALA 
—jo Areynqtay, “mIvO1Ig ‘OUI *04R19 TOTRIG 
. , *poyooys miver1s wor} 
MSP 30 teqmn N oy} Ut poortd ysy ojvg | -ejs Suave, Jo oyvq 


*sayp)9 0) Burp.ooop pabuvtio 
‘wosnbuagy “gf “J, fo woyoa.up wapun ‘uorssrumog ysyT savjig panug fq “Cosel ‘2% eung op ‘Ogel ‘Z kopy wouf apow poys fo uoyngrysrp fo puooay—'9  ATAV I, 


[20] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


672 


7 


*IO]JN [OWO[OD 0} 1940 powmy, | 


900 ‘96 62) 000 ‘ELF ‘62 


-_—_— 


‘sosodind [vjuomt10dx9 10F pasg » 
Ee a ee Ea a es ee et ee 


PAQXTTINGS) |cnamemanae souue |'"-- xoyyeuroddy |--*---Sanqsiojog |"*** “BA | 000‘09E | 000‘o9T =| 6 Avy |" Aepsoupa ry | ot Avy_ |: Aupsoupo my |-"--7* SOROS CYA E 
ED AELON SO OST (alae ie maar al tee SRS ET das Baia gl Sani renee OD |000" 000: == 1000: 006 - |/253**"s|" Ser aaron sacs 8¢ Avy |----7- Aepyayy [ooreees-o7-- OG, 
aOTrey 
TG Cle eS 99pad YVary |-"--- S9pod OTIT | STOMOIN = va |*-"* Op~"| 000 ‘OF peas Gre YE | PO OROOS ODE sis 
‘od -=5-Avgn MBAUT AN 7-77" (6) 92)3 eral (3 0 [Pee SOO () DASH Oa Op=s"000L0 Is: saec es Hoo ACN: |e es OpES=s 
og “*"""99ped JUady) |" YooIQ 8,WouAryT |---------"- oy sirle|| sie! Op=>| 000,07 _ \=2-=2 Secel ee WG INh inne cca Operas 
“SUL 
*AOXTY “W'S |-77 70°57 =" eaqutug |-------- eor10}v AK | -BS0IQ prvorer |---* Op--| 000 OF att he alias POLACIAL | sence oO 
SOUP Sel eae o> Weg tes S| me Se eee lpn eae ee ee Op" "| 000 ‘0FT4 77777-7777 $e Avy | -777*° op'--" 
SHUG CREA Ee nee COTS TUIMG me ure VGMUWH |" “TH WOW ION |--"" Op--| 000 ‘09 fo ** SE" he, ABT | 02° S5< LY 
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XXVI.—RAISE CARP !* 


By Max VON DEM Borne. 


It is well known that carp:raising is a very ancient industry and has 
been brought to a very high degree of perfection. Any one who wishes 
to start a carp-raising establishment will not hesitate to undertake a 
journey for the purpose of studying by personal observation the estab- 
lishments of experienced carp-raisers. Valuable hints wili be found in 
the following works: 

WENZEL HORAK. Die Teichwirthschaft, mit besonderer Riicksicht auf 
das siidliche Bohmen. Prag, 1869. (Pond Culture, particularly in South- 
ern Bohemia.) 

KaRL NICKLAS. Lehrbuch der Teichwirthschaft. Stettin, 1880. (Man- 
ual of Pond Culture.) 

ADOLF GAscH. Die Teichwirthschaft auf dem Gute Kaniow. 1 sielitz, 
1880. (Pond Culture on the Kaniow estate.) 

As also in my own work, Die Fischzucht (Pisciculture). 

The president of the German Fishery Association, Herr von Behr, of 
Schmoldow, has requested me to prepare a short article, which would 
show in a simple manner that, even independent of pond culture, carp- 
raising may reach a much higher degree of perfection than it possesses 
at present. I gladly meet this request, and, as the contents of this brief 
paper have been very carefully examined by von Behr, I feel convinced 
that he fully agrees with the views expressed by me. 

The main points are, to introduce great masses of young carp in our 
rivers, which by river. improvements have been deprived of the old 
spawning-places of the cyprinoids; to stock with young carp our numer- 
ous German lakes, where, owing to the presence of pike and other fish 
of prey, carp cannot successfully spawn, as a portion, at least, of such 
young carp will under all circumstances reach maturity; and to make 
even small ponds and marl-pits sources of revenue by stocking them 
with young carp. The manner in which [ would like to see the Stettiner 
Haff stocked with 20 million young carp, may be seen in various news- 
papers articles on the subject, as well as in Circular No. 6, 1881, of the 
German Fishery Association. 

I therefore gladly meet von Behr’s request, and will endeavor to de- 
scribe how young carp, for the purposes indicated above, can be pro- 


* Ziichtet Karpfen! | M. v. d. Borne | auf Berneuchen i. N. M. | herausqeben rom Deutsche 
Fischerei- Verein. | —Translated from the German by HERMAN JACOBSON. 
[1] 673 
S. Mis. 29-——43 


674 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


cured in the easiest and cheapest manner, instead of obtaining them 
’ from a distance at a comparatively great expense. 

The beau ideal of carp-raising would be the following plan: Every owner 
of ground should toward the end of May select a dry piece of ground, 
well warmed through by the sun—say one-half hectare in extent—and 
fill it with water from a running stream or brook to the height of three- 
quarters to one meter, and thus form a so-called “sky-pond.” Pike 
should positively be kept out of such a pond, which is much easier con- 
structed than is generally supposed, especially if one does not mind the 
small expense of inclosing it with a low dike. Most estates have suf- 
ficient running water to keep the water at the same height all the time. 
The next thing would be to procure from some reliable establishment 
one spawner and two milters, place them in the pond, and also put in 
it a quantity of brush-wood of pine, juniper, birch, &c.; and one may 
with certainty count on seeing this brush-wood, in June, when the sun 
has warmed the water, and again in August, covered with numberless 
carp eggs. A female carp is said to contain about one-half million eggs. 
This figure may bea little exaggerated, but Mr. Gasch, whose pamphlet 
has been spoken of above, and who, for his carp culture, received the 
gold medal at the Berlin International Fishery Exposition, calls 60,000 
young carp to one-half hectare a very common result. He also assures us 
that 1,000 young fish of this description, in a pond measuring one-half 
hectare, reach the length of 20 centimeters (in exceptional cases 15 or 
25 centimeters) the same summer in which they first saw the light of 
this world, without giving them any food. As such a carp is worth 20 
pfennig (5 cents), the revenue from one-half hectare, from the end of 
June till October, would be 200 mark ($47.60). This astonishing devel- 
opment of the young carp was owing to the faet that they always had 
abundant food. When the 60,000 young fish first left their eggs, they 
found sufficient food on one-half hectare, but as they grew in weight 
and size they needed a larger extent of pond, which in four mounths 
increased from one-half hectare to 60 hectares. The small spawning- 
pond cannot supply sufficient food tillautumn, and evenifthe fish escape 
starvation, they will always be in poor condition. As our, ideal “ sky- 
pond” is of course supposed to enjoy the advantage of a most favorable 
location, we permit the young fish, when they have reached the length 
of a few centimeters, and need a larger extent of water, to slip through 
the grating which closes the pond, in order to scatter over the river 
or lake, or we let the entire contents of the pond flow into the river or 
lake. If this is not possible, we assign to the fish a larger space from 
the very beginning. Fifty thousand young fish can live very well till 
October in one hectare of water, and be successfully used for stocking 
other waters, although they will not reach that degree of development 
which Mr. Gasch attains for his fish. The fish may also be fed with 
boiled potatoes, broken into small pieces, kitchen refuse, linseed cake, 
manure, &c¢. 


f 
me [3] RAISE CARP. 675 
What becomes of our young fish when the cold season approaches, 
when in October their power of moving decreases, till the period when 
they commence their long winter sleep? Ifthe spawning-pond is suited 
for wintering, where there is no danger of its being covered so thickly 
with ice as to cause the death of the young fish, it will be best not to 
take them out till spring, when the ice has melted, and when it is cer- 
tain that the pond can again be filled at the right time. 

If the young fish cannot winter in the pond, they may get through 
the winter by being placed in a so-called “ chamber-pond” which is free 
from fish of prey, and can be laid entirely dry; or, if this should be 

‘impossible, the 60,000 young fish°may safely be set free in October. 
_ We know the dangers to which they are exposed in waters containing 
many fish of prey, but we also know from experience that, in spite of 
this, successful results may be looked for. While, during winter, the 
-young fish are in a lethargic condition and the fish of prey are par- 
ticularly voracious, these latter are in spring in a very lazy condition, 
. owing to their having spawned, whilst the carp are lively and have an 
excellent appetite. From principle, therefore, it is much better to set 
out young fish in spring, although the setting out of one summer’s young 
fish is by no means as hopeless an undertaking as is thought by many 
pisciculturists. I will give an example from my own experience. One 
of my lakes, the Hamelung Lake, measures about 5 hectares, and con- 
tains numerous pike and perch. In autumn I stocked this pond with 

1,200 one-summer’s carp, and three years later I caught, during the ice 

fisheries, 680 table carp, which on an average weighed 3 pounds each. 

During the two previous winters the pike, caught during the ice fisher- 

ies, invariably threw up small carp, which they had evidently swallowed 

durizg the fisheries, because they had not yet been digested. I obtained: 
similar favorable results in several other lakes and in the river Mietzel, 
all of which waters are rich in pike and perch. I have, therefore, come 
to the conclusion that one hectare of water, which contains many fish of 
prey, can, even in autumn, be sufficiently stocked with carp, by placing in 
it 250 one-summer’s carp. ‘The fear, so often expressed, that such small 
fish would all be devoured by fish of prey, is in my opinion entirely 
groundless, because all large fish have, at some time during their life, 
been small, and been exposed to the danger of being devoured by larger 
fish. 
The larger the carp the smaller may be the number of fish placed in 

one pond. It will also pay to place large carp in open waters, for a 

very intelligent pisciculturist in Schleswig-Holstein has for a long time 

been in the habit of buying a large number of carp measuring 20 centi- 
meters or more in length, and stocking, with these fish, lakes where 
fishing is easy; and has in this way become a wealthy man. Thus he 
set out, last year, carp weighing 14 pounds each, and has been able, 
this winter, to catch fish weighing 24 pounds each. 

Throughout our entire country people begin to take a greater inter- 


676 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


est in water culture, and there is avery general and growing conscious- 
ness of our duties with regard to our large ana beautiful lakes and rivers. 
The hope may therefore not be in vain that landed proprietors of liberal 
views, and more especially the largest landed proprietor, the State, 
will here and there, in their fields or forests or along their rivers, con- 
struct spawning-ponds of 4 hectare, buy 3 spawning carp for 10 mark 
($2.38), and annually let 60,000 young carp loose in the rivers. An 
example will show what may be accomplished with very small means. 
When in the autumn of 1881 I visited some of the forests on the shores 
of the Stettiner Haff, in company with Counsellor von Biinau and the 
Royal Forester Baron von Diicker, for the purpose of finding suitable 
places for constructing spawning-ponds for carp, we found that Baron 
von Diicker had already, by irrigating certain portions of these forests, 
constructed the necessary ponds by simply closing those ditches through 
which in former times several of the ponds and one lake had been drained. ° 
At an expense of only 71 mark 69 pfennig ($17.19), four ponds had been 
constructed with a total area of 101 hectares, and by a further expense of 
3,500 marks ($833) all the other necessary arrangements could be made. 
With just as small an expense, spawning-ponds with a total area of 700 
to 1,000 hectares could easily be constructed in all the forests on the 
shores of the Stettiner Haff. The 101 hectares already in existence 
could probably furnish at least 5,000,000 carp per annum, and therefore 
produce the quantity demanded by me (20,000,000) in four years. 

Magnificent carp, both as to size and flavor, are caught here and there 
in our rivers, and there is hardly a doubt that they have, when young, 
escaped from some piscicultural establishment, or that, because not 
needed there, they have been purposely set at liberty. 

As not all those persons who would like to raise young carp are 
able to construct spawning-ponds, I make the following proposition, 
which I do not consider chimerical, and which is well worth a trial. I 
must state expressly, however, that I have not personally made the 
experiment. At the International Fishery Exposition in Berlin, there 
was exhibited in the Swedish department a spawning-box which had 
been used in Sweden since 1761 for bleak and other fish, and might also 
be used for carp. It is very spacious, made of perforated boards, and 
the inside is covered with pine brush. At the beginning of the spawn- 
ing season it is stocked with male’and female fish, which deposit their 
eggs on the brush-wood, and are thereupon let out through an opening 
in the side of the box. The spawning carp have to be removed, for if 
they remained in the box they would either injure or devour the eggs. 
The fish may also, when taken from the box, be placed in a small pond, 
where they will sufficiently recover to be fit for another spawning. The 
box is secured by an anchor and floats about in the water; by the mo- 
tion, the water 1s constantly renewed, and any injury from strong waves 
is averted. As soon as the young fish can swimn the box is opened, so 
that they can go out into the open water. It would be an advantage 


[5] . RAISE CARP. 677 


to have portions of the sides of the box made of fine wire grating. Why 
could not such boxes with brushwood be placed in a lake and stocked 
with 3 carp (1 spawner and 2 milters)? Would not the brushwood soon 
be covered with eggs? 

Carp may also be transplanted by sending such brushwood covered 
with eggs to some distance and placing it in floating boxes similar to 
the one described. It is well known that Mr. R. Eckardt, of Liibbin- 
chen, has frequently shipped carp eggs in this manner to distant places. 

There is much talk at the present time of mirror carp and leather carp; 
they are generally considered a more delicate article of food than the 
scale carp, but do not grow as fast as these. Mr. Gasch very justly 
considers it important to use for purposes of propagation only the finest- 
shaped carp, which presumably will grow quicker than carp of inferior 
form. 

In the above I have entirely followed Mr. Gasch, as far as the small 
“sky ponds” are concerned, whilst, with regard to the Swedish spawn- 
ing-box, I have only urged that experiments be made; but in the follow- 
ing I take the liberty to communicate my own experiences of many 
years in the Berneuchen piscicultural establishment, as well as those of 
other pisciculturists. 


CONSTRUCTION OF A GOOD SPAWNING-POND. 


The first condition is that it can be laid completely dry and be filled 
again with water at the proper time. No puddles must remain, if any 
favorable results are to be looked for, and no pains should be spared to 
remove them. Only in rare cases can a good pond be constructed by 
digging out of the ground; the best way is to inclose a piece of low 
ground in the lowest place by a dike. As has already been mentioned, 
a pond can be constructed at a very trifling expense by closing the 
drain by means of which swamps, lakes, or ponds have formerly been 
laid dry. 

According to the ditferent sources from which the water for the ponds 
is drawn, we distinguish— 

Brook and river ponds, which are fed by running water ; 

Spring ponds, which are fed by springs; 

Sky ponds, which are fed by rain and snow-water, or by ditches which 
are dry during the hot season. 

The dike is made from the material nearest at hand, the fish pit being 
constructed at the same time. The best material is loam or clay. 
Wherever the soil is sandy, the dike and pond must have a foundation 
of clay, if water does not flow into the pond at all times, in order to 
prevent the pond becoming dry. 

Flat spawning-ponds are the best, because in them the water gets 
warm easier than in deep ponds. The most suitable depth of water 
is about 1 meter in the deepest places. 

In order to let off the water from the pond, a drain-pipe is laid through 


678 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


the dike, which can be closed and opened on the water side; it may be 
either of wood or burnt clay or cement. In sandy soil the drain-pipe 
must be perfectly tight, because otherwise the sand enters and is car- 
ried along with the water, so that the dike sinks and the water of the 
pond flows out. In sandy soil wooden drain-pipes ought therefore to be 
-incased in cement. 

The so-called tap-house is located at the end of the drain-pipe on the 
water side; it consists of a wooden grating or rake, which prevents fish 
from entering the drain-pipe, and a valve for letting off the water. Iron 
gratings are not suitable, because rust soon destroys them. 

The fish-pit is a hole near the tap-house, in which the the fish gather 
when the water of the pond is let off. It should be so constructed that 
it can be laid entirely dry, must be spacious and have a firm bottom; 
wherever the bottom is loose, it should, therefore, be made firm by means 
of sand, gravel, and stones. 

Besides the fish-pit there is another pit, into which the water flows 
after having left the drain-pipe. It is intended to receive the fish when 
the grating is broken, and for this purpose there is a grating at its mouth. 
It is not advisable, however, to let too many fish gather in this pit, be- 
cause they are easily injured in passing through the drain-pipe. 

The bottom of the pond is furrowed with small ditches, so that the 
water can everywhere flow off easily and quickly, and the fish can easily 
find their way into the fish-pit. 

If a brook or stream passes through the pond, a ditch is carried round 
the edge, so that the water can in this way be let out. In this manner 
stones, sand, and mud are kept out of the pond, which would otherwise 
be entirely filled with such matter. High, water is also let out in this 
way, as it might cause a break in the dike. 

Small floating seamp islands and reeds are injurious. The floating is 
prevented by putting sand on the swampy places when the pond is 
drained off; and the growth of reeds is checked by laying the pond dry, 
by using the bottom for agricultural purposes, and by cutting the reeds 
under the water during summer. 

Spawning-ponds for carp should be kept free from fish of prey, because 
they prevent the increase of the carp. In Bohemia one pike is put in 
the raising-ponds, to every 10 carp ; the increase is thereby so completely 
prevented that when the pond is laid dry not a single newly-born carp 
is ever found. When the carp want to spawn, the pike immediately 
make their appearance and act as if they too wanted tospawn. This prop- 
ably disturbs the carp to such a degree as to prevent impregnation, for 
the numerous eggs are always destroyed by asort of mold. The pike 
must therefore be carefully kept away from the spawning-ponds; and 
it will be the safest way to feed such ponds from such rivers, &¢., which 
contain no other fish, but especially no pike. Sky-ponds, which are fed 
by atmospheric water, are therefore the safest. Water coming from 
brooks, lakes, and ponds containing pike should therefore be filtered 


[7] RAISE CARP. | 679 


through a gravel weir. Such a weir is made by placing a grating inthe 
feeding-ditch and filling the ditch with coarse gravel of the size of walnuts. 
Pike of the previous year cannot pass the weir, and the young pike are 
too small to disturb the carp in their spawnirg process; they grow so 
rapidly, however, that they devour many small carp till the autumn 
fisheries commence. Such pond feeders should, therefore, be avoided as 
much as possible during the period when the young pike can still pass 
the gravel—from March till the beginning of the opening season of the 
carp. Following the example of Bohemian pond-culturists, I have, so 
far, stocked 2-hectare spawning-ponds, with 10 spawners, 6 milters, and 
1 male carp weighing one pound, and obtained during one summer on an 
average 100,000 young carp (the maximum being 150,000). Spawners 
weighing 4 to 6 pounds are the best, as larger fish are too indolent. 
The fishing of the ponds takes place during a cool season, inspring or 
autumn, when there is no danger of any frost. It will be well to intro- 
duce fresh water into the fish-pits during the fisheries, so as to freshen 
up the fish at all times. As soon as the water has been drawn off, and 
the water-area has been diminished to about one-fifth or one-tenth of 
its original size, fishing commences, care being taken that the fish never 
lack fresh water, by occasionally stopping the draining process or by 
introducing fresh water. The edge of the fish-pit is covered with boards 
and reeds, and on the edge of the water large tubs are placed filled with 
fresh water. From the net the carp are removed to these tubs, cleaned 
from mud and dirt, counted, put in the transporting vessels and carried 
as quickly as possible to their destination. As in catching the fish the 
water is stirred up and becomes muddy, and as the fish more or less in- 
hale this impure water, it has to be removed from the gills. Carp which 
are to be transported any considerable distance are therefore, some days 
previous, placed in clear running water, where they are not given any 
food whatever, so that they may be thoroughly purified, and do not make 
the water impure by their excrements. The temperature of the water 
should, at most, be 10° Réaumur; the lower the better. One of my 
friends in Pomerania has calculated the necessary quantity of water, in 
the following manner, from the weight of the fish and the time consumed 
in transportation. 


Excess of weight of water over-weight of body during a period of transportation lasting : 


| 
ey? 


| 
12 15 18 


| Carp. 10 bours. E hours, s0hours, 40 hours. 
| 
| 


The result obtained in my spawning-ponds is entirely thrown in the 
shade by that obtained by Mr. Gasch; but,in order not to make any 
rash calculations, I will make my result the basis, and assume that a 
~ spawning-pond of 1 hectare produces annually 50,000 carp of one suin- 
mer. Supposing that 1 hectare of water, containing fish of prey, needs 


680 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


250 carp of one summer, a Spawning-pond of 1 hectare would be sufficient 
to completely stock with carp an open water area of 1,000 hectares in 
5 years, and to fill up the gaps occasioned by the fisheries. 

In setting out the young fish, they should be distributed, as much as 
possible, over the entire water area, and care should be taken to place 
them in shallow water where they find plenty of food and where they are 
protected from fish of prey. 

If it isintended to raise large carp, which are not exposed to any dan- 
ger from fish of prey, a larger pond area is needed. I must here refer 
once more to Mr. Gasch, whose results are unexcelled by those of any 
other pisciculturist, and, basing my assertions on his experience, I must 
say that it requires a pond-area of at least 50 hectares to raise 50,000 carp 
of 20 centimeters length per annum; therefore, 50 times as many as 
we supposed before. 

The otter is an exceedingly dangerous enemy to the fish, and must 
positively be exterminated, if carp are to be raised; herons, cormorants, 
and ducks also do great damage to the spawning-ponds. It is, therefore, 
necessary to combat these enemies in the most energetic and persistent 
manner. Inmy book Fischzucht I have treated of all these matters at 
length, and any of my readers who desire further advice on this subject 
are therefore referred to that work. 


APPENDIX H. 


WHE OYSTER. 


~# 


Sa. 


XXVII.—THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE.* 


By Karu MOBIUs, 
Professor of Zoology at Kiel. 


INTRODUCTION. 


Since the first attempt in France, in 1858, to raise oysters by artificial 
means, very much has been written concerning the oyster and its cult- 
ure. Authors, themselves astonished, have endeavored, by displaying 
long rows of figures indicating the great number of oysters that could 
be produced, to awaken like astonishment among their readers and 
arouse the inhabitants of the coast to propagate extensively in all 
their countries this most valuable of all sea invertebrates. These ac- 
counts of the immense production resulting from the artificial culture 
of the oyster went from paper to paper and book to book, and carried 
with them such an appearance of credibility'that even practical oyster- 
breeders and acute biologists believed that, with little labor, great sums 
might be realized by raising oysters for the table. This is comprehensi- 
ble, for the reason tliat the official reports of England, France, and Amer- 
ica concerning oyster-culture, from which the large figures were taken, 
present either no information as to their true significance, or that only 
of a scattered nature, intelligible to those alone who are already ac- 
quainted with the subject. In order to gain this acquaintance and com- 
prehend the true significance of such figures it is necessary to become 
informed as to the nature and the condition of life of the oyster; and 
in regard to both of these subjects biologists, as well as breeders and 
consumers of oysters, will find in the present work all that is necessary 
to enable them to form an opinion upon the questions which will arise 
in regard to the breeding and rearing of oysters. I believe T have clearly 
demonstrated that true oyster-culture must be conducted according to 
the same principles that are employed in the extensive cultivation of 
any other living commodity. If I have done so, then I have accom- 
plished what should not have been necessary ; for what is more natural 
than that both oysters and oyster-culture should be subject to the same 
universal, controlling, biological laws. And yet an explanation was 

*Die Auster und die Austernwirthschaft ; von Karl Mobius, Professor der Zoologie in 
Kiel. Mit einer Karte und neun Holzschnitten. Berlin, Verlag von Wiegandt, Hem- 
pel & Parey. 1877. Small octavo; pp. 126. Translated by H. J. Rice, B. Se., by per- 


mission of the author, by whom electrotypes of the original cuts have been furnished. 
[1] 633 


684 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


necessary, for not only the ignorant in natural science, but men also 
who teach and write upon biological subjects have, even in our day, 
expected the most impossible results from the artificial breeding of 
oysters. The investigator has seldom to seek for new facts and ideas 
alone; generally, in the first place, he must be able to recognize and 
expunge from the system any errors which may exist in the knowledge 
previously acquired, and in their places establish those facts and ideas 
which he has found to be true. And while I am well aware that the 
little book hereby presented to the world contains but a very modest 
share of what we wish to know with certainty concerning oyster biol- 
ogy and oyster culture; still I have allowed it to appear because, incom- 
plete as it is, it will give welcome information to many biologists and 
oyster-breeders, and will serve as a safe basis for the operations of those 
governments which have within the limits of their territories natural 
oyster-banks which they desire to have managed in the best interests of 
the general public. Those, of course, who delude themselves with the 
belief that, by means of artificial cultivation, oysters can be bred in great 
quantities wherever there may be sea-water, will scarcely agree with my 
book, and it is indeed quite certain that it will not convince them of 
their error. But the most dazzling error does not become transformed 
into truth, however long and firmly one may believe in it. 
KARL MOBIUS. 
KIEL, July 8, 1877. ® 


CONTENTS. 
Page. 
1.—The géa-fats . .- 265 s-cisenticicie cena cisviondaes se ada st notaei ae ae efit ae eee 3 
2.—Oyster-banks and..oystering’. 20%. 3.52 yiosices = stee eee ea ee eee 2 
3.—The reproduction of the oyster ..-.2-1...6) 2/2 .2s2-b cee e RETR EL NYE eet 10 
4.—Why are oysters not found over all portions of the sea-flats..........----- 14 
5.—Artificial oyster-breeding In, Prances.cocsc ons o-ce nes ee ee eee eee 16 
6.—Attempts to introduce the French system of artificial oyster-breeding into 
Great Britain ..o<. 0.0.2 set nceeesee Seco ee ee ee Rome eee ce eee 20 
7.—Can the French system of artificial oyster-breeding be carried on in the 
waters of the German coast-; 22-2525 ceeseesnee aoe eee caesar eee 21 
8.—Can natural oyster-beds be enlarged, and can new beds be formed, especially 
aloneithe: German coast 22 2.s.c8 cctv nee eee eee oe ne ee eee 25 
oorowthand fecundity of the oysterscass seen ee sere ee se ee 31 
16.—An oyster-bed is a Biocénose or a social community ..-......-....-------- 39 
11.—Concerning the increase in the price of oysters and in the number of con- 
sumers, and the decrease in the number of oysters..........-.---------- 47 
12.—The chemical constituents and flavor of oysters ....-..-.--. Ree Nee 50 
i3.—The.qbjects and results of oyster-cnlturesesecs wees se see ee sees eee eee 56 


¢ 


[3] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 685 


1.—THE SEA-FLATS. 


Among those oysters which are produced in the waters of the west 
coast of Europe the Holstein oyster has, for more than a hundred years, 
maintained a well-merited celebrity. The beds which furnish them lie 
along the west coast of Schleswig-Holstein, in a territory only 74 kilo- 
meters long by 22 broad. The most and the best oysters are found on 
the east side of the island of Sylt and in the neighborhood of the islands 
of Amrum and Fohr. . 

Along the northern boundary of the German oyster-territory, near 
the island of Rém, and along the southern boundary, near the islands of 
Pellworm and Nordstrand, opposite the city of Husum, there are only a 
few insignificant beds. And since the flavor of the oyster is entirely 
dependent upon the quality and quantity of food in the water in which 
it grows, it becomes necessary, first of all, to examine into the character 
of the soil and water of the Schleswig-Holstein Archipelago. In com- 
parison with the open North Sea this portion of our coast is a very 
shallow division of the ocean. Along the entire southern portion of the 
open North Sea, between Germany, Holland, England and Scotland, 
the general depth is from 35 to 45 meters. In no place in the Schles- 
wig-Holstein Archipelago is the water as deep as this, the greatest depth 
being 15 to 20 meters, and this only in the channels which connect it 
with the open sea. The floor of this archipelago is raised above the deep 


Fig. 1. 


The sea-flats, with three buoys indicating navigable water. In the background 
the Hallig Langeness is seen above the surface of the water. 


bottom of the open North Sea, very much like a high table-land. In this 
table-land valleys, varying in depth and width, have been cut out be- 
tween the islands and the mainland. At high water, the entire floor is 
covered, but at the end of the ebb-tide, very much of this table-land lies 
dry above the surface of the sea. These stretches of sea-bottom which 
thus become dry are termed “ Watten,” (plains or flats,) and from these 
“ Watten” this archipelago has received the name of “ Wattenmeer,” (sea- 
flats.). The water, which during the ebb-tide runs off from the flats, flows 
in both shallow and deep channels, called by the sailors “Leien” and 
“Tiefen,” partly in a northerly, partly in a southerly direction, into the 


na * 


686 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


open sea, until the incoming flood-tide, which flows in from both sides 
twice daily, stops the ebbing water and turns it back. The water now 


Das 
| schleswig - holsteinische 


Wattenmeer 


mit den 
Austernban ken 
Stromrinnen 


und Tiefen in Metern. 


MAA 


ped land 


aoa 


Nordslrandischmoor 


5 E 
pine. 


= 


SbSe En Te RESELL 


s of Schleswick- 


ai 


flat 


TCP en tas rN chaste 


Map of the sea- 


rises once more. The Leien and Tiefen can no longer hold it, and it 
finally flooding them to 


pours over their banks and over the flats, 


[5] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 687 


such a depth that small vessels can pass over places where only a few 
hours before men and wagons might travel with perfect safety. In an 
investigation of the oyster-beds our little steamer got into too shallow 
water between the island of Féhr and the mainland, and ran fast 
aground about nine o’clock in the morning. The water was falling, and 
in a few hours it was entirely out. We descended and went on foot to 
Hallig Oland,* which lay like a green plate, upon the level, grayish 
sea-bottom, about one kilometer to the eastward of our vessel. While 
upon this Hallig we visited a hill which had been formed by artificial 
means. Upon the hill was a fresh-water pond surrounded by a small 
group of dwellings, among which was a church encompassed by graves. 
We then returned to our vessel before the water had again flooded the 
flats. At about seven o’clock in the evening the water had risen so high 
that our vessel began to rock; it soon floated, and we steamed to Fohr, 
to anchor for the night in the harbor of Wyk. 

Along the entire German coast, from Rém in the north, upon the Danish 
border, to Borkum in the west, near the islands of Holland, the sea is 
of a similar character. Thus, before the mouth of the Elbe, from Cux- 
hafen to the island of Neuwerk, the sea-bottom is laid bare with every 
ebbing of the tide, for a breadth of 7 to 8 kilometers. At such times one 
can reach the island on foot, on horseback, or with a wagon. In pass- 
ing over this flat one finds himself at such times on a level with the 
sails of vessels which are passing by upon the sea, and along the bor- 
der of the retreating waters and the emerging sea-bottom one sees 
scattered flocks of sea-birds hunting the uncovered worms, mussels, 
and crabs before they withdraw into the earth. When the flats, at the 
time of the lowest ebb, are lying, dry and silent, above the water, one 
can already hear in the distant depths the roar of the incoming flood. 
First it comes in slowly, then faster and faster, and finally more slowly 
again, until at the full flood the water stands over the northern por- 


* Halligen is a name given to small, low islands in the Schleswig-Holstein Archi- 
pelago, composed of marsh land, and not protected by dikes from high tides. They 
are green plains, enlivened by pasturing cattle and sheep, and lie only a foot above 
ordinary high-water level. They are overflowed by the water during storms. The 
word Hallig is perhaps derived from Haf-lik. That portion of the coast which is 
dry during the ebb and covered during the flood tide is called Haf; lik means like, 
similar. No other land is so similar to the Haf land as the land of the Halligen. 

The islands of the Schleswig-Holstein sea-flats consist either of low marsh land 
protected by dikes, or of higher sand tracts and downs. 

Nordstrand and Pellworm are marsh islands; Féhr is marsh and sand together, and 
Sylt and Amrum have high sand tracts and downs. 

The marsh soil isa gray, uniform, fine mass without any stones; when wet it becomes 
tough and sticky. It originated from muddy material brought down by rivers and 
streams and deposited in quiet places along the sea-coast. The high sand tracts are 
composed of old raised sea-bottoms. They are uneven, consist principally of coarse 
sand, and are much less fertile than the rich marsh soil, which, without manuring, 
yields abundant harvests. 


688 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


tion of the flats nearly 2 meters higher, and over the southern portion, 
out from the mouth of the Elbe, nearly 3 meters higher than at the 
ebb. The tide generally attains three-fourths of its entire height about 
three hours after turning. In this short time immense masses of water 
move towards the coast, and in many places currents are formed as 
swift as the current of the Rhine between Coblenz and Bonn, the rate 
of which is from 1.5 to 2 meters per second. Yet the ebb-currents 
are nearly everywhere stronger than the flood-currents, since they not. 
only carry off the sea-water which has been brought in, but also the 
fresh water from the land, which was checked in its flow during the 
flood. Hence the ebb-currents bring about much greater changes in the 
soil of the sea-flats than the flood-currents, and they displace and trans- 
port the constituents of the flats in the most powerful manner, wherever 
great fresh-water streams enter the sea, as at the mouths of the Eider, 
Elbe, Weser, and Ems. Here the floating buoys and the implanted 
buoy-stakes (Baken), which indicate navigable water for vessels, are 
changed nearly every year because of the changes in the channels. 

The principal ingredient of the bottom of this changeful sea is quartz. 
sand. In many places there are accumulations of mud, which is very 
slimy and sticky, and contains much organic matter. This mud is found 
along the shores of the mainland and on the east side of the island of 
Sylt, principally at those points where, after the changing of the currents, — 
the water does not flow fast enough to carry away all of the muddy ma- 
terial which was deposited upon the bottom as the tide ran out. Along 
the slopes which lie between those portions of the flats, which the tide 
leaves dry, and the deep channels are long dry stretches of soil where 
the ground is covered with coarse sand, small and large stones, and 
shells. At such places colonies of oysters, so-called oyster-beds, are 
found, along with many other sea-animals. 


Diagram of a cross-section of a deep channel in the sea-flats, upon the left bank 
of which lies an oyster-bed. Upon both sides are flats which are left dry by the ebb- 
tide. (The breadth of the channel is drawn upon a much smaller seale than the depth.) 


[7] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 689 


2,—OYSTER-BANKS AND OYSTERING. 


By far the greater number of our oyster-beds are never exposed to 
view on account of the muddiness of the water of.the sea-flats, from the 
continual stirring up of the sediment upon the bottom. Only when, dur- 
jing the lowest ebb of thespring-tides, easterly winds drive off a great deal 
of water from the land, does the sea along the border of many beds 
become so shallow that the oysters can be seen, and even taken up with 
the hand. This state of affairs occurs upon the oyster-beds which are 
numerous along the east coast of the island of Féhr, and in one autumn 
as many as 20,000 oysters could be gathered from these beds by hand 
and transplanted into deeper waters. 

Generally one is obliged to use measuring-sticks or dredge-nets in 
order to tell when he is over a desired oyster-bed. The measuring-sticks 
are poles, five to six meters long, with the lower half divided off, by dif- 
ferent colors, into feet. They are used from vessels, in shallow portions 
of the flats, in order to ascertain during the journey whether the depth 
increases or diminishes, so that the vessel may not run aground. The 
measuring-rod is pushed down to the bottom, and one can thus easily 
tell whether the bottom is composed of soft mud or pure sand, or whether 
it is covered with shells. : 

The dredge used by the oyster-men (Fig. 3) consists of an iron frame 
upon either side of which there is a shank. These shanks, or side- 
pieces, are brought together and united, at a short distance from the 
frame, so as to form a ring in which the dredge-rope is fastened. Fast- 
ened to the frame upon the opposite side from the shanks is a net whose 
upper half consists of coarse yarn or cord, and the lower half, that which 
drags along the sea-bottom, is, for greater durability, made of iron rings 
united together, each of which has a diameter of from six to seven centi- 
meters. The entire net weighs from 50 to 60 pounds. 


Fia. 3. 


Oyster-dredge. The frame and handles are made of iron. The upper portion of the 
bag is made of coarse net-yarn, the under portion of iron rings from six to seven centi- 
meters in diameter. The form of the rings and the method of uniting them is rep- 
resented with greater exactness at 0. 


The older oyster-dredgers know the position of all the oyster-beds with 
great precision, and they guide their vessels to the desired places by 
reckonings from high-lying points of the coast and islands, from light- 

S. Mis. 29 44 


690 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] _ 


‘houses, churches, windmills, and houses. Their vessels are yacht-like, 
with a capacity of from three to six tons. Hach one generally carries 
two sailors in addition to the owner. 

Upon the Schleswig-Holstein banks there are fourteen vessels en- 
gaged in the oyster business. When the wind is favorable and brisk, 
four dredges can be used at the same time; but with a light wind, two, 
or one only can be dragged. They are fastened by means of strong 
ropes to the windward side of the vessel. One hand is kept upon the 
dredge-rope, in order to tell by the feel whether it is passing over smooth 
ground or over oyster-beds, for the rope is given an irregular, jerking 
motion upon rough bottom. Generally the net is allowed to drag from 
five to ten minutes; then it is drawn up by two or three men, and the 
entire contents of the bag emptied upon the deck. This mass consists 
of old oyster-shells, mussels of various kinds, living oysters, snails, crabs, 
worms, star-fish, sea-urchins, polyps, sponges, and sea-weeds, which are 
generally mixed up with sand and mud. From this heterogeneons heap 
all the matured oysters are now picked out. As they pass singly 
through the hands of the fishermen, the coarsest of the foreign material 
is cut and scraped from the shells with a knife, and then the oysters 
are thrown into baskets. In these they are shaken about, in order to 
get off any material which has escaped the knife. Ropes are then fastened 
around the baskets, which are put overboard, and raised and lowered in 
the sea until all dirt is completely washed from the oysters. They are 
now for the first time in the condition in which they appear in commerce. 
Despite these manifold cleansings, many oysters when they. are exposed 
for sale are covered with dead and living animals, and the peculiar 
odor which oysters have when carried into the interior arises from the 
death and decay of the organic material upon the outside of the shells, 
and does not pertain to the living oyster itself. In no place upon the 
sea-flats do oysters grow upon rocky bottom. They grow best where 
there is a substratum of old oyster and other shells. The most of them 
lie singly, and they are seldom found growing together in clumps or 
masses. The wide-spread notion that they are found growing firmly 
attached to the sea-bottom, and piled upon one another, layer upon layer, 
is accordingly false. Upon the best of the Schleswig-Holstein beds the 
dredge must drag over a surface of from 1 to 3 square meters, and often 
overa still greater distance, in order to secure a single full-grown oyster. 
Over the Schleswig-Holstein sea-flats there exist 50 oyster-beds of very 
different sizes. The largest is not far from 2 kilometers long, but the 
greater number are shorter than this. Their breadth is much less than 
their length, which is in the same direction as the channels along the 
slopes of which they lie. The greater number of the beds have a depth 
of water of at least 2 meters above them when the ebb-tide has left the 
neighboring flats dry. 

There are no beds upon our sea-flats which have a greater, depth of 
water over them than from 6 to 9 meters. Although all the beds 


| THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 691 


lie within an area 74 kilometers long by 22 broad, yet the nature of the 
oysters, and especially the form and solidity of the shell and the flavor 
of the animal, differ very greatly. Upon two beds inside of the south 
point of the island of Sylt are found oysters which in fullness and deli- 
cacy of flavor are not inferior to the best English “natives.” 


Fic. 4. 


A full-grown Schleswig-Holstein oyster, about ten years of age. It is a female with 
eggs, and was drawn from life, on the 14th of June, 1871, by Mr. J. Wittmaack. The 
right, or upper, valve of the shell has been removed. The oyster lies in the hollow 
of the left valve, in its natural position. On the upper side the thickened layers of 
the shell can be seen. Each year new shell-layers are formed. The inner surface of 
the shell is white to near the edge, where it becomes of a brownish color. Above, 
close to the back of the animal, which issomewhat curved, is a crescent-shaped brown 
mass, the shell band or ligament. In separating the valves this band is broken across 
in the middle. The right side of the animal is exposed to view; the left rests upon 
the inner hollow surface of the left valve. The upper layer, with its edge turned 
back, is the mantle-lobe or fold of the right side. The white lines seen in it are mus- 
cular fibers. The left mantle-lobe lies close upon the shell, and is more expanded than 
the right. The gills are to be seen just below the inverted edge of the right mantle- 
lobe. In the oyster they are four in number. The outer gill of the right side is the 
most exposed; a narrow border of two others can be seen. All four have furrows run- 
ning from the inside to the edges. Upon these furrows are sithated cilia, by the mo- 
tion of which water is driven over the gills for the purposes of respiration. Along the 


692 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [101 


upper portion of the gills hang two pairs of furrowed folds, or lobes (the labial palps), 
between which is the mouth opening. The swollen upper portion of the body contains 
the generative organs, the liver, stomach, intestine, andheart. The bean-shaped organ 
near the center of the body is the adductor muscle, the so-called stool. This muscle 
which closes the valves consists of an upper grayish and a lower whitish portion. 


3.—THE REPRODUCTION OF THE OYSTER. 


If the surfaces of all the Schleswig-Holstein oyster-beds should be 
united together they would not cover a space equal to the one-hundredth 
part of that portion of the sea-flats which remain under water. Why 
is this? Isit because from a lack of oyster-broods all the places between 
the banks are yet to be peopled? I cannot accept this view for the fol- 
lowing reasons: The entire number of full-grown oysters existing upon 
the Schleswig-Holstein beds I estimate to be not far from five millions. 
According to my observations, 44 per cent. at least of these oysters will 
bring forth broods of young oysters in the course of a summer.* 


*The data from which I arrived at the conclusion that at least 44 per cent. of full- 
grown oysters spawn during each spawning season were derived from the following 
observations : 


These con- 

tained— e 

. ~ 

I opened on— H On | da 3 

So Nei a aeaeca lated 2 

enh (ieee vase hl vaca hale 

io) = fo | Seo} Ay 

shamed OUR 7a ed oo Seco va Saree on eae ee ee ee eee 112 | °5 |e 4 9| 8 
hUlye 6 S73 se Coates se ole cans ue Seance eee een ae coon nee nee eee 63 Uf 6 13 20.6 
AM HISt loli SOO ase cewees me teces eae 3 adem ise ietcarttatslsie ein aueenctaeie eee ASO i|(ctatatetaig eereteial= 72 15.8 
of Ae) 1) EARS ry Rr tes ee Oe AG IS BEBE a Heanee res eborlesacea|Seeese 44.4 


I do not know the length of time of development, from the beginning of segmenta- 
tion of the egg until all the embryos have passed out from the mother animal, but it is 
probably less than four weeks; for while, in the last weeks of May in the years 1871 
-and 1874, from June 4 to 6 of the year 1873, and June 6 to 9 of the year 1876, in hundreds 
of oysters which I opened, I found no embryos in the beard, yet of 112 oysters dredged 
on the 16th of June, 1873, five contained germs of a white color, and four contained 
germs already bluish, and possessed of shells and vela. 

If by the end of the first week in June no eggs have been laid, but by the beginning of 
the third week germs are found of a bluish color, then the transformation of the white 
germ into the blue cannot consume more than a week, and these germs will hardly re- 
main in the beard for an additional period of more than two weeks. Those oysters, 
then, which are found with eggs during each of the following months must be differ- 
ent individuals from those which spawned during the earlier periods; hence, it is right 
to add together the percentage of egg-bearing oysters found separately in June, July, 
and August in order to arrive at the percentage of egg-bearers for the entire summer. 
And since many oysters are found upon the Schleswig-Holstein beds with germs of a 
bluish color in the mantle even in the beginning of September, then the percentage 
of 44.4 per cent. surely cannot be too high. Oysters are hermaphrodite. In a large 
number of oysters which I examined I found ova in the generative organs, but no 


[11] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 693 


Longitudinal cross-section of a seven or eight years old oyster. 

The curved left valve (1K) of the shell is, as usual,” 
somewhat thicker than the right (rf). They are 
bound together by the ligament L, which keeps them 
separated a certain distance from each other so long 
as the adductor muscle (gS and wS) does not by its 
contraction stretch the ligament and close the valves. 
The shell-muscle consists of fine gray (gS) and coarse 
white muscular fibers (wS). In the neighborhood of 
L the ligament, in the left valve, are four small perfora- 
tions made by a sponge (Clione celata) which lives 
housed in the oyster-shells of the sea-flats. Other 
larger holes are often found in the shells of old 
oysters. They are filled with w ater, which has a rank, 
gaseous smell; hence they are eid! “oas-holes.” The 
os thickest part of the shell is near where the shell-muscle 
is attached. The shell consists principally of carbon- 
ate of lime, arranged in firm, glistening layers. Close 
above the shell-muscle lies the heart (H). The mass 
over the heart, which in life is of a bright color, con- 
sists principally of the organs of generation (G). 
These surround the stomach (Ma) and the liver (L), 
which during life is brown in color. In the space 
i above the intestines is seen the sections of the four 
ik; mouth-plates(-Mp). Under the shell-muscle and close 
to the shell are the two mantle-lobes (Mt), whose 
edges are thickened and beset with fringes. They 
contain muscle and nerve fibers. During life the man- 
tle-lobes can be thrust out over the edge of the shell. 

From the edges of the mantle-lobes all the shell material is secreted. Between the 
two mantle-lobes there is a wide space, in which hang the four gills (Kt). Each gill- 


ws! 


Fira. 5. 


spermatozoa; in many others I found spermatozoa, but no ova; “and ‘in seven oysters 
which bore embryos of a blue color upon the beard I found spermatozoa in the genera- 
tive organs. 

Three oysters with embryos of a white color attached to the beard had no sperma- 
tozoain the generative organs. Most mature oysters produce either ova or spermatozoa, 
and not both at the same time. Of 309 oysters which were dredged on the 25th of May 
from four different beds along the east side of the island of Sylt, and which were ex- 
amined from the 26th of May to the ist of June, the sex of 18 per cent. could not be 
determined ; of the remaining 82 per cent., one-half were males and one-half females 
In none of them were the generative products completely matured. From these results 
I conclude that the ova and spermatozoa do not arise in the generative organs of the 
oyster contemporaneously, but that one follows the other. The spermatozoa can arise 
ery soon after the expulsion of the ova, and probably one-half of the oysters of a ter- 
ae during any spawning period produce eggs only, the other half spermatozoa only, 

\\/ a. Amass of spermatozoa, still clustered together just as 
they arise in the generative organs, enlarged 275 tines. 
b. Asingle spermatozoan, enlarged 1,000 times. By the 
motion of the tail the body is driven forward. 
/ The ripe spermatozoa pass from the generative organs 


into the water, with which they pass into the brood- 
chamber of the female oyster, where they impregnate the 
h freshly-laid eggs by penetrating the yolk and uniting 
\ with it. 
lia. 6. 


694 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] _ 


lobe consists of two plates, which grow together above and below. The mantle-folds 
and the gills taken together form the so-called ‘‘ beard” of the oyster. In the spaces 
between the layers of the beard the development of the eggs takes place. In the fig- 
ure a few germs are represented in this brood-cavity. 


Now, a mature egg-bearing oyster (Fig. 4) lays about one million of eggs, 
so that during the breeding season there are upon our oyster-b eds at least 
2,200,090,000,000 young oysters, which surely would sutiice to transform 
the entire extent of the sea-flats into an unbroken oyster-bed ; for if such 
a number of young oysters should be distributed over a surface 74 kilo- 
meters long by 22 broad, 1,351 oysters would be allotted to every square 
meter. But this sum of 2,200,000,000,000 young oysters is undoubtedly 
less than that in reality hatched out, for not only do those full-grown 
oysters which are over six years of age spawn, but they begin to pro- 
pagate during their second or third year, although it is true that the 
young ones have fewer eggs than those which are fully developed. Ata 
very moderate estimation, the, total number of three to six years old 
oysters which lie upon our beds will produce three hundred billions of 
eggs. This number added to that produced by the five millions of full- 
erown oysters would give for every square meter of surface not merely 
1,351 young oysters, but at least 1,535. In order to determine how many 
eges oysters produce, they must be examined during their spawning sea- 
son. This begins upon the Schleswig-Holstein beds in the middle of 
June, and lasts until the end of August or beginning of September. The 
spawning oyster does not allow its ripe eggs to fall into the water, as 
do many other mollusks, but retains them in the so-called beard, the 
mantle, and gill-plates (Fig. 5) until they become little swimming ani- 
mals (lig. 7). Theeggs are white, and cover the mantle and gill-plates 
as a semi-fluid, cream-like mass. As soon as they leave the generative 
organs the development of the germ begins. The entire yolk-mass of 
the egg divides into cells, and these cells form a hollow, sphere-like body, 
in which an intestinal canal arises by the invagination of one side (Fig. 7). 
Very soon the beginnings of the shell appear along the right and left 
sides of the back of the embryo, and not long afterwards a ciliated pad, 
the velum, is formed along the under side. This velum can be thrust out 
from between the valves of the shell at the will of the young animal, 
and used, by the motion of its cilia, as an organ for driving food to the 
mouth, or, in swimming, as a rudder. During these transformations 
the original cream-white color of the germ changes into pale gray, and 
finally into a deep bluish-gray color. At this time they have a long oval 
outline, and are from 0.15 to 0.18 of a millimeter in breadth. Over 
300,000 can find room upon a square centimeter of surface. If an oyster 
in which the embryos are in this condition is opened, there will be found 
upon its beard a slimy coating thickly loaded with grayish-blue granules. 
These granules are the embryo oysters, and if a drop of the granular 
slime be placed in a dish with pure sea-water the young animals will 
soon separate from the mass, and spread swimming through the entire . 


[13] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 695 


water. When the embryos are at this stage their number may be esti- 
mated in the following manner: The whole mass of embryos is carefully 
seraped from the beard of the mother oyster by means of a small hair- 
brush. The whole mass is then weighed, and afterwards a small portion 
of the mass. This small portion is then diluted with water or spirits of 
wine, and the embryos portioned out into a number of small glass dishes, 


FiaG. 7. 


A few stages of development of the embryo oyster; a to e enlarged 125 times, f and 
g, 150 times. 

a. The freshly-produced egg. In the yolk-mass is seen the germinative vesicle, 
with its nucleus. 

b. Commencement of development. A part of the vesicle has passed out. 

c. Division of the egg into two unequal portions. 

d. A later stage. 

e. The germ now consists of a layer of cells, which have arisen by repeated divis- 
ions of previous cells. They form a hollow vesicle, with a depression upon one side, 
which is the beginning of the digestive system. 

jf. The embryo is now represented at about the stage at which it leaves the brood- 
cavity. It has a transparent two-valved shell, and inside of the body the course of 
the digestive tract can be made out. An arrow shows the position of the mouth, and 
those within the body indicate the course which the food takes. Behind the wsoph- 
agus is the stomach, with two enlargements. The end of the intestine is shown over 
the mouth. To the left of the first enlargement of the stomach is the shell-muscle. 
On the under side is the velum, which is the locomotive organ of the young oyster. 
The young oyster can, by means of muscles, draw the velum entirely within the shell. 

g. An embryo, seen from behind. Upon the sides are seen the valves of the shell, 
and across the body, from one valve to another, passes the shell-muscle. Below this 
muscle is the velum, with the muscles, one on each side, which serve to withdraw it 
into the shell. 


so that they can be placed under the microscope and counted. Thus, 
knowing the weight of the small portion and the number of embryos in 


696 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


it by count, we can estimate the total number of embryos from the weight 
of the entire mass, which is also known. In this manner I estimated 
the number of embryos in each of five full-grown Schleswig-Holstein 
oysters, caught in August, 1869, and found that the average number was 
1,012,955. 


4.—WHY ARE OYSTERS NOT FOUND OVER ALL PORTIONS 
OF THE SEA-FLATS? 


It is now clear that the fruitfulness of the oyster is extraordinarily 
great, and that the extension of oyster-beds over the entire surface of 
the sea-flats does not fail of being accomplished from a lack of young 
oysters, but from other causes. It then becomes our duty to investigate 
into the characteristics of our sea-flats; in order to determine whether 
some portions are more suitable for the growth of oysters than others; 
and whether the saltness, temperature and movement of the water, the 
amount of food which it contains, and the nature of the ground compos- 
ing the oyster-banks, differ in any respect from these same features as 
observed in other places over the bottom. 

The saltness of the upper layers of the water of the open North Sea is 
from 3.47 to 3.50 per cent.* The water of the sea-flats is slightly less 
salt, being only from 3 to 3.3 per cent.t Here upon our sea-flats, and in 
other European coast-seas, where the water is less salt, the oysters ac- 
quire a much finer flavor than upon the ground of the open North Sea,t 
where they live in water 35 meters or more in depth, with a percentage 
of salt of about 3.5. 

That coast-water is, then, the most desirable for oyster-culture which 


*Dr. H. A. Meyer has published a paper concerning the saltness, temperature, and 
currents of the North Sea in the ‘‘ Bericht der Commission zur Untersuchung der deut- 
schen Meere tiber die Expedition zur chemisch.-phys. und biologischen Untersuchung 
der Nordsee, 1872. Berlin, 1875.” (Report of the commission for the investigation of 
the German Ocean upon the expedition for the chemico-physiological and biological 
investigation of the North Sea.) (Specific weight and saltness, page 18.) 

tI have myself repeatedly determined the temperature and saltness of the water dur- 
ing investigations of the oyster-beds of the sea-flats; and since 1872 the commission 
for the investigation of the German Ocean have caused regular stated observations 
to be made, which, since 1874, have appeared under the title ‘‘Ergebnisse der Beo- 
bachtungs-Stationen an den deutschen Kiisten iiber die physik. Eigenschaften der 
Ostsee und Nordsee. Berlin, 1874, 1875, 1876.” (Results of investigations into the 
physical characteristics of the North and East Seas made at observation stations 
along the German coasts.) 

{ Many oysters are taken north of Germany and Holland, east of England, and in 
the channel between England and France. The German fishermen of Blankenese and 
Finkenwirder, near Hamburg, who fish with great dredge-nets for flounders, turbots, 
and soles out from the mouth of the Elbe, often dredge oysters along with their fish- 
The oyster-grounds of the open North Sea lie mostly from 33 to 34 meters beneath the 
surface of the water. They begin with a small stretch to the southeast of the island 
of Heligoland, extend from this island in a west-northwest direction, and form a ter- 
iitory 15 to 22 kilometers broad, which spreads out far to the west. Fishermen from 
Holland and Germany dredge for oysters here, especially during the months of August, 


[15] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 697 


contains about 3 per cent. of salt; and since not only over our oyster- 
beds, but over our entire sea-flats, the water possesses this degree of salt- 
ness, neither a lack nor an excess of salt can hinder the extension of 
the beds over the whole area. Even less can the temperature of the 
water hinder their extension, for the variation is the same over the 
oyster beds as at other points, and it fluctuates, during the course of the 
year, from 20° C. above zero to 2° C. below. Norcan alack of motion of 
the water or of nutriment be the cause why the oyster-beds have not 
during the past hundreds of years extended themselves beyond certain 
definite limits, for floating everywhere, in the ebbing and flooding 
water, are microscopic plants and animals, and much dead organic mat- 
ter, which would nourish large numbers of oysters, just as they do mul- 
titudes of soft clams (J/ya arenaria), edible mussels (Mytilus edulis), and 
cockles (Cardium edule). There remains, then, as the single natural hin- 
derance to a further extension of the oyster-beds, the unfavorable condi- 
tion of the ground over the greater portion of the sea-flats. Oysters 
cannot thrive where the ground is composed of moving sand, or where 
mud is being deposited, and one of these conditions or the other is found 
over the greater part of the sea-flats. The number and size of those 
places where, notwithstanding the daily ebb and flood currents, the 
ground remains unchanged and free from mud are very limited. Only 
along the slopes of certain channels to the north of the mouth of the 
Hider do we find united all the conditions favorable for such places, and 
only within these limited districts can young oysters grow to complete 
maturity. 

When the young oysters attached to the beard of the mother have 
reached a diameter of 0.15 to 0.18 of a millimeter, when their digestive 
organs have reached such a stage that the young animal can receive 
nourishment through them, and when the velum, by means of its cilia, 
is in a condition to enable them to move about, they leave the brood- 
cavity, swarm at the surface, and after swimming about for a short time 
finally sink once more to the bottom. If the swarm of young oysters 
settles upon a spot covered with clean stones or mussel shells to which 
they can become attached, they have a prospect of growing to maturity ; 
but if, on the contrary, they settle upon a changing sand-bank or upon 
a muddy bottom, they will surely be lost; for at the close of their swarm- 
ing period their velum, which is their swimming organ, is absorbed, and 


September, and October, and often catch, at a single drag of the dredge, as many as 
1,000 oysters. Sometimes great bunches of oysters growing attached to one another 
are gathered into the net. 

The deep-sea oysters grow much larger than those found along the coasts. Speci- 
mens are taken with shells 13 centimeters broad. Their flesh is tough, yet large 
numbers are consumed in England, France, and Germany; in England and Trance 
chiefly in pastries and sauces, but in Germany many are eaten fresh, especially in 
Hanover and Bremen. For general winter use they are kept under water in certain 
places adapted to them, especially near the island of Wangeroog. (S. Metzger’s Bei 
triige zu dem Jahresbericht d. Commiss. zur Unt. d. deutschen Meere, 1873, page 171, 
u. 1875, page 252.) 


698 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


no muscular foot, as an organ of locomotion, is formed in its place, as 
with most other bivalves. The oyster must thus remain upon that spot 
where it settles at the close of its swimming career. If currents and 
waves cover it with sand, if, during tidal changes, the quiet water allows 
mud to sink down upon it, if plants luxuriate over it, then, being unable 
to work its way out into free water, and wander to a better place, it must 
remain as it is, and, from lack of air and nourishment, soon perish. 


5.—ARTIFICIAL OYSTER-BREEDING IN FRANCE. 


The yield of many once rich oyster-beds along the west coast of 
France had fallen off to such an extent from 1850 to 1860 that Prof. P. 
Coste* of Paris, the originator of the celebrated fish-breeding establish- 
ment near Hiiningen, in Alsace, presented, in 1859, to the Emperor Na- 
poleon III, a plan for the artificial breeding of oysters, by which means 
he would prevent the destruction of a large number of young oysters at 
the beginning of their lives as independent animals. The first attempt 
to render the impoverished oyster-beds once more fruitful was madé in 
the Bay of Saint-Brieuc, upon the north coast of Brittany. Here, where 
1,400 men were formerly engaged yearly in fishing for oysters, and where 
the yield was of the annual value of from 300,000 to 400,000 francs, 
the oyster-fishery, during the ten years from 1850 to 1860, had become 
almost entirely valueless. 

In the months of April and May, 1858, under the direction of Professor 
Coste, vast numbers of the old shells of oysters and other mollusks were 
scattered over the ground, and great numbers of fascines were sunk and 
anchored with stones so as to float in the water just free above the bot- 
tom. After 1,000 hectares of sea-bottom had thus been excellently pre- 
pared for the reception of the young oyster-broods, three millions of 
mature oysters were planted upon it. 

In the autumn all the shells and the twigs of the fascines were 
found so thickly covered with young oysters that even the wildest ex- 
pectations were more than realized. 

This abundance of young oysters was something indeed entirely 
natural. Professor Coste, in his report to the Emperor, January 12, 
1859, says, when speaking of this experiment in the Bay of Saint- 
Brieuc, that every mature oyster produces from two to three million 
embryos, but he does not inform us as to his authority for this state- 
ment. If we allow that those oysters which were planted for breed- 
ing purposes in the Bay of Saint-Brieue produced each only the same 
number of embryos as are produced by a-Schleswig-Holstein oyster, the 
entire progeny would amount to the enormous sum of 1,320,000,000,000, 
young oysters. Such a number would allow 132,000 to fall upon every 
square meter of sea-bottom, and for the reception of this number 


* Professor Coste died in 1873. His chief work, upon the artificial breeding of oysters, 
mussels, and fish, appeared under the title: ‘“‘ Voyage d’Exploration sur le Littoral de 
la France et de l'Italie, 2. éd., Paris, 1861.” 


[17] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 699 


there was enough suitable material already spread out about the mother 
oysters. 
_ This experiment at Saint-Brieue was considered to completely demon- 
' strate the possibility of artificial oyster-breeding. It was believed by 
many that the whole coast of France might be bordered with oyster- 
beds, and they began already to reckon, according to the market-price 
. of oysters at that time, which was 20 franes per thousand, how many 
millions of francs would be the result of this sea-harvest. Capitalists 
hastened to form companies for the purpose of engaging in the business, 
and obtain from the government the right to lay down oyster-beds upon 
‘certain definite portions of sea-bottom along the coast. But in nota 
single case were the rich earnings which had been reckoned upon before- 
hand as resulting from 
the sale of marketable 
oysters ever realized; 
and not only this, but 
the money which had 
been paid for the prep- 
aration of the ground 
and the purchase and 
transportation of 
Fig. 8. breeding oysters from 
Outline figures of young oysters, natural size.—a. About natural beds gave no 


one month old. b, About two months old. c. About four returns, and for the 
months old. d. From twelve to fifteen months old. most part proved an 


entire loss. The young oysters were nearly all covered up by sand or 
mud, or eaten by other sea-animals. This explains why, in the year 1869, 
I found in the Bay of Saint-Brieue nothing remaining of the beds which 
had been thus artificially formed in 1858. The bottom of the bay had 
become unsuitable fer the growth of oysters because of the wide-spread 
distribution of sand and the changes which it was constantly undergoing. 

At the present time the extensive propagation of oysters by this 
method of breeding is carried on with success only in certain places along 
the French coast where the natural conditions are especially favorable. 
The Bay of Arcachon, south of Bordeaux, is one of the favored places. 
There, as I myself have observed, the soil and the saltness of the water 
are very similar to that of our sea-flats. We find there wide-spread 
shallow sand and mud banks which are covered with vast numbers of 
bivalve-shells. These banks are left dry by the ebb-tide, and between 
them are deep channels through which the water at ebb and flood tide 
flow out and in. In places which remain always under water natural 
oyster-beds are found, and at other places longer stretches along the 
soft, bare slopes of the water-courses are made use of as breeding-beds. 
Here mother oysters from natural beds are planted, and among them, 
towards the end of May, are placed old shells and tiles with @ covering 
easily detached, as objects of attachment for the young broods. 


700 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


In October the young oysters, which have become firmly attached, are 
freed by means of chisels from the larger of these objects of attachment, 
and are then placed in flat boxes, 2 meters long, 1 meter broad, and 15 
to 30 centimeters high. In detaching the young oysters about one-third 
are destroyed. 

The boxes into which the young oysters are placed are made of thick — 
plank, with wire-sieve bottoms, through which the water can pass in 
and out. At the corners of each box are fastened stakes which serve 
to raise the box above the sea-bottom, so that there will be a depth of 
water of about 10 centimeters between the ground and the wire netting. 
The object of this protection is to guard the young oysters against small 
erabs (Carcinus menas), “drills” (Murex erinaceus), and other enemies, 
which formerly destroyed great numbers of young, as the breeders of 
Arcachon found out by bitter experience. At this period the shells of 
the young oysters are too thin to protect their soft bodies from their ene- 
mies. While in these breeding-boxes the young oysters must be kept 
continually under water, so as not to be destroyed, either by being left 
dry, by the heat of summer, or the cold of winter. In order to accom- 
plish this square trenches, from 30 to 40 meters long and 4 to 5 meters 
broad, are dug in those portions of the oyster-territory which are left 
dry by the ebb-tide. The side walls of these excavations are made firm 
by means of posts and planks, and the spaces between the planking 
and the banks are packed with clay. The bottom is covered with sand 
and gravel to serve as a bed for the oysters. At one of the four sides a 
canal, with a gate, is formed, through which, at the pleasure of the 
breeder, water can be allowed to flow in during the flood or to pass out 
during the ebb-tide. In these artificial ponds, called claires, the boxes 
containing the young oysters are placed, nourishment being brought 
to them by the water which forces its way in through the sieve- 
bottoms. As often as the condition of the water renders it possible, the 
breeder opens the tops of the boxes, in order to permit the free entrance 
of air and light and to remove any accumulations of dirt which may 
have lodged upon or around the oysters. Two months later he takes the 
oysters from the boxes and strews them about upon the bottom of the 
breeding-pond. In these ponds they must not be placed too close to- 
gether if their best growth is desired. Even into these ponds their numer- 
ous enemies will make their way, and in order to protect the oysters from 
these hordes of spoliators a small-meshed net is drawn over them. It 
is very desirable to change the oysters, once or twice during the course 
of the year, into neighboring ponds which have been purified by lying 
entirely dry for several months. During the warmest and also during the 
coldest months, especially during ebb-tide, a depth of water of at least 
20 centimeters must be retained over the oysters. This troublesome and 
tedious handling is demanded for at least two years before the oysters 
can be brought to market. At least this is the case in the Bay of Arca- 
chon. In the year 187475 there were produced in this bay 112,000,000 


[19] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. ZO 


artificially grown oysters, and in 1875~76 about 196,000,000. This im- 
portant yield of the last year, as compared with the poor returns of 
former years, may be accounted for principally through two causes: 

First. The natural oyster-beds in the Bay of Arcachon had had com- 
plete rest for the entire two years immediately preceding these rich har- 
vests. During the years 1870-71 they had produced only 4,897,000 
oysters, but after this period of rest, in November, 1874, 8,500 persons 
assembled, and in the space of three hours, during which time the 
gathering was in progress, 40,360,000 oysters were taken from the sea. 
A great number of these were transplanted, as breeding oysters, to the 
prepared beds, which covered altogether an actual area of sea-bottom 

of 2,669 hectares (about 5,338 acres). 

Seoond: The former eat method of caring for the oysters had 
been improved to the extent that the young oysters were protected from 
their enemies, and care was exercised that during hot and cold weather 
they should always be kept under water. 

With the earlier methods very many of the young oysters were 
destroyed by their enemies, and often, during a few unfavorable summer 
or winter days, when a low tide left the beds dry, all the young oysters 
died. The extraordinary yield of oysters in the Bay of Arcachon and at 

other points along the coast of Brittany, as a result of the improved 
method of artificial oyster-breeding, has very materially lessened the 
price of oysters in France, despite an greater consumption occasioned 
by this abundance. In 1873 oysters sold for 43 franes per thousand, 
while in 1876 the price was 25 franes per thousand. On this account 
only those oyster-breeders who attend personally to the work and are 
assisted in it by their families make anything over and above all 
expenses. Those who undertake the breeding of oysters, relying upon 
outside help to do the great amount of work necessary, can gain re- 
turns scarcely worthy of the name; at least this is the case in the Bay 
of Arcachon, as I know from trustworthy sources. 

The cost of transforming a hectare of sea-bottom along this coast into 
an oyster-bed, together with the necessary apparatus for oyster-culture, 
and a guard-vessel as required by the government, is not less than 
seven to eight thousand franes.* 

* Besides the works of Coste, which have already been mentioned, the following 
also treat of oyster-breeding in the Bay of Arcachon: 

K, Mobius. Ueber Austern- und Miesmuschelzucht und die Hebung derselben an 
den norddeutschen Kiisten. (A report to the hon. minister of agriculture.) Berlin, 
1870. pp. 8. 

A. Tolle. Die Austernzucht und Seefischerei in Frankreich und England. (A report 
to the hon. minister of agriculture.) Berlin, 1871. pp.8. 

De fon. Notice sur la situation de Vostréiculture-en 1875. Paris, 1875. (Extract 
from the Maritime and Colonial Review. ) 


702 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


6—ATTEMPIS TO INTRODUCE THE FRENCH SYSTEM OF 
ARTIFICIAL OYSTER-BREEDING INTO GREAT BRITAIN. 


In Great Britain a large number of men are employed in oyster-dredg | 
ing and in the oyster-trade, and, according to the published official esti- 
mate for the year 1870, the yearly value of oysters sold in the kingdom 
is not far from £4,000,00) sterling. If we take the average price of 
oysters as one penny (two cents) apiece, which is rather too much than 
too little, this amount would account for 960,060,( 00 of oysters. 

In the year 1864 there were brought to the London market alone 
more than 495,000,000 of oysters, which were worth over £2,000,000 
sterling. The culture of oysters being thus of so much importance to 
Great Britain, it was very natural that attempts at artificial oyster- 
breeding in France should be watched with intense interest, and imitated 
at various points along the Brifish coast. It was carried on most ex- 
tensively upon the coast of the smallisland of Hayling, east from Ports- 
mouth, by the South of England Oyster Company, organized in 1865 
with a capital of £50,000. Inside of a dike upon the west side of the 
island five oyster-beds were prepared, having an extent of sea-bottom 
of about 32 hectares (about 80 acres). May 11 and 12, 1869, when I 
visited these beds, several of them had not been overflowed. The nat- 
ural bottom, which was a sticky mud, had been covered with gravel and 
mussel-shells, and upon the largest bed hurdles, each 2.4 meters long by 
75 centimeters broad, and composed of birch twigs, had been placed so 
as to rest horizontally at about one-half a meter above the ground. 
Besides these hurdles, laths, with oyster-shells and bundles of small rods 
nailed to them, were stuck about over the ground, so that there should 
be plenty of objects of attachment for the young oysters. The inward 
and outward flow of the water was regulated by means of a sluice and 
gate. The mother oysters are generally placed in the beds just before 
the breeding season. 

In 1869 they expected to place upon the beds 50,000 breeding oysters. 
The water is generally changed every day, except during the winter 
months, when there would be danger of freezing the oysters, and also 
except during the swarming period, when the young would be liable to 
escape into the sea with the changing water. In 1867, 00,000 mature 
deep-sea oysters were placed on an oyster-bed which covered a surface 
of 7.3 hectares, and over which 10,000 hurdles were placed as objects of 
attachment. Upon an average over 12,000 young oysters were found 
attached to each hurdle, making for all the hurdles a total of more than 
120,009,000. In these and other experiments at artificial oyster-breed- 
ing in England all the experiences of French oyster- breeders were 
made use of as far as possible, but, notwithstanding this, at no single 
breeding station were the expectations of a great yield of marketable 
oysters ever realized. In London, on the 4th of May, 1876, Mr. Blake, 
, the inspector of fisheries, made, before the commission for the investi- 


[21] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 703 


gation of the oyster-fisheries, the astounding statement that every oys- 
ter grown by means of artificial culture near Reculvers, at the mouth 
of the Thames, cost £50 Sterling, that every one grown in Herne Bay 
cost £100, and in a third place about £500, and that he was prepared to 
furnish several other examples of alike character. Mr. Blake, who is 
very well acquainted, from personal observation, with French and En- 
glish oyster-culture, considers artificial oyster-breeding according to the 
I'rench method impossible along the British coast, on account of the un- 
favorable character of the climate. 

The most important source whence I hare drawn my information in 
regard to the culture of oysters in England is the report of the select 
committee on oyster-fisheries, together with the proceedings of the com- 
mittee, minutes of evidence, appendix, and index, ordered by the House 
of Commons to be printed J uly, 1876. This report contains 3,941 ques- 
tions and answers concerning oyster-culture. 

What I have been able to learn, through my own observations, of the 
English oyster industry I have described in a work referred to in chapter 
4° To this, Mr. A. Tolle, who accompanied me as hydraulic engineer of 
the commission of the Prussian minister of agriculture, has, in a report 
to the honorable minister, issued a supplement, which is also referred to 
in the same chapter. 


7—CAN THE FRENCH SYSTEM OF ARTIFICIAL OYSTER- 
BREEDING BE CARRIED ON IN THE WATERS OF THE 
GERMAN COAST? 


What German who loves oysters has not wished that the whole Ger- 
man coast might be bordered by fruitful oyster-beds? For this reason 
we wish to investigate as to whether the necessary conditions for arti- 
ficial oyster-breeding are to be found in the coast-waters of Germany. 
AS regards the saltness of the water, the currents, the food, and even 
the composition of the soil, our sea-flats will compare as favorably for 
the artificial gathering of the young broods and for the raising of the 
same as the Bay of Arcachon, but not as regards temperature and the 
depth of water. 

In the Bay of Arcachon the difference between ordinary high and low 
tide is 4.5 meters, and during a storm a meter more. But along our 
North Sea coast during a storm the water rises with the tide even more 
than twice as high as during ordinary flood-tide. The power of the 
water during a storm, as compared with the power of the. water during 
an ordinary flood-tide, is much greater along our coast than in the Bay 
of Arcachon. Hence, we would be obliged to give to our oyster-beds a 
much greater firmness than the French breeders have to give to theirs. 
We would also be obliged to place them so far out in the sea that they 
would be entirely covered with water, even at the lowest ordinary tide, 
and also give them sufficient stability to withstand, during a storm, a _ 


704 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


rise of water of from 2 to 2.5 meters, as well as the great and powerful 
force of this water-mass. Beds thus laid down would cost much more 
than the ditched and planked ones of Arcachon. But even if they were 
so placed as to bid defiance to the most severe flood-storm, they would 
indeed hardly suffice to protect the breeding oysters from being covered 
with mud and sand; and thus one flood-storm, or storm in connection 
with a flood-tide, might destroy the accumulated oysters of many gener- 
ations. A visit made to the island of Norderney showed us how de- 
structive nature can be to the oyster-beds of our sea-flats. Upon the 
inner side of this island, early in the year 1869, a surface of 825 square 
meters was dug out, and made firm by double-planked walls to about 
the height of half tide. The space between the walls and banks was 
filled in with sand and mud, and the inclosure itself was divided into 
two compartments, one of which was longer than the other. 

In the smaller division the water was detained to enable it to deposit 
its coarser materials before it was allowed to pass into the larger one. 
In the beginning of June, 20,000 mature oysters were placed in these 
artificial beds, with the expectation of reaping a rich harvest of young 
oysters; but the harvest never came. Star-fish and crabs attacked the 
oysters, in the beginning of August flood-storms broke down the walls, 
and the storms of autumn completed the work of destruction, so that 
very soon nothing was left of the entire enterprise. If the situation of 
the free sea-flats is not suitable for the formation of oyster-beds, per- 
haps there is still a possibility of artificial oyster-breeding being carried 
on inside of the dikes which protect the fertile marsh-land along the Ger- 
man coast from the envroachments of the waters of the North Sea. For 
this purpose basins would have to be dug outinside of the dike and placed 
in connection with the sea by means of canals. Where these canals cut 
through the dike it would be necessary to build a gate, in order to pre- 
vent the sea-water from passing in during high-tide. Then, oyster-beds 
could not be laid down in the neighborhood of this gate, because it would 
serve not only as an inlet for salt water, but as an outlet for the fresh 
water from the marsh-land, and so fresh water instead of sea-water 
would cover the oyster-beds. But evenif it is admitted that oyster-beds 
might be laid down inside of a dike without danger to the diked lands, 
and with sluices and gates to permit the inflow of sea-water, there are 
yet several questions to be answered. How will oysters thrive in such 
beds? Will they receive enough nourishment to become fat? How will 
they exist during continued cold weather? And will they produce young 
in such a place? It is certain that they will not receive as much food 
as in the open sea, since they cannot have nearly as much water as will 
pass over them upon the natural beds; and the quantity of nourishment 
varies in proportion to the amount of water which passes over the beds. 
In these beds the oysters would also be in danger of being buried in the 
deep mud, and in order to prevent this they must either be changed 
very often into clean beds, or else a cleaning-pond must be formed beside 


[23] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 705 


the breeding-pond. But while the water is rendered clear by being al- 
lowed to stand quiet, yet by this means a large amount of organic mat- 
ter which serves as food for the oysters is taken from it. Especially | 
dangerous, however, to oyster beds within the dikes would be the cold 
during winter weather, for along our North Sea coasts the water is low- 
est during an east wind, and at the same time such a wind is accompa. 
nied by the lowest degree of temperature. Hence, at such times, when 
a great depth and a constant change of water over the beds would be 
the best protection from freezing, we cannot have high water, nor can 
the water then standing over the oysters be constantly changed; thus 
during every cold winter, a large number of oysters would be sure to 
perish in their beds. Even now, upon the shallow oyster-beds of our 
sea-tlats, oysters are frozen exactly in proportion to the depth of the water 
over them during these cold spells; the shallower the water the greater 
the destruction upon the beds during a severe winter. During the severe 
winter of 1863~64, when, on account of ice, no oysters could be taken 
from December 21 to February 17, and during the winter of 1864~65, 
when the fishing was interrupted from January 24 to March 26, dead 
oysters were found upon a large number of the banks. The greatest de- 
struction of oysters within the memory of the oldest fishermen took place 
during the severe winter of 1829~30, when Schleswig-Holstein was 
visited by an unusually low temperature, which continued from the mid- 
dle of November until the beginning of the next February. Most of the 
beds suffered greatly, and it was many years before they again recov- 
ered their former fruitfulness. In cold weather slime collects upon the 
gills and mantle-lobes of the oyster, the power of the muscles and cilia 
being weakened by the cold. Accordingly, the oyster is no longer in a 
condition by means of its rapidly-moving cilia, and the quick closing of 
the valves of its shell, to drive out the particles of slime brought in 
with the water. But the power of the cilia and the elasticity of the 
muscles are again restored as the water becomes warmer, providing the 
cold has not lasted too long. ‘The gills become clean once more, and res- 
piration and nourishment, which have been disturbed by the sliming, 
proceed again as before. If the cold spell is prolonged, then, in ad- 
dition to the sliming of the gills and mantle, there are yet other per- 
nicious results. The shell-muscle becomes so soft that it can no 
longer close the valves. The cilia move slower and slower, and finally, 
when the shell-muscle has allowed the valves of the shell to gape 
wide open, cease moving altogether. The mantle and gills become 
pale in color, infusoria nest in them and hasten their destruction, 
and soon their ciliated layer separates and disappears. The softest 
portions of the body, the generative organs, the liver, and the stomach 
quickly vanish, probably consumed by snails, crabs, worms, and star- 
fish as soon as they can make their way unhindered into the open 
shell. The last part of the mollusk which is to be found in the shell is 
the shell-muscle. It remains free between the two valves, or attached 
S. Mis. 29 45 


706 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


to only one of them, until finally but a trace of its fibers is to be seen at 
the points of attachment, the so-called muscular-impressions. During 
the latter part of March, 1870, I was able to follow out for myself, at the 
Schleswig-Holstein beds, the entire course of the changes produced in the 
oyster by freezing. Long-continued east winds had kept the water ex- 
traordinarily low, and for more than a month thick ice had covered the 
flats, so that from the 4th of February to the 7th of March no oysters 
could be taken. On the 14th of February the water in the neighbor- 
hood of an oyster-bed at the north end of the island of Sylt was found 
to be of a temperature of 2° C. below zero. At this point the depth 
of water was 3.5 meters. Of those oysters which were taken in my 
presence from the shallower beds 7 to 8 per cent. were frozen. Upon 
beds which lay in deeper water, nearer the open North Sea, the cold had 
killed only from 2 to 3 per cent. Evidently, then, these latter beds had 
suffered less damage because at every flood-tide they received water of 
a somewhat higher temperature from the open sea. I have frozen the 
mantle and gill lobes of oysters in North Sea water and allowed them 
to remain inclosed in ice for an hour at a time, with the temperature of 
the water varying in degree from 4° C. to 9° C. below zero. When the 
ice had melted, the cilia began to move feebly, and four hours later, 
when the temperature of the water had risen to 5° C. above zero, their 
movements were once more fully established. Other gill and mantle 
lobes which had been three hours in water of a temperature of 1° C. to 
2° ©. below zero moved quite lively on the following day. This 
recalls to me a very weighty difference between fresh and salt water, 
which is often overlooked. It is generally known that fresh water 
is densest and heaviest at a temperature of 4° C. above zero. When any 
portion has arrived at this temperature during freezing weather, it sinks 
to the bottom of the body of fresh water, where it remains until the en- 
tire mass above it is of the same density. That portion which first be- 
comes lower in temperature than 4° C. then expands, rises to the surface, 
and stiffens into ice as it reaches the temperature of 0°. 

The fact is less known that with sea-water the lower the temperature 
the greater the density and weight of the water. Therefore, it also sinks 
to the bottom until it has reached the temperature at which it forms ice, 
which, when it holds 3 per cent. of salt in solution, is 2.28° C. below 
zero. It is evident, then, that water may be found at the bottom over 
the sea-flats of a temperature of 2° C. below zero, while, during the most 
severe cold, water at the bottom of the lakes and deeper rivers of North 
Germany is found to be constantly several degrees warmer than this, 
When, finally, the sea-water, from the surface to the bottom, has reached 
its freezing point, it does not become solid ice for the whole thickness, 
but thin layers of ice, at greater or less distances apart, are formed in it. 
These layers, which are crystallized from the salt water, are free from 
salt, are hence lighter than the surrounding water, and accordingly as- 
cend to the surface; consequently, those animals which live upon the 


[25] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 107 


ground of the deeper portions of the sea-flats remain surrounded by 
water whose temperature is 2° C. lower than the freezing point of fresh 
water. tn shallow places which the ebb-tide leaves dry, the frost kills 
all animals which have not the ability to dig their way to such a depth 
in the sand and mud that they will be beyond the influence of frost, and 
where the water remains liquid. ! 

Here only a few kinds of mussels, worms, and crabs possess this 
ability; hence all of those sand and mud banks of the sea-flats which 
are left dry by the ebb-tide are comparative ‘“ barrens,” occupied only 
by very few animals and plants. . ; 

Our investigation, then, has led to the grievous conclusion that prof- 
itable artificial oyster-breeding, according to the French system, is not 
possible along our North Sea coasts. Whoever should attempt to carry 
out this system, despite the unfavorable conditions of our waters and 
climate, would be certain to find that his breeding oysters were more 
costly than many English oyster-breeders have found theirs to be; for 
upon the English coasts the difference between ordinary high tide and 
the tide increased by a storm is much less than upon our sea-flats, the 
lowest water does not occur simultaneously with the coldest winds, as 
along the southeast shore of the North Sea, and the climate there is 
milder than upon our coasts. 


8.—CAN NATURAL OYSTER-BEDS BE ENLARGED, AND CAN 
NEW BEDS BE LAID DOWN, ESPECIALLY ALONG THE 
GERMAN COAST? 


It will thus be seen that the German oyster industry remains depend- 
ent now, as ever, upon the natural oyster-banks of our coast-seas, where 
oysters have lived for thousands of years, and where they exist to-day 
fruitful and well-flavored. And in regard to these beds we have now to 
consider the important questions : 

First. Is it possible to increase their size ? 

Second. Can we still farther increase the surface of our oyster-terri- 
tory by laying down new beds ? 


Fig. 9. 


In the foreground are the sea-flats, with two can-buoys which indicate the course of 
the channel for vessels. In the background are seen the dunes or sand-hills of Hor- 
num, the southern point of the island of Sylt. 


The water in the neighborhood of the banks, and over all the stretches 
between them, has the same character as over the banks themselves. 
All that is necessary, then, in order to increase the size of these beds is 


708 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


to render the sea-bottom between them habitable for oysters. Old beds 
increase naturally in size whenever the shifting and slimy sea-bottom 
which borders them becomes changed into stable and clear ground. 
This can take place if changes occur in the force and direction of the ebb 
and flood currents. In such cases the extension can be hastened artifi- 
cially by placing upon the newly forming ground shells of oysters and 
other mollusks, in order to furnish just outside the borders of the old 
bed the most judicious objects of attachment for the young broods as 
they swarm out from the mother oysters. For the establishment of new 
beds, within the limits of the German sea-flats, in places where no oysters 
are found at present, it will be necessary to find stretches of sea-bottom 
which are free from mud, where the soil is not being constantly shifted 
about by currents, and where the ebb-tide will leave at least one to two 
meters in depth of water over the beds. But nearly all such places are 
at present occupied by oyster-beds. In the year 1876 the buoy-tenders, 
who are best acquainted with the bottom over the entire Schleswig- 
Holstein sea-flats, and who have to mark out the channels for vessels, 
by means of cask and stake buoys (Figs. 1 and 9), sought to find some 
places upon the flats suitable for oyster-beds, where no oysters yet ex-. 
isted. They found within their whole territory only eight such places 
where it might be possible for oysters to thrive; and it would be very 
hazardous to immediately distribute over all these places a great num- 
ber of breeding oysters, since it is yet doubtful whether new beds would 
be able to flourish there or not. It would be much wiser to experiment 
with one only of these places at first. Upon this let oyster and other 
mollusk shells be scattered in May and again shortly before the breed- 
ing period; then, upon the ground thus prepared place several thousand 
mature oysters. If, by next fall, a deposit of young oysters is found to 
have taken place, it will not be certain even then that the experiment 
will prove successful, but only after three or four years, when a large 
number of half-grown oysters are found lying beside the old mother 
oysters, and when these young are found in turn to have produced other 
broods which locate upon the new bed. Over the entire German sea- 
flats lying south and southwest of Schleswig there can hardly be found 
a single place which is suitable for the formation of a protitable oyster- 
bed ; for in front of the mouths of the Hider, Elbe, Weser, Jahde, and 
Ems the sea-bottom is so covered with mud, or so subject to change, that 
oysters could not live and multiply there. In the fall of 1868, when I 
investigated with a dredge-net the sea along the German coast from the 
Hider to Borkum, I found over this entire territory but one single locality 
vpon the coast of Hanover, between the mainland and the island of Juist, 
west of Norderney, which in any manner would be suitable for such an 
experiment. Here, in the spring of 1869, a large number of breeding 
oysters from the Schleswig-Holstein beds were distributed. But no 
permanent bed has been established there, for in June, 1875, during an 
investigation of the bottom near Juist and Borkum, only seven oysters 


[27] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 109 


were taken, notwithstanding the dredge was used for three whole days. 
The sea-bottom in the neighborhood of Juist is, therefore, not suited to 
the growth of oysters. It is too muddy, and already in possession of the 
edible mussel (Mytilus edulis). During the last century, and the first half 
of the present one, the Hanoverian Government was accustomed to lease 
the oyster-fisheries along its coast. These fisheries were principally in 
the neighborhood of Juist and Borkum, and from 1841 to 1846, inclu- 
Sive, 193,684 oysters were taken there, making an ,average yield of 
38,727. In 1851, in a survey of the beds, very few oysters were found, 
and in 1855 the beds were so impoverished that no one would rent them. 

The exhaustion of the beds resulted from excessive fishing and from 
the increase of mud upon the ground occupied by the oysters. Whoever, 
therefore, would establish new oyster-beds along the German portion of 
the coast of the North Sea, between the Hider and the mouth of the Ems, 
must begin his difficult work by changing the ebb and flood currents in 
the southern portion of the North Sea, in order to prepareasurface upon 
which oysters can thrive; for to attempt to adapt oysters to a bottom 
of shifting sand or mud is not natural, nor is it conducive to an indus- 
try which is to last for a hundred years. For thousands of years innu- 
merable young oysters have been scattered from the oyster-beds over 
changing mud and sand banks, and yet not one has so altered its or- 
ganization as to become adapted to such a bottom and transmit its new 
nature to its progeny; they have all been destroyed. 

Since the sixteenth century, along the west coast of France, on both 
sides of the mouth of the Seudre, near Marennes and La Tremblade, 
the oyster-breeders have been in the habit of transplanting oysters, one 
year old, from natural oyster-beds to prepared ponds in order to fatten 
them and improve their flavor. These ponds, called claires, are shallow 
excavations of various shapes and sizes. The greater number are square 
or rectangular, and cover from two to three thousand square meters of 
surface. They lie near together, but irregularly, and are divided off 
into sections by deep trenches or canals, by means of which the sea-water 
flows in and out during spring-tides. The bottom of the ponds is some- 
what higher near the center than around the edges. The walls surround- 
ing the ponds are formed of the earth dug from within, and are about one 
meter in height. The neighboring ponds are placed in communication 
with one another by means of ditches or wooden pipes in the walls. 
Flood-gates are placed in the larger trenches, by means of which the 
water can be retained in the ponds from one spring-tide to another. 
In the fall, when fishing upon the sea-beds is permitted, young oysters 
are taken and transplanted to these ponds. From August until the 
breeding season next year, these transplanted oysters acquire a cloudy, 
dark-green color in the tissues of the mantle, gills, liver, and stomach. 
The delicate flavor, for which the green oysters of Marennes are especi- 
ally famous in Paris, is only acquired after three or four years. During 
this time they must often be cleansed from the mud which has accumu- 


710 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [28] 


lated upon them, and transferred to fresh ponds, if they would be kept 
healthy. In these feeding-ponds the oysters spawn well, and at times, 
when there are any objects of attachment free from mud, such as stones, 
shells, and pieces of wood, the young oysters become attached, but they 
do not mature into marketable oysters. Oyster breeders, after three 
hundred years of practice in rearing young bank-oysters in the mud of 
feeding ponds, have not as yet been able to transform the oyster into a 
mussel which can live and propagate in the mud. The breeders of 
Marennes and La Tremblade have been able to change the color and 
flavor of mollusks, but they have not been able to give the oyster a foot 
for the purpose of locomotion. Along the German coast, in the East 
Sea, the sea-bottom, over many extensive tracts, is firm, and also free 
from mud. ‘These places possess, then, in this respect, one of the most 
important conditions for the successful formation of oyster-beds. Yet 
several attempts to plant oysters in the Baltic have proved entire fail- 
ures. In 1753, 1830, and 1843, oysters were planted along the coast of 
Pomerania. The last of these attempts was made by a company, of 
which the Kings of Prussia and Hanover and the Prince of Putbus were 
members. Fifty thousand oysters, taken in the northern portion of the 
Cattegat, near Frederikshavn, were placed, on the 6th and 18th of 
April, 1843, in the waters southeast of the island of Riigen, near Greifs- 
walder Oie. ‘Two years later, investigations showed that they were all 
dead, since not a single living one could be foand. The much talked-of 
attempt at oyster-breeding by Coste gave a new impulse to the question 
of planting oysters inthe Baltic. In the Bay of Kiel, on the south coast 
of the island of Laaland, in the neighborhood of Korsér, and in the Isef- 
jord, on the coast of the island of Seeland, mature oysters were planted, 
upon apparently suitable ground, but the desired result was not attained 
in either place. The water of the Baltic is not salt enough for the propa- 
gation of the oyster. East of the island of Riigen the water at the bot- 
tom contains only 1 per cent. of salt, and near the surface still less, 
since the rivers bring in much fresh water. West of Riigen, south from 
the Great Belt, to near the coast of Mecklenburg, the water at the bot- 
tom contains indeed as much as 3 per cent. of salt, but here also the 
surtace-water everywhere contains a less degree. The young oysters, 
as soon as they had left the mother oysters, would then ascend to the 
surface, and thus come into water which throughout the entire southern 
portion of the Cattegat contains less than 2 per cent. of salt, while they 
need water with at least 3 per cent. of salt. This I infer from the 
fact, that. such a degree of saltness is to be found at all places along 
the European coast where natural oyster-beds exist. There are two 
other conditions of the Baltic besides the low percentage of salt, 
which certainly hinder the growth of the oyster—the long-continued 
low temperature of winter, and the lack of regular tidal-currents; for 
in the North Sea, where there are strong and regular tidal-currents, 
the oyster, which is a stationary animal, will receive daily a greater 


* 


[29] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. relat 


quantity of oxygen and food in the water brought to it than it will in 
an interior sea, where the water is in less regular motion. These chemi- 
cal and physical differences between the North and East Seas render it 
not only impossible for the oyster to live in the latter, but also for many 
other North Sea animals, of which I will mention only the lobster, the 
larger punger (Platycarcinus pagurus), and the edible sea-urchin (Echinus 
esculentus). 

If nothing further were necessary in order to establish a permanent 
settlement of oysters in the Baltic than to plant there several thousand 
fresh and healthy mature oysters, why then cannot lobsters, crabs, sea- 
urchins, and all the other animals which are found associated with the 
oysters upon the banks, and indeed the entire fauna of the North Sea 
oyster-banks, flourish in the Baltic? If this could have been accom- 
plished, I should long ago have had a large number of the animals of 
the North Sea naturalized in the Bayof Kiel, in order to facilitate my 
own investigations, and for the purpose of instruction to students. 
Nature has already made frequent efforts to introduce not only oysters, 
but other North Sea animals, into the Baltic. Nearly every year fish 
and other animals from the North Sea appear in the Baltic, but they 
are not permanent, and soon disappear again from our fauna. 

The great storm-flood of the 13th and 14th of November, 1872, brought 
Noctiluca scintillans from the North Sea into the harbor of Kiel in such 
numbers that for weeks they made the waters of the harbor brilliant 
with their phosphorescent flashes, but very soon they had entirely dis- 
appeared. Under the present geognostic and physical conditions the 
oyster can advance no farther towards the Baltic than into the south- 
western part of the Cattegat. Here a line drawn from Samsde over the 
island of Anholt to Gothenburg represents the limits of those conditions 
suited to-their welfare. Along this extreme border of their existence one 
could not expect such productiveness and size among the oysters as a 
costly artificial system of breeding would demand in order to be profit- 
able. 

Every change in the saltness of the water below the general mean, or 
in the temperature of the sea-water, would incur heavy loss to any arti- 
ficially conducted system of oyster-breeding which might be carried on 
here. That oysters of their own accord spread out from their great 
breeding home in the North Sea into all places where they find the ex- 
ternal conditions favorable, is proven by their substantial immigration 
into Lim Fiord, in the north of Jutland. This fiord, up to the year 1825, 
consisted of a number of connected brackish-water lakes, with an eastern 
out-flow into the Cattegat. During the last century futile efforts were 
made to establish oyster-beds in these seas; but on the 3d of February, 
1825, a fearful storm-flood broke through the dam which separated the 
western portion of the Lim Iiord from the North Sea, and after this the 
water of the fiord became more salt every year, the brackish-water ani- 


712 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF ‘FISH AND FISHERIES. [30] 


mals and plants which had lived there vanished, and in their place 
came North Sea animals, and among them, in 1851, the oyster was first 
noticed. From year to year they spread over more surface. In 1860 
only 150,000 weredredged; presently 98 places were known where oysters 
had become established, and in 187172 the oystermen were able to take 
for foreign consumption seven millions of mature oysters from the beds 
of Lim Fiord. Their distribution was very rapid. In 1851 the first 
were found; had there been many there before this time, they would 
certainly have been noticed by the fishermen. The water must first 
contain a percentage of salt of 3 per cent before they can enter a new 
territory. If we admit the first appearance of oysters here in 1840, 
then in an interval of thirty years they had spread over an extent of 
surface 15 miles (German) in length, which shows a yearly advance, in 
territory covered of about one-half mile in length, or rather more, 
about 3,700 meters. The beds ofthe Lim Fiord are from 1 to 8 kilo- 
meters from one another. Their length is from 1 to 7 kilometers and 
their breadth somewhat less. These facts show that the young swarm- 
ing oysters are capable of moving over a stretch of bottom 8 kilometers 
in length. In the same manner as it has thus immigrated into the Lim 
Fiord the oyster would have established itself in the Baltic had the 
water been similar in its characteristics to that of the North Sea, and 
this would be the condition of affairs if the connection between the North 
Sea and the Baltic were broader and deeper than it is at present. At 
one time it was broader and deeper, and, for this reason, oysters once 
lived four miles east of the point where the city of Kiel now stands. 
This is proven by the fossil oyster-beds found near Waterneversdorf, in 
the eastern part of Holstein, which, together with the entire bottom of 
the western portion of the Baltic, have been raised more than 30 meters. 
By this elevation the Cattegat, the Belt, and the Sound were made shal- 
lower and smaller pathways for the water coming in from the North Sea 
than they were in olden times, when the oyster-beds of Waterneversdorf 
still produced oysters. Yet, by this elevation of the sea-bottom, which 
took place thousands of years ago, the percentage of salt in the water 
has been lessened but very little. Thousands of years later, when the 
oyster-beds of Waterneversdorf had been dry land for a long time, oys- 
ters were found in such abundance along the coast of the Danish Islands 
that they served as food for the people of the Stone Period who lived 
in this vicinity, since great masses of oyster-shells are found in the heaps 
of kitchen refuse of that time. 

And since the oyster-shells of Waterneversdorf and of the kitchen- 
heaps of the Stone Age fully agree with those of to-day, since they are 
also bored like ours by the boring sponge (Clione celata), and since the 
whelk (Buccinum undatum) and other animals at present found upon 
the sea-flats lived with them, conditions favorable to their growth 
must have existed at that time in the meridian of the present Cimbrian 
Peninsula, the same as now to the west of Schleswig-Holstein. The 


[31]. —s« THE OYSTER AND’ OYSTER-CULTURE. 113 


oyster has thus not changed during the course of at least ten thousand 
years. It has not accommodated itself to the changes which have taken 
place in the territory occupied by it, but has yielded to those changes, 
although they were brought about very slowly.’ Hence it is impossible 
for any human power to change their nature in a short time and accus- 
tom them to the water of the Baltic as it is to-day. 

The following Danish works treat of the oyster-beds of the Lim Fiord, 
the extension of the oyster into the southern portion of the Cattegat, 
and of the unsuccessful attempts to plant oysters in the Baltic: 

Jonas Collin. Om Ostersfiskeriet i Limfjorden. (With a chart of the oyster-beds. ) 
Copenhagen, 1872. 

G. Winther. Om vore Haves Naturforhold med Hensyn til konstig Ostersayl og om 
de i den Henseende anstillede Forség. Copenhagen, 1876. 

F’. Krogh. Den konstige Ostersayl og dens Indférelse i Danmark. Hadersleben, 
1870. 

In the royal archives at Stettin and Stralsund are to be found the acts under which 


the attempts to locate oysters along the coast of Pomerania in 1830 and 1843 were 
made. 


9.—SIZES AND PRODUCTIVENESS OF THE OYSTER. 


The delightful hopes of bordering the entire German sea-coast with 
fruitful oyster-beds, and of seeing German oysters as food upon every 
table, must, therefore, be given up. The nature of our waters, as well as 
the nature of the oyster itself, forces us to do so. Yet it is especially 
difficult for those to understand this who share the widespread opinion 
that all eggs which are spawned by oysters are destined to become trans- 
formed into young mollusks. Most animals, however, whose ova and 
young are exposed to attacks and liable to be destroyed, produce a large 
number of eggs, while those animals, on the contrary, which guard their 
broods until they can take care of themselves, as is the case with mam- 
mals, birds, and some invertebrates, generally produce but few eggs ; but 
in those cases where care for the brood is entirely lacking, or lasts for a 
very short time only, eggs are produced in such great numbers that the 
numerous enemies Which regularly attack them are not able to destroy 
them all. <A certain number escape destruction and arrive at maturity. 
The tape-worm of man (Tenia solium) produces from its eight hundred 
segments not far from forty million germs, and the parasite Ascaris 
lumbricoides forms in its ovary about sixty million eggs. ¢ Under the 
normal condition of affairs for the development of these worms, only 
a very few of the great number of eggs laid ever go so far in growth 
that they in turn produce eggs. This is satisfactory to everybody, since 
none desire that all of the forty million eggs of the tape-worm or the 
sixty million eggs of the “‘itch-insect” should ever become mature para- 
sites. It would be a horrible state of affairs if such a thing should hap- 
pen. On the contrary, every one very much desires that all the young 
broods which the oyster sends forthinto the water should become ma- | 
ture table-oysters, since, when fully grown, they become one of the most 


714. REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [32] 


delicious of delicacies. But in observations and investigations which 
have for their object the discovery of the methods and means by which 
nature brings these things about, such desires as these must not be 
allowed to have an influence upon our opinion; for whoever would have 
nature especially attractive, beautiful or useful, whenever he is in im- 
mediate contact with her becomes easily led away from the pathway 
of strict scientific investigation and lost in the dark and boundless ter- 
ritory of speculation. 

Nature accomplishes at every place just what she is obliged to accom- 
plish there with her united forces, according to the conditions upon 
which the development of the world has proceeded. Throughout her 
entire limits there are no such distinctions as useful or injurious. 
The terms agreeable or disagreeable, beautiful or frightful, useful or 
harmful, as applied to the workings of nature, exist only in the thoughts 
and comprehension of intelligent and sensitive beings. Yet very fre- 
quently we hear it said, when speaking of the fossil oyster-bed which 
now lies near Blankenese, below Hamburg, 80 meters above the level of 
the Elbe, that it did not make any difference that oysters should once: 
have lived there and produced young, of which only a small proportion 
should ever come to maturity, since no human beings were there at that 
time who could have fed upon them. 

Oysters belong to that class of animals which secures the continuance 
of the species, not by guarding the young for a long time, but by pro- 
ducing a vast number of embryos every season. They are able to pro- 
duce so large a brood that enough of the number will be certain to 
arrive at maturity to maintain the status of the bed, and supply the 
places of those old oysters which die or are destroyed; and this result 
takes place notwithstanding many of the young are destroyed by sand, 
mud, or unfavorable temperature, and many others are eaten before 
their shells are thick and large enough to protect them from the nume- 
rous enemies which live upon the same banks with them. ‘The number 
of descendants from any one oyster which thus arrive at maturity is 
so small even upon the best beds, where for more than a hundred years 
the finest and most productive Holstein oysters have been caught, 
that Iam persuaded no one would give credit to my words if I was 
not able to substantiate them by means of figures. In 1587, Frederick 
II, King of Denmark and Duke of Holstein-Gottorp, appropriated 
the oyster-beds of Schleswig-Holstein as royal prerogatives.* They 


* The public order by which the Ducal-King Frederick II took possession of the oyster- 
beds of the sea-flats along the coast of Schleswig-Holstein and Jutland, is printed 
by H. Kroyer in his work ‘‘De danske Ostersbanker,” Kjébenhavn, 1837, page 110. 
Translated into English, through the German, it reads as follows: ‘‘ We, Frederick, &c., 
make known to all by these presents, that since it has been brought to our knowledge 
that in the waters of the West Sea, in the fief of Ribe, a kind of fish called an oyster 
can be found and caught, therefore we have commanded our liege Albert Friis, super- 
intendent and guardian at our castle at Ribe, that he permit this kind of fish to be 
caught in our name and sent to us; and in order that a future lack of them may not 
occur, we forbid one and all, whoever he may be, from taking oysters or allowing 


[33] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 715 


were then leased, generally for a long term of years. From time to time 
the government caused the banks to be officially examined, in order to 
find out their condition and prevent their depletion by overfishing. The 
examination was conducted by commissioners appointed by the govern- 
ment, and the dredging carried on in their presence was performed 
by fishermen specially sworn for the purpose. The smaller beds were 
dredged in three, the larger in six, different places, and all the oysters taken 
were divided, according to size and age, into three classes, known as— 

1. Zahlbar Gut, or marketable. 

2. Junggut, or medium (half grown). 

3. Junger Anwachs, or young growth. 

The marketable oysters are those which are large and full grown. Their 
shell is at least 7 to 9 centimeters in length and breadth, and when 
closed the greatest thickness must be more than 18 millimeters. The left 
valve, or the one which is most curved, is from 6 to 9 millimeters thick at 
the point of attachment of the shell-muscle, and also under the ligament. 

The greater number of full-grown oysters are from seven to ten years 
of age, yet many older ones are found, which can be distinguished from 
the younger ones by the greater thickness of their shell. Oysters more 
than twenty years old are seldom seen. The oldest which I have per- 
sonally examined I estimated to be from twenty-five to thirty years old. 
The left valve, at the muscular impression and below the ligament, was 
20 to 25 millimeters in thickness. ; 

The shells of the half-grown oysters, when closed, show a thickness 
of from 16 to 18 millimeters. The valves, where thickest, are, at the 
most, only 5 millimeters thick, and their breadth is less than 9 centi- 
meters. They are cleaner than the old oysters, upon whose shells are 
generally to be found many animals and dlants. The young growth are 
those small and thin oysters which are not older than from one to two 
years (Fig. 8 d). 

In the record of each inspection we find indicated the number of n.ar- 
ketable and the number of medium oysters caught in each haul of the 
dredge, but the number of the young growth is not given, mention only 
being made as to whether there were many or few.* 


them to be taken in that place. We except, however, those who take them in our 
name by the authority of our liege at Ribe. Whoever shall dare to act contrary to 
this command, and he can be justly convicted of so doing, shall be punished accord- 
ing to his deserts. Each one is then to govern himself accordingly, and guard against 
transgressing. Given at Skanderborg, the 4th day of February, 1587.” 

* The work of Kréyer contains also a tabular review of the numbers of mature and 
medium oysters of the official investigations which took place from 1709 to 1830. This 
table, and also tables for which I have to thank the royal government at Schleswig, 
have furnished me the numbers from which I have estimated the proportions between 
half and full grown oysters. I have not considered the investigations previous to the 
year 1730, partly because in the beginning of the eighteenth century a number of beds 
were unknown, and partly because the numbers of the first five inspections (1709 to 
1728) give no positive results. On six official investigations made between the years 
1869 to 1876 I have participated myself. The results of these I will give later. 


716 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [34] 


During the period from 1730 to 1852 ten records were made of all the 
oyster-beds of the Schleswig-Holstein sea-flats. If from these records 
the numbers of all the marketable and all the medium-sized oysters are 
taken and added together, we will have a series of very different totals, 
showing no particular general law. But if for each of these reports the 
proportion of marketable to medium oysters is taken, then we will 
arrive at the surprising result that this proportion fluctuates but very 
slightly during all the records. 

The following table gives a summary of the marketable and medium 
oysters recorded as caught during each of the ten investigations. From 
these numbers I have reckoned for each record the proportion of medium 
oysters to every thousand of those which were full grown. 


Ho ae | 

Se ie 

eet ea oN a | 

: = Ok oa 
Year of record. Ee eae hes | Propertion of market- 
x He Sa able to medium. 

| S bey = CH 

BHS | see 

4a A 
TTT ae ae MeO nat Wall OEE PEE 5, 394 2, 602 1, 000 48h 
PBA SE clo DENG 2 ps SAN RDS. iy ee EER 16, 770, 5, 205 | 1, 000 310 
TE ei Seine ERROR O SCAG REIS M Ee crtice ound aetna at motley . 7, 185 | 3, 007 1, 000 418 
DG A Ale ee oe a oe Mirictacitate ave etias Seen ena 6, 793 3, 833 | 1, 000 490 
IL Hyatt ea eta eae oe EL It EN Soh eR meee Let OY 8 2,078 1,006 | 1, 000 484 
TOO ee Sie ae ho acre rat ta eicctane re aes, nike Venetia en ate 2, 705 831 | 1, 000 307 
AUST RYE ea tA oR Seer Ree tens ors Re Ld See ere 2, 828 1, 087 | 1, 000 388 
UEBO seen Lode acorn tet see oder eee ocala 1, 956 197. | 1, 000 417 
GSO Ee Saaton sdeicioinis se able e Bisa das, o omjsie ease mie miata semis 3, 272 | 1, 552 | 1, 000 440 
WB GRE Ssh Sa Se ne ok scene win sas ajee inte Se ae nie eee ee 3, 584 1, 673 | 1, 600 473 

a Wa he ee eR RR OA Ve NCI. Saute a MIR ROU dN pest) STR led LO, | 10, 000 4,213 
ae s a | a 
Mean proportion: J: css. caso occemonsetteceme St) aaa se eee Ce Sere ee 1, 000 421.3 


The following table gives the quantities of oysters which were taken 
during these investigations from two of the largest and most productive 
beds of the Schleswig-Holstein coast, the Huntje and the Steenack 
Banks: 


Huntje. Steenack. 
Year of record, | EE ot a =a ] 
Marketable. | Medium. | Marketable. | Medium. 

Filla’ a Sear a ft ih (ea! 
DEUS Se Cane Pa Sey ROC RR PNA R TC. 355 164 158 | 69 
TPS Y heat MESO by es tA ey Seep i 1,353 874. 465 90 
TAPED) es Sen La AE eR RPS TA oR Geld PR ISHED) Ney eu 323 158 26 110 
LAFRSKGSS Ea, eel bac ine Re ut aL pent ee eH LACE ESTA EL 736 99 149 35 
TUPI eres, Sete p NCS ar. pak AAG eM ee dene UO lean 931 66 607 197 
1795 Fa Nt ates ree are ets ete ee iais tote eth ati Slee ee 87 | 461 261 106 
TOON Rem NER ACB he TL 928 ah, Sa 183 | 119 | 236 56 
TISSt)S etd = Uae ta MRC op 363 | 173 | 53 | 79 
IESE U Ee Se cyt Aes ee 40 | 3 | 11 | 4 
TE aodno last de dusedecaos sek 6 He Be ReBenN Asem mB Mee 128 64 136 | 58 
Fatale es ees arya scl FS ona 4,499] 2, 181 2, 082, | 804 
IPT OpPOLti One mes e ce ot eeh-ssise sections ete 1, 000 | 484 | 1, 000 | 385 


The proportion of marketable to medium-sized oysters is thus seen to 
be almost the same upon single beds as in a mean of all the beds taken 
together. 


(35) THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 17 


In this similarity of proportions between the marketable and me- 
dium. oysters in different years and upon different beds a natural law 
is very Strikingly manifested. The medium-sized oysters of any bed 
consist of the descendants of the marketable ones. They are those 
members of the young broods which have escaped the numerous enemies 
living upon and around the beds, and which, despite the numerous 
attacks thade upon their lives, have grown into very respectable-sized 
animals. 

The medium oysters thus represent the total number of embryos from 
the bed which, in the struggle for existence, have continued to exist. 
A thousand mature oysters will produce during a breeding period, as I 
have already shown in chapter 2, at least 440,000,000 of young; but 
upon the beds alongside of these 1,000 mature oysters are to be found, 
on an average, not more than 421 half-grown ones; so that, aS a rule, 
for every Holstein oyster which is placed upon the table more than 
1,045,000 young are destroyed or die; and indeed even more-than this, 
for not only do those oysters which are over six years of age produce 
eggs, but those which are two and three years old also reproduce their 
kind to a certain extent. ‘The younger oysters, however, produce much 
less spawn than those which are mature, so I estimate that those half- 
grown oysters lying beside the mature ones on the same banks, and 
which are their offspring, will produce 60,000,000 young oysters. 

We thus have, upon a surface of oyster-bed occupied by 1,000 full- 
grown and 421 half-grown oysters, at least 500,000,000 of young pro- 
duced during the course of the summer, and of this immense number 
only 421 arrive at maturity. The immolation of a vast number of young 
germs is the means by which nature secures to a few germs the certainty 
of arriving at maturity. In order to render the ideas of germ-fecundity 
and productiveness more easily understood, I will make a comparison 
between the oyster and man. 

According to Wappiius,* for every 1,000 men there are 34.7 births. 
According to Bockh,t out of every 1,000 men born 554 arrive at maturity, 
that is, live to be twenty years or more of age; thus, on an average 34.7 
children are produced from 554 mature men, or 62.6 children from 1,000 
mature men. Since 1,000 full-grown oysters produce 440,000,000. of 
germs, then the germ-fecundity of the oyster is to the germ-fecundity of 
man as 440,000,000 to 62.6, or as 7,028,754 to 1. On the other hand, 
the number which arrive at maturity, is 579,002 times as great with 
mankind as with the oyster; for of 1,000 human embryos brought 
into the world 554 arrive at maturity, or of 440,000,000 newly born 
248,760,000 would live to grow up, while of 440,000,000 young oysters 
only 421 ever become capable of propagating their species. The pro- 
portion is then 421 to 243,760,000, or as 1 to 579,002. I am fully per- 


* Wappiius, Handbuch der Geographie und Statistik. Band I, 1855, Abth. I, p. 197. 
tR. Boéckh, Sterblichkeitstafel fiir den Preussischen Staat im Umfange von 1865, 
Jena, 1875. 


718 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [36] 


suaded that these figures represent: the number of oysters which 
arrive at maturity more favorably than is really the case, since from 
every thousand of full-grown oysters it is certain that, on an aver- 
age, more than 440,000,000 young are produced. The correctness of 
my argument that the number of oysters which arrive at maturity 
is very small indeed as compared with the exceedingly large number of 
germs produced is corroborated by the experience of those who have 
engaged in oyster-culture in France and England. In the year 1870 
a small oyster-bed was discovered at the mouth of the Thames, north- 
east from Whitstable.* It was about 18 meters long by 6 meters broad. 
Forty-eight hours later 75 boats were there, close alongside of one an- 
other, fishing up the oysters. Upon every old oyster which was taken 
were found only from nine to ten young ones of different ages. This 
bed had never been previously disturbed, and the oysters were ac- 
cordingly found in their natural condition. Whoever is not informed 
in regard. to the small number which arrive at maturity, but knows 
only of their immense fecundity, will, in thinking of the growth and 
production of oysters, consider the oyster-beds as inexhaustible. It has, 
indeed, really been thought that if millions and millions of oysters were 
taken from a bed no harm would be done to its prosperity, since it was. 
the opinion that the dredges would leave everywhere as many breeding 
oysters as would be necessary to supply the place of those taken away,, 
by means of the immense number of young which would be produced. 
In accordance with this view, the oyster-fisheries were made entirely 
free in England in 1866. But the consequence of the continuous fish- 
ing which followed was everywhere a quick impoverishment of the beds, 
concerning which result the official reports upon the oyster-fisheries in 
France and England contain a vast number of authentic proofs. <Ac- 
cording to the statement of Mr. Webber, mayor of Falmouth, 700 men, 
working 300 boats, were profitably employed in oyster-fishing in the 
neighborhood of Falmouth so long as the old laws of close-time were 
observed. But since the year 1866, when those old laws were set aside, 
the beds have become so impoverished that now, in 1876, only about 40 
men, with less than 40 boats, can find employment, and even with this 
greatly diminished number of boats no single boat takes daily more 
than from 60 to 100 oysters, while formerly in the same time a boat could 
take from ten to twelve thousand. About the year 1830 an oyster-bed 
was discovered upon the English coast near Dudgeon Light, containing 
- an immense number of oysters, among which were very many old ones. 


* The statistics concerning English and French oyster-fishing were taken partially 
from my own notes, made during a visit to the English and French coasts, and partially 
from two official English reports: I. Report on the Oyster and Mussel Fisheries of 
France, made to the Board of Trade by Cholmondeley Pennel, Inspector of Oyster-fish- 
eries. London, 1868. II. Report from the select Commission on Oyster-fisheries. 1876. 

These reports are attached to summaries of the profits arising from oyster-fishing in 
France, which were delivered to the authorities at the French department of marine 
and fisheries. 


[37] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 719 


During the next three or four years this bed was fished so persever- 
ingly and disastrously that since then it has not produced enough 
oysters to be worth recording. Between the years 1840 and 1850 there 
were in the harbor of Emsworth so many oysters that one man in a 
single tide (five hours) could take from 15 to 20 casks, each containing 
1,600 oysters. Later, 70 to 100 sailing vessels from Colchester came into 
the harbor and fished up so many young and old oysters during the two’ 
or three weeks they were there that, in the year 1858, scarcely ten ves- 
sels could load there, and in 1868 the beds were so impoverished by this 
fishing that a dredger in five hours could not gather more than 20 oys- 
ters. These figures are taken from the statement of Mr. Messum, oyster- 
dealer, and secretary of an oyster company at Emsworth, made before 
the commission for the investigation of the British oyster-fisheries, on 
the Ist of May, 1876. From the beds of the districts of Rochefort, Mar- 
ennes, and the island of Oléron, on the west coast of France, there were 
taken, in the years 1853-54, ten millions of oysters, and in 135455 fif- 
teen millions. By means of long-continued and exhaustive fishing they 
were rendered so poor that in 1863~64 only 400,000 oysters were furn- 
ished for market. 

The very celebrated rich oyster-beds of the Bay of Cancale, on the 
coast of Normandy, have produced, according to official reports, the fol- 
lowing numbers of oysters : 


Number of 3 Number of 
Year. oysters. | Year. oysters. 
1, 200, 000 43, 000, 000 
1, 500, 000 || 1: 40, 000, 000 
1, 300, 000 || 36, 000, 000 
BOOAOOO| | TEBBUAe fate ae hate oc Mes eee 44, 000, 000 
AAOOSO00'y| S89 eas noe toe ee ce cece eens eee 42, 000, 000 
SOOROOO |) 1840 aeons ees naan see oee 52, 000, 000 
HOOKCOO || USA Meck set seem anes mnieacee cs 56, 000, 000 
TOSOKOO0)| TSO Meee Se saS cceoece cence 63, 000, 000 
UPSOONOOONN T8488 vo 52k cesaleo ce saeceseeeene some 70, 000, 000 
1-200: OOO) MT Saat. eee ee eee aoe somes cece 68, 000, 000 
MOOHO00!)|| 1845. sae saccssesac oe coemcwenem ese 67, 000, 000 
T, TSOROOO! | USACE Ee cee see eS sae ee eee | 65, 000, 000 
AP 1O0S OOOR GV S4 75ers see centers fecmemseee eee 71, 000, 000 
G00).000% | (tS4 Se “ees ace ( toe secaoe fas our tae 60, 000, 000 
400s000NI|MS40 yee ek See Ne TS eee 52, 000, 000 
8005, 000" 1850.65 eee ae ERS eee ce 50, 000, 000 
2400000) | kl Gale ee eae ee eee ee eee eee ene 47, 000, 000 
BE GOONOOON IMISSD caus a seme eran soe oan ee 20, 000, 000 
51800) 0004| Shia. mene «couse cone oe ee cee 49, 000, 000 
CORSO NOOO) | astes Ue ue Ne hs Cee lo te ep aacoesee 20, 000, 000 
CRCCOR OT MUS itay yee oe mene ae oe es 20, 000, 000 
600050008 | t856r ea oa eee EE ees eee 18, 000, 000 
T1800) OO0ul | Meo Tetes cose tee ke che ccleee steer ck 19, 000, 000 
87000 000M SHSM eweae ee kee ee SR ST tye | | 24, 000, 000 
20, 000, 000 | | 16, 000, 000 
20, 000, 000 | 8, 000, 000 
25, 000, 000 9, 000, 000 
28, 000, 000 | 3, 000, 000 
33, 000, 000 2, 090, 000 
31, 000, 000 2, 200, 000 
36, 000, 000 1, 100, 000 
42, 000, 000 1, 960, 000 
38, 000, 000 | a 
41, 000, 000 | 1, 079, 000 
46, 000, 000 


The records of inspections of the Schleswig-Holstein oyster-beds have 
furnished the means by which such an impoverishment of these rich 


720 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [38] 


beds can be explaimed. From 1800 to 1815 there were taken yearly from 
the beds of Cancale less than two million oysters. The oysters, both 
marketable and spawning, had thus an opportunity to accumulate in 
greater quantity to form the increased production which occurred in 
1822. If the French oysters live as long as those of the Schleswig- 
Holstein beds, some of this stock, which had accumulated during the 
period of comparative rest at the time of the Napoleonic wars, would have 
been lying upon the banks as late as about 1830. From this time on for 
nearly a score of years it is probable that the ever-increasing yield was 
the produce of only those oysters existing upon the beds from 1820 to 
1830. Krom 1840 to 1847 the number of oysters taken was extraordi- 
narily great—evidently too great for the productiveness of the beds, since 
from this time they produced fewer oysters each year. 

The total number of oysters taken between the years: 1840 and 1847 
was about 512,000,000, being on an average about 64,000,000 per year. 
If this average represents the natural stock of marketable, full-grown 
oysters upon the beds of Cancale, then the number taken yearly should 
not have been over twenty-six to twenty-seven millions, if it was desired 
that this degree of productiveness should be maintained. This I assert 
upon the supposition that the productiveness of the oysters in the Bay 
of Cancale is no greater than upon the Schleswig-Holstein banks. If 
this productiveness was higher than upon our sea-flats, then we ought 
to have at Cancale, not 421 half-grown oysters for every 1,000 full-grown 
ones, but, for example, 500. Under these cireumstances the presence of 
64,000,000 matured oysters would permit the fishing of 32,000,000 yearly, 
but no more if the fruitfulness of the beds would be kept at that number, 
since such a stock would be absolutely necessary in order that a suffi- 
cient number of young should be produced to secure the maturing of 
32,000,000 yearly. 

After the impoverishment of the beds of Cancale the inspection officers 
enforced once more the laws protecting the oyster, since they did not 
believe that all the mature breeding oysters had been taken off the beds. 
Upon some of these beds there has already been a very significant in- 
crease of oysters through this action; for in 1872~73, 7,300,000 oysters 
were taken, in 1873~74, 9,056,000, and in 1874~75, 9,342,000. To pre- 
serve oyster-beds a stock of full-grown oysters, for the purposes of prop- 
agation, must be left lying upon the banks. The number thus left must 
depend upon the fruitfulness of the oysters of each section, or, still bet- 
ter, of each single bed. Accordin g to the experience of oystermen, the 
most fruitful as well as the largest of the Schleswig-Holstein oyster- 
beds is the Huntje Bank. The proportion of medium oysters upon this 
bed is 484 per thousand, which is thus greater than the mean produc- 
tiveness of the whole Schleswig-Holstein oyster-beds. The productive- 
ness of smaller beds is belowthe average of 421 per thousand. As ex- 
amples, we give the proportions of the following beds: Steenack, 385 per 
thousand; Hédrnum, 319 per thousand; West Amrum, 165 per thousand. 


[39] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. Won 


These beds are only from 1,000 to 1,050 meters long by about 300 meters 
broad, while the Huntje Bank is more than 1,800 meters long by about 
900 broad. . The speedy extension of oysters in the Lim Fiord has taught 
us that young swarm-oysters can wander from 4 to 8 kilometers away 
from their home-bed before they become attached to any object. So if 
the oyster-bank is of small extent, the young oysters are in danger of 
swimming out beyond the limits of the bed and settling upon unsuitable 
ground, and thus of being destroyed in much larger numbers than upon 
a larger bed. Of such broods of swarm-oysters the large banks will re- 
tain many more than the small beds; and if upon both all other con- 
ditions are the same, a much larger number of young will grow to ma- 
turity upon those beds which have a large extent of surface than upon 
the smaller beds. 


10.—AN OYSTER-BANK IS A BIOCONOSE, OR A SOCIAL COM. 
MUNITY. 


The history of the impoverishment of the French oyster-beds is very 
instructive. When the beds of Cancale had been nearly deprived of 
all their oysters, by reason of excessive fishing, with no protection, the 
cockle (Cardium edule) came in and occupied them in place of the oyster; 
and vast hordes of edible mussels (Mytilus edulis) under similar cireum- 
stances appeared upon the exhausted beds near Rochefort, Marennes, 
and the island of Oléron. The territory of an oyster-bed is not inhabited 
by oysters alone but also by other animals. Over the Schleswig-Hol- 
stein sea-flats, and also along the mouths of English rivers, I have ob- 
served that the oyster-beds are richer in all kinds of animal life than any 
other portion of the sea-bottom. As soon as the oystermen have emptied 
out a full dredge upon the deck of their vessel, one can see nimble pocket- 
crabs (Carcinus menas) and slow horn-crabs (Hyas aranea) begin to work 
their way out of the heap of shells and living oysters, and try to get to 
the water once more. Old abandoned snail-shells begin to move about, 
caused by the hermit-crabs (Pagarus bernhardus), which have taken up 
their residence in them, trying to creep out of the heap with their dwell- 
ing. Spiral-shelled snails (Buccinum undatum) stretch their bodies as 
far out of the shell as they can, and twist from side to side, trying, with 
all their power, to roll themselves once more into the water. Red star- 
fish (Asteracanthion rubens), with five broad arms, lie flat upon the deck, 
not moving from the place, although their hundreds of bottle-shaped 
feet are in constant motion. Sea-urchins (Hchinus miliaris), of the size 
of a small apple, bristling with greenish spines, lie motionless in the 
heap. Here and there a ring-worm (Nereis pelagica), of a changeable 
bluish color, slips out of the mass of partially dead, partially living, ani- 
mals. Black edible mussels (Mytilus edulis) and white cockles (Cardium 
edule) lie there with shells as firmly closed as are those of the oysters. 
Even the shells of the living oysters are inhabited. Barnacles (Balanus 

S. Mis, 29 46 


722. REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [40] 


erenatus), with tent-shaped, calcareous shells and tendril-shaped feet, often 
cover the entire surface of one of the valves. Frequently the shells are 
bedecked with yellowish tassels a span or more in length, each of which 
is acommunity of thousands of small gelatinous bryozoa (Aleyonidium 
gelatinosum), or they are overgrown by a yellowish sponge (Halichondria 
panicea), whose soft tissue contains fine silicious spicules. Upon many 
beds the oysters are covered with thick clumps of sand which are com- 
posed of the tubes of small worms (Sabellaria anglica). These tubes, 
ealled ‘‘sand-rolls,” resemble organ-pipes, and are formed from grains 
of sand cemented, into shape by means of slime from the skin of the 
worm. The shell forms a firm support upon which the worms can 
thus live close together in a social community. Upon certain beds near 
the south point of the island of Sylt, where the finest-flavored oysters 
of our sea-flats are to be found, there lives upon the oyster-shells a 
species of tube-worm (Pomatoceros triqueter) whose white, calcareous, 
three-sided tube is very often twisted about like a great italic S. The 
shells of many oysters upon these beds also carry what are called “sea- 
hands” (Alcyoniwm digitatum), which are white or yellow communities of 
polyps of the size and shape of a-clumsy glove. Often the oyster- 
shells are also covered over with a brownish, clod-like mass, which con- 
sists of branched polyps (Hudendrium rameum and Sertularia pumila), 
or they may be covered with tassels of yellow stems which are nearly 
a finger long and have at their distal ends reddish polyp-heads (Tubu- 
laria indivisa). Among these polyps, and extending out beyond them, are 
longer stems, which bear light yellow or brown polyp-cups (Sertularia 
argentea). Within the substance of the shell itself animals are also found. 
Very often the shells are penetrated from the outside to the innermost 
layer, upon which the mantle of the living oyster lies, by a boring sponge 
(Clione celata), and in the spaces between the layers of the shell in old 
oysters is found a greenish-brown worm (Dodecacerea concharum), armed 
with bristles, and bearing twelve large tentacles upon its neck. I 
once took off and counted, one by one, all the animals living upon two 
oysters. Upon one I found 104 and upon the other 221 animals of 
three different species. The dredge also at times brings up fish, 
although it is not very well adapted for catching them. Soles (Platessa 
vulgaris), which seek by jumping to get out of the vessel and once more 
into the water, stone-picks (Aspidophorus cataphractus), and sting-rays 
(Raja clavata), which strike about with their tails, are abundant upon 
the oyster-banks. Besides those already mentioned, there are many 
other larger animals which are taken less frequently in the dredge. 
There are also a host of smaller animals covered up by the larger ones, 
and which can be seen only with a magnifying glass. Very few plants 
grow upon the banks. Upon only a single one of the oyster-beds of the 
sea-flats has eel-grass (Zostera marina) taken root. Upon other beds 
reddish-brown alge (Mloridie) are found, and, floating in the water which 
flows over the beds, occur microscopic alga (Desmidie and Diatomacee), 


[41] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 128 


which serve as nourishment to the oysters. If the dredge is thrown out 
and dragged over the sea-flats between the oyster-beds, fewer and also 
different animals will be found upon this muddy bottom than upon thesand. 
Every oyster-bed is thus, to a certain degree, acommunity of living beings, 
a collection of species, and a massing of individuals, which find here 
everything necessary for their growtlhand continuarce, such as suitable 
soil, sufficient food, the requisite percentage of salt, and a temperature 
favorable to their development. Each species which lives here is repre- 
sented by the greatest number of individuals which can grow to matur- 
ity subject to the conditions which surround them, for among all species 
the number of individuals which arrive at maturity at each breeding 
period is much smaller than the number of germs produced at that 
time. The total number of mature individuals of all the species living 
together in any region is the sum of the survivors of all the germs 
which have been produced at all past breeding or brood periods; and 
this sum of matured germs represents a ceriain quantum of life which 
enters into a certain number of individuals, and which, as does all life, 
gains permanence by meaas of transmission. Science possesses, as yet, 
no word by which such a community of living beings may be designated ; 
no word for a community where the sum of species and individuals, 
being mutually limited and selected under the average external condi- 
tions of life, have, by means of transmission, continued in possession of 
a certain definite territory. I propose the word Biocenosis* for such a 
community. Any change in any of the relative factors of a biocénose 
produces changes in other factors of the same. If, at any time, one of 
the external conditions of life should deviate for a long time from its 
ordinary mean, the entire biocénose, or community, would be trans- 
formed. It would also be transformed, if the number of individuals 
of a particular species increased or diminished through the instrumen- 
tality of man, or if one species entirely disappeared from, or a new spe- 
cies entered into, thecommunity. When the rich bedsof Cancale, Roche- 
fort, Marennes, and Oléron were deprived of great masses of oysters, 
the young broods of the cockles and edible mussels which lived there 
had more space upon which to settle, and there was more food at their 
disposal than before, hence a greater number were enabled to arrive at 
maturity than in former times. The biocdnose of those French oyster- 
banks was thus entirely changed by means of over fishing, and oysters 
cannot again cover the ground of these beds with such vast numbers 
as formerly until the cockles and edible mussels are again reduced in 
number to their former restricted limits, because the ground is already 
occupied and the food all appropriated. The biocdnose allows itself to 
be transformed in favor of the oyster, by taking away the mussels men- 
tioned above, and at the same time protecting the oysters so that the 
young may become securely established in the place thus made free for 
' them. Space and food are necessary as the first requisites of every so- 


* From Bioc, life, and xoivéew, to have something in common, 
Ss) ? ? 8 


724 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [42] 


cial community, even in the great seas. Oyster-beds are formed only 
upon firm ground which is free from mud, and if upon such ground 
the young swarming oysters become attached in great numbers close 
together, as happened upon the artificial receptacles in the Bay of Saint. 
Brieux, their growth is very much impeded, since the shell of one soon 
comes in contact with that of another, and they are thus unable to 
grow with perfect freedom. Not only are they impeded in growth in 
this manner, but each oyster can obtain less nourishment when placed 
close together than when lying far apart. 

In an oyster-breeding trench upon the island of Hayling, in the south 
of England, I saw, in May, 1869, oysters three years old which had grown 
thus far towards maturity attached to hurdles. Nearly all had twisted 
shells, which were not larger in diameter than from 2 to 3 centimeters, 
while a Holstein oyster three years old is from 5 to 6.5 centimeters broad. 
Evidently, thé reason for their small size is to be found in the fact that 
in the trench they receive less nourishment daily than they would in 
the open sea. In the Bay of Arcachon the breeders are obliged to loosen 
the oysters from their artificial points of attachment and place them in 
boxes and trenches where they can grow to maturity, and in these 
the oysters must not be placed too close together or they will not grow 
to the best advantage. Even upon the best beds the oysters will remain 
poor if they are allowed to lie too thick upon the bottom; but if a por- 
tion of these poorly nourished oysters are taken away, those which re- 
main—as has been found out by experience upon the Huntje Bank, the 
largest and most fruitful of all the Schleswig-Holstein beds—will soon 
become fatter, that is, their generative organs will become larger because 
more ege’s or spermatozo a are produced than with poorer oysters. Thus, 
if a bed is above its mean in productiveness, every single one of the ex- 
cessive throng of full and half grown oysters will not receive sufficient 
nourishment to enable them to generate a full number of germs, so that 
the number of germs produced and the number of young which arrive 
at maturity being thus regulated the entire bank will very soon be 
brought back to its former or normal condition. Since this law is in 
operation upon even the most productive of the Schleswig-Holstein beds, 
where the number of young which arrive at maturity is 484 for every 
thousand of mature @ oy sters, while the average for all the beds is only 

421 to each thousand, then a productiveness of 484 to the thousand is 
the highest which can be reached and maintained among the oysters 
existing under the biocénotic conditions of our sea-flats. Near Auray, 
in Brittany, the oyster-breeders collect many more young than they can 
grow to maturity, since they possess comparatively little oyster-terri- 
tory, and this territory is not supplied with sufficient suitable food to 
nourish large numbers of oysters; so that whenever the breeders fail 
to find a purchaser for their extra stock of young they lose all the 
profits of their labor. Thus, it is with oysters as with all other 
animals; their increase in size and numbers depends upon the quantity 


» 


[43] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. (eas 


of food which they get and consume. The peasants of Jutland are 
great breeders of horned cattle, but they have not sufficient food to 
grow and fatten all their calves. Accordingly, many are sold to the 
peasants of the marsh-lands on the west coast of Schleswig-Holstein, 
and upon these extensive pasture-lands great numbers of cattle can be 
raised. Upon the estate of Hagen, near Kiel, there is a carp-pond of 
more than 80 hectares in size which is drawn off every three years, and 
while in this condition sown with oats and clover. It is afterwards 
refilled with water and 30,000 yearling carp placed init. In three years 
from this time, as a rule, the production is 40,000 pounds of food-fish. In 
order to obtain a still greater profit, another lot of young carp was 
once placed in the pond, and this time more than 30,000. In three 
years the produce is indeed a larger number of fish than before, but they 
weigh, taken all together, only 40,000 pounds. The quantity of food 
which the pond supplies in three years is thus sufficient only for the 
growth of 40,000 pounds of carp. 

I do not consider it practicable to fatten oysters by artificial means, 
although in North America and Europe an effort should be made to fat- 
ten planted oysters upon corn-meal. The food of oysters consists of very 
small organic particles which float in the water, ard if one should at- 
tempt artificial feeding by carrying to the oysters of a bed water con- 
taining pulpy pulverized flesh, bone-meal, fish-guano, or corn-meal, it 
would be necessary to prevent the water from flowing off from the bed 
until all the organic matter had been eaten. But by so doing a large 
quantity of foul gas would certainly be generated upon the bed and re- 
main there, so that the oysters, instead of fattening, would become sick 
and die. Among the external life conditions of a biocénose, temperature 
plays an important part. 

In our seas, with their equitable temperature, a mild winter, followed 
by a spring and summer with the temperature much higher than usual 
during spawning time, is especially favorable to the production of a vast 
number of embryos. All living members of a social community hold the 
balance with their organization to the physical conditions of their bioco- 
nose, for they live and propagate notwithstanding the influence of all 
external attractions, and notwithstanding all-assaults upon the continu- 
ance of their individuality. Although every species is differently organ- 
ized, in each the different forces act together for the growth and main- 
tenance of the individual, and although each species has from this fact 
its own organic equivalent, yet they all possess the same (balancing) 
power for the totality of the external conditions of life of their biocdnose. 
Hence all species must respond to a deviation in the conditions of life 
from the ordinary mean by a corresponding action of their forces, so 
that their efficacy may increase or diminish uniformly. If favorable 
temperature makes one species more fruitful, it will, at the same time, 
increase the fertility of all the others. If more young oysters exist 
upon an oyster-bed because the old ones receive more warmth and 


726 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [44] 


food than during ordinary years, then the snails, crabs, sea-urchins, and 
star-fish, and all other species living together upon the bank, will also 
produce more young, as repeated observations have shown to be the case. 
But since there is neither room nor food enough in such a place for the 
maturing of all of the excessively large number of germs, the sum of indi- 
viduals in the community soon returns to its former mean. The surplus 
which nature has produced by the augmentation of one of the biocénotie 
forces is thus destroyed by a combination of all the forces, and the bioc6- 
notic equilibrium is by this means soon restored again. Where it is pos- 
sible for one to furnish suitable ground and food for an excessive num- 
ber of young germs, a greater proportion of them can arrive at maturity 
than in an entirely natural biocOnose. The oyster-breeders of Arcachon 
and Auray increase very much the mean number of oysters which arrive 
at maturity upon their beds by placing tiles in the water, upon which 
the young can attach themselves. These young are then provided with 
a suitably prepared ground over which water containing food is allowed 
to flow. If in a community of living beings the number of individuals 
of one species is lessened artificially, then the number of mature indi- 
viduals of other species will increase. Thus, upon the west coast of 
France cockles and edible mussels took the place of the oysters which 
had been caught from the beds; and upon the fertile prairies of North 
America herds of tame horses and cattle are now pastured where im- 
mense throngs of wild buffaloes (bos americanus) once ranged in full 
liberty. 

If the germ-fecundity of a species is lessened by the artificial distinction 
of many mature breeding individuals, while all the other forces of the 
community are working with their accustomed vigor, so surely must » 
there be a decrease in the number of individuals of this species which 
arrive at maturity. A largenumber of the most productive oyster-beds 
upon the west coast of Europe have been devastated by overfishing, 
and many fresh waters have, through the incessant catching of half- 
grown fish, been almost entirely depopulated. It is very natural that 
those years during which a large number of herring, salmon, or sturgeon 
are caught upon a certain stretch of territory should be followed by years 
when fewer fish appear, because in the years when large catches are 
made very many breeding individuals are destroyed. 

If in a case of subtraction the minuend is lessened while the subtra- 
hend remains the same, the remainder will be lessened also. By the 
continued artificial destruction of breeding individuals, the fecundity 
of any one species of a community may sink so low that it is no longer 
able to produce sufficient germs to insure in all cases the maturing of a 
sufficient proportion which shall escape the ordinary natural assaults 
to which they are subject in the community; the species therefore dies 
out. In this manner the dodo (Didus ineptus) became extinct upon the 
island of Mauritius in the seventeenth century, after the Portuguese, 
in 1507, had disturbed the biocGnose of the island by the introduction 


[45] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. ae 


of swine and other animals, and after the Dutch, still later, had ruth- 
lessly killed many of these birds. Also, at present, there are no turtles 
at Mauritius, while up to the year 1740, according to written testimony, 
hundreds were caught there for the provisioning of ships. Certainly 
many young dodos and turtles must have been devoured by the pigs. 
The beaver (Castor fiber) will perhaps very soon have vanished from our 
biocénotic transformed portion of the earth. The Greenland whale 
(Balena mysticetus) is now seldom seen in the neighborhood of Spitzber- 
gen and Greenland, on account of the persecution to which it has been 
subjected since the seventeenth century. Every biocénotic territory has, 
during each period of generation, the highest measure of life which can 
be produced and maintained there. All the organic material which is 
there ready to be assimilated will be entirely used up by the beings 
which are procreated in each such territory. Hence at no place which 
is capable of maintaining life is there still left any organizable material 
for spontaneous generation. If, in a biocénose the number of individ- 
uals which arrive at maturity would be maintained at the highest point, 
even though the number of breeding individuals is being artificially 
lessened, the natural causes which act towards the destruction of the 
embryos must be diminished at the same time. In the Bay of Arcachon 
the breeders raise to maturity an unusually large number of young oys- 
ters by guarding them artificially from their enemies. 

In an example in subtraction the remainder may be kept unchanged, 
or even increased, if the subtrahend is decreased at the same time as the 
minuend; and the mass of individuals of any species may be increased 
permanently if the biocénotic territory is extended. Thus, when the 
Lim Fiord became filled with water from the North Sea, the number of 
mature oysters over the territory of the North Sea coast of Denmark in- 
creased to more than seven millions (chapter 8, p. 30). The oyster-beds 
in the Bay of Arcachon and the claires, or fattening-ponds, at the mouth 
of the river Seudre (p. 27), are artificial extensions of oyster-territory. 

The individual number of cultivated plants and animals has been im- 
‘mensely increased because man has artificially extended their biocénotic 
territory; and this artificial increase in the number of plants and ani- 
mals by means of cultivation is the foundation for the increased fecundity 
of the human species and the greater number of individuals which 
arrive at maturity—that is, for the extension of the biocénotie territory 
of Homo sapiens. The average yieid of our woods, fields, and gardens 
is the result of natural force and human labor, for in addition to the 
chemical and physical forces of earth and air, and the organic forces of 
wild and cultivated plants and animals, the bodily and mental forces of 
man play an important role in the culture of field and forest, and a very 
significant share of the large yields of harvests is due not only to the 
numerous workmen of the woods and fields, but also to the makers of 
implements of labor, to the mechanics and opticians who produce in- 
struments for the investigation of natural phenomena, and to the care- 


728 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [46] 


ful studies of the many investigators of nature and of those interested 
in land and forest culture. And these manifold interdependent human 
powers must unceasingly oppose the average uniform workings of nat- 
ural forces if a permanent mean profit would be derived from the arti- 
ficial communities of cultivated lands, or if Nature would be prevented 
from introducing again into each such territory her own communities. 
This was entirely disregarded in the case of the banks along the west 
coast of Europe. Millions and millions of oysters were taken from these 
beds, and. great astonishment arose when it was noticed that their 
productiveness had diminished. Notwithstanding that the number of 
breeding animals was extraordinarily diminished at each annual gather- 
ing, yet every succeeding year an equally large number of mature de- 
scendants would be harvested. Oystermen wish the oyster to be ex- 
empted ‘from the workings of those communal laws, according to which 
field and forest culture must be conducted in order to achieve a certain 
measure of success; and there are oyster-breeders in England who 
desire, for the entire satisfaction of their great yearly demands upon 
both the oyster-banks and the oyster-beds, that every year, during the 
breeding period, the temperature of the water should remain at from’ 
18° to 20° C., that no wind should blow, and that no storm should 
suddenly disturb the good weather, in order that none of the young 
swarming oysters may be destroyed. 

In France they expected that all of the million zerins produced by a 
full-grown oyster would grow into marketable oysters, if only suitable 
objects were provided to which they could attach themselves. It was 
thus believed that some miracle would be wrought by means of which 
oysters would reach maturity, for there existed in the water which 
passed over the beds where the millions of young oysters were laying 
not a particle more food than was brought there years before, and 
that was only enough to feed the much smaller number of oysters ex- 
isting there at that time. In Germany they desire that oysters should 
live and thrive upon changing sand-banks and mud-bottoms, and ae- 
custom themselves to the brackish water of the Baltic, and that at the © 
same time they should remain animals of the same tenderness and deli- 
cacy of flavor as the oysters of the good Schleswig-Holstein beds. Such 
desires could only be realized by means of miracles or by the exemption 
of certain single cases from the necessary workings of Nature’s laws. 
There must be an entire change in the form of our coasts and in that 
of the islands lying along them, in the direction of the mouths of the 
rivers and in the flood and ebb currents, before oysters can be made to 
thrive over our entire sea-flats. It would thus be necessary to supersede 
the natural oyster biocénose by an artificial one, which would have to be 
cultivated as farmers and gardeners cultivate their fields and gardens; 
and in order that oysters should be able to live in the waters of the 
Baltic to-day, their physiological activities would have to be so changed 
that they could thrive in water in which the percentage of salt is much 


[47] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. (29 


more vacillating than in the water of the North Sea; that is to say, it 
must become another animal, and yet, at the same time, retain the flavor 
of the oyster. People have experienced a thousand times that the 
best-flavored and most agreeable animals and plants are brought to 
perfection only under entirely definite external conditions of life, yet 
they wish an exception to this law of nature in favor of the oyster. 
They wish for miracles in order that oysters may be supplied to the 
many who are now oyster-eaters, as cheaply and plentifully as they 
formerly were to the few who at that time appreciated their value. 


11—CONCERNING THE INCREASE IN THE PRICE OF OYS- 
TERS AND THE NUMBER OF CONSUMERS, AND THE DE- 
GREASE IN THE NUMBER OF OYSTERS 


In England there are breeders of oysters and others who are well 
versed in oyster economy who maintain that the oyster-banks have 
become impoverished because of a long series of seasons which have been 
unfavorable as breeding years, and not because of overfishing upon the 
beds. According to their observations, there have been no large broods 
of young oysters since 1857, 1858, and 1859. This may be the case in 
regard to a number of localities, but it has no significance in the man- 
agement of a permanent, profitable oyster-culture, since such culture is 
not conducted according to an unusually favorable summer, but accord- 
ing to the average of climatic conditions. And that these conditions 
have not changed in the west of Europe in our century, and thus during 
the time of the impoverishment and exhaustion of many beds along the 
west coast of Europe, is proven by the temperature observations which 
have been made at the Observatory at Paris sincethe year 1806. Accord- 
ing to these, the mean yearly temperature of Paris during this century 
has remained, up to present time, at 10.8° C., from which it follows that 
the climate is the same nowas before any impoverishment took place. In 
1859 there were many young oysters spawned upon the beds along the 
west coast of France. In 1860 there were many young broods upon the 
beds near the island of Ré and near Rocher d’ Aire, and but few broods at 
Areachon ; 1861 was a good brood year for all three places; 1862 bad 
for the island of Ré and good for both the others; and in 1865 there 
were very many young in the Bay of Arcachon and but few near Rocher 
- @ Aire and the island of Ré. These facts show that local conditions can 
either favor or prevent the production of broods of young oysters in one 
and the same year. 

On the 6th of April, 1876, Mr. I’. Pennell ipade a communication to 
the commission for the investigation of the British oyster-fisheries, and 
at the same time remarked that, according to his experience, the number 
of young oysters in each brood period was dependent upon the number of 
breeding oysters, but that, nevertheless, at times, extraordinarily large 


730 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER Of FISH AND FISHERIES [48] 


numbers of young were produced.* Whoever has followed thus far the 
detailed statements which I have made must be obliged to confess that 
Nature is not to blame for the impoverishment of the oyster-beds along 
the western coast of Europe during the last century, for neither have 
the external conditions of life for the oyster become less favorable nor 
has the fecundity of single animals become less. 

Nothing else but excessive fishing, without protection, has depopu- 
lated the beds. Most of the oystermen and those thoroughly acquainted 
with oyster industry, who reported their experience and opinion, in Lon- 
don, in 1876, to the commission for the investigation of the British oyster- 
fisheries, were entirely of this opinion. But the question will beasked, 
Why were the beds of the west of Europe not overfished in olden times? 
Because, before the time of steamboats, locomotives, and railroads, there 
was a much smaller number of consumers than at present. Then genuine 
connoisseurs were rerely to be found except along the coast where the 
oyster lived. 

In the autumn, when oyster-fishing began, those only were very costly 
which were first caught, but as more were brought in the price rapidly 
fell. On the 21st of September, 1740, the first hundred fresh Schleswig- 
Holstein oysters sold in Hamburg for 1.42 marks (about 35 cents) of 
present money. Later the same day 900 were sold at 1.20 marks (30 
cents) per hundred; then 3,400 at 15 cents; and finally 10,800 at 74 
cents per hundred. On the 15th of October of the same year, and at 
the same place, the first hundred fresh, newly arrived oysters sold for 
2.40 marks; the second hundred for 2.10 marks; then 1,025 were sold 
for 1.80 marks per hundred; then 1,000 at 1.50 marks; then 2,000 at 
1.20 marks; and finally 12,500 at 60 pfennige (L5 cents) per hundred. 
These numbers are taken from the report upon the Schleswig-Holstein 
oyster-banks,} and show that it was necessary to lower the price of oysters 
very soon after the arrival of a large importation into Hamburg harbor, 
if they were to be disposed of in an eatable condition and not entirely 
lost, because there was no adequate means of transporting them into 
the interior. Such a fall in price guarded the oyster-beds from too 
destructive fishing. Soon, by means of steamers and railroads, oysters 
fresh from the beds could be spread far and wide into the country; then 
oyster-eaters began to increase in number; and so, despite the rapid 
advance in price, the demand for oysters increased from year to year. 
This demand was very much in proportion to the spreading of the net- 
work of railroads in England, France, and Germany. It did not come 
into the heads of the oystermen that a more exhaustive fishing would 
tend to depopulate the beds. Year after year they had found an ever- 
ready supply of oysters upon the same beds; why should they not, then, 
take away whatsoever came into their dredge ? 


* Report on Oyster-fisheries, 1876, p. 116, Nos. 2386 and 2357. 
+t H, Kroyer. De danske Oystersbanker. In this work several examples are given, 
at pages 92 and 93, taken from the reports of oyster-culture in Schleswig-Holstein, of 
_ the decrease in price of oysters upon one and the same day at Hamburg. 


[49] ‘THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 731 


In former times, fishing was carried on only in those places where the 
oysters lay thickly together, for where only a few oysters could be caught 
it did not pay to fish, because of the low price; hence all of those banks 
which were covered only with scattered oysters were left to rest until 
a sufficient number of mature oysters had accumulated upon them to 
repay the labor of fishing. But when, however, the number of oyster- 
eaters increased, and likewise the price of oysters, it became profitable 
to fish upon less fertile stretches, and the dredges were used so per- 
sistently that finally very little more could be found upon the banks. 
Before the time of railroads the decline in price of oysters regulated the 
fishing in favor of a good condition of the beds; but since the time of 
railroads the ever-increasing price has acted as an incentive to the oys- 
termen to depopulate their banks. The official reports upon French 
and English oyster-breeding contain abundant proofs of this, as evi- 
denced by the facts there set forth. The oyster-fishers of Cancale were 
made happy by receiving, each succeeding year, for those oysters which 
they sent fresh to Paris, more money than they had received the year 
before, and the possibility of depopulating their rich banks was not 
thought of. 

Learned authorities had said that every mature breeding oyster pro- 
duced from two to three millions of young. They believed, then, that 
if they left upon the beds only a hundred breeding oysters they would 
be doing all that was necessary in order, in a short time, to find upon the 
overfished beds two hundred to three hundred million descendants of 
the same. Up to 1854, the oyster-beds of Rochefort, Marennes, and the 
island of Oléron were fished with some regard to their preservation, 
since their oysters found a market only in those places which were situ- 
ated along the neighboring coast. But in 1854 Rochefort was placed in 
connection with the interior by means of the network of railroads, and 
the market for these oysters, and the profits from them, increased so 
much that they were taken until these beds were almost entirely depop- 
ulated. From 15,000,000 in 1854~55, the catch fell off to 400,000 in 
1863~64. (See chapter 9, p. 37.) 


The last report upon the English oyster-fisheries in the year 1876, 
contains many instructive instances of the great advance in price as the 
result of the decrease in number of oysters. At Whitstable, where the 
finest kinds of native oysters are produced, the price for a bushel, 1,400 to 
1,600 oysters, was, during the period from 1852 to 1862, never higher than 
£2 2s. sterling. In 1863~64 it had risen to £4 10s., in 1869 to £8, 
and in 1876 to £12 sterling. Thus, in 1876, a single oyster cost there 
about 16 pfennige (3 to 4 cents) in our currency. 

At Colchester, another celebrated market for oysters on the east coast 
of England, a bushel of oysters cost, during the years 1856-63, 66s.; 
186465, 80s.; 1865-66, 95s.; 186667, 100s.; 1867~68, 130s., English 
money.* 


* Report upon oyster-fisheries, 1876, p. 63. 


732 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [50] 


At Falmouth, a tub of oysters (1,600) cost, in 1830, 1s.; 1860, 2 to 
24s.; 1863, 4 to 14s.; 1867, 9 to 37s.; and in 1869, 45s. A cask of 
Schleswick-Holstein oysters (700 to 800) was sold, in 187576, to oyster- 
dealers, for 105 marks (about $26.25). 

Fifteen years previous the price was only a third of that sum. By the in- 
corporatien, in 1864, of Schleswig-Holstein in the German tariff union, 
the territory into whose markets the Schleswig-Holstein oysters could 
be brought free of duty was very significantly increased, and at this 
time English oysters were becoming very rare in German markets. The 
political changes in Germany, and at the same time the great increase 
in the consumption of oysters, evidently increased the incentive to a more 
complete fishing of our oyster-beds than in former times, and this ac- 
counts for the extraordinary decrease in the number which arrive at 
maturity to-day, for at the iaspection of these beds in 1869 there were 
found only 282 half-grown oysters for every 1,000 full-grown, and in 
five inspections during the years 1872 to 1876 there were found, on an 
average, only 107 half grown. This is in striking contrast to former 
inspections, where the average was 421 half-grown oysters for every 
1,000 full-grown, as has been shown in chapter 9, p. 35. 


12.—THE CHEMICAL CONSTITUENTS AND THE FLAVOR OF 
OYSTERS. 


The heaviest portion of an oyster is its shell, and this, on an average, 
constitutes about 84 per cent. of the total weight of an ordinary Holstein 
table-oyster. Internally, the oyster is a soft animal; externally, it is a 
stone animal. The dried shells of very old oysters weigh from 250 to 
320 grams. In such heavy, thick-shelled oysters the soft portion is 
generally very poor, and the body-space is smaller than at the time 
when it first attained its complete maturity. From this it follows that 
the edges of the last-formed shell-layers do not pass over those which 
were formed earlier, but lie under them. The principal constituent of 
the shell is carbonate of lime, which forms about 96 to 97 per cent. of 
the whole weight. The shell also contains 1.2 to 1.3 per cent. of sul- 
phate of lime, 0.09 per cent. of phosphoric acid, 0.03 per cent. of oxide of 
iron, and traces of magnesia and aluminum. If these inorganic con- 
stituents of the shell are dissolved in acid, there will remain undissolved 
brownish bits and flakes of an organie substance which has been named 
conchyolin. This contains the elements oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, and 
carbon. The left or arched valve of a Holstein oyster contains from 1.01 
to 1.025 per cent. of conchyolin, the right somewhat more, from 1.10 to 
1.15 per cent. This increase in the percentage of conchyolin makes the 
ri ght valve less brittle than the left. 

At times pearls are found in oysters. They generally lie in the mantle, 
but also in the shell-muscle. Pearls are isolated deposits of shell-mate- 
rial. Their chemical constituents are accordingly the same as those of 


[51] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 133 


the shell. In some pearls taken from Schleswig-Holstein oysters there 
has been found a proportionally greater amount of carbonate of lime 
than is found in the shells themselves. Brilliant pearls, suitable for 
ornaments, are seldom found in oysters, those generally taken being 
white and without brilliancy. However, an oyster-eater in Hamburg 
once discovered, by means of his tongue, a pearl which he sold to a 
jeweler for 66 marks (about $16.50). Nearly all mussels have more 
beautiful shells than that of the oyster, but in delicacy and fineness of 
flavor the oyster surpasses every other mollusk. Ouly those materials 
can be tasted which, dissolved in fluids, come in contact with the organs 
of taste. Hence the flavor of the oyster depends upon substances which 
are either in solution in the juices of the body of the oyster or which 
become dissolved in the mouth of the eater. Fresh, living oysters, as is 
the case with all sea-animals, contain very much water. In order to 
estimate the proportion of water the greatest. care must be taken in 
removing the oyster from the shell, especially when the shell-muscle 
uniting the two valves is cut. The exterior of the body must first be 
dried with blotting-paper, the body then weighed and finally placed 
under the air-pump and all the water drawn out. Two Schleswig-Hol- 
stein oysters which were taken from the shell and dried, weighed to- 
gether 14.70 grams, and after all the water had been drawn from them 
they weighed only 3.05 grams. They thus contained 79.25 per cent. 
of water and only 20.75 per cent. of solid material. Two other large 
oysters, which had been previously deprived of their gills and mantles, 
weighed together 20.55 grams; after being thoroughly dried they weighed 
4.809. Thus, their edible portion contained 76.64 per cent. of water and 
25.36 per cent. of solid material. 

A large number of investigations upon Schleswig-Holstein oysters 
demonstrated that the entire animal contained from 21.5 to 23 per cent. 
of solid material, while the body, without the gills and mantle, contained 
from 23 to 24.5 per cent. of solid material.* Making due allowance for 
size, there is a somewhat greater difference in the proportion of solid 
material between oysters and fish than between oysters and birds and 
mammals, for— 


Per cent. of 
solid material, 


Trout-flesh contains .......... a aes eR eae eee me OG eae Le 19.5 
Are HM ESE COMDAINS 2.0 12/5 2,+ eletejo- oy amet ae alee somone eens «ae So 20.2 
HOT etCONUARIS ice. caus Siac wore Fa gioks weer ee cree Naas chs ba 
NMG TMC CHTIIENINT Seti. ce Soa eo 2a Sears ea eR era eee baleen ee Stn ADRS 
SCAM MEITINS eT eee Gik,  c hc orc. kad SAN. ish pain! lees Beets tele ao 25 i 22.5 
Fowl-flesh contains ....... ee ccfard'S, cso are ee eee aa setae = Cake a spn gi 38 22.7 


*JT am indebted to Prof. O. Jacobsen, of Rostock, for all the information that I have 
given in chapter 12 in regard to the chemical constituents of the Schleswig-Holstein 
oysters. In June, 1871, when he lived in Kiel, he analyzed, at my request, a number 
of oysters which I had received fresh from the Schleswig-Holstein beds. 

t The figures quoted in the comparison of the amounts of solid materials in different 
kinds of flesh are based upon the analyses of Schlossberger and Von Bibra. They 
were taken from the Elements of Physiological Chemistry of Gorup-Besanez, third 
edition, 1874, p. 682, 


734 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [52] 


One hundred parts of dried oyster-meat contain 7.69 to 7.81 parts of 
nitrogen, and 100 parts of fresh oyster-meat contain 1.85 to 1.87 parts of 
nitrogen. By burning the dried oyster-meat we can obtain the amount 
of inorganic material which it contains. By this method it has been 
found that the meat of completely dried Schleswig-Holstein oysters, 
when deprived of the beard, contains 7.45 per cent. of inorganic sub- 
stances, while in those which have not been dried the amount is only 
1.79 per cent. According to these determinations, 100 parts of the 
bodies of fresh edible Schleswig-Holstein oysters, contain— 

77.00 parts of water. 

21.21 parts of organic material. 

1.79 parts of inorganic material. 

The principal inorganic substances are salt (sodic chloride) and phos- 
phoric acid. The proportion of salt in fresh oysters is 0.58 per cent., 
and of phosphoric acid 0.38 per cent. In fresh beef the proportion of 
salt is 0.49 per cent., and of phosphoric acid 0.22 per cent. From these 
results it is evident that the oyster contains as much food substance as 
the better sorts of meat used for food, oreven somewhat more. In addi- 
tion to this, it is still farther distinguished from the greater number of 
animal foods by being more easily digested. Butif we compare the price 
of oysters with the price of equal quantities of the best kinds of ordinary 
meats, we find that, with us, the oyster furnishes a much more costly 
means of nourishment than the others. If the edible portions of a dozen 
Holstein oysters weigh 125 grams, or one-fourth of a pound, and if that 
number cost 2 marks (50 cents), then the oyster, as a means of nourish- 
ment, is 64 times more expensive than beef-steak, at 1 mark 20 pfennige 
(30 cents) per pound. The value of an oyster does not depend princi- 
pally upon the amount of nourishment which it contains, but chiefly 
upon its delicacy and uniformly fine flavor. Oysters form the finest 
article of food which our seas produce—food which can be eaten fresh 
from the water, and which requires no artistic cooking to develop its ex- 
cellencies. They resemble the noble pearls, which attain their greatest 
perfection in the place of their growth. What particular constituent of 
the oyster it is which gives it its flavor is as little known as the origin of 
the flavor of various other kinds of food. The liver and the generative 
organs contain glycogen and grape-sugar. Pure glycogen has no taste, 
and it is composed, as is grape-sugar, of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. 
Probably the fatty matters aid greatly in giving flavor to the oyster. I 
have repeatedly found that in May and the first half of June, when the 
generative organs are very much developed, the females have a much 
finer, nut-like, and full flavor than the males. 

I have repeatedly placed fresh oysters, whose sex I had previously 
ascertained by means of the microscope, before different people in order 
to get their opinions of the flavor. They also, without knowing any- 
thing about the difference in sex, found the female superior in flavor to 
the male, Those females which are well developed are generally some- 


[53] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 735 


what thicker and more cream-like in color than the males, whose bodies 
are more transparent and watery. In the middle of winter these differ- 
ences are not so apparent as shortly before the breeding season. Im- 
mediately after the emission of the generative products, oysters are poor- 
est and they are more watery then than at any other time. After the 
breeding period their size increases from month to month, and, in case 
their nourishment is not interrupted by long-continued severe cold, their 
flavor becomes fuller and richer in proportion to the rapid development 
of the generative organs. From this it follows that winter, but more 
especially spring, are the periods of the year for the enjoyment of oys- 
ters. I have repeatedly heard people, who rated themselves as genuine 
oyster-eaters, say that ‘“‘oysters ought never to be bitten, but should be 
swallowed whole.” If this were so, then one might better use, in the place 
of the high-priced oyster, a succedaneum made of tasteless thin paste, 
and having merely the form of the oyster. 

As with all other kinds of food, the flavor of the oyster is more 
effective and can be better appreciated the more intimately its con- 
stituent elements come in contact with the surface of the organs of 
taste. Therefore, if one would obtain the full flavor of the oyster, it 
must be bitten to pieces and chewed, in order that all the constituents 
may be free to produce their greatest effects. The Schleswig-Holstein 
oyster-banks produce oysters of very different flavors. Those having 
the finest flavor exist upon beds which lie not very far from the deeper 
channels, through which the water passes in and out during the flood 
and ebb tides. (See the chart of these beds on page 4.) Thus, very 
superior oysters are found upon the beds at the northern and southern 
ends of the island of Sylt, and upon a single bank north of the island 
of Rém; but the very finest oysters are found upon the beds near Hor- 
num. The oysters of these beds are especially distinguishable by the 
large growth of their organs of generation. Their flavor is very delicate, 
and never bitter and watery, as is the case with the oysters of many other 
beds. This superiority in form and flavor must be the direct result of 
the action upon the oysters of these banks of the external conditions 
of life under which they exist. The oysters upon the beds near Hér- 
num lie deeper and nearer the open sea than those farther in upon the 
flats. The water, also, which flows over them during the course of the 
day and year is less subject to fluctuations in temperature than that 
which flows over the beds lying nearer the mainland, and there is here a 
somewhat greater percentage of salt than in the water over the beds of 
the shallower portions of the sea-flats. To these external physico-chemi- 
cal properties of the Hérnum banks are also united faunal peculiarities. 
Here are to be found the three-sided worms (Pomatoceros triqueter), and 
colonies of polyps which, from their form, are called “sea-hands” (Ale- 
yonium digitatum). Both of these forms are found abundantly upon the 
bottom of the open North Sea. They are not to be found upon any 
other beds of the sea-flats, and it is very evident that they cannot live 


736 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [54] 


upon the inner beds, since these do not furnish the necessary conditions 
for their growth. Thus, just in those places where the extreme limiting 
line of the territory inhabited by the ‘‘sea-hands” and three-sided worms 
passes across our oyster-beds, the most favorable conditions exist for the 
growth of the finest-flavored oysters. A three-sided worm upon the 
shell of a Schleswig-Holstein oyster is, therefore, a sign of ifs arrival 
from one of our best beds. A pastor living upon the island of Sylt was 
fond of good oysters, and was also well acquainted with this external 
indication of them; so he was accustomed to say to the out-going oyster- 
fishers: ‘“ Rring me some fresh oysters when you return, but only such 
as the good Lord has marked.” In Paris the green oysters of Marennes 
and Tremblade are especially prized on account of their delicious flavor. 
This cannot come from the green constituents of their body, for if old 
oysters are taken there during the winter months and placed in a fatten- 
ing-pond, they will, indeed, become green, but by no means so well- 
flavored as those oysters which were placed there when young and have 
lived there several years. (See chapter 8, p. 27.) 

The flavor of oysters is best at the banks themselves, if they are 
opened very carefully and all the sea-water which is inclosed in the 
shell when shut is allowed to escape. .This can be done most judi- 
ciously if the oyster is placed upon the flat right valve, after the 
loosening of the shell-muscle. This valve is a superior natural plate 
for the oyster, since it has no cavities like those of the left valve, filled 
with disagreeably smelling water, which flows out when the shell is 
opened and contaminates the flavor of the oyster. (See Fig. 5, p. 11.) 
The oyster can live for days perfectly dry without dying, but it grad- 
ually loses its softness, and soon begins to smell, from the dying of 
the animals which inhabit the outside of its shell. It is very seldom that 
these can be entirely removed by the usual means of purification (p. 8), 
so that the flavor of the oyster inland is almost always affected by these 
contaminating odors. 

In order that oysters may be furnished to those who want them, in 
the freshest and best-flavored condition possible, only such a number 
should be caught at any one time, and for any one market, as can be 
disposed of in a very few days. But since wind and weather are often 
so unfavorable, just in the height of the oyster-season, that vessels 
cannot go out to the beds and fish, the oystermen are obliged to dredge 
a large supply of oysters during good weather and plant them in some 
place where they will live and at the same time be available whenever 
they are wanted. For this purpose large reservoirs have been built 
near Husum. These consist of four four-sided ponds, with perpen- 
dicular walls, lined with plank. The length of the ponds is 14 meters, 
the breadth 12 meters, and the depth about 2 meters. The bottom is 
paved with tiles. The ponds can be divided into compartments by 
means of perpendicularly placed wooden partitions. In these compart- 
ments the oysters are planted as soon as they are brought from the 


[55] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 137 


banks. They are then covered with water which has stood for a while 
in a neighboring pond, the clearing-basin, in order to let the mud settle. 
During cold weather 500 tons, or 350,000 to 400,000 oysters, can be kept 
in these storage-ponds, but during warm weather only 200 tons. If it 
be necessary, oysters can be stored in the clearing-pond and in the 
trenches which lead to the ponds. In order to preserve the oysters in 
the storage-ponds in a healthy condition they must not be placed too close 
together, especially in warm weather. They must also be changed very 
often from the compartment which they have occupied to a clean one, 
and be subjected to a rapid flow of water in order to wash off all the dead 
material from their shells. Most of the English oysters which are eaten 
in Germany come from Ostend. They are kept there in basins similar 
to those at Husum, which have been built behind the walls of the old 
fortress. In 1869 I found there nine of these basins, which could be 
filled to a depth of about 2 meters with sea-water, supplied through 
sluices which connect the basins with the sea. In these ponds oysters 
are only stored and fattened. Those not sold by the close of the oyster- 
season are generally sent back to the English beds, because they 
are kept with difficulty during the summer, but principally because, 
after lying in the ponds for a long time, they become very poor from 
the lack of food. In the years 1875-’76 it is reported that a weekly 
supply of 500 bushels (750,000 oysters) were received at Ostend from 
England. 

The most celebrated oyster-port in England is Whitstable, situated 
on the southern side of the mouth of the Thames. Here the best na- 
tives are found. Their shells are indeed not very large, but their bodies 
are thick and very full, on account of the great depth of the cavity of 
the left valve. : 

The oysters which are sent over to Germany, by way of Ostend, are 
smaller varieties than the celebrated Whitstable oysters. These last 
are seldom sent to the continent, nearly all being demanded for the 
London market, where they command a higher price than any other 
kind. Oysters for exportation are packed in casks. In these they are 
placed with the left valve always undermost, and are packed so close 
together that, when the cask is closed, no room is left for them to open 
the valves of their shells. Upon many oyster-beds along the west coast 
of France those oysters which have very nearly arrived at a marketable 
size are at frequent intervals left uncovered, and longer and longer each 
successive time. As long as they are deprived of water they will keep 
their shells closed, and thus they are trained to retain, while in the dry 
casks, and until the knife prepares them for the table, the water which 
they inclosed in their shells when taken up. If ice is used to keep 
oysters fresh, care must be exercised that the water from the melting 
ice does not come in contact with the mollusks, or their flavor will be 
injured. Care should also be taken, especially with shelled oysters, that 

S. Mis. 29—— 47 


738 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [56] 


the ice used to cool them off does not entirely cover them.* Preserved 
oysters, packed in tin cans, are brought into the markets from North 
America. In these the natural flavor, for which the fresh oyster is so 
highly prized, is as much destroyed as is fhat of the tropical fruits 
which come to us cooked in sugar. If they were not preserved oysters 
they would hardly find purchasers. They serve merely as suggestions 
of fresh oysters. 


13.—THE OBJECT AND RESULTS OF OYSTER-CULTURE. 


The object of a good oyster industry is to gain from the territory 
cultivated the greatest possible profit, and at the same time to render 
the industry permanent. From a bed of inanimate material one can 
take away as much of the mass as he can use with profit. Such 
a proceeding does no harm to the prosperity of the bed, since what is 
left has nothing to do with the production of a new supply. With 
living objects, on the contrary, it is different. They are not quiet, im- 
movable masses, but combinations of materials and active forces, which 
are engaged, among themselves in a continual renewal; and if one is 
to derive the greatest possible benefit from them, their mass must not 
be indiscriminately reduced, as with minerals in a mine, but care must 
be taken that their powers of renewal are not weakened by a lessening 
of their available forces and materials. A breeder of cattle who would 
maintain a certain definite degree of productiveness in his herd must 
keep a definite number of breeding animals. If it is desired to have a 
definite permanent production of wood from a given extent of forest, only 
such an amount must be cut yearly as will be offset by the yearly 
growth. Ifa permanently larger quantity is desired, the forest surface 
must be increased. A profitable permanent system of oyster-culture 
is also dependent upon these same laws. Hence its foundation is the 
preservation of a stock of mature breeding oysters. No artificial sys- 
tem has yet succeeded in bringing to maturity, in inclosed parks, genera- 
tion after generation of oysters, and the most clever breeders are obliged 
to rely upon the natural banks in order to obtain breeding oysters or 
young for their fattening-ponds. Hence the foundation of all oyster 
production, whether artificial or natural, is the preservation of a stock of 
full-grown breeding oysters upon the natural oyster-banks. 

In France, ever since the government undertook to retain upon the 
natural banks along its coast a sufficiently large number of breeding 
oysters to keep up the stock, artificial oyster-breeding has maintained 
a secure basis. by this means the French Government has been en- 
abled, through its fishery commissioners, to determine the beds which 
are in asuitable condition to be fished and the time at which they can 


*The Romans were in the habit of cooling their oysters with ice from the mount- 
ains: ‘‘Addiditque luxuria frigus (ostreis) obrutis nive, summa montium et maris ima 
miscens.” C, Plinii Sec., naturalis historia, lib. xxxii, 6, 21. 


[57] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 739 


be profitably worked. In the rich oyster-regions of Caneale and Saint- 
Vaast-de-la-Hogue, on the coast of Normandy, and in the Bay of Arca- 
chon, there are great banks which, during spring-tide (at the time of 
full and new moon), run dry, or are covered with so little water that 
people can wade over them and pick up the oysters with their hands. 
Near Cancale crowds, resembling caravans, of from 500 to 1,000 per- 
sons, mostly women and children, fish for oysters upon these exposed 
banks. One of the best of these beds in the Bay of Arcachon, called 
Le Cés, has an extent of 11 hectares (about 26.73 acres). When oys- 
ter-fishing is permitted on this bank, it is generally performed by 
women, who are placed in rows of about ten each, and, headed by two 
men, proceed over the bed. ‘The oysters are gathered into sacks which 
are carried by women following behind the others, and who empty the 
sacks, as they become filled, into larger baskets. The gathering can- 
not continue longer than from two to two and one-half hours in any 
one spring-tide, because the bank is not exposed for a longer time. 
Yet, in this time, 40 to 50 persons can gather about 60,000 oysters. Thn- 
mediately after any place is fished in this manner it is marked by four 
cask-buoys, so that it may not be fished again the same year, and in order 
that it may be readily found later, when they scatter oyster and mussel 
shells over the ground for the attachment of the young oysters. About 
the year 1870, the beds in the Bay of Arcachon had become almost en- 
tirely exhausted, but by this strict method of protection, the fecundity 
of the 19 beds which are located there has once more become so great 
that the water of the bay, from June till into August, is filled with 
swarms of young oysters. Hence it is no wonder that at times, and in 
favorable places, single tiles can be found to which from 1,000 to 1,200 
young oysters have become attached. According to an official report* 
upon French oyster-culture which appeared in January, 1877, there 
were, in 1876, in the fattening-ponds upon both sides of the mouth of 
the Seudre, 80,000,000 oysters; near Oléron, 7,000,000; near Sables- 
VOlonne, 10,000,000; near Lorient the same number; and near Cour- 
seulles-sur-Mer, 20,000,000 to 30,000,000. This extraordinary fruitfulness 
of the oyster-beds along the west coast of France is the result of the care- 
ful preservation of a rich stock of mature breeding oysters upon the nat- 
ural banks, especially in the Bay of Arcachon, on the coast of Brittany 
near Auray, and on the coast of Normandy near Saint-Vaast-de-la-Hogue, 
Cancale, and Granville. Thousands of persons are industriously em- 
ployed, during the season, in taking, upon shells, tiles, &¢., the im- 


*Rapport adressé au ministre de la marine et des colonies sur lV’ostréicultur, par M. 
G. Bouchon-Brandely, Published in the official journal of the French Republic, Jan- 
uary 22, 1877. Under an act of Parliament of May 17, 1877, an English translation 
of this appeared, with the title: Copy of translation of a report made to the minis- 
ter of marine in France, by M. G. Bouchon-Brandely, relative to oyster-culture on 
the shores of the channel and of the ocean. 

From this report I have taken all the remarks which I have made in chapter 13, in 
regard to the latest condition of the French system of oyster-breeding. 


740 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [58] 


mense swarms of young oysters which are produced upon these beds, in 
guarding them from their enemies, and then in transplanting them to the 
numerous fattening-ponds along the coast, where, at last, by careful rear- 
ing, they are brought to marketable size. The number of persons em- 
ployed daily in oyster-culture near Saint-Vaast-de-la-Hogue is 300, and 
near Cancale 4,000. In the district of Auray, for the year 1876, the 
total number of days’ employment for all the men, women, and chil- 
dren who were engaged in this industry was 89,678. In Arcachon an 
oyster-breeding company laid out 110,000 tiles as objects of attachment 
for the young oysters. In 1876, 300,000 tiles were used for the same 
purpose near Vannes, and as many at Oleron. At Auray, in 1874, 
as many as 2,580,000 tiles were employed as objects of attachment for 
the young broods. At Lorient 60,000 troughs of cement, each trough 50 
centimeters long by 30 to 40 broad, are used in rearing and fattening 
young oysters. In these the water remains constantly, during the 
lowest tides, 10 to 12 centimeters deep. Near Saint-Vaast-de-la-Hogue 
there are 185 oyster-beds, which cover an area of 88 hectares (about 213.84 
acres); near Cancale the amount of surface which has been artificially 
changed into oyster-beds is 172 hectares (about 411.96 acres). 

At Auray the amount of oyster-ground is over 300 hectares. Here 
there are 277 storage-beds and 20 fattening-ponds. In 1876, in the 
neighborhood of Marennes and Tremblade, on the Seudre, there were 
13,526 artificially prepared beds, covering an area of 4,000 hectares 
(9,720 acres), and at the same time the Oe of Arcachon contained 3,317 
such places. The production of oysters from these beds is so great that 
machines have been invented to sort them. With the help of a machine, 
two women can sort in a day 30,000 to 40,000 oysters. Railroads con- 
nect the feeding-ponds with the cleansing-basins, packing-houses, and 
landing-places of the boats which bring the young oysters from the 
banks and brood-beds for fattening. From these accounts it will be seen 
how large a surface of sea-bottom, how much money, and how much 
human labor are requisite in order that the embryos which under nat- 
ural conditions originate in the sea shall be transformed into the im- 
mense number of full-grown oysters which the French oyster-breeders 
now place upon the market. The original plan of Coste to line the 
entire coast of France with a network of oyster-beds has indeed not been 
carried out; but in consequence of his exertions and experiments many 
oyster-parks have been established in favorable places along the coast 
from Normandy to south of the mouth of the river Gironde. The French, 
favored with innumerable bays and with a mild sea temperature along 
their coast, have, by diligence, perseverance, and the invention of new 
methods, brought oyster-culture to such a high degree of perfection, 
and given it such wide range, that now, in that favored land, it is to be 
reckoned as one of those cultured industries in which man tonverts to 
his service vast numbers of plants and animals. The large number of 
oysters produced as a result of the French system of oyster-culture has 


[59] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 741 


been held up very often to the inhabitants of the German coasts, in 
order to incite them to establish in their seas similar places for the 
artificial harvesting of oysters. The writers who did so knew neither 
the nature of the oyster nor the character of our seas. They might just 
as well have said to the inhabitants of the lower portion of the Elbe: 
‘¢ Lay out vineyards, for in 1874 the department of the Lower Loire pro- 
duced 1,914,427 hectoliters of wine, and the department of Gironde 
5,123,643 hectoliters.” In Egypt there is nothing lacking, except water, 
in order to produce dates and wine in abundance upon the desert which 
stretches from Cairo to Suez. So itis with us; all we lack in order to carry 
on successfully artificial oyster-breeding upon the mud-fiats of the North 
Sea are mild winters, with no ice, and security against the force of storm- 
floods. There is food enough there to feed billions of oysters. The old 
English method of oyster-culture was much simpler than the new French 
method. The work consisted chiefly in transplanting young oysters from 
the natural banks along the coast to suitable beds in the mouths of riv- 
ers, Where they became fat and well flavored. They also removed the 
mud and plants from these new beds, destroyed as many of the enemies 
of the oyster as possible, and improved the ground by scattering over 
it the shells of oysters and other mollusks. This industry is carried 
on in a much better manner at Whitstable, where there is an oyster 
company which, it is claimed, has been in existence for six or seven hun- 
dred years. It numbers over 400 members, who work 120 vessels. Only 
the sons of those who are, or have been, members are admitted into 
the guild. In 1793 an act of Parliament adjudged to this company, as 
their property, an extent of oyster-ground about two miles long and 
the same in breadth, situated in the mouth of the Thames, and which 
they had claimed up to that time only by right of possession. This ter- 
ritory consisted partially of natural oyster-banks, partially of beds upon 
which oysters from the open sea had been placed to spawn, and par- 
tially of beds upon which oysters from along the coast had been placed 
to fatten. In order to still further improve these beds, empty oyster- 
Shells, sent back principally from London, were often scattered over 
them. The Whitstablers consider that a thick layer of oyster-shells 
forms the very best bed for oysters, and they pride themselves that 
they possess the “ best oyster-grounds in the world,” as I myself have 
heard them say. The fecundity of the oysters upon their fattening-beds 
is very small. The cultivation of the oyster is carried on at Colchester, 
Burnham, and other places along the coast of England very much as it 
is at Whitstable. From these places many oysters are taken to Ostend. 
The efforts which have been made to bring living oysters from North 
America to England and plant them there have notsucceeded well enough 
to warrant imitation. But if they could succeed in transplanting large 
quantities of young oysters from the breeding-stations of Normandy and 
Brittany to the excellent feeding-grounds of England, English oyster- 
breeding would.probably soon take a very significant upward tendency, 


742 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [60] 


The oyster industry is conducted in North America very much as it is 
in England. In protected muddy bays and mouths of rivers near the 
coast, great quantities of young oysters, which have been taken from the 
natural beds, are planted for the purpose of fattening, the method thus 
resembling that in vogue at Whitstable and at other places along the 
west coast of Europe. In North America places are also chosen where the 
oysters will be protected from frost and heat. In localities rich in food 
they arrive at marketable size in from two to three years. The North 
American oyster is a different species from that of Europe. Its scientific 
name is Ostrea virginiana. It is longer from the hinge-ligament to the 
shell-muscle than is the European oyster, Ostrea edulis, and the left 
valve is generally more curved than with our oyster. Very few efforts 
have ever been made in North America to catch and grow oysters arti- 
ficially according to the French system. The natural banks produce 
such an abundance of young oysters that all the beds artificially planted 
ean be abundantly and cheaply supplied from them. During late years 
the North American beds have furnished an annual average of about 
thirty million bushels of oysters for market; this is about nine to twelve 
billions of oysters, since there are from three to four thousand oysters 
in a bushel. In 1859 the number of oysters sold amounted to from six 
to eight billions. 

The principal markets fer North American oysters are New York and 
Baltimore. In 1867 there were over 10,000 men employed in the oyster- 
trade in Baltimore. The yearly capital employed in this business in New 
York was, about 1870, over $8,000,000.* |The North American oysters are 
so fine and so cheap that they are eaten daily by all classes; hence they 
are now, and have been for a long time, a real means of subsistence for 
the people. This enviable fact is, however, no argument against the 
injuriousness of a continuous and unprincipled fishing of the beds. The 
size of the territory over which oysters are found, and the number of in- 
habitants, must not be left out of account, however, if a right judgment 
would be formed in regard to those great sums which appear in the oyster 
statistics of North America. The territory of the North American oyster- 
beds is of very great extent, comprehending the greater portion of the 
east coast of the United States. Oysters occur from Cape Hatteras, in 
North Carolina, to the mouth of the river Saint Lawrence, and Chesapeake 
and Delaware Bays are especially rich oyster localities. In the United 
States there are now 52,000,000 of people; in Germany, France, and 
England, altogether, over 109,000,000. Hence, in Norti America, with a 
less number of inhabitants, there is a much greater supply of oysters 
per person than there is in Europe. But as the number of consumers 


*Tu the following works will be found more detailed statements in regard to oyster- 
culture in North America: 

P. de Broca. Etudes sur Vindustrie huitritre des Etats-Unis. Paris, 1865, 

Spencer I’, Baird. Report on the condition of the sea-fisheries of the south coast 
of New England in 1871/72, Washington, 1873, Oyster-beds, p, 472, by A. E. Ver- 
rill. 


[61] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 743 


increases in America, the price will also certainly advance, and then 
the desire will arise to fish the banks more severely than hitherto; and 
if they do not heed in time the unfortunate experiences of the oyster- 
eulturists of Europe, they will surely find their oyster-beds impover- 
ished from having defied those biocénotic laws which have been given 
in chapter 10. 

As man has uprooted the greatest forests, so can he also annihilate 
the richest oyster-beds. In England it is now understood to be abso- 
lutely necessary that the natural oyster-banks should be regularly 
and systematically protected if they are to remain uniformly and 
permanently productive. A commission for the investigation of the 
English oyster-fisheries, which met in London early in the year 1876, 
recommended to Parliament that fishing for oysters be forbidden by law 
from the 1st of May until the Ist of September each year, and that def- 
inite limits of time be designated, during which certain definite oyster- 
territories must be allowed entire rest. During the close-time all hand- 
ling of oysters for the purposes of food should be prohibited under 
penalty of fines; yet it should be permitted, even during close-time, for 
the purposes of transplanting, with the design of preservation and im- 
provement, oysters taken in a lawful manner upon public beds. Upon 
the banks in the open sea the close-time was to last only from the 15th 
of June until the end of August, since these banks can very seldom be 
fished during the stormy seasons of the year. The size of the sea-oys- 
ters brought to market was to be at least 24 to 3 inches in diameter.* 

A close-time has been enforced upon’ the Schleswig-Holstein beds for 
along period. This time extends from the 9th of May to the 1st of Sep- 
tember, and, furthermore, no oysterman is permitted to take away any 
oysters which are less than 24 inches in diameter. All oysters which 
are not of this size must be thrown back into the water. Both of these 
laws have been carried out; yet, nevertheless, in the course of the last 
twenty years the fertility of the beds, in comparison with earlier rental 
periods, has very significantly fallen off. These laws in regard to close- 
time and a minimum size for marketable oysters, which were designed 
to preserve to the banks an undiminished power of renewal, did not, 
therefore, attain their object at the very time of the high price of oys- 
ters, and when oysters should have been plentiful. It is, therefore, 
not enough to regulate the time of catching and the size of oysters, if, 
at the same time, care is not used to prevent too large a number of 
oysters from being taken from the beds during any one fishing season. 
But what number is too great? A foundation for an estimate of the num- 
ber of oysters which may be taken away from the beds without injury 
totheir productiveness can be obtained, for the Schleswig-Holstein beds, 
by means of the inquiry in regard to their productiveness. This product- 
iveness is, upon anaverage, 421 per thousand ; so for every 1,000 full-grown 


* Report on oyster-fisheries, 1876, p. ili. 


744 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [62] 


oysters which are now upon the beds not more than 421 ought to be 
taken away annually. Uponanumber of banks where the productiveness 
is less than this the number taken should be less. Upon the Huntje 
Bed, where the production is more than 421 per thousand, as many as 
484 for every thousand can be taken yearly without endangering or 
lessening the productiveness, since that number of medium oysters grow 
into marketable oysters every year. But although the productiveness is 
thus expressed by a proportional number, yet the absolute number of full- 
grown oysters which may be taken from a bed during any one season 
cannot be arrived at without further consideration. One must know 
how thick the full-grown oysters lie upon the beds; whether, in fact, 
there is a sufficient number to secure an average fecundity to the bank. 
Upon banks such as those in the Bay of Arcachon and near Cancale, 
which are left dry during spring-tides, it is not difficult to observe the 
number of oysters necessary per square meter, in order to maintain the 
fecundity of the bank at its highest point, for at such times they are su 
exposed that they can all be counted. But those beds along the German 
and English coasts and in the open North Sea, which, on the contrary, 
remain continually under water, are much less favorably situated for the 
purposes of these inquiries. I have often been told that “such beds 
could be best investigated by means of divers.” The general impressien 
is that the divers can see, through the glass in the front part of their 
helmets, everything which lies upon the sea-bottom. But this is erro- 
neous, for in those shallow coast-seas which have ebb and flood tides 
the water is so clouded by the floating particles of mud that very little 
light can penetrate to the bottom. But even in clear water a diver would 
not be in a condition to ascertain by sight the number of oysters, for 
whenever he steps he renders the water cloudy, by stirring up the lighter 
particles lying upon the bottom; and so he would have to depend prin- 
cipally upon his hands, and ascertain, by feeling, those oysters which 
could just as well be taken up by means of the dredge, for the dredge 
brings from the bottom not only some of the soil, but also a portion of 
its inhabitants. And if the contents of the dredge be placed in large 
vessels or aquaria, with sea-water, the animals will very soon assume 
their customary positions and motions, so that we can see, in quiet and 
clear water, just how they live at the bottom of the sea. An aquarium 
with the living inhabitants of an oyster-bank is thus a segment of the 
bank itself. : 

When, in imagination, I have united many such segments together, I 
can picture to myself the sea-bottom, with its inhabitants, as a diver 
would never be able to see it. I can see the ground covered with oyster- 
shells, and here and there among them a living oyster with open shell, 
out of which protrude the fringed borders of its mantle. Upon the upper 
valve polyps are growing with expanded heads, looking like delicate, 
many-rayed stars. Hermit-crabs, bearing their snail-shell houses, are 
crawling hither and thither over the rough surface, and groping about 


[63] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 745 


with their claws for something to eat. Worms stick their heads out of 
holes and crevices; sea-urchins stretch out their sucking feet beyond 
the points of their spines and pull themselves slowly up on to a stone; 
a star-fish, with greatly arched back, has fastened itself about a mussel 
in order to suck it out of its shell; and a small fish has stationed itself 
under an open oyster and snaps up the embryos as they come from 
the shell.* Of this life of the oyster-bank the diver would see little or 
nothing, even if he happened to be a zoologist, for as soon as he had 
descended to the bottom the oysters would shut themselves up, the crabs 
and worms creep out of sight, and the fish swim away. I thus sketch 
this picture of a small portion of the really abundant life of an oyster- 
bank in order to show that one may become really very well acquainted 
with an oyster-bed by means of adredge. It can also be used to estimate 
the thickness of oysters upon a bed, if the distance passed over by the 
dredge while it is taking oysters be measured. In the inspections of the 
Schleswick-Holstein banks, during the last few years, this has been ac- 
complished in the following manner: At those points, where the dredge 
is dropped upon the bed, an empty cask, attached by means of a rope to 
a heavy weight, is cast overboard. The weight sinks tothe bottom and 
holds the cask securely anchored, floating upon the surface of the water. 


-Connected with the rope of the cask is a measuring-line, whichis wound 


upon a roller, and which runs off as long as the vessel is going forward 
and the dredge drags over the bottom. The mouth of our larger dredges 
is one meter in width. Thus, if we let the dredge drag over the bottom 
until 100 meters of line have run off, and find that we then have 50 oysters 
in the bag, we can conclude that one oyster came from every two square 
meters of bed-surface; and if an oyster-bank, the length and breadth 
of which are known, is dredged over in this manner in different diree- 
tions, a foundation is obtained from which to estimate the number of 
oysters upon the bed with certainly as much accuracy and with far 
greater speed and ease than a diver; and when the proportional pro- 
ductiveness of a bed thus examined is ascertained, we can estimate the 
number of oysters which can be taken from the bed without injury to its 
productiveness. 

Practical persons will object to these methods as being too detailed, 
and yet not leading us to a sufficiently high estimate of the number of 
oysters; but they will be obliged to admit that there is no better means 
of finding out, with any degree of certainty, the number of oysters 
upon these banks. <A skillful oysterman, one who has been acquainted 
with the beds for a number of years, will notice, without the use of a 
measuring-line, whether the oyalers lie uuORs the banks in sufficient 


- *An oyster- eae eas ain metton saw, at some oyster- ae ution for ar tificial cult- 
ure, small fish of the genera Gobius and Mullus swallowing young oyster-swermlings. 
He caught the fish, opened their stomachs, and found therein partially digested em- 
bryos. (Report on the oyster-fisheries, p. 87, Nr. 1711.) 


746 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [64] 


numbers for the prosperity of the banks, or whether the beds have 
become impoverished. He will reach this conclusion from the number 
of oysters which he can catch with a certain speed of his vessel, and 
during a certain definite time which his dredge drags over the bottom. 

Those authorities who have control of the inspections of the oyster- 
fisheries might, therefore, be able to avail themselves of the services of 
skillful dredgers to find out the condition of the banks before they de- 
cide, each season, the particular places which can be fished and the 
number of oysters which can be taken from each. The inspectors at 
Arcachon, after observations extending over many years, have arrived 
at a definite conclusion in regard to the number of breeding oysters 
which it is absolutely necessary to retain upon the banks, in order to 
maintain them at that stage of fruitfulness necessary for a permanent 
and profitable oyster-culture. 

The report of January, 1877, upon oyster-culture in France says: 
“ Although the natural oyster-beds in the Bay of Arcachon are regarded | 
as breeding-beds, yet, nevertheless, the government allows them to be 
fished for some hours ever year, in order to remove the surplus of oys- 
ters.” This is a fundamental proposition which a judicious oyster- 
breeder must carefully consider if the greatest amount of profit would 
be gained. In accordance with this proposition, oysters should never be 
allowed to remain upon a bank after they have passed the period of their 
greatest growth and fecundity, or until they die of old age; but we 
should anticipate nature, which demands the death of the old and weak 
as an indispensable condition for the production and bringing to ma- 
turity of the greatest number of young upon any bed. I do not con- 
sider it, then, as for the best interests of the beds to prevent dredging 
upon one or all of them for any long periods of time. The French Gov- 
ernment has not, therefore, in my estimation, acted in the best interests of 
the beds, in entirely forbidding dredging upon a strip of territory which 
lies along the edge of the oyster-banks of Cancale and Granville. The 
object of this protection is to retain there an undisturbed stock of breed- 
ing oysters, from which to rejuvenate the impoverished beds of both 
these places. Upon such unfished beds the natural biocénotic balance, 
from which acertain definite average germ-fecundity results, will yery soon 
become established. But this will become less if, with the same propor 
tion of nourishment, more superannuated than mature oysters are to be 
found upon the beds. The productiveness of any territory will thus be 
much less, if it is left entirely undisturbed than if itis judiciously fished, 
and, moreover, the profits which result from the food-oyster taken from 
such territory are lost. Upon the Schleswig-Holstein banks the oysters 
are best when from about seven to eight years old. In warmer regions 
they become fully matured in a shorter time. 

The amount of increase in the length of oyster shells during a given 
time is very different upon different portions of the Schleswick-Holstein 
sea-flats, but their average growth in thickness is much more uniform; 


[65] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 147 


hence it would be more correct to estimate the minimum size for mark- 
etable oysters according to the average thickness of the shell than ae- 
cording to its breadth. Estimated thus, a thickness of shell of 18 milli- 
meters would be a judicious minimum size for the Schleswig-Holstein 
oysters. In conclusion, I hereby give, as a foundation for all oyster- 
culture, the most important rules for the preservation and improvement 
of natural oyster-banks. 

An oyster-bank will give permanently the greatest profit if it pos- 
sesses such a stock of full-grown oysters as will be sufficient to maintain 
the productiveness of the bank in accordance with its biocénotie condi- 
tions. 

Whenever the natural conditions will admit of it, the yielding capa- 
city of an oyster-bed may be increased by improving and enlarging the 
ground tor the reception of the young oysters. 

The natural banks should be improved by removing the mud and 
sea-weeds with dredges and properly constructed harrows, and by seat- 
tering the shells of oysters and other mussels over the bottom. When 
circumstances will permit, all animals which are taken in the dredge, 
and which kill the oysters or consume their food, should be destroyed. 

It would be much more judicious, and much better for those who eat 
oysters, if the close-time could be extended until the 15th of September 
or the Ist of October, so as to allow the oysters sufficient time, after the 
expulsion of the contents of the generative ®rgans, to become fat before 
being brought to the table. 

If it is desired that the oyster banks should remain of general advan- 
tage to the public, and a permanent source of profit to the inhabitants 
of the coast, the number of oysters taken from the beds yearly must 
not depend upon the demands of the consumers, or be governed by a 
high price, but must be regulated solely and entirely by the amount of 
increase upon the beds. 

The preservation of oyster-beds is as much a question of statesmanship 
as the preservation of forests. 


» 
> 
be 


Page. 
Alcyonium digitatum, in oyater beds. ..-. 40, 53 
Alcyonidium gelatinosum in oyster beds. - 40 
American coast, oyster territory of....... 60 
Animal life in oyster beds..-............- 3 
Appropriation of oyster beds by the King. 32 
Arcachon, oyster beds in- -17, 21, 22, 42, 45, 57, 62, 64 
Artificial extension of oyster territory. --. 45 
OVSterDEdSs ase sess cece ei seeee elo 42 
on the British Coast. 20 
OY Sferbrecding 5c sssceeee meee 42 
Artificial oyster breeding: 
INEM TANCO stew Ss ais Bie verse ee eens e cee e 116)'57,.58 
Im:Greatebritaimecis. sea secmoceeee sees 20 
on) German: coastice noo. ose cccec bee 2 
COS OP Ne sect aM aeiese eeeiee eho Sct 9 
Artificial oyster ponds.-.-.......-......-. 18 
Aspidophorus cataphractus, on oyster 
bankksjs-425 5. 2. re tes Actes 40 
Asteracanthion rubens in oyster beds. --. 39 
Auray, Brittany, oyster beds at.......... 57, 58 
breeding in..---- 42 
Baird, Spencer F., report on the condition 
of the sea fisheries of the south coast of 
New England, cited --3...-.--.- 22.2... 60 
Balanus crenatus, in oyster beds......... 40 
Baltic Sea, experiments in oyster planting 28 
freshness of, excludes oysters. 28, 29 


Bay of Arcachon, oyster beds. 17, 21, 22,42, 45, 27,62, 64 


Bioceenosis of oyster banks............... 39, 41 
Blake, Mr., on cost of artificial oysters... 20, 21 
Bockh, R., Sterblichkeitstafel, &c., cited... 35 
Breeding boxes for young oysters ..-...-. 18 
of oysters, artificial ........-.--. 16 
British coast, artificial oyster bre@ding- -. 21 
Broca, P. de, Etudes sur l'industrie hui- 
triére des Etats-Unis, cited............. 60 
Buccinum undatum, in oyster beds. --.--. 39 
Burnham, England, oyster industry at. -- 59 
Cancale, oyster beds at - - - -37, 38, 39, 41, 49, 57, 58, 64 
Carcinus menas injurious to young oyster. 18 
IMOV SEL! DOGS is ers oe 39 
Cardium edule, in oyster beds ..-....-.--- 39 
Chemical constituents of the oyster ..... 50 et seq 
Clione celata in oyster beds -......-....-- 40 
amjoyster:shells,.-.25.-s...-- 11 
Coast-water desirable for oyster culture -. 14 
Colchester, England, oyster industry at .- - 59 
Cold;effect‘of ‘onioysters:--25..-.-2---.-- 23, 24 
Collin, Jonas, Om Ostersfiskeriet i Limf- 
orden cited) eas... eek sce oe cocee co cewane 31 
Coste, Prof.M., artificial breeding of oysters 16 
Cross-sectional view of oyster ...-....--- 11 
De Bon, Notice sur la situation de l'ostréi- 
culture enS75 ;clted 323 os. e cc css cls 19 


[67] 


Page. 
Deep-sea Oysters) s22-- cee ones ace ae 15 
Desmidiz, on oyster banks ..--....---.... 40 
Destruction of oyster beds ........-..-...- 44 
of young oysters.........-..- 19 
of oysters, causes of..-...-.. 23 
Diatomacez, on oyster banks --.-..-.---- 40 
Didus ineptus, extinction of............ 30 44 
Difficulties in establishing artificial oyster 
beds along the German coast ..--. 21, 22, 26, 27, 59 
Dodecacera concharum, in oyster beds. - 40 
Dodo; extinctiontof-22-4--- a. 1 eee 44 
Dredging of oyster beds.-----.........2.. 40, 41 
fOLIOV Stems asec sos eee nee 7,8 
Dudgeon Light, England, oyster bed at... 36 
Eastern limits of the oyster in Germany.. 29 
Echinus miliaris, in oyster beds ........-- 39 
Eggs, number of, produced by oysters.... 12,16 
Exhaustion of oyster beds..--.......-..-- 27, 37, 38 
Embry OOysters\; 222 2..-5- 52 4s- ee seeseee 12,13 
development of ..-......-. 13 
Enemies of the young oyster-.-....-...-.-. 18 
Enlargement of natural oyster beds...... 2 
Examination by a royal commission. ..--. 33, 34 
Extension of oyster beds, hindrance to.. - 15 
Extension of oyster territory, artificial... 45 
Eudendrium rameum, in oyster beds ..... 40 
Fattening ponds in France: 
at mouth of the Seudre.. 57 
ati@léronesicesseceene ase 57 
near Sables-d’Olonne - ... 57 
neareWorientiosssse sees 57 
near Courseulles-sur-Mer 57 
Fattening oysters, artificially............- 43 
Female oyster, superior to male in flavor. . 52 
Flavor of the Marennes oysters .......-.. 2 
Of the Oyster <> 4-4-2 eh eee see 50 
dependent on saltness of water --. 14 
Floridiz, on oyster banks ...............- 40 
Moodiof Gheioystemeesesrcises4- seo tene ce 43 
Formation of the young oyster........... 12 
Fossil oyster bed near Blankenese.....--. 32 
oyster beds near Waterneversdorf. 30 
France, artificial oyster breeding in. .. -1, 16, 57, 58 
fattening pondsin'.2.:..-......--- 57 
oyster fisheries in -----..........- 64 
oyster production in.........---- 58 
transplanting practiced in .....-.. 2 
Freezing oysters, results of ............-. 13, 24 
French system of oyster breeding ...--.. 20 
Fruitfulness of the oyster.-.-.-...------. 14 
German coast, artificial oyster breeding. - 21 


coast waters, inadaptiveness. .21, 25, 26, 27 
OVStOr| COrritOLly.<-=-~.145\- + loaeen 3 
Granville, France, oyster beds at.......-. 57, 64 


750 
Page. 
Great Britain, artificial oyster breeding in 20 
Halichondria panicea, in oyster beds----. 40 
fale | @ lami crests Nala ia aia am mi mlel lai 5 
Hayling, island of, oyster breeding trench. 2 
ISK TREE MVS RE 555 sop oqeeGSUOSDEOsOne 3 
Hornum, oyster bed of ..-..-..-----..-..- 38, 53 
Huntje Bank oyster bed.-..-...-..-.----- 34, 38, 39 
oystersbank == se4-- =~ ---ric- ei = 34 
Husum, oyster reservoir at......-.--.---- 54, 55 
Hyas aranea, in oyster beds.......-.-.---- 39 
Ice used in cooling of oysters .-----..----- 5 
Immigration of the oyster......---.------ 2 
OYStCRsss- sesceinceeceseae 39 
Impoverishment of oyster banks....-..-- 47, 48, 49 
Jacobson, Prof. O., analysis of oyster. ---- 51 
Johnston, Captain, cited 2:-:-..-2-25..... 63 
Krogh, F., Den konstige Ostersavl og dens 
Indférelse i Danmark, cited .....-..---- 31 
Kriyer, H., De danske Ostersbanker, cited 32, 48 
Lim Fiord, appearance of oyster in....--. 29, 30 
OVStersin=sss ese see eee ee 39, 45 
Limits of the oyster in German waters... - 29 
Location of oysters along the coast of 
Pomerania, acts respecting.......-...-- 31 
Marennes, France, oysters -.--.--- Dracseas 2 
oyster bed at.....-.--- 39, 41, 49 
Marketable oyster, size of......-.-.------ 33 
Market value of oysters.-..--.-----.----- 48, 49, 50 
Maturity cofj0vesterza so a-cers semen eects 64 
Mobius, Die Austerund die Austernwirth- 
Behalhy.cltede.sesea-s jase es 1 
oyster and oyster culture...----- 1 
Ueber Austern-und Miesmusch- 
elzucht,| ete; citedit 22-4. se 19 | 
Measuring sticks for oyster beds...-..--- Us 
Medium oyster, definition of....-.....---- 35 
Messum, Mr., statement of oyster fishing- 37 
Meyer, Dr. H. A., on saltness, tempera- 
ture, and currents of the North Sea, cit. 14 
Murex erinaceus, injurious to oysters .-... 18 
Mytilus edulis in oyster beds...--...----- 39 
Natural oyster beds, conditions favorable 25 
investigation of..... 25 
Nereis pelagica, in oyster beds.--....---. 39 
Noctiluca scintillans in the harbor of Keil 29 
North America, oyster industry in.....-- 60 
North Sea, pottomiotees sce... see ser eee 6 
oyster grounds of the...-.--.-- 14 
Salimesstofenensan seusacemneces 14 
CIDESAN 15 ooo sclcwe elas es 5, 6 
Number of eggs produced by oyster... --- 12, 16 
Ostend, oyster reservoir at...... -..--.--- 55 
Ostreae gis isan sem ase alee selaavs sere oes enine 60 
Oyster and oyster culture (Title)......-.- 1 
bank is a Bioconose..-..-.---..-.. 39 
banks, how exposed....-..----..... 7 
causes of impoverishment ..47, 48,49 
InspectionOfssc2-.--5------- 63164 
protection required ........ 65 
bed at mouth of Thames........-.. 36 
near Dugeon Light ..-.....--. 36 
Oyster-bedseestcer accom serss aera le> 3, 4, 6, 15 
appropriation of, by the King. 32 
AbeROmM y= sea emc eee ewe asl 53 


at Arcachon -.17, 21, 22, 42, 45, 57, 62, 64 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


[68] 


Page. 
Oyster-beds Cancale. .-.--- 37, 38, 39, 41, 49, 57, 58, 64 
conditions favorable. -.-..-.---- 42 
Dudscon Lights=>-e95~-2--2 05 o6 
exhaustion ofa. 22 oecee nese 37 
TOTMAuONKO tees eee eee 42 
LOSS Mec tan ace ot meeteesecsee 30, 32 
Granville. cc cess. sce ene eee 57, 64 
hinderance to extension of...- 15 
LO MMMM ses ertece ete see eee 38, 53 
Hunt) efbankea-sencmseessescne 34, 38, 39 
Island ofi@lérones--=25- sess 39, 41, 49 
Tslandtofel6)es--)as eee 47 
Tslandofpoylbyesscsr see eee eee 53 
IMarennessoiac5, Seesce sickhemee 39, 41, 49 
near Auray, Brittany..-..-..-. 57, 58 
near Rocher d’Aire........-.- 47 
on the American coast. -..-- .- 60 
production Otes-eeeeessaeeea ee 37 
productivencss)of--5--2 3.5.4 61, 62, 64 
Rochefort! 232 ecu. nee soeeeeesee 39, 41, 49 
Wihitstableje-2 S225 seseenceo ae 36, 46 
Saint-Vaast-de-la-Hogue..-..- 57, 58 
Schleswig-Holstein. .3, 8, 9, 38, 39, 64, 65 
Steenaekuceoece-c haseosee oe: 34, 38 
Wiest -Ammnromeee ses eens cee 38 
Oyster breeding, artificial, in France. - .-1, 16, 57, 58 
artificialieeeas sess coeeceen 42 
causes of failures in..---- 46 
ATG USMC ATI Yio cratelaye ee erate ae 2 
temperature of water for. - 46 
trench seaac ss scenjose eect 42 
| Oyster, chemical constituents of the. ..--- 50 et seq. 
culture in Great Britain -.----..-. 20 
Oyster culture, object and results of...--- 56 
dredimersesesc oe see veceee ei bise since 7 
fisheries, restriction in..---........ 61 
intl olandiec semester 61 
UNUM AN COueeaae eee eee 64 
in Schleswig-Holstein .... 61 
of Hanover) cs... -secse<. 08 27 
Oyster fishing, extent of, in England...--. 36 
IncreasooL.-ss4-) seseee ea 49 
processes in use: ----.----.- 57 
SUALIStIGSTOLe = ents eie 37, 38 « 
flavor'of thes: a. .22-~ see se eres =a 50 et seq. 
grounds in the open North Sea... 14 
Thal, Jb DN BAe eas Moroso cade 3, 9, 45 
industry in England.-.-....--..-... 59 
in North America..-...--. 60 
Oléron, island of, oyster beds at..--.-.--. 39, 41, 49 
Oysters, lifeofexplained.----...2-..-.2-2- 1 
Oysters, market value of, in Hamburg. --. 48 
at Whitstable... 49 
at Colchester... 49 
at Falmouth.... 50 
Oyster, maturity of ------- 22. --2- 2. anne 64 
preservation Of .-:---..20222 532205: 55 
production of........... TeeRetene 58 
quality of, at different periods. -- 53 
ESOL OILS aaa -yaetasat en oeaictrtee iste 54, 55 
tenacious top lites.-44- eee ee see 54 
territory, artifical extension of... 45 
cleaning of, for commerce..-.-.--- 8 
Oysterin ge eacacs chee eee tana aaete 7 
Pagarus bernbardus, in oyster beds--.--- 39 


[69] 


THE OYSTER AND 
Page. 
Pearls|found in oysters.--.-.-..--...--<-- 50, 51 
Pennel, Cholmondeley, report on the oys- 
ter and mussel fisheries of France, cited 36, 47 
Platessa vulgaris, on oyster banks..-...-. 40 
Pomatoceros triqueter, in oyster bedst.-.. 40, 53 | 
Pomerania, coast of, location of oysters -. 31 
Prehistoric oysters in German waters. -.. 30 


Productiveness of oyster beds----.....-. 61, 62, 64 


sizes and, of the oyster - 31, 35 
Propagation of oysters, artificial....-...- 16, 17 
Quantities of oysters taken from beds on 
the Schleswig-Holstein coast....,....-.- 34 
Raja clavata, on oyster banks.--......... 40 
Ré6, island of, oyster bed in.---.-.......... 47 
Reports on artifical oyster culture.....--- 21 
Reproduction of the oyster.....-...-.---- 10 
Reservoirs for oysters at Husum..--...-.. 54, 55 
ab Ostenden ses sec fence 55 
Rochefort, France, oyster bed at.----...39, 41, 49 
Rocher d’Aire, France, oyster bed near... 47 
Romans used ice in cooling of oysters.--. 56 
Rom, island of, oyster bed at.......-...-- 53 
Sabellaria anglica in oyster beds..--...-...- 40 
Saint-Brienc, oyster breeding at ......--. 16, 17, 42 
Saint- Vaast-de-la-Hogue, oyster beds at .. 57, 58 
SalitmessofeNorthi sea: ==. eaec ec cciee ss se 14 
Schleswig-Holstein, oyster, flavor of--.---- 9 
oyster, size of..-..-.. 9 
Oyster beds) .- =a 3, 4, 37, 38 
oyster beds, 3, 8, 9, 38, 59, 64, 65 
beds, composition of. 8 
oyster beds, extent of, 3, 8, 9 
Wattenmcer......... 4 
Schlossberger, analysis of oyster, cited... 51 
Sea-flats...--- Dace eee see enc cane ee aie 2, 4 


OYSTER-CULTURE. 


Sertularia argentea, in oyster beds..___.. 
pumila, in oyster beds.......-. 

Sizes and productiveness of the oyster. ._. 
South of England oyster company. ---..-. 
Spawning season of oyster.----..-...-..- 
Spermatozoa of the oyster.---....-....... 
Steenack oyster bank-- 5. .-25------2--2- 
Oyster beds\Of-2---sscs5-37s~ 522s 
Structure’ of oysterss2e14:-22-- ees. cs 5. 
Sylt, island of, oyster beds near.......... 
Temperature an important factor in life, 
conditions of a biocénose.-..--...-..... 
Temperature for oyster breeding ........ 
Tidesiinthe; North) Sease-s-cc seese cess 
Tolle, A., Die Austernzucht und Seefisch- 
erel) ete. \Clved seas alee seee Cee eee 
Tolle, A., report on oyster culture .....-- 
Transplanting of oysters in France..-.---. 
Tubularia indivisa in oyster beds.-.-..-.... 
Von Bibra, analysis of oyster, cited....-- 
Wappaus, Handbuch der Geographie und 
Statistik, cited)s=.scsq9-2 2s eee see eres 
Wattenmeer, Schleswig-Holstein.....-- 4 
Waterneversdorf, fossil oyster beds ..-.-. 
Webber, Mr., on extent of oyster fishing. 
West Amrum, oyster bed of..-........--- 
Whitstable, England, an oyster port..--. 
England, oyster bed near... - 

oyster industry at..-.....--. 

Winther, G., Om vore Haves Naturfor- 
hold med Hensyn til konstig Ostersavl, 
ete: clied=o=--- 2a Dasotisteeeewnstesmets ee 
Young oysters, formation of bed by.----- 
outline figures of......-.. 

Zostera marina, on oyster banks........-. 


34, 38 


XXVUI.—A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO OYSTER CULTURE, AND THE 
tenth OF REARING AND MULTIPLYING EDIBLE MARINE 
ALS, 


By F&LIx FRAICHE,* 
Professor of the Natural Sciences and Mathematics. 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


Introduction. Present condition of the oyster industry upon the coast of France. 1 

he natural history of mollusks and crustaceans..----..-....sccesosssccesssce-- 608 

Causes of the continued depopulation of the oy on beds) and the impov tena 
GUMERHSNETIONS wat O Nn cee. kl ae Rnd os eae This Ree a eek ich o eee ee et 22 


METHODS OF BREEDING AND REARING OYSTERS, MUSSELS, LOBSTERS, ETC. 


CHAPTER ee de industry and present methods = 2-3-2 22-/2. sce nscsceiemcdinecesices 29 
CuHapPrerR IJ. Means and methods of gathering and transporting oyster-spawn.- 32 
CHAPTER III. Preparation of the bottoms. Construction of claires, parks, live- 


SONG ee) AN eS ae SE oe Sa Se Mey Smetana See, eet 45 
CuAPTER IV. Methods of working the claires...--- ROH EOBUBSON A SUBD SHaaccosSe 59 
CHAPTER V. Cultivation of mussels .....--. even a aia ne oem is Sete aie a atelye asian 58 
CHAPTER VI. Rearing of lobsters and other crustaceans .-.....--..------------- 66 


INTRODUCTION.—PRESENT CONDITION OF THE OYSTER 
INDUSTRY UPON THE COAST OF FRANCE. 


The oyster industry, which was formerly carried to a high degree of 
perfection by the Romans, as shown by the results obtained at Lake 
Luerin by Sergius Orata, who, according to the testimony of his con- 
temporaries, would not have found any difficulty in causing oysters to 
thrive upon the roofs of buildings, and by the industry yet in full activ- 
ity at Lake Fusaro, has always been left in France entirely to the forces 
of nature. Asa result of this our numerous oyster banks, furnishing 
sufficient supplies for all demands when the imperfect means of com- 
munication hindered the shipment of this mollusk from point to point, 
have not been able to resist the abusive fishing to which they have been 
subjected since our railroads have afforded facilities whereby the oyster 
can be carried to all parts of the country, and thus to millions of new con- 

* Guide Pratique de L’Ostréiculteur et Procédés d’Elevage et de Multiplication des 
Races Marines Comestibles, par M. Félix Fraiche, Professeur de Sciences Mathé- 
matiques et Naturelles. Paris; Eugéne Lacroix, Editeur, 15 Quai Malaquais. 12mo, 
174 pp., 25 woodcuts.—Translated by H. J. Rice, B. Se. 

[1] 8. Mis. 29 48 753 


o 


754 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES [2] . 


sumers. In 1858 M. Coste addressed to the Emperor a report upon the 
condition of the oyster fisheries of the coast, and exposed in these terms 
the deplorable impoverishment of “the oyster industry, which‘has fallen 
into such decline that unless prompt mexsures are taken, the source of all 
production will very soon be entirely exhausted. At Rochelle, Maren- 
nes, Rochefort, and the islands of Ré and Oléron, of twenty-three banks, 
which formerly constituted one of the sources of wealth of this part of 
the coast, eighteen are completely depopulated; while those which yet 
furnish oysters are seriously affected by the increasing invasion of mus- 
sels. Moreover, the oyster breeders of these regions are no longer able 
to find there, not to mention those necessary for consumption, a suffi- 
cient harvest to supply their ‘parks’ and ‘claires’ with oysters, which 
are there fattened and brought to perfection, and are obliged to bring 
them, at great expense, from the coast of Brittany. The bay of St. 
Brieux, which is so admirably and naturally adapted to the production 
of the oyster, and where there formerly existed, upon a hard and per- 
manent bottom, thirteen beds in full activity, has to-day not more than 
three beds, from which twenty boats might in a few days carry away the 
last oyster. At the time when the gulf was in its prosperous condition, 
more than two hundred vessels, manned by fourteen hundred men, were 
engaged in fishing each year from the 1st of October to the 1st of April, 
and took from these waters a harvest valued at three to four hundred 
thousand frances ($60,000 to $80,000). In the harbor of Brest, and at 
the mouths of the rivers in Brittany, the decrease has been less rapid, 
because these fertile sea-territories have net as yet been subjected to 
so active a fishing; but as the decimation of other parts of our coast 
forces us to resort to these beds for what can no longer be found else- 
where, they will soon share in the general ruin. At Cancale and Gran- 
ville, two classical quarters for the growth of the oyster, it is only by 
dint of care and good administration that they succeed, not in increas- 
ing the crop, but in moderating its decline.” Such, then, was the de- 
plorable condition of the oyster industry upon the coast of France in 
1858, when M. Coste wrote his report,—a condition much more threaten- 
ing for the future, in that it coincided exactly with the completion of 
our net-work of railroads, which permitted the products of the ocean to 
be carried in a few hours throughout the entire territory of France, even 
to the departments most remote from the sea, thus tending unquestion- 
ably to increase the consumption by placing a large number of our peo- 
ple in a position to profit by the delicacies which were formerly forbid- 
den them, on account of their distance from the centers of production. A 
continued rise in the price of oysters, coincident with a decrease in their 
delicacy and fatness, were the immediate results of this state of things. 

But still another very grave and menacing result was the continued 

diminution of our maritime population, the sole source whence, in our 

days, are recruited the sailors for our fleets; for, where fifty boats, each 

with from five to eight men, formerly found profitable labor in gather- 


[3] OYSTER CULTURE. ioe 


ing oysters, it is now barely possible for ten boats to provide support for 


‘fifteen to twenty families, who have, 
moreover, no other means of support 
than gathering this mollusk. Hence 
we find a very general abandonment 
of maritime careers, the impoverish- 
ment and degradation of our coast 
population, and, finally, the imminent 
weakening of our marine. At this 
time M. Coste discovered a remedy 
for the evil he had announced, and 
through the munificence of the Em- 
peror obtained the means of experi- 
menting, upon a grand scale, with the 
object of restocking the oyster banks 
of the coast, and of applying to this 
great and useful end the principles 
which had been revealed to him in 
his long and arduous scientific labors. 

The harbor of St. Brieux was chosen 
as the site of the first experiment; 
and during the months of March and 
April, 1858, the general planting took 
place with oysters brought from the 
sea at Cancale ‘and Tréguier. Two 
imperial guard-boats, the Ariel and 
the Antilope, were employed to assist 
inthis work. Theoysters were placed 
in six long beds, situated in various 
portions of the bay, and these beds 
were then carefully buoyed out so that 
they could be easily found and exam- 
ined when necessary or desirable. 
Besides the oysters, the bottom was 
paved with oyster shells and the shells 
of Cardium and various other mol- 
lusks, with the object of offering sup- 
port and shelter to the young oysters ; 
then bundles of twigs, from two te 
three meters (6 to 10 feet) in length, 
were anchored with stone and main- 
tained at a short distance from the 
bottom; thus completing a series of 
collecting apparatus sufficient to se- 
cure and hold all the young which 


Fic. J.—A twig bearing young oysters (natu- 
might appear. Six months later, the *! size). 
experiment had already promised complete success; for the shells 


756 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


and fascines planted for the reception of the young were found, 
upon examination, to be literally covered with young oysters (Figs. 1. 


Fic. 2.—Shell of cardium covered with young oysters (natural size). 


and 2), and in such great abundance that Cancale and Granville, in 
the days of their greatest prosperity, never saw such a spectacle. One 
single fact will suffice to give some idea of the immense wealth thus 
created in a few months. Upon one single bundle of the twigs as 
many as twenty thousand young were counted; and as oysters sell 
at the fishing stations for 20 franes ($4) per thousand, this bundle 
promised for the future a return of 400 frances ($80). The experiment 
was decisive, and it only remained to have these teachings propagated 
and the people incited to similar efforts, not only at other points along 
the ocean coast, but in the British Channel and the Mediterranean. 
It was a noble and great undertaking, in which M. Coste had not failed. 
He soon had numerous imitators. In the Bay of Arcachon the possess- 
ors of parks and claires, or fattening and feeding places, were wise 
enough to transform them into breeding places, veritable hives, whence 
every year swarms of oysters issued forth into the sea, assuring to this 
coast, then nearly barren, a future revenue of from twelve to fifteen 
millions of delicious bivalves. 

By the efforts of government two model establishments were founded 
upon this bay, and one hundred and twelve persons, associated with the 


[5] OYSTER CULTURE. 757 


marine, came to carry on the new industry, which occupied an extent of 
400 hectares (about 960 acres) of emergent lands, made over by the ad- 
ministration. In 1863, during six tides and upon only one-half of the 
restocked lands, the oystermen took sixteen millions of oysters—that is 
to say, more than the public fisheries of Cancale and Granville have ever 
produced. Not long ago [ had occasion to visit an artificial park, which 
had been instituted only three years before, at a total cost of $2,400, 
and which sold at the time of my visit for $8,000. 

On the island of Ré three thousand people migrated from the interior 
to occupy the emergent sea-territory, ceded to them in individual lots 
by the government. The condition of these lands necessitated arduous 
and long-continued labors on the part of the men, since these portions 
of the island were simply vast wastes, where to-day more than two 
hundred parks can be seen in full activity, occupying the entire coast 


. from the point of Rivedoux to that of Loix, a distance of twelve miles, 


and covering an area of nearly 205 hectares (about 492 acres). In 
these parks, or prepared oyster-beds, there are to-day, on an average, 
six hundred oysters to the square meter, or a total of two billion oysters, 
representing a value, when of marketable size, of about 40,000,000 francs 
($8,000,000). Before this new industry had transformed the arid and 
desolate character of these portions of the coast, the 18,000 inhabitants 
of the island of Ré had no other source of revenue except from the growth 
of barley and the culture of the vine, whence there were 1ew returns, the 
production being slight and of poor quality, and by fishing, which pro- 
duced about 50 frances ($10) per month for each boat employed. 

This state of affairs, instead of growing better, grew worse until the 
year 1858, when Hyacinthe Boeuf, of Rivedoux, upon the island, under- 
took for the first time the artificial breeding or cultivation of oysters 
upon eighteen hundred meters of emergent lands granted him by the 
state. Boeuf was a mason, and commenced his labor by inclosing 
his property with a wall of rocks. He then covered the soil with 
straw and branches to consolidate the mud and render the place 
suitable for the reception of the oysters which he proposed bring- 
ing from Brittany, since the coast of the island was entirely destitute 
of them. What, then, was his astonishment when he saw the stones of 
his wall become covered spontaneously with a young growth of oysters, 
which appeared in the water surrounding the island and probably came 
from the parks along the coast of Nieulle; they were so numerous that 
they averaged about two thousand young oysters per square meter. 
He at once demolished his wall, stone by stone, and placing the oysters 
upon the bed of the park, he succeeded, by favoring their development 
by intelligent care, in creating on the island an industry destined to bring 
wealth and prosperity. His example was soon followed by others, and 
numerous parks were laid out, so that in 1860 oysters were sold to the 
value of 3,150 franes ($630), and in 1863, 53,000 francs ($10,600), without 
counting the thousands of oysters deposited in the fattening-ponds, the 


758 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


value of which could not have been less than from 25,000 to 30,000 franes 
($5,000 to $6,000). I cannot omit to mention in this connection, without 
injustice, the name of Dr. Kemmerer, of St. Martin, whose labor and exam- 
ple have been of great value in the progress of oyster culture on the island 
of Ré. The work of transformation thus begun in the Bay of Arcachon 
and upon the coast of the island of Ré gradually extended to the entire 
ocean coast and even into the Mediterranean, multiplying to an almost 
unlimited extent the edible treasures, of which the ocean contains inex- 
haustible germs, creating upon these desolate and barren territories 
wealth and abundance, and attracting there a hardy and numerous 
maritime population, from which to draw recruits for our marine. Such, 
then, are the grand results already due to the learning and devotion of 
M. Coste, and to the powerful and efficient aid which he has received 
from the Emperor, who has not hesitated to place at the disposal of this 
great worker the lands and material resources required for the under- 
taking. 

The domain of the sea is public property, and it becomes the duty 
and the right of the state alone to extend prompt aid to the increasing 
impoverishment and sterility of one of the branches of public industry 
and wealth, and it is evident from what has already been done, that the 
state has not failed in this duty. But although this is the chief cause 
of the renewed activity in the oyster industry, is it to be considered or 
does it follow that this industry can prosper only over great tracts of 
waste territory, like the bays of St. Brieux and Arcachon, with the 
help of powerful auxiliaries, such as the government vessels with their 
many intelligent men and officers? Does it follow, in a word, that 
there is nothing to be done, so far as personal endeavor is concerned, 
by the dwellers in coast territories? We think just the contrary; we 
believe there is much to be done, and that the cultivation of marine 
species is an inexhaustible mine, in the fruitful working of which each 
one can find his place according to his strength and means, and with 
that belief in view we have written this book, designing it especially 
for the proprietors of marine lands and salt marshes, and for the pos- 
sessors of parks and claires, the products of which can be easily 
increased a hundred-fold. While the labors of restocking, executed 
under the authority of the state, the reconstruction of old breed- 
ing or fattening ponds and the creation of new banks where none pre- 
viously existed, are undeniably great results; as is also the re-estab- 
lishment of the national maritime wealth by the reconstruction of the 
fishing grounds; yet it is important in another respect that it forms a 
grand example which each individual possessor of emergent or tide 
lands, of salt lakes, or simply of lands bordering the coast, can follow 
with profit, in creating artificial oyster stations, or fattening ponds, 
where oysters, mussels, crustaceans, or even marine fish can be confined, 
and where, as a result, there will gather an uninterrupted, fruitful, and 


[7] OYSTER CULTURE. 759 


abundant harvest, even upon ground primitively condemned to eternal 

sterility on account of mud or stones. It is with the object of instruct- 

ing proprietors of fishing privileges, or dwellers upon the sea-shore, con- 

cerning a source of immense wealth, the labor of which concerns them 

alone, and in order to facilitate the methods of attaining the best re- | 
sults, that I have endeavored to present in this book a summary of 
those principles, now sanctioned by experience, which ought to guide 

them in this new culture. The question of oyster culture will then be 

treated here from a restricted point of view, as a private industry, such 

as a small farmer, who is desirous of increasing his revenue from his 

marsh or fattening pond, can readily undertake. In accordance with 

the plan which I followed in a former work, upon the culture of fresh- 

water fishes, I have preceded the account of the special processes of 
oyster culture with some remarks upon the functions, habits, and strue- 

ture of various species of mollusks and crustaceans, the cultivation of 
which can be undertaken with profit, and with a study of the causes of 
the depletion of our coast waters. For it is only when acting with a full 

knowledge of the cause, that is to say, in reasoning in regard to his 

labors, and choosing his processes according to the nature of that which 

he grows, and the. circumstances and conditions of growth, that one can 

hope to prosper in a work of this kind. Many of the earlier attempts 

in this direction miscarried simply from not having followed rational 

methods. But their authors had one excuse, the nearly universal ignor- 

ance in regard to the habits and needs of the species upon which they 

experimented, and they had to guide them only the numerous and. ac- 

credited errors which tainted this branch of natural history. 

To M. Coste belongs the honor of having destroyed these illusions, 
and his learned researches enable us to work with better results. Thanks 
to him, the route is now defined, the guide has been found, and success 
is insured to all except those who are willfully ignorant or careless. 
This latter cannot be said of the experiments recently made by M. 
Thibaut upon the rocks of Bouchots near Oléron; ‘by the government 
upon the bank of Richelieu at Rochelle; by M. Boissiére at Arcachon ; 
and, finally, among others, by M. Cressoles in the marsh of Kermoor, 
where, in practicing the principles of a sound agriculture in regard to 
oyster culture, he has been able to transform an uncultivated and pesti- 
lential morass into vast reservoirs for fish and oysters, thus changing 
into a source of great wealth what was before a barren and disease- 
breeding tract. Their example is both a proof and encouragement; my 
most earnest desire is that this book may stimulate numerous others to 
imitate their labors. ; 


760 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


THE NATURAL HISTORY OF MOLLUSKS AND CRUSTA- 
CEANS. 


MOLLUSKS. 


The third division of the animal kingdom, that of Mollusks, contains 
animals having a generally symmetrical body, that is a body with simi- 
lar parts upon either side of a median line, and which never presents 
an internal skeleton, as in vertebrates, or external one, as in the crus- 
taceans, and never becomes divided into segments, aS with the annelids. 
The body is soft, and is generally inclosed in a calcareous test or shell, 
which may be univalve or bivalve. 

The nervous system of mollusks, especially the ganglionic, does not 
present a median longitudinal disposition as in the vertebrates and 
articulates, but consists simply of symmetrically disposed little no- 
dules or ganglions of nerve matter, united together by nerve cords, and 
located throughout the body in the neighborhood of the principal or- 
gans. Mollusks breathe in the same manner as fish, by means of gills, 
which are either superposed lamin or branched filaments, and which 
act by separating from the water and absorbing those gaseous elements 
held in solution. Some few species present an internal respiratory 
cavity, to which is given by analogy the name of lung. These excep- 
tional species are always terrestrial. . Those mollusks having the most 
perfect organization are ranked in the class of Cephalopods (yegaiy, 
head, zovs, foot ; head-fogted animals), so named because of the tactile 
or prehensile appendages, which are located upon the head end of the 
body in a complete circle about the mouth, and called arms, feet, or 
tentacles. The only useful species is the cuttle-fish (Sepia officinalis), 
which produces the color called sepia or India ink, and the bone sold 
in commerce under the name of sea-biscuit or cuttle-fish bone. The 
poulpe or squid also belongs to this class, and is likewise called cuttle- 
fish; it serves as food for some of the poorer classes along the coast of 
Italy. 

The second class of mollusks is that of the Gasteropods (yast7p, belly, 
zovs, foot; belly-footed), which owe their name to a fleshy, contractile 
base serving as an organ of locomotion. Their shell, when it exists, is 
always univalve. As examples may be mentioned the slug, the snail, 
and those animals which furnish the helmet and porcelain shells. 

The last class and the least specialized group of mollusks, which, how- 
ever, contains species of great importance in a commercial point of view, 
is that of the acephalous mollusks (4, without, yegai7, head; headless). 
This class contains all of those mollusks having a bivalve shell, such 
as the oyster and the mussel, which we propose to study. All are 
without a distinct head, hence the name. The body has the form of a 
flattened, oval disk, and is pierced at one extremity with a mouth orifice 


[9] OYSTER CULTURE 761 


surrounded by tactile appendages, the palps, which seem intended to 
take the place of the organs of sight and touch. From each side of the 
body hang two folds of integument, formed of a double membrane, which 
clothe the inner surfaces of the shell, protecting the body of the animal 
from immediate contact with the hard external covering, and guarding 
it from any rubbing that might take place if in contact with such a sur- 
face. These protecting folds form the mantle, which also secretes the 
shell. 

Some species, the mussels among others, possess a sort of fleshy foot, 
which can be protruded at will from between the valves of the shell and 
the folds of the mantle, and can also aid'in locomotion. But the greater 
portion of the acephalous mollusks live firmly attached to solid objects 
under the water, either by a union of the calcareous matter of their 
Shells with the object upon which they are stationed, or by means of a 
small bunch of hair-like threads, which arise from near the ligament 
uniting the valves, and which are called collectively the byssus. Other 
species live buried in the mud, or move about in the water, sometimes 
swimming great distances. They are met with in the fresh water of 
our rivers and lakes, and in all salt water. 


THE OYSTER. 


Naturalists have united under the common name of oyster a large 
number of mollusks having very different aspects; they are the genera 
Gryphea, Plicatula, Vulsella, Malleus, Lima, Meleagrina or pearloyster, 
&c.. These mollusks are widely distributed, and have been very abund- 
ant in both fresh and salt water, in all ages of the world, so much 
so that they have left some very extensive fossil remains, as in the 
cretaceous beds of Versailles, of Meudon, and in all of those deposits 
to which, from their marine origin, the name of Neptunian beds has 
been given. Without entering, however, into useless details in re- 
gard to the various species of this family—since as articles of food they 
are of little or no interest—we will confine our attention to the edible 
oyster (Ostrea edulis), which is easily recognized by its compressed, 
roundish body and bivalve shell, the two valves of which are quite 
unlike, one being nearly flat, the other convex, and both without teeth 
at the hinge joint. The two valves are formed of a series of imbricating, 
circular layers of carbonate of lime secreted from the mantle, and are 
held together and closed by a single large and powerful adductor mus- 
cle, attached near the center of each valve. The layers of shell material 
have very much the appearance of shingles upon the roof of a house. 
The best-known forms of this animal are the common oyster, used upon 
our tables; the horse-foot oyster (Ostrea hippopus), very large and broad, 
but little esteemed, found at many places along the shores of the Medi- 
terranean, and also at Bologne-sur-Mer; the oyster of Beauvais (Ostrea 
bellovacina), taken at Bracheux, near Beauvais, &c. But the oyster is 
so well known to every one that, without attempting a minute descrip- 


762 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


tion of its structure we will pass at once to the study of the phenome- 
na of reproduction, which have for us a very important significance. 
The oyster is hermaphrodite* ; that is to say, each individual contains in 
itself the organs of both sexes—the ovary, or egg-producing organ, and 
the testicle, or organ for the formation of the male element or spermato- 
zoa. This question, which for a long time was the subject of debate, 
is now entirely settled (MM. Quatrefages and Blanchard sustained the 
contrary opinion, and several memoirs read before the Academy of 
Sciences treat of the artificial fecundation of the eggs and the artificial 
formation of oyster beds). It is recognized that in every individual are 
to be found at the same time both eggs and spermatozoa, and that, more- 
over, the eggs present all the phases of fecundation before they have left 
the ovaries of the animal and have reached a place where an external 
impregnation could be possible. One should not think, therefore, of 
artificially impregnating the eggs of the oyster, for this would require 
the removal of the eggs from the ovary of the mother while in course of 
development, which would be incompatible with an independent ex- 
istence.t 

The spawning season of oysters lasts about three months, from June 
to September. The eggs are produced in the ovary,t which is situated 
deep in the body of the animal, and whence, after they have arrived at 
a certain stage of maturity and have been impregnated, they descend 
along spacious canals into a fold of the mantle, where they remain in- 
closed in a mass of mucus, until they have completed their develop- 
ment. The eggs form at this time two whitish, creamy masses, which 
increase the size of the oyster very much, and cause it to be much sought 


* This is without doubt not true so far as regards the American oyster (Ostrea Vir- 
giniana). I have examined, under the microscope, hundreds of oysters during the last 
two years, and throughout nearly the entire spawning season as late as the middle of 
October, and never in a single instance have I found any evidence of hermaphro- 
ditism, the sexes always being well marked and perfectly distinct. Neither have I 
seen any evidence of the development of the egg until after it had passed from the 
ovary and come in contact externally with the floating spermatozoa; from my own 
observations, and from those of accurate observers with whom I am acquainted, I am 
of the opinion—which coincides with that of Quatrefages and others as to the Eu- 
ropean form—that the American oyster is as truly unisexual or dicecian as any mam- 
mal.—(Tr. ) 

tNotwithstanding this statement in regard to the oyster in general, Prof. W. K. 
Brooks, of the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md., has succeeded, during the 
past summer of 1879, at Crisfield, Md., in successfully impregnating great numbers 
of eggs of the American oyster. The impregnation was effected by taking the ripe 
eggs from the ovary of the female and mixing them artificially with the spermatozoa 
taken from the male animal. Many others of the party, of the Chesapeake Zoological 
Laboratory, including myself, also succeeded with the artificial impregnation, and 
there is no question but that such a process can be successfully performed, although 
to what extent it is practicable is a question yet to be settled.—(Tr. ) 

{ The statement of the author in regard to hermaphroditism and its results, and the 
changes undergone by the eggs within the ovary, must, in all probability, be consid- 
ered as entirely erroneous.—(Tr. )- 


[11] OYSTER CULTURE. 7163 


after by certain amateurs; but this should not be done, for when in this 
condition the animal should be especially protected. Although we may 
now consider the eggs as laid, yet they will not be ready for some time 
to leave the protecting mantle of the mother; they must undergo a sort 
of incubation, during which the mass loses some of its fluidity, and as- 
sumes a dark, violet color, a certain indication of maturity. From this 
time the embryos can lead an independent existence, and if they are now 
taken from the mantle they can be preserved alive for several days in 
sea-water; and, moreover, by frequently renewing this water and arrang- 
ing solid bodies for their attachment, such as bits of wood or fragments 
of shells, one can reproduce artificially what takes place at every spawn- 
ing season in the depths of the ocean. When the embryonic mass has 
assumed a bluish black or muddy color, the 
young leave the mantle of the mother and 
become dispersed in the surrounding waters. 
Each individual is furnished, at this time, 
with a special swimming organ, which disap- 
pears as soon as the animal has found a suit- 
able place of attachment where it can con- 
tinue its growth. This fleshy pad, or velum, 
is covered with cilia, and by the aid of these 
and of powerful muscles, which seem to re- 
tract or extend the velum, the embryo can 
move in any direction. 

The accompanying figures represent much 
enlarged a young oyster which has just left 
the mantle-cavity of the mother oyster; the 
first shows it in front view; the second, as 
seen in profile; at the upper part can be seen 
the ciliated velum. The number of embryos 
spawned in a single year from a single ma- 
ture oyster cannot be estimated at less than 
from one to two millions, and the imagina-  yy¢.3 Embryo Arno Caeeiindeh 
tion is simply astounded at the idea of the ©™rsed). 
immense numbers which would result from each annual spawning of a 
single bed of oysters, if this living cloud, which at a given moment 
almost darkens the waters, found for each one of the minute beings com- 
posing it a support and a protection which would enable it to escape 
the innumerable causes of destruction to which the laws of nature 
and human negligence expose them, and develop into mature and edi- 
ble oysters. In order that an embryo oyster may live to acquire a shell 
which shall serve to protect it, it is necessary that it should find near at 
hand a solid body, stone, bit of wood, or shell, for its attachment, so 
that it may be protected from too strong currents, which would carry 
it off; from deposits of mud, which would smother it; and from the 
voracity of the inhabitants of the sea, among which there are countless 


764 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


varieties of crustaceans, worms, and polyps, which prey upon these ani- 
mated organic corpuscles, so easy to capture and so attractive as food. 
And, finally, it is especially necessary that no blundering or greedy hand 
shall come with rake or 
dredge to seek for a few 
oysters of ediblesizeand 
by so doing tear to pieces 
and overturn the objects | 
upon which the young 
are attached, and thus 
killor bury inthe mud all 
the young generations 
to which the few old 
ones have given birth. 
If the young oyster can 
escape its many enemies 
and causes of destruc- 
tion it will in about six 
months acquire a diam- 
eter of 8 to 10 millime- 
ters, a very rapid in- 
crease when one takes 
into account its size at 
the time of swarming, 
about one-fifth of a mil- 
limeter. At one year of 
age the oyster is from 
4 to 5 centimeters in di- 
ameter, and in about 
three years it dttains 
marketable size—from 
8 to 10 centimeters— 
when it can be gath- 


Fic. 4. Oysters of different ages (natural size).—A, oysters from 
12 to 14 months old. B, oysters from 5 to 6 months old. C, oysters es 
from 3 to 4 months old. D, oysters from 1 to 2 months old. KE, oys- ered and sold for con 
ters from 15 to 20 days old. sumption. 


Figure 4 represents a number of oysters of various ages attached to 
the same object. 

But like nearly all animals destined for man’s use, the oyster is sus- 
ceptible of great improvement by special cultivation, which gives it a 
flavor and appearance very different from those of oysters freshly taken 
from the great common reservoir—the ocean. 

Upon our entire coast, especially where oysters are taken, it is well 
known that a prolonged sojourn in a fattening pond, or park, is neces- 
sary in order that they may acquire those qualities which place them 
in favor with consumers. 

Under the generic name of parks are designated reservoirs containing 


pia] OYSTER CULTURE. 765 


sea-water, which communicate with the ocean by means of sluices and 
flood-gates, that can be opened at each flood-tide or at pleasure; here 
it is that the oysters are deposited, after being taken from the beds, in 
order to protect them, and make them convenient for the demands of 
trade. dn this stagnant water, charged with organic material and pro- 
tected from all agitation, the oysters increase in size very rapidly, become 
fat, and lose the bftter flavor and slightly tough consistency common to 
the natural oyster. It is greatly to be regretted that the steady diminu- 
tion of this mollusk will not allow the oystermen to retain the oysters in 
their parks but a very short time; the full benefit of the park is then not 
attained, while at the same time the continually increasing price makes 
the oysters articles of luxury reserved for the tables of the rich. Often, 
one can see placed on sale in our markets oysters which have been sent 
in immediately after being taken, and without having been placed in a 
park at all. 

This mode of cultivating oysters by means of parks forms an import- 
ant industry for the inhabitants along the coasts between the harbor 
of Brouage and the mouth of the Seudre, and constitutes the chief source 
of wealth of the territory of Marennes. There, in ponds or parks, to 
which they give the name of claires, and which differ from ordinary 
parks in that they do not receive any water from the sea except dur- 
ing spring-tides, while the parks receive it at every flood; there, I 
repeat, the oystermen, known under the name of amareillewrs, cultivate 
their oysters, procured either from the banks of the neighboring coast, 
or from the coasts of Brittany, Normandy, or Vendée, and produce 
those delicious bivalves known in the southern and central portions of 
France as green oysters. Oysters which leave the ocean very light in 
color, after being placed in the claires at Marennes for a short time, 
acquire a deep green color, most pronounced in the gills; these are the 
veritable oysters of Marennes, which are preferred to any other growth. 
The reason of this is simple, and the color has little, or nothing, to do 
with it. The oyster, deposited when young in the claires—and this is 
an indispensable condition—undergoes a careful nursing, a sort of stab- 
ling, and acquires, at the same time that it receives its characteristic 
color, a fineness and delicacy of flavor and a fatness which it could 
not acquire upon the muddy and disturbed natural banks; from this 
cause arises its real superiority, a superiority which it would acquire 
equally well in any other park where it could be treated with sim- | 
ilar care and where it would even retain its natural color. This is so 
true that adult oysters placed in the claires at Marennes rapidly acquire 
the green color, but always remain just what they were when they were 
taken from the sea, although they present all the external characteris- 
tics of the most highly prized oysters. As to the peculiar color of the 
oysters which have been kept in the claires, it has been attributed to 
certain marine alge growing in that neighborhood, to the presence of a 


766 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


small animal (Vibrio ostrearius), and also to a disease of the oyster, a 
sort of jaundice or affection of the liver; but to-day it appears certain 
that this coloration is due solely to the peculiar nature of the soil form-. 
ing the bottom of the claires, and that every park having as a basea soil 
composed of a blue or a rich ferruginous clay will give to oysters placed 
in it this esteemed color; but this character will no, longer be of any 
importance when colorless oysters raised in parks whh the same care as 
those in the claires at Marennes shall present the same qualities. Upon 
those coasts where favorable circumstances permit their multiplication, 
oysters form beds or banks often several hectares (a hectare is 2.41 acres) 
in extent. These banks are formed by the aggregation of oysters of 
different ages and sizes, whose shells become firmly attached or soldered 
to the stones or rocks covering the bottom or to the shells of neighbor- 
ing oysters. If it were not for the destructiveness of oyster-fishing, 
these banks would go on increasing insize and depth, without limitation, 
and also, as a natural result, in value, by the annual accumulation of 
new germs; an accumulation singularly favored by great numbers of 
vacant places over the bottom of the ocean.* The oysters which are 
most esteemed in Europe come from England, while the best of the French 
oysters are found upon the coasts of Brittany and Normandy. Those 
most commonly eaten at Paris come from the north, from Cancale, Dieppe, 
Eitretat, Dunkerque, &c. The southern and central portions of France 
are supplied from Bordeaux and Rochelle, and from the few rare banks 
of the west coast which are not yet exhausted. 

The principal parks are those of Marennes, Saint-Waast, Courceul, 
Etretat, Fécamp, Dieppe, Tréport, and Dunkerque. The fishing is done 
by means of a dredge, which is dragged over the bottom ofthe sea. This 
dredge scrapes over the soil and gathers up into a bag of leather or twine, 
which is attached behind it, everything that lies in its course. When 
the dredge net is felt to be full the dredge is drawn on board of the 
boat and its contents emptied and sorted, those oysters only being re- 
tained which are of the size established by law, the rest being cast 
back into the water. We will now end this study by some observations 
upon a foreign species of oyster which it may be possible to acclimate 
in our southern waters, and which, although without value as an article 
of food, is of very great commercial importance; I refer to the pearl- 
oyster. 

The shell of this species is semicircular, greenish externally, and of 
a beautiful nacreous color upon the inside. The animal is white, soft, 
and similar in form to the common oyster. The pearls found in the shell 
of this mollusk appear to be calcareous secretions from the mantle lobes 


* A judicious fishing or working of an oyster-bed tends to increase both its size and 
value, while a natural unfinished oyster-bank, instead of being of unlimited growth, 
is always limited in size by the condition of the soilupon which it is formed as affected 
by the currents of the surrounding waters.—(Tr.) 


fd... OYSTER CULTURE. 767 


and of the same nature as the secretions which form the nacreous lining 
of the valves, but which in consequence of peculiar conditions, either a 
sickness of the animal or the presence of some strange body, assume a 
spherical or pyriform shape. It is certain that the presence of a foreign 
body, by irritating the mantle, produces an abnormal secretion of the 
nacreous material which soon entirely covers that body with a material 
identical in character with that forming the pearls. 

For a long time the Chinese have made use of this peculiarity of the 
pearl-oyster and of certain other mollusks. Among the class of pearl- 
producing or nacre-producing animals must be placed our fresh-water 
mussel. In order to have any ornament covered with nacre. it should 
be placed within the shell of a pearl-oyster and left there for several 
months, after which time it will appear as though entirely composed of 
pearly material. The most valuable pearls come from Ceylon and the 
Persian Gulf. The pearl-oysters are found in banks, like the common 
oyster, at a depth of from 5 to 20 meters. The pearl-oyster bears a gen- 
eral resemblance to the edible oyster, except that it is much larger, at- 
taining sometimes a diameter of 30 centimeters (between 9 and 10 inches). 
They are taken in Asia at four principal places: around the island of 
Bahren in the Persian Gulf, on the coast of Arabia near Carisa, in the 
Gulf of Manaar in Ceylon, and upon the coast of Japan. The fishing 
commences in February and ends in April; it is performed by native 
divers furnished simply with a knife to detach the shellsand a basket to 
gather them in. The fishing of the banks is subject to a sort of police 
supervision on the part of those who lease the right to fish for pearls. 
Only a certain number are taken, and the banks are carefully inspected 
at every fishing ; the divers are always careful to spare the young ones, 
and take only those which look as if they ought to contain pearls, since 
all do not contain them. The valves of the pearl-oyster are also objects 
of commerce, as they furnish nacre. But they are not the only ones 
which furnish this product; upon our coasts a great number of mollusks 
are found, among others the Haliotus, which furnish a very valuable 
nacre, more beautiful even than that of the pearl-oyster. In seeking 
conditions of soil, depth, and temperature as nearly as possible like those 
surrounding the pearl-oyster in Asia, it would seem possible to acclimate 
this mollusk in the waters of our coast and of the African shores of the 
Mediterranean; waters which even now contain much unexplored wealth, 
particularly vast beds of coral, and which would seem to cover naturally 
fertile places for the abode of the pearl-oyster. 


MUSSELS. 
Under the generic name of mussel (Mytilus) are united bivalve mol- 
lusks having a symmetrical shell and equal valves, and with the mantle, 


is divided into two similar lobes, entirely separated along the ventral 
edges, both of which are smooth, much thickened and attached to the 


768 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


edges of the valves. These mollusks have two very powerful adductor 
muscles and are furnished with a foot or thick and fleshy prolongation 
of the central portion of the body, which can be protruded from the shell 
at the will of the animal. From the foot posteriorly arises the byssus, a 
small buneh of hair-like stiff threads, secreted by a gland, and by means 
of which the animal is permanently attached to some solid body, such 
as a rock, shell, bit of wood, &c. The gills, differing from those of the 
oyster, are made up of two lamine fixed to one end of the ventral mass 
along either side and free at the other, which is prolonged from either 
side of the posterior adductor muscle. 

The mussels are hermaphrodite like the oyster, and reproduce in the 
same manner (?), giving birth, after an incubation in the folds of the 
mantle, toa gelatinous mass, composed of a great number of young mus- 
sels, each furnished with its byssus and ready. to float away in the water, 
to become fixed to the first solid body which it encounters, or to perish in 
the mud, or serve as food for its innumerable enemies. Mussels can- 
not move about, or at the most move very slightly, yet, nevertheless, if a 
mussel becomes detached from its support by the rupture of its byssus it 
can move some by thrusting its foot.out from between the valves of the 
shell and pushing against the ground as against a fixed point. Mussels 
live nearly everywhere; there is not a point upon the coast of France 
where they cannot be met with, clustered in groups upon the rocks, in 
crevices, upon piles, and upon bits of submerged wood. They are to be 
found especially at the mouths of rivers and in muddy bays, the contact of 
fresh water not being objectionable to them, and, according to Beudant, 
they can even be acclimated out of sea-water. Of the many species of 
mussels, we shall speak here only of the edible one (Mytilus edulis), which 
has an oblong shell, of a very deep violet color externally, and white 
within except along the border and at the two muscular impressions, 
where the violet color also appears. 

In Normandy the light-colored mussel is much esteemed; it is smaller 
than the above and the valves are of a brown-fawn color. It is found 
principally at Villerville (Calvados). 

In France the mussel is taken throughout the entire year, except 
during the hottest months and the spawning season. The women and 
children, armed with a strong knife, gather them from the rocks which 
are uncovered at low tide, or dig them from the mud of the sea-shore. 
These mussels, however, are small, tough, and bitter, while those which 
grow in quiet and protected places, where the bottom is muddy but not 
sufficiently so to bury them, attain a large size and a delicate flavor. 
The mussel banks are practically inexhaustible, but as this mollusk is 
not of great value until it has attained a certain size, and lost the bit- 
terness and toughness belonging to the sea-mussel, the means of bring- 
ing it to perfection have long been sought for. Upon certain parts of 
our coast they are placed in parks like oysters, and in the Bay of 
Aiguillon they are made the object of a very important enterprise, which, 


[17] OYSTER CULTURE. 769 


we will describe in the chapter in which we treat of the rearing of this 
mollusk. At other places they are taken from the sea and placed in 
salt marshes, since it has been noticed that a sojourn in water less salt 
than that of the sea improves their flavor. Finally, there are no places 
along our coast where this mollusk cannot be cultivated with advantage 
and profit, and our mauy railroad facilities will cause it to be still more 
widely known and esteemed throughout France. 


CRUSTACEANS. 


The important class of crustaceans constitutes one of the divisions of 
the sub-kingdom Articulata. The animals of this class are character- 
ized by a symmetrical body divided into a number of more or less similar 
segments, and provided with a nervous system, consisting of a row of 
ganglia, or small, nervous masses, connected by nerve cords and arranged 
in a longitudinal chain following the median line of the body, with a 
ganglion located in each segment. The appendages constitute a variable 
number of pairs, each pair being carried by a segment. Respiration is 
aquatic, or by means of gills; the skin is sometimes soft, and sometimes 
hard or coriaceous, forming an external skeleton moved by internal 
muscles. This last characteristic is peculiar to crustaceans, as is also 
the pyramid-like gills, furnished with hairs or little tufts, and placed 
on each side of the thorax at the base of the feet, or under the abdominal 
portion of the body. The segments of the body are generally twenty- 
one in number, but the first are nearly always united into a firm, inflexible 
portion, containing the head and thorax and named, accordingly, the 
cephalothorax. The remaining segments remain distinct and together 
form the abdominal portion of the animal. This division is very easily 
recognized in the crab and lobster, in which animals that portion which 
is popularly known as the tail represents the abdomen. The limbs of 
crustaceans number from five to seven pairs; those which are borne by 
the abdominal segment being generally only rudimentary and desig- 
nated false feet. These false feet subserve respiration, in some forms, 
and in others carry the eggs during incubation, as in the species to be 
mentioned farther on. The crustaceans are subdivided into several fami- 
lies, among which we shall call attention to those containing useful spe- 
cies, all of which belong to the same order, that of decapods (%<za, ten; 
mobs, feet). The name clearly indicates the distinctive character, that 
of having five pairs of feet. Of these five pairs, the anterior is often 
terminated, as in the cray-fish, crab, and lobster, by large and powerful 
pincers or claws, which are of use in prehension and in defense. A 
large abdomen, lengthened into a caudal appendage and terminating in 
a broad swimmeret, characterizes the macrurous decapods (2zpés, large; 
obpa, tail). When, on the contrary, it is short, flat, and recurved under 
the cephalothorax, it classes the animal among the brachyurous deca- 
pods (6pazis, short; va, tail), as the crab, &c. With these general de- 
finitions we can now pass to the consideration of those species which are 

S. Mis. 29-49 " 


770 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


useful to man as food, and which, thanks to the patient studies of M. 
Coste, can now be reared in great numbers. 


CRAY-FISH, LOBSTER, ROCK LOBSTER, AND CRAB. 


There is a single edible species of crustacean called the cray-fish, 
which is found in our fresh-water streams. This animal, which it is 
scarcely necessary to describe since it cannot be confounded with, or 
mistaken for, any other aquatic animal in the waters which it inhabits, 
is provided on the anterior pair of limbs with two strong but unequal- 
sized pincers; the abdomen is generally very much developed, the six 
segments composing it being very convex above, furnished with power- 
ful muscles, and supplied below with false feet, movable at the base, 
which serve as swimmerets. The false feet of the male differ somewhat 
from those of the female, and present moreover two pieces which are 
‘formed beneath the first segment, are movable at the base upon a cartila- 
ginous articulation, and generally lie directed forward upon the sternum. 
There are two rolled laminz forming a sort of tube which repesents the 
male copulating organ, and connects with a triple testicle and seminal 
vessels. The female has two ovaries placed one upon either side of the 
body and opening beneath at the base of the first joint of the third pair 
of walking appendages. At the period of spawning thése ovaries become 
elongated and much distended with eggs. Copulation is effected as with 
many species of flies, belly to belly. When the male attacks the female 
he turns her over upon her back and the two then closely clasp each other 
by means of their claws and walking legs. Itdoes notappear that the male 
organs enter into the oviduets of the female, but the semen is simply shed 
upon the plastron and around the orifices of the oviducts, where it sol- 
idifies, allowing, without doubt, the spermatozoa to escape and penetrate 
into the ovaries.* When a female is found full of eggs and with certain 
whitish flakes adhering to the under side of the carapace, itis pretty cer- 
tain that the eggs have beenimpregnated. Spawning takes place about 
two months after fecundation, and the eggs when laid become attached 
to the false feet upon the abdomen. ‘They are secured to the feet by 
means of a membraneous pedicle formed by a prolongation or hardening 
of the envelope or glutinous mass in which the eggs are laid, and are 
held in this position until the young are hatched, and even after this 
period the young cray-fish, soft and delicate, find protection under the 
abdomen of the female, whom they do not entirely abandon until their 


* According to the careful observations of Mr. P. R. Uhler, president of the Mary- 
land Academy of Science, the fecundation of the eggs of the cray-fish is external, or 
after they have left the oviducts; that is, the seminal fluid of the male is emitted, while 
in the position described above, upon the plastron and swimmerets or false ap- 
pendages of the female; the eggs are then discharged from the body, pass back to the 
swimmerets, where they are retained during the incubatory period, and where they at 
once come in contact with the fecundatory spermatozoa and are impregnated.—(Tr.) 
[See ‘‘ The Cray-fish,” by T. H. Huxley. ] 


[19] OYSTER CULTURE. T71 


calcareous test or covering is sufficiently hard to completely protect them. 
The cray-fish change or shed their skin or test once a year, and this 
shedding takes place from May to September. During the shedding 
period the animal retires into some hole or sheltered place so as to protect 
itself from the thousand dangers to which its soft and defenseless body 
would subject it. It remains concealed for two or three days, in which 
time its new covering acquires nearly the solidity of the old envelope. 
Among the cray-fish and other crustaceans of the same family the feet 
and antenne possess the remarkable property of being renewed in case 
they are accidentally lost either in part or wholly. A few days after 
a leg is lost a reddish membrane forms over the place, covering and ob- 
literating the wound; soon a conical bunch appears, which elongates 
and finally bursts through the membrane and shows a small, soft foot, 
which increases in size, regains its calcareous test, and in a short time 
duplicates completely the lost member. The river cray-fish, which is 
also much sought after for food, is found in fresh-water streams through- 
out Europe, but it is quite particular in its choice of habitation. It 
loves clear, flowing water, where the bottom is composed of small stones 
and pebbles without mud, and where it can find protection and plenty 
of holes and crevices into which to retire, and which it leaves only to 
seek food, consisting of mollusks, little fish, and the larve of insects ; 
it also feeds upon, and even prefers a more wholesome diet, decaying 
animal substances, or dead bodies floating upon the water, and in de- 
fault of any of the above-mentioned articles it will make a bountiful meal 
of vegetables or young shoots. It lives for about twenty years, and as it 
increases in size at each moult, it may become relatively of considerable 
magnitude. It can be very easily acclimated in foreign waters, provid- 
ing the water is sufficiently pure and the surrounding conditions suita- 
ble to its existence; it also conforms readily to a state of confinement, 
and will readily develop and reproduce in small basins, analagous to 
those in general use for artificial fish culture. 

The lobster (Homarus vulgaris) may be known by its smooth carapace 
and greenish-brown, sometimes bluish, color, which, when cooked, changes 
to a pale red, thus diminishing a littie, when upon our tables, the repul- 
sive aspect characteristic of all crustaceans. The head of this animal 
is terminated anteriorly by a sort of three-pronged rostrum, and is armed 
with long reddish antenn# and two pedunculated eyes. The anterior 
pair of feet are armed with powerful pincers, which are often out of pro- 
portion to the size of the rest of the body.” The lobster is widely dis- 
tributed in the ocean, the British Channel, and the Mediterranean, and 
inhabits rocky bottoms, often at great depth. 

The rock-lobster (Palinurus vulgaris), which is nearly as much sought 
for as an article of food as the lobster, is distinguished by the large 
fan-shaped termination of its abdomen, by the five pairs of similar legs 
without pincers, by possessing long and strong antenne and a moder- 
ately long carapace covered, especially in front, with small points or pro- 


772 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] _ 


tuberances. The female is distinguished from the male, at the spawning 
season, by a character, which was recognized even in the time of Aris- 
totle: the last pair of walking legs, that is, the pair nearest the abdomen, 
presents near their distal extremities a spur, which is absent in the 
male, and the use of which will be revealed later. This animal is very 
common in the Mediterranean, but rare along the ocean coast except in 
the harbor of Brest. Like the lobster it is carnivorous and very vora- 
cious, consuming mollusks, worms, and fish, which are abundant upon 
the bottom in the waters where it lives. It rarely swims, or leaves the 
bottom, except to escape some threatened danger. 

The crab (Cancer) is distinguished by having a large, broad carapace, 
and its posterior pairs of legs all modified for walking; the anterior ‘pair 
is furnished with powerful pincers. The carapace is broader than long, 
and is denticulated, much like a saw, along the anterior border. The 
eyes are close together in front and furnished with short peduncles. 
The crab is partly terrestrial, partly marine; it inhabits holes among the 
rocks and in the sand, which are covered by the sea during every tide. 
It is carnivorous, its principal food being dead mollusks or any pieces of 
animal matter that may be within its reach. The most important edible 
species is the Cancer pagurus, which has the carapace smooth above and 
with the edges marked with prominent serrations. The rostrum is three- 
pointed and the large anterior feet are black and furnished with large, 
smooth tubercles upon the inside. This crab is very abundant in the 
ocean but rare in the Mediterranean. It grows quite large, and its flesh 
is, with reason, much esteemed, and must not be confounded with that 
of the common crab, about the only form found in our interior mar- 
kets, and which the fishermen of our coast consider of very little value. 

After this summary of three marine species which are useful as food 
to man, it is especially important that we should carefully study their 
mode of reproduction as well as the method of exercising this function, 
and the precise length of its duration, since by this means we shall be 
able to obtain a foundation for our efforts in artificial breeding. The pe- 
riod of reproduction with the lobster commences in October, with the 
rock-lobster in September, and it lasts about six months; but the union 
of the sexes takes place most commonly in November for the rock-lob- 
ster, and in December for the common lobster. -It does not end, how- 
ever, until towards the close of January. As with the cray-fish, the 
sexual act is accomplished belly to belly, and so closely and firmly do 
they clasp each other, that, if taken from the water at this period, it is 
with difficulty that they can be separated. With the rock-lobster the 
penis or copulating organ of the male does not penetrate into the body 
of the female, the seminal fluid being shed upon the plastron in the 
neighborhood of the external orifices of the oviducts, where it hardens, 
forming plates of a gelatinous consistency, from which the spermatozoa 
escape and work their way into the oviducts and thus to the ovaries, 


[21] OYSTER CULTURE. 3 


which are filled with eggs, the latter in this manner becoming impreg: 
nated. With the lobster and crab the seminal fluid appears to be intro- 
duced directly into the oviducts. As already indicated, the autumnal 
months are, as a rule, the time for the union of the sexes; but, especially 
with the lobster, this time is extended somewhat into the winter. The 
spawning takes place about one month after fecundation. When the 
eggs are ready to issue the female folds the abdominal portion of the 
body against the plastron, thus forming a close cavity into which the ovi- 
ducts open, the orifices being located at the base of the third pair of 
walking appendages. This cavity receives the eggs as they pass from 
the body, and in the course of one day the common lobster will deposit 
in this chamber about 20,000 eggs and the rock-lobster about 100,000. 
During the period of spawning the sides of the abdomen secrete a kind 
of viscous substance, which incloses the eggs, and hardening around 
them, attaches them in irregular groups to the abdominal appendages. 
In this manner the cavity formed by the incurved abdomen soon be- 
comes a nearly solid mass of ova. Incubation now commences, and while 
in this condition the female is said to be ripe. This new stage of repro- 
duction lasts about six months, or until about March to June. During 
this time the female attends closely to the welfare of its eggs. 

By reversing their abdomen as much as the calcareous nature of the 
segments will allow, the eggs are exposed to the light, or by gentle move- 
ment of the false appendages they are subjected to a hygienic bathing; 
now, by refolding the abdomen, the eggs are carefully protected from the 
many dangers which threaten them; and so well is all this managed, 
that among the thousands of eggs of a ripe lobster one can rarely find 
any that are sterile or bad. When the young crustaceans are about to 
escape from the eggs the mother animal assists in releasing them by 
the aid of the spur upon the last joint of the last pair of walking 
legs. With this she detaches the groups of eggs, and at the same time, 
by an oscillatory movement of the false or abdominal appendages, she 
scatters the myriads of newly-born animals on every side. The young 
animal at this time has no resemblance whatever to its parent, and up 
to the date of the recent investigation of M. Coste, to whom we are in- 
debted for the preceding account, these young crustaceans had been 
placed in a special genus under the name of Phyllosomes. These em- 
bryos, with a soft, nearly gelatinous body, are furnished, upon each 
limb and at each joint, with a sort of tuft of vibratile cilia, by the in- 
cessant motions of which they float in the water and are carried about 
in different directions. Upon leaving the maternal protection the young 
animals mount to the surface, and there often form quite extensive 
swarms, which, from the constant movement of the animals and the con- 
stant changes in position of the swarms, sensibly alter the transparency 
of the water. They continue to live in this manner for quite a time— 
thirty or forty days—during which they undergo three moults; finally 
they lose the cilia from their feet, fall to the bottom, and gradually 


774. REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


work their way, by means of their walking appendages, back to the shore 
where they were born. From this time onward their form is like that of 
the adult, or nearly so, but they are very small and grow very slowly. 
They increase in size only at intervals, that is, at each period of moulting, 
for the animal, enveloped upon all sides by a solid and inelastic covering, 
preserves almost exactly the same size up to the moment when its 
envelope is removed, and while awaiting a new covering the body can 
enlarge to but a limited extent. The number of moults is quite consid- 
erable, and is not the same during the same period of time for all indi- 
viduals, for it is known that when placed under apparently similar con- 
ditions individuals of the same brood will vary much in size. Every 
moult is a very critical period for the animal, and a cause of great mor- 
tality, not only because at this time there is a considerable interval when 
the animal is without defense against its numerous enemies, which at 
other times might have been kept away by its hard and formidable 
pincers, or resisted by its firm carapace, but especially because this 
period forms a sort of crisis, occasioned by its increase in size with 
every moult. 

Mr. Coste has shown that the common and rock lobsters change their 
carapace or moult— 

The first year from 8 to 10 times; size then, 0™.04. 

The second year from 5 to 7 times; size then, 0™.09. 

The third year from 3 to 4 times; size then, 0™.14. 

The fourth year from 2 to 3’times ; size then, 0™.18. 

In five years the two forms above mentioned attain a size of 20 cen- 
timeters (about 6 inches), this being the size established by law as the 
smallest that can be caught for the market, and at this time they begin 
to reproduce their kind. After the fifth year, moulting takes place only 
once a year, for, if it were more frequent it would, in the case of the 
female, seriously interfere with the reproductive functions. 


———— 


CAUSES OF THE CONTINUED DEPLETION OF THE OYSTER 
BEDS AND THE IMPOVERISHMENT OF THE FISHERIES. 


What are the causes that have so greatly impoverished the oyster 
beds of our coast, as announced by M. Coste in the report from which 
we have already cited certain extracts? This is the question which we 
propose to discuss in this chapter—a question of prime importance, for 
if it explains the past it also indicates the entire future of the oyster in- 
dustry. The productive forces of nature are so powerful, and the laws 
of general harmony, which preside over the increase and the existence 
of animated beings, are so evenly balanced, that sometimes an apparently 
futile modification in the conditions of development of these beings is 
necessary, in order to give an unlimited range to their reproduction, just 


[23] OYSTER CULTURE. 1715 


as an inequality of these conditions may suffice to lead to the decline or 
disappearance of an entire species. 

Like all of those organized beings, animal or vegetable, which are 
obliged from their nature to live securely fastened or attached at the 
place of their birth, forming there aggregations of similar individuals, 
aggregations which are always increasing, and which, when reaching 
beyond certain limits, become fatal, first to other species inhabiting 
the same places, and finally to themselves, oysters have numerous 
enemies, which restrict their increase and retain them within the just 
limits of fruitfulness, not permitting the general encroachment or usur- 
pation of outside localities and the destruction of other marine species. 

Innumerable hordes of fishes, mollusks, crustaceans, and polyps gain 
their nourishment almost exclusively from the spawn of the oyster and 
from the oyster itself; for, even in an adult state, the oyster is the prey 
of crabs, aquatic birds, and certain worms which pierce the valves of 
the shell and destroy the animal sheltered within them. But the fecun- 
dity of the oyster is so great, and the number of living germs which 
float in the water during the spawning season is so large, that all of 
these enemies together are not able to diminish the number and extent 
of the oyster banks, nor even arrest for an instant their continued growth 
and enlargement. It is not then against these enemies that we shall 
have especially to seek a means of defense, since such defense would 
be valueless, as it would not operate against the real cause of the evil, 
and powerless, as it is impossible to subvert natural laws. 

Along all portions of our coast where oysters exist this mollusk has 
very sensibly diminished in numbers. This fact is unfortunately ac- 
knowledged by all; diversity of opinion’exists only with regard to the 
causes which have led to this decadence, the principal ones, dependent 
upon locality, being accumulations of mud er sand upon the bottom, 
invasions of mussels, or the invasion of the maérle. To these pretended 
causes we will add a fourth, the only true one, according to our opinion, 
which can account for the continued decadence of the oyster industry, 
and in fact the only one which demands prompt remedy. It is, unin- 
telligent and avaricious fishing of the oyster banks by oystermen, a 
fishing which has heretofore been directed by routine and the selfish 
carelessness of the fishermen, and not by a profound knowledge of the 
nature and wants of this mollusk. 

In fact the encroachment of mud and sand, and the invasion of mus- 
sels, and maérle, are not, as are generally believed, the causes of the de- 
struction of the oyster banks, but are consequences of their destruction, 
or at least coexisting occurrences. People are, in general, very easily 
led to establish between two facts, by reason of their simple coincidence, 
a relation of cause to effect, while really they are both only consequences 
of some common and unknown cause; thus in the country, and even in 
the most enlightened centers, the frosts of early April are attributed to 
the influence of the moon, because its appearance coincides with a clear 


776 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


sky, which is really the true cause of the phenomenon. In like man 
ner with the oyster banks; just in proportion as they diminished in size, 
as became manifested by vacant places appearing where oysters formerly 
grew, people said of the work of destruction, here it is mud or sand; 
there mussels; and at other places the maérle, without reflecting that the 
dredge which, in tearing up the soil and plowing over the beds, 
brutally and ruthlessly destroying countless oysters, young and old, 
was the prime cause of these vacancies and of the filling in by mud 
and sand which shortly followed. This can be easily understood. When 
a bed of oysters is intact, that is, before the dredge has commenced 
its work of destruction, the oysters, congregated upon the rocks and 
pebbles, firmly united to one another and superimposed without order, 
form at the bottom of the sea a complicated network of prominences 
and hollows, of tortuous channels and rocky crests. When, during 
high tide, these beds are covered with several meters of water, which 
always holds quantities of mud in suspension, the tendency is always 
for this mud to be deposited upon the beds, and it is actually deposited 
during tidal changes. But when at low tide the water passes down 
the beds, the eminences and crevices of the bottom formed by the 
irregular disposition of the oysters constitute so many obstacles to its 
onward flow, that it is divided into a thousand little streamlets, which, 
however calm the sea may be, form a sufficiently rapid current to carry 
away any mud which may have been deposited, and in this manner sub- 
ject the oysters to a sort of hygienic cleansing. So true is this, that the 
fishermen to whom the government conceded the tidal or emergent lands 
of the island of Ré, which formed an immense sand-flat or sand-morass, 
working from these data, undertook and succeeded in obtaining, in a 
relatively very short time, the entire removal of the deep mud which 
rendered their lands sterile. They paved the muddy bottom of their 
territory with irregular fragments of rock taken from the island, and by. 
ingeniously varying the hollows and eminences, so as to break up the 
water into thousands of currents and streamlets, they had the satisfaction 
of seeing the mud sensibly diminished in depth with every tide, and the 
young growth of oysters coming in from the open sea soon took possession 
of this territory, which had been so long deserted by these animals. By 
the accumulation of the oysters upon the rocks which follows this reclama- 
tion, the beds are preserved from mud and sand, and consequently from 
the invasion of mussels; but as soon as the dredge is used indiserimi- 
nately upon this surface, and a vacant place or hollow produced, where 
the water can remain stagnant at each flood tide, a deposit of mud soon 
forms, which augments every day, gaining perceptibly in length and. 
breadth, invading the oysters, leveling the bottom, and tending by 
its presence even to destroy the beds and at the same time to favor the 
birth and development of mussels. It is the same with the maérle, 
which is the common name for a submarine plant, an alga, having a 
kidney-shaped form, and closely resembling both in shape and appear- 


[25] — OYSTER CULTURE. eM 


ance a fresh brain, of a whitish color, tinted with rose externally, and in 
closing a glutinous, greenish tissue, or growing into ramified branches, 
This plant has the singular property of absorbing or secreting lime, 
which, by hardening at the surface, forms an external coating or semi-solid 
test. It is gathered in considerable quantities along the coasts of Brit- 
tany and Normandy as a fertilizer for very silicious soils, which in this 
manner receive their lime. And this is the plant which is wrongfully ac- 
cused of destroying the oyster banks and usurping the territory. I say 
wrongfully, for, as in the case of the mud, the maérle never attacks the 
oyster banks until after the dredge has commenced the work of destruce- 
tion. In fact a surface completely restocked with oysters, which are ab- 
sorbing animals, furnished with caleareous shells, cannot supply all the 
calcareous elements demanded by the oysters for the formation of their 
shells, and at the same time supply the maérle, which also requires a 
large quantity of the same materials to enable it to multiply. Wherever 
the maérle exists it is certain that the oyster cannot flourish, for it 
could not find subsistence there ; and, reciprocally, wherever the oyster 
occupies the entire territory and absorbs all the shell-producing ele- 
ments, the maérle can neither flourish nor live. But when human in- 
dustry, yielding without reflection to selfish and grasping desires, carries 
away incessantly and by thousands the oysters and their progeny, leav- 
ing the surface absolutely bare in patches, it is not surprising that the 
germs of the maérle, which lives near by in the same waters, should 
come and plant themselves upon the ground, whence the enemy has 
disappeared, and there developing, become predominant, and _ finally 
entirely supersede the former occupant. From all this it is evidently 
necessary to seek the true and only cause of the depletion of our oyster 
deposits in the mode of fishing practiced at the present time. 

Some details will here be necessary in order to explain ourideas. In 
all sections of the country oysters are taken by means of the dredge. 
This is a heavy iron frame, which is loaded with stones to render it more 
effective, and cause it to ‘“‘ bite” the ground deepers A rope is attached 
to the dredge, which is dropped overboard from a vessel of some kind, 
and the vessel set in motion causes the dredge to drag over the bottom 
upon one of its sides, which, having a sharp edge, cuts or tears up every- 
thing in its course and gathers them into a net or bag attached to the 
lower side or bottom of the dredge. When the dredge appears to be 
full it is drawn on board of the vessel and its contents emptied upon the 
deck. The heap is then culled, and those oysters which are not of the | 
size established by law are thrown back into the sea, and the rest placed 
to one side either for market or, as in Cancale, for the parks or fatten- 
ing ponds. 

In the month of August the commissioners of fisheries inspect the 
beds so as to ascertain their condition before permitting any fishing 
upon them, which, before M. Coste had made known the time when 
they could be worked with the least damage, commenced in September 
and lasted until May. 


778 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


In certain localities where the fishing of oysters is a national industry, 
as at Cancale and Granville, in order to obviate the evil as much as pos- 
sible and prevent the entire depletion of the banks, the oyster territory 
has been divided into zones or sections, and each section is fished in 
turn, while the others are left for perhaps a year or two to repair their 
losses and fill up the vacancies caused by the dredge. Thanks to this 
system, which, unfortunately, has not been general, these two quarters 
have been able to preserve their beds from complete ruin, but have not 
been able to increase their fruitfulness or restore them to their ancient 
splendor. In fact the use of the dredge—bad at any time, for it not only 
tears up oysters of all sizes, but also buries the spawn and the young 
beneath the mud which it stirs up, and destroys thousands of oysters 
which should be left to mature, for every thousand procured for the 
market—becomes more injurious every day, since, in order to increase 
the returns of fishing upon a devastated soil, and supply the demands 
of an ever increasing consumption, the oystermen are obliged to employ 
stronger and larger dredges and drag them more frequently over the 
same territory, so that the bottom becomes torn up, denuded of shells 
and rocks which are indispensable to the young growth, and offers a 
surface ready to receive a deposit of mud suitable for the development 
of mussels. 

Further, in designating September as the time of opening of the fish- 
ing season, the administration acted with a desire to protect the oysters 
during the spawning period, but it did not perceive that the measure 
was useless, because incomplete. Of the immense number of germs 
produced at this time from a bed of oysters, only a very small propor- 
tion escape the innumerable enemies always near at hand, or, failing 
to be carried away by the ocean currents, become attached to the 
valves of the mother oysters or to the prominences of their native bed 
and serve to restock it. In September, when the fishing commences, 
these oysters, now only about a month old, are scarcely visible, requir- 
ing very close scrutiny to detect them, and when an old oyster is 
taken from the water at this season all the young upon its shell are 
inevitably destroyed. If, on the contrary, the fishing was begun in Feb- 
ruary, these oysters could be easily seen and removed from the objects 
of attachment, either to be returned to the sea or placed in parks or 
claires. This method would be of triple advantage to these latter 
places, since the fishing would not last longer than three months, and 
the parks would receive the harvest, which could be held there and re- 
tailed in accordance with the demands of commerce. Upon such con- 
siderations as these, which are in a high degree protective, the new 
fishing regulations have been founded, and these prudent measures, 
added to the practice of restocking, will be sure to re-establish and in- 
crease the oyster industry of our coasts. The state, as proprietor and 
guardian of the domain of the sea, has thus done its share; the fisheries 


[27] OYSTER CULTURE. tate 


are regulated by wise and efficacious laws, and the restoration of the 
devastated banks is in a fair way of being accomplished, so that in the 
near future not only will the evil be repaired, but a return to the former 
state of affairs will become impossible. But is this all that can be done? 
We have already said that among the myriads of germs sent forth from 
a bed of oysters at every spawning period, asmall proportion only, that 
which becomes attached to objects on its native bed, is apt to furnish 
any recruits for the bed, or any subjects for the fepeen) while by far 
the greater share are devoured by their many foes, carried away by the 
tides, or buried up in the shifting sand and mud. Now, if it were possi- 
ble to gather up at the time of spawning all of these swarms and place 
them where the conditions are favorable to their development, what 
incalculable wealth would result, and the truth of the matter is that 
this gathering up and guarding of the young is entirely feasible. It has 
been tested by so many experiments that it rests beyond a doubt, and 
one can even now with ease and certainty labor in this direction, since 
we know the conditions favorable to the growth of the young, such as 
are met with in the depths of the ocean, and which it would be neces- 
sary to provide artificially in order to favor their development. This 
is the work reserved for private enterprise, and it has been with the 
desire of furnishing a guide in this labor that this book has been written, 
and that the practical development of the oyster industry has been 
made the subject of the following chapters. 

Among crustaceans the common and the rock lobsters occupy an 
important rank as food animals and as objects of trade; the fisheries 
of our coast supply not only all of France, but also a great part of 
Europe. The high price of these animals during the last few years, 
which has banished this kind of food from the tables of the poor, at 
least in the interior, and at the same time their relative scarcity in our 
markets, are consequences of the increased fishing to which they have 
been subjected, and of their gradual disappearance from our waters, 
where they were formerly so abundant. As in the case of the oyster 
fisheries, it is necessary to seek for the cause of this disappearance 
in the avariciousness of the fishermen and in the uselessness of the 
old protective regulations. In fact, if one has carefully followed the 
details which we have already given on a previous page, in regard to 
the manner of reproduction of crustaceans, it will be seen that the 
period of time intervening between the fecundation of the female and 
the hatching of the eggs, is about nine months, the fecundation begin- 
ning in September and the incubation ending in May. During these 
nine months these animals ought then to be entirely protected, for the 
death of a female at any moment whatsoever of this time is equivalent 
to the destruction of many thousands of individuals, even where great 
allowance is made for the many chances of destruction which surround 
the young before they are fully developed. It is thus during only three 
months, June, July, and August, that regulations really protective to 


780 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [28] 


these animals would allow of their capture, especially as concerns the 
common and the rock lobsters. But far from conforming to these natural 
requirements, the old regulations authorized the taking of these crusta- 
ceans at all times throughout the year, with only two restrictions: first, 
to return to the sea all ripe females, that is, females with eggs attached 
to the abdomen; and, second, to return all individuals less than 20 
centimeters in length. The first of these requirements of the law was 
excellent in principle, but it was impossible to secure its rigorous 
execution. 

The fishermen would not consent to throw back into the sea often as 
much as half of their catch, and so eluded the law by tearing off the 
bunches of eggs from the femalés, thus destroying at a blow myriads of 
young ones. It is evident that such action as this has had not a little 
to do with the increasing scarcity of these animals and their nearly 
complete extinction in certain sections. On the other hand, if the fish- 
ing season were limited to three months it would ruin the fishermen in 
thus restraining the use of a commodity now generally in demand at all 
seasons of the year. So under the new regulations now actually in force, 
and which are due to the exertions of M. Coste, the taking of these 
crustaceans is forbidden only during the last three spawning months, 
March, April, and May, during which time most of the young are 
hatched from the egg. To this eminently protective measure is added 
the obligation to return to the water every animal less than 22 centime- 
ters in length from the eye to the beginning of the abdominal portion ; 
for all animals smaller than this not only sell for a minimum price, and, 
being too young for reproduction, their destruction before having ful- 
filled this function at least once would be a loss without any compensa- 
tion. What has thus far been done is all that can be done judiciously 
in the present state of affairs, when both the common and the rock lob- 
Sters, as soon as they are taken from the water, are delivered immediately 
to the consumers, or at least are preserved in small live ponds or boxes 
only as long as is necessary to find a purchaser. But it is known to-day 
that both of these animals do well in confinement, and when kept in 
spacious basins where the conditions suited to their normal existence 
are artificially realized, they will live, increase in size, fatten and repro- 
duce their kind just the same as in a state of nature. And it is even to 
be supposed that, like oysters in parks, this mode of breeding should 
improve them in flavor and delicacy. 

Here, then, is a new industry open to the inhabitants of our coast; 
an industry which, in multiplying products, is suppressing non-values, 
since every individual which is under the marketable size can be pre- 
served until such a size is attained. By being able to satisfy instantly 
all the demands of commerce, even at times when bad weather or other 
circumstances prevent fishing, the consumption in the interior and the 
exportation to foreign countries will be considerably augmented, and 
a wise and effective protection will become possible, since the fishing 


[29] OYSTER CULTURE. 781 


grounds will be invaded only to supply vacancies in the breeding-basins, 
made in answer to the demands of the market. ‘The industry, moreover, 
far from being independent and distinct from the breeding of oysters, 
or of forming the basis of a special labor, is simply supplementary, and 
additional in that it increases the supply and the revenue without in- 
creasing the expense at the beginning. The breeding of mussels will 
also be considered in detail; for if their disappearance is not to be feared, 
there is such a vast difference between the sea-mussel and the mussel 
of the parks that the latter alone should be used for food, and this 
method of breeding enables a useful article of food to be grown upon 
bottoms whose nature is entirely incompatible with the production of 
oysters. In the following pages I shall only mention methods which 
have been sanctioned by long experience, dating back certainly for sev- 
eral centuries. I shall not entertain any theories or enter the domain 
of hypothesis, but remain faithful to the practical idea in which this book 
was conceived. 


METHODS OF BREEDING AND REARING OYSTERS, MUS- 
SELS, LOBSTERS, &c. 


CHAPTER I. 
INDUSTRY AND PRESENT METHODS. 


In the preceding pages we have said that the only methods described 
in this book would be such as had been sanctioned by centuries of ex- 
perience, and we now propose to prove that our assertion was not falsely 
made by describing in a few words the artificial breeding of oysters, 
taking as guides, if not as models, two examples: one, that of Lake 
Fusaro, which dates far back in the Christian era, and the other, that 
of Marennes, which began in the earlier times of our history. About 
the beginning of the seventh century a Roman knight, Sergius Orata, 
undertook the artificial breeding of oysters in the waters of Lake Lucrin, 
the Avern of poets. Historical documents prove incontestably the ex- 
istence of this establishment of oyster culture, and Pliny informs us 
that the enterprise was very successful, and its author in a short time 
became very rich. The methods followed, and probably invented, by 
Orata have been perpetuated to our day upon the banks of Lake Fusaro, 
a small salt-water lake, about a league in circumference, situated in 
the neighborhood of Cape Miséne, near the ruins of Cumes, which has 
been poetized by Virgil under the name of Achéron. Upon the blackish 
mud, which covers the volcanic soil of this basin to a depth of from one 
to two meters, the fishermen have constructed here and there artificial 
rockeries formed of rough stones gathered together and thrown into heaps 
sufficiently elevated to be protected from deposits of mud or slime. 
Upon these rocks oysters taken from the sea were deposited, to form an 


6 


782 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [30] 


artificial planting ground for all time, except, as is weil understood, in 
the case of accidental mortality, such as has been occasioned by volcanic 
eruptions, which have sometimes necessitated their renewal. Each 
rockery (Fig. 5) is SesO Tel by a ‘circle of stakes, which are fastened 


Fria. 5.—Artificial oyster rockery of Lake Fusaro. 
in the bottom of the lake by one end, while the other extends up out of 
the water so that they can be seen and removed when necessary. Often 
these stakes are united by a cord passing from one to another (Fig. 6), 
and to which is suspended, between each two stakes, a small bundle of 
——— — ae twigs, floating in the 


water ashort distance 
from the bottom. 
These, together with 
boats, tools, and a 
= storehouse, consti- 
—— tute the entire appa- 
22 _= ratus used for oyster 

== = cultureat Fusaro,and 
===— such is the appara- 
= tus whichcommonex- 
perience has found to 
be invariably effica- 

Fic. 6.—Bundles of twigs panera tere ene nace of oyster cious. At the Spawil: 
Tockeny: ing season the oysters 
deposited upon the artificially formed rockeries, and living there as if 
in the open sea, allow the myriads of germs to which each gives birth 
to escape, aS an animated cloud of dust-like particles, which, finding 
close at hand suitable materials for their attachment, become located 
there almost as a mass, beside the mother oysters. An insignificant 
portion only of these young oysters are lost, either by being carried 
away by the current of the water, or by being buried in the mud of 
the bottom. The colony is thus continually increasing in size by the 


[31] OYSTER CULTURE. 783 


annual deposit of new germs, which develop under favorable conditions 
of shelter, light, and temperature. When the fishing season arrives the 
owners or leasers of these artificial banks take up the stakes and bundles 
of fagots, select without any trouble from among the oysters which cover 
them those of a suitable size for the market, and then replace the stakes, 
&c.; the remaining oysters continue their growth, and the vacant places 
become filled another season with a new lot. The industry at Lake 
Fusaro, which has prospered for centuries, employs, as can be readily 
seen, only methods of great simplicity—probably the same as were used 
by Sergius Orata—and it teaches for our benefit, that by careful and 
skilful management, aided by suitable means of collecting the spawn of 
the oyster, all of which is neither difficult nor expensive, one can indefi- 
nitely multiply this bivalve, while the processes employed by us at pre- 
sent lead only to the ruin of our naturally excellent beds. At Marennes, 
upon both sides of the mouth of the Seudre, a similar industry is per- 
petuated, and is being developed more and more under the patronage of 
the state, but unfortunately it is merely directed to the work of bringing 
to perfection these animals taken from the sea and transplanted in the 
new regions without any effort to reproduce and multiply them. In 
spacious live-ponds, called claires, constructed upon a definite plan, to 
be described in one of the following chapters, are placed the oysters ta- 
ken from the sea, preference being given to those about 12 to 18 months 
old; that is, much below marketable size. These claires are so arranged 
as to allow of a careful inspection on the part of the breeders, to facili- 
tate the distribution of the sea-water at will, the clearing of the bottom, 
and the gathering of the products. In these claires the oysters are 
arranged by hand upon the bottom, which has been made hard and free 
from mud; they are so deposited that they do not crowd one another 
or lie in piles, and are left there to increase in size, grow fat, and acquire 
that greenish color which is so much desired by amateurs. During the 
period of their growth the water is renewed only during the spring-tides. 
The additional labor consists simply in regulating the depth of water 
over them according to age and temperament, in changing them from one 
claire to another if any danger arises of their becoming covered with mud 
and thus smothered, and in culling them according to size. In about two 
years they attain marketable size, and compensate largely by their extra 
value for the necessary outlay in their rearing. This method is far from 
perfect, since in the first place the great mistake is made of drawing 
from the claires only one-half of what they might be made to produce. 
As breeding places they ought also to be places of reproduction and mul- 
tiplication, and they might be such, as has been often shown accidentally. 
But, such as it is, it offers us a good model as a method of management, 
and also an argumentin favor of the new industry, the reality and sue- 
cess of which is, I trust,no longer doubted by the reader; thus we can 
enter without fear upon the details of the practical workings of oyster 
culture, which we shall proceed to develop in the following chapters. 


784 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [32] 


CHAPTER II. 


MEANS AND METHODS OF GATHERING AND TRANSPORT- 
ING OYSTER-SPAWN. 


If the reader has attentively followed and understood what has been 
recorded on the preceding pages concerning the causes of the ruin of our 
oyster-beds, the evil resulting from the present mode of gathering oys- 
ters, and, finally, the methods of reproduction, especially that employed * 
at Lake Fusaro, he has probably been able to recognize that the first, 
and by all odds the most important, thing to be done in the new industry, 
is to gather up, with the least possible loss, the young growth sent forth 
by the mother oysters during each spawning season, then to cause them 
to attach themselves to some object which will give them sufficient 
support for their future growth, and also allow of their removal, either 
to preserve them from mud or other causes of mortality, or to transport 
them to a distance in order to restock barren territories, or acclimate 
foreign species. 

Accordingly we propose to proceed at once to the description of vari- 
ous styles of apparatus used in such collecting, and indicate, for each 
one, the conditions under which it is especially to be recommended. 

Movable collecting apparatus.—In those sections where oysters already 
exist, and where the fishermen have not completely stripped the beds, 
the fixed collecting apparatus is alone necessary for the multiplication 
of this mollusk; but when it is demanded of the beds that they not only 
furnish supplies to the ordinary fishermen, but also the young necessary 
for restocking barren lands, and medium-sized oysters for the artificial 
parks and basins, then movable collecting apparatus should be used. 
This is the most economical method, and the most certain, when it is 
desired to plant oyster-beds upon virgin soil. Many efforts have already 
been made to stock new waters and restock old by throwing into the sea 
oysters which have been taken at a distance and transported at great 
expense to the place of the experiment; but nearly all the attempts have 
proved futile, either from the impossibility of keeping oysters alive on 
board of vessels during a long voyage, or from their soft condition at the 
time of their arrival and their sudden change into a strange water, or pos- 
sibly from not encountering in their new locality conditions suitable to 
their existence. Moreover, this process is very expensive, and very slow, 
for the oysters destined to be the source of the future supply are neces- 
sarily always very limited in number, and must be above all carefully 

_preserved and no fishing allowed until the young from the first spawn- 
ing, which may have been much retarded by reason of the change of 
locality of the old ones, have attained a marketable size. Thus a period of 
five or six years at least must elapse before sufficient returns can be ex- 


[33] OYSTER CULTURE. 785 


pected to compensate for the advances made; during this period, from 
the impossibility of knowing \ | " ATA ATTA TAT il Hi, 
pee | 
Y 


=I 


Ayaan 
4 


Mm 
precisely what is taking place ( i Mi) 
beneath the surface of the water, I \ 
everything must be left almost 
entirely to chance. On the con- 
trary, when the movable col- 
lecting apparatus is used the 
territory can be planted not 
with thousands alone, but with 
millions of young, of various 
ages, whose management is 
easy, since they are all bound 
together, thanks to their com- 
mon support, which permits 
them to be placed at will in the 
most favorable conditions of 
bottom, depth, temperature, 
and light. Inspection is also 
easy, and can be undertaken at 
any moment. At the end of 
three or four years, when the 
oysters should have attained 
marketable size, they can be 
culled, on account of their large 
number, and the largest sold, 
leaving still a sufficient number 
to assure the continuous and 
definite repeopling of the bed. 
Fascine collector (Fig. 7).— 
The most simple movable col- 
lecting apparatus, and the least 
expensive, at least in the be- 
ginning, consists of bundles of 
small branches of chestnut, oak, 
or elm, fragments of grapevine, 
or, in fact, of any wood con- 
taining no poisonous or aro- 
matic principle which by dis- 
solving in the water can injure 
the spawn or prevent its adher- 
ence. The fascines or bundles 
of fagots, from one and one-half 
to two meters in length, are i | | 
bound around the middle with ‘ li 1 AR AIEEE 
strong galvanized and tarred iron wire, experience hav ing ana that 
8S. Mis. 29-——50 


= 


‘OL 


*10JD9T[0I OULISVY[—'L 


f 
| 


| 
! 


786 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [34] 


hemp cords cannot endure, without decay, a prolonged sojourn under the 
water. The fascines are also furnished with stones, which, being attached 
by other wires to the first-mentioned central wires, serve to anchor the 
fascines and maintain them at a depth of from 20 to 30 centimeters above 
the bottom. . 

About three weeks before the spawning season the fascines are 
placed over the beds from which the spawn is to be gathered, and are so 
disposed, according to the configuration of the bed, that obstacles 
as collectors shall be met with in every direction where the tidal currents 
may be transporting the embryos. Experience has shown that fascines 
thus disposed receive the young in such abundance that each often 
holds several thousand. They are left in place from five to six months; 
by this time the young oysters have attained a size of from 2 to 3 centi- 
meters in diameter, and can very easily be removed. from the branches 
to which they are attached, and placed in such grounds as it is desired 
to restock, whether these be far or near, for nothing is easier than to carry 
these young animals, either upon the fagots or off, providing fresh sea- 
water is supplied them. The disadvantage of this apparatus is that the 
same fagots cannot be used more than once, or for a single gathering. 
The action of the sea-water soon destroys them, and they do not gener- 
ally last long enough to permit the oysters which cover them to acquire a 
marketable size. This process may be advantageously employed to in- 
crease the supply of oysters in a park, but always upon the condition © 
that it is to replace those taken away and for the multiplication of the 
quantity in the park, for the entire renewal of the fascines each year 
would be too expensive. This is not the method, however, to which we 
would give the preference in the case of a long journey by land or sea, 
in transporting the young growth from the place of production to the 
breeding ponds. 

Platform collector.—This collecting apparatus is susceptible of all man- 
ner of modifications as to form and size to adapt it to the character of 
the ground upon which the bed is located. Not only is it easily made, 
arranged, and handled, since one person can perform all the labor neces- 
sary, but it also does no injury whatever to the oysters which it covers. 
Itis generally placed in position one or two weeks before the spawning 
period, and during its stay over the bed it preserves the oysters from 
all deposits of mud; when it is charged with a young growth it can 
be taken down in a short time and transported to any required distance, 
leaving the bank which it had covered not only in its primitive condition, 
so far as the original stock is concerned, but moreover enriched by a 
large number of germs which, had it not been for the presence of the 
collector over the bed, would have been carried away, at least in great 
part, by the tidal currents, and thus lost. The platform collector consists 
(Fig. 8) of several rows of posts arranged in pairs, A, each pair being 
fastened together, with an intervening space of 12 to 15 centimeters (4 
to 5 inches), and planted in the ground over the entire area of the bed 


[35] OYSTER CULTURE. 187 


at a distance apart of about 2 meters, with each pair occupying one of 
‘the angles of a ‘square, so that the surface covered is divided up into 


“10JD9TTOO WIOJYeTG—"g “NWT 


—= 
————— 
SES 
a 


H 


A HU 


blocks, much like the surface of a chess-board. Each set of posts is 
pierced through by two sets of holes, the first at one-half meter and the 


° 


788 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [36] 


second at .75 to .80 of a meter from the bottom; bars of wood or iron are 
passed through these holes, thus making each pair a sort of ladder with 
two rounds. Upon the lower rounds, from post to post, are laid bed- 
pieces, or stringers, B, which should be quite strong, and which together 
constitute a frame-work of contiguous squares, upon which a platform of 
rough planks, D, is built and maintained in position by a second series 
of stringers, C, held down by the upper round, J, of the posts; the pres- 
sure upon the planks is regulated when necessary by means of beveled 
wooden blocks, Q, Q’. 

It will be readily seen that, by the aid of these stringers and rounds, 
nothing can be easier than the mounting and dismounting of the planks, 
either to change or turn them, or transport them elsewhere. Whenever 
desired the stringers and posts can be so arranged as to leave free spaces, 
EH, as passages, to facilitate the working of the platform. The planks 
should be of pine or fir, and from 2.10 to 2.15 meters (6 to 7 feet) in length, 
by .20 to .25 of a meter in breadth (8 to 10 inches), and .04 of a meter 
(about 13 inches) in thickness. 

In order to facilitate the adherence of the spawn, planks with a rough 
surface are used, and the rougher the surface, as by gouging it out so as to 
increase its snaauibritne: the more easily can the young oyster adhere to 
it. The sides of the planks can also be covered with a layer of pitch 
and tar, in which, while it is yet soft, valves of oysters, mussels, or any 
other shells, which occur abundantly along the shore, or bits of coral, or 
small stones of about the size of a nut, can be placed, so as to form a 
sort of artificial, rock formation, favoring very much, by the roughened 
surface and the multiplication of points of attachment, the deposition 
and development of the young animals. This is much preferable to 
the other method, since it preserves the planks from the action of the 
water and the destructive borings of certain worms and mollusks. In 
order to afford a still greater number of points of attachment for the 
young germs, the lower face of the planks is covered with fascines of 
chestnut, oak, or other wood, which are held close to the planks by 
means of cords, passing through holes in the planks and fastened upon 
the upper side (see Fig. 8). Upon sandy or muddy bottoms the posts 
which support the stringers can be set without difficulty; but when the 
bottom is rocky or too hard they cannot be employed. They should then 
be replaced by blocks of stone, G (Fig. 8), about .70 of a meter in height 
by .25 of a meter in breadth and thickness, pierced through by a hole 
of sufficient size to receive the ends of the stringers, which are fastened 
there by means of a small block, H, driven in upon the upper side. 
These blocks can then be simply placed upon the bottom or fastened 
there with iron clamps; or the wooden stakes can be employed by fixing 
their lower ends into blocks of stone which when in place should be 
large enough to give steadiness to the collector and maintain it in its 
right position. This form of collector, it is true, is costly to establish, 
and more so from the fact that on account of the long time it must stay 


[37] OYSTER CULTURE. 789 


in the water it is necessary to select firm, solid wood, of good quality, 
but in its adjustment there is no need of any particular nicety of work- 
manship or finish, and there is moreover this advantage that it lasts 
a long time and can be used for several harvests. However, in those 
waters where boring worms and mollusks occur, a single season will 
render the platforms unfit for further service. In this case galvanized 
iron supports can be used in place of the wooden frame-work and the 
planks may be replaced by sheets of metal having the two faces covered, 
as already described, with a mixture of pitch and tar, in which valves 
of shells, bits of coral, or small stones have been imbedded. The me- 
tallic sheet, which forms the body of these pitch planks, will give suffi- 
cient solidity to the structure, and the supports can be in the form of a 
frame-work, capable of holding at least three sheets, which can be fast- - 
ened in position by means of bolts; the entire structure may be arranged 
like a table upon four or eight legs, which can be driven into the ground, 
or fastened into blocks of stone, which will give the desired stability to 
the whole. These tables can be placed in rows according to the config- 
uration of the bed, leaving passages between each two rows to facilitate 
working them. After the spat or germs have been collected upon the 
planks of the platform they can be easily transported either by sea or 
land. If by sea the planks are taken from the stringers and suspended 
lengthwise and vertically in a frame-work provided with floats, or ar- 
ranged in the direction of the current, like a series of shelves, about 
one-fourth of a meter apart, and thus kept constantly in the water; in 
this shape they can then be towed without trouble to any distance. 
When they are transported by land the planks are either carried in tanks 
full of sea-water, or placed between layers of wet sea-grass, and when so 
managed the young oyster can sustain, without serious damage, a journey 
of one or two days. When their destination is reached the young oysters 
are detached from the planks without trouble, as this operation demands 
only a slight amount of skill and attention, and deposited in the places 
to be stocked; or the planks may be placed upon supports similar to 
those whence they were taken, and the young oysters allowed to con- 
tinue their development protected from the mud, and in such a position 
that by turning the planks the conditions of light and aération can be 
varied to suit the wants or requirements of the growing brood. 


Box collector.—This apparatus unites the double advantage of pre- 
senting ina relatively small compass the greatest possible extent of 
surface for the attachment of germs, and, at the same time, the most 
favorable conditions for the transportation and ultimate development of 
the young, in the movable and independent parts which compose it. 
It consists, essentially (Fig. 9), of a rectangular box, two meters in 
length by one meter in breadth and height, and is without any bot- 
tom. It is formed of planks, O, placed from 2 to 3 centimeters apart, 
or pierced with holes, for the entrance and circulation of water in the 
interior. These planks are permanently maintained in place upon the 


79) REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [38] 


front and back sides by two cleats, R R, extending below the edge 
of the box and are nailed to transverse pieces, which pass across the 
i bottom from side to side. 
We Bon: Theendsare pierced by three 
MTA sets of holes to accommo- 
date the transverse bars, S, 
upon which in the interior 
are placed movable frames, 
dividing the box into super- 
imposed compartments. The 
cover is formed of thinner 
planks, D, placed side by 
side, and maintained in po- 
sition by the bar T, which 
slides into the two sockets, 
A, at the ends of the two 
stakes supporting the ends 
of the box. It is hardly nec- 
essary to add that the appa- 
ratus should be constructed 
of solid planks of a dura- 
ble wood, such as oak, and 
that the fastenings of the 
parts should be, so far as 
possible, of the same kind 
of wood, employing neither 
iron nor nails; but if their 
use is absolutely necessary, 
then the preference should 
be given to iron or galvan- 
ized nails. The frames for 
the inside are of wood, about 
4 centimeters in thickness, 
and furnished with two han- 
dles to facilitate removing. 
The bottom is covered with 
brass wire netting (Fig. 10), 
the meshes of which are 
about 2 centimeters upon a 
side, and in order to increase 
the strength of the frame and 
sustain the netting, diagonal 
wires can be run across from 
corner to corner, or a central 
bar of wood from side to side. 
These frames are made of such a size that when placed side by side, two 


*10}09][09 XOG—"g "DLA 


"MOLA IOLOFXG 


[39] | OYSTER CULTURE. 791 


of them willform a continuous flooring or division across the box, as shown 
in ‘Fig. 11, where the 
front portion of the box 
has been removed so as 
to show the arrange- 
ment of the interior. It 
is necessary, however, 
to give sufficient play 
to the frames, so that 
they can be moved at 
any instant without 
trouble and without 
shaking. Weherewith give the conditions in which this apparatus is used, 
andthe method of operation. 

The box collector is espe- 
cially valuable when the 
oyster culturist has no natu- 
ral bed near at hand whence 
to gather germs, and yet 
wishes to procure a large 
number of young to rapidly 
stock a park or live-pond. 
For he can always, just be- 
fore the spawning season, 
have several hundred oys- 
ters brought from the bed 
nearest his basin, since oys- 
ters when they have at- 
tained a certain size will 
sustain transportation for 
several days without dam- 
age, providing the precau- 
tion is taken to furnish them 
with water now and then. 
Once in possession of these 
oysters, in a good location, 
where the water is calm 
without being stagnant, the 
bottom pebbly and properly 
protected from mud, and 
the light and depth suita- 
ble—or even in an artificial 
basin of from 1 to 14 meters 
in depth, which communi- I HAT 
cates with the sea at each or TC ae 
tide—the box is placed upon the bottom in such a manner that the 
lower transverse pieces rest upon stones and the entire lower side is oft 


Fic. 10.—Inner frames of box collector. 


Interior view 


Fic, 11,—Box collector. 


792 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [40] 


the ground, enabling a free virculation of water. Four stakes, P P, Fig.9, 
are then driven into the ground, one along the middle of each face of the 
box, so as to prevent any swaying or change of position, by the action of 
the waves and currents, and maintain the apparatus in the same position. 
The cover isthen removed, and sixty mother oysters are deposited upon 
that portion of the soil circumscribed by the box, care being taken, if the 
soil is soft or muddy, to cover it previously with empty shells, so that the 
oyster, when placed there, may not become covered up but always remain 
in pure water. This done, the two lower stringers, SS, are placed in 
position, and upon them two frames (Fig. 10), are arranged, which are 
treated the same as the bottom; that is, a layer of shells is first placed 
upon them, and then a certain number of mother oysters above and 
over the shells. The second set of stringers is then placed in position, 
the frames arranged as before, and the oysters distributed over them, 
and, finally, the third set of stringers and frames are arranged and coy- 
ered with shells (Fig. 11), but no oysters are placed upon them. The 
cover is then placed upon the box and fastened down by means of the 
top bar and the wedges, C, which fasten the ends of the bar in the sock- 
ets of the end posts, and render the whole apparatus solid and immoy- 
able. The apparatus being thus prepared, it is easy to conjecture the 
result. The oysters, under such excellent conditions of existence and in 
such pure and quiet water, soon spawn; the young growth, finding itself 
imprisoned, or nearly so, in the various compartments of the box, and 
coming upon suitable places of attachment near at hand, remain in the 
box and dispose themselves nearly everywhere, but from preference 
upon the shells covering the frames, and proceed in their development 
under the best possible conditions and protected from all danger. In 
from five to six months the young oysters have attained such a size that 
they can be removed without danger. The apparatus is then taken apart 
piece by piece, commencing with the cover, and as each tray is removed 
its contents are deposited upon the bottom of a park, live-pond, 
claire, or such place as one wishes to restock or supply. If it is desired 
to carry them to a distance the trays can be placed in a floating box 
pierced with holes, and if arranged in layers, like shelves, and with sea- 
weed packed between them, so as to prevent the disturbance and shaking 
incident to movement in the water, they can be towed for long distances 
without danger of injuring the shells of the young oysters or detaching 
them from their supports. And if the trays are packed in boxes with wet 
sea-weed between them they can be transported by land very nicely. 
For one who has limited means at his disposal, and when labor and ex- 
pense is an important consideration, the box collector ought by all means 
to be given the preference; by the ingenious method of multiplying 
surfaces, which is its distinctive feature, innumerable germs can be 
hatched out in a very restricted space. A small case of a few square 
meters in area, a Small artificial basin which can be filled at each tide, 
and a narrow passage-way between two rocks, is amply sufficient for 


. [41] OYSTER CULTURE. 793 


the production of the thousands of germs necessary for the stocking of 
a live-pond, or even a larger inclosure; for the possibility of placing two 
or more of these boxes close together without injury to the oysters or 
the germs which they contain, permits a response to all the demands 
of the breeder, however restricted or extended they may be. Moreover, 
the apparatus itself, besides being easy to manage, arrange, and trans- 
port, will last for several years if suitable wood is used in its con- 
struction, and if the outside at least is protected in some such manner as 
are the bottoms of vessels, by a sort of sheathing. As to the inside, as 
well as the cross-pieces and the wooden parts of the trays, they can be 
covered with the mixture of tar and pitch already mentioned, and in- 
crusted with shells and stones, which will not only preserve them from 
rapid decay, but also render them suitable places of attachment for the 
young oysters. 

Fixed collecting apparatus.—When the bottom is already covered with 
oysters, either from the existence there of a natural bank or by artificial 
means, movable collectors are useless, and for the multiplication of these 
oysters, the proper method is by means of fixed apparatus, which, while 
much less expensive and complicated than the preceding, performs the 
same office. The various kinds of fixed apparatus are as follows: 

First. Pavement collectors—This method, employed at the island of Ré, 
at Rochelle, &c., consists in covering the bottom with blocks of stone irreg- 
ularly broken and formed into a sort of uneven pavement, and by so ar- 
ranging the pieces that as many crevices and prominences may exist as 
possible. The best way of arranging these pieces is to group them in 
threes, two being placed flat, at a short distance apart, and the third 
above and resting at its extremities on the other two, in such a manner 
as to form a sort of bridge with the arch, or third stone, sufficiently ele- 
vated above the bottom to be out of reach of mud. 

The young growth, moving freely in the water, becomes attached to 
these rocks, in the hollows and under the arch stone of each set of 
three, where they are protected, and where pure water and a mild light 
are offered them, conditions which are very necessary during the early 
stages of their existence. During the first year they should be left en- 
tirely in peace, and at the spawning period all that is necessary is to 
simply turn over the upper stones without touching in any manner the 
lower ones. The oysters which have become attached to the lower sides 
of these stones are thus exposed to a full light, a condition favorable to 
their future development, and the upper faces of the stones, now turned 
downward, are ready for the attachment of the next growth. During the 
third year the oysters upon the upper surfaces of the stones can be taken 

- off, having acquired a sufficient size to permit of their being placed with 
others upon the beds or in the fattening ponds, and the stones can again 
be turned so as to expose the oysters upon the under side to the full light, 
and leave a fresh under surface for a third growth. This process is not 
expensive, at least in those sections where, as in the island of Ré, the 
rocks of the coast furnish ample supplies for all the pavements neces- 


794 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [42] 


sary in the working of the beds. Moreover, it demands neither much 
skill nor long and wearisome labor; but there is one bad feature: the 
oysters which develop upon the stones become attached to them so firmly — 
that they cannot be removed without destroying a great number, and 
they often grow in such a bad shape that they are not of much value 
in the market. I think, nevertheless, that the nature of the pavement has 


Fic. 12.—Tile collector, simple form. 


much to do with the first of these two defects, and that, where one can 
make use of soft stories, such as limestone and pudding-stone or frag- 
ments of coral, the adhesion of the shells might be easily overcome, and 
in this case the pavement collector, as being economical and easy to use, 
would give most satisfaction. Those misshapen oysters, on the other 


Fic. 13.—Double tile collector. 


hand, which are little sought after for the table in their natural condi- 
tion, can be used without disadvantage in making pickled oysters, or 
preserved in any other manner, and thus supply a constant and remu- 
nerative demand. 

Second. Tile collector.In regions where rocks are scarce, and also to 
avoid the disagreeable features mentioned above as pertaining to the 
pavement collector, one can make use of curved tiles, similar to those 


[43 ] OYSTER CULTURE. Coo 


employed in certain countries upon the roofs of houses, to gather the 
young oysters. For this collector lines of stakes are driven into the 
ground, over a space of 15 to 20 centimeters of the surface of the bed 
whence it is desired to take the spawn. Upon these stakes transverse 
stringers are fastened, along which tiles are placed side by side, with the 
concave side down (Fig. 12). Here and there heavy stones are placed 
upon the tiles so that neither the current nor the waves can raise or dis- 
place them. But this 
disposition of the tiles 
is not the only one; 
many others can be 
adopted which multi- 
ply the surfaces of 
attachment for the 
young. Thusthetiles 
can be disposed in two 
superimposed and 
crossed layers (Fig. 
13), forming a double 
tile collector, or again, 
as in Fig. 14, they can = : 
be set up obliquely : a 
between the trestles, Fic. 14.—Tile collector. 

which in this case may be placed nearer together ; the tiles forman angle 
of about 25° to 30° with the surface. Still another method, in which the 
wooden trestles are dispensed with, is to arrange the tiles in the form of 
a tent, or pointed roof, kept in place by stones placed between the rows 


Fic. 15—Tile collector, tent form. 


(Fig. 15). This last disposition is the most simple, the least expensive, and 
moreover not a bad one, for it offers a very large amount of surface for 
the attachment of the young. Whichever style of tile collector may be 
employed the concave surfaces of the tiles become covered at the spawn- 
ing season with the young growth, which develops there under excellent 


796 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [44] 


conditions and which can be easily detached when the size of the oysters 
is such as to fit them for the parks, or for the bottoms where the mother 
oysters live. 

To Dr. Kemmerer, of the island of Ré,is due the credit of numerous 
ingenious contrivances in the arrangement of tiles as collecting appa- 
ratus. The tile is in fact the fixed collector par excellence, except that, 
like the pavement, it affords too firm and complete an attachment for the 
shell of the oyster, causing the destruction of numerous animals when 
they are detached, and also often giving a defective form to the shell. 
Dr. Kemmerer, in order to remedy these defects, covered the tiles with a 
coating of cement, composed of water-lime, four parts of water and one of 
defibrinated blood. This cement dries rapidly, hardens under water, 
but remains sufficiently brittle to en- 
able the oysters to be detached with- 
outdifficulty. Or, if desired, the entire 
layer of cement can be taken off in a 
single piece, when the young oysters 
are sufficiently grown, and in this man- 
ner transported to a distance to stock 

Go ae ra orer jules: depleted parks or territories, while the 
tile can be recovered with a coating of cement and used a second time. 
The coating mentioned is employed when the labor of preparation can 
be performed at home, but when it is necessary to make repairs, or coat 
the tiles at the parks or preserves, then a coating is used of water-lime 
and Grignon or Vassy cement, very hard plaster, or water-lime and 
pounded brick. The presence of the lime seems, moreover to have, a 
very favorable influence upon the 
deposit of the young. Fig. 16 rep- 
resents the various arrangements 
preferred by Dr. Kemmerer for his 
cement tiles. No. 5 represents the 
tile pierced by a simple hole, 4 the - 

: tile with its coating of cement alone, 
and 1 and 2 the cemented tiles with fragments of grape-vine and shells 
embedded in the cement. Fig. 17 represents the best methods of ar- 
ranging the tiles so as to give a large exposure of surface and sufficient 
solidity to the pile. The various forms of apparatus we have just de- 
scribed are not the only ones in use, nor are they the only ones to be 
recommended. 

The essential condition which should be fulfilled by all collecting 
apparatus, that of offering proper and extended surfaces for the attach- 
ment of the young, is so simple that the mode of constructing apparatus 
can be varied in a thousand ways. The fundamental principle being 
once comprehended, the oyster-culturist, by using the above-described 
collectors as models, can vary the form, the disposition, and the material 
according to his means, the resources of the locality where he labors, 


Fic. 17.—Tile collectors. 


[45] | OYSTER CULTURE. — 197 


and the price of the component parts. We will leave this subject, 
then, to his ingenuity, trusting we have said enough, so that he need 
not run any risk or labor in the dark in this first stage of the oyster in- 
dustry, in which the collecting apparatus is an instrement of prime im. 
portance. 


CHAPTER III. 


PREPARATION OF THE BOTTOMS.—CONSTRUCTION OF 
CLAIRES, PARKS, LIVE-PONDS, ETC. 


All bottoms are not equally adapted to the culture of the oyster; some, 
even, are entirely opposed to it and can be modified only by completely 
changing its nature. It is, then, of primary importance for the oyster 
culturist to know how to rightly estimate the value of the soil which he 
wishes to work, as to its aptitude for the production and growth of this 
mollusk, and to be able to modify it according to the needs of the case. 
This is the subject which we propose to treat of in this chapter. 

The type of marine bottom especially adapted to the growth of oysters 
is offered to us at several points along our coast, particularly in the Bay 
of St. Brieux. The bottom there is firm and suitable, covered with a 
rather thin layer of fine sand, formed by the débris of shells ground up 
by the action of the sea and the natural wearing of one shell against 
another, with large fragments or whole shells scattered here and there 
over the surface. There also occurs here a thin layer of marly mud, 
similar deposits of which exist nearly everywhere, but it never increases 
in this locality so as to become injurious, for at every tide the water, 
which comes in from the ocean with great velocity, carries the greater 
portion of the mud off with it as it retires. Moreover, the water of this 
bay is singularly well adapted to the development of all kinds of marine 
animals, from its vivifying properties, brought about by its ceaseless 
dashing and breaking upon the numerous rocks which line the coast, and 
by its constant renewal through which it maintains a favorable mean 
temperature. We will take this sort of bottom as a type and model, 
and indicate by what means those places which differ from it in some 
respects can be modified so as to produce nearly as favorable results. 
It can be said, in general, that all soils are or can be made suitable for 
the culture of oysters, although in different degrees; the only ones to be 
excepted are those formed of large deposits of mud, so deep and so con- 
stant in its renewal that there is no hope of its being carried away ; 
and those constantly shifting sand-banks, which change with every 
spring or very high tide and every heavy sea, covering up upon one side 
as much as they uncover upon the other. The impossibility of any pre- 
vious preparation of such soils will prevent any desire or attempt at 
working them. We shall not, therefore, treat of such bottoms, at least 
not in this chapter, but confine our attention to oyster culture on those 


798 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [46] 


bottoms which are naturally solid, and only altered by superficial de- 
posits. 

Muddy bottoms.—As is well known, mud is the result of the deposi- 
tion of pulverized material of any kind which is held in suspension 
by the water, having been gathered from the bottom of the open sea 
during stormy weather, or produced by the decomposition of animal 
and vegetable forms, or by the erosive action of the waves upon sub- 
marine rocks. So long as the water is in constant agitation these mate- 
rials remain in suspension, and no mud is deposited; but whenever 
the water becomes quiet, these fine particles, being denser than the 
water, drop to the bottom, resulting in the formation of mud; however . 
short a time the stagnation favorable to this deposit continues, so long 
as it lasts the layer of mud goes on increasing in thickness until the 
entire bottom is rendered completely sterile. The first thing to be done, 
then, in order to render a muddy bottom suitable for the growth of oys- 
ters, is not only to clear the bottom of the mud, but especially to pre- 
vent its future deposition. The most certain and most economical — 
method is to make the water itself remedy the evil which it has produced, 
and prevent its return. One very simple ‘observation will be a lesson in 
this direction. A deposit of mud is never found at the foot of a rocky 
cliff, or distributed over a bottom covered with reefs or ridges, since in 
such localities the water, even in the calmest seasons, is never in per- 
fect rest, but always in motion, and broken into thousands of little 
streamlets and currents by the many obstacles which it encounters. 
Although pure, the water of these sections is always charged with in- 
finitesimal particles taken from the mineral substances of the bottom, 
or ground up from the organic debris which is found here. These par- 
ticles can be recognized without trouble when the rays of the sun pen- 
etrate down into the water, just as in a chamber the particles of dust in 
the air mark the ray of light which penetrates the room. In a word, in 
sections of this character the water makes mud but does not deposit it. 
It is this natural effect which it is desirable to have produced artificially 
upon bottoms covered with mud, first to clear the mud away, and sec- 
ondly to prevent itsreturn. In order to accomplish this a wall of broken 
and irregular fragments of rocks so disposed as to produce the greatest 
number of obstacles and checks to the action of the waves is built along 
the edge of the shore, at the extreme inner limit of the mud. The next 
day the success of the movement becomes apparent, the sea comes 
rolling in and breaking against the rocks, lashing them upon all sides; 
it stirs up the mud from the bottom and retires loaded with the sedi- 
ment which it bears off with it, until all the mud along the base of the 
wallis gradually borne off to sea. A gain of ground having been thus 
accomplished, a second wall of breakers is formed outside of the first, 
and when the space in front of this is clear of mud, a third line is run 
around the second, and so on, breaker after breaker; by gradually driv- 
ing the mud farther and farther into the sea, solid and permanent 


[47] OYSTER CULTURE. Ns, 


ground is obtained, which is visited by pure and aerated water, where 
oysters can be planted and where they can flourish unmolested; often 
upon such places a self-planting takes place, that is, the young, floating 
in the water after having escaped from some natural bed, finding the 
place in excellent condition for their reception, attach themselves to the 
rocks and form a new colony. When the deposit of mud is once com- 
pletely broken up, the rocks, by the aid of which this result has been 
accomplished, will serve to prevent its return, and as all the rocks will 
not be required for this purpose some of them can be used as fixed pave- 
ment collectors, the advantages and disadvantages of which have been 
noticed upon a previous page. Certain of the walls may be entirely re- 
moved and shells and valves of diverse mollusks, found in abundance 
nearly everywhere, can be scattered about in the intermediate zones, or 
other collectors, either fixed or movable, may be employed in the spaces 
between the lines of breakers. 

Sandy bottoms.—Sandy bottoms, if the sand forms a comparatively 
thin layer resting upon a sure and solid subsoil, so that the action of 
the currents, tides, and heavy seas is never intense enough to produce 
great changes, capable of covering up the oysters which may be placed 
upon them, are the best and may be worked without any fear. All 
that is necessary, when the oysters are planted, is to distribute a layer 
of shells over the bottom, and these shelis sinking slightly in the sand 
will give it a certain degree of fixity, and, gradually consolidating by the 
attachment of oysters to them, will soon transform the entire bottom 
and even change it into a bed of great value. 

Bottoms of grass or weeds.—Certain bottoms become invaded by an 
abundant submarine vegetation consisting of grass, various kinds of sea- 
wrack or alge, including the maérle. In their natural condition these 
regions cannot be utilized for the cultivation of the oyster. By their 
presence these plants serve to entirely stifle both old and young oysters, 
and they moreover give refuge to multitudes of crustaceans, mollusks, 
and polyps, which gain their nutriment principally by feeding upon the 
young of other marine animals, or in the case of some mollusks, furnished 
with a boring tongue, they pierce the shell of the oyster and gradually 
eat out the soft animal parts contained within it. It is necessary, then, 
if one wishes to cultivate these bottoms and raise oysters there, to com- 
mence by dragging up all the parasitic vegetation upon them, and then, 
to prevent their reappearance, the entire bottom must be covered with 
a thick layer of shells and broken fragments of rocks, which must be 
pounded down nearly, if not quite, to the subsoil. But even then it will 
be well to keep a constant lookout over these bottoms, for marine veg- 
etation has a strong tendency to reproduce itself in the same places, 
and holds its ground for a long time by means either of subterranean 
roots or of seeds. It is only by perseverance that ‘they can be finally 
eradicated. Only after this has been accomplished can oysters be planted 
without danger of losing both the young and future harvests. What 


800 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [48] 


we have just said in regard to marine plants applies equally well to 
mussels when it is desired to replace them with oysters. Frequent 
dredgings will be necessary in order to remove the greater number of 
these animals, whose presence, moreover, nearly always coincides with a 
muddiness of the bottom, and necessitates, in this case, a cleansing of 
the bottom as indicated above. But the mussel is essentially rustic, 
if I may be allowed the expression, and accommodates itself to nearly 
all conditions of bottom, so that when the mud has been taken away 
and the mussels have all been scraped up, it will be nene the less nec- 
essary to pay frequent visits to the collecting apparatus and carefully 
remove ail the groups of mussels, large or small, which may be discov- 
ered. When the multiplication of the oyster is well assured, and it 
covers all the bottom without leaving any vacant places, this vigilance 
may be relaxed a little, for although the mussel, when it can invade a 
locality, is a redoubtable enemy to the oyster, the reverse is also true, 
and the presence of a bank of oysters in fine growing condition is suffi- 
cient to keep the mussels from such preoccupied grounds. 

Emergent and non-emergent bottoms.—Finally, the marine oyster terri- 
tory can be divided into emergent and non-emergent bottoms. The first 
are found all along the shores of the ocean and the British Channel, and - 
consist of those lands which are left uncovered, either at every tide or 
at the spring-tides, thus exposing for a length of time to the air and 
light, which may amount to several hours per day, the marine animals 
which inhabit them. The second or non-emergent lands lie on the ocean 
coast and join the emergent lands. ‘They are never exposed by the 
withdrawal of the water. Upon the coast of the Mediterranean and 
other inland seas, where the action of the tide is scarcely felt, all the 
lands are non-emergent. Both kinds are suited to the cultivation of 
the oyster, but to a variable extent, dependent upon circumstances. 
The emergent lands, since they are frequently uncovered, have the great 
advantage of facilitating all the labor necessary to their management, 
the sorting, the arranging, and the gathering of the oysters, all being 
done without trouble when the surface is free from water. But the oys- 
ters ought not to be arranged indiscriminately, old and young together, 
for a long sojourn in the air, exposed to the fierce heat of the sun in 
summer and the hard frosts of winter. The young oysters would surely 
perish by a too prolonged exposure where older oysters might exist with- 
out special damage. One should then, if possible, arrange to have in 
connection with his emergent lands a certain amount of territory which 
is never entirely exposed, and upon which the collecting apparatus with 
the young growth can be placed, and the younger oysters also deposited. 
Then as these oysters acquire a suitable size and the power of resisting 
external conditions they can be moved forward, first to that portion of 
the territory which is uncovered only a short time each day, then to 
where the water leaves it for a little longer period, and so on gradually 
advancing, until the oysters shall be arranged in a series according to 


[49 ] OYSTER CULTURE. 801 


age and size; the oldest, those destined for consumption, at the extreme 
inner limit attained by the sea, and the youngest at the farthest point 
cultivated, where the bottom is never exposed. 

As the collectors furnish each year the germs necessary for the re- 
stocking of the outer zones, the young oysters in these zones, about one 
year old, should be passed to the next inner zone, and a rotation thus 
inaugurated, which would simplify and at the same time facilitate the 
labor. As for the lands which are never uncovered, and in this number 
are included all those of the littoral zone of the Mediterranean, oysters 
can be raised upon them, but they are more easily covered with mud, 
on account of the stagnation of the water at a certain depth, and it is 
on this account, or at least this is one of the principal causes of the 
absence of oyster beds along the coasts of this inland sea, except at 
certain places, as in the Gulf of Lyons, where the continuous agitation 
of the water, caused by the strong currents of this portion of the sea, 
prevents the deposition of mud. Of lands of this character one should 
choose those in preference where the water is not very deep, from one to 
two meters at the most, and employ the system of preparing the bottom 
recommended for muddy lands, in order that the obstacles placed in the 
way of the moving water may produce a constant agitation which will 
renovate the water and prevent all deposit. ! 

There are a great many places in the Mediterranean where oysters 
can be raised with great success, and many of these require no previous 
preparation. Imight mention, among others, the entire coast from Cette 
to Toulon, the coasts of Corsica and Africa, and the large salt lakes in 
the neighborhood of Montpellier and Cette, which seem to be vast natural 
basins especially constructed with a view to this industry. 

But for all of these regions it will be necessary to add from three weeks 
to a month to the period already described as the spawning season, and 
the time for placing the collectors, &c., since the higher temperature 
and earlier season of this latitude cause the young to be hatched much 
sooner. 

However, the non-emergent lands in general have a great disadvan- 
tage over the other, and the cultivation of the oyster can never attain 
the same perfection as upon emergent territory, since more labor and 
greater expense are demanded in the former than in the latter case. In 
fact, since they are always covered with water, all the previous labor of 
preparation, the management of the collectors, and the planting of the 
young oyster, in a word all the manipulations, must be made under water, 
which render the execution difficult and costly, if nut impossible in many 
cases. Neither could the supervision be very effective, and the oyster- 
culturist would be obliged to leave his charges almost entirely to them- 
selves, from his inability to cull, change, or distribute them at pleasure 
or when necessary. Only at the time of gathering could he obtain any 
exact idea of the success or failure of his undertaking, or the richness 
of his harvest. Concerning such lands as these, however desirable their 

S. Mis. 29 51 


802 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF ‘FISH AND FISHERIES. [50] 


cultivation may be from all points of view, it is best, perhaps, that the 
small oyster-culturist, to whom this book is especially addressed, should 
look to these bottoms only for his germs, and carry on the breeding and 
fattening entirely in parks or live-ponds, where, master of the water 
which fills them, he can easily follow his products in the successive 
phases of their development, and give to them, from time to time, and 
without very much trouble, all the care they may demand. The culti- 
vation of the constantly submerged bottoms belongs properly to the 
State. : 


ARTIFICIAL BASINS. 


Claires, live-ponds, parks, &c.—For a long time past the breeders of 
Marennes, at the mouth of the Seudre, have employed, for fattening and 
perfecting oysters, artificial basins called claires, a description of which 
we now propose to give. Recommended by a long experience, they seem 
to us, save for the necessary improvements which we shall mention, 
the best model to follow in the construction of artificial breeding-ponds. 
The claires are basins of variable form and extent, but generally with 
an area of about two to three hundred square meters (about the same 
number of square yards). Situated at a short distance from the sea, and 
with the waters they contain at a higher level than the mean height of 
ordinary tides, it is only at the period of the spring-tides, or at each new 
and full moon, that the sea rises to their level and supplies them anew 
with water. The best claires are those which receive water periodically 
from the sea, during about three days before and three days after each 
highest tide. This period of renewal for the eclaires is that which expe- 
rience has found to be the best, and it determines the maximum altitude 
above the sea for the construction of these reservoirs. 

Around each claire is built a levee or dirt wall, called a yard, about 
one meter in height and thickness. This yard retains the water fill- 
ing the basin, and upon it the workmen pass to and fro in inspecting 
and working the claire. A flood-gate closes a sluice in one side of the 
wall, by means of which the sea water is admitted to the basin. This 
gate also regulates the height of water within the basin, and if de- 
sired, the basin can be entirely emptied by opening it wide. All around 
the inner circumference of the yard a continuous trench is dug, to re- 
ceive the mud deposited in the basin from the stagnant water, for if 
this mud should be left in the basin the oysters would soon be smoth- 
ered. In order to facilitate the clearing away of the mud into this ditch, 
a slight slope is given to the bottom of the basin, circumscribed by 
the ditch, from the center towards the borders, so that the surface is 
sensibly convex. Some breeders dispense with this ditch; in which 
they are probably wrong, for if it does not prevent the deposit of mud, 
it at least retards it and lessens its effect. Its use cannot be judiciously 
dispensed with, unless the water has a long distance to run from the 
sea and is given a chance to settle before being admitted to the claire, 


[51] OYSTER CULTURE. 803 


so as to enable it to part with the greater share of the mud which it 
carries. ; 

In order to prepare the ground of the claire for the reception of oys- 
ters, it must first be cleared of stones and all vegetation which may 
‘cover it, and then the necessary slope from the center towards the sides 
may be given it. The ditch is next dug and the yard thrownup. Then 
with the sluice-way made and the gate in place the claire is ready to be 
filled with water during the first high tide. When the basin is full the 
gate is closed and the water retained after the sea has returned to its 
ordinary level. Thesea-water soon penetrates the soil of the claire, satu- 
rating it with salt, destroying all injurious germs, and transforming it, in a 
word, into a marine bottom. Assoon as it is supposed that this effect is 
produced the gate is opened and the surface paved; that is, it is first 
smoothed over, and then pounded until it has the even, compact appear- 
ance of a threshing-floor. In about two months the bottom of the claire 
will be ready for the reception of the oyster. The breeders to supply these 
claires have, up to the present time, had recourse to oysters taken di- 
rectly from the sea, either from banks near at hand or along the coasts 
of Brittany, and brought in bulk in coasting vessels. In order that the 
products should be of a good quality and that the regimen of the claire 
should have a beneficial influence upon the oysters contained therein, it 
is necessary that they should not be older than from fifteen to eighteen 
months, or larger than from five to seven centimeters in diameter (about 
two inches). The breeder culls them, cleans them, chooses the best- 
shaped ones, and then scatters them with a shovel over the surface of 
the basin. Afterwards they are all arranged by hand so that nothing 
shall hinder their development or interfere with the opening of their 
valves. In this manner about 150,009 can be accommodated upon a hec- 
tare (about 2.41 acres) of surface. The claire is then filled with water, 
which is maintained at a uniform depth of 30 to 35 centimeters. This 
water, as has already been said, is renewed only at the spring-tides, 
and at this time the water in the claires is necessarily very much raised 
in level, and consequently the most active supervision is necessary, for 
the heavy pressure upon the dikes may produce breaks or fissures which 
it is necessary to repair immediately or widespread disaster may result. 
During cold or hot weather or sudden changes of temperature the 
breeders maintain the water in the claires at a higher level than the ordi- 
nary, in order to obviate the destructive action of the frost in winter or 
the rapid evaporation and heating of the water in summer. Neverthe- 
less, the construction of the claires does not always permit of accidents 
from these causes being guarded against, and sometimes the result is an 
enormous mortality and the ruin of the breeders. Moreover, the water 
by remaining in the same basin necessarily deposits there a certain 
amount of sediment which continually accumulates, being added to at 
each high tide, and especially during the equinoxial tides, thus placing 
the oysters in no slight danger. To remedy this evil, since it is impos- 


804 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [52] 


sible to prevent the deposit of mud, the breeders always have certain 
unoccupied claires into which they transfer the oysters from the muddy 
claires while these are being cleaned. After a thorough cleansing they 
are left empty until it becomes necessary to clean the other claires, 
when the oysters are transferred back to their old quarters. But cer- 
tain of the breeders, not willing to allow portions of their land to lie 
unproductive, content themselves by cleaning the bottoms and then 
replacing the oysters in their old inclosure, always soiled with mud. 
It is useless to enumerate the defects of this practice, which can only 
produce inferior results both as to quality and numbers. 

Such, in a few words, is the industry of the breeders of Marennes, 
and it is this which we shall take as a guide, if not as a model, for 
debarring certain imperfections, it presents the most rational and best 
combined principles. If the breeders were in the habit of obtaining the 
germs necessary to restock their claires from the claires themselvas, if 
they had constructed their ponds so as to be able to raise the level of 
the water contained in them from one and one-half to two meters, and 
had subjected the water from each tide to a certain amount of stagna- 
tion before entering the claires, so that it would carry with it as little 
mud as possible, there would be nothing lacking in their methods; it 
would simply be necessary tocopy them. Letus profit, then, by all that 
is valuable in their industry, such as it is ; let us borrow from the claires 
all that can be borrowed, all that long experience has proved efficacious, 
and then add the improvements suggested by our recent studies, and 
with these elements combined we shall have an excellent guide for 
the future service of breeders in constructing and working their claires 
and live-ponds. <A claire or live-pond can be established upon any 
ground where the altitude above the level of the sea is sufficient to ena- 
ble it to be covered by the tide, not every day, which would expose 
it to a too frequent deposit of mud, but at least twice per month and 
during five or six days each time. And as a breeder should never be con- 
tent with one claire, however small his establishment may be, a series 
of basins can be made, either in one or two rows parallel to the coast, 
along the surface sloping to the sea, and all having the same level. It 
would not be prudent, however, to have somany that it would be neces- 
sary to place them at different levels, or in the form of steps, since in 
this case. the lower ones would receive water more frequently, and 
even be submerged and exposed to a more frequent deposition of mud, 
while the upper ones would receive very little water. But if it becomes 
necessary to construct claires in a series of steps at different levels, 
either because of a restricted amount of surface, or to utilize pre-exist- 
ing basins, they ought never to be used indifferently for oysters of all 
ages, because the conditions offered by the upper basins would be much 
more favorable for young oysters, and only when they have attained acer- 
tain size and a greater degree of vitality should they be placed in the 
lower apartments. The soil of the bottom of the claire demands, ac- 


[53 | OYSTER CULTURE. 805 


cording to its nature, different kinds of treatment. If it is argilla- 
ceous or muddy it should be cleaned and leveled, leaving the central 
portion higher than the borders, then pounded to give it solidity, and 
finally covered with water until the bottom is thoroughly saturated, when 
the water can be allowed torun out, and the bottom once more pounded 
while itis drying. If the bottom is sandy it is necessary to render it 
impermeable, so that the water may not leak out, and also to consolidate 
it. To accomplish this the ground is worked over and covered with a 
layer of coarse gravel or fragments of shells, upon which is laid a layer 
of clay 30 to 40 centimeters (10 to 12 inches) in thickness, which is then 
treated as already mentioned for the marly bottoms. A bed of concrete 
answers the same purpose, and while it is more costly it is more durable 
A pavement of blocks of sandstone or porphyry, &c., similar to those 
which are used in the pavements of certain of our cities, carefully 
pointed with clay or hydraulic cement, will also make an excellent bot- 
tom. But the clays, especially the reddish clays and the bluish marls, 
should be preferred in all cases where one wishes the oysters to possess 
the greenish tint to which the oysters of Marennes owe their celebrity. 
Surrounding the ground thus prepared are built the dikes which are to 
retain the water in the basins. These should be at least 2 meters in 
height above the bottom, so that a depth of water of from 1.50 to 1.80 
meters can be maintained over the oysters, not all the time, as gen- 
erally a depth of from .35 to .50 of a meter is best, but when it is very cold 
to prevent the injurious effects of frost, and when it is very warm to 
prevent the water becoming too salt from evaporation. These dikes 
should be constructed very solid, so as to resist the great pressure 
which is brought to bear upon them at every spring-tide, and should 
also be covered upon the inside, the same as the bottom, with a layer of 
clay or hydraulic cement, so as to prevent all leakage, which is very dis- 
astrous in these basins, since the water is renewed only at long inter- 
vals. Since these earthen dikes are liable to be injured, making it nec- 
essary to go to the expense of frequent repairs, it would be best, in my 
opinion, to construct them at first in masonry of rough stones and 
cement, and give them solid foundations. The upper portion of the 
larger of these dikes should be sufficiently broad and firm to permit the 
workmen to traverse them easily and without danger, for all the neces- 
sary manipulations of working and inspection. If the height of the 
ground permits, these claires can be formed by excavating in the solid 
earth, in which case it will only be necessary to cover the slopes of the 
banks with a layer of stones set in cement. This system moreover will 
allow of the utilization of lands slightly above the level of the tides, so 
that by uniting the two systems one can arrange three or even more 
rows of claires all upon the same level. 

As to the expense of construction, I judge it will be about the same 
for the two methods, the excavation in the one compensating for the 
masonry in the other. Finally, to avoid or at leastretard the deposit of 


S06 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [54] 


mud, resulting from the stagnation of the water, the claire should not. 
receive a new supply of water from the sea without giving it a chance 
to deposit the greater part of its sediment, which can be accomplished 
by keeping it for a certain length of time in a special basin. These 
basins themselves might be made of service by providing them with 
gates and sluices, and using them as breeding or fattening ponds for 
mussels or other marine animals. Fig. 18 gives a bird’s-eye view and 


Ss 
SY 
YY ‘ 
\\ YY 


\ 
NHN NN WY 


A SN 


OMY 


Fic. 18.—Claires. Vertical section, and bird’s-eye view. 


also a cross-section of two rows of claires with their feeding and puri- 
fying basins. The following explanation will sufficiently explain all the 
details given. CC, C’ represent two claires seen in section, the one dug 
into the bank, the other on the same level but nearer the open water. 
The sides or slopes of the former, B, B, consist of a layer of rough stones 
cemented together; the sides B’, B’ of the second are formed of thick 
walls, about two meters in height above the bottom of the claire, and 
about 1.40 meters in thickness at the bottom and .75 to .80 of a meter at 
the top, with an equal slope upon either side, f, f, of the bottom of each 
claire, the center being higher than the sides by about .30 of a meter. 

V, V, sluices and gates for the entrance of water from the sea. 

V’, sluice and gate between two of the claires, to allow the entrance 
of water into one, only after remaining a certain time in the other, and 
to establish the same levels in both compartments. 

S, basin for the deposit of the sediment contained in the sea-water 
which enters through the gate V’’.. It can also be used, if desired, as a 
supply reservoir, for the claires during the intervals between the spring- 
tides. In this case it should be constructed in the same manner as the 
claires themselves, so as to retain the water stored in it. Otherwise it 
will only be necessary to make the,dikes of dirt. In any case it ought 
to be proportioned in size and capacity to the claires which it supplies. 

T, T’, canal through which the water enters from the sea. 


[55] OYSTER CULTURE. 807 


By the aid of the sluice-ways and gates in this canal the water can be 
admitted directly into the claires without entering the outer basin at all. 
This could be done in case the outer basin were utilized for the rear- 
ing of mussels and there was danger of the spawn of the mussels enter- 
ing into the claires at the period of reproduction. 


GLA P TROL. 
METHODS OF WORKING THE CLAIRES. 


Now that enough has been said in relation to the apparatus for col- 
lecting the young growth, and the construction of the breeding ponds, 
there remain only a few words to be said concerning the method to be 
followed in commencing and continuing a profitable artificial oyster cul- 
ture. First, it is necessary to construct the breeding-ponds which, for 
the sake of greater precision, we call claires, taking as a basis for their 
extent the proportion of 1,000,000 oysters to the hectare or 100 per 
square meter, a proportion which, if it is desired simply to raise oysters, 
can be carried to 500 or 600 per square meter, or 5 to 6 millions per 
hectare; this is the proportion in the parks of the island of Ré. Dur- 
ing their construction, and in order to stock them as soon as they are 
completed, the young growth is procured by means of the collecting 
apparatus already described, or by some of the other forms, preference 
being given to that which will answer best for transportation, &e., accord- 
ing to the distance to be traversed from the spawning locality to the 
breeding-pond. As six months of time at least must elapse after the 
young growth have become attached to the collectors before they can 
be transported with safety, the two operations, of constructing claires 
and gathering the young, ought to proceed simultaneously.. Itis in June 
that this work should be undertaken in the ocean and a little earlier in 
the Mediterranean. When the claires are finished, and have a layer of 
pure and fresh sea-water over the bottom, the oysters which have been 
brought upon the collectors should be distributed as evenly as possible 
with a shovel, and afterwards arranged by hand, so that they may not 
form piles in certain places, and be entirely wanting over other sections. 
As the oysters should not remain in the same basin during the entire 
period of their growth, and as the young detached from the collectors are 
very small, they ean be easily so arranged that three or four hundred can 
be accommodated upon a square metre of surface, and afterwards, as they 
increase in size, they can be separated, so as to give more room to each. 
The time of this labor should be chosen so as to end, if possible, at the 
period of a spring-tide, in order that the young oysters, placed upon 
strange soil and in strange water, may be promptly refreshed by the 
incoming tide, and covered with a layer of water sufficiently deep to 


808 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [56] 


prevent any abrupt change of temperature. During the entire first year 
it will be well if the water never has a less depth than about one meter, 
and a strict guard will be necessary to maintain the dikes in good con- 
dition, repair all breaks, look out for the deposit of mud, and if any takes 
place change the oysters to another claire without delay. Later, in pro- 
portion as the oysters increase in size, and are less affected by external 
changes, this constant oversight can be relaxed to a certain extent, but 
not entirely, and the level of the water may be lowered to from .50 to .30 of 
a meter, always taking care, however, to increase the depth to 1.50 to 2 
meters during very cold or very warm weather. It will be readily under- 
stood with how much caution the level of these basins should be lowered, 
when it is remembered that it is only possible to fill them again at quite 
long intervals, eight to ten days generally, during which time, especially 
in spring and autumn, great changes of temperature may take place, 
exposing the oyster to evils against which there is no remedy. For 
young oysters, and especially during their first years’ growth, the most 
formidable enemy is mud. We have already spoken of transferring the 
oysters from a basin where the mud has accumulated or is being rapidly 
deposited to another which is free from mud, but this measure, which is 
excellent for oysters somewhat advanced in size, is not always satisfac- 
tory for the very young individuals ; and besides, at certain seasons of 
the year the temperature would render such a change impracticable. I 
would counsel the breeders then to use for the first year frames of gal- 
vanized iron, about two square meters in superficial area, covered with 
a netting of galvanized iron or zine wire, having meshes of such a size 
that the young oysters could not fall through. These frames could be 
supported upon four or eight legs from .20 to .30 of a meter in length, and 
arranged side by side in rows over the bottom of the claires, thus form- 
ing a double bottom with a space between the frames and the soil suffi- 
cient to accommodate the mud, which would then never trouble the oys- 
ters upon the frames. They could be left in this position the entire year, 
without disturbing them. After this time they should have sufficient 
natural vitality to be handled without danger, and could be placed upon 
the bottom of a fresh claire. Thus in the rearing of oysters, since five 
years are required for an oyster to become of marketable size, it will be 
necessary to allot five claires to the rearing of one generation, and to 
establish a series which shall render the production continuous. One 
claire in five should, therefore, be provided with the wire tables men- 
tioned above. The necessary expense of their construction and intro- 
duction would be compensated by the decreased cost of manipulation 
and attention, and the greater production from the claires. The employ- 
ment of these frames would be nearly indispensable for basins along the 
Shores of the Mediterranean, which, nearly always covered by the sea, 
are more liable than others to be covered by a deposit of mud, which 
can be cleared away only at considerable expense. During the first 
three or four years of such an enterprise one should, in order to procure 


[57] OYSTER CULTURE. 809° 


the young growth necessary to restock the claires left vacant by the 
preceding generation, have recourse, as at first, to the movable collec- 
tors and bring the young from some natural bank; but as soon as a gener- 
ation of oysters becomes adult, and consequently capable of reproducing 
the species, the claires themselves ought to produce all the young neces- 
sary to furnish the ponds with a constant supply of animals. To accom- 
plish this, about one mouth before the spawning season collectors are 
disposed in those claires containing the adult oysters, it having first 
been ascertaimed that these oysters are nearly ripe. The collectors are 
chosen at the convenience of the breeder, according to the means and 
resources of the country where the claires are situated, and become 
charged with young just the same as over the natural beds at sea, since 
before being taken from the ponds for market the adult oysters leave 
there a numerous progeny to replace themselves; as the germs produced 
are always vastly more numerous than the oysters which produced them, 
if the breeder does not desire to extend his industry and increase the 
number of ponds, collectors need be placed only in one or more of the 
ponds containing adults, so that the demands of commerce can always be 
satisfied during the five or six months required to charge the collectors. 
Experience proves the efficacy of this process. Many times, despite the 
defective condition of their claires, the breeders of Marennes have wit- 
nessed their basins, depleted by a wide-spread mortality, unexpectedly 
repeopled from a few oysters which had survived the disaster, the young 
developing upon the shells of the dead oysters; the shells in these cases 
acted as collectors to retain the germs which otherwise would have per- 
ished or been carried off by the first spring-tide. 

It is.perhaps to be wondered at, and even regretted, that such facts 
should not have caused the breeders to see the immense advantage- 
of making their basins places of production and growth, as well as fat- 
tening establishments. To-day, thanks to the light thrown upon this 
question by the researches of M. Coste, the oyster industry can be raised 
above the condition in which it has been kept up to the present time, by 
routine and indifference, and spread along our coasts, which have been 
threatened with misery and depopulation; the consequences will be an 
eminently remunerative industry and a permanent source of labor, which 
will attract to our coasts numerous and robust men, the future hopes of 
our navaland commercial marine. A few figures, not chosen by chance, 
but selected as a possible minimum, may serve to prove to my readers 
that I have not exaggerated in qualifying the new industry as highly 
remunerative, especially when it is called to mind that the lands upon 
which this industry is carried on are nearly valueless and unsuited to 
any other sort of cultivation. 

The price of a hundred oysters of the Marennes variety varies from 
14 to 6 franes.. Let us then adopt the price of 3 francs, which is less 
than a mean, as the average price per hundred. Upon a square meter 
of surface in a claire we can raise from 60 to 80 oysters, and if we take 


810 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [58] 


the minimum at 50 it will give us upon a hectare of surface 500,000 

-oysters, which, in about five years (average time of growth), would be 
worth, at 3 franes per hundred, the sum of at least 15,000 frances, making 
a yearly revenue of 3,000 franes.* Admitting whatis evidently above the 
truth, that the expense of labor, repairs, supervision, &c., absorbs three- 
fifths of this revenue, then the net profits would be 1,200 frances per hee- 
tare, or for the five years 6,000 francs. But these calculations are based, 
as will be recognized, upon mean numbers, which are probably lower 
than facts would demand. It will readily be seen, then, that in five 
years a landed property of the value of at least 6,000 francs a hectare 
per year can be established upon lands which before were unproductive 
and of no value. I think it can be said without danger of exaggeration 
that there are few, if any, rural occupations which in so short a time wili 
give equal results. 

As to the decrease in price of oysters consequent upon the increased 
production of this mollusk there is nothing to fear at present. Thanks 
to steam, the oyster can cross our entire continent without becoming dry 
on the way. Our coasts are called upon to answer the demands not 
only of all France, but of other countries. The demands for a long period 
have been greater than the supply, and we are too far as yet from the 
time when the supply shall equal the demand to include this among the 
risks. 


CHAPTER NV: 
CULTIVATION OF MUSSELS. 


In the preceding chapters, in treating of the rearing of oysters we have 
said, that the only bottoms upon which such an enterprise could not be 
prosecuted with chances of success were those where the mud was so 
deep and well established that there could be no hope of getting rid of 
it. These places, very numerous upon our coasts, in the coves and 
sinall bays formed at the mouths of snany rivers, where the mud is de- 
posited both from the waters of the sea and from those coming from the 
land, can nevertheless be made of service. Unfit for the home of oysters, 
they are very well adapted to mussels, which, aided by certain simple 
and inexpensive processes, can acquire there a size and flavor very 
much superior to those of the sea-mussel. Tor this industry, as for that 
of oysters, we have the experience of the fishermen of the Aiguillon, 
where this industry has existed since the thirteenth century, when an 
Irishman, named Walton, was shipwrecked upon the rocky point of 


*In 1863, on the island of Ré, a sailor named Moreau sold the first gathering from his 
park, which contained only 500 square meters, for 1,300 francs, making the revenue 
26,000 franes per hectare. 

tOn the island of Ré the first sales were made at 15 to 20 francs per thousand; to- 
day the price is 30 to 35 francs for the same quantity. 


[59] OYSTER CULTURE. 811 


Escale, near the port of Esnandes, and founded here the first bouchot 
or fishing-crawl. Thrown by the tempest upon a barren coast, among 
a scattered and indigent people, without hope of again seeing his native 
land, Walton at once sought means of existence by hunting marine birds. 
The bay, or rather cove, of Aiguillon is only a great mud-flat, a vast lake 
of mud, where, at low tide, one cannot travel with safety. It was on this 
bottom, nevertheless, that Walton made his domain. In order to traverse 
this flat without danger and at all seasons, he constructed a sort of 
“pirogue” or wooden box 8 or 9 feet long, bent up in front, square be- 
hind, and flat upon the bottom. This “acon,” or flat-bottomed boat (Fig. 
19), is still used by the fishermen, successors and imitators of Walton. 


In using this boat to travel in various directions over the flat, the fish- 

erman places one knee in the beat near the bind end, and then with his | 
hands upon the sides he pushes himself along with his other leg, which 
is covered with a long stout boot, and remains outside the boat, acting 
as a pole to impel it over the mud. In this manner the fishermen can 
proceed very rapidly in any direction where their labor may require 
them. In the vacant portion of the box he places his tools, or necessary 
materials, and whatever he may have gathered in his labors, and trans- 
ports them without much fatigue. Furnished with this ingenious ap- 
paratus for locomotion, Walton planted stakes about in the mud, by 
means of which he spread vast nets, in whose meshes he caught those 
aquatic birds which in skimming over the flats flew across these lines 
of nets. But soon Walton noticed that the stakes which sustained his 
nets became covered upon those portions just above the mud which were 
under water at every tide, with great numbers of mussels, which very 
rapidly attained a size much superior to those in the mud only a short 


812 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [60] 


distance away, and also a much superior flavor and delicacy of meat. 
This was a revelation to Walton. Thence to the establishment of the 
first of the five hundred crawls or mussel-frames, the revenues from 
which have brought ease and comfort to those countries, was but a 
step ; and it is the crawl of Walton, for it is constructed to-day just as 
he constructed it, that we shall take as a guide and model in the study 
forming the subject of this chapter. If, as in the cove of Aiguillon, the 
raising of mussels is undertaken upon emergent lands belonging to the 
domain of the sea, the arrangement of apparatus adopted by Walton is 
the best for the purpose, since it gives sufficient stability to enable it to 
withstand the shocks of the waves and boats, and the force of the wind. 
The apparatus is in the form of a V, with the point turned towards the 
sea. Each wing is built of a row of stakes interlaced with a wicker- 
work of flexible branches or strong pieces of osier or chestnut. The 
stakes are trunks of trees in their original condition, 4 to 5 meters long 
and .30 of a meter in diameter, driven into the mud half of their length, 
and placed at a distance apart of from .50 to .60 of a meter. Together 
they form a palisade from 2 to 2.50 meters in height above the mud. 
The branches forming the wicker-work, and for which as long branches 
as possible are chosen, are woven upon the stakes like the osiers of a 
basket or gate. This wicker-work covers the stakes without leaving 
any vacant spaces from the top to within about 15 to 20 centimeters of 
the bottom, in such a manner as to allow, during ebb and flood tide, a 
free circulation of the water at all times, so as to avoid the deposit of 
mud at the base of the stakes. 

The points of contact between the branches of the wicker-work and 
the stakes constitute the only support or fastening between these two 
parts, and to make this fastening as firm as possible, so that there will 
be no sliding of the wicker-work down the stakes, care should be used 
in spacing the stakes, and the branches of the wicker-work should be 
woven as tightly as they can be drawn. But they should not, neverthe- 
less, be brought too close together, for they would thus present too 
many obstacles to the movement of the mud and thus cause deposits, 
which, by their rapid increase, would very soon seriously interfere with 
navigation and endanger the apparatus itself. The mean distance of 
from .50 to .60 of a meter is the best. The length of the palisades or - 
wings of the V can be varied at will. 

The length of the crawls of Aiguillon is, upon an average, from 200 to 
250 meters; but this length, which is justified by the condition of the 
surface upon which they are built, ought to be regulated so that the sides 
of the V shall occupy about one-fourth of the distance between the 
extreme limits reached by the water at high and low tides. Upon all 
emergent lands those portions nearer the sea are much less often un- 
covered than those toward the shore, so that while the former are cov- 
ered every day with a layer of water several meters in depth and are 
dry for only a short period, the latter are covered by a layer only a few 


[61] ' OYSTER CULTURE. 813 


centimeters in depth and remain dry for many hours. Hence there are 
diverse conditions of life for the animals which inhabit these different 
zones, and there results the necessity of constructing the crawls or pali- 
sades in series along the slope of the shore so that the sea will visit them 
less and less in proportion as they approach the inner limits of the water. 
The fishermen of Aiguillon call those crawls which are farthest out in the 
sea, and which are uncovered only by the lowest tides, low crawls ; the 
two next inner rows are called false crawls, and those nearest the land, 
and consequently uncovered most frequently, high crawls. The outer line 
is generally formed of single posts (Fig. 20), without any wicker-work 
whatever, and the posts are : 
somewhat nearer together = — =. 
than in the line of palisades. = —— 
They serve especially as col- £ : == 
lectors of the young growth. 
In fact, at the spawning pe- 
riod they arrest, in the zone 
in which they are planted, = 
the young which are being 
swept out by the tide, and = 
offer to them, owing to their = 
nearly continuous immer- = 
sion, a more secure and ap- 
propriate protection than the 
other collectors, where they 
would frequently be left out 
of water. 

The fishermen thus resort 
to these outer posts for the 
seed necessary to supply the false crawls. Toobtain this the workmen go 
about the monthof July, at the beginning of the spring-tide, to detach the 
young, which are about the size of a bean, having been spawned in Feb- 
ruary and March. They are detached from the posts, in bunches, by 
means of a hook-shaped instrument, and are gathered into baskets and 
transported in the small foot-boats to the false palisades, to which they are 
then attached. In attaching them, the bunches, formed by the adherence 
of the byssus to the shells, are inclosed one by one in a bourse of old 
twine and then tied in the interstices of the wicker-work, being equally 
distributed, so that nothing shall interfere with their future development. 
Soon the net which incloses the mussels disappears, but it has become 
useless, the mussels being by this time firmly attached by their byssus 
to the branches of the wicker-work. Ina short time, by a continuous 
and rapid growth, the mussels cover the entire palisade or trellis in a 
dense layer of clusters, in which one can scarcely find a vacant space 
(Fig. 21). When, finally, this increase in size threatens their further 
development, they are detached, and transferred to palisades still nearer 


Fic. 20.—Low crawls. (Bouchots d’aval.) 


814 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [62] 


the shore, for by this time they have acquired sufficient vitality to endure 
frequent exposure to the air. They are fastened in their new positions in 
the same manner as at first, or, perhaps, only saddled upon the branches, 
where theyremain until they have attained a marketable size, which takes 
place in about a year after this last change. At this period, when they are 
strong enough to endure an exposure of several hours every day, they are 
transferred to the high crawls, to give place to the next generation, and 
also to have them at 
hand to supply the de- 
mands of consumers. 
Thanks to this system, 
the reproduction, rear- 
ing, gathering, and 
sale go on simultane- 
ously and without in- 
termission. But it is 
from July to January 
that these transactions 
are carried on and 
== = the mussel is most es- 

Fic. 21.—False crawls (bouchots batards) loaded with mussels. teemed as food. 4 In 
February the spawning season begins, after which they are poor, 
tough, and not desirable. Those mussels are also much superior in 
quality which grow on the upper portion of the hurdles, while those 
which grow close down to the mud are more like the sea-mussels in 
flavor. Such, in afew words, is the history of the industry founded by 
Walton upon the flats of the bay of Aiguillon, an industry which has 
continued to the present time and extended gradually to all portions of 
the bay, occupying an area of 8 kilometers, with a length of hurdles of 
225,000 meters, averaging 2 meters in height, and bringing ease and 
comfort to the surrounding communities of Esnandes, Charron, and 
Marsilly. 

According to M. D’Orbigny, the elder (Les habitants des communes de 
Vanse de V Aiguillon, &c., La Rochelle, 1835), each crawl or double hurdle 
costs for construction 2,049 franes; the demands for labor, supplies, and 
inspection are 1,136 franes, and the production each year from the sale of 
mussels 1,500 franes, making a yearly gain from each crawl of 364 franes, 
upon a yearly capital of 3,185 franes, the legal interest of which at 5 per 
cent. would be only 159 franes. 

It must be admitted that there are few classes of labor where the re- 
turn for capital invested is at the rate of 114 per cent. The methods 
invented by Walton, and imitated by his successors, are so simple, so 
rational, and so well adapted to the nature of the lands occupied, that 
it would be somewhat difficult to find anything to change or improve 
upon. All possessors of emergent lands can thus, by carefully imitating 
these methods, arrive at the same or similar results, and there remains 


[63] OYSTER CULTURE. 815 


nothing for us to say in addition to the preceding description. But the 
emergent mud-flats are not the only ones upon which the rearing of mus- 
sels can be successfully undertaken. As a rule, this ought to be accom- 
plished upon all bottoms and in all basins, whether natural or artificial, 
where the deposit of mud renders the cultivation of oysters impossible, 
and it is not only possible but advantageous to combine the two methods 
or kinds of culture, especially when the rearing of oysters is carried 
on in the elaires described in a preceding chapter. This would be an 
excellent method of utilizing the stagnant basins, in which the water 
from the sea frees itself of sediment before being admitted to the claires, 
and which as a result of this use are necessarily muddy. In these basins, 
and in all of those which are dug for the purpose of rearing mussels, 
the hurdles would not be exposed, as in the bay of Aiguillon, to the 
fierce action of the sea and to the thousand other conditions which de- 
mand attention. Hence it would no longer be necessary to arrange 
them in the form of the traditional V, but they might be placed in par- 
allel lines according to the shape of the basin, leaving between each 
two rows sufficient space to pass in working them. <A gateway in the 
basin would permit the regulation of the height and the renewal of the 
water at pleasure, or allow it to run dry when necessary to aid in work- 
ing the hurdles. By combining this culture, with that of the oyster, the 
breeders could more than cover the expense, always considerable, of 
digging a basin for purifying the water and a canal to lead this water 
to the basins, an expense which the breeders with reason often shrink 
from, yet which ought to be considered indispensable to complete the 
breeding arrangements. In case the two kinds of cultivation are united, 
that of oysters in the claires and that of mussels in the purifying basin 
and entrance canal, the only precaution to be taken, to avoid injury 
to the first by the second, will be at the spawning time of the mussels 
to avoid using the water from the outer basin to supply the claires, 
for in such a case the claires would become filled with great numbers of 
mussel-germs, which would thus tend to supplant the oysters. This re- 
sult can be easily obviated by arranging upon the sides and outside the 
basin of purification a small body of water communicating upon one 
side by a gate with the entrance canal, before its entrance into the basin 
of the mussels, and upon the other with a claire, which, during a certain 
period, can play the réle of basin of purification. (See explanation to 
Fig. 18, page 54.) 

In Fig. 18, the purifying basin surrounds the claires and each one 
communicates with it by a sluice and gate. If it is desired to raise 
mussels in this basin, these gates can be placed between the canal and 
the basin and between the canal and one of the claires, so that with the 
gates of the basin closed the claire can be used as a basin of purifica- 
tion for the time being, and the spawn from the mussels prevented from 
entering where the oysters are. This arrangement will be necessary 
only during the spawning period of the mussels, that is, from the end of 


816 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [64] 


February to the end of April, two months and a half at the most, and 
this portion of the year in France is generally cool and rainy, so that 
the claires, frequently refreshed by rains, need then less than at any other 
season a renewal of water. Moreover, if one is under the impression 
that the too frequent use of the canal causes deposits of mud in the claires, 
it need be employed only when it is absolutely necessary. The use of 
wood, such as osier or chestnut, for the wicker-work generally gives 
excellent results, and its renewal is not relatively very expensive. It 
may be, however, that from its scarcity, or from having to be brought 
too far, or from the presence of boring animals in the water, its use is 
not advisable; in such cases the wood can be replaced by frames of gal- 
vanized iron, covered with a trellis of iron or zine wire, woven coarse or 
fine according to the age and size of the mussels which are to be placed 
upon it. In order to fasten the frames it is well to attach them to two 
posts firmly driven into the ground at a distance apart equal to the 
length of the frames; or better, the frames can be entirely immersed in 
the water and suspended vertically by means of floats, or held by 
chains or ropes stretched from one side of the basin to the other and 
worked by capstans, so that they can be raised or lowered at will accord- 
ing to the level of the water and in order to facilitate the labor of caring 
for them. This method presents this great advantage that all the man- 
ipulation, the building of the trestles or frames, the changing and gather- 
ing of the mussels, &c., can be effected without letting the water out of 
the basin. When desired the frames can be partially raised from the 
water by means of the cables, and then taken on board of a boat carrying 
the workmen, and after they have been either loaded with or deprived 
of their mussels they can be placed in the water without any derange- 
ment of the neighboring apparatus. Moreover, the mobility and inde- 
pendence of each frame will considerably facilitate all changes, clean- 
ing, or repairs which it is necessary to make. 

It is, perhaps, unnecessary to remark that this system is equally ap- 
plicable to frames made of wood and filled in with wicker-work. When 
such frames are used it will only be necessary to anchor them with stones 
fastened to one side, so as to maintain them vertically under water. The 
fundamental principles of this kind of culture once fairly understood— 
and the preceding descriptions have, we hope, been sufficient for that— 
nothing can be easier than to modify the apparatus as to form and ma- 
terial to accommodate it to the thousand various conditions of each 
particular locality. But here we must leave the breeder and allow his 
ingenuity full sway, guided by the experience which he will acquire after 
a few years of labor, and which will be of much more help to him than 
the superabundance of details with which we might fill the rest of this 
chapter. We will only add a few words upon the different methods of 
procuring the young animals necessary at the start, and of renewing 
each year the young stock needed to enable the basins to meet the de- 
mands of consumers by the sale of the adults. 


[65] OYSTER CULTURE. 817 


The sea is the place to go for the germs, and the most simple col- 
lecting apparatus is the low crawls or solitary posts employed by Wal- 
ton. Stakes are planted towards the beginning of the spawning season 
in those sections where mussels are known to exist. Then, after several 
months, the stakes are pulled up and the groups of young mussels 
covering them used as the first supplies for the hurdles or frames. If 
upon the coast where the basins are built or where it is desired to estab- 
lish this industry, mussels are so rare that there is no hope of gathering 
a sufficient number of young ones upon the stakes, a circle of stakes can 
nevertheless be formed, planting them from 10 to 15 centimeters apart, 
upon that portion of the bottom which is uncovered perhaps only twice 
per month, and then suspending to them, at a short distance above the 
ground by means of netting or twine, clusters of adult mussels which 
have been gathered from the sea just before the spawning season. The 
mussels thus imprisoned within the circle of stakes will spawn just as 
plentifully and in better condition than if left upon the sea-bottom, and 
the spawn as it encounters the stakes, which prevent its dissemination 
throughout the water, becomes attached to them; in this way a numerous 
progeny can be gathered and transported to the prepared hurdles when 
they have reached a suitable size for handling. 

After the basin has been once planted it may be made henceforth to 
‘furnish its own supplies, and this it will do with much more certainty 
since all the spawn is obliged to remain in the basin; thus if one util- 
izes the purifying basin for mussels all communication between the 
elaires and the basin must be cut off during the spawning season of the 
mussels. Stakes planted here and there will suffice to collect a sufficient 
quantity of the young, and the hurdles or frames to which the adults 
are attached will also be covered with a young growth, for in these arti- 
ficial basins the water is nearly always at the same level, and the hur- 
dles are never uncovered, as happens at sea; hence the spawn will not 
be liable to perish from too long an exposure to the air, but will thrive 
wherever it may become attached. 

One can also make use of a very simple and ingenious apparatus 
which fills the double office of collector and hurdle or frame. If consists 
of a raft (Fig. 22) formed of a variable number of pieces of wood, accord- 
ing to its size. To this raft between the stringers and in the direction 
of the length of the frame are attached, like the slats of a blind, pieces 
of planks, or, better still, wicker-work frames, about 30 to 40 centime- 
ters in breadth (10 to12 inches). They can be made to turn upon their 
axes so as to take any desired inclination, or they can be suspended by 
one end, as shown in the figure. After floating a raft of this kind, with 
the planks or hurdles suspended vertically, in the water where the 
mussels are spawning, it can be carried into the breeding basins when 
it has become covered with germs, and the rearing go on without any 
other care than to replace the planks or wicker frames lengthwise of the 
raft, and change their inclination now and then to remove the mud 

S. Mis. 29-——52 


818 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [66] 


which may have settled upon them. The only disadvantage of this sys- 
tem is that the planks or frames, the latter especially, decay quite tap- 
idly by a continuous stay in the water, frequently causing the breeder 
the loss of his harvest or obliging him to entirely renew his apparatus. 

And here one cannot replace the wickets with metal, since the spawn 
of these mollusks will not voluntarily attach themselves to metal. So 
this apparatus will have to be used simply as a collector, and in numer- 


Fic. 22.—Raft collector. 


ous cases it can be of great service to breeders, when, for example, the 
requirements of navigation do not permit the use of fixed apparatus. 
It can also be employed with success in the culture of oysters, when, 
because of the deposit of mud, they cannot be placed upon the bottom 
of the claires. In this case the rafts, covered with young during the 
spawning season, can be floated at the surface and the mobility of the 
frames or slats will allow of the oysters being kept free from mud while 
the condition of light and heat may be varied at will. 


CHAPTER VI. 
REARING OF LOBSTERS AND OTHER CRUSTACEANS. 


In order to accomplish the task which we have undertaken, it now 
remains for us to speak of the processes which can be employed in the 
multiplication of crustaceans, such as crabs, lobsters, and the like. 
While the eftorts at artificial reproduction and multiplication of cray- 
fish in fish-ponds may be successful, and while the fecundated eggs of 


[67] OYSTER CULTURE. 819 


the cray-fish deposited upon wicker frames in hatching-ponds and con- 
stantly bathed with a stream of pure running water, may give birth to 
hundreds of little cray-fish, which need only to eat and grow, we cannot 
advise the same methods for the reproduction of the larger marine spe- 
cies, like the rock lobster and the common lobster. 

We have already said, and we repeat it now, that these species reproduce 
in the sea in sufficient quantities to supply all the demands of consumers, 
especially now that, by reason of the reports of M. Coste concerning 
these affairs, already cited, the laws governing the fishing of crustaceans 
have been modified in such a manner as to respect the females at the 
proper season, and prevent the destruction of young individuals until 
after they may have exercised, at least once, the function of reproduc- 
tion. Thanks to these modifications, while the numerous natural causes 
of destruction will always exist, as they have existed throughout all time, 
without having caused the disappearance of crustaceans from a single 
point of our coast, it is more than probable that the preservation of these 
species is henceforth assured. 

There is, moreover, no incentive, unless it may be from a purely scien- 
tific point of view, to undertake their artificial rearing, which would 
probably find a great obstacle in the vagrant and especially pelagic 
character of the germs of the lobster during their first transformations. 
But among those taken in the nets of the fishermen there are always a 
certain number which, although of regulation size, are so much smaller 
than the others that they sell in the market per dozen at the price of a 
single one of twice the length, and this price is far from being remunera- 
tive. Moreover, the fishing, formerly allowed throughout the entire 
year, is now prohibited during the three months of March, April, and 
May, the spawning period, and if the incessant demands of commerce 
would allow, it should be extended through the entire period when the 
sexes meet. 

There are, then, two important improvements to be introduced into the 
regulations concerning these crustaceans: first, to preserve alive those 
lobsters which are too small to sell profitably and keep them in suita- 
ble places for continuing their development, so that they can be sent 
to market when they are large enough to command a ready sale and 
a good price; second, to establish depots or live-ponds, in which, during 
the fishing seascn, all those individuals, over and above what are needed 
for immediate use, can be stored and held to supply the market during 
the period when no fishing is allowed. These improvements can be 
readily made, and far from being incompatible with the labors described 
in the preceding chapters, they can be readily carried on in connection 
with them. Previous to the labors of M. Coste in regard to these sub- 
jects, an ordinary fisherman, the Pilot Guillou, had succeeded in accli- 
mating crustaceans and marine fish in artificial basins of very limited 
extent. He very soon recognized that the restricted quarters and the 
care which these animals received were in nowise unfavorable to them; 


820 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [68] 


that their growth continued as normally as in the open sea, and that 
they reproduced the same; he also noticed, what is more curious than 
important, that some species were capable even of being tamed and | 
would come to recognize the hand*that fed them; they could be handled 
and would even touch the hand in their evolutions. From these expe- 
riences of Guillou, made in restricted ponds, and since repeated by M. : 
Coste upon a grand scale at Concarneau, it is evident that the immedi- 
ate sale of lobsters and certain fish, the turbot, &c., when their size is 
such that they cannot command a remunerative price, is to-day an act of 
blamable prodigality and evil administration which is of profit to no one. 
Tt is the case of the farmer who would wastefully cut all his wheat because 
afew early stalks show ripe heads. The dwellers along our coast should, 
therefore, construct basins where the conditions of the open sea may be 
realized as nearly as possible, and where the water can be renewed often 
enough to remain fresh and pure; then after every fishing trip the catch 
should be culled, all the lobsters which can be sold immediately and at a 
good price being taken out and the remainder of an inferior size being 
placed in the basins to continue their development. From the basins they 
should not be removed until after they had attained a suitable size, and 
at such times as fishing could not be carried on, either from stress of 
weather or in observance of special rules for the marine fisheries. These 
basins should be constructed upon the model of claires, except that the 
renewal of water should be made more frequently, providing there is no 
danger of too rapid a deposit of mud, although in this case the mud 
may not produce such evil effects as in the rearing of oysters. One 
might also appropriate to this use the basins of purification, where the * 
water is held for a time before being admitted to the claires, and this 
could be done without abandoning the cultivation of mussels in the 
same basins. Those places should vary in depth from one-half a meter 
to three meters, and have artificial rockeries, built up of irregular pieces 
in such a manner as to form numerous cavities and crevices where a 
multitude of species could find protection’ out of the way of mud and 
undisturbed by heat or cold. The summits of these rockeries should 
reach a certain distance above the maximum level of the water to benefit 
those animals which at certain periods come out of the water into the 
air. Sand-banks should also be constructed at the level of the water, 
and, in a word, we ought to have here, so far as is practicable in the 
limited extent of these basins, all the diverse conditions of depth, bottom, 
light, &¢., which are met with in the sea where the different species live. 
In order to do this it will be necessary to observe the nature of those 
submarine localities which each species frequents by preference. But 
however frequent may be the renewal of the water it is impossible to 
prevent stagnation to a certain extent, which has the effect of diminishing 
the aeration of the water and increasing the production of noxious gases. 
To prevent this result, which would in a short time be fatal to the in- 
habitants of the ponds, it will be necessary to establish there, as far as 


[69] OYSTER CULTURE. 821 


the necessary working of the ponds will permit, certain forms of-sub- 
marine vegetation, which should be planted upon the rock-piles and 
bottoms of the ponds. As arule plants of a green color should be chosen. 
Marine plants act in the water in the same manner that land plants do 
in the air. While men and animals absorb oxygen in breathing, and 
throw off carbonic acid, a noxious and suffocating gas, land plants, on 
the contrary, absorb the carbonic acid gas and decompose it, assimilating 
the carbon and exhaling the pure oxygen. In the same manner aquatic 
plants absorb the noxious gases produced by the respiration of aquatic 
animals and the fermentations going on in stagnant water, decompose 
them, and while storing up the carbon exhale the oxygen, which by dis- 
solving in the water gives it its vital properties. It is necessary, how- 
ever, to exercise some choice in selecting marine plants, since some of 
them grow with such rapidity and spread to such an extent that they 
- would soon interfere with, if not destroy, the culture they are designed 
to promote. To prevent this extension with such plants as may be 
chosen, it is well to introduce into the ponds some of those univalve 
mollusks which feed exclusively upon marine vegetation, and they will 
keep in check any excessive growths. 

One can also divide the basins into compartments, to separate the dif- 
ferent species and facilitate their capture at the time of sale. In fact the 
claires themselves can be used simultaneously for different species of 
crustaceans or other animals, excepting always those like the crab, &c., 
which would feed upon the oysters. 

One single example will suffice.. The morass of Kermoor, converted 
by M. de Cressoles into a salt lake about 70 hectares in extent and sur- 
rounded by salt meadows or lands formed by the mud dug from the 
lake, contains at the present time seventy thousand adult lobsters, which 
flourish in this miniature ocean as well as could be desired. There are 
also in this same lake hundreds of turbots which prophesy by their size 
and rapid growth a complete success for this magnificent experiment. 
In a word, and to sum up the various advantages of this kind of labor, 
so far as regards marine species, the owner of claires is in the same 
position as the agriculturist with his farm, his stables, and his meadows. 
He can multiply, rear, and fatten a large majority of the edible marine 
species, and, like the agriculturist, he should, as a good administrator, 
allow no portion of his domain, so far as is possible, to remain vacant or 
unworked. He should draw a revenue from everything, and while we 
have spoken here only of those species which are of considerable im- 
portance as marketable commodities, yet there are thousands of other 
marine species, fish, crustaceans, and mollusks which form only arestricted 
branch of commerce in those sections where they are taken, and which 
the possessors of claires might cultivate. By the rapid means of trans- 
portation to all the markets of France, they would become important 
sources of profit. Despite the immense impulse which M. Coste and his 
followers have given to this science, it can hardly be considered as yet 


® 
822 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [70] 


more than in its infancy, at least from a practical point of view, thus 
leaving much to be done by those who wish to devote their time and skill 
to this labor. But at the same time it is to-day removed from the do- 
main of speculation, for experience has demonstrated the excellence of 
the principles upon which it is founded and the methods it employs; 
hence the laborer can proceed successfully without fear, and acquire 
wealth in return for his trouble and expense. Imbued with this idea, 
I have wished to codperate, to the extent of my feeble means, in popu- 
larizing this humanitarian science. Have I succeeded? If this book 
Shall instruct those who are ignorant and guide those who are laborers 
in this field, then will my most ardent desires be satisfied. 


Page 
Acclimation of crustaceans......--.--.... Tai 
Acon, a flat-bottomed boat................ 59 
Aiguillon, Bay of, mussel banks in ...--.. 16 
mussel fisheries at...-.....-.-- 58 
Amareilleurs, oyster cultivators. ......--- 13 


Apparatus for gathering oyster-spawn .32et seq. 55 


for mussel breeding -.-.-- 60 et seq. 64 
Arcachon, Bay of, oyster banks in......-- 4,6,7 
Artificial culture of oyster.......-...---- 27, 29 
OVSbON Danks e524. siete seni aes 29 
Bay of Arcachon, oyster banks in.....--. 4,6,7 
Bay of St. Brieuc, oyster banks in.-...-.-- 2, 6, 45 
Bendant, acclimation of mussel.-...-...-.. 16 
Blanchard, M., artificial fecundation -.--. 10 
Beuf, Hyacinthe, experiments........--. 5 
Boissiére, M., experiments ....:....--.... 7 
Brest, harbor of, oyster banks in.-.....---.- 2 
Brittany, coast of, oyster banks on..-.--.--- 13, 14 
Brooks, Prof. W. K., experiments of -...-- 10 
Caneale, oyster banks at .--..-...--. 2, 3, 4, 5, 14, 26 
Claires for oyster raising... -- 1, 2, 45, 4, 18, 14, 29, 50 
et seq. 63 
preparation of bottoms ......--..- 45 et seq. 
WOLKING/O fens ete ental -ceesioe ee 55 et seq. 
method of working the.........--- 55 
@®olomot the oyster... csscice -ceeenase ene 13, 53 
Coste, M., protection of crustaceans ..---- 28, 67, 68 
report upon oyster fisheries . 2, 3, 4, 6, 22 
study of crustaceans.....-...-.. 18, 21, 22 
Courceulloyster park-~. 2/552. -- <== 14 
CLANS Heese se saris sae we ale ca cus cae n en geeesoe 20, 66 
Matoralehistory Olesc= esescicmesinae 20 
TEPLOdUCtION Os. sasese seca ees 20, 66 
spawning period! Of 22. <-2-.c-n--- 15 21 
@ray fish/sts sc) 8 2 she cane ae oe taesee 18 
natural history of: ..---:-.-..--- 18 
Copulibion Of. <csecee- eae e ee 18 
fecund Ahlon Ore see eace eee eee 18 
SPAWN OKO Lees ee ec ase ee ate 18 
sheddingiofskini os .a.)- css =t 19 
TOOMIO Lease et sae ease ese ses cee 19 
lOn&eVAbYIOL: ses sieievseie aeietce ee fa ai= 19 
Crawls Adguillon:.c.o24s--c ce heccec ce 60 
‘Cressoles, M. de, lobster pond of........-. 
‘Crustaceans, acclimation of ........-...-- 67 
breeding of........--1, 29, 6, 66, 67, 68 
M. Coste’s study of.......-. 18 
natural history of........... 138; 1 
protection during spawning - 28 
rearing/of-...-- - Fee 1, 66 
Cultivation of the oyster.........-.-..--. 13 
Cttlepfis hee aecmsae aes cers tea alos ooainire 8 
Depletion of oyster banks............---. 22,24 
Depopulation of oyster banks.........-.- 2 


[71] 


69 | 


Depopulation of oyster beds..-.-.-........ 1, 22 
Dieppeoyster parlee-ee-men seem ciee os soe 14 
Diseases.of the oyster..--5.-.-4---------- 14 
D’Orbigny, apparatus for mussel breeding 62 
Dredging of) oysters-..- 5 o-secee~-es-- 42 24, 25 
Dunkerque oyster park .......----:------ 14 
STS OL OV SUC < cei emir ain alco aie sles ateninelos 10, 11 
Hmibry O10 YStCrs\e\< skisis)-(e\es ee eileen eee 11 
Enemies of the oyster..-....-.-------...-. 12, 23, 24 
Htretatoyster parksee ss see eee oe 14 
Hécamp) oyster parki--5.sscesssce-ne see 14 
Fecundation of oyster......--..-..------- 10 
Fecundity of the oyster...-...-..-------- 23 
Flavor of the OvGUG) sao bo oSo So Te SeeaSenee 13 
Formation of oyster banks.-..-....--.--. 14 
| Fraiche, Félix, guide to oyster culture, &c. 1 
France, coast of, oyster industry upon. -.. 1 
Fusaro Lake, oyster culturein.........-.- i 
Granville, oyster banks at .....--........ 2,4, 5, 26 
Guillou, M., acclimated crustaceans ...-.-. 67 
Homarusivulgaris. c= --sscs esse ae 19 
Huxley, T. H., The Cray-fish, cited ....... 18 
Island of Oléron, oyster banks on....-.... 2, a7 
Island of Ré, oyster banks on -...... 2, 5, 6, 24, 41, 55 
Kemmerer, Dr., collecting apparatus. .-.- 44 
Gxperiments=_-eeeeeases 6 

Kermoor, oyster banks at ....-..-----.... 7 
Lake Fusaro, oyster-breeding in.....-. 29, 30, 31, 32 
Lake Lucrin, artificial oyster-breeding in. 29 
MODStOr ss ~s-ie «sees clsecee sce sasceee ee aes 19 
artificial cnlture =. ease eeceeenee 28, 29 
breedin gol. 213 eaten ee 66 et seq. 
importance of....--. mi sleSefeise cle sae 27 
methods of breeding........----- 1, 29 

MOltin GOL ees eee eee 21, 22 

natural history of ........----... 19 

pond of M. de Cressoles.....-.--. 69 
protection of, recommended.....- 27 

7) TeproguchontOtespe-scesees sseses 20, 21, 27 
TEALIN OLA see cet eeice eres sees , 66 

Lucrin Lake, oyster culture in .--...-..-. 1 
BW EN SR OR See oe 6 DORRIT ee oe ee 23, 24, 25 
Marennes, artificial oyster breeding at. .-.29, 30, 31 
oyster banks at).-s..-..-2-.-- 2,13, 14, 50 
OVBLEMPAL KG: cecce ss sac se sence 14 
Mediterranean, oyster banks in ..-.....--- 6 
Mollusksjantiquity/0f. -. 2.2 -cc sinew ee 9 
Natural history of---.-.------- 1,8 

nervous system of ......-....-. 8 
Multiplication of the oyster..--.-..------ 14, 57 
Mussel and oyster breeding combined. - -- 63 
breeding, apparatus for........-.. 60 et seq. 
fisheries at Aiguillon ............. 58 
ID@@GIN OVOL oe esceerieesces 1, 6, 29, 58 et seq. 

823 


824 


Page. 
Mussel are hermaphrodite. ............-- 16 
Danks/ofs 22s classe sels welseisise 2 2eya10 16 
GOlOL OLE wesch sarc wetie deme aicin:5 16 
Cultivation of-ncoe-eacaoml= se stale 1, 58 
fishin Ofer fae ee re tiatcineiein es 16 
in} Bayon Aiguillon! 2250.2. s2se-- 16 
Natural history of '..:..5...--.--- 15 
TEPLEdUCvion/ OL) se =jaie = yee seein tere 16 
WOR oA ASE eee eR ee Ree boot oC 15 
Normandy, coast of, oyster banks on...--. 18, 14 
Oléron, island of, oyster banks on..-..-.--. 2,7 
Orata, Sergius, results in oyster culture... if 
Ostreaibellovacinalsecs--n-cere aise cetera. 9 
SGhni lise ee aaeee bec cgevidoboees cqKOnG 9 
DIPPOPUSeeeer se siee = eeeee eee ees 6 
WAL CINIANG, eesti sitet soe 10 
Oyster and mussel breeding combined. - -. 63 
artificialicultures. = cen cee sce ese 27, 29 
banks, depopulation of ....-.-----. 2 
atenochellem sass sceecee 2,7, 14, 41 

At Marennes! fc secieesaee 2, 13, 14, 50 | 


on island of Ré .. 2, 5, 6, 24, 41, 55 


onisland of Oléron......-.. 2, 

in bay of-St. Brieuc..-.-.-- 2, 6,45 

in harboriof Brest .-.--42--- 2 
atiCancalereeesecs see 2,3, 4, 5, 14, 26 | 

atiGranvallesscateces ceceeee 2, 4, 5, 26 

restocking Of. oe. ss. ene as 3, 5, 6, 26 

QM LESuICL eee ce. - sess 3 

bay of ‘Arcachon... 2522-4 4, 6,7 

in the Mediterranean .....-. 6 

establishment of -.........- 6,7 

abINermoorsssees cose eee er 7 

on coast of Brittany .-....-- 13, 14 

Normandy.-.... 13, 14 

Vendée......-... 13 

formationof2 esters oe cee 14 

depletion! Of.-—2 ae e2 seco 22, 24 

artificial. sec eee eee 29 

Oyster-beds, artificial .......... 3, 4, 5, 29, 30, et seq. 

depopulation of..-..- wvelneres 1, 22 

depletioniof;-o--2;.05-- 549-5 22, 24, 26 

dred minmiol<-sosccc. ee see 24, 25 

ottomiolss sao cisc ccc aieeees = 24 

preservation Of ce --2-e esse 24 

maerleynlason cee eek eee ae 3, 24, 25 

INSPEChion Ofsasce ae sees aaa 25 

artificial Fo cewen ese ciees eee 29 

Oyster breeding, artificial...........-...- 29 

experiments in ....5, 6, 29, et seq. 

COlOnOf: tno ae neem 13, 53 

causes of destruction of. 28, 57 

PA cultivation by parks.... 13 

Oyster culture, practical guide to...-.-.- 1 

among the Romans ....-.- 1 

development of ...---.... 12 

diminishing of ...... wee 23 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


Page. 

| Oyster, disease of .-.-.. 52.2... Ores rahe 14 

dred ging) Of. seodeseeeee cee ee 24, 25 

OBST OLE eaten son cece tememene ees 10, 11 

EMDLYO pe ete ee eestor eae il 

CHEMIES Ofte cece eee esa eees 12, 23, 24 

fecundation oft 22 ee ae eee aeeee 10 

fecunditivjioten-scue 4 sae cmeeecene 23. 

fisheries, impoverishment of ..-..- 1, 22 

M. Coste’s report on ..-. 2 

fishin: Wey Sate ALN ht 14, 24, 26 

Aavorof swe He socks eer 13 

PONETA Ola siniscceeseacissceecieenersts 9 

industry upon the coast of France. 1 

is hermaphrodite. --5--4-2--:-224: 10 

matutalMhishonyOlwes- == aera 9 

pearlsifoundin= oo ea sess 14 

Yam bIin ress eeee oe eniae atete ae 3, 4, 52, 55 

ponds. See Claire’s parks........ 1,45 

Tockeries artiiciallssccecciaeeees 29, 30 

spawn, gathering and moving.... Sa 

spawning, season of...-.....-.... 10 

| Oysters, methods of breeding -----.------ 1,29 

multiplication of .---.-.2-5..2... 14, 57 

IQUE OM Nonrseloocs condac Sone 4, 5, 6, 57, 58 

protection of, while spawning... 26, 27 

reproduchion Of e-..-s-ceia=— = 22,107 

Palinurus vulgarisscoses oe aeeee ee eee 19 

Parks for oyster raising -..-.-- 2, 4, 12, 28, 50, et seg. 

IPeaTOyStCrsee sec seller cojatastse nieces 15 

Production ohys--eesn oe ese eases 15 

found Ani OV StCrsieecsicer-leaeneeinetaiee 14 

| Ponds for oyster raising....- 1, 12, 29, 45, 50, et seq. 
| Practical guide to oyster culture, and the 
methods of raising and multiplying edi- 

ble marine animals. By Félix Fraiche. 

(Eitle) asses soe serene eee eee eae J 
Purifying basins in mussel culture-....... 63 
Quatrefages, M., artificial fecundation . --- 16 
Ré, island of, oyster banks on.-..... 2, 5, 6, 24, 41, 55 
Reservoirs for fattening oysters..-..-.--. 12,13 
Restocking of oyster banks.......--..--. 3, 5; 6, 26 
Rochelle, oyster banks at......--.-...-.. 2, 7, 14, 41 
Rock BlOvSberas eee seer enscree eee teer 19 

natural history of......-.... 19 

shedding of skin....-...-.-. 22 

reproduction of....-........- 20 
Romans, oyster culture among the.-.-...---. 1 
St. Brieuc, bay of, oyster banksin .....-. 2, 6, 45 
Saint-Waast oyster park .......-....--.-- 14 
Spay Oto VSters ia. oreciinels sieemenieeia i 32 
Spawning season of oyster.-........--..--- 10 
Thibaut, M., experiments..-:............ 7 
Tréguier, oyster banks at.........-..-..- 3 
Mréport Oyster patke roses == -misesameaee 14 
Uhler, P. R., on fecundation of cray fish. 18 
Vendée, coast of, oyster banks on..-...--- 13 


Walton, developed mussel fisheries. 58, 59, 60, 62, 65 


XXIX.—REPORT ON THE OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES OF 
FRANCE AND ITALY.* 


By M. Costs. 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


A.—ARTIFICIAL OYSTER BEDS OF LAKE FUSARO. 
B.—GREEN OYSTERS OF MARENNE. 

C.—MUSSEL WIERS OF THE Bay OF AIGUILLON. 
D.—DOCUMENTS RELATING TO THE MARINE FISHERIES. 


1. Report to His Majesty the Emperor on the condition of the oyster beds along 
the coasts of France, and on the necessity of restocking them. 
. Report to His Majesty the Emperor on the artificial oyster beds created in the 
Bay of Saint Brieuc. 
3. Report to his excellency the Minister of Marine on the restocking of the Basin 
of Arcachon. 
4. Appliances suitable for the reception of oyster spat. 


[ws] 


A.—ARTIFICIAL OYSTER BEDS OF LAKE FUSARO. 


At the inner end of the Gulf of Baia, between the beach and the ruins 
of the city of Cume, may still be seen, far inland, the remains of two 
ancient lakes, Lucrin and Averne, communicating in olden times through 
a narrow canal, one of which, Lucrin, gave access to the waves of the 
sea through an opening in the embankment over which passed the Her- 
culaneum road; tranquil basins they were, which an eruption of this 
voleanic soil has almost completely filled up, and where, as the poets said, 
the sea appeared to repose. A crown of hills, covered with primeval 
forests casting their shadow uponthe waters, had madeof it an inaccessi- 
ble retreat which superstition consecrated to the gods of the infernal 
regions, and where Virgil conducted Ainéus. But about the seventh 
century, when Agrippa had despoiled them of that gigantic vegetation, 
and the subterranean route was dug (the grotto of the sibyl), leading 
from Lake Averne to the city of Cume, the unveiled myth disappeared 
betore the works of civilization. A forest of splendid villas, built and 


* Extracted from ‘‘ Voyage d’Exploration sur le littoral de la France et de I’Italie, 
par M. Coste, membre de l'Institut, professeur au Collége de France. Deuxiéme 
édition, suivie de nouveaux documents sur les péches fluviales et marines. Publiée 
par ordre de 8. M. VEmpereur sous les auspices de S. Exc. le Ministre de l’Agriculture, 
du Commerce et des travaux publics. Paris, Imprimerie Impériale, MDCCCLXI,” 
pp. 89 to 193. 295 

(1) 


826 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


ornamented with the spoils of the world, took the place of these dark 
groves. Rome gave herself up to this place of delight, attracted by a 
soft sky and an azure sea. The warm, sulphurous, aluminous, saline, 
and nitrous springs which run from the top of these mountains formed 
the pretext for the emigration of the patricians who were driven from 
their homes by ennui. 

Commerce exhausted its resources to accumulate around them all the 
enjoyments which their indolence sought, and among those who de- 
voted themselves to this enterprise, Sergius Orata, a wealthy man of 
agreeable manners, and possessed of great credit, conceived the idea of 
organizing oyster beds, and of bringing this mollusk into popular favor. 
He had oysters brought from Brindes, and persuaded everybody that 
those which he raised in Lake Lucrin contracted there a flavor which 
rendered them better than those of Averne, and even those of the most 
celebrated countries. His opinion gained ground so rapidly that, in 
order to meet the demand, he finally occupied all the circumference of 
Lake Lucrin with constructions destined to receive oysters, encroaching 
thus upon the public domain with so little discretion that it was neces- 
sary to bring a lawsuit to dispossess him of his usurpations. At the 
time this misfortune overtook him, to express the degree of perfection to 
which he had brought this industry, it was said of him in allusion to the 
suspended receptacies, of which he was also the inventor, that if he was 
prevented from raising oysters in Lake Lucrin he would become wealthy 
by making them spring forth from the roofs. Sergius, however, was not 
destined to organize oyster beds. He had created a new industry, of 
which the methods are still applied some miles distant from the place 
where he had carried it on. I hope, however, to show this further on. 

Between Lake Lucrin, the ruins of Cumes and Cape Miséne, there 
exists another salt pool about one league in circumference, from one to 
two meters in depth over the greater portion, and with a bottom of 
blackish voleanic mud. This is the Achéron of Virgil, and bears at 
the present time the name of Fusaro. At intervals around its entire 
border one sees spaces, generally circular in outline, occupied by stones 
brought there from away, but there is no possibility of determining when 
this industry was begun. These stones resemble a kind of rocks, 
which have been covered with oysters from Tarente in such a way as 
to transform each of them into an artificial bed. About forty years ago, 
the sulphurous emanations from the crater occupied by the waters of 
Fusaro became so great, that the oysters of all these artificial beds died, 
and to replace them it was necessary to restock the beds. Around each 
of these artificial mounds, which are generally 2 or 3 meters in diameter, 
stakes are driven rather near together, and so as to surround the space, 
in the center of which are the oysters. These stakes project a little 
above the surface of the water, so that one may easily seize them with 
the hands and raise them when it becomes necessary. There are other 
stakes, also, arranged in long series, and united by a rope from which 


[3] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 827 


are suspended bunches of brushwood intended to increase the growing 
individuals which are awaiting collection. 

In the spawning season, which is ordinarily from June to the end of 
September, the oysters lay their eggs; but they do not abandon them, 
as happens with a great number of marine animals. They protect them 
during incubation in the folds of the mantle, between the gills. There 
they remain immersed in a mucous substance, necessary to their evolu- 
tion, and in the midst of which they acquire their embryonic development. 
The mass of eggs resembles thick cream in color and consistency; and 
moreover, the oysters at this time, owing to their appearance are called, 
milky oysters (huitres laiteuses). But the whitish tint so characteristic of 
the eggs when first deposited assumes little by little, as the process of 
development advances, a shade of clear yellow, then of dark yellow, 
changing by degeneration into a brownish gray, or a very decided violet 
gray. The entire mass, which, at the same time, loses its fluidity, prob- 
ably in consequence of the progressive reabsorption of the mucous sub- 
stance enveloping the eggs, presents then the appearance of compact 
mud. This stage indicates that the development has reached its limit, 
and is a sign of the approaching expulsion of the embryos and of their 
independent existence; for, already, they thrive very well without the 
protection furnished by the maternal organs.* 

The mother soon ejects the young ones hatched in her mantle. They 
go forth furnished with a temporary apparatus for swimming, which 
enables them to seek a fixed body to which they may attach themselves. 
This apparatus, discovered by Dr. Davaine, and described in the remark- 
able work which he has undertaken and executed under the auspices 
of M. Rayer, my associate in the Academy of Sciences, consists of a 
sort of ciliated cushion, provided with powerful muscles, by the aid of 
which the animal can at will protrude the cushion from the valves or 
retract it. When the young oyster has become attached, this cushion, 
which is henceforth useless, is lost, or, as is more usual, atrophies in posi- 
tion and disappears by degrees. 


*It would be interesting, especially in a commercial point of view, to know whether 
embryos which have arrived at this stage of development, and which have been 
placed in a pond, or recess of the sea previously prepared, would survive this prema- 
ture and forced hatching, attach themselves, and continue to grow. An experiment, 
incomplete it is true, but which I propose to enlarge upon, would seem to show that 
their organization is sufficiently perfect to permit them to be born prematurely, and, if 
I may be allowed the expression, outside of the medium in which their cyolution is 
accomplished. Thus, young oysters extracted from the mantle of the mother, and 
placed in a little vessel filled with sea-water, still preserved all their activity at the 
end of the fourth day; 24 hours later some were motionless; the sixth day all were 
dead. In fact, the water of the vessel had not been renewed, and had acquired too 
great a percentage of salt, and too high a temperature, which very probably hastened 
their death. I am led to believe that under other circumstances, care being taken 
to change the liquid of the vessel every day, this experiment would give results which 
one would be able, perhaps, to apply to the indusiry. 


828 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


The number of young thus thrown out from the mantle of a single 
oyster at each spawning is not less than from 1,000,000 to 2,000,000; so. 
that at the time when all the adult individuals composing a bed set 
free their offspring, this living mass escapes like a thick cloud, which 
moves from the center whence it emanates, and which the movements. 
of the water disperse, leaving upon the parent stock but an insignificant 
portion of that which it has produced. All the remainder wander, and. 
if these animalcules, which wander here and there by myriads at the 
mercy of the waves, do not meet solid bodies where they can fix them- 
selves, their loss is certain; for those that do not become the prey of 
lower animals which subsist upon Jnfusoria, end by falling into a place 
unsuited to their subsequent development, and often by being engulfed 
in the mud. 

One could, therefore, render the industry a great service by furnish- 
ing a means of preventing these immense losses, and of securing nearly 
all the crop. The methods of Lake Fusaro, if we knew how to extend 
their application, would present this advantage. The stakes and fagots. 
by which the artificial beds are surrounded are precisely for the purpose 
of preventing the escape of this spreading mass, and of presenting sur- 
faces where they can fix themselves, like a swarm of bees to the shrubs: 
which they encounter on going out from their hives. They attach 
themselves there, and grow so rapidly that at the end of two or three 
years each of the original living corpuscles becomes edible. 

The facts which the fishermen in charge of the operations at Lake 
Fusaro brought to my notice confirm what I advance here. The propa- 
gating stakes, which have stood around the artificial beds for about 
thirty years, were drawn out before me covered with oysters which one 
could assign, notwithstanding the numerous variations of size, to three 
distinct periods. The largest, resulting from the first spawn which 
became attached to these stakes, were from 6 to 9 centimeters in diame- 
ter, and were, for the most part, marketable; those of .the middle size, 
ranging in diameter from 4 to 5 centimeters, were only sixteen or 
eighteen months old, and were the products of a second season; some 
of the smallest were of the size of a 2-frane piece, others that of a 50- 
centimes piece; the remainder, finally, were of the size of a large lentil, 
that is to say, from 6 to 8 millimeters in diameter. The age of the first, 
according to the testimony of the fishermen, was about six months; that 
of the second, three; while that of the last could not have been more 
than a month or forty days. Their growth would appear rapid enough 
if we would consider that at the time of their expulsion they were but 
the fifth of a millimeter in diameter.* . 

When the collecting season arrives they withdraw the stakes and the 


*According to M. Dureau de la Malle (Acad. des Sci., 19 avril 1852), the young oys- 
ters placed in beds established at Cancale grow very rapidly. In a year and a half 
they reach the size of 9 centimeters, while upon the bank of Diélette they would require 
five years to attain that size. 


{5] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 823 


fagots, from which all the oysters considered marketable are taken suc- 
cessively, and after having picked the fruits of these artificial clusters, 
the apparatus is replaced, to remain until a new generation has arrived 
at maturity. At other times, without touching the stakes, they simply 
detach the oysters by means of a hook with many*prongs. The source 
from which these generations are derived therefore remains permanent, 
perpetuating and renewing itself constantly by the annual addition of 
a small minority which never desert their place of birth. 

The produets of the collecting, heaped up in wicker baskets of a 
spherical form and with large meshes, are provisionally deposited, while 
awaiting sale, in a reserve or park established in the same lake by the 
side of the royal pavilion, and constructed of piles, which support a 
platform of open work furnished with hooks to which the baskets are 
suspended. 

I said at the commencement of this work that the industry of Lake 
Fusaro was known to the ancients, and that probably Sergius Orata 
was the inventor; there are two historical monuments which prove that 
it began, probably, in the time of Augustus, or, as Pliny says, at the 
time of the orator Crassus, before the war of the Marses. These mon- 
uments consist of two funereal vases of glass, discovered, the one in 
Pouille, the other in. the environs of Rome. They have the shape of 
antique bottles, with large bodies and long necks, and are covered on 
the outside with designs in perspective, in which, notwithstanding their 
crude representation, we recognize fish ponds adjoining edifices, and 
communicating with the sea by areades. However, if. we should enter- 
tain doubts of their purpose and meaning, the inscription which accom- 
panies them would fully explain their character. We read upon the 
vase from Apulia, illustrated by Sestina: *STAGNUM PALATIUM (a 
name sometimes given to a villa upon the banks of Lake Lucrin, owned 
by Nero), and lower down: OSTREARIA. The other vase, which is 
preserved in the Borgia Museum at Rome (at the present time that 
of the Propaganda), and of which M. G. B. de Rossi has given an excel- 
lent interpretation,t bears the following words, written under the objects 
designed: StAGNUM NERONIS, OSTREARIA, STAGNUM, SYLVA, BAtA, 
which plainly shows that the figures have been drawn from edifices, and 
from places of the famous shore of Baia and Pozzuolo. 

What is most striking in the view of the fish-ponds represented upon 
these funereal vases is the disposition of the stakes crossing one another 
in divers directions, and arranged in circles, stakes which were evidently 
there only to receive and protect the progeny of the oysters. 

The industry of Lake Fusaro is simply a practice invented by the 
ancient Romans, and continued by their descendants, and which for 
Sergius Orata, lwruriorum magister, as Cicerot called him, was the source 


* Tllustrazioni di un vaso antico di vetro trovato presso P: Splenic Troan 1812. 

t Topografia delle Spiagge di Baia, graffita sopra due vasi di vetro. Bullet. Arch. na- 
politano, nova serie, anno primo, Napoli, 1853, p. 133, tab. 1x 

t De fin., 1. ii. 


830 | REPORT OF CQMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6} 


of immense profit; for, according to the statement of Pliny, it was not 
only for pleasure, but for love of gain that he pursued this business: 
Ostrearum vivarium primus omnium Sergius Orata invenit in Bajano, etate 
LI. Crassi oratorio, ante Marsicum bellum: nec gule causa, sed avaritie, 
magna vectigalia talé ex ingenio sus percipiens.* 

This curious industry, all the details of which I have been able to study 
with care, thanks to the obliging co-operation of M. Bonnuci, inspector- 
general of the royal monuments, who kindly accompanied me during my 
exploration of the gulf, gives to the civil list, despite its restricted ap- 
plication, a revenue of 32,000 francs; but it would be still more lucra- 
tive if, from the disinterested hands of the prince, the proprietorship of 
the lake Should pass into those of speculators. Introduced into the salt 
ponds of our sea-coast, the trade of Lake Fusaro would then be a real 
source of wealth to our population. Extended, with modification, to 
the cultivation of the natural banks which exist in the sea, it would as- 
sume the proportions of an enterprise of general utility. I will explain 
how this may be done.* 

In comparing the methods of Lake Fusaro with the methods of culti- 
vating the natural sea banks, it is not difficult to perceive that if the 
mode of treating the latter is not abolished the source of production wilk 
certainly soon be exhausted. Speculation, in fact, without taking any 
care of new generations, which it would, however, be so lucrative to re- 
tain and preserve, only occupies itself in perfecting instruments to be 
used in securing oysters for the market from the artificial beds where 
they lodge. This class only exerts itself, therefore, to render the means 
of destruction more efficacious; for these beds are precisely those where 
the young ones which, in their infancy, did not abandon their place 
of birth, increase. Or, since it attacks with equal power of destruction 
the old and the young, it follows that any bed is surely destined to be 
destroyed by the hands of the very person who cultivates it. Yet we 
would be able to produce more abundant crops without ever touching 
the stock which originates them, or, in other words, that which now 
forms the sole resource of the industry. 

In order to attain so important a result it will be sufficient, in intro- 
ducing the processes employed with such success in Lake Fusaro, to 
simply modify them in accordance with the demands of the place where 
it is desired to operate. We should have the frame-work weighted 
by stones put in at its base, formed of numerous pieces, covered with 
stakes solidly attached, secured with props, &c.; then, at the spawning 
season, this apparatus should be lowered to the bottom of the sea, either 
above the oyster beds or around them. There they should remain until 
the young were produced and had covered the different pieces of the 
frame-work ; ropes, indicated at the surface of the water by a buoy, would 
permit of their being drawn up when it is considered desirable. 

These movable beds, so to speak, could be transported to localities 


——— 


“Hist. nat., 1. ix, c. liv. 


[7] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 831 


where experience has shown that oysters grow rapidly, and acquire an 
agreeable flavor, or they might be carried to some small lagoon, where 
they would always be easy of access, as in a laboratory. 

Already M. Carbonel, struck with the depression of the industry, has 
endeavored to call the attention of the government to the necessity of 
creating new beds upon our sea-coast. This useful project certainly de- 
serves to be taken into consideration, but the question of the permanency 
of this restocking can only be definitely determined by the adoption of a 
mode of operation analogous to that which has been practiced from time 
immemorial in the Gulf of Naples, and by making the salt ponds, such 
as the basin of Arcachon and the lagoons of the Mediterranean, con- 
tribute to the production. 

But this useful undertaking can only be accomplished by a careful 
initiative on the part of the government. Upon the government alone 
devolves the duty of awakening attention to the preservation and de- 
velopment of this source of food ; for the domain of the seas is common 
property. 

It is well that the administration of the French marine seems to under- 
stand the question, since it takes such great care to prohibit the work- 
ing of the natural beds during the spawning season, and to compel the 
fishermen to throw into the sea the young oysters which have not reached 
the lawful size—a measure full of wisdom, which has already produced 
the happiest results; but it should not limit itself to this intervention. 
It is necessary that the hydraulic engineers should prepare a topographic 
chart of the bottoms to be protected from invasion, and that the vessels. 
laden with the edible mollusk, which it is so desirable to multiply, should 
distribute the seed on these appropriate grounds. 

However, before beginning this work we would have to exterminate 
the mussels, the presence of which is, perhaps, a difficult obstacle to 
surmount. 

Thus the oysters from the ocean will, when we bave chosen beds suit- 
able for them, be transported by degrees from the fresh waters into the 
waters of the Mediterranean, and from the Mediterranean into salt ponds. 
which line the shores. The administration of the marine has in its hands. 
all the instruments necessary to undertake this great work, and to ac- 
complish it without hinderance, to the advantage of a grateful popuiation. 
I do not, therefore, hesitate to advise it to enter heartily into this scheme, 
and I know thatin giving this advice I point out an object which is in the: 
minds of intelligent men charged with this part of the service.* It is 
only to be regretted that the maritime guards appointed by the admin- 
istration are not numerous enough, nor sufficiently paid, so that one may 
count upon their efficient watchfulness. 


*Since the publication of the first edition of this work, artificial oyster beds have 
been created, according to my proposition, in the bay of Saint Brieuc, through the 
efforts of the administration of the marine. (See, in the appendix, two reports on this. 
subject addressed to the Emperor. ) 


$32 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


This is a question to which I beg to call the favorable attention of M. 
the minister of the marine. His active solicitude for the interest of 
these modest workers, and his desire to utilize their zeal, will inspire 
him with the thought of bettering their condition. 

A question of some importance naturally suggests itself here: it is 
that of ascertaining whether the process actually in use for breeding 
fish in fresh water can be applied to oyster culture; in other words, are 
oysters susceptible of being propagated by artificial fecundation? M. 
de Quatrefages thought so, and he advises the industry to have recourse 
to this process, which he has not experimented upon, but which he 
believes would be efficient from the anatomical researches which he has 
made upon the structure of the generative organs of these mollusks. I 
quote verbatim the note which this naturalist has published upon this 
subject, in order that all the elements of the question with which I am 
occupied may be brought together before the mind of the reader. 

“Tt is generally admitted,” said he, ‘that in oysters the sexes are 
united. Observations which I made some years ago led me to accept a 
contrary opinion. More recent researches, due to M. Blanchard, have 
confirmed these first results, and I believe that we should consider these 
mollusks as having the sexes distinct. Experience has taught me that, 
among mollusks which present this condition, artificial fecundation 
readily sueceeds. Thenceforth we would be able to apply this process 
to the raising of oysters as wellas to the raising of fish. Even in cases 
where the sexes might be united, I believe that the process would be 
perhaps a little more difficult, though equally applicable, and I am con- 
vinced that the industry would find here, in this application of physi- 
ology, a new source of profit. 

‘‘Several of the oyster banks upon the cultivation of which the fish- 
ing population of Mancha depends for its livelihood are so poor that it 
is necessary to abandon them. Left to themselves, the restocking is 
always very slow; in a short time a bank is so completely exhausted as 
to entirely disappear, when, as soon as we know localities favorable to 
the development of oysters, it would be easy, by resorting to artificial 
fecundation, to obtain a prompt restocking, for certain facts which I 
have had the opportunity of observing have taught me that oysters, 
once fixed, grow rapidly. 

“To stock an exhausted bank with oysters it would be necessary to 
convey the fertilized eggs to the very bottom, in order to avoid the 
losses which the currents and waves would inevitably cause. To this 
end, I believe we ought to carry on fecundation in vessels contain- 
ing a sufficient quantity of water, and then, with the aid of pumps, 
the pipes of which should be sunk to a sufficient depth, spread the eggs 
over all the places which were formerly richest. We understand, how- 
ever, that although artiticial fecundation permits of the restocking of 
these oyster fields at will, it would be useless to plant an entire bank 
more than a league in length. 


= 


/ 


[9] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 833 


‘Independently of these natural banks which we would be able to sup- 
port and cultivate, I believe that the raising of oysters, in ponds and arti- 
ficial reservoirs, would become easy by means of artificial fecundation. 
Experiments and researches are here necessary, however, to indicate the 
best processes to pursue; I will simply recall the fact here, and prove 
by the document, that oysters do not appear to dread a certain quantity 
of fresh water. Thus we find these mollusks in considerable quantities 
in Reance, for instance, at such a distance up that, at dead low tide, 
they are bathed by nearly pure, fresh water.” * 

Such are the opinions advanced by M. Quatrefages. 

The most careful researches undertaken upon the reproduction of 
oysters indicate that in all individuals, without exception, the sperma- 
tozoa and eggs are met with in the same organ, and develop there 
together. The cells in which the former are developed are the first to 
arrive at maturity, and the elements destined to effect fecundation break 
from their inclosures when the eggs, which they are to fertilize, begin 
to appear. These mollusks are, therefore, hermaphrodites, since they 
unite in one and the same organ the attributes of both the male and the 


female sexes; this is henceforth an incontestable fact. 


‘If oysters are hermaphroditic, fecundation must take place within the 
body of the animal, that is to say, either in the ovary, which is the 
more probable way, or in the canals [oviducts] which conduct the eggs 
from the ovary into the folds of the mantle, where they are to develop. 
Experience proves, in fact, that it is thus accomplished. When the 
eggs have arrived at the place of incubation, they present all the indica- 
tions of development which imply a previous fecundation. Impregna- 
tion is then an internal phenomenon accomplished before the spawning, 
I might say even before the eggs are detached from the ovary. 

To prove it, it is sufficient to remember that in the oyster the testicle 
and the ovary are one and the same organ; that in this organ the fe- 
cundating elements arrive at maturity and disappear long before the 
ovules break from the ovarian capsules which inclose them. But, if these 
fertilizing molecules disappear before the extrusion of the eggs, their 
action upon the latter must have been anterior to that extrusion; it is 
therefore while the eggs are still in the tissue of the ovary that impreg- 
nation is accomplished. They remain buried in the tissue of that organ 
a long time after this influence is exercised, and grow there considerably, 
only disengaging themselves when they have attained a sufficient size to 
break the walls of the capsules, which they distend. 

Ovarian fecundation so long before the time of the extrusion of the fer- 
tilized eggs is a fact that ought not to surprise us. We find striking ex- 
amples of it among birdsin general, and among the gallinaceous species 
in particular. All physiologists know at the present day that even one 
copulation fecundates 5, 6, or 7 eggs at a time in the ovary of a hen; that 
among the eggs poeedioed at the same time there are some which have 


* Comptes-rendus de Vv Académie des Sciences, Reance du 26 février 1849. 
S. Mis. 2? 53 


834 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


not yet attained one-fifth the size necessary for them to break their cap- 
sule and pass into the oviduct; and that they require fifteen days to: 
attain this size, without this latent fecundation showing itself by any 
appreciable sign. 

Under parallel circumstances artificial fecundation, such as is prac 
ticed among fish, would be impossible; for, to procure eggs, it would be 
necessary to forcibly extract them from the midst of the torn ovary, and 
thus remove them from their normal condition. With oysters, the im- 
possibility is still more evident; the eggs and spermatozoa, originating 
in the tissues of the same organ, could not be extracted and separated 
from each other in such a manner as to permit of their being afterward 
united in one vessel. Besides, even in case this operation should prove 
successful, it would be necessary to place the artificially-fertilized eggs 
in a suitable medium; and where could this medium be found except 
within the mantle of the female? 

Thus, in whichever way we consider the question, we must arrive at 
the conclusion that with oysters the natural processes are the only prac- 
ticable ones and the only ones we ought to advise for this industry. 
We shall come to see, in treating of the breeding of oysters at Marenne, 
what advantage the culturists of that locality would be able to derive | 
from the employment of the processes applied in Lake Fusaro. 


B.—GREEN OYSTERS OF MARENNE. 


The reservoirs in which the culturists of Marenne deposit oysters in 
order to give them a green color bear the name of claires. They are like 
so many inundated fields distributed here and there upon the shores of 
the Bay of Seudre, and spread over several leagues of space, forming 
an immense domain. Here there is carried on a curious and lucrative 
trade, the development of which is favored by the State by concessions 
made to enrolled seamen who wish to devote themselves to this kind of 
business. 

These claires differ from the fish ponds and ordinary parks in that 
they are not submerged at each tide like the latter, but only at the pe- 
riods of the high tides, which occur with the new and full moon, when 
the waves reach higher upon the land than at other times; too frequent 
submersion would be an obstacle to the end proposed. They are, con- 
sequently, not established on the immediate borders of the sea-shore, as 
certain authors have erroneously supposed. 

Those which are most favorably situated receive water two or three 
days before and after the high tides; but that depends upon their rela- 
tive distance from the shore. In this way the water they contain is 
never entirely renewed, or, if there is a complete renewal, it takes place 
only at considerable intervals of time. These intervals cannot, how- 
ever, exceed the period intervening between the epochs of the spring- 
tides without serious inconvenience to the industry; for experience 


[11] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 835 


proves that a claire which is only renewed on the eve of the day, or the 
following day, of these dry periods has less value than one which is 
inundated by the sea for a longer time; but both are endowed, though 
in different degrees, with the power of improvement and of viridity. 

The claires have no regularity of plan, nor uniformity in dimensions. 
Their size varies, however, on the average, from 250 to 300 square me- 
ters. They are surrounded by a bank of earth called chantier, about a 
meter in height and thickness, forming a dike where the amareilleurs 
walk about to keep watch or perform the duties pertaining to cultiva- 
tion; a dike which offers sufticient solidity to resist the pressure of the 
water when these pools are filled. A flood-gate fitted to an opening in 
the wall of this dike permits the regulation at will of the flow and ebb of 
the sea-water, keeping it at the interval of the great tides at a suitable 
height to accommodate the business, and allowing it to flow off entirely 
when they wish to empty the reservoir, to cleanse it, and to place the 
oysters there to become green. 

In a well-arranged claire is placed, also, at the bottom of the dike and 
around its inner circumference a ditch intended to receive the slime 

‘thrown by the waves on the central plateau which this ditch surrounds 
thus preserving the young from this injurious substance. In order to 
facilitate the end proposed, the plateau itself is slightly inclined from 
the center to the extremity, so that by means of this inclination hurtful 
matter may be carried off; but this arrangement is not absolutely neces- 
sary, and is frequently dispensed with. 

When everything is arranged, they profit by the first high tide to fill 
the reservoir, in which, when the waves recede, the flood-gate retains the 
water. The prolonged stay of these waters in this species of hydraulic 
apparatus fills the earth with a deposit of salt, which gives it qualities 
analogous to those of the sea bottom, and purges it from all hurtful 
products which it may have contained before submersion; then, when 
they think it necessary that these bottoms should be examined, they 
empty the clear pools, in order, according to the saying of the amareil- 
leurs, to prepare the bottom (parer le sol). 

This preparation, which can be made at all periods of the year, takes 
place usually in March, April, and June. It consists in drying out the 
claire, in order to level it like a garden walk or a thrashing-floor; all 
foreign substances, whether dead plants or growing, are carried off with 
the greatest care, so that upon this surface, hardened by the rays of the 
sun, there may be no obstacle to the free development and the acclima- 
tization of the edible mollusk which is proposed for cultivation. 

In about two or three months the soil is prepared, that is to say, it has 
taken the consistency necessary for the oysters to be buried therein. 
It is advisable then, in attempting to stock the surface, to follow the 
rules established by old experience; rules which are susceptible of con- 
siderable improvement, the introduction of which would greatly improve 
the quality of the oyster, and at the same time lower its price. Let us 


836 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


see from what source they now procure the shell-fish which are imbedded 
in these fields of cultivation; we shall afterwards tell how they proceed 
in the arrangement. 

About the month of September.in each year, when the spawning 
season is passed, and the opening of the fishery gives to each one the 
right to obtain his supply of oysters from the public beds, all the popu- 
lation of Marennes meet there; men, women, and children rival each 
other in activity to take part in the harvesting. At low tide they are 
seen running towards the beds which they discover, detaching from 
them the oysters which the laws permit them to extract, placing them 
afterwards in store in the spacious live ponds, where they are preserved 
until the time of sale, or until that of their distribution in the claires. 
At high tide, the deep beds are incessantly raked by the sailing- 
vessels, which detach from them the oysters by means of a dredge, 
a kind of iron rake, furnished with a net which collects all that the 
instrument loosens. But as this mode of operation involves consider- 
able expense, only a few persons are able to practice it. 

As they withdraw the oysters from the sea, they place them provi- 
sionally, as I have said, in these live-ponds, situated immediately upon 
the border of the sea-shore, and which differ from the claires in being 
recovered at each tide, which is twice a day. There these oysters live 
as they do on natural beds; they are kept white, and continue to in- 
crease in size. The largest, those which have attained adult age when 
they are deposited, are ordinarily destined for the use of the surround- 
ing country, where the wives of the fishermen go to sell them. The 
young ones are preserved for nourishing in the claires. But, at present, 
the natural beds of the neighborhood do not meet the requirements of 
this trade; about a third of the young which they introduce into these - 
reservoirs come from the coasts of Britanny, Normandy, and Vendée. 
They are brought by vessels, on which they are loaded in sea-weed, and 
where they can remain eight or ten days without alteration. But when 
the voyage is prolonged beyond that time, they are obliged to put them 
into the water to moisten them (faire boire); then they gather them up 
again, and thus gradually conduct them to their destination. 

These foreign oysters never acquire the excellent flavor of those which 
are taken in this locality. They allow them in vain to stay a long time 
‘inithe claires. The improvement which they undergo in becoming green 
(verdissant) never effaces completely the traces of their primitive nature. 
They remain tough notwithstanding the new qualities which cultiva- 
tion gives them, and preserve a certain sharpness which connoisseurs | 
know how to distinguish. It is the same with them as with the adult 
native oysters. When they attain this period of their existence, their 
coloration is nothing more, if I may be allowed the expression, than a 
false stamp, by the aid of which speculation gives to them a higher 
mercantile value, thus compromising by this fraud, unfortunately too 


[13] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 837 


common, the future advantages of the trade. It is not sufficient that 
these mollusks acquire a particular distinguishing flavor; it is not 
sufficient that they contract greenness (viridité); it is necessary that 
these qualities be impressed upon them in their early stages of ex- 
istence by the continued influence of cultivation in the claires. That is, 
in fact, the sole guarantee of their real value. 

Thus the cuitivators of oysters in Marennes who desire to satisfy 
their patrons and to preserve a good reputation for their products never 
admit any except young oysters in their reservoirs, in order that the 
action of the improving agents, being exerted upon them as they de- 
velop, may become constitutional. They choose anfong those from the 
storage-ponds the youngest which the laws permit them to detach from 
the natural beds of the country, that is to say, those of twelve or 
eighteen months, which are from 5 to 7 centimeters long. The amareil- 
leurs in making a choice give the preference to those having the best 
shape, separating such as adhere together, freeing them from all foreign 
substances, and making, so to speak, their toilet, before admitting them 
to this new regime. 

When this sorting is finished, they spread them out with long-handled 
rakes on the bottom of the elaires, previously prepared to receive them, 
taking care afterwards to spread them out with the hand in such a 
manner that in growing larger they will not crowd each other, and, by 
their mutual contact, interfere with each other in the free movement of 
their valves and the preservation of their regular forms. . The ostracul- 
turist, in a word, imitates the plan adopted by the agriculturist in re- 
setting his plants. He plants about 5,000 to the journal of the claires, 
that is to say, in the space of 33 ares. The young colony, installed 
in this new home flourishes under a covering of water, which is kept at an 
average height of from 18 to 30 centimeters, is never renewed except at 
the great spring-tides, and which rises only at these epochs, descending 
again to its former level after each periodical submersion. The calm 
and repose which the new-comers enjoy in these tranquil basins are 
so mantained that nothing more is needful after installation than to pro- 
vide against accidental causes which may produce some disturbance, 
and this then becomes the object of constant solicitude. 

When the great spring-tides advance or decline, the workers care- 
fully watch the movement of the waters. They see that they flow in 
. and out freely, repairing the timbers which the waves displace, and 
neglect nothing to insure the proper working of the hydraulic apparatus 
which each claire represents. If they do not take the greatest care to 
preserve the integrity of the reservoirs, fissures cause leakages which 
will diminish the mass of water, so that there will not remain suf- 
ficient to preserve the oysters against two influences equally injuri- 
ous, that of great heat, and of rigorous cold. Their vigilance must, 
then, be redoubled ahener er excesses of temperature are to be ex- 
pected. To secure the water they completely close the opening of the 


§38 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] © 


flood-gate, at the first great spring-tide in order that the claire may 
remain full; and, thanks to this measure of foresight, the oysters are 
placed at a depth where the causes of mortality from which they seek 
to preserve them cannot so easily reach them. The culturists who 
are not sufficiently vigilant in this respect soon become the victims of 
their carelessuess. In 1820, the precautions of which I speak not having 
been taken in time, the colds of the first days of January became sud- 
denly so severe that the waters of these claires and the oysters them- 
selves, not having sufficient depth of water, were frozen so that it 
was impossible to remedy the disaster. The entire crop perished in 
one day. 

If the waves of the sea did not bring in upon the bottoms of the clatres 
a mass of slime, the deposition of which is favored by the stagnation of 
the waters, there would be no more to do, as I have already said, but to 
leave the oysters in repose on this well-provided bottom, where abun- 
dant nourishment is secured for them. They would be brought to 
perfection under the influence of this clear water; quickly becoming 
fat, large, and green, without receiving any other care; but the slime, 
progressively accumulating, threatens to destroy them, and will infal- 
libly become a deadly poison to them, if they are not quickly withdrawn 
from its influence ; and the slime is all the more fatal as it attacks every 
individual at the same time. Industry has succeeded in protecting the 
oysters from these unhealthy sediments by transporting the whole pop- 
ulation from a claire in operation to a claive at rest, and by renewing 
the operation whenever necessary, until the maturity of the crop. To 
provide for all the needs of the experiment, it is necessary to have at 
their disposal a greater number of reservoirs than is actually necessary 
to lodge the oysters while they are perfecting. There are in the environs 
of Marennes speculators who possess 20 or 30 of these reservoirs, of 
which 8 or 10 are always at rest, in order that they may put them to 
use as soon as a claire becomes slimy and obliges them to transfer the 
crops to a vacant one. By the aid of this transfer, several times re- 
peated, they preserve their crops and give them, at the end of a certain 
time, qualities which those do not possess, in the same degree, which 
have received less prolonged care. 

It becomes necessary to repair the claires at the period of the equinoctia] 
spring-tides, which are the strongest and the most injurious on account 
of the great quantity of slimy matter which they bring; but these periods 
are not the only times when a change must be made. It may happen 
that the earthy deposits will necessitate a removal at other seasons; 
generally it is done only once a year. The producers who have not at 
their disposal a sufficient number of claires are content to cleanse their 
oysters and replace them on the same bottom, thus carrying on their 
business under very unfavorable conditions, but nevertheless profitably. 

It requires a sojourn of two years in the claires for oysters twelve or 
fifteen months old at the time when they are placed there to attain a 


[15] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 839 


suitable size; it takes three or even four years to give them the degree 
of perfection which characterizes the best products of Marennes. But 
the greater number of those which are raised in claires are, unfortu- 
nately for the trade and for consumption, far from having these good 
qualities. Placed when adult in the reservoirs, they become green in a 
a few days, and speculators, abusing a property which adds to the 
mercantile value of their products, carry them to market without having 
taken the trouble to give them the benefit of prolonged cultivation. 
Thus they avoid all the expenses of manipulation, and can prepare several 
crops each year upon the same bed. It is this that enriches oyster- 
culturists. 

The oysters of Marennes donot become green in summer, either because 
during this season the claires lose the property of transmitting this color, 
or because the oysters, having become milky, are then opposed to this 
influence. Those which had previously experienced the effects blanch 
by degrees as the time of reproduction approaches, and, when the spawn- 
ing season has come, lose their color entirely; on the other hand, white 
oysters deposited at this period of the year remain white. ‘They do not 
recover from this temporary loss until some time in the month of August, 
and itis notatall inconvenient for the trade, as the coloration reappears 
immediately after spawning. This coloring is not general; it shows 
itself particularly upon the respiratory organs, that is to say, upon the 
four branchial lamine. The internal surface of the first pair of labial 
palpi, the external surface of the second pair, and that portion of the 
intestinal canal which surrounds the exterior of the great attaching 
muscle also show visible traces of it. No other organ is affected by it. 
The liver, it is true, presents a more or less intense greenish tint; but 
this tint is by no means equal to that of the gills and the labial palpi. 
The green matter which thus invades the parenchyma of the organs 
which it prefers, invades the contents of the cells which form the tissues 
of these organs about the same as the substance which colors the yelk 
of a bird’s egg, or the corpus luteum of the ovary of amammal. Chemical 
analysis leads us to believe that this matter must be distinct from all 
ereen substances, animal or vegetable, studied up to the present day, 
for reagents do not affect it in the same manner.* 


*T give here the result of experiments which M. Berthelot has had the kindness to 
make, at my request, with a view to determine the nature of the matter which colors 
the branchi of the oysters of Marennes. 

These organs have been treated successively : 

First. By water, which has become slimy without being colored or diminishing the 
color of the gills. 

Second. By ether, which likewise had no action upon the coloring matter. 

Third. By crystallizable acetic acid, which precipitated traces of a yellowish sub- 
stance which was neutralized by the yellow prussiate of potash, though it increased 
considerably the coloring of the gills. 

‘Fourth. By cold potash, which diminished the coloring precipitated by the acetic 
acid, but without causing it to disappear. 

By this series of manipulations the branchiz lose their coloration in part, and are 


840 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16], 


Authors do not agree upon the origin of this coloring principle. Some 
suppose that it is the soil itself which contains it; others that it is an 
animalcule ( Vibrio ostrearius), or certain alge which produces it’; others, 
finally, attribute it to a sort of jaundice or to a diseased state of the 
liver, whose superabundant secretions tinge with green the parenchyma 
of the respiratory apparatus of the animals influenced by the treatment 
to which they are subjected in the claires. , 

Of these three opinions, the one which attributes the power of pro- 
ducing a green color to the nature of the spoil would seem most nearly 
correct. Both the comparative analysis of the soil taken from the claires 
which produce the green color and from those which do not, and the 
experiments of the commission of pisciculture of La Rochelle,j have at 
least a tendency to establish this. These experiments prove that the 
bluish-green marls have, like the soil of Marennes, and to the same 
degree, the property of coloring oysters; so that, according to the re- 
sults which this commission has obtained in the artificial basins where 
they have pursued their experiments, it would be safe to conclude that 
whenever we can organize clay reservoirs upon our coast, similar to 
those of which I speak, we will succeed in creating the same industry 
as upon the shores of the Bay of Seudre. 

This industry, extended to districts in which it has not yet been 


disintegrated into viscous flakes, in the midst of which the coloring matter is con- 
centrated. 

Fifth. The green substance treated by sulphurous acid in solution is not Ceprived 
of color; on the contrary, it is deepened in color as by the acetic acid. 

Sixth. Treated by chlorine water the color entirely disappears. 

Seventh. Heated to ared heat and incinerated, then treated by a drop of diluted 
muriatic acid, it gave a blue precipitate with prussiate of potash, which indicates the 
presence of an appreciable proportion of iron in the incinerated tissues. 

We may justly regard this iron as one of the essential elements of the coloring mat- 
ter, although this substance has not been isolated. 

In conclusion, the coloring matter of the oysters of Marennes does not resemble either 
that of the blood, or the bile, nor is it like most of the vegetable or animal coloring 
matters. The coloring matter of the blood contains iron, it is true; but the properties 
of this matter as well as the color are very different. 

The earth of the claires, which do not make the oysters green, and that of the basins, 
which do transmit to them this quality, differ notably in the proportions of the ele- 
ments which enter into their composition. According to the analyses which M. Ber- 
thelot has kindly made for me, independently of the ordinary elements of the soil, 
both are equally colored by the sulphuret of iron, contained in animal and vegetable 
matter in decomposition, and are impregnated with water containing salt and a little 
chloride of magnesium; but in the first these elements are much less decided than in 
the second; the sulphuret of iron is less abundant, and presents less decided tints; the 
vegetable and animal matters predominate less; the chloride of sodium is found in 
smaller quantity, and of the salts of magnesia there are only traces. Though these 
differences, seem of such little importance, may they not be the cause of the differences 
presented by the products raised in these claires? This is a point which subsequent 
experiments, made in these places, will doubtless soon clear up. 

t Rapport fait a la Société des sciences naturelles de la Charente-In ferieuires par la Com- 
mission de pisciculture, etc.’ La Rochelle, 1853. 


[17] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 841 


attempted, simplified and improved by the introduction of the methods 
of Lake Fusaro, would become the source of a much more considerable 
and lucrative commérce; but in order that it may make this advance 
itis necessary to organize the means of cultivation upon a greater scale; 
to make the reservoirs deeper in order to introduce a greater volume of 
of water when the season requires it; to raise and strengthen the dikes 
in order that they may resist a greater pressure; to connect the flood- 
gates in such a manner as to easily regulate the circulation of the 
waters; to establish reservoirs in which these waters can repose and 
settle in part before passing into the claires, and remain in reserve for 
the needs of the work. Hach establishment, thus transformed into a 
true workshop, where the action of man creates all the influencing con- 
ditions and varies them at his will, will perform at the same time the 
functions of an artificial bed furnishing seed, and of an apparatus for 
perfecting the crop; so that the oysters which have become green and 
marketable will be replaced every year in the claires by their progeny, 
which will be carefully gathered and reared in the place where they 
were born; giving thus, by this unceasing rotation, constantly renewed 
products. 

The oysters, in fact, which live in the claires become milky there as 
they do upon the natural beds. They deposit spat with the same pro- 
fusion, but this spat, finding no solid support upon the soft slime 
which the sea carries there, inevitably perish, unless they attach them- 
selves to the vertical walls of some structure or the boundary stones, by 
the aid of which, in certain localities, as at Oléron for example, they 
mark the limits of submarine fish ponds which are not uncovered until 
the great spring-tides. These live-ponds are not destined for reproduc- 
tion, for this kind of industry is not practiced upon any part of the coast 
of France; but small as is the quantity of spat (naissain, as the young 
oysters are called) which remain on the stones placed there for another 
purpose, it nevertheless indicates the benefit which might be derived 
from a mode of cultivation rationally organized. 

Collecting, in this way, the progeny of the oyster in the elaires, as they 
gather that of mussels within the inclosures (bouchots) of Hsnandes, 
stocks these artificial reservoirs with thousands of beings, each of which 
passes its life there held by an artifice, in order that it may be brought 
to perfection in adult age; such is the ingenious industry which it is at- 
tempted to create, and which awaits its Walton to utilize these immense 
riches. The products of this new mode of cultivation, obtained by 
economy, will acquire qualities far superior to those which the present 
method gives them; for, born in the claires, from parents raised therein, 
they will add to the advantages of education those of inheritance. 

The deposit of mud in the waters being the only obstacle to the pres- 
ervation of the progeny of oysters in the claires, a simple means may be 
found to remedy this evil and save the offspring. This will be to place 
for the spat at a certain height above the bottom, and in such a position 


842 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


that the molecules of mud cannot encroach upon them nor cover them, , 
solid bodies upon which they may fix themselves. If in supplying these 
points of support we should follow the example of what is done in Lake 
Fusaro, and use stakes, it will be necessary to plant them vertically, 
either at the bottom of the claire, or to fasten them to floating rafts, 
which would hold them suspended without the necessity of occupying a 
portion of the soil upon which the reproducing animals repose. ‘These 
rafts would have another advantage: they could carry movable planks, 
placed obliquely side by side like the slats of blinds, in such a manner 
as to have one side always preserved from contact with, and from the 
deposit of, the mud. These movable pieces, when covered with seed, 
could be disconnected and suspended vertically from the frame of the 
raft; we would thus imitate the process long since adopted in one of the 
basins of the arsenal of Venice, by the keeper, who raised mussels there 
artificially. But there are details of operation which experience will 
teach us how to vary in practice. The following extract leaves no doubt 
as to the success of the enterprise. 

In 1820 a salt-maker of Marenne, having parked 6,000 oysters in one 
of the claires, an intense cold killed them all with the exception of a 

dozen, which survived this disaster. But when the reservoir was 
~ emptied in order to cleanse it, instead of finding the soil nearly deserted, 
it was an agreeable surprise to discover upon the shells of all the dead 
oysters young of considerable size, which restocked the whole reser- 
voir.* The presence of these shells was sufficient to enable the new 
generation to fix themselves, and prosper there. Art must then only 
imitate the example which nature offered in this curious circumstance, 
and it will not be necessary to borrow from more or less distant countries 
the material for restocking (renouvelain), which is now obtained at great 
expense. 

When we have adopted this mode of cultivation, it will be important 
to find out if, instead of maintaining the dikes in reproductive claires 
low enough for the great spring-tides to submerge them, it would not be 
better to raise them above the level of the highest sea, in order to pre- 
vent the receding waves from washing away a part of the seed. At the 
eve of each great spring-tide the water of these reservoirs, emptied 
almost entirely by careful workmen, who leave only a necessary quan- 
tity to protect the oysters from injury, will be replaced the next day, 
so that all the conditions favorable to development will be found com- 
bined in the same degree as in the ordinary claires. These would be 
true nurseries from whence could be drawn all the elements of a new 
prosperity, since they would furnish the live-ponds with abundant seed 
easy to obtain. 4 

With the help and consent of the administration of marine, an abund- 


*Essay upon the green oysters of Marennes, M. G. de la B., president of the Tribunal 
of Marennes; Rochefort, 1821. (‘‘ Dissertation sur les huitres vertes de Marenncs, par M- 
G. de la B., président du tribunal de Marennes; Rochefort, 1821.”) 


LOK OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 843 


ance of the seed might be gathered, by very simple and cheap means, 
on the natural beds themselves without ever exhausting them. It 
would be sufficient to fix upon the beds, some time before the spawning 
period, by means of anchors or weights, a quantity of bushes tied with 
ropes, to one or more buoys; these bundles might be taken out five or 
six months after their submersion, either to be carried to the claires, 
where the sorting of the oysters which may be clinging to them could 
easily be done, or for the purpose of detaching the oysters of suitable 
size to be placed in the perfecting basins. The young ones which have 
not attained sufficient size may be left on the branches, which should 
again be placed in the reserved part of the pools, or on the beds them- 
selves; here they will grow rapidly, and from them a second and third 
crop may be taken. I recommend, with all confidence, the adoption of 
this process, as I have proof of its success. M. Ackermann, commissary 
of marine at Marennes, having caused some pieces of wood to be drawn 
out from an oyster-bed, where he had driven in the pickets at my 
request to receive new generations, found them covered with seed. The 
young attached to these fragments had collected in sufficiently large 
numbers to justify the supposition that a few stakes or fagots would be 
sufficient to stock a claire. The commissary at Marennes thus an- 
pounces the sending of the specimens in question: 

‘“‘T am happy, sir, to be able to announce to you to-day the shipping 
of a box containing embryonic oysters adhering to pieces of wood. I 
have indicated their approximate age estimated by the Oysterman 
Babeau. The specimens which you will receive come from on the rock 
called Bouchot, which M. Gabion formerly owned, where we had placed 
stakes; there is no doubt in my mind that oysters can, like mussels, be 
raised from bouchots.” 

The claires of Marennes now furnish annually for consumption 
50,000,000 oysters, the price of which varies from one france and a half 
to six franes per hundred, which, at an average of three francs, repre- 
sent the enormous sum of 2,000,000 frances. They are shipped to all the 
southern villages of France, from Bordeaux to Marseilles, and from the 
latter city to Italy and Algeria. Those which are intended for the latter 
countries are deposited in the Marseilles ponds, where they are left at 
rest some days before being reshipped. Paris consumes very few; they 
prefer there generally, as in other more northern cities, the white 
oysters of Normandy, which are furnished in great quantities. 

The oyster, therefore, is important as an article of food and of com- 
merce. Many localities along our seaboard owe to it their prosperity, 
and among those which are most noted, the banks of the bay of Seudre 
are best esteemed. On the left bank especially, the inhabitants are 
almost entirely occupied in this culture and enjoy a great reputation 
on account of the superior quality which the soil gives to the oysters 
raised there. 

To give an idea of the prosperity which this business produces in the 


° 


844 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


country, and to give a vivid description of the habits of the people who 
follow it, I could not do better than quote from a manuscript work, by 
M. Robert, a merchant of Marennes, the details which he contided to 
me with liberty to publish them: 

“A stranger, going from Tremblade to Royan, is struck with surprise 
at the number of buildings which abound along the whole route as in 
the vicinity of large cities. New houses, tastefully built and luxuriously 
furnished, rise from the center of rich vineyards; and the progress in 
building is such that ere long ''remblade and Etante will be nothing 
more than extremities of a street several kilometers in length. These 
fine houses, it may be added, are of little use to their owners, who, ill at 
ease in their splendid apartments, generally spend their time in the 
least habitable portions, thus condemning themselves to be less com- 
fortably lodged than when they had dwellings suitable to their means. 

“At first thought it would seem that the culture of oysters requires 
but little care; but quite the contrary is true. The men so employed 
work very hard at certain times. They are, however, not prevented 
from engaging in other industries, from being salt-makers and farmers; 
their work is disagreeable, as it is done in the water and mud, when 
necessary to repair and cleanse the claires. The same difficulty occurs 
in depositing and collecting the oysters. 

“The women take no part in this kind of work, except to assort 
the oysters before putting them in the ponds. Their principal work con- 
sists in selling the shell-fish. Towards the end of August, or early in 
September, as the heat decreases, great numbers of women and young 
girls can be seen going in all directions to live until April in the villages 
which they have selected. Many women sell for their husbands; others 
buy from the oyster-growers and sell again on their own account. 
There are also many who are hired, and who receive a certain sum for 
the season. When they go to their destination, they carry the oysters 
in wicker baskets carefully closed. Each one has some particular selling 
place. Some pass the day in the open air, at the doors of restaurants 
and hotels; others, more favored, have a little stall or corridor to shelter 
them. They remain there from morning until near night, and it is 
astonishing to see them enjoy such good health, exposed, as they are, to 
the cold and to the inclemency of winter. This kind of life gives the 
young girls much assurance; the stay in the city develops, also, a taste 
for dress and a certain skill in making it up. Tremblade also, on Sun- 
day, offers quite pleasing scenes. The workers of the week-day, dressed 
in their holiday clothes, are not recognizable, and these oyster women, 
with willowy forms, coquettish air, and easy bearing, agreeably enliven 
the scene. 

‘“The men are vigorous, active, and enterprising, and as the claires 
are their fortunes, they are reproached, with reason, with not respect- 
ing sufficiently, in forming them, the interests of the public and of 
the bordering proprietors. Thus cultivators are often seen contract- 


[21] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 845 


ing the bed of the Bay of Seudre, and obstructing the channels of the 
saline marshes, in order to make oyster beds. The means they em- 
ploy to accomplish this end is both simple and ingenious. They cut 
bundles of grass and transport them in boats to the localities selected ; 
then, at low tide, they arrange them in such a manner as to form small 
dams. Now it is known that the water of the Bay of Seudre contains 
mud, and in such great quantity that each tide deposits many millimeters 
of it on the ground which it covers. Ordinarily this mud, stirred up con- 
tinually by the water, would be carried out again by the receding tide, 
but being prevented by the dams, it settles, remains where it falls, and 
the bottom soon becomes sufficiently raised to receive the oysters. In 
this way dry land will often be seen where a short time previously there 
was several feet of water. 

“Thanks to the watchfulness of the authorities, these culpable 
encroachments are to-day exceedingly rare, and will no doubt cease 
entirely. Then it will only be necessary to encourage and protect an 
industrious population, who have learned oyster culture in general, and 
they will find profit in the marshes which are otherwise in great part 
useless.” 

These details I have thought of sufficient importance to mention, in 
order to give an idea of the methods of the industry of Marennes and of 
the means which might contribute to its perfection. The manuscript 
of M. Robert, and the good offices of M. Ackermann, commissioner of 
marine of that locality, were of great assistance to me, and I am happy 
to express my gratitude to the author and the officer. I also owe to 
M. Chabot, manager of the establishment for fish culture at Huningue, 
many thanks for information furnished while accompanying me in this 
investigation. 


C.—MUSSEL WEIRS (BOUCHOTS*) OF THE BAY OF AITI- 
GUILLON. 


The majority of persons who partake of the fine mussels which are 
daily served upon their tables suppose that they, like the oysters, come 
from natural beds. They do not know by what skill human industry 
gives to this mollusk, raised by its care, the size and the flavor which 
render it so far preferable to the poor, little, acrid mussel, frequently 
unwholesome and infested by a repulsive crustacean, with which the 
rocks and mud of our coasts are inhabited. Few authors having treated 
upon this subject, t it will be useful to describe here the processes and 


*A word formed by contraction from boutchoat, an expression derived from a mixture 
of Celtic and Irish, and signifying a wooden inclosure: bout, inclosure, and choat or 
chot, of wood. 

+The work containing the best details of the origin and processes of this curious in- 
dustry bears the date of the year 1598, and has for its title, Thédtre des merveilles de Vin- 
dustrie humaine, par D. T. V. T., gentilhomme ordinaire de la chambre du Roi, Rouen, 


846 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


to illustrate the apparatus which the genius of a victim of shipwreck 
and the experience of several centuries have applied to this important 
enterprise. 

In the Bay of Aiguillon, a few kilometers from Rochelle, upon the 
immense and sterile marsh which forms the extremity of this muddy 
bay, where up to that time the inhabitants of the coast had been 
unable to obtain any sustenance whatever, a poor Irishman, thrown 
thither by storm and shipwreck some eight centuries ago, created a busi- 
ness which now supports at ease over 3,000 inhabitants of the communes 
of Esnandes, Marsilly, and Charron, to whom he left this legacy, as if 
Providence wished that he should be able to repay the generous hospi- 
tality which had been extended to him in his misfortune. It was towards 
the close of the year 1235 that this event occurred, which was destined to 
open up to the country an era of prosperity and produce an abundance 
where before only want and misery existed. 

A bark laden with sheep and manned by three sailors was driven by 
a terrible northwest gale from the coast of Ireland and thrown upon 
the rocks at the point of Escale, half a league distant from the port of 
Esnandes. The crew and the freight would all have been inevitably 
swallowed up in the sea but for the timely help of the fishermen along 
the bleak coast. But with all of their efforts they succeeded in saving 
the life of only one of the sailors; he was Walton, the owner of the cargo, 
and became the founder of the first bowchot, a marvelous invention, the 
fruits of which have long since enriched one province, and the applica- 
tion of which to other shores will some day cause the once obscure name 
of its author to be inscribed among those of the greatest beneiac 
of the human race. 

Exiled on this barren coast, with all his fortune gone, save a few 
sheep rescued from the wreck, which afterwards, crossed with the local 
breed, produced that splendid variety known in Vendée as marsh sheep 
(mouton de marais), Walton applied his inventive genius to the prob- 
lem of obtaining a livelihood and of making himself useful in his new 
home. He therefore determined to explore throughout its length and 
breadth the immense lake of mud which lay before his eyes, and ascer- 
tain if it could not be turned to some profit. But to do this he was 
compelled to walk at low tide through this liquid mud, which slipped 
from under his feet and formed an obstacle to the realization of his 
purpose. 


XN 


1598, chez J. Caillove, Cour du Palais (trés-rare). In 1752, Mercier Dupaty, treasurer 
of France, inserted in the reporis of the Royal Academy of Rochelle a Memoir on the 
bouchots for mussels, which he had previously read two years before at one of the meet- 
ings of this academy. In 1835, M. C. @Orbigny, sr., wrote a memoir in favor of the 
bouchot fishermen, containing documents and statistical reports proving the importance 
of this business. This work has been republished, partially, but with additions giv- 
ing it greater importance, in the Annales de la Société @agriculture de la Rochelle, for the 
year 1846, under the title of A/émoire sur les bouchots & moules des communes @ Esnandes 
et de Charron. 


[23] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 847 


In the presence of this first and very serious difficulty, the idea struck 
him of building a canoe of the most ingenious simplicity, by the aid of 
which, without other impulse than that of the foot, he could glide over 
the mud with the rapidity of a trotting horse, visiting remote localities, 
and being able, thanks to this new instrument, to devote himself from 
this time to all enterprises which he thought useful. He noticed that 
the sea birds and land birds, which skim along the surface of the water 
during the twilight, collected in sufficiently large numbers to form an 
object of lucrative trade, if suitable snares could be devised for their 
capture. Ue used for this purpose a particular kind of net invented by 
him, and called filet @allouret,* or night net. 

This immense net, of two unequal meshes, was 300 to 400 meters in 
length, by 3 meters in height, fastened upon long stakes driven in the 
mud to the depth of a meter; it was stretched carefully above high-water 
level like a curtain, in the meshes of which all the birds flying in that diree- 
tion would be caught. Walton was not engaged in bird-catching very 
long before he discovered that young mussels attached themselves in 
great numbers to the submerged stakes which upheld his net, and he 
perceived that if they were suspended a certain distance above the 
mud, they would not only grow larger, but be of much finer flavor 
than those beneath the mud. This discovery was to him a veritable 
revelation. He increased the number of stakes, and, like the first, these 
became covered with young mussels, which increased in proportion to 
the number of stakes provided for these growing colonies. After the 
success of such an experiment, he became convinced that the progeny 
of the native mussels could be gathered and bred in artificial reservoirs, 
and that this culture might be made a great industry. To this important 
work he consecrated henceforth all his efforts. 

The methods which he applied were so happily adapted to the per- 
manent necessities of the new industry, that after the lapse of eight 
centuries they are still employed by the people who were so greatly 
enriched by them. In putting up his structures he seems to have 
desired that they should serve the most useful purpose to his contem- 
poraries, and at the same time remind their descendants of kim, since he 
gave, them the form of the letter V, the first letter of his name, as if he 
wished that his monogram should be inscribed on all the points of this 
swamp, fertilized by his genius, hoping, no doubt, that in time a suitable 
monument would be erected by a grateful public to the memory of the 
founder. According to the plan described below he constructed his first 
establishment, upon the model of which the 490 bouchots now in oper- 
ation along the Bay of Aiguillon were built.t 

Referring to a document published towards the close of the sixteenth 
century, we find that it was in the year 1246, ten years after his ship- 


*Allawrat, or allaurat, from which comes allouret, isa word compounded of Celtic and 
old Irish, which signifies a dark-night net: d’allaow, obscurity, and rat or ret, net. 
tSee plan of the Bay of Agiuillon, on page 


848 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


wreck, that Walton began this construction. The scattered stakes 
which he had used up to that time, but which were often torn up by 
wind and sea, or broken down by vessels and blocks of floating ice, 
from which causes he frequently lost in one day the fruit of months of 
labor, led him to have recourse to appliances more complex, stronger, 
and less apt to be affected by the action of the tides, and which would 
offer alarge surface to the young mussels. Hethereforedrew at low-water 
mark, following an imaginary line running from the Castle of Esnandes 
to that of Charron, where now are to be seen extensive meadows, a V, 
the apex of which, partially opened, was turned towards the sea, and the 
sides of which, extending along the coast about 200 meters, were turned 
towards the shore, forming an angle of about 45°. On both sides of 
this angle he imbedded half their-length in the mud strong stakes, 10 to 
12 feet high and 2 to 3 feet apart, which were joined at intervals by bands 
of twisted branches so interlaced that they formed solid palisades and 
resisted the waves of the sea. At the vertex of the angle formed by 
the two wings he left openings of from 3 to 4 feet, where receptacles were 
to be placed to hold the fish, which, as the tide flowed out, would follow 
the way bordered by this double hedge; thus his invention served a 
double purpose, being at the same time an artificial mussel-bed and a 
fish-trap. And so even at this day we see the bouchot fishermen, faithful 
to all the details taught them by Walton, going in their canoes (acons ) 
before the sea recedes, to station themselves behind the entrance of each 
trap, in.their hands a net called avenau, to devote themselves to fishing 
until the tide leaves their boats, and they can then fill them with mussels, 
and bring them back to port by gliding over the mud. 

It is quite a curious spectacle to witness the return of this singular 
fleet, composed of hundreds of canoes, gliding here and there through 
all he openings in the palisades, where they disappear during their work, 
slipping along the surface of the mud like a flock of birds driven by the 
tide. Itis impossible to describe the grotesque maneuvers of this strange 
looking fleet. These acons or foot-canoes (pousse-pieds) are nothing 
more than plain wooden boxes, about nine feet long by about 18 inches 
deep, the front of which is shaped into a kind of prow. The fisherman 
places himself in the stern, supporting his right knee on the bottom, 
leaning forward, seizes the two sides with his hands, leaving his left 
leg, clad with a long boot, hang over the side to serve as a propellor. 
When he has thus balanced himself, he plunges his free leg into the 
mud, which serves him as a point of support, withdraws it, then pushes 
again, and, by repeating this maneuver, he propels his boat easily and 
guides it wherever his presence is required. By long habit these fisher- 
men have learned to distinguish, even in the darkest night, their own 
bouchots from those of their neighbors, notwithstanding all the mazes 
of the immense labyrinth which is formed on the marsh by the 6,000 
palisades which cover it. 

This was the ingenious though simple device which Walton invented, 


= [25] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 849 


to explore, at low water, the Bay of Aiguillon, and which enabled him 
to carry out plans and perform work which, without its aid, he could 
never have undertaken with such a muddy and mobile surface to contend 
against. Besides, this apparatus is to this day of prime necessity in the 
business. The inhabitants of Esnandes, Charron, and Marsilly not only 
use them to bring in their mussels, or to keep up their colonies, but they 
also transport in them all the wood with which they build their inclos- 
ures and palisades. In such a case a single canoe is not enough; they 
join three together abreast, tying them in front and behind with cords, 
which they pass through holes prepared for the purpose, then, loading 
the stakes and the branches on the middle canoe, they take positions 
on those at the sides, and push, one with his right leg the other with his 
left, by their united efforts directing the cargo toward the place of its 
destination. The alder and the snow-ball (obier), one employed for the 
thatching, the other for the stakes, are the only kinds of wood used in 
constructing the bouchots. 

There is one season of the year when it would be very difficult to pro- 
pel these canoes but for the timely assistance of a small crustacean, the 
Corophium longicornis, which, in following marine worms upon which he 
feeds, smooths the irregularities and rough places in the mud, which, 
hardened by the rays of the sun, would otherwise offer great obstacles 
to the movements of the fishermen. 

‘What a thousand men,” says M. d’Orbigny, sr., ‘could not effect 
in the whole summer, is performed in a few weeks by the hordes of 
these little animals, scarcely 4 lines in length and a line and a half in 
diameter; they fill up the fissures, and smooth the surface; they loosen 
the mud which is carried out of the bouchots and even out of the bay 
by the sea at each tide; and, but a short time after their arrival, the 
marshes present aS smooth a surface as at the close of the preceding 
autumn. 

‘““The Corophies first appear towards the end of April; about this time 
also the burrows of which I have spoken are inhabited by innumerable 
annelids of many species. All these marine worms, which appear in the 
month of March, as soon as the tide begins to cover them, hold them- 
selves in readiness at the openings of their retreats to seize the animal- 
cule which are floating by, secreting themselves and sinking in the mud; 
but as soon as their enemies come they are seen no more. The Corophies, 
which are very fond of them, wage upon them a war of extermination ; 
they pursue them incessantly, even in their retreats in the depths. 
Nothing is more interesting for the observer thap to see these little 
crustaceans at the rising tide moving about in all directions, striking the 
mud with their long antenne, beating it to discover their prey. Should 
they meet a Nereis, an Amphitrite, an Arenicola, frequently a hundred 
times their own size, they unite and seem to act in concert in attacking, 
killing, and devouring it, continuing the carnage until they have searched 
everywhere and nothing remains to satisfy their voracity. 

S. Mis. 29 54 


850 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


‘* These animals, which seem to multiply during the whole of the warm 
season, generally quit our marshes towards the end of October; they. 
go all at once, in one night, and spread over the high seas, and not one 
can be found where a few days before they were innumerable.” 

Walton realized from his first structure all the suecess which his ex- 
perience with the isolated pickets in the first instance had led him to 
hope for, but still he did not entirely give up for this the use of the 
isolated stakes. He drove a considerable number on the sea-shore, 
using them afterwards to fill up the gaps in the wattle fence which the 
young of the year did not fill up, and in the succeeding spring the fine 
mussels which he raised in these artificial beds were preferred to all 
others. His neighbors, struck with the advantages he had obtained 
through his industry, followed his example with such eagerness that 
soon the whole marsh was covered with bouchots, and at the time these 
lines are being written a forest of about 250,000 stakes is permanently 
in use to support 125,000 fascines bending every year under the weight 
of a crop which a whole fleet of vessels of the line could not carry. 
These stakes are trunks of ‘trees, measuring 12 feet in height and 6 
inches in thickness, which are driven down into the mud half their 
length, thus leaving 6 feet above the surface; planted about 40 or 50 
centimeters apart, they are arranged in double rows, according to 
Walton’s plan, and extend some 200 to 250 meters, each pair forming a 
V, with the point towards the sea. The upper ends of the stakes, that 
is, the ends out of the mud, are interlaced with wicker-work formed 
from the branches of the obier, which are not less than 25 to 30 feet long, 
and by twisting them the long colonnades which support them are con- 
verted into solid stockades, covered like basket-work. But the wicker- 
work does not extend entirely to the bottom, stopping a few centimeters 
above its level, so that the water may flow freely between, both at the 
rising and ebbing of the tide. Its lower side does not touch the mud, 
and the whole weight rests on the poles; they, of course, must be placed 
sufficiently near each other to offer a great number of points of contact, 
for without this precaution the wicker-work, weighted by the mussels, 
would bend in the long spaces between the supports so as to touch the 
bottom and promote the accumulation of soil by opposing an obstacle 
to the mud which the tide carries, or, being broken by it, the expenses 
of cultivation would be so increased as to ruin the business. A distance 
of two feet is sufficient; a distance of a meter would be disastrous. 
The question, therefore, is whether narrower intervals will not cause a 
more rapid filling of the Bay of Aiguillon, and whether, in favoring the 
culture of mollusks, the interests of navigation, of which the minister of 
marine ought to be the vigilant protector, may not be put in jeopardy. 

A eareful exploration of the Bay of Aiguillon during an ebbing spring- 
tide completely reassured me on this point; I discovered that the ebb- 
ing sea encountered just as much opposition from the stakes which 
hold up the wings of the douchots. Striking against them, the waves 


127] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. '* Soe 


were separated, only to fall with greater force on the next ones. If the 
wind is northwest (which is usually the case in this locality) the strug- 
gle between the waves and stakes is plainly visible. A depression of 
the mud in the direction of these wings proves that the erosions could 
only be caused by the rushing of the waves against the obstacles in the 
way: therefore there is no doubt that if the stakes be driven 2 or 3 feet 
apart they would not cause any deposit of alluvium. If their presence 
could produce so unfortunate a result, the portion of the Bay of Aiguil- 
lon near Charente, where there have been for centuries more than 
150.000 stakes, should now be much more filled up than that of Vendée. 
where there has never been one driven; the fact, however, is quite the 
contrary. The minister of marine need, therefore, have no scruples in 
permitting this great industry to be developed to its utmost extent. 
The pursuit of this industry is not incompatible with the interests of 
navigation. I therefore join my wishes to those of this industrious 
people, and call the attention and solicitude of the government to their 
work, that the watchful protection heretofore given them may be con- 
tinued. . 

The palisades which the stakes support are not less than 200 to 250 
meters in length each, by 6 feet in height. They are, as I have said, 
grouped in the form of V’s, to constitute weirs or bouchots, and these 
bouchots are so arranged as to always present their vertices toward the 
sea, and prevent the waves from attacking their flanks. These pali- 
sades, to the number of thousands, form 500 weirs, and each weir is at 
least 450 meters long; so that the whole forms a vast wicker-work of 
225,000 meters in length and 6 feet high. This immense apparatus 
extends over a surface of § kilometers in the Bay of Aiguillon, oceupying 
all the space between the points of St. Clement and the mouth of the 
river Marans, in the communes of Esnandes, Charron, and Marsilly. 

The majority of the fishermen own several bouchots, as some farmers 
own several farms. The poorest of them have for their whole pat- 
rimony only the half, third, fourth, or even the fifth part of one of these 
structures, which they work in common with their partners, dividing the 
profits and losses proportionally. 

All these structures are arranged in four series, each of which has its 
different use, according as it is near to or distant from the shore. They 
are called by the names of bouchots du bas ou Maral, bouchots batards, 
bouchots milloin, and bouchots Tamont, names which refer to the zone 
which each series occupies in the topographic plan of the bay. 

The bouchots du bas are the most distant from the shore, and are left 
dry only at the lowest tides. Instead of being built in palisades. as the 
others, they are composed simply of stakes driven about a third of a 
meter apart. These solitary stakes, if I may so express myself, are in 
the zone most favorable to the preservation of the embryo mussels 
which attach themselves to them. In other places this spat. composed 


852 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [28] 


of exceedingly delicate animals, would too often be left exposed, and 
could not well resist the prolonged action of the sun or of extreme 
cold. It is therefore here that all the seed is allowed to grow and accu- 
mulate which is intended afterwards, by means of transplanting and 
rearranging, to replenish the palisades which are empty or too scantily 
furnished, and the series which the sea uncovers very often; for the in- 
habitants of the country use agricultural expressions to designate the 
different operations of their industry they say sowing, planting, trans- 
planting, weeding, pruning, and harvesting the mussels. 

Towards the mouth of April, this seed, fixed in February and March 
to the solitary lower bouchots (bouchots daval), hardly equals in size a 
grain of flax, and is then known under the name of naissain; by the 
month of May it has grown as large as a pea, and by July attained the 
size of a bean, and is then called renouvelain; at this time the trans- 
planting oceurs. 

When the month of July has arrived, and the spat has acquired, in 
its cradle, the size of the seed-mussel, it is considered sufficiently devel- 
oped to undergo the change and to acclimate itself to a spot some: 
what less favorable, where, before this period of its age, it would have 
suffered. The fishermen push their boats out to the points in the marsh 
where the spiles are filled with this seed. 

They detach by scraping, with the aid of a hook fastened in a handle, 
as many shells as they will be able to transplant at low water, heaping 
up these shells in baskets, and directing their canoes towards the near- 
est palisades, the bastard weirs (bouchots batards), which are uncovered. 
after ordinary high tides, and there begin the work of stocking (la bd- 
tisse). 

Then, taking each parcel separately, they inclose it in a bag of old 
netting; then they place all these colonies among the branches, one 
cluster after the other, the individuals of which, bound together by 
their byssus, form distinct families; filling all the interstices with this 
stock (bdtisse), as a mason would do who inserts plaster to convert | 
open stone-work into a wall; with this difference, however, that here 
one must always place the families so far apart that the increase of one 
community shall not obstruct that of its neighbors. The bag in which 
they were wrapped soon decays, and nothing prevents these isolated 
colonies from extending their limits by the development of individual 
members. They grow up in this new abode and finally touch one an- 
other; so that these immense palisades, when these clusters completely 
cover them, resemble the sides of a wall blackened by a fire. 

When this state of things has arrived, and the mussels are so large 
as to touch each other, their resistance to the action of external con- 
ditions is much stronger than when in their young state. They may be 
thinned out, when too thick, to make room for younger generations, and 
to transfer those which are detached from the bastard bouchots, which, as 
I have already said, are not uncovered during ordinary tides, to the 


v 


[29] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 853 


empty fascines in the middle bouchots, which are uncovered at low water 
during all tides. Here the same operation of placing the mussels in 
bags, which has already been mentioned, is repeated, before assigning 
them to anew dwelling place, where they may continue to grow and 
expand without hindrance. They are not, however, so carefully 
wrapped as when younger and taken from the first series, because their 
size is now such that they can be put in position more easily and securely 
without the help of this fastening. 

Thus the work of distribution goes on as long as there remain on the 
solitary stakes of the deep water bouchots any young which can be 
transferred to the wicker-work, taking advantage at all seasons, at all 
hours of the day and night, of the low tides, the only times when they 
are able to prosecute this laborious culture. If the scaffoldings, upon 
which they have so carefully placed their crop, give way or break, they 
repair the damages, replace the stakes which can no longer be used, 
change the position of the mussels that are not lying properly, and take 
precautions for the preservation of the whole establishment. 

Ordinarily, after ten months’ or a year’s residence upon these artificial 
beds, the mussels become marketable. Then, before offering them to 
the consumer, and to make room on the intermediate palisades, these 
colonies are subjected to a third and last transplanting. Those which 
have attained the desired size pass accordingly into the bouchots of the 
inner series, which are more accessible from the shore, as a sort of depot 
where they are more easily handled. They live here, though left dry 
twice a day by the sea, and, thanks to this continuous changing, there 
is no fear that the crop will suffer or the culture be interrupted. 

The mussels thus raised, although developed side by side on the 
same wicker-work, have not all the same qualities. Those which 
occupy the higher rows are better than those in the middle rows, and 
so the latter are preferred to those in the lower rows, which, being 
nearer the mud, are defiled by it whenever it is disturbed by the action 
of the waves. Only enough of it arises, on the contrary, into the upper 
series to furnish the mussels with the nutritious molecules, the infu- 
soria which abound in this diluted mud, and this is really the cause of 
the difference.. However, notwithstanding this difference, the poorest 
of the cultivated mussels are sufficiently improved by the care bestowed 
upon them to be far preferable to the best mussels grown in the sea. 

This mollusk, on account of its abundance and cheapness, has become 
the daily food of the indigent classes, and is sold at all seasons of the 
year. But there is one period during which its flesh is more tender, 
more savory, and fatter than at any other season. This period begins 
in July and extends into January. From the close of February to 
the end of April the mussels are milky (laiteuwses). They lose, like the 
oyster during the spawning season and during the period of incubation, 
the qualities which they previously possessed. Poor and tough, they 
are at such times less sought after. From July to January, therefore, 


854 REPORT OF COMMISSIQNER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [30] 


the business is most important, and the greater portion of the crop is 
sold. 

When it is desirable to: supply the neighboring villages or cities not 
far distant, the fishermen draw their canoes to the shore filled with 
mussels. The women then take charge of them, transport them first 
into caves dug in the foot of the cliff, where they keep their implements 
and building materials. They first wash them and then arrange 
them in baskets and hampers, which are either loaded on horses or in 
carts, and then as soon as night sets in, no matter what the state of 
the weather, they start with their cargoes towards the point of destina- 
tion, arriving sufficiently early to be present at the opening of the 
market. Thus they travel to Rochelle, to Rochefort, Surgeres, Saint- 
Jean-VAngély, Angouléme, Niort, Poitiers, Tours, Mauzé, Angers, 
Saumur, &e. About 140 horses and 90 carts, making altogether to these 
different cities more than 33,000 trips, are employed annually in this 
service. 

If, on the contrary, they wish to export to greater distances, and on 
a larger scale, 40 or 50 barks coming from Bordeaux, the isles of Ré and 
Oléron, and Sables-d’Olonne, and making altogether 750 voyages annu- 
ally, distribute the crop in countries which the horses and earts do not 
reach. 

A bouchot, well stocked, furnishes generally, according to the length 
of its wings, from 400 to 500 loads of mussels, that is to say, about one 
load per meter. The load is 150 kilograms, and sells for 5 francs. One 
houchot, therefore, produces a crop weighing from 60,000 to 75,000 kilo- 
grams, and valued at 2,000 to 2,500 franes; from which it follows that 
the crop of all the bouchots united would weigh about 30,000,000 to 
37,000,000 kilograms, which at the figures already given would be worth 
about 1,000,000 to 1,200,000 frances. These figures and the abundant 
crops from which they result, give an idea of the food supplies and 
of the great benefits that may be derived from a similar industry, 
if, instead of being confined to only one portion of the Bay of Aiguillon, 
it should be extended to the whole of it, and carried from the locality 
where it originated to all the coasts and salt-water lakes where it could 
be successfully carried on. In the mean time the prosperity which it se- 
cured in the three communes of which it has become the patrimony will 
remain as an end worthy of effort; for, thanks to the precious invention 
of Walton, wealth has succeeded to poverty, and since the industry 
has been developed here no healthy man is poor. Those whose infirm- 
ities condemn them to idleness are cared for in a most generous and 
delicate manner by the others. 

“Twice a week,” says M. @Orbigny, the elder, “the housekeepers of 
each family carry their bread to be baked at the baker’s; the poor people 
or their agents, often persons in easy circumstances, who take upon them- 
selves the honorable mission when the unfortunate themselves are not 
able to go to the place, present themselves there with a basket. Each 


[31] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 855 


housewife, before putting her bread in the oven, breaks off a piece of 
dough from each loaf; the baker charges himself with the duty of mak- 
ing all these bits of dough into loaves of bread, gratuitously. Nothing is 
more interesting, for a sensible and observing man, than to be present 
on the arrival of the weir-men and fishermen, at the unloading of the 
fish; a course of lectures on morals would not be worth as much as this 
lesson of fraternal humanity. Whether by day or night, the same indi- 
gents, ranged in rows and furnished with baskets, and stationed near 
the place of unloading, receive from each of them, according to what he 
brings, the first fruits of his fishing, one a handful of mussels, another a 
few fish; this gift is bestowed with politeness, with questions which show 
the interest each one takes in the unfortunates whom he knows, who, per- 
haps, are his parents; the fisherman fears that he will bring upon him- 
self trouble by refusing them or treating them rudely; often he even has 
the gift carried to them on a horse or cart which his wife has brought 
to the landing place to receive the results of the fishery. Bread fur- 
nishes them subsistence; the surplus of fish and of mussels is sold, and 
the revenue therefrom serves to buy for them fire-wood, candles, in fact 
everything that they may need. 

‘‘ This population, entirely Catholic, fairly represents those large estab- 
lishments in North America and Germany of the Moravian Brothers. 
Everywhere are found plenty of work, good morals, cheerfulness, content- 
ment; the households are happily managed, quarrels seldom occur; 
hospitality is here looked upon as a religious duty; honesty is the foun- 
dation of all education; and the traveler, astonished at all he sees, almost 
dreams that he has found a better world.”* 

We present here according to a statistical report made in 1846, by 
M. @Orbigny the elder, the estimated cost at that time of conducting 
one of these establishments, and the annual expenses and profits of 
the 340 bouchots which were being operated by the three communes of 
Esnandes, Charron, and Marsilly. 


Cost of equipment of 340 bouchots. 


Francs 
159, 400 stakes driven, at 300 francs per hundred ....-..-..-. 478, 200 
90, 000 bundles of twigs intertwined, at 150 frances per hun- 
ARGO wots psivlcis! Vint etd shacid sein tel Datta meincloy cemeeete afet & 135, 000 
160 canoes with apparatus, at 40 frances each ...-....-.-. 6, 400 
160 pairs of boots for fishermen, at 33 francs per pair. .... 5, 280 
166 aveneau nets, rigged, at 15 frances each ........-. --- 2, 490 
400 allouret nets, at 15 francs each...--...----..----.--+ 6, 000 
200 boundary stones (bowrnes), at 20 franes each ...-..--- 4, 000 
2,000 bourolles, at 1 frane each.....-------.-- Pee eas het 2, 000 
600 pairs hampers, at 3 francs a pair.-..-.---..--- +++: 1, 800 


*Les habitants des communes littorales de Vanse de V Aiguillon, etc., au Gouvernement, 
etc. La Rochelle, 1835, p. 25. 


856 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [32] 


1, 000 fish-baskets, at 75 centimes each ...... LAME arse era aN 750 
110 pack-horses, at 350 franes each .... 22.2 fi 052.2. oe. 38, 500 
28 cart-horses, at: 380 franes each 52-2.. 022222 2. 22. 22% 10, 540 

28 carts, equipped, at 800 francs each ................. 5, 600 
Moga roe Bane Eells, eC Sn erates eat kes mre hee 696, 660 


Making the cost of each bouchot 2,049 frances. 


Annual expenses of keeping up 340 bouchots. 


Francs. 

Annual interest on 696,660 francs....... ..-....- ai tS: pemeehete 34, 833 
Cost and transportation of stakes and brush ...............-.- 64, 000 
For the repairing of canoes, boots, nets, utensils, &e- .-.-.....- 11, 000 
102,000 days’ labor of men, at 14 francs.......... 2-2... .2--- 153, 000 
42,000 days’ labor of women, at 14 frames ..........-........ 52, 500 
Feed for 138 horses, and repairs of harness, carts, &...... .-- 41, 400 
1,800 days of detention in Rochelle, at 50 centimes .... ..... 900 
Hire for lodgings for 140 families, at 60 franes each ..-....... 8, 400 
©ost:of gathering seed) -a3+ 2 feaste4 og Jb eee eer eee ae Ose 1, 400 
Old nets for wrapping, and time spent in placing them....... 18, 807 
Totals.dcctirs sees eee ce esen Bee Be peepee ub as Meo 386, 240 


Annual expenses of each bouchot, 1,136 franes. 


Annual revenue in mussels, fish, and game from 340 bouchots. 


Francs. 
To Rochelle, 60 horses make 18,000 trips annually, at 5 franes. 90, 000 
To Rochelle, 28 carts make 7,000 trips, at 20 franes ..--.--.-.-- 140, 000 
To Rochefort, 12 carts make 840 trips, at 40 franes.........-- 33, 600 
To Surgéres, 16 carts make 1,120 trips, at 20 franes ..-.. .--- 22, 400 
To Saint-Jean-d’Angély, 28 carts make 1,120 trips, at 20 franes. 22, 400 
To Angouléme, 40 horses make 1,600 trips, at 5 franes........ 8, 000 
To Angouléme, 8 carts make 320,trips, at 20 frames ..... -.-. 6, 400 
To Niort, 28 carts make 1,960 trips, at 40 francs..-..- ....--- 78, 400 
To Poitiers, 8 carts make 160 trips, at 40 francs.............. 6, 400 
To Mauzé, 8 carts make 320 trips, at 25 francs... ...... ..-- 8,000 
To Tours, 12 carts make 240 trips, at 30 frames .............. 7, 200 
To Angers, 4 carts make 80 trips, at 40 francs ... ...---.---- 3, 400 
To Saumur, 8 carts make 160 trips, at 40 frances. -..........-- 6, 400 
To Bordeaux, 32 barks make 128 trips, at 300 franes ...-..-..- 38, 400 
To isles of Ré and Oléron, 4 barks make 480 trips, at 30 frances. —_7, 200 
To Sables-d’Olonne, 6 barks make 150 trips, at 30 franes...... 4, 500 
Fish caught in the bouchots and birds caught in nets .......-- 27, 500 


[33] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 857 


Francs. 
achvouchot produces annually) 2c. - -nusmereieis tars ot sues sec 1, 500. 00 
DeEduching annual OxpPenSesi. ce vacate a aaicrcoewseh see cas 1, 136. 00 
NEL RO RO Mies zee clot ace oheise pete Rede ey eee eres + 6 364. 00 

To which should be added the interest on capital of 2,049 
TEV ENES eee Staystea ssid, eS sare afer kei Sass eeis oe ee Gp epee the we 102. 45 
MNS eM coe ac at seein sos Sahn ave en I, cht ae feetan ene .-- -466. 45 


The labor of both men and women is included above in the annual 
expenses. 

If this statistical report made by M. d’Orbigny gives a correct esti- 
mate of the condition of things, the business must have developed ¢on- 
siderably since that time (1846). Instead of the 340 bowchots then in the 
Bay of Aiguillon, there are at present nearly 500; and I do not think I 
make any mistake in these figures, for, after having taken them on the 
spot, a letter which I received from the mayor of Esnandes confirmed all 
my estimates. 

M. Belenfant, commissary of marine at Rochelle, by the information 
he was so kind as to give me, and by the interest he manifested in ac- 
companying me in my exploration, has also contributed a great deal 
toward the investigation of all the details of this industry. 


[APPENDIX TO THE FIRST EDITION.] 
D.—DOCUMENTS RELATING TO THE MARINE FISHERIES 


1.—REPORT TO HIS MAJESTY THE EMPEROR ON THE CONDITION OF 
THE OYSTER BEDS ALONG THE COASTS OF FRANCE AND ON THE 
NECESSITY OF RESTOCKING THEM. 


Paris, February 5, 1858. 

SirE: The domain of the sea, like the earth, may be cultivated; but 
this domain being public property, to the government belongs the duty 
of applying such methods as science has demonstrated to be the most 
suitable for the execution of so grand a scheme, and then leave to its 
grateful citizens the harvests which have been prepared by its care. 

I have, therefore, the honor to submit to Your Majesty, according to 
command, the various plans which promise to promote the success of 
this useful innovation. I will commence with those which relate to the 
multiplication of oysters on the shores of France. 

The oyster trade has already fallen into such a state of decadence, 
that, unless a prompt remedy be at once applied, the source of production 
will soon be utterly exhausted. 

At La Rochelle, Marennes, Rochefort, and in the isles of Ré and 
Oléron, out of the 23 beds lately forming one scource of wealth of that 
portion of our shores, 18 are completely destroyed, while the others, still 


858 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [34] 


furnishing a.small supply, are seriously injured by the growing invasion 
of mussels. The cultivators also in these regions, not being able to find 
sufficient oysters to stock their ponds and elaires for greening or perfect- 
ing, are obliged to seek them at great expense as far off as the shores of 
Brittany without being able to supply the demand. 

The bay of Saint-Brieuc, so admirably and so naturally adapted to 
the reproduction of the oyster, and which on its clean, hard bottom for- 
merly contained no less than 15 beds which were continuously dredged, 
has to day but 3, from which 20 boats could in a few days carry off the 
last shell, while in the period of its prosperity more than 200 barks, 
manned by 1,400 men, were annually employed in the business from the 
~ 1st of October to the Ist of April, and realized from it between 300,000 
and 400,000 franes. 

In the harbor of Brest and at the mouths of the rivers of Brittany 
the decadence has not been so great, because these fertile spots have 
not been subjected to such constant dredging. But inasmuch as our 
own fishermen are now compelled to resort to these beds, they, like our 
own, will soon become exhausted. 

At Cancale and at Granville, which are historic grounds for the muiti- 
plication of oysters, it is only by good management that they succeed, 
not in inereasing the supply, but in preventing its decline. While this 
important trade is steadily declining, or remaining stationary, the in- 
creased facilities of communication between the sea-board and the inte- 
rior as steadily augment the demand for these marine articles of food. 
These products, made costly by scarcity, now bring in our markets fabu- 
lous prices, and the inhabitants of the coast, consulting only their 
immediate wants, and looking only to the present hour, commit depre- 
dations which, in the near future, will aggravate their distress. 

Now, Your Majesty, there is for this deplorable state of things arem- 
edy, easy of application, certain to succeed, and which will furnish an 
incalculable wealth of food for the public. This remedy consists in 
undertaking at the expense of the government, under the direction of 
the administration of the marine and by means of its vessels, the stock- 
ing of the shores of France so as to restore the ruined beds, to revive - 
those which are declining, to protect those which are prosperous, and 
to create new ones wherever the nature of the bottom is suitable. And 
when by this generous policy these marine fields shall once more be- 
come productive, the dredging may be placed under such restrictions 
that while certain fields are being operated others may lie in repose; a 
plan which, for a century, has kept the bays of Cancale and Granville 
from the destruction which injurious dredging has caused everywhere 
else. 

To give a striking example of the method in which these operations 
of restocking and of creating new beds ought to be conducted, and of 
the immense results which may be obtained, I have the honor to recom- 
mend to Your Majesty’s government that the bay of Saint-Brieuc be set 


[35] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 859 


apart for this purpose. There the experiment may be undertaken in a 
restricted space, supervision will be easy, and in less than six months 
a fair estimate could be made of the expected results, as from a tree in 
blossom, provided the artificial beds are planted in March or April, that 
is, before the spawning season. 

The sum of 6,000 or 8,000 franes, placed at the disposal of the commis- 
sary of the marine, in that quarter, would suffice for the purchase of the 
oysters required for stocking the bay. These oysters should be caught 
in the open sea, and, if possible, carried immediately by a government 
steamer to the grounds naturally fitted for them. But, when they are 
unable to collect enough in one day to complete a cargo, they may store 
them temporarily near Plévenon, adependency of Saint-Brieue, in charge 
of two custom-houses found there, so as not to start them from this pro- 
visional storage to the places where they are to remain before they have 
a full load. 

With the aid of this simple means, and at a relatively insignificant 
cost, it will be possible in a few years, if proper precautions be adopted, 
to realize a considerable revenue in the bay of Saint-Brieue alone. 

Among these precautions, I put first, that the oysters ought not to be 
out of the water for a moment longer than is required for their trans- 
portation from the place where they are caught to their destination. It 
is owing to a neglect of this precaution that the failures in the past are 
due; for, whenever it has been observed, success has crowned the ex- 
periments, as is proven by the attempts of M. de Bon in the Rance. 

A second and not less important condition is that an intelligent and 
watchful care be given to these submarine fields, made fertile by science 
and cultivation; and to the commissary of the region naturally belongs 
the duty of exercising this care. But in order that the equipment of 
this officer may correspond with his responsibility, he should have at 
his command a pinnace, or better still a launch of 8 to 10 tons, furnished 
with a captain, four sailors, and a cabin-boy, a sufficient crew for all the 
needs of the enterprise; the launch may serve at the same time to guard 
and cultivate the tract which is assigned to its care. 

The oyster beds created or supported in this way by the government 
will always be easy of exploration and investigation. Nothing con- 
nected with them can occur without the administration being instantly 
informed of it and in condition to act. If the mud accumulate on the 
producer’s grounds, or if the mussels and the maérle invade them, the 
drag will detach the oysters’ enemies or remove the parasites as the 
plow removes weeds from the ground. If in the vicinity of the estab- 
lished beds they discover other bottoms adapted to the multiplication 
of oysters, the exploring launch may always be occupied in superintend- 
ding its domains, will seek everywhere on the natural beds the adult 
oysters required for stocking these new fields, or will sow there the 
young oysters, which in the fishing season are rejected in selecting the 
marketable oysters. So that whether we consider this craft from a 


360 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [36] 


supervisory point of view or as a means of cultivation, it will render 
services which cannot be obtained by any other means. 

Iam willing, then, considering all things, to follow the example of 
the chief of the service of Saint-Servan. 

These launches would, in the navy, form a sort of agricultural marine, 
the employment of which would not exclude the use of vessels concerned 
in the general police of the fishing vessels which are employed in a 
greater development of the coast. They should be so constructed as to 
contain a well in which experiments could be made, or in which speei- 
mens could be transported alive from one point to another. 

Without doubt, when it is necessary to restore the prosperity of the 
affected beds by delivering them from a general invasion of mussels 
(moules), such as exists now at Marennes, or from the encroachment of 
the no less injurious maérle, as at certain points in the harbor of Brest, 
the tleet devoted to the ordinary service of the region will not suffice 
for the emergency; but, on such an occasion, the boats of the fishermen, 
for whose benefit the enterprise was established, could be pressed into 
service for the treatment of these beds, by the same rights which the 
proprietors of communes exercise when they undertake the repair of a 
public road. 

The young oysters and those taken in the open sea form two sources 
from which the government vessels may secure supplies for stocking 
the coast; but notwithstanding their abundant reproduction they would 
never be sufficient to accomplish this vast project unless means are em- 
ployed to prevent the loss of the myriads of embryo oysters, which, in 
the spawning season, leave the maternal valves as bees leave their hives; 
embryos which are nearly all lost in the natural state for the want of 
something to which they may attach themselves. 

To the care of this precious spat the attention of the agents of the gov- 
ernment should be henceforth directed. 

Each oyster produces not less than 2,000,000 of young. But, if out 
of this immense number a dozen succeed in attaching themselves to the 
parent shell it is all that can be hoped for, even in years of the greatest 
abundance. Those, then, that succeed in attaching themselves are as 
nothing in comparison with the immense numbers that are swept off by - 
the waves or which are lost in the mud, or which become the prey of 
polyps, which feed upon the animalcules suspended in the waters of the 
ocean. The problem to be solved, then, is how shall this inexhaustible 
seed supply be secured and carried to the grounds which are to be 
stocked ? 

In doing this, no notice need be paid to the natural beds formed 
from the young obtained at each spawning season, although even from 
them incalculable riches might be obtained. The only thing necessary 
is to fasten around the beds a species of wicker-work made with twigs 
and branches of trees with the bark on, imbedded in such a manner as 
not to interfere with navigation, and held to the bottom by heavy 


[37] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 861 


weights. The progeny of the oysters deposited will rise like a living 
cloud of dust through the branches, and the embryos will incrust every 
available point of this structure, which will thus be made the recipient of 
seed. 

These receptacles, filled with this microscopic population, should be 
left on the beds not only during the whole spawning season, but also 
until the young cysters shall have attained a sufficient size to be used 
for restocking other localities. The government vessels will then carry 
the whole structure to the point which may be selected for organizing 
new beds. After they have been fixed for a short time, the young oys- 
ters will detach themselves naturally and sink to the bottom, previously 
cleaned by the dredge, just like the wheat from a drill on ground pre- 
pared by the plow. 

This transportation should be effected in February or March, because 
at that season of the year the spat deposited in the branches, during 
either the months of September or May, are easily discovered, the first 
having already attained the size of a 20-sous piece and the latter that of 
a 2-frane piece. It is then easy to ascertain whether the seed is scarce 
or plentiful, and in what measure it will contribute to the object in view, 
Besides, the force of vital resistance with which it is endowed at this 
age enables it to endure without inconvenience the changed conditions 
of its new abode. 

The possibility of gathering the progeay of the oysters by means of 
this wooden wicker-work is a fact established not only by the results 
obtained from time immemorial on the artificial beds of Lake Fusaro, 
an industry of which I described the methods in my Voyage sur le littoral 
de la France et de UVItalie, but also from experiments made in the ocean 
itself. Branches sunken on the beds of Brittany by M. Mallet, com- 
manding the Moustique, and on those of Marennes by M. Ackerman, 
ex-commissary of marine, were taken out a few months subsequently, 
filled with seed. I preserved them in my. collection as a proof of the 
efficacy ot the methods which I recommend. In order to derive from 
these methods incalculable benefits, it is only necessary to employ them 
on a large scale. 

I make bold to affirm, sire, that if the administration of the marine will 
draw upon the various sources [ have designated, and employ all the 
means tending to the development of the object which I have had the 
honor to recommend to Your Majesty, they will very soon convert the 
whole coast of France, except in such places as are filled with mud, into 
one long chain of oyster beds. It will be necessary for the realization of 
this scheme that the agents be encouraged to devote themselves zeal- 
ously to the service, and that they shall have placed at their disposal 
all the means requisite for the furtherance’of the object in view. As if 
by enchantment the harbor of Brest, the bays of Brittany, and the 
mouths of the rivers will extend their isolated beds and unite them, by 
the creation of new ones, into one vast productive field. The depleted 


862 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [38] 


beds of Cancale and Granville will be renewed and extended to a great 
many neighboring localities whose suitable bottoms will readily respond 
to the attempts which are made to enrich them. The basin of Arcachon, 
all that portion of the shores of the British Channel which extends from 
Dieppe to Havre, from Havre to Cherbourg, from Cherbourg to Gran- 
ville, will be covered with oysters, and the extinct beds in the neighbor- 
hood of La Rochelle, Oléron, Rochefort, Marennes, &c., will be restored to 
their former prosperity. But here, more than elsewhere, it will be nee- 
essary for the government to continue the work of restocking and di- 
vision, which it fortunately has already begun: that of cleansing, by 
repeated dredgings, these productive bottoms from the mussels and 
mud which completely cover them. 

This work accomplished, there is no reason why these ruined localities 
may not witness a return of their early prosperity and an increase of their 
wealth. The exploration which has enabled me to ascertain the state of 
suffering, of poverty, and of complete ruin in which most of the beds 
along the coast are now to be found, also demonstrated to me the fact 
that the depopulated depths had lost none of their fitness for reproduc- 
tion. The abuses by excessive fishing, aggravated by the want of care, 
have alone completed the destruction. Careful culture will soon repair 
the harm done in the past, and properly taken in charge, fields hitherto 
sterile will create, by a kind of submarine cultivation, new sources of 
abundance. But to create new sources of wealth is not sufficient; it is 
necessary, in order to perpetuate them, to define also the method of their 
cultivation, and to fix the time of year when it will be best to gather the 
crop. 

The experience of more than a century has already, in the bays of 
Cancale and Granville, given a solution of the first part of this impor- 
tant problem; regular periods of harvesting are the only means of ob- 
taining from the beds the greatest yield without destroying their fertility. 
The same general methods should be henceforth applied to the cultiva- 
tion of oyster beds; they should be divided into zones, so as not to re- 
turn to any one of them for two or three years, according as the bottoms 
are more or less suitable for the rapid maturing of the crop; but always 
taking care to leave a sufficiently large number of adults, so that the spat 
which they spread during the periods of repose may create new and sufii- 
cient harvests. By the general application of this method, the supply- 
ing of our markets and the fertility of the beds will be assured. 

There is, however, no rule so general, especially when applied to the 
reproduction of living creatures, subject to all the vicissitudes of the 
external world, that it may not have exceptions. There may exist un- 
known causes which will delay for a longer or shorter time the genera- 
tive function of the oysters of one locality or destroy their spat, and, in 
this case, the beds found to be affected ought to be kept in reserve until 
it is certain that they have resumed the regular exercise of their func- 


[39] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 863 


tions. This moment having arrived, they should be included anew in the 
alternation of regular harvesting. 

In the present state of things, the regulations of the police which 
supervise our fishing coasts, prescribe the first half of the month of 
August for the purpose of visiting the oyster beds and designating 
those which are to be dredged at the opening of the month of Septem- 
ber, which is the legal period for commencing operations; but the com- 
missioners charged with this duty cannot at that time form any exact 
idea of the actual condition of things; for a large number of oysters 
have not at this period spawned, and the spat of those which spawned 
in the month of July is scarcely visible to the naked eye. In order to 
fully recognize them recourse must be had to a magnifying glass, by 
which they can be distinguished only after drying, and by one accus- 
tomed to researches of this kind. To obtain the most satisfactory re- 
sults, therefore, it is necessary to defer the inspection of the beds until 
later in the season, that is to say, until the month of January. By the 
adoption of this measure the government will find that February or 
March, and not September, is the proper season for the opening of the 
fisheries, and by this means alone the yield will be increased at least 
tenfold. 

In fixing upon the first of September as the time for the opening of 
the fishing season, the government has undoubtedly (in a measure) acted 
wisely, as the majority of the oysters have already spawned, and there 
is not much danger of taking from the water the parent oysters still con- 
taining the spat in their interior. But this progeny, which, before the 
spawning, forms in the interior of each milky (laiteuse) oyster an innum- 
erable family, after parturition spreads itself over the exterior of the 
valves, incrusts them, and creates a new population on the surface of the 
old. Now, if at this time dredging be permitted, the harm resulting 
therefrom will be almost as extensive as though it had occurred at the 
period of gestation; for, in taking out the adult oyster, the younger gen- 
eration will also be removed, at least all that have not deserted their birth- 
place. The dredge would devastate the fields in full germination likea 
rake drawn through the branches of a fruit tree while covered with blos- 
soms. This is not one of the least causes of the impoverishment of our 
coasts. To remedy this evil it will only be necessary to change the open- 
ing of the dredging season and make it February or March instead of 
September. By that time the young oysters of the year will have at- 
tained the size of seed-oysters (huitres de rejet), and those that still adhere 
to the parent-shell can be easily detached, and either returned to the 
beds, as prescribed by law, or preserved in the étalages, as is done at 
Cancale. 

It may be said, probably, that in appointing February as the opening 
of the season there will be only three months for dredging, as in May 
the oysters become milky, and dredging is then prohibited. But this 
objection is not well taken, for six weeks of daily dredging would be suffi- 


864 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [40] 


cient to depopulate the whole coast of France. Besides, the question 
has already been settled by experience: At Cancale, one of the most fer- 
tile districts, the season extends only from March to May. The fisher- 
men of Marennes, from what I learned during my exploration of the bay 
of Seudre, will hail with gratitude such a measure. It will cause their 
exhausted beds to be once more restocked, will prevent the complete 
ruin of those which are still dredged, and, as a consequence, will relieve 
them from the heavy taxes which they pay to other countries from which 
they are obliged to obtain their supplies. | 

It will probably be also said that the interval of three months De 
tween the opening and closing of the fishing season will not suffice for 
the consumption of the crop. But the oysters which are eaten at this 
season are not then taken from the sea. On the contrary, to be admitted 
to our markets, it is first necessary that they be kept several months in 
the parcs, claires, and viviers, where they are prepared for their destina- 
tion. Now, the owners of: these pares, claires, and viviers, in which the 
oysters are brought to perfection, being always able to accommodate 
more than éan be supplied, it follows that the fishermen will always find 
a ready market for the stock on hand. 

While, by the generous intervention of the government, this industry 
may be extended to all suitable points along the whole coast, the navy 
department will be enabled easily to follow its progress, if the agents 
charged with this work be compelled to keep a register not only of the seed 
beds, but also of the establishments where the oysters are perfected, 
such as pares, claires, viviers, étalages, and bouchots ; if it instructs them 
each year to give, in this register, a complete description of the beds 
and to state which are affected and which are thriving; if, finally, it 
compels them to keep as exact an account as possible of the yield, not 
only of each bed in particular, but of all the beds contained in their 
jurisdiction, whether the yield be obtained by dredging or by hand. 

This statistical work, which I propose to extend to all the marine 
products, will form, in the archives of the central administration, a col- 
lection of documents from which to ascertain in what proportion these 
products enter each year into the public food supply, and to determine 
whether they are increasing or declining: important questions upon 
which up to this time our knowledge is very incomplete, as I have rea- 
son to know from my experience in exploring the sea-coasts. 

The methods which I recommend for the creation of artificial oyster 
beds along the ocean shores are equally applicable to the Mediter- 
ranean. While waiting for the special plans which I shall propose for 
the latter scheme, I think it would be well, sire, to authorize, as a pre- 
liminary experiment, the commissaries of the districts in which the ponds 
of Berre and of Thau lie, to begin at once gathering, from the natural 
beds of the Gulf of Lyons, in the neighborhood of Cette, a suflicient 
quantity of seed oysters, to be transported to these ponds, and deposited 
alongside of each other, on sandy and rocky bottoms, rather than muddy, 


[41] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 865 


which will there form experimental beds. These beds, protected from 
depredation by a rigid surveillance, will constitute the first step toward 
the further experiments which your majesty wi-bes to make in the salt 
lakes of Southern France. 

I am, with profound respect, sire, Your Maj.:;ty’s humble and very 
faithful servant, ; 

COSTE, 
Member of the Institute. 


2.—REPORT TO HIS MAJESTY THE EMPEROR ON THE ARTIFICIAL 
OYSTER BEDS CREATED IN THE BAY OF SAINT-BRIEUG. 


PARIS, January 12, 1859. 


StRE: Subsequent to the report in which, in February last,* I had the 
honor to submit conclusions for your acceptance, Your Majesty, desirous 
of testing the conclusions I had arrived at, and of ascertaining decis- 
ively whether the promises held out by science in regard to the cultiva- 
tion of marine products could be realized, ordered that the Gulf of Saint- 
Brieuc be made the theater of the first experiment at oyster culture 
by the government, executed by means of its vessels, confided to the 
keeping of its navy, and destined, in case of success, to serve as @ 
model for the creation along the coasts of France of a vast submarine 
industry, alike profitable in developing the navy and enhancing the 
prosperity of the coast inhabitants. 

The harbor selected for the accomplishment of this undertaking has 
a solid bottom, naturally clean, composed of shells or coral, thinly cov- 
ered with marl or mud, with scattered eel grass (pailleul), covering an 

.area of 12,000 hectares everywhere adapted to the sojourn of the parent 
oysters. The current, which at each tide sets from northwest to south- 
west and from southwest to northwest, at the rate of one league per 
hour, brings in fresh waters continually, carries off all unhealthy depos- 
its, and gains by rushing upon the rock-bound coast all the vivifying 
properties which such constant aeration communicates to it. 

The excellent bottom, the active nature of the limpid waters which 
cover ‘it, unite, then, over this immense submarine domain all the condi- 
tions favorable to the multiplication and development of this article of 
food, which I propose to introduce there, and the products of which we 
are endeavoring to transform into an inexhaustible annual harvest. 

But while in its work of intervention and conquest science recom- 
mended this as an enterprise of great public benefit, empiricism and old 
fogyism condemned it in advance as rash and visionary. It is only nec- 
essary, Sire, to recall the various obstacles which had to be overcome, 
and the amount of perseverance required for the realization of a scheme, 
the marvelous results of which I already have the honor to make known 


* See preceding report. 


S. Mis. 29-——55 


866 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [42] 


to Your Majesty; a scheme which aimed to retain on the spawning beds, 
by means of a simple device, the seed which in a state of nature is dis- 
persed by the currents, and to create sources of wealth wherever the 
bottoms are not subject to the invasion of mud. 

No region along our coast offered at the same time so vast and so ap- 
propriate a theater for drawing public attention to the solution of this 
double problem; for the bottoms are undisturbed, though the currents 
rush over them at times with such violence that superficial thinkers pre- 
judged this to be an inevitable cause of failure. Everything there de- 
pended on a triumph of art over nature, for it was necessary not only 
that material from various provinces should be transplanted to a foreign 
land, but also that the progeny of this exiled population be protected 
from the perturbation of the waters. 

It will not be out of place, sire, for the honor of science, to state here 
in detail how the dominion of the sea is made accessible to industry, 
for, in providing new methods applicable to the business, it creates, for 
its abstract studies, instruments of investigation which extend its range 
to regions yet unexplored. 

The planting of the reproductive oysters, opened in the month of 
March, closed under my own supervision towards the end of April. In 
this brief period 3,000,000 of individuals, some taken in the high seas, 
others at Cancale, and others from Tréquier, were distributed over ten 
long beds, situated in different parts of the gulf, and together repre- 
senting an area of 1,000 hectares; beds previously traced on a marine 
map, indicating the productive fields, and provided with signals in- 
tended to facilitate the movements of the vessels engaged in the stock- 
ing. But in order that the planting should be done with the regularity 
of a practical farmer, and-that the mother oysters should be sufficiently 
separated so as not to interfere with each other, a government steam- 
vessel, first the Ariel, and then the Antelope, towing the launches, and 
a basquine filled with oysters, would make alternate trips to either ex- 
tremity of the line, where a small boat, placed crosswise, designated the 
spot upon which operations should begin. Then, steaming to the other 
end, designated by another boat, it would go around this in following 
the long axis of the rectangular space designated by the flag signals, 
and return to the starting point, like a plow which makes two parallel 
furrows in a field. : 

While our tow-boat was thus engaged, the sailors beionging to it were 
placed on board the accompanying launches and employed in emptying 
the hampers, filled with oysters, which they had previously arranged in 
rows along the decks, and as they were gradually thrown overboard 
they sank to the bottom and spread themselves over the surface intended 
to become stocked by their seed. To insure the success of the work, it 
was not only necessary that the oysters should be planted under the 
conditions most favorable to their propagation, but also to build around 
and above them efficient means of securing the progeny and of compell- 


[43] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 867 


ing it to fix itself on the beds where it had commenced to spread; for 
the planting took place at the time of the first spawning. 

This second end, which transforms the gulf planted into a species of 
submarine farm, undergoing the various processes of rational cultiva- 
tion, has been accomplished, by means of two contrivances, the simulta- 
_ neous employment of which has already furnished immense results, and 
which in the near future will permit the increase of the supply to any 
extent that may be desired, provided propagation keeps pace with the 
demand. 

One of the contrivances consists in covering the productive bottom 
with oyster or other kinds of shells, so that every single embryo that 
sinks shall find a solid body to which it may cling. The shells which 
we used for this purpose were gathered on the beach at Cancale, by 
order of M. de Bon, chief of the maritime service at Saint-Servan, who 
was kind enough to lend us his assistance, and were brought to the 
gulf by a special convoy of fishing smacks, and scattered over the arti- 
ficial beds in my presence. These shells, otherwise useless, which must 
be cleared away from the beach at great expense every year, so that 
they may not encumber it, if carefully preserved hereafter, will become, 
after drying, valuable instruments of culture. 

The second appliance, which is designed to secure the embryos ear- 
ried away by the currents, and to receive them on solid bodies placed 
under the tide-whirls, which do not extend to their depths, consists of 
long lines of small bundles, placed crosswise like intersecting bars, from 
one end to the other of each bed. These bundles, perfect collectors of 
seed, formed of branches from 2 to 3 meters in length, tied in the center 
by means of a rope to a stone, which holds them 30 or 40 centimeters 
above the bottom, were put in position by men wearing cork jackets, 
who were instructed to place around each stone a few oysters about to 
spawn. The rope, which the haste of the first experiment made it nec- 
essary to use for anchoring this apparatus, will, of course, soon rot, and 
it may be necessary to replace it in future by chains made of galvanized 
iron, which can be constructed in our arsenal shops, and which will form 
a part of the permanent outfit of this new culture. 

Bearings, carefully taken, form, on special charts well plotted, the 
means of identifying the points where each line is sunken, so that there 
will be no difficulty in finding each one in succession, of raising the bun- 
dles and removing the crop of oysters, as easily as the farmer gathers 
the fruits from his trees. 

Two government vessels, the Pluvier and the Fveil, stationed at 
opposite points in the gulf, one at Portrieux, the other at Dahotet, 
visit each day the artificial beds, while a small cutter, which was con- 
structed by Your Majesty’s orders, at mysrequest, steams up the gulf 
and helps to complete the surveillance, besides rendering other neces- 
sary assistance in carrying on the work. ‘This little cutter, which is 
almost indispensable in the enterprise, should be placed under the im- 


868 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [44] 


mediate orders of M. the commissary of the marine at Saint-Brieuc, 
so that my daily instructions can be promptly executed by-a force 
selected by that agent of the administration. I think, sire, that it 
is my duty to insist that this essential part of the programme be not 
forgotten. 

These, sire, are the initiative means which have been adopted for the - 
fertilization of the gulf. Hardly six months have elapsed since they 
were put into execution, and already the promises which were held out 
by science have become startling realities. The treasures accumulated 
by the persevering application of these methods in these fully devel- 
oped fields exceed the most sanguine expectations. The mother oys- 
ters, the shells which were scattered over the bottom, in fact everything 
brought to the surface by the dredge, is covered with spat; the beach 
itself is thick with them. Never at Cancale or Granville, in the eras of 
their greatest prosperity, was such a spectacle of immense reproduction 
witnessed. 

The bundles bear in their branches and on their smallest twigs bou- 
quets of oysters in such profusion that they resemble the limbs of our 
fruit trees, which, in spring, are hidden by the profusion of their blos- 
soms. They look like veritable petrifactions. To believe such wonders 
it is necessary to be an eye-witness of them. 

In order that Your Majesty may judge with your own eyes of the ex- 
tent of these treasures, I caused to be transported to Paris one of these 
appliances for collecting the spat, together with specimens taken from 
the several beds; these will testify eloquently in behalf of our success- 
ful efforts. The young oysters which cover them are already from 2 to 
3 centimeters in length. They are simply the seed which, in eighteen 
months, will ripen and yield an immense harvest. On one bundle alone, 
occupying no more space in the waters than a sheaf of wheat in a field, 
as many as 20,000 were found. Now 20,000 oysters, when they are of - 
edible size, represent in value 400 frances, the current price being 20 
franes per thousand on the spot. The revenue from this industry will 
therefore be immense, since one may put down as many spat collectors 
as he wishes, and since each adult individual forming part of the bed 
will furnish not less than 2,000,000 to 3,000,000 embryos. The bay of 
Saint-Brieue will become in this way a perfect storehouse if, by the junc- 
tion of beds already formed, we convert the whole area into a vast pro- 
ductive field. 

All the arrangements necessary for the accomplishment of this great 
scheme can be promptly executed, sire, if the prosecution of it be en- 
trusted to those from whose intelligent zeal I have received so much aid 
up to this time. The experience which they have acquired in these first 
operations is a guarantee that what remains to be done will be brought 
to a successtul issue. 

I therefore hope that, in order that I may retain the indispensable 
assistance of two fellow-workmen, Your Majesty will deign to reward 


[45] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 869 


their zeal, and appoint from the list of officers M. Levicaire, chevalier 
of the Legion of Honor, and wearing the medal of Saint Héléne, who, 
unites with the best record thirty-nine years of excellent service, and 
- ought to be raised to the rank of commissary of marine at Saint-Brieuc; 
and that M. Bidaut, lieutenant in the navy, a chevalier of the Legion of 
Honor, with nineteen years of excellent service to his credit, will be kept 
in command of the Pluvier, with all his crew, beyond the ordinary period, 
that is to say, until the scheme that we are now engaged in be entirely 
accomplished. 

With the ossistance of these two distinguished officers and the aid of 
an inspector of fisheries, whose appointment should be immediate, so 
that the bay of Saint-Brieuc may be placed on the same footing with Can- 
cale, Granville, and Marennes, we hope in less than three years to unite 
all the beds, and have the whole surface of 12,000 hectares under full cul- 
tivation. An annual appropriation of 10,000 franes will suffice to carry 
on the work of clearing out the bottoms, buying supplies of seed oysters, 
gathering shells, repairing the structures for holding the embryos, or- 
ganizing other beds of acclimatization like the one already established at 
Plevénon, and for the creation of perfecting-claires, where the fattened 
oysters are improved by becoming green. When this project is accom- 
plished, the inhabitants of the sea-board will find in the gulf, as in a 
very productive field, an inexhaustible supply provided by generous 
foresight, and will witness on the shores an example of the different 
methods and practices connected with this oyster industry. It will prove 
at the same time a lesson and a great benefit. 

If Your Majesty consent to this proposition, I shall immediately trans- 
mit to the commissary of the marine at Saint-Brieuc, and to the com- 
mander of the Pluvier, all the instructions necessary in executing these 
delicate operations. But to preserve our artificial beds one more meas- 
ure must be brought into requisition: to order the dredgers to obtain 
their supplies at greater distances from the beds, where they may rake 
the bottom without injuring an enterprise commenced under such happy 
auspices. 

To sum up, sire, the experiment made in the bay of Saint-Brieuc has 
been attended with such decisive success that the lessons it teaches can- 
not be ignored. It proves, by a splendid result, that whenever the 
bottoms are free from mud and slime, industry, guided by science, may 
reap from the depths of the sea, fertilized by its care, more abundant 
harvests than can be obtained from the earth. I deem it, therefore, my 
duty to recommend that Your Majesty order the immediate restocking 
of all our sea-coasts, that of the Mediterranean as well as of the ocean 
itself; that of Algeria and of Corsica, not excepting all the salt lakes 
found in southern France, the fruits of which, by multiplying, will become 
a source of wealth to the poor people who inhabit the shores. But, in 
order that these operations may be successful, it is necessary that a swift 
propeller of light draught should be built and devoted exclusively to this 


870 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [46] 


service; which vessel, during the spawning season, should be subject to 
my orders, so that I may visit all the centers of these great phenomena 
of natural reproduction, where science promises to industry precious 
revelations. 

Captain Isidore Le Roy, known to the government by his studies upon 
the fisheries, a pilot experienced in the waters which are to be the scene 
of our work, well qualified in mechanical arts, and officially recommended 
for the surveillance of the first and second naval districts, could render 
me much aid if he were invested with the command of this vessel, hereto- 
fore mentioned as necessary to the execution of our plans; and in case 
Your Majesty sees fit to appoint him my coadjutor, he should at once 
report at the College of France, there to be instructed, under my direc- 
tion, in all that pertains to the cultivation of marine products. 

Among the measures to be taken for the accomplishment of. this 
object, there are, sire, some which experience has already demonstrated 
to be efficacious, and which, by their immediate application, will pro- 
duce certain results. But, besides these known facts, there are mys- 
teries which persevering study alone can reveal, and which should be 
made the object of serious investigation. It will then be necessary to 
open along our shores vast laboratories, where scientific experiments 
may be performed, which will furnish new means for the extension of 
empire of industry. The saline lakes of Southern France, the bay's of 
the ocean, those of Algeria, of Corsica, &c., offer the best opportunities 
for organizing great districts to be gradually transformed at Your Maj- 
esty’s desire into supply centers for the seeding and cultivation of the sea. 

The different edible species admitted by turns into those zoological 
gardens, so to speak, would be, like the animals in our stalls or in our 
parks, under the observant eye of those charged with the duty of study- 
ing their laws of propagation and of development, investigators placed 
there, as a branch of my laboratory of the College of France. It will 
then be necessary to enlarge the study rooms and increase the personnel 
and endowment. <A skilled artist with his brushes will give a represent- 
ation of each curious discovery which shall be made in this living museum, 
and thus prepare plates for one of the most important publications with 
which the annals of natural history will ever be enriched. 

The unexpected phenomena which I witnessed at Concarnean, in the 
small ponds of Pilot Guillou, left no doubt in my mind as to the great 
serviceability of an establishment which will place in the hands of the 
government the necessary means for executing a work of public utility. 

In the age when, by a sovereign application of the laws of physics, 
an invisible flame carries thought through conducting wires with which 
the genius of man has encircled the earth, physiology will exercise its 
empire over organic nature by an application of the laws of life. 

I cannot conclude this report, sire, without expressing my thanks to 
Admiral La Place, prefét maritime at Brest, for the energetic assistance 
which he gave to our enterprise, by confiding its rapid execution to the 


[47] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 871 


combined care of the commandant of the station at Granville and to the 
chief of the maritime service at Saint-Servan. 
I am, sire, with profound respect, Your Majesty’s very humble and 
very faithful servant, 
COSTE, 
Member of the Institute. 


After the above report was made, M. Levicaire was promoted to the 
grade of officer of the Legion of Honor, and M. Le Roy was appointed 
to the command of the Chamois, a steam-vessel which was placed at 
the orders of those superintending the restocking operations. M. Bi- 
daut, lieutenant of the Pluvier, was retained in command of that vessel. 


3.—REPORT TO HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER OF MARINE, ON THE 
RESTOCKING OF THE BASIN OF ARCACHON. 


PARIS, November 9, 1859. 

Str: In the first edition of a work which is now being republished 
by order of the Emperor, I demonstrated five years ago, by the help ot 
numerous facts observed at Marennes, at Tremblade, and at the isle of 
Oléron, that oysters reproduced themselves in as great profusion in the 
claires, viviers, and étalages as in the open sea. 

At the sight of these revealed sources of wealth, I announced that, by 
means of appliances for collecting the seed, all the establishments organ- 
‘ ized along the coasts would soon be transformed into productive areas, 
where, without quitting the land, the coast inhabitants would have in 
their hands the inexhaustible treasure which science offers to labor; and 
I described the instruments which were to be used in securing the pos- 
session. 

I hope, sir, in the presence of the wonders accomplished under the eyes 
of the astonished inhabitants, henceforth anxious to take part in the 
prosecution of a work in which they, at first, had no confidence what- 
ever, that your excellency will permit me to restate here the means 
employed, so that it may again be shown that the most abstract know- 
ledge is everywhere the lever employed in attaining most wonderful re- 
sults, in the great workshop where the genius of man extends its em- 
pire over the world. As I said before: “‘ Each establishment, being thus 
transformed into a veritable manufactory where all the conditions are 
created by the genius of man, and varied at his pleasure, would at the 
same time answer the purpose of artificial beds and of appliances for 
perfecting the yield, giving in this manner constantly renewed products. 
The deposit of mud being the only obstacle to the preservation of the 
progeny of the oysters in the claires, there is a simple method of saving 
the spat, which is to place at a certain distance above the bottom, 
within their reach, and in such a position that the mud cannot interfere 
with them, solid bodies upon whose surface the oysters may cling. If 


872 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [48] 


in building these resting places preference be given to stakes, they 
should be planted in a vertical position, either driven in the bottom 
or fastened to floating rafts. These rafts would have another advantage: 
they could carry movable planks, placed obliquely one by the side of 
the other, like the slats of a window-blind, so that one side would al- 
ways be free from contact with the mud. These movable planks, when 
once filled with seed, could be taken apart and suspended vertically 
to the frame-work of the raft. These, however, are initiatory details, 
the application of which may be varied according to the dictates of ex- 
perience.” 

The first models of these plank collectors, whose efficiency as a mean 
of collecting the seed has been tested along our whole sea-coast, had 
certain disadvantages which rendered them insufficient for practical 
purposes. One objection is, that they offer but a limited surface to adhere 
to; and another is, the difficulty in gathering the crop, as the young 
oysters attach themselves to the surface in such a manner that in remoy- 
ing them one part of the valve is frequently left adhering to the wood. 

The problem, then, is not whether the spat may be cultivated in new 
grounds, for that fact has long since been demonstrated by science, 
and is known to all oystermen, but to discover some economical means. 
of gathering large numbers of embryos in a limited space, and of easily 
removing them from these temporary repositories. It is necessary, in 
short, to organize hive-like structures where the mother oyster can de- 
posit her young, like the queen bee, in myriads of cells so arranged 
that the swarm may be removed and renewed. This apparatus of pre- 
cision places the work of nature under complete shelter, and carries 
the business even to man’s habitation, where the saline waters, invig- 
orated by a communication with the sea, are retained by artifice. By 
such means every point will be occupied by the spat, and they may be 
easily removed and multiplied. 

The idea of applying these hive-like structures to the cultivation of 
the oyster, whether in bottoms sometimes exposed or always covered, 
has already made a decisive advance in the bay of Arcachon by the 
combined efforts of Drs. Lalesque and Lalanne, who bring their physio- 
logical knowledge to bear upon the new methods. The first named of 
these park-owners has converted my plank collectors into inclosed 
Spaces, or submerged boxes, where the spawning is as effectual as when 
the oyster enjoys complete freedom, and so arranged that the young are 
entirely protected from the currents. The second is applying himself 
to the problem of multiplication of surfaces by doubling the height of 
the propagating cells by means of artificial stalactites made from a mix- 
ture of three parts rosin (brai) to one of tar (goudron). This mixture, 
poured while hot on the prepared plank surface, gathers up the pieces 
of shell with which it is sprinkled, and, in cooling, substitutes for a 
hard, smooth platform, a rough, jagged, and friable surface, from which 
the spat can be easily removed and attached to other parts of the seed- 
plots on the étalages. 


[49] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 873 


The collecting appliance thus modified is of a much more practical 
character, as the artificial stalactites form an inclosure where the oyster 
can be reproduced, and from whose surface the young can be easily re- 
moved. ,But even with this improvement it will be insufficient for 
the necessities of an industry which has so suddenly assumed colossal 
proportions, unless the interior of the structure be filled with fagots 
and branches, among which the embryos find unlimited space for spread- 
ing themselves. Thus sheltered, the branches, kept from contact with 
the mud, will, as I have already frequently demonstrated, be more 
abundantly filled with the embryos than if exposed in the open sea. 
But whether the industry be prosecuted upon the naked planks or in 
artificial stalactites, whether upon inclosed or open wicker-work, whether 
upon surfaces sometimes exposed or always submerged, it is still the 
same industry, furnishing everywhere proofs of incomparable success, 
and organizing effective appliances for fertilizing all the coasts where 
its development may be attempted. 

Thanks to the rapid progress already made in this industry, it is now 
possible to retain in a space of a cubic meter in extent more than 
_ 100,000 embryos. So that with a simple outfit of twelve or fifteen hives 
of the dimensions given a million individuals may be obtained, which 
can be raised in a space of one hectare. 

Now these oysters, representing in the pond when they have attained 
marketable size a value of at least 25,000 francs, it follows that, from 
the 800 hectares of surface in the bay of Arcachon suitable for this 
oyster culture, an annual revenue of 12,000,000 to 15,000,000 frances 
may be derived. What wealth for France, and what a lesson for the 
people! 

A simple arrangement of the productive bottoms, a watchful care, 
and the necessary appliance for collecting the seed, will give this 
wealth and this salutary lesson. 

Although the entire bay of Arcachon may be transformed into one 

vast oyster-bed, there are two localities, the point of Germanan and 
the space comprised between Estey de Crastarbe and the port of the 
island of Oiseaux (bird island), which are best adapted to the purpose 
of reproduction. The muddy, pebbly, and uneven bottoms will afford 
every opportunity for the various methods. 
_ Lhave, therefore, the honor of proposing to your excellency that the 
government agents be ordered to proceed at once to the organization of 
two kinds of model farms, which will be at the same time public stor- 
ages for seed and great areas for the concentration of the harvests. 

The superabundance of seed which the collecting apparatus cannot 
hold will spread far and wide over the shells and artificial repositories 
with which the bottom of different parts of the bay will be covered, and 
will furnish, both to the hand fishery and the boat fishery, a continu- 
ally renewed source of food. This portion of the harvest will be con- 
mon property. 


874 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [50] 


Those which develop in the reserved cantonments will be distributed 
in lots to the most zealous seamen, to whom this loan or renerous gift 
will be a means of cultivating, on their own account, beds, ceded by the 
government, and thus creating for themselves a first capital, by which 
they will pass from a mercenary or laboring condition to that of culti- 
vators. This will be part of the recompense. 

But in order that nothing shall be left undone that is calculated to 
expand the business, it will be well to admit, to a certain extent, private 
enterprise to the benefits of the concessions, obliging it to be associated 
with the fishermen, whose rights will be protected by contracts made 
before the proper authority. So that, without making over anything, 
the government can aid the development of the industry and attract 
those who, witnessing its prosperity, feel disposed to engage in the pur- 
suit. 

If your excellency consent to this plan of organization, the commis- 
sary of maritime inscription at Teste will have ship-loads of shells taken 
from the Matoc bank, situated at the entrance of the bay, and carried 
either by the fishery-police boat or other vessels and deposited in the 
places designated to receive the spat. But before spreading them over 
the bay, they should be exposed to the sun a sufficient time to destroy 
any deleterious animals that may live in or cling to them, so that they 
will not be deposited in the oyster beds to increase and multiply. 

In carrying out the details of this general arrangement, about 1,000,000 
breeding oysters, procured either in the channels where fishing is pro- 
hibited or in the markets, should be carried during the following months 
of March or April to the places I have designated for the creation of 
the two model establishments. These oysters should be submerged, 
as in the ordinary étalages, in parallel rows, between each of which a 
path must be left for the laboring men, who, during the highest tides, 
will be occupied in the restocking operations. But in order to avoid 
the injury incurred by leaving the oysters exposed too long to extremes 
of heat or cold, such places as are less frequently left dry should be 
selected for depositing them. 

Above each of these level rows boxes 3 meters long, 2 meters wide, 
and 60 centimeters in depth, built of fir planks, are to be placed in line, 
end to end, and held at a certain distance above the bottom by means 
of stakes, to which they must be securely attached. These boxes, divided 
into two compartments by wooden partitions, something after the manner 
of a traveling valise, will receive in the upper story as many fagots as can 
be placed under the cover, which is provided with artificial stalactites ; 
the covers should be arranged on hinges, so that the operations of nature 
may be watched without interfering with them, and any causes that 
might prove an obstacle to them be easily removed. By the side of 
these appliances, placed like bells, receiving in their open lower part’ 
the spat which escapes from the étalages, a tew completely closed should 
be built, the sides of which should be pierced with holes to allow the free 


ot] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 875 


flow of water; and in these pens, filled with branches, a few oysters about 
to spawn should be placed, in order to ascertain whether these collec- 
tors will retain more or less seed than the first. 

In other places, the work will consist simply in placing wicker-work 
beneath planks, fastened by cross-pieces to stakes. The ceiling of this 
plank structure, being roughened by adhering chips, will furnish to the 
spat points of support which will replace the artificial stalactites. 

I have had constructed by the crew of the Chamois models of these 
different instruments of cultivation, and will place them at the disposal 
of the government when it is desired to introduce them. 

In the center of each of these school-farms a pontoon surmounted by 
two rooms will serve as a lodging place for the persons in charge of the 
apparatus, who will act in concert with the maritime guards of Dauris, 
Séveillard, and Daillon. These guards are all devoted to the work, and 
the first named have excited special remark by their ardent zeal. In 
order, however, that these agents may derive from their employment a 
livelihood, I hope that their salary may be raised to at least 800 francs, 
whether in the form of a temporary grant, or as a permanent salary. 
The watchmen of the two pontoons, two men to a pontoon, will be taken 
in turn from the crew of the police-boat; for the personnel of the fleet, 
being under a rigid discipline, offers a guarantee of faithfulness. 

In the present condition of things the general surveillance of the bay 
is insufficient. There are in a circumference of 18 leagues containing 
10,000 hectares of surface, three maritime guards, the inspector of fish- 
eries, and a small cutter commanded by a skipper. So limited a force 
is evidently insufficient to meet the exigencies of the service. I there- 
fore recommend that the maritime guard be increased to six, their pay 
doubled, and that the inspector of fisheries be promoted to the first class, 
so that increased responsibility may be rewarded by increased pay. I 
also recommend that the actual guard be stationed at the far end of the 
bay towards Gujan, and the employment in addition, of a serew-launch 
of 25 or 30 tons burden, of light draught, constructed upon the model 
of those used in the light-house service, and commanded by an ensign 
or lieutenant. 

With these means of action, and the aid of private enterprise, an 
appropriation of 20,000 franes would be sufficient to transform, in two 
years, with profit to all and honor to the government which extended its 
help to the enterprise, the bay of Arcachon into a veritable field of abun- 
dance. This bay then would produce upon its stocked depths, by 
means of appliances prepared beforehand, immense harvests, the extent 
of which may be calculated in advance by the result which the perma- 
nent depots have already begun to accumulate. 

But shell-fish will not constitute the only harvest taken from this 
fertile tract. The government can easily create along the coast a no 
less precious source of production, by building reservoirs connected by 
trenches with the sea, through which the excess of fish spawn can be 


876 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [52], 


carried into the interior; this question has been controverted, and to its 
discussion I will in a future report call your excellency’s attention. 
While awaiting your decision, sir, | beg you to accept a renewed 


assurance of my respectful consideration. 
COSTE, 


Member of the Institute. 


In accordance with the conclusions arrived at in the above report, two 
establishments, to be used as models, are already in operation at the 
designated places in the bay of Arcachon. A second polive-boat, the 
brig Léger, commanded by Lieutenant Blandin, is charged with the 
surveillance of the bay, and co-operates with M. Filleau, commissary of 
maritime inscription of that region, in the cultivation of the two beds 
created by the government. One hundred and twelve grantees (conces- 
sionaires), associated with registered seamen, now follow this new indus- 
try over an extent of 400 hectares which the government has ceded to 
them. 


4.—APPLIANCES SUITABLE FOR THE RECEPTION OF OYSTER SPAT, 


Young oysters, after leaving the parent shell, move about in the 
waters, here and there, seemingly in search of the most favorable con- 
ditions for their adherence and their subsequent development, preferring 
solid bodies, with a slightly roughened surface, protected from the mud. 
It is for the purpose of creating similar conditions that the appliances, 
of which a compendious description is herewith given, were invented. 

These various appliances, when used in the pares, claires, viviers, 
étalages, natural beds, &c., which are left dry at each tide, or only 
during equinoctial tides, should not be put in place more than a week 
or two previous to the most active period of the spawning season, that 
is to say, during the first fifteen days of June, or towards the end of 
that month, if the hot season be early. 


THE PLATFORM COLLECTOR. 


The platform collector will cover only a limited space, if but one com- 
partment be used, but may be extended over a vast surface if its com- 
partments be multiplied. Its construction is such that the labor of one 
person is sufficient to manage its different operations. Wherever the 
oyster is cultivated it may always be used, if it be so arranged that at 
any time after the young oysters have attached themselves it may be 
taken apart and transported to such places as may be desirable. It 
has an additional advantage, in that it protects the embryos from the 
mud, which would smother them at their birth, and also shields them 
from most of the animals that feed upon them. 


[53] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 877 


The platform collector, with multiplied compartments (Fig. 1), con- 
sists of several series of double stakes (A) separated by a space of 12 
to 15 centimeters only; arranged in squares like a chess-board, at a 
distance of about 2 meters from each other, and divided by passages for 
convenience of cultivation (EZ) about 60 or 70 centimeters in width. 
Two corresponding holes, the first at 50 centimeters from the bottom 
of the bay, and the other 25 or 30 centimeters above the first, pierce 
the coupled stakes. A pin (I), either of wood or iron, passed through 
the lower hole, converts the stakes into a kind of trestle, and serves as a 
resting-place for cross-pieces made of a single piece of timber (B), at least 
2 meters and 20 centimeters in length, and from 10 to 12 centimeters 
in diameter. These cross-pieces should be solid, because they are to 
bear the weight of the flooring, consisting of planks (D) supported 
horizontally at their extremities by the lower cross-pieces, and placed 
as close together as possible. Other cross-pieces (C), of the same 
length as those already mentioned, placed above the planks, and held 
together by pins (J) passed through the upper holes, keep all the planks 
in place. If it should happen that there be too much play between the 
upper pins and the cross pieces they hold in position, a wedge (Q) placed 
between the two will prevent this inconvenience. Wooden wedges (Q’) 
serve also to fasten such planks as are too movable. Whenever it is 
desirable to take the planks apart, either to carry them to some other 
supports, or to turn them and isolate the young oysters, which are 
large enough to resist the deleterious action of the mud, or to inquire 
into the state of the crop, or examine the surrounding bottoms, all that 
is necessary is simply to pull out the upper pin (J’ ) and remove the 
eross-pieces (C’) that hold. the planks down. The wood best adapted 
for making these planks is that of pine or spruce; the planks should be 
from 2 meters and 10 centimeters to 2 meters and 15 centimeters in 
length, and about 20 to 25 centimeters in width; one side of which is 
made rough with an adze, the chips to be left adhering to the plank. 
These chips which project 2 to 3 centimeters, offer a larger and better 
surface to the embryos, and also make it easier to gather the oysters 
which adhere to them. The chips may be replaced by a bed of shells 
of cockles, clams, scallops, mussels, or of pebbles as large as a nut, 
which can be fastened to the planks with a cement made of tar and rosin. 
Finally, to increase as much as possible the points to which the spat 
may fasten themselves, small branches of chestnut, oak, vine cuttings, 
&e., are tied on to the planks (DD), holes being bored through them for 
the purpose. 

In pares, viviers, &c., where the bottom is rocky or hard, and piles 
therefore cannot be used, stones should be used as asubstitute; these (G) 
should be about 70 centimeters high and 25 centimeters thick, pierced 
at certain points with holes sufficiently large to receive the cross-pieces 
(B ©), and also a wedge (H) to hold the latter in place, and held in posi- 
tion by masonry or by means of iron clamps. 


878 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [54] 
ROOF COLLECTOR. 


The roof collector (Fig. 2) may be used advantageously instead of the 
stones, which serve at some points, for the purpose of keeping the spat 
in the parcs, or it may supplant the wooden collectors where these are 
subject to the invasion of teredos and of other wood-eating mollusca. 

The roof collector is supported on trestles made of cross-pieces nailed to 
stakes, which rise above the bottom from 15 to 20 centimeters. 

The number of trestles is increased or diminished according to the 
area which is to be covered. 

The tiles, which are the chief elements of the roof, being susceptible 
of different combinations, allow the form to be varied at will. 

These tiles may be arranged in parallel and contiguous rows, and 
thus form a simple complete roof. 

In all the parcs where the action of the water is very strong the 
different rows of tiles should be secured to one another by means of a 
galvanized iron wire, or with stones placed here and there over their 
surface. 

A double roof may be formed (Fig. 3), consisting of an open work of 
tiles covered by a series placed close together. 

The tiles may be placed between wooden supports (Fig. 4) in rows, 
covering, without touching each other, and forming, with the bottom 
upon which they rest, an angle of from 30 to 35 degrees. 

They may also be arranged in the shape of a tent, with both ends 
open and more or less extended, as in Fig. 5. 

In this last combination, the tiles touching the bottom will act as a 
mutual support to one another, and can be strengthened by placing 
stones along the line of contact with the bottom; thus the use of wood 
becomes unnecessary; the apparatus is consequently protected from 
destructive animals. The embryos can be gathered from this kind of 
collector more easily and with less loss than from those made of stones. 


HIVE-COLLECTOR WITH MOVABLE TRAYS. 


The hive-collector with movable trays, although of limited dimen- 
sions, offers, nevertheless, to the spat multiplied points upon which to 
fasten themselves, and the independent collectors, which form the essen- 
tial elements, offer the most favorable conditions for the complete 
development of the young oysters. 

This apparatus (Fig. 6) is composed of an enveloping part, consisting 
of a chest made of light wood, rectangular in shape; measuring 2 me- 
ters in length, 1 meter in width, and 1 meter in height; without a bot- 
tom; with a cover made of several pieces (D), held in position by a 
cross-piece (T) passed through cleats at the handle (A). The chest is 
bored at the extremities with a double series of holes, either square or 
round, corresponding to each other, and large enough to admit beams of 
6 to 7 centimeters in diameter (S); it is held together on the sides by 


[55] OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 879 


battens of wood (R), which correspond to traverses of the same size placed 
across the bottom (Q). In order that the water may circulate freely in all 
parts of the structure, the vertical bands (R) should extend some 10 
centimeters below the bottom of the chest; the planks that form the par- 
titions ought also to be placed 2 or 3 centimeters apart, or be pierced 
with a great many holes (QO). 

In this chest wooden trays of about 4 centimeters in thickness are 
placed, having two handles opposite each other (Figs. 7 and 8), and 
furnished on the opposite side with a screen of brass wire with meshes 
2 centimeters in size; the bottom is held in place by means of cords, 
nails, or galvanized iron wire. A median cross-piece (Fig. 7), consisting 
of two copper rods placed at right angles to each other, fastened at the 
ends, either to the angles of the frame (Fig. 8) or to the middle of its 
arms, increases the strength and helps to support the wire gauze. 

To make the work all the more easy, the trays ought to be square, of 
only one-half the size of the interior surface of the chest, so that it will 
be possible to place two of them on the same supports, as shown in 
Fig. 9, and there should also be sufficient space between them so that 
they may be removed or put in place without difficulty. 

Finally, shells of different mollusca, of medium size, such as the ordi- 
nary mussel, the edible cockle, commonly called coque or sourdon, of our 
various species of Venus, &c., form an indispensable part of this appa- 
ratus. , 

The method of putting the various parts together is very simple (see 
Figs. 6 and 9). After having placed the chest on the strips of timber 
which extend beyond its bottom, and having placed under these a flat 
stone which prevents them from sinking too far into the earth, some 
sixty odd selected parent oysters are spread in the vicinity; then, in 
the lower openings of the ends of the chest the first two supports (SS) 
are placed, on which two trays are laid, which are previously covered 
with a bed of mussel or cockle shells, above which other spawning 
oysters are spread. This first tier being arranged, the second is pro- 
ceeded with, and then the third, in the same manner except that in 
the third no mother oysters are admitted. 

The whole is then covered with notqed planks (D), which are held 
in place by means of a cross-piece passed through iron handles and 
tightened with wooden wedges (C). These handles being fastened in 
two posts solidly attached to the ends of the chest (P), it follows that 
in holding down the planking the cross-piece also keeps the whole 
structure together; additional strength can be given to it by nailing to 
the sides two other independent posts (P’), shorter than the first, but as 
deeply imbedded in the earth. 

Five or six months after the spawning, the young oysters having at- 
tained sufficient growth, the apparatus is taken apart piece by piece by 
an inverse operation, that is, proceeding from top to bottom, and the 
contents of each frame are carefully placed in some pare, étalage, or vivier, 
in places least affected by currents and mud. 


880 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [56] 
PAVING-STONE COLLECTORS. ° 


Oyster spat is also gathered upon blocks of stone, such as are some- 
times used in parks; this practice obtains in the neighborhood of La 
Rochelle, and notably at Laleu and the isle of Ré. | 

These stones, irregularly and obliquely arranged one against the 
other, serving for mutual support, should form numerous winding cay- 
erns, Whose arches are protected from mud, and afford numerous large 
spaces where the young oysters may fasten themselves. 

The paving-stone collectors can be constructed at small cost, and each 
one of them offers. also, the advantage of accommodating two crops; 
all that is necessary to accomplish this is simply to return the blocks 
to the same places from which they were taken, and arrange them as 
nearly as possible in the same position as they originally occupied. 

By this operation the oysters fastened to the lower surfaces are placed 
in a full light, which is a most favorable condition for their growth; 
while the upper surface of the stones, when reversed, furnishes to suc- 
ceeding generations shelter and an excellent surface for their adherence. 

But while these paving-stone collectors offer incontestable advantages, 
they are also open to grave objections, made evident by experience. 
The oysters are apt to fasten one whole side of the valve to the stones, 
and hence cannot be removed except with great loss; and then again, 
those that are not attached in this manner are liable to contract defec- 
tive shapes. 

It is not only necessary that large quantities be produced, but also 
that the product may be easily gathered, and that the oysters have a 
desirable form. 


Page 
Ackermann, M., experiment on seed -.... 19 
thanks due ............ 3 21 
wicker work sunk by... 37 
IA CONS) HEC’ CAN0OSe Wee. waeen ao ees eee ewes 24 
Aiguillon, Bay of, mussel weirs in......-.. 21 
PAMare lenses see oS 2 ce sn ccetisicittoe ete. 13 
Apparatus of Walton described ......... 24, 25, 26 
for oyster cultivations........ 50, 51 
invented by Dr. Davaine..... 3 
Appliances for the reception of spat..... 52 et seq. 
Arcachon, restocking the basin of........ 47 
hive collectors): +5-.-5.<<s=-<5- 48, 49 
collectors used. -.-.--.5.----.6 48, 49 
most desirable locations in..-. 49 
organization of.....-......--- 50 
planting of oysters............ 50 
multiplication of surfaces ..... 48 
apparatus recommended .-...-. 50, 51 
SUPERVISION Ofs os cee ecmcs cess 51, 52 
appropriation required for .... 51 
model establishments ......-.. 52 
Artificial fecundation impossible ....-.... 10 
oyster beds of Lake Fusaro .... al 
Saint-Brieuc....- 41 
Bay of Aiguillon, mussel weirs of ..-...--. 21 
* Belenfant, M., information given by...-..- 33 
Berthelot, M., experiments of -----....... 15 
Bidat; Lieutenant, a... «ste scieelac-'<e nee a0 45, 47 
Blandin; Lieutenant: ---<..ccececeoscnses 2 
ISO I Dee eee Seemromessocorces S66o6 6 
IBouchots t.ho. cases =o cece efesiee oe cet 21, 27 
deep awaterse. ac. soso coesctee 27 

Casbardeensn occas reccerslae 27 

Middle ees e eee eee oe cei 27 
shallows tos act scree eee 27 
Breeding of oysters, propositions.......-.. 7, 8,9 
Brest, oyster beds in harbor of ...--.-.--.. 34 
Brittany, oyster beds, wicker work used - 37 
Cancale, oyster beds:at..:-.-..-2-----2-60 34 
Canoes used by mussel fishers.......-.-.- 24 
Carbonel, M., interest in oyster beds ..-.. i 
@habot, MM. thanks due} --22322 0.25 -casace 21 
Claires; 10f Marennes).2 = <--.552s--.25cen2 10 
MOOGING Ofc. cece Des cence 10, 11, 13, 14 
plan and dimensions...........-.. 11 
ditchvaroundl 282 </sett. «ise se sie 11 
preparation of the bottom.-....... 11 
plantin Ph OLimes see ile esc as eo es 13 
require attention s-.4--..2------- 13 
effects of slime accumulating in - 14 
green color given to oysters in... 16 
reproduction of oyster in ..-...-. 17,18 
planting of propagating stakes .. 18,19 

[57] 


S. Mis. 29-— ~56 


Page. 
Claires, quantity of oysters furnished by. 19 
Coast of France, oyster beds along ....... 33 
Collecting oyster seed, experiments on... 19 
Collectors of oyster seed....2.........-.-- 47, 48, 49 
BPAben.. jemacbmeicseeeeise 52 et seq. 
Collectors used at Saint Brieuc .......... 43 
Colorjofoysters\---cse-s---tieeaccecee eee 15 
Coloring of oyster, causes of............-. 16 
Corophium longicornis........-.......... 25 
Coste, M., report on: 
artificial oyster-beds of Saint-Brieuc .- 41 
oyster beds along the coasts of France, 
SCO cateccnetese renee mas ieee ceeeeeee 33 
oyster and mussel industries in France 
and tally. Ss Sw eces ea nca ce sen 1 
oyster beds on coast of France -...... 33 
restocking the basin of Arcachon.... 47 
Davaine, Dr., apparatus invented ......-. 3 
DedRossi; IM. GB: .eltedt.-cseescoeseee eee 5 
Destruction of oyster beds ............... 6, 7, 34 
Documents relating to marine fisheries. .. 33 
DOrbigny, MC sre citediee cose ne een 22 
D’Orbigny, on corophium longicornis .... 25, 26 
D{Orbisny,.sr:, report Of. 2-2. ass. 5. 30, 31, 32, 33 
Dredging, a cause of destruction of beds... 39 
Dredging season ought to be changed .... 39 
Dupaty,; Mercier; cited. 2.22. -2.5-2 55.824. 22 
Dureau de la Malle, M., cited ...........- 4 
Establishment of oyster beds ............ 34 
Exhaustion of oyster beds..............-- 33 
Experiments connected with oyster beds. 35 
Extension of oyster beds recommended... 46 
Fecundation in oysters..-...5....--...-+- 9 
Will eas Mie ee ee eee eet MOU wom ancice 52 
Fisheries, marine, documents relating to. 33 
France, coast of, oyster beds along. ...... 33 
oyster and mussel industries in. . 1 
French marine, regulations of...........- 7 
Fusaro, oyster beds of -...-.........-.--- a 
action of sulphurous vapors ...-. 2 
TEStockin prof... case sccigs ose 2 
propagating stakes -............. 4,18 
collecting season in.............. 4,5 
AntiquityjOls=cs-\j\sceseleeencaeicee 5 
MOV ENUG Ohne = a's eeiaee ls aleaer 6 
Granvillevoysteribedsiati.2:---25- seeeoe 34 
Green color of oyster, causes........-.... 15,16 
oysters from Marennes.-.--....... 10 et seq. 
Hvecollectorss. stan ce eee eee eee 54, 55 
collectors at Arcachon.............. 48 
Isle of R6, oyster beds at....-....-....... 33 
Italy, oyster and mussel industriesin .... 1 
oyster culture by Sergius Orata.... 2 


881 


882 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


Page. 

Lake Fusaro, artificial oyster beds of - - -. 1 
oyster beds of ..-----..- 19254,15,16; 18 

Lake Lucrin, oyster culture in ..---.-.--. 2 
Lalanne, Dr., collector constructed by. --- 48 
Lalesque, Dr., collector made by --.--.-.- 48 
La Rochelle oyster beds at ...-----.------ 33 

* Le Roy, Captain Isidore...........-...--- 46, 47 
Age VAC ai Tew Meena ee lose ene serie classe 45, 47 


Live ponds for reception of oysters .-.---- 12 
IMF AAG) 65 ain6 su obe Ben aeaSoeeeROn copodenS 36 
Marennes, claires of .-.--.--------2.----- 10 et seq. 
green oysters from ..-...------ 10 et seq. 

invasion of mussel at...-.-.-.- 36 

=» oyster beds at......--....----. 33 

wicker work used. 37 

oyster industry at...-......-.- 21 

Marine fisheries, documents relating to. . 33 
Mallet, M., wicker work sunk by...-.-..-- 37 
Mollusks, entrance of ..---- be maaan aars 21 
Mussel and oyster industries, report on-- a 
cheapness of ....---.- A ee eters 29 

culture at Aiguillon, by Walton - 22 


culture, methods of Walton. --.- 23 et seq. 


discovery of, and results .--.--... 23 
ADV ASTON Obese e sctsere eianeieae eae 36 
GPeUbinG NO eceHos apasncospsecaTedd 29 
transplantino(of2 =) -.-se: eee se 28 
Welrs of Aveuillon™. ease e here 21 et seq. 
ON SInOlswse once see hemes 22 
.founded by Walton....---. 23 
apparatus described. -.-.--- 24 et seq. 
not incompatible with the 
interests of navigation. 27 
OWNErShIplOPE eases see 27 
NAMES OL senso sade seeciee 27 
stockinpi0f-c- 2. s9--see ie 28 
VAC AOL S22 senescence eee 30 
cost of equipment .....-.-. 31 
annual expenses.-.......... 32 
annual revenues.-.-....----. 32 
statistical report........--. 31, 32,33 
Orata, Sergius, established oyster culture. 2 
Ovarian -fecundation 2-442 5-+-e-sees-22eee 9 
Oyster and mussel cultures in France and 
Italy, M. Coste’s report on ...........-- 1 
Oysters are hermaphroditic .............. 9 
Oyster banks, restocking of .............. 8 
Oyster beds, artificial, of Lake Fusaro...-. iL 
Saint-Brieuc.... 4] 
bottom of the bay........... 41 
planting fof. a. s-—ss—seee eee 42 
preparation of bottom..-..-.. 43 
vessels employed............ 42, 43 
collectors of seed.......:...- 43 
success attained............. 44, 45 
executive force appointed 45 
@XPeriMentS iM fee cess 45 
at Saint-Brieuc..-........-.. 7 
destructioniofs 3. -n.4=.02- 6,7 
dredging oteereermasticn eae 12 
extension of, recommended . 46 
MOVADO sae aae cease acct 6 
on coasts of France.......... 33 
M. Coste’s report on......-.. 33 
exhauslioniofe nce sso cscs s 33 


[58] 


Page. 

Oyster beds at La Rochelle .-..-.--...... 33 
at Marennes=.-----seeosseee 33 

ab Rochetortieams-ees ees 33 
atislessofeRG ease cease eres 33 

at Bay of Saint-Brieuc......-. 54 

in harbor of Brest.---....... 34 
atiCancalenessaecesSeeee ae 34 

at Gramvalleyn. aime aislamte 34 

restockine Of: 20 coe seccectee 34 

ereating Of < yaene sasccseiee~e 34 
destructioniot ses s---5 ae ae 84 
experiments suggested. --... 35 

supported by government... 35 
to be examinedand explored. 35, 39 
ProteckionVOl sn sees 36, 39 

wicker work as collector .--. 36, 87 
restoration Of =. 6 sess sce == 88 
extinct beds to be restored... 38 
policeregulations............ 89 

statistical work of..-..-....-. 40 

Oyster breeding, M. de Quatrefages ..... 8 
PLOPOSIGIONS sie state eel=y ft; 8,9 

Oyster, care and number of its young ones 3,4 
Oysters; collecting: of: 2202. -.--5 262 see eee 37 
Oyster: coloring offe---4--e one eeceee eee. 10, 15 
cultivation, apparatus for......-.- 50, 51 
culture in Lake Lucrin.--......-- 2 
destructionis-02- oc J-04 4s 5055 36 
dred ping 22 i jase haa ctaecesaces 12 
change of dredging season ....-.- 39 
enemiesiot these s-ceeae Se Sorere 36 
fecundation 2+ 32-3222 eae. ese ee 9 
fishing, restrictions in ...........- 7 
Oysters from Marenne ..--...-----..-.-.. 10 
Oyster, green: color of the.--2-232-0505-.-6 10, 15 
: Callsesiol-c- eee 15,16 

STOW OD Ob soz se Se artes Sesto ees 4 

in claires, destruction of.......--- 14 
industry of Marennes....-..-.-..- 21 
industry, M. Robert’s report... --- 21 

a cause of prosperity... 19, 20 

time required in clairés. 14,15 

Oysters placed in live ponds......-..-.--- 12 
planting at Saint-Brieuc --... .--. 42 

in basin of Arcachon™ --- 2-2-6 =s 50: 

Ponds. tee AS. -oe ose See eeees 12 
furnished by claires of Marennes 19 
TEPLOACUCHONY OL aesee ee eee aeae 47 

: in:claires\2 =.=. =: 17 

scientific study of --222225-.2--22- 46 

seed, apparatus for collecting... -. 47, 48, 49 
Collectin oof Gast. ess-sse= ae 19 

spat, appliances for reception of .52 et seq. 
Spawning Ol seen. eaeeee eee eases 3 
Paving-stone collectors. --....--.--.-..--- 56 
Planting of oysters at Saint-Brieuc..-.--.-. 42 
Planting of oysters in bas'n of Arcachon. 50 
Platform: collectonaspeaeec- ase cee cone ce apie 
Police regulations respecting oyster beds. 39 
Propagating stakes in claires ..........--. 18 
Protection of oyster beds...........--..-- 36, 39 
Quatrefages, M., on oyster breeding. -.--- 8 
Rafts for propagating oysters in claires - - 18 
Reception of oyster spat, appliances for.52 et seq. 
Ré, island of, oyster beds at...........--- 33. 


[59 | OYSTER AND MUSSEL INDUSTRIES. 883 


Page. Page. 
Report on restocking at Arcachon ....--. 47 | Saint-Brieuc, oyster beds of .............. 7, 34 
on beds in the bay of Saint-Brieuc AN eSestina cited: pecec nce sacs ask odet ee eee 5 
on the oyster and mussel indus- Spawning of the oyster-_.................-. 3 
tries in France and Italy, by M. of oysters in claires............ 17 
Costex(title) eases aes ei- === - 1 | Statistical report on mussel culture .. .30, 31, 32, 33 
Reproduction of oyster.....-.........-.-- 47 work on the oyster beds. ...... 40 
of oysters claires........... 17 | Stoeking of mussel weirs.........---..... 28 
Respecting material for oyster beds....-- 18 | Transplanting of mussel ..-..........-... 28 
Restocking of oyster banks .....-........ 8 | Vessel for supervision of oyster beds... .. 35, 36 
of oyster beds ---------..-<-- 34) Vibrioios treariusi--csed-t tes sees oe eoe ee 16 

the basin of Arcachon....... 47 | Voyage d’Exploration sur le littoral de la 
Restoration of oyster beds .......-..-..-. 38 France et de l’ Stelic par M. Coste, cited - 1 
Robert, M., effects of oyster industry ... 20,21 | Walton, M., discovery of mussels. ....... 23 
Rochefort, oyster beds at ........ eeerece 33 founder of mussel culture -- 22 
IROGHCONMCCLOT cons sjcecoece econ sees case 54 method of mussel culture. .23 et ssq. 


Saint-Brieuc, artifical oyster beds of ..... 41 apparatus described .......- 24, 25, 26 


eG) 


ay 
aaa 
i ode 
Nee 


CP Wee nia le 


Report U. 8. F. C. 1880.—Coste. Oysters. PLATE I. 


art in the sides of a promontory, and connecting the lake with 
In a pond or reservation there the oysters destiaed for sale are 


pended; and at one of the extremities, the labyrinths in front of which there is 


), showing here and there the stakes arranged circularly around the artificial beds; the 


yte, communicates with this canal. 


, believed to be the ancient Coc 


placed provisionally; it joins the royal pavilion, the re 


a 
| 
a3 
3 
o 
~ 
oS 
> 
a 
o 
A 
o 
ee 
Easy 
TO) 
os 
Sis 
Aes) 
ee 
ais 
stigelirs) 
So8 
ages 
S55 wu 
eqs 
Pick 
iol 
oe 
oFS 
eeu 
ae) 
52 
38 
So 
Xs 
SF 
ok 
52 
Br 
5 
ey 
& 
ea 
4 
oS 
i=) 
E 
Oo 
Pen! 
> 
Lom 
Pm] 
HH 


\ F Ssh ( 
y SSS 
Yj SS 
A) sult 
a 
ie Hi 
yf Silas 
i gt SS f 
f i IN 


_ Fic. 1.—Gene 
single and double rows of other stakes 


tt 


\) Nits 
EMM a SE 


a canal two and a half to three meters in width and 


the sea. A small lake 


sidence of the personnel charge, with the superintendence and collecting. 


Report U. S. F. C. 1280.—Coste. Oysters. PLATE Ii. 


\ 


I 


TAT HADANTTUTAT 
1 
| 


——— — ———— —S—— — = 
Fic. 2.—Artificial beds surrounded by stakes. 


Fig. 3.—Stakes arranged in a straight line and united by a rope to 
which are suspended the fagots intended to receive the young oysters. 


Fias. 4, 5, 6, 7—Oysters ready to leave the mantle of the parent, enlarged a hundred and forty times. 
Figs. 4, 6, 7, show one side. In the three last, the cushion, provided with its natatory cilia and the 
muscles which move it is outside of the shell and protrudes beyond the mouth, which is itself ciliated. 


PLATE III. 


HiGa ie 


Af 
- nat 
i 


i} 


Fig. 8.—Group of oysters attached to a piece of woud: (A), oysters from twelve to fourteen months 
old; (B), oysters from five to six months old; (C), oysters trom three to four months old; (D), oysters 
from one to two months old; (E), oysters from fifteen to tw nty days old. 


Mle 
_ 


PLATE Iv, 


| NA IW 
| | WH | Hh} 
| WHI | 
| 

| 


WN! | 
NW 


preservation of 


| 


st h 


| | 


ted for the 


oysters intended for sale, 


Fig. 9.—Basket fit 


>. 


arrangement of the planks and 


i i | 
AAT HN 
| i | 1) 
" ' Hil i | 
hte dy | | 


| 


1ed at one end for the workine- 


whiner 
Lin n 1 Hi 


7 bina sf il 
yield 


ght side to show the 


‘p water, and with a sl 


y omitted on the ri 


‘om them, 


1. partl 


ge park, constructed in dec 


eel 


ion or stora 
stakes has ) 


ers suspended fi 


the baskets of oyst 


: 5 FG j a ‘ . 
be ; 7 
1 i 
( R mM) < 
foge i ‘i 
¥ ‘ yf ul 
Lone h 
f * bs = 
ti ‘ 
. ' i Y 
, 
2 i A H ‘ 
i as fe ' 
‘ y: = 
+), Be : 


a ' . e P 
c a ie 
= i P aye i 
+ (ire y e 
: - . rs 
1 v < ‘ 
- ' > \, 
ij ; ‘ i 7 iy ie 
J : + 1 - 
ya i \ 
1 vt ‘ 
U ~- = = ‘ 
/ 1 
‘ [Pity 
= r 
- i 
i Mays e 
a 1 
ie, ‘ac 
i~ 
‘ i . 
j = 
(7 ty, L4 - 
is 2 i ay f 
ca Se : Hehe ’ ' 4 ‘ “ 
‘ Li i ' y 
2 } iy Sa 4 J ‘ A i 
ra - ve 
> cate ez i 4 
Hi s ) \ Oy i Si ‘ 4 


= i ’ ’ 
for iy gi , A . ; : h 
a: . f . . } 
. . i - t 
] e 1 : i { 
: { ‘ 
‘ i 
P * hy - i 
. z A s ; : 
{ a 7 ‘ 
« ‘ ‘a 1 
{ : i wi 
- ‘ i 4 
f . % 
ve F ‘ 5 . s J 
t t Hl , am "4 ‘ , 
\ ; } ‘ 4 
f ee i! ‘ ‘ “ 
; A 7 i rai beg - Ly 
3 ‘a A5 
i: ' f = 
oy f F ro i 
bs ' T 7 : 
- i - : : bs J 
‘ ‘ , 
uF * 4 ie ' + 
Mg . & F (i 
; : { Ma us bi 
¥ : ‘ ‘ = ’ ri , Rie 
} . 4 a =) i % F f 
f : : i i oe 
i P J t HN / A 7 get ay 
i i if ss a +: ; 
# ‘ Wr ons ‘ 
iJ ‘ s ! = a; a Pes 
i ; z : it ) ea 
j ) 4 
: 1 4 ee : 
o a * 3 ist r ; 
a oe : 
ae 2 he seal 7 : 
< i : } , z 
i ‘ hus : F fi 
ah) ‘ sy 
\ ‘ 2 
~ ; rie be 
+ . 
' if is 
: ' i ; i : 1a 


PLATE V. 


Fic. 11.—Floating apparatus for the artificial culture of mussels, consisting of a double frame formed 
of beams, on which are fixed, by the aid of hooks, cither vertically or horizontally, as the case requires, 
planks covered with mussels. The horizontal planks, submerged from 15 to 20 centimeters, receive the 


seed-beds of very young mussels, which attach themselves there, and allow the suspension of these 
seed-bed planks vertically. 


Fic, 12.—‘‘ Bouchot fisherman in his acon, which be pushes over the mud.” 


— 


¥ : a 


aE cS 1880.—Coste. Oysters. 


7 
* 
~ 
vs 


SOR 


A 
et 


pas Sal 


Fic. 13.—A. map of the Bay of Aiguillon. 


i 
i 
#3 
-\ 
» 
oy 
inet 
( 
Fi 


¢ a t 
7 / 
, ‘ ' 
P { 
' 
} 
‘i ay 
_ . 4 
A p 
= t 
‘ 
. > % ie 
4 } , ‘ 
7 <t Thy 
+ 
‘ 
4 P 
ae : 
A 4 gs 
a i 1 
r F 
= = Peet j 
t f 
Ns fad wl 


Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Coste. Oysters. PLATE VII. 


"4 
P 


/ 
| 


Fic. 14.—Isolated stakes, called bouwchots d’en bas ov d'aval, covered by the spat (renowvelain) or spawn 
of mussels, which they are especially intended to receive. 


Fic. 15.—Hook for detaching the seed-mussels from the spiles or bouchots d’aval. Basket for receiv- 
ing the mussels. 


Fic. 16.—Stakes of the upper series (piewx d’amont) with wicker-work filled with mature mussels 
fit to be gathered. 


a Report U.S. F. C, 1880.—Coste. Oysters. PLATE Vili 


MM rere eMetrics vit 
Pte, HATTH 


——— 


Will 

y WH \\ | 

| i 

H | i uh ih 
Til ANIA NY 

I | Sra | ae 


| ee i 
UP Ae 
a (Ga a sp r SS 


mill 


NW 'D tN 
141) 1a | 
! | | 
NY id WAN ' 
AW ANH TINY ‘4 
Hl) Way uit 
i Wi VY WT 
|| \ WN i 
\| i i) wii 
| } 
l i | 
| WI AAWHIGAIAA { 
{Mi} | 
| i 


attra Gc - 


(ris 


lI 
\ Vad 


Fic. 17.—Bundle of fagots taken from the oyster beds at Saint Brieuc, October 25, 1858, and a fagot 
from one of the bundles, natural size. 


“ 


ot = Oe a Z - , wei. ee iy 
a YO . 7 ? 
The : + ere ; F : 
; e : > bry i 
t a ; 
. 7 \ ‘ 
=—~ a " y 1 
: - i 
c- y: 7 - : 
—— . oe al a 7 
a = ae ‘- % > -_ a 
Ae — * a ‘ ei 
y 3 a 7 : : E in 
: rade. - : = 
Pe ee . t 1 = 3 
ig t % —s~ S oe 
5 i ao _ 4 
- 7 ' : . —¢ iy 
! < > 
: 7 ’ - 


= = 7 = 
F — - i 
ae 8 = = 
- 1 
t 
f= , = 
, = zs = 
f > - 
a es - as a) 
as . at 2 : E = 
- i ‘ - 
f : = 
ts 2 - - 7 
Fi r = i 


Report U. S. F. C. 1880.—Coste. Oysters. PLATE IX. 


Fic. 18.—Cardiumn shells covered with young oysters of life size. 


rennin 


Fic. 19.—Simple roof-collector. 


a 


Ol aes 


a, J 
Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Coste. Oysters. PLATE X. 


Fig. 20.—The platform-collector with multiplied compartments. 


Fant } IR TTA 4 
=== | it al 
i= e ji i uN} 
| \ i HII)" 
I 


WH 
IA 


tre 


Sim terse 


Se ee 


es 3S 


et a 


io 
= ’ 


a | 


Report U. S. F. C. 1880.—Coste. Oysters. PLATE XI. 


Fic. 23.—The roof-collector in alternate rows oppusing. 


a Report U.S. F. C. 1880.—Coste. Oysters. PLATE XII. 


7 


Tic. 24.—The hive-collector, complete. 


Report U.S. F. C, 1880.—Coste. Oysters. PLATE XIII. 


Cro 


Jey ey ty 


{LT 


Toei) 
toa 


lala) vet=tejahatay 


= 


Piri lar RTT 


Lit 


wry tt 1 

tit tit tit l ing i} 
tit palais lo iaioieetchotreint 1 | 
i Jefe [et ata a parttelayalsl i 
wt Totahat jaierfapapolohal ] 
japcy BBG St a | i | 
fatt t Breer eeEry Ws 
= = S})\!\| ee 

— == SS 


iw 
i 
| 

(om 


SSS ——— Py 
RC f 
f 


ES Gl 
BERRA 
TOT 
t is es 
1 et 
1 1 
THEE CECE ae 
l 


epi afah fener pa ata 1oey, 


WAIT ! | 

NN | | Hh i) i | 
NNAWAIAH| My i i | 
WTA ARS ARe ACAA VBA 


H LTT PRATT THT Pa AG deal 
Aaa aE 


LAWN 
Wa, 


Fic. 26.—Hive-collector with lateral wall removed to show arrangement of the frames. 


XXX.—REPORT ON THE CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 
1875, PRECEDED BY A REPORT TO THE MINISTER OF MA- 
RINE AND OF THE COLONIES.* 


By M. DE Bon, 
Commissary-General and Director of Administrative Affairs of the Ministry of Marine and 
of the Colonies. 


REPORT TO REAR-ADMIRAL THE MARQUIS OF MONTAIG- 
NAC, MINISTER OF MARINE AND OF THE COLONIES, BY 
M. DE BON. 


VERSAILLES, January 23, 1875 

After a long Oea of quietude oyster culture rats recently eae con- 
siderable advancement. In the basin of Arcachon, especially, it has 
rapidly developed since 1870. The practical results attained by the im- 
proved methods of work have attracted the attention of all the inhabit- 
ants of the basin, have even acquired a great notoriety abroad, and have 
induced many people to engage in this industry. The demands for con- 
cessions of ground have increased to an unusual extent, and at the same 
time the oyster culturists, already provided with parks, have found them- 
selves much inconvenienced in the establishments they now possess 
from the lack of room in which to raise the young oysters taken in large 
quantities from their collectors. 

A ministerial decision, published in 1860, reserved for the general 
fishery quite an extended area in the basin, upon which the establish- 
ment of parks was prohibited. The suppression of this area was asked - 
for by some in the interest of oyster culture, but there was also another 
party, opposed to this plan, according to whom it was not only neces- 
sary to maintain the existing reservations, but also to refuse all new 
concessions, under the pretext that the multiplication of the parks would 
injure the general prosperity of the basin. : 

At the beginning of last year Vice-Admiral Dompierre d’Hornoy, then 
minister, instructed me to proceed to these places in order to ascertain 
the state of affairs at Arcachon, and toreport to him de-visu. Ireturned 
from this mission convinced that the oyster industry of Arcachon was 


Ministre de la Niavine et des foes par M. De Be Co mimissaire Gene r als Dies 
teur des services administratifs au Ministére dela Marine et des Colonies. (Extrait de 
la Revue Maritime et Coloniale.) Paris: Berger-Levrault et Cie., Rue des Beaux- 
Arts, 5. 1875. Octavo pamphlet, 27 pp. 

[1] 885 


886 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


susceptible of important developments; that it merited favorable atten- 
tion from the administration, and that the greater part of the reserved 
area could be turned over to oyster culture without any inconvenience 
whatever to the general interests. The minister, in accordance with 
propositions which I submitted to him upon this subject, decided on the 
28th of January, 1874, that all the grounds of the basin yet unoccupied 
should be placed at the disposal of private industry, and in addition a 
certain number of natural oyster-beds, which need to be taken care of, 
as they constitute breeding centers indispensable to the maintenance 
of the parks. 

In executing this decision, the first work of dividing the old reserved 
area was effected during the year 1874 and received the sanction of 
the ministry on the 19th of last December. Seven hundred and twenty- 
eight new parks were thus authorized at one time, and were added to 
the seventeen hundred and six oyster-cultural establishments already ex- 
isting in the basin. A second work of the same kind was also ap- 
proved by the minister, and a third will soon follow. At the same time 
concessions of ground were daily granted in all other parts of the basin 
and the great number of demands was not lessened. Furthermore, this 
progress in oyster culture is not limited to the basin of Arcachon. In 
Morbihan industry and capital favor it in a nearly equal degree. There 
also oyster culturists, finding the condition of the soil, climate, and loca- 
tions propitious, have, little by little, perfected their methods and ob- 
tained remarkable results. 

From these two centers of activity oyster culture radiates to a greater 
or less extent in all directions. It has been permanently established in 
the bay of Mount-Saint-Michel and on the sandy borders of the Vivier. 
It seems in a fair way of becoming re-established on the coast of the isl- 
and of Noirmoutiers and the island of Ré, where it had previously given 
great hopes of success at the time it was first started there; it is more 
prosperous than ever on the banks of the Seudre. Finally, it has be- 
come in many places the object of attempts which will, without doubt, 
prove partially successful. 

Aware of the deep interest taken in the coast fisheries by the Admiral 
Marquis of Montaignac, who, in 1850, was one of the commission under 
the presidency of the Count Chasseloup Laubat to prepare the penal 
laws of 1852, I have thought that at this time, when oyster culture has 
received a definite impulse, the minister would read with pleasure a de- 
tailed report of its origin, its first phases, and its present condition. I 
have, therefore, by the aid of documents collected at the bureau of fish- 
eries, prepared this report, which comprises the history of oyster culture 
and practical descriptions of the most perfected methods of cultivation 
practiced upon our shores. 

I have the honor to submit this work to the minister, and should he 
find it worthy of his approbation, I beg he will give it to the public as 


[3]. CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 1875. 887 


an aid in extending the knowledge and facilitating the progress of an 
industry which is still new and full of promise for the future. 

I recommend that this report be published in the Revue Maritime 
et Coloniale. 

Commissary-general of the marine, director of administrative affairs, 


| Signed: DE BON. 
Approved. 


Signed: MONTAIGNAC, 


AN ACCOUNT OF THE CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE 
IN 1875. 


In addition to the taking of oysters by dredging, there exist two very 
distinct branches of oyster industry, which have hitherto been carried 
on to a very unequal extent. 

The first consists only in the improvement of oysters taken from 
natural banks. The oysters are taken, so to speak, ready-made, are de- 
posited in localities calculated to give them certain qualities of flavor, 
shape, or color, and are then furnished to consumers after they have ac- 
quired these qualities, which increase their market value. It is a sort 
of stock-raising, analogous to that of the farmer who buys lean cattle 
and fattens them before sending them to market. 

The second industry consists in taking the oysters when they are in 
an almost embryonic state, as soon as they have left the valves of the 
mother oyster; in favoring the first phases of their development by special 
care, thus saving from destruction a multitude of germs which would 
perish if left to themselves; and subsequently in increasing artificially the 
harvest of these productions which nature lavishes with so much care- 
lessness and prodigality. This latter industry has been compared to 
agriculture, which multiplies the productions of the earth in order to 
meet the constantly increasing demands of mankind; hence the name 
oyster culture, which has of late been applied to it. 


I.— HISTORY. 
RAISING OF OYSTERS TAKEN FROM NATURAL BEDS. 


Ancient origin of this industry.—The rearing of oysters by the first 
of the two methods just spoken of is of very ancient date. Historians 
relate that a rich Roman, named Sergius Orata, a contemporary of 
Cicero, at the close of the Roman Republic, conceived the idea of bring- 
ing oysters from Brindes, and of parking them in Lake Lucrine, which 
communicated with the Mediterranean Sea not far from Naples. This 
plan resulted very successfully, for the oysters of Lake Lucrine soon ac- 
quired an unequaled reputation and the originator of the idea derived 
considerable profit therefrom. This industry appears to have been per- 
petuated in the country where it began. M. Coste, the celebrated propa- 


888 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


gator of the methods of fish-cu]ture, during his voyage of exploration 
on the coasts of France and Italy found it practiced in Lake Fusaro, a 
short distance from Lake Lucrine. The oysters employed there are taken 
from the gulf of Tarente and distributed over various portions of the 
lake, which have been previously arranged for this purpose. This in- 
dustry is associated there with methods of oyster culture, properly so 
called, to which we shall refer hereafter.* 

Practices in France—Marennes.—In France the improvement of oys- 
ters by parking has been known and practiced for a long time. The 
productions of Marennes have long been famous. The parkers of that 
district purchase not only the shell-fish taken in the immediate neigh- 
borhood, but they also bring them from the coasts of Brittany and the 
basin of Arcachon. These oysters are put into ponds, where they grow 
rapidly, and into claires, consisting of shallow basins, where they acquire, 
after a more or less prolonged stay, a particular flavor and that green 
color so much prized by epicures. 

Cancale, Granville, Saint- Vaast-la-Hougue, Gc.—The oysters of Cancale 
and Granville are also parked, either locally at Saint-Vaast or at Cour- 
seulles, where they greatly improve and acquire the faculty of preserv- 
ing in their valves, for a long time after they are taken from the park, 
the savory water, constituting one of their principal merits. 

Practices in America—Importance of the production in that country.— 
The same method of raising is practiced in America on a grand scale. 
The coasts of the United States have, almost everywhere, oyster-beds of 
extraordinary richness. The consumption of oysters among the Ameri- 
cans attains proportions quite unknown on this side of the Atlantic. In 
1859 a newspaper of that country estimated the trade in this mollusk in 
the principal cities of the Union at 20,000,000 bushels; each bushel con- 
tains onan average 400 oysters, making the enormous total of 8,000,000,000 
oysters consumed in a single year, without counting those eaten on 
the spot, or those omitted by the errors of enumeration.t Most of these 
oysters after being taken are parked the same asin France. The parks 
are usually near the large centers of population, which in America are 
almost all situated in the vicinity of the sea. The most favorable places 
are the estuaries of rivers; for it has been ascertained in all countries 
that a mixture of fresh and salt water greatly develops the edible quali- 
ties of the oyster. In fine, the rearing of oysters is an industry of great 
antiquity, and is practiced almost everywhere where this mollusk consti- 
tutes a common article of food. 


OYSTER CULTURE PROPER. 


The same is not true of oyster culture. We have said before that this 
industry consists in collecting by artificial processes the spat of the 


* Voyage Vexploration sur le littoral de la France et de VItalie, par M. Coste, pub- 
lished in 1855. 
tDe Broca: Industrie huitriére des Etats-Unis, 1865. 


Peale CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 1875. 889 


oyster at the time of spawning. Some details of natural history will 
here be necessary. 

Spawning of the oyster.—The oyster is hermaphrodite;* that is to say, 
each individual possesses the attributes of both sexes, fecundates itself, 
and produces yeung. The spawning usually takes place from June to 
the end of September; but the eggs are not immediately expelled; they 
remain until batched within the mantle folds of the parent oyster, en- 
veloped in a mucous substance essential to their development. When 
the proper time arrives the young sally forth, being furnished with a 
temporary swimming apparatus, which enables them to go in search of 
a suitable point of attachment. The swarms of embryos are innumer- 
able, each parent giving birth to not less than one or two millions of 
young at each spawning. ‘At the time when all the adult individuals 
composing a bed void their progeny, this living dust issues like a thick 
cloud, which, leaving the point where it originated, is dispersed by the 
action of the water, only an imperceptible portion remaining attached 
to the parent stock. The rest is all scattered, and if the multitudes 
carried here and there by the waves do not find something solid to 
which they can attach themselves they are certain to be destroyed, for 
those that do not become the prey of other forms of life finally settle 
upon a locality unsuited to their development, and are often swallowed 
up in the mud.” 

Recent origin of oyster culture—The idea of forming special establish- 
ments for the purpose of retaining and preserving some of those in- 
numerable germs is a recent one, or, at least, only a few years have 
elapsed since it passed from the domain of theory to that of fact. The 
only oyster cultural practices known of somewhat ancient date are those 
seen by M. Coste in the parks of Lake Fusaro, to which we have 
already referred. The keepers of these parks had, from time immemorial, 
been in the habit of collecting the spat upon stakes driven around their 
deposits, and upon bundles of fagots suspended from ropes stretched 
above the water. But this industry was an entirely local one; it had 
not extended to the other districts of Italy, not even to the adjacent 
ones, and it was not at all commonly known. 

First attempts made at Saint-Servan.—It was in France, some twenty 
years ago, that oyster culture really had its origin. About the time M. 
Coste visited Lake Fusaro, in 1853, M. De Bon, then commissioner of 
marine and chief of the service at Saint-Servan, now director of adminis- 
trative affairs in the ministry of marine, was directed by the minister 
to attempt the restocking of the old oyster-beds of the Rance and of 
the roadstead of Saint-Malo, by means of shell-fish obtained from 
the beds in the bay of Cancale. In observing the results of these ex- 
periments, which sueceeded perfectly well, he became convinced of a 
fact which had, until then, been contested, viz.: that the oyster can re- 
produce itself even after having been transplanted to bottoms which are 


*Coste: Voyage d’éxploration, &c. 


890 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] ~ 


left bare at each low tide, and on which it has never existed before. 
He was struck with the facilities thus offered for the obtaining of arti- 
ficial supplies of spat. He established at Saint-Servan, in the port of 
Solidor, a sort of experimental park, and commenced a series of experi- 
ments to discover means of fixing the spat emitted from the oysters. 
In the year 1855 he announced to the minister that the question of 
artificial reproduction was for him definitely settled in the affirmative. 
In 1858 he asked to be authorized to try in one of the parks at Cancale 
the system of collecting spat which he had decided upon. It was a sort 
of floor formed of boards from 15 to 18 centimeters wide (6 to 7 inches), 
upheld by stakes and placed 20 centimeters (8 inches) above the oysters. 
Having seen with their own eyes the results of this system, the parkers 
of Cancale did not hesitate to give it a trial at their own expense dur- 
ing the summer of 1859. The experiment was crowned with complete 
success. In the month of October of the same year, M. De Bon trans- 
mitted to the minister, as a specimen, several boards covered with spat, 
some from the beds of Cancale and some from the parks of the Rance. 
His experiments had, moreover, become famous. The prefect of the 
island of Vilaine had come to pay a visit to the park and had compre- 
hended the scope of the discovery. In pursuance of his advice, M. De 
Bon sent specimens of the oysters obtained by the new method to a 
local exhibition which was held at Rennes in August, 1859. These 
specimens, which were accompanied with a description, attracted much 
attention, and the jury of the exhibition conferred a silver medal upon 
the inventor. 

M. Coste’s share in the introduction of the new industry.— Notwithstand- 
ing these satisfactory results, oyster culture would undoubtedly have 
found difficulty in overcoming the obstacles which prejudice always 
’ places in the way of new advances, in attracting public attention and 
subsequently in securing the costly and persevering efforts necessary to 
insure its speedy development, had it continued as a purely administra- 
tive work, subject to the conditions of prudence and wise reserve which 
are always imposed upon responsible functionaries. It found in M. Coste 
a bold champion, who brought to its service his reputation as a man of 
, Science, his talent as a propagandist, and the open support of the chief 
magistrate of the nation, which he had gained by the eloquent ardor of his 
convictions. Made proficient for this work by reason of his studies on 
fish-culture, M. Coste had become much impressed by what he saw in 
Italy, in the parks of Lake Fusaro. He at once conceived the idea of 
transporting to France the industry which flourished so obscurely near 
the guif of Naples. In the report of his explorations, made January 1, 
1855, to the minister of agriculture and commerce, he expressed a desire 
that the same processes might be tried in the salt ponds of the south of 
France, and also applied to the natural oyster-beds. He proposed to 
let down over these oyster-beds in the spawning season large wooden 


[7] CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 1875. 891 


frames to collect the spat, which should be withdrawn at the. proper 
time. 

His first missions on the coast.—Two years afterwards, in 1857, the 
Emperor commissioned him to make experiments in maritime fish-cul- 
ture. Soon thereafter, having received letters of introduction from the 
minister of the marine to all the maritime officers of the ports, he began 
to travel along the coast. He visited Saint-Servan in August, 1857. 
M. De Bon showed him the already decisive results which he had ob- 
tained, both in restocking the beds of the Rance and in collecting spat 
artificially. This was a practical confirmation of his theories, and in 
many respects a revelation of the means of executing them, for which 
he was still seeking. He saw with his own eyes the reproduction of 
oysters upon ground left bare by the tide, a fact which be had long de- 
nied and from which he subsequently derived so much advantage. On 
the 5th of February, 1858, in the first report addressed to the Emperor 
on the subject of his mission, he asked that a simultaneous experiment 
in restocking and in oyster culture might be tried on a large scale in the 
bay of Saint-Brieuc. He predicted its success, and his vivid imagina- 
tion, entirely given over to the fondest hopes, already saw the coast of 
France transformed by the same process into an almost continuous 
chain of oyster-beds, furnishing inexhaustible supplies of food. 

Experiments in the Bay of Saint-Brieuc.—This report, which was printed 
in the *‘Moniteur,” attracted much attention. M. Coste received from 
the minister of marine all the means that he required. Three million of 
oysters, purchased at Cancale and Tréguier, were deposited (April, 1858) 
at various points in the bay of Saint-Brieuc, with the aid of two small 
steamers belonging to the government, which towed the entire flotilla of 
boats carrying the oysters. On these improvised beds oyster shells were 
previously spread, to serve as collectors, and, for the same purpose, long 
rows of bundles of fagots were let down and anchored at a height of 30 
or 40 centimeters (12 to 13 inches) above the bottom. Other boats were 
permanently detailed to watch and keep the new beds inorder. Success 
seemed insured from the first. Atthe close of the spawning season the 
collectors brought to the surface were covered with spat. M.Coste thought 
that now he was about to see his plansrealized. He proposed to imme- 
diately undertake to restock the entire coast, and the report in which he 
announced his results in the bay of Saint-Brieue (December, 1858) re- 
ceived the same publicity as the former one. 

Attempts at restocking on a large scale.—From this time onward oyster- 
cultural experiments both by the department of Marine and by private 
individuals developed rapidly. In the month of July, 1859, a steamer 
called the “Chamois” was placed at the disposal of M. Coste to convey 
him to such points along the coast as he desired to visit, in order to 
direct his experiments, and especially to co-operate in the oyster-cultural 
works under the charge of the commissioners of the maritime inscrip- 
tion and of the vessels guarding the fisheries. In January, 1860, two 


892 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


and a half million oysters were purchased at Cancale and distributed 
through the bay of Saint-Brieuc in order to enrich its bottom. In May 
and July of the same year two million more were purchased in England 
and taken to Bordeaux, by the Chamois, whence they were conveyed to 
Cette by railway for the formation of oyster-beds in the Mediterranean. 
This lot was divided between the pond of Thau and the roadstead of 
Toulon. The roadstead of Brest was restocked, and an oyster reserva- 
tion, supplied by large shipments from England and intended to facill- 
tate the stocking of the surrounding beds, was established in l’Anse de 
la Forest, near Concarneau. In the basin of Arcachon, explored by M. 
Coste in October, 1859, there were established by his advice two model 
parks to serve as breeding beds for the entire basin and for the trial of 
the different collecting apparatus thus far invented.* Several millions 
of oysters were deposited in these parks, and a government vessel, 
together with a coast guard expressly appointed, were charged with 
their supervision and with the carrying on of all necessary work. 

First advances made by private industry.—Private industry followed 
the impulse given by the state. On the coasts of Normandy and Brit- 
tany, on those extending from the Loire to the Gironde, and in the basin 
of Arcachon, concessions were solicited from the minister of the marine; 
oyster-parks were established, and the people engaged with eagerness 
in experiments at artificial reproduction. Capitalists intrusted their 
funds to enterprises of this kind, conceived on a grand scale. The suc- 
cess in several localities was very marked. In the beginning of 1861, 
M. Coste, in requesting the minister to grant further extension to his 
restocking operations, stated that the bey of Saint-Brieuc, where the 
first experiments had been made, could immediately furnish a harvest 
of several millions of marketable oysters ; that the coasts of the island 
of Ré had been converted into a vast and richly stocked oyster-bed ; 
that the basin of Arcachon promised a harvest of incalculable richness; 
that in the roadsteads of Brest and Toulon the success attained, although 
less pronounced, was still of a nature to justify the most sanguine hopes; 
that at La Rochelle and at Marennes the production was equally satis- 
factory; and, finally, that in the pond of Thau, if the oysters had not 
reproduced they had at least grown and acquired qualities which would 
cause that pond to be considered a place for improving their flavor. 

Numerous failures— Temporary decline of oyster culture.—Unfortunately 
numerous and bitter disappointments followed in the course of the suc- 
ceeding years. The artificial beds of Saint-Brieue were destroyed by 
inclement weather, the oysters being scattered and the bundles of fagots 
broken apart and thrown upon the shore; they never rallied from this 


* These parks were formed in 1860, on two of the best oyster bottoms of the basin, 
called the Cés and Crastorbe. In 1863 a third model park was established upon the 
crassats of Lahillon. These parks, after having rendered much good, ceased to be 
useful when private industry had made considerable advancement at Arcachon. In 
1872 the minister of the marine granted to the Central Life-Saving Society the right to 
take oysters therefrom, with certain reservations. 


a ER CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 1875. 893 


disaster. The roadstead of Brest became again impoverished, in con- 
sequence of the imperfect reproduction of the oysters deposited there, 
and the plundering operations of the fishermen. The experiments made 
in the Mediterranean failed completely. The parks of the islands of 
Ré and Oléron and of La Rochelle, after a few years of prosper ity, 
rapidly declined and were almost entirely abandoned. It was the same 
at Cancale and in the Rance, where the attempts at oyster culture, begun 
by M. De Bon, resulted unsatisfactorily not long after his departure ; 
the majority of the parkers abandoned the work. Finally, the report 
of the maritime authorities stated that in the basin of Arcachon, at the 
close of 1805, the government parks were flourishing, but the natural 
beds were impoverished, and private industry was prostrated because 
of the failure to collect spat. 

Causes of this decline.—What were the causes of these failures, which 
seemed to indicate the ruin of all hopes based upon oyster culture? They 
were manifold: in the first place, ignorance or neglect of the natural 
laws governing the formation and continuance of oyster-beds; secondly, 
imprudent attempts at restocking, or cultivation under unfavorable cir- 
cumstances, quite excusable, however, at the outset of a new enterprise; 
and, lastly, the inexperience of the oyster culturists, all of whom were 
green hands at the business, the uncertainty which prevailed as to the 
choice of favorable localities, the methods to be followed, and the appa- 
ratus to be used as collectors. 

Action of the department of marine.—While seconding the efforts of 
M. Coste, the department of marine did not share in his illusions. It 
rightly considered that the renewal and enlargement of our oyster-beds, 
exhausted by the excessive drain upon them, could not be accomplished 
either as speedily or completely as he had anticipated. The department 
was not, therefore, discouraged by the failures it had encountered. It 
was this department, in fact, that had really opened the way, both by 
its experiments in restocking, commenced in 1852, and by the promulga- 
tion of the decrees of July 4, 1853, concerning aaaee fishing, which de- 
crees laid the foundation of a rational system of regulations as to the 
taking of oysters. 

The coast-fishery regulations of 1853 with reference to the oyster.—The 
main features of this system of regulations are the prohibition against 
taking oysters at times not allowed by the maritime authorities; the 
determination of the proper time for taking them dependent upon the 
advice of special commissions that visit the oyster-beds annually; the 
reservation of beds found to be impoverished or calculated to answer 
as centers of reproduction; and, finally, the obligation imposed upon 
fishermen to throw back onto the beds or preserve in parks the young 
oysters which have not yet attained a certain size. Wherever it has been 
possible to enforce these rules continuously, and at the same time keep 
a sufficiently close watch to prevent the plundering operations of fisher- 
men and other people living upon the shore, the marine authorities have 


894 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] | 


succeeded in securing the prosperity of the oyster-beds, provided they 
were established upon bottoms naturally productive and not entirely 
exhausted; the success of enterprises whose object is to reconstruct beds, 
of which not a trace remains, or to create entirely new beds, is much more 
problematical. In this latter case the lessons taught by experience have 
not been lost. Since 1865, the department, without refusing to engage 
in all attempts at starting new beds, has especially endeavored to main- 
tain the already existing ones, to improve them by timely cleansing or 
by the additions of shell-fish brought from richer localities, and, finally, 
to strengthen the watch upon them, which is the best method of preserv- 
ing them. Thus, in several localities they have been gradually raised 
from the decay into which they had fallen. 

Results of the continued enforcement of these regulations.—Oyster culture, 
properly so called, has advanced continuously, and in the course of its 
progress there has been brought to light a fact of prime importance, 
viz., that the artificial breeding of oysters can scarcely be successful 
excepting in the neighborhood of the natural spawning-beds. Thus the 
oyster-park of the island of Ré became sterile as soon as the neighbor- 
ing natural beds which supplied it had disappeared. ‘The abandonment 
of the attempts at oyster culture at Cancale was contemporaneous with 
a prolonged impoverishment of the oyster-beds in the bay of Mont-Saint- 
Michel; these beds are now becoming filled up again, and oyster-cultural 
industry has reappeared upon the shores of that bay, at Vivier, where 
it is increasing daily. It is the same at Arcachon and in the rivers of 
Morbihan. The oyster propagates well in parks, as was demonstrated 
by M. De Bon, and perhaps at some future time it will be possible by 
improved methods to collect the spawn artificially produced in sufficient 
quantities, especially if the operation be performed in a favorable me- 
dium; but at present an abundant supply of spat from large natural 
beds is essential to success. 

Progress made by private industry—Improved methods—Revival of 
oyster culture—On the other hand, the oyster culturists, taught by their 
own experiences and by the results attained through the government 
experimental parks, became more self-reliant ; they improved their im- 
plements and their methods of work. It may be affirmed that in the 
two principal centers in which it is now carried on, the basin of Arcachon 
and Morbihan, this industry then emerged from its period of-uncertainty. 
The great profits realized there during the past few years have brought 
oyster culture again into favor and turned toward it a current of labor 
and capital much greater than that which flowed in the same direction 
after the publication of M. Coste’s report. Requests for concessions of 
parks are received by the minister of marine from all quarters of the 
coast. Attempts are being made to reconstruct old and abandoned es- 
tablishments, while new ones are being started in the majority of local- 
ities where others formerly existed. Those seeking grants desire par- 
ticularly the unclaimed localities in the basin of Arcachon and the rivers 


Or 


[11] CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 1875. 89 


of the marine sub-district of Lorient, certain that they will receive in | 
the future what is promised by the present. 

Rapid increase in the number of oyster-cultural establishments at Arca- 
chon.—At the close of 1871 the parks controlled by private parties in 
this basin numbered 724 and occupied a total area of 588 hectares (1,450 
acres); at the close of 1872 they were 1,133 in number and occupied an | 
area of 1,061 hectares (2,625 acres); at the close of 1874 they numbered 
1,706 and covered an extent of 1,733 hectares (4,310 acres), not counting 
the portion formerly included in the reserved zone but now given over 
for parking. The denomination ‘ Reserve Zone” was applied to a consid- 
erable section of the basin in which parks were prohibited in order to 
retain a common fishing ground which could be frequented by all. In 
view of the great increase in oyster culture at Arcachon, both to satisfy 
the claims of the old parkers, who complained that they were cramped 
for room, and to meet the new demands which were constantly increasing 
in number, the minister of marine decided, on January 28, 1874, to open 
up the greater portion of the reserve zone to private industry. There- 
mainder of this zone, positively withheld from private demands, com- 
prises exclusively the natnral beds of the basin with their immediate 
surroundings, which it is important to protect against all intrusion, as 
the prosperity of the parks depend upon their preservation. In pursu- 
ance of the ministerial decision of January 28, the first work of dividing 
off the sections for distribution was carried on during the year 1874; a 
decree has just been issued for the formation of 728 new parks, which, 
added to the 1,706 now existing, will make a total of 2,434 concessions 
and an extent of 2,669 hectares (6,625 acres) to be occupied by oyster 
culture. A second work of the same character has just terminated ; a 
third will soon follow. 

Prosperous condition of the establishments at Morbihan.—In Morbihan 
the development of oyster culture is no less striking. The section of 
Vannes contains nearly 200 oyster-parks, while that of Auray will soon 
have 500 and requests are still coming in. Thus, persons in all stations 
of life are engaging in oyster culture, either by investing their capital in it 
or by laboring for it. Many of them are without experience in the matter 
and it, therefore, seems proper and opportune to add to this brief his- 
torical sketch a few practical remarks concerning the processes now in 
use for the cultivation of the oyster. A knowledge of the processes 
which have the authority of success will, perchance, guide inexperienced 
oyster culturists in the right direction and prevent mistakes ; it may also 
incite others who are still indifferent or timid. 


Il—PRACTICAL REMARKS ON OYSTER CULTURE. 


Different kinds of collectors.—The first apparatus used to collect the 
spat of oysters were the plank collectors of M. de Bon, and the bundles 
of fagots, stones, and shells of various mollusks, as recommended by M. 
Coste in his first publications. We have seen that the parkers of Can- 


896 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


cale successfully used the plank collector in the summer of 1859. At 
the close of the same year the parkers of Arcachon also tried it, hav- 
ing learned through the authorities of the success obtained by its use 
at the former place. In several other localities private oyster breeders, 
hearing of the experiments made by the chief of the marine service at 
Saint-Servan, wrote to him direct, in order to obtain information regard- 
ing his method of work. In the great experiment at Saint-Brieuc bun- 
dles of fagots and shells alone were used, as the plank collectors would 
not have withstood the violence of the sea in a position so exposed. 
Stones, slates, and bricks were employed in the more quiet waters. All 
of these collecting implements are still in use, and are more or less suc- 
cessful according to the locality; but with regard to this there is no 
uniform rule. At Arcachon, wooden boxes or hives, 4 meters square, and 
filled with fagots, were employed in the beginning. These were the in- 
vention of Messrs? Lalesque and Lalanne, two promoters of oyster culture 
in that district; but this system was soon abandoned as being of little 
avail. 

The use of tiles—It was at Arcachon, and in the parks of Régneville, 
belonging to Mrs. Sarah Félix, that the use of tiles, which has since be- 
come very general, was first inaugurated. The tiles used as collectors 
are concave in shape, being the same as those which are placed upon 
the tops of walls to protect them from the rain. They were arranged 
in the shape of a roof at a short distance above the bottom, being held 
up by means of stakes. They answered well, but presented a serious in- 
convenience at the outset; the young oysters attached themselves so 
firmly to them that they could not be removed, without breaking either 
the collector or the shell. 

Improved methods of preparing the tiles—Dr. Kemmerer, an oyster 
eulturist of the island of Ré, found means to obviate this difficulty by 
coating the tiles with a layer of hydraulic cement mixed with water and 
defribrinated blood. The young oysters adhering to this friable outer 
coating could be easily removed from the tiles at the proper time. This 
system was greatly improved upon, or rather simplified, by the parkers 
of Arcachon; the hydraulic cement, which became very hard by contact 
with the sea-water, was replaced by a less expensive coating—consisting 
of ordinary mortar, and made by mixing two parts of sand with one part 
of an inferior quality of lime. 

Claires, or water parks.—Another improvement consisted in the es- 
tablishment of claires, which are basins of slight depth, so built and ar- 
ranged as to retain the water at low tide, in order to protect the oysters 
against excessive heat and cold during the period of development. They 
are in imitation of the method of cultivation that has been used at Mar- 
ennes and in the Seudre since very early times. 

“Ambulances,” or preservative boxes.—Finally, as the operation of re- 
moving the oysters from their point of adhesion often results in injury 
to their shell, notwithstanding all the precautions taken, and as their 


[13] CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 1875. 897 


shells are then too weak to withstand the attacks of crabs and other 
predaceous animals, the parkers of Arcachon hit upon the plan of plac- 
ing their oysters just detached from the tiles in wooden or osier boxes, 
furnished with hinges and lids, in which they were left until they had 
acquired sufficient size to be deposited in parks or claires without dan- 
ger. These boxes received the significant name of ambulances. M. 
Michelet, a resident of Teste, who took a notable part in oyster-cultural 
improvements, invented an improved system which he called ‘ ambu- 
lances ostréophile” ; it is a stone basin with the bottom of bricks, laid in 
cement, raised upon a strong frame-work of wooden joists, which, in turn, 
rests upon stakes driven into the bottom. A second frame-work placed. 
above the stones is attached to the first by strong iron bolts. On the 
inside, at a height of about 10 centimeters (4 inches) above the bottom, 
are fixed screens of osier or wire cloth, on which the young oysters re- 
pose. The covering is formed of movable pieces of wood or wire cloth, 
or simply of tarred netting having a very close mesh, stretched tightly 
by means of hooks screwed into the upper frame-work. An opening 
through the stone side, on a level with the bottom, serves to empty the 
basin when necessary. The entire structure is surrounded by clay ma- 
sonry which strengthens the walls. 


THE COURSE PURSUED IN CARRYING ON THE OYSTER INDUSTRY AT 
ARCACHON. 


Such are the principal improvements which have transformed the cul- 
tivation of the oyster into a regular and methodical industry. It is by 
the following series of operations that itis carried on. We will take as 
types the processes employed in the basin of Arcachon, because they 
are the most advanced, and because that region is now the principal 
center of oyster-cultural activity. 

Preparation of the ground.—The parks of Arcachon are established 
upon bottoms called crassats, which are uncovered at each low tide. 
These regions are covered by a species of fine grass which gives them 
the appearance of sea meadows, and those having the firmer soil, com- 
posed of clay and shells, are best adapted to the reproduction of oysters. 
The oyster culturist, having taken possession of a portion of crassat as 
*the site of a park, commences by clearing it of the long grass and of alk 
foreign materials which may lie upon it; but he takes care not to pull 
up the short grass, commonly called moussillon, for, although the oyster 
grows more rapidly on bottoms entirely free of all covering, it is less 
fecund there and more exposed during inclement weather. 

Construction of claires, or water parks.—In the highest portion of the 
park, claires or water parks are established. These are of two kinds: 
first, those in which the tiles, still covered with young oysters, are 
placed, and, second, those for the young oysters after they have been 
removed from the tiles. The height of the water in the former should 

S. Mis. 29-——57 


898 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


be 40 to 50 centimeters (16 to 20 inches), and in the latter from 15 to 20 
(6 to 8inches). Both are dug in the ground to the required depth. The 
sides are formed of boards held in place by strong stakes and supported 
on the outside by a bank of clay. Their bottoms are covered with sand 
and fine gravel. A small sliding door or a mere hole filled up with pot- 
ters’ clay suffices to empty them when necessary. The claires are in gen- 
eral from 30 to 40 meters (100 to 130 feet) long by 4 to 5 meters (13 to 
16 feet) wide, and it is advisable to divide them into several compart- 
ments by wooden or tile partitions, in order to prevent the wind from 
agitating the surface of the water too strongly, to the injury of the walls 
and young oysters. 

Construction of “ambulances.” —A fter the claires the parker prepares his 
ambulances as we have before described them. The ambulance of stone 
and brick belonging to M. Michelet forms quite an extensive building, 
and cost in the neighborhood of 600 francs ($120). The parkers usually 
content themselves with wooden boxes 2 meters (65 feet) in length, 1 
meter (34 feet) in width, and from 12 to 15 centimeters (5 inches) in 
depth. The bottom of these boxes are now covered with wire netting, 
and the tops also sometimes with the same. Constructed in this manner, 
however, they are liable to be invaded by mud which passes through 
the meshes of the netting. Coverings made of boards or of tarred cloth 
seem to be preferable and are much more economical. The oysters in 
the ambulances should always be covered with water. The boxes are 
generally placed in claires and fastened upon stakes which sustain them 
at an elevation of 10 centimeters (4 inches) from the bottom. 

Choice and preparation of collectors.—These preparations being com- 
pleted, collectors must now be arranged. Notwithstanding the pre- 
dominance of tiles, boards, fascines, and strings of shells are still used at 
Arcachon. But, whatever may be the kind of collector employed, there 
is one precaution which is never neglected, and that is to scatter over 
the bottom, as thickly as possible, oyster and other shells, which offer at 
slight expense one of the best means of retaining and fixing spat. In 
order to prepare the tile as a collector, it is coated over with a substance 
destined to facilitate the removal of the oyster. It is plunged several 
times into a bath of hydraulic cement and water, and when it is sufficiently 
dry it receives in the same way a layer of ordinary mortar (one part of 
lime and two parts of fine sand), which should be from 2 to3 millimeters 
(;'5 to 4 of an inch) in thickness. Some parkers substitute a second layer 
of hydraulic cement for the mortar; the advantage claimed being that the 
tiles are made smoother, are less easily soiled, and retain the spat much 
better, while they do not need to be cleansed to fit them for use the fol- 
lowing year. On the other hand the use of mortar renders the separa- 
tion easier. 

Barges.—The organization of a park is generally completed by the 
accession of a barge, containing two rooms for the guard, and the pur- 
chase of a small boat for communication between the park and the shore. 


[15] CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 1875. 899 


Arrangement of the collectors.—By way of commencing operations, the 
oyster culturist first supplies his park with adult oysters, purchased 
either from the dredgers at the time of collection or from other parkers. 
The collectors must next be put in place, and it is very essential that 
the proper time for arranging them should be ascertained, for the spat 
will fasten to clean and smooth bodies only; and if the collectors are 
put in place long before spring time they will become covered with mud, 
algee, small shells, &c., and the harvest will prove a failure. The oyster 
spawns earlier or later in the season according as the average tempera- 
ture ranges higher or lower. The proper time for placing the collectors 
varies, therefore, according to the latitude of the place and the relative 
temperature of the season for each year. In the basin of Arcachon the 
collectors are usually placed the latter part of May. The locality chosen 
for this purpose is the lowest portion of the park, in order that the ap- 
paratus may be under the sea for as long a time as possible. The strings 
of shells are placed in the dampest places, especially in the natural ex- 
cavations of the bottom, where some water always remains. 

Arrangement in piles.—The tiles are arranged in piles called “hives” 
(ruches). In the first place, there is placed upon the bottom a wooden 
frame, formed of two parallel beams about 2 meters (64 feet) in length, 
30 centimeters (11 inches) apart, and connected by two short cross-pieces 
upon which they rest. The tiles are placed in successive layers above 
the frame, with their concave sides downwards, the tiles of each succes- 
sive row being arranged alternately parallel with and at right angles to 
the beams of the frame. The whole is held in place by means of ropes, 
or, better still, by wire, and sometimes even by a circle of stakes, if from 
the situation of the park the apparatus is exposed to the force of the 
waves. In the latter case the lowest hive is also protected by reducing 
the number of layers of tiles, which may vary from five to nine. The 
hives should be at a distance of 2 meters (64 feet) apart; if there are 
several lines of them they should be arranged in the form of a quincunx, 
in order that the current may pass through them so as to form eddies at 
intervals, enabling the spat to become the more easily attached. They 
should not be brought together in too confined an area, for then they 
would become filled in with mud, and, from the desire for too rapid gain, 
ell would be lost. 

Removal of the collectors—Detaching of the oysters, &c.—The hives re- 
main in their places until October, the spawning season continuing until 
‘the end of September. They are then taken apart, the tiles are placed 
in large claires prepared for the purpose, and the work of detaching 
commences. This operation, which is usually performed by women, 
consists in cutting into the coating of the tiles around each oyster, by 
means of a chisel. The young oysters when detached are placed in am- 
bulances or preservative boxes, in piles 3 to 4 centimeters (14 inches) high 
at the most. They spend about two months in this place, during which 
time the parker frequently visits them in order to keep them clean and 


' 


900 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


supply them with air, by opening the boxes when the weather will per- 
mit. They are then conveyed to the breeding claires and scattered over 
the bottom, where they should be placed as far apart as possible, in 
order that they may become the better developed. The claires are pro- 
tected by means of fine mesh nets against the attacks of the various ani- 
mals which prey upon the oyster; these nets cover or surround the 
claires. The water is kept at aheightof 20 centimeters (8 inches) above 
the oysters during the extremes of heat and cold, but during mild 
weather this height is lessened, so that the oysters may come more 
directly under the influence of the air and light. When this cannot be 
done it is well to change the oysters from one claire to another once or 
twice a year, placing them in well-cleansed basins, the bottoms of which 
have been renewed by allowing them to remain unused for several 
months. 

Final care to be bestowed upon the oysters. “SN fter two years of this 
treatment the oysters have attained an edible size, but before being 
taken to market they must be accustomed to remain without water. 
The parker, therefore, at each low tide for a certain length of time, 
drains the claire containing the oysters to be sent to market; these 
oysters gradually acquire the habit of retaining the water within their 
shells by not opening their valves, and become able to stand a journey 
of several days without losing their freshness. 

Another method.—According to another method the oyster is not sep- 
arated from the collector to which it is attached, until it has attained 
the age of eighteen months. Two sets of tiles are necessary in this case, 
the first remaining in the claires until the time of detaching, while the 
second is made ready to receive the spawn of the next season. Accord- 
ing to this system the waste is very small, because the oyster is much 
stronger when it is separated from its point of adhesion. When allowed 
to remain too long upon the collectors, however, they often become mal- 
formed, and this diminishes their market value. 

Guar produced upon the bottoms of parks.—The oysters produced upon 
the bottoms of parks, or upon the shells deposited there, are easily sep- 
arated from one another, or from the collector to which they have ad- 
hered. They are scattered in grassy places and are taken up from time 
to time in order to secure those which are marketable, the others being 
returned to the park. Sometimes, with a view to diminishing the waste, 
they are placed in claires, where they are raised like those on the tiles. 


USUAGES AT THE PARKS OF MORBIHAN. 


Such, in brief, is the manner in which oyster culture is conducted in 
the basin of Arcachon. The methods of breeding are nearly the same 
everywhere, with some exceptions rendered necessary by the climate 
and nature of the soil or water of different localities. Thus, in the dis- 
trict of Auray, the plank collectors succeed perfectly and are much used. 


[17] CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 1875. 901 


They are especially employed upon bottoms consisting of soft mud. 
They consist of rude deal platforms, placed one above the other, at a 
certain elevation, and separated by interspaces whose height is equal to 
the cross-pieces serving as supports. In order to retain the structure 
in place and prevent its being carried away by the waves, it is either 
surrounded by a line of stakes or the upper platform is loaded with 
stones. The objection to this style of collector is, that the oysters do 
not adhere to it very firmly, but are easily detached and swept off by 
the currents. This defect is remedied by a coating of lime like that 
given to the tiles, for a very different purpose, however. On hard bot- 
toms the parkers of Morbihan prefer tiles arranged in hives, as at Ar- 
cachon. They also suspend the tiles from stakes by means of iron wire. 
The tiles are pierced by a single hole at each extremity, and through 
these holes an iron wire is passed so as to maintain the tiles in a nearly 
horizontal position. The ends of all the wires are then fastened to the 
top of the stake. By this means veritable quagmires can be utilized, 
which are otherwise unproductive and inaccessible to persons on foot. 
In Morbihan the collectors are not usually put in place until the begin- 
ning of July; but there, as elsewhere, it depends upon the temperature, 
and the prudent oyster culturist should, before proceeding, make certain 
that the mother oysters of the natural banks are about to spawn. The 
preservation of the spat is now the principal question in this region. 
Many claires are constructed for the reception of the young oysters, 
which are usually detached from the collectors at the age of nine months; 
but suitable grounds are not always within reach of the breeding-park, 
and amends are sometimes made for this by using boxes, whose four 
sides consist of wire netting. 


USAGES AT THE PARKS OF VIVIER. 


The collectors which have produced the best results on the shores of 
Vivier, near Cancale, are slabs of schist and birch screens. ‘The slates, 
although favorably regarded in the beginning, have been discarded on 
account of their expense, and for the reason that they cause the oysters 
to assume a flattened shape, which reduces their market value. The 
screens are divided into sections, from 5 to 6 meters (16 to 20 feet) long, 
to facilitate their removal and cleansing; they are fastened to stakes, 
5 centimeters (2 inches) in diameter and 66 centimeters (24 inches) 
high. Being arranged in the direction of the current, they form paraliel 
lines, stretching the entire length of the park, and at a distance of 4 or 
5 meters (13 {016 feet) apart. Between these rows are placed horizontal 
cross-pieces of wood, raised 20 centimeters (8 inches) above the bottom, 
on which are fastened slabs of schist, 50 centimeters (20 inches) long by 
25 (10 inches) wide, and 15 (6 inches) thick, supported one upon the 
other at their extremities. In some parks the stones are retained in a 
vertical position by means of stakes driven into the ground on both sides 
of them. The latter arrangement is more favorable for the collection. 


902 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 
} 


of the spat, but it is also more expensive. The parkers of Vivier place 
their apparatus during the months of May and June. They have not 
yet constructed claires in their breeding-parks, but several have ob- 
tained grants in the harbor of Roteneuf, a small well-sheltered bay, sit- 
uated between Vivier and Saint-Malo, where they will doubtless meet 
with more favorable conditions for the formation of breeding-parks, the 
indispensable complement of all well-regulated oyster-cultural enter- 
prises. Moreover, the revival of oyster culture in the subdistrict of Saint- 
Servan is of quité recent date; the establishment at Vivier and those 
at several other places are still few in number, and the methods em- 
ployed have not been so much perfected as at Arcachon or Auray. 


CONCLUSION. 


The foregoing statements will give an idea of the new industry which 
has already taken firm root in some of our coast districts, and which 
will probably be established in other localities wherever there are men 
of enterprise and intelligence. Let us add that, according to the com- 
mon estimates, the establishment of an oyster-park, such as we have de- 
scribed, with an extent of one hectare (24 acres), requires an expenditure 
of from seven to eight thousand francs ($1,400 to $1,600) for the prepa- 
ration of the ground, the purchase of the various implements and the 
first expenses of preparation, &c. As to the results obtained, they 
necessarily vary greatly, according to the more or less favorable char- 
acter of the locality selected, the skill and care displayed by the oyster 
culturists, and the abundance of the spawn; with regard to the latter 
item there are considerable variations from year to year. The oyster 
culturist who happens to commence during an unfavorable season should 
not be discouraged at the ill success of his first efforts. The parks of 
the basin of Arcachon and those of Morbihan were severely tried at 
first, but the fruitful years which followed have made ample amends for 
the early losses ; with a gain in experience the inequalities of the different 
years will doubtless be less sensibly felt in the future. Everything 
tends in this direction; the constant improvement in the means of trans- 
portation will facilitate the sale of the excess of production during cer- 
tain years, while the multiplication of claires and breeding-parks will 
render it possible to store up richer harvests and preserve them for 
times of scarcity. 

The part devolving upon the administration—Supervision.—It may also 
be relied upon that the marine authorities will not fail in the proper dis- 
charge of their duties, the importance of which is better realiged now than 
ever. They will take special care to preserve the natural oyster-beds, 
the sources of present prosperity and the pledge of future development. 
Already, thanks to their incessant watchfulness, and to the reservation 
of important sections of the bays of Granville and Cancale, the restock- 
ing of these regions, formerly so prolific in oysters, is progressing favor- 
ably in the vicinity of Cancale, where, during a few low tides last season 


[19] CONDITION OF OYSTER CULTURE IN 1875. 903 


(1874), the dredgers obtained oysters valued at 900,000 francs ($180,000), 

/ which result will be exceeded in 1875. There is, moreover, a fact full of 
significance, which observation has most clearly demonstrated. It is 
as follows: If the bottoms which supply the parks produced oysters 
naturally, the latter return to the natural beds a portion of what they 
have received from them. Aninterchange of germs between them there- 
fore ensues, which is a further guarantee of their common prosperity. 
The basin of Arcachon is an illustration of this. Since the increased 
development of oyster culture in that locality, the natural beds have 
become enriched to such an extent that, although they were only open 
to the public during a few hours at the close of the month of Novem- 
ber, 1874, still they yielded a harvest of 40,360,000 oysters to the 8,500 
persons engaged in taking them. An examination of these beds, made 
after the dredging had ceased, indicated that that enormous and unpre- 
cedented catch had not exhausted them. Very many of the oysters 
taken were purchased by the oyster culturists of the neighborhood, who 
placed them in their parks, so that they will still further contribute to 
the general fertility of the basin. 

Dissemination of information and encouragement.—The second aim of 
the authorities is to disseminate information concerning oyster culture, 
and the methods of conducting itin districts where this industry is still 
hampered by the ignorance or prejudices of the people. Early in 1874 
the minister of marine instructed the maritime authorities to examine 
such points within their districts as promised favorably for the procuring 
of spat by means of collecting apparatus. At Cancale, where the fisher- 
men have little sympathy with the oyster culturists of Vivier, at Granville, 
Tréguier, Paimpol, and in the vicinity of Sables d’Olonne, in the bay of 
Bourgneuf, on the coasts of the island of Ré, and in other places, small 
breeding-parks were created in accordance with the orders of the min- 
istry. These attempts are of such recent date that it is as yet impossible 
to form a correct idea of the probable results. The department of marine 
aids them with the appropriations at its disposal. These appropriations, 
when wisely managed, suffice for the essential services which they have 
to render, and itis by their aid that it is possible to continue, or resume, 
when necessary, the experiments started by the department twenty years 
ago; to maintain the oyster reservations upon which depend the future 
prosperity of certain localities; to form new reserves; to pay the expenses 
of the special supervision in the most important oyster districts; and, 
finally, to encourage labor favorable to the progress of oyster culture. It 
is for private interests to do the rest. The path is now marked out and 
a beginning has been made. We hope that the zeal of our oyster cultur- 
ists will not diminish, and that this industry will become, through a con- 
tinuous and rapid development, an abundant source of wealth to our 
country, where it originated. 


LN DEX. 


Page 

Ambulance collector..........-.----s---<s 12 

Ostréophilemseccecec -mercticc 13, 14 

America, oyster culture in..--........---. 4 

Arcachon, collectors in use at......--..... 1213 

oyster culture at.......... 1, 4, 8, 9, 10, 11 

oyster industry at...-.-..-..... 13,18 

preparation of ground.......... 13 

claires or water parks........-.. 13 

Collectors#: See e ee ee eae 14,17 

ambulanceses.-as-e= eee reer 14 

Michelet’s collector............ 14 

[DAT LOS seaacn wensiskieeeece ceases 14 

arrangement of collectors. ..--. 15 

tile;collactors! <2). - ss. <cec so eee 15 

removal of collectors........--. 15 

detaching of oyster...........- 15 

final care of the oysters.....-.. 16 

HOXICOMOCLONS: cee oxic heciemeecctiane lees ee 12 

Brest, oyster beds of, impoverishment of. 9 

roadstead of, oyst@r beds.........-. 8 

VAIO MlOLsece sec cer cecs neecemtense 8 

restocking of oyster beds at.--....-. 8 

Brickscollectorsyfe ss yee ne ceeeme cman 12 

Brittany, oyster beds along coast of....-.- 8 

Broca, Industrie huitridre des Etats-Unis. 4 

Cancale, decline of oyster culture at.....- 9, 10 

oyster collectors in use at......- 12 

oyster culture at ...82-2.cccecee ce 4,9 

OyStersifromy-csonessas cose seree: 6, 7,8 

Cette, oyster beds at, formation of.....-..- 8 

Claires or water parks...............-..-- 12, 13 

Collectors used in oyster culture ..-..----- 11 et seq 

plank: collector 22. sc. <n cms-.ces- 11 

DWeIBOn sence wissescceesccsccewee 14 

au Cancalee- cern: esses cienceers 12 

ateATCAChONssasces ec cece See toe 12,13 

at Saint Servan-.....-....-566 12 

Ati Saint~BrieuG sees ccess~- ese 12 

Offslatensse onc semeccsejcee sae 12 

OlyDriGks secs see cece aceteecie 12 

wooden boxes>.-------s 6-1 -b'- 12 

hive collectorse--.-+2--+ 22 sc0 12 

of Messrs. Lalesque and Lalanne 12 

UES eeeet eee Secs css Saeco soos 12 

Dr. Kemmerer’s method. ....--.. 12 

claires or water parks..-.....-. 12,13 

ambulances or preserving boxes 12 

WOOGENIDOXES .<- ccc -ce sec cece nic 13 

OnMoMicheletwoss..ae--ce = [22 13, 14 

ambulance ostréophile. -..-....-- 13 

Concarneau, establishment of oyster beds 8 

Coste, M., experiments in oyster culture. . 3,4 
voyage d’exploration sur le lit- 

toral de la France et de l'Italie 4,5 


[21] 


Page. 

Coste. M., visit to Lake Fusaro............ 5 
restocking of old oyster beds... 5 
experiments at oyster culture.. 6,7, 8,9 


De Bon, established oyster beds.......... 9,10 
exhibited specimens of oysters... 6 
oyster collector by..............- 11 
oyster culture in 1875............ 1 
France, oyster culture in...............-. 4 
Government supervision of oyster beds.. 18,19 
Granville, oyster culture at .............. 4 
Hire\collectors ee.) shoe. cnapecceieeee ee 12 
Island of Noirmoutiers, oyster culture at. 2 
Island of Oléron, decline of oyster culture 9 
Island of R6, decline of oyster culture at- 9 
oyster beds at .............. 8 
oyster culture at ........... 4, 8,9, 10 
Kemmerer, Dr., oyster collector.......-.. 12 
Lake Fusaro, oyster culture in........-.. 6 
Lalesque and Lalanne, oyster collector. .. 12 
L’Anse de la Forest, oyster beds at....-.. 8 
La Rochelle, decline of oyster culture at. 9 
oyster beds at, yield of...... 8 
Marennes, oyster beds of..-........-..-.-- 4, 8,12 
Michelet, M., method of collecting oysters 13 
Montaignac, Marquis of, report to........ ds. 
Morbihan, oyster culture at.............. 16,18 
collectors in use at.........--. 16,17 


rivers of, oyster culturein.... 10,11 


Noirmoutiers, island of, oyster culture at. 2 
Normandy, oyster beds along coast of. .-. 6 
Oléron, island of, decline of oyster culture 8 
Orata, Sergius, oyster culture...........-. 9 
Oyster, spawning of: 5. hea. sscer cece ces 35 
artificial culture of ............... 4etseq. 
detaching Of 7 .cnr cas sscloesclectes se 16 
producedan parkse-.---ss2-5---=- 16 

Oyster beds, establishment of ..-......... 8 
impoverishment of.......-.. 9 
Tesirictinpiole-s-<-jecece sees 9 


Oyster culture : 
Report on, by M. De Bon (Title) ...-..-- 
advancement! Ofera.sertece cet ccsscceee 
aurAircachonesecce ss ccs ss sistcininieyas ceniste's 
NiStOVy 10 Mem aseee asc sce e et eae e se 
raising from natural beds............... 
practices iniHrance:....\....s..cssesccee 
abyMarennes\<i.nie<cosssscocc cls 
ati Cancale: vec cue snseetaceiee 
atiGranvilles<: st aseeeme cece 
at Saint Vaast-la-Hougue..-.. 
INVA CLICR tees es ee eats eee 
AI POMPANCO Ole eae es 
spawning of the oyster.......-..-....-. 
TECeNtOLIPIN OL. an ame eras lamina eeeeeaetars 


anf ke ee PR Ph Rh Ow ee 


906 


Page. 

Oyster culture: 
At: Salnt Servanecieeccwe cis asimacdwcedcwe 5 
M. Coste’s participation in ............. 6 
experiments at Saint Brieuc............ 7,8 
restocking on a largo scale ........---.. 7 
ANSE ACV ANOSB AN 6 ale vis wsesvicaic seems «0010 8 
TALES TIN emacs tea sss case meget 8 
temporary decline in................-.. 8 
causes of decline in........--.--....s26- 9 
action of department of marine......... 9 
Ashery TECUlAtIONS ....2-00seceweccnsace 9 
TTOPTOVEMONUS IN oasis sae eecomiaadavens 10 
OVAL VAL Ole: dm alanis nicials oie «(anniatniest wb meinialoln 10 
increase at Arcachon ......s0000. scenes i 
practical remarks On...........+.se-0+- I 
COUECTOLA IN USO tne pees smadkoleaente ei 11, 14 
LLB an ais te fe tee hietaiahtstaia aig Sforahae alatere tei stenatene 12 
CURITOS inn notcientn bctnioW meme ccat deat dls 12, 18 
VA UONS DL Ate ate tae aidan ein (ae rei wigtels gisle era's 12, 18 
RITDUIANCOS Enemies cata inciw abe ways eecineins 12, 14 
preservative boxes. /..........05-seen- 12 
BUPA ECAC HON Mates walste(sn nie a aida Mare mbin mietete 13 
preparation of ground... .. 18 
GIGINER BLU Veswauwe« ieeheed 13 
wator-parks ......+...-.-+- 138, 16 
ambulances ..........--... 14 
COLLGCUONA'= wan aaaisaian a eRe 14, 15 
DAT QOS tiene pmic aeslu afew vamiel 14 
detaching of oysters. ....-. 15 
BU MLOLDID EM ction eaniten = nance elses sete 16 
RURVAVIOLS scape ais eeiin cioviela dt beieaiccye © cists 17 
BUPEI VISION OL DAVIE em okcememicle Je sieia se 18 
dissemination of facts ..............---+ 19 
Information COsILGd): nnwsieccndcwuwannpass 19 
Oyster fishing, laws and regulations....-.. 9, 10 
parks, demands for .......---seana« 1,10 
establishment of........... 2,8 
in bay Mount Saint Michel 2,10 
at island of Noirmoutier .. . 2 
at island of R6............- 4, 8,9 
GU MATENUECD waawa icumecicane 4, 8, 12 
Bt Cancale... ..cccveccccadns 4,9 
BtiGVaN Ville’. swensensnnews 4 
at Saint Vanst-la-Tougue .. 4 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES, 


[22] 


Page. 

Oyster parks, of Lake 'Tusaro ............ 5 

at Saint Brieuc ............ 7,8 

restocking Of ..........c005 7,8 

in basin of Arcachon ..... 8,9, 10, 11 

at Ange de la Forest...... 8 

near Concarneau........... 8 

at island of Oléron......... 9 

at La Rochelle............. 9 

abandonment of 2.2.2.2... 9 

PAULSON, 5am stele ae maratawese ee 9 

causes of failures of........ 9 

OE VAVIEPE sen eccalew cede metsrn 10 

Bt LOT OUMMAT vate wee nee 10, 11. 

improvements in.......... 10 et seq. 

TOVIVAMOL 0. cmablveetcetete wants 10 

at Régneville .......-..00. 12 

Blanks COlectors: a5 tea sisw tes sen pemietanetsicn 1 

Rance, decline of oyster culture in the... 9 

oyster beds at, restocking of ..... 6, 6,7 

Ré, island of, decline of oyster culture at. 9, 10 

oyster beds at ............. 8 

WIGLMOLhvncaweccauiats ne beeen 8 

oyster culture at........... 4, 8, 9, 10 

Régneville, oyster culture at............. 12 
Rotenent, harbor of, concessions granted 

TOP PYGOCIN gg PDATKBMN. wees eviews sclcaaawer 18 

Saint Brieuc, collectors in use ab......... 12 

oyster culture at........... 7,8 

Saint Malo, oyster beds at, restocking of. 5 

Saint Michel, Mount, oyster culture in bay 2,10 

Saint Servan, collectors in use at......... 12 

oyster culture at .........4. 5, 6,7 

Saint Vaast-la-Ilougue, oyster culture at. 4 

BIATE COL SObOE ic isia wicmwin/eiulute ct dim ate, twceindnt 12 

SPA WDINGOL OV STOLB) i suim ou simian bale bbmsialan 5 

THA, DONG Ol) OV SLCIM lice s mea ninwsinnn wnat 8 

Tiles AB ICOMCOLOLS sn slcaptinvueerisseen inn ain 12 

Toulon, roadstead of, oyster beds ........ 8 

VIGL( Ol mei anne baie 8 

TPE QULET) OVRUGYE LlOWceenciemetaun uence 7 

Viviers, oyster eulture at .............--6 10 

OVStOr Parks AL... ss cceewaspenas 17 

collectors in use at.............. M7 


Water-parks, seo claires ......... ‘ngenniee 12 


XXXI.—A REPORT ON ee ees IN THE MEDITERRA- 
NEAN.* 


By G. Boucnon-BRANDELY, 


Seereiary to the College of France. 


OYSTER-CULTURE IN ITALY. 


It is to Italy we are indebted for the idea of establishing in France 
that branch of industry, so tlourishing at the present time, known as 
oyster-culture. ‘The Romans were the tirst to engage in the cultivation 
of the oyster, and their methods, inherited by the Italians, have come 
down to us without any moditication. The method of cultivating this 
mollusk at Tarente to-day is the same as that practiced in the time of 
Sergius Orata. In 1853 M. Coste visited Fusaro, and from that remark- 
able journey of scientitic exploration, it is said, he brought back the 
elements of the new industry to which science has assigned general 
rules that have since been improved upon by practice. But if, prior 
to that time, an exceptionally tine tlavor was given to the precious 
bivalve at Marennes, Courseuilles, and Cancale, by a special treatment, 
we were still ignorant of the processes of taking the spawn and of sup- 
plementing the loss occasioned by the continued impoverishment of the 
beds on our coast, the sources of production which had formerly been 
erroneously supposed to be inexhaustible. 

Oyster-culture, properly so called, is carried on in Italy in only one 
locality, Tarente. The celebrated Lake Fusaro, to whieh I will devote 
a tew words hereafter, has become sterile and has been abandoned. 
The oysters consumed in Italy, beyond those received from Tarente, 
come trom the gultS of Genoa and Naples, trom the coasts of the 
Adriatic, and trom the ponds of Corsica. 

The Gulf of Genoa produces small and delicate oysters, which are 

* Rapport au Ministre de l'Instruction publique sur la Pisciculture en France et 
L’Ostréioulture dans la Méditerranée, par M. Bouchon-Brandely, Seerétaire du College 
de France. Paris: A. Wittersheim et C%, Quai Voltaire, $1, 1878, (Extrait du Journal 
Officiel des 16, 17 ef 18 Mai 1878.) small 8 vo, pamphlet, pp. 103. Only that portion 
of the report devoted to oyster-culture in the Mediterranean (pp. 45-108) is reproduced 
hare. 

ae 7 


908 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] _ 


held in high repute. At Naples, near the rocks of Castel, and in other 
deeper parts of the gulf, oysters similar to those of Genoa, are still 
found, which are designated, scientifically, under the name Ostrea plica- 
tula. At neither Genoa nor Naples are the banks sufficiently well 
stocked to permit the use of the drag, with profit, in gathering oysters. 
The fishermen take them by hand, sometimes at a considerable depth. 
The products of this fishery are entirely consumed in the vicinity. 
Rome, Florence, and the large towns of the peninsula receive a part of 
their supplies from Brindisi and Venice, at which places some natural 
beds exist. The oysters from these beds belong to the common Medi- 
terranean species (Ostrea edulis). 


LAKE FUSARO, NEAR NAPLES. 


There is no necessity of our entering here into a retrospective exam- 
ination of the industry of Lake Fusaro. M. Coste, in the learned report 
he has published concerning his mission to the shores of the Mediter- 
ranean, has performed this task better than I could doit. But I have 
thought it proper not to leave Naples without first endeavoring to 
ascertain the causes which have occasioned the sterility of this ancient 
lake and the loss of its secular industry. The principal cause, as well 
as the oldest and most incontestible one, which has at all times occa- 
sioned the greatest disasters, results from sulphurous emanations aris- 
ing over certain portions of the bottom during the eruptions of Mount 
Vesuvius. At such times as these all of the inhabitants of the lake 
are imperiled, but shell-fish suffer most because of their inability to 
get out of harm’s way. At various periods of eruption the oysters of 
Fusaro have been very nearly exterminated, but so great has been their 
fecundity that only a few years were required to enable the lake to re- 
cover its normal productiveness. In addition to this natural and inev- 
jtable cause, there are others of more recent origin and less extent, 
among which may be cited: (1) the accumulation of vegetable and an- 
imal refuse which has fouled the bottom; (2) the too extensive cultiva- 
tion of mussels; (3) the excessive saltness of the water; and (4) the 
insufficient supply of fresh water. Finally, in 1856, the Neapolitan 
Government, with a view to rendering Lake Fusaro more healthy—as its 
marshy water propagated the malady so common in certain parts of 
Italy, viz., malaria—caused a new canal to be dug at the extremity of 
the lake, in order to secure, to the greatest possible extent, the renewal 
of the water. It is claimed that this work hastened the decay of Lake 
Fusaro. The contact of this new current with the old resulted in the 
stirring up of the materials that had been accumulating in the lake for 
many years. Sands were brought down by the current, thus changing 
the nature of the bottom. The oyster-culturists, after vain endeavors 
to overcome this new misfortune, abandoned their concessions, and in 
the year 1869 the last oysters disappeared from Lake Fusaro. 


a 


[3] OYSTER-CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 909 
TARENTE. 


From the earliest times the maritime population of Tarente has busied 
itself in the cultivation of oysters and mussels. This industry is carried 
on in salt ponds which border the city on the west, and to which the 
name of “ Little Sea” has been given. Being connected with a roadstead 
or open sea, by means of a narrow channel, sufficiently large, however, 
to insure the renewal of the water, the Little Sea (piccolo mare) presents 
the most favorable conditions for the production of shell-fish. The 
productiveness of this portion of the coasts of the Ionian Sea is pro- 
verbial; fish and shell-fish of all kinds occur there in abundance, and 
in addition to the species which are also common to the Mediter- 
ranean and the Atlantic coast of Europe, it likewise possesses certain 
other varieties peculiar to itself. The Littie Sea, which is quite well 
sheltered from the sea winds by the eminence on which the city of 
Tarente stands, is also protected against the winds from the interior by 
the range of hills in the midst of which it lies. It measures twelve 
miles in circumference, and is six miles wide in its broadest part, that 
is, from the gate of Naples to the convent of San Francisco (Battentiere). 
Its waters are pure; the bottom is composed of calcareous sands, and 
the shores at intervals are covered with sea-weed, which the fishermen 
do not molest, and in which many different species of fish come to spawn 
and find shelter. The depth of the Little Sea is relatively great and its 
shores are narrow. In its deepest part it measures 174 to 18 meters 
(about 55 feet). At 2 or 3 meters from the shore (64 to 10 feet) it is 
about 1 meter (34 feet) deep, and thence it gradually deepens until at 
200 meters (650 feet) from the shore it is about 6 meters (194 feet) deep. 
Seven small streams whose sources are near at hand flow into the Little 
Sea, five into the upper part and two into the lower. The most import- 
ant of these are the Galésio, the Oro, so called from the particles of gold 
brought down by it, the Battentiere, and the Adeja. The Little Sea re- 
ceives, moreover, the waters of submarine springs, one of which, the 
Citrello, has been pointed out by geographers and is very well known ; 
it rises nearly in the middle of the sea at a great depth, but with such 
force as to agitate the surface over a space more than 100 meters (325 
feet) in diameter. The quantity of water supplied by this spring must 
be considerable, and it is even conjectured by some to be a veritable 
river which rises there. It is these bodies of fresh water that insure 
the prosperity of pisciculture; for during the months of July and August 
the heat is so great at Tarente and the evaporation so rapid in the Lit- 
tle Sea, that the water would soon become too salt for the oysters to 
live in it. 

The temperature of the water in the Little Sea rises in summer to 279 
and 28° C., and even higher at times; on the 15th of September, at 7 
o'clock in the morning, my thermometer indicated 25° C. Its density 
varies greatly, according as the examinations are made near to or at a 


910 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


distance from the places where the fresh water enters; three or four 
hundred meters (975 to 1,300 feet) below where the Citrello emerges I 
found the hydrometer indicated 24°, while over the oyster and mussel 
parks it marked from 22° to 3°; in the roadstead, which likewise re- 
ceives the fresh water of the Citro, and near which are situated the oys- 
ter beds that furnish the young oysters, I found an indication of 3°. It 
was not without astonishment that I became convinced that oysters 
could live and thrive in water as warm as that of the small sea of Ta- 
rente; for it had generally been admitted that their preservation was im- 
possible in water exceeding 23° or 24° O.* In support of this assertion 
it was customary to refer to the oysters of Lake Fusaro, which died in 
large numbers whenever the temperature of the water reached such a 
height as this. But in reply it may be argued that the oysters of Lake 
Fusaro die rather in consequence of the action of volcanic emanations, 
or of sulphurous gases, which, under the influence of a high tempera- 
ture, escape from the decaying animal and vegetable remains accumu- 
lated at the bottom of the lake. From this fact it is evident that the 
heat of the water on the French Mediterranean coast is not as insur- 
mountable an obstacle to the establishment of oyster parks as has been 
asserted. 

The Little Sea of Tarente is leased by the city to a company that pays 
for it an annual rental of 38,000 francs ($11,600). The oyster and mus- 
sel parks are situated in the lower part, where the currents unite, al- 
ways bringing with them fresh nourishment and an ever-changing sup- 
ply of water. They are thirty-five in number, twenty-one for oysters 
and fourteen for mussels. Each oyster park measures from three to four 
hundred paces on each side. The mussel parks are much more spa- 
cious, their extent equaling from two to three times that of the oyster 
parks. The latter are farmed out by the company to the fishermen, who 
devote themselves to the culture of the mollusks, at the rate of one 
franc (20 cents) per seven palmes (about 6 feet). All concessions are 
marked off by strong posts driven into the bottom. In the spaces in- 
eluded within this first line of division there are other parallel lines of 
posts, arranged at intervals of fourteen palmes (about 12 feet). Of their 
uses we shall hear more further on. 


MUSSEL-CULTURE. 


Bouchots are entirely unknown at Tarente; and it is even doubtful 
whether they would yield favorable results in the sea at that place. 
The larval mussels are gathered on the spot by means of cords arranged 
horizontally very near to the spawning mussels, which lie on the bottom 
and are connected by slight agglomerations. This reserve is placed, as 
nearly as possible, in the most suitable location for it, and where it is 
least liable to suffer from the encroachment of mud. It is also neces- 
sary to avoid placing it at too great a depth, for mussels will not repro- 


a 


* Professor Oronzio Gabrielle Costa, Del Fusaro. 


[5] OYSTER-CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 911 


duce deep down in the water. From time to time, as the mussels 
increase in size, the reproducers are changed for others which the 
fishermen get from the crop of each season. The cords used to gather 
the young mussels are made from rushes or “alfa”; each of their ex- 
tremities is fastened to a stake, and their length depends upon the depth 
at which they are to be immersed, it being required that the tangent of 
the are which they describe should lie close above the bed containing 
the reproducing mussels. 

The mussel spawns in March or early in April, and reproduces so 
rapidly that the cords used as collectors soon become loaded with young 
ones. The collectors are allowed to remain down six months before 
they are taken up to make a selection, the object of which is to remove 
the mussels when they attain the size of asmallalmond. Those selected 
are then interlaced, either in bunches or singly, with the strands of the 
ropes, and these ropes are fastened to others stretched horizontally be- 
tween stakes placed at suitable distances apart, so as to fall vertically 
into the water. 

In selecting the mussels from the collectors, those which have not yet 
attained the required size are allowed to remain, and the collectors are 
thrown back into the water. The following season these will have 
grown large enough to serve as food. The rearing places are in deep 
water; parks even are utilized which extend eight or nine hundred 
meters (2,600 or 2,925 feet) into the sea; the cords bearing the mussels 
are also sometimes nearly forty palmes (about 30 feet) long; so that, at 
least as regards Tarente, breeding may be well accomplished in shallow 
water, while the rearing should be carried on where the depth is greater. 

The little sea of Tarente produces two kinds of mussels, the common 
mussel and the red mussel (Modiola barbata). The latter is preferred, 
_ and is much more valuable. The red mussel and the white mussel mul- 
tiply and abound in nearly equal proportions; nevertheless it would 
seem that the white mussel is endowed with greater fecundity, and can 
be kept fresh, out of water, for a longer time. A park will furnish, on an 
average, from four to five hundred quintals of mussels every year, the 
wholesale price of which is 11 francs ($2.20) per quintal. 


OYSTER-CULTURE. 


The arrangement of oyster parks is like that of the parks for mussels, 
with this difference, that they do not generally extend quite so far into 
the sea. Beyond certain depths oyster culture presents great difficulties 
and entails great expense. ‘These parks are divided by stakes into equal 
squares of fourteen palmes (12 feet) on each side. They are entirely de- 
voted to the raising of oysters. Breeding cannot succeed there on ac- 
count of the large quantity of mud brought down by the current into 
the lower part of the Little Sea. Nevertheless, the adult oysters accom- 
plish their generative functions there; but the young ones, on leaving 
the mother oyster, do not find collectors suitable to receive them and fall 


912 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


down upon the muddy bottom; the stakes of the parks and the cords 
which they sustain are speedily covered with a thin layer of mud, which 
prevents the young oysters from adhering. Moreover, in the upper por- 
tion of the Little Sea isolated oysters, called “ horse-feet,” are sometimes 
found in the natural state, and these seem to leave traces of their spawn- 
ing, doubtless on account of the purity of the water and the cleanliness 
of the bottom. But these mollusks are constantly displaced by the cur- 
rents, and it would be quite hazardous to count upon a regular harvest 
of young ones. This kind of oyster, which is still found in very small 
numbers in the roadstead, is highly esteemed by the 'Tarentians, who sell 
them for 15 to 50 centimes (2 to 24 cents) apiece. The beds near which 
the oyster-culturists of Tarente have placed their collectors are situated 
in the large sea. It is not known whether these beds are of large ex- 
tent or merely small aggregations; their exact limits as well as their 
actual situations are unknown. In the month of May the fishermen 
submerge fascines about two miles from the shore to serve as collectors. 
Stones attached to cords serve to keep them down at a suitable depth in 
the water, and they are found and recognized by means of pieces of float- 
ing cork. The fascines are examined fortnightly or monthly. Those 
which do not have a sufficient quantity of young oysters upon them are 
returned to the water after they have been cleaned of the mud that may 
have collected between the branches, and of all parasites which may have 
grown thereon, by leaving them exposed, for one or two days, to the heat 
of the sun. Those, on the contrary, on which the young oysters have 
attached themselves in large numbers, are immediately transferred to 
the parks of the Little Sea. 

The spawning season in the Gulf of Tarente is of exceptional length; 
it begins early in May and does not end until the close of September; 
and the yield, dependent upon the character of the year, may be abund- 
ant either at the beginning, at the middle, or at the end of this period; 
there is nothing fixed as regards this. Upon their arrival at the park 
the fascines are suspended from cords stretched from one stake to 
another, and kept in the water at a depth of one, two, or three meters 
(3 to 10 feet). After having been there six months, the young oysters 
havealready attained a length of two or three centimeters (about an inch). 
The time has now come to give them more space, and to place them under 
more immediate oversight; the fascines are untied, the branches taken 
apart, and those bearing oysters are placed between perpendicular cords 
similar to those used for mussels. The young oysters which are detached 
during this operation are placed either in baskets, on screens, or in nets 
suspended from the horizontal ropes, but never on the bottom. This 
system of breeding avoids general mortality. Atleast every four months 
the cables and other apparatus carrying the young oysters are taken up 
and examined. Those oysters which have become large enough to sell 
are removed, and advantage is taken of this opportunity to give those 
’ which ought to remain some time longer in the park the cleaning and 


[7] OYSTER-CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 913 


care which they need. The growth of the oyster takes place rapidly 
and regularly; from two to two and a half years suffice for the young 
oysters to reach a diameter of from 7 to 8 centimeters (about 3 inches). 

The oyster of Tarente is of good growth; its shell is usually rather 
thick, this being due tothe great amount of calcareous matter contained 
jn the sea-water. This peculiarity, however, in no way impairs the reg- 
ularity of its form. 

The number of oysters obtained each year from the parks of Tarente 
is estimated at about 10,000,000. Before forwarding them they are ex- 
posed to the air for twenty-four hours, in order that they may be the more 
easily cleaned afterwards. The sale of oysters is absolutely free, what- 
ever may be their size, orthe season. Butit is unnecessary to state that 
during the summer, the period of gestation, oysters are never sold. It is, 
moreover, to the advantage of the fishermen that their oysters should 
have attained a good size before being offered for sale. 

The prosperity of the fishermen of Tarente is, unfortunately, disturbed 
from time to time. From a volcanic excavation situated below the con- 
vent of Saint Antoine, and which is obstructed during long periods of 
time, surges sometimes a boiling sulphurous spring, which flows down 
into the Little Sea. As soon as this phenomenon manifests itself, con- 
sternation spreads among this population of ten thousand fishermen, who 
live exclusively upon the products of the sea. The Little Sea then takes 
a reddish tint; the water of the springs, lighter than that of the sea, is 
rapidly transported by the currents. The fish are able to flee from this 
pest, but the oyster, the mussel, and shell-fish in general are quickly 
poisoned. When the water is in this state the fishermen call it “the 
seaof blood.” This fortunately happens only at rare intervals; but, never- 
theless, within the past twelve years it has taken place twice; formerly 
it had become almost a legend, for it had not occurred within the memory 
of man.* 


* OYSTER-CULTURE IN Norway.—The work lately undertaken in Norway by Lieu- 
tenant-General Wergeland, formerly minister of war, enables us to further extend the 
comparative study of the methods of oyster-culture in the different seas. 

There are remarkable differences between the processes in use in the Mediterranean 
and in the ocean, but these differences can only be the more sensibly realized if we go 
as far as the North Sea. Hitherto, Vivier-sur-Mer, in the bay of Mont-Saint-Michel, 
seemed to be the most northern limit where oyster culture assumed all its phases, for, 
if at certain more northern points on the Norman coasts, and at a few stations on the 
southern and eastern coasts of England, young oysters have been taken by the aid of 
scientific appliances, the means of preserving the spawn are still to be discovered and 
these experiments have not been practically applied. 

Considering the latitude of Norway, the intense cold which prevails there during a 
large part of the year—cold so intense that sometimes the spawning of the oyster on 
the natural banks is without results for several seasons; and, moreover, considering 
the distance of Norway from those countries from whose experiences she might profit, 
and from which she might obtain information, it will be readily seen how numerous 
are the difficulties to be overcome in the establishment of oyster culture on the shores 
of Norway. General Wergeland was not deterred by these obstacles. After carefully 
consulting works relating to oyster culture which had been published in foreign coun- 


S. Mis. 29 ———58 


914 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


TOULON. 


The roadstead of Toulon presents, on first examination, most favorable 
natural conditions for the cultivation of oysters, mussels, and edible 
shell-fish in general. All the edible species common to the Mediterra- 
nean occur there, and it produced, moreover, in the early part of the 
present century, very fine oysters. Gradually, however, the exhaustion 
of the natural beds there began to be felt, as was the case with most of 


tries, and procuring oxact data from M. Théodore Soelfeldt, who had come to Paris to 
study the French industry, he resolutely set to work in the month of April of last 
year. 

Various circumstances appeared to him encouraging : first, the presence of the oys- 
ter in the North Sea; second, the small amount of salt contained in the water of that 
sea; third, the favorable influence of the Gulf-stream on the climate of these regions, 
and finally, the ease with which shelter may be found in the numerous fjords which cut 
into the shores of the peninsula of Norway. A bay situated a few leagues from Chris- 
tiania (toward the fifty-ninth degree of north latitude) was the spot chosen for the 
experiment. It was necessary to guard against the inconveniences resulting from 
the early setting in of winter, from the slight rise and fall of the tides, which at the 
_ sysygies rise but a foot or a foot and a half, and from the violence of the storms which 
sometimes displace a volume of water more than 7 feet in depth. On the arrival of 
winter in Norway, that is to say, toward the beginning of September, the young oys- 
ters are still too young to resist the shocks and sudden changes of temperature. It 
was, therefore, of the greatest importance that they should not come into contact with 
the outer air. These difficulties were surmounted in the following manner: In tke 
upper part of the establishment a supply reservoir, fed by a pump, worked by wind, 
was dug. Immediately beneath, within a house which protected it from the rigor 
of the cold, was placed a basin for holding the eggs, measuring 8 meters (26 feet) in 
length by 6 meters (19 feet) in width. A leaden conduit, furnished at its upper part 
with a grating fine enough to stop the passage of harmful fish, and in its lower part 
with fancets to regulate the supply of water at will, brought the two reservoirs into 
connection with one another, This tube took several windings and passed through 
an inclosure filled with water, which could be heated when necessary so as to main- 
tain the water supplied to the hatching basin of a nearly uniform temperature. The 
level of the water in this latter basin was regulated by means of a tube, the opening 
of which was covered with a filter to prevent the escape of the young oysters. In this 
basin 2,200 female oysters were placed at the commencement of the season, and, 
although they had undergone the fatigue of a long journey, they emitted such a 
quantity of spawn that it was found upon the collectors by which they were sur- 
rounded. 

This first experiment, as will be seen from the above, succeeded well, and the system 
jnvented by General Wergeland for obtaining larval oysters in inclosed places could 
be developed to any desired extent. The General intends to try and obtain the spawn 
of free oysters, if the season be mild enough to permit, by surrounding with fascines 
a natural oyster bed that has been recently explored. He proposes subsequently to 
inclose the young oysters in floating preservative boxes, and to raise them on the spot. 

The labors, works, and schemes which I have just explained are due to the in- 
itiative taken by General Wergeland, whose laudable ambition it is to render to his 
country the same services which M. Coste has rendered to France. He is now en- 
gaged in restocking by means of pisciculture the large and beautiful lakes of Norway. 
If he succeeds, as there is every reason to believe he will, his country will be indebted 


to him for the introduction of a branch of industry for which there is a great future 
in store. 


[9] OYSTER-CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. - 915 


the banks along our coasts, and the deposits which had been of consid- 
erable importance were speedily exhausted. The oysters now taken at 
Toulon are isolated ones found in the crevices of the rocks. 

Did the ruin of these banks arise from excessive and unlimited fish- 
ing, or must we attribute it, as at Brest, to the successive transforma- 
tions which the submarine soil must have undergone, in consequence of 
the great works performed in the bay, and the repeated dred gings which 
stirred up the sand and the mud, and covered up the solid objects to 
which the oysters might have attached themselves? All have, doubt- 
less, contributed to this result; but it is certain that at the same time 
_ the oysters disappeared, several other edible shell-fish, the mussel, for 
instance, became rare, and certain migratory fish which usually visited 
the shores of Toulon, as well as some stationary species, deserted the 
coast. This state of affairs aroused the solicitude of the marine admin- 
istration. The labors of M. Coste had just then been meeting with 
great favor in France. Numerous attempts to introduce into our waters 
the oyster-cultural methods, brought by that gentleman from Italy, were 
repeated at various points along our sea-coast. The task of renewing 
the oyster banks of the roadstead of Toulon, and of making oyster-cul- 
tural experiments there, was confided to M. Coste about the year 1859. 
He proceeded in the following manner: Spawning oysters, with which he 
hoped to accomplish the restocking, were brought from England and 
Arcachon, and plante’!, some at points that had been previously ex- 
plored, and found to be most favorable for the preservation and increase 
of the mollusk, especially near Seyne, the others in suspended baskets. 
Collectors, consisting of fascines or pieces of wood, were placed around 
the reproducing oysters. The oysters distributed in the improvised 
parks and those contained in the baskets acted differently; the latter 
spawned abundantly, and grew rapidly during the entire summer; the 
others spawned but little, or at least their spawn was without vitality ; 
they thrived miserably during the season following their spawning, and 
finally perished. This was the fate of them all. This result, though 
not a negative one, having been deemed unsatisfactory, the experiments 
were, too hastily perhaps, abandoned. 

In order that the fatal influences should not always exist as a check 
to oyster culture in the Mediterranean in the future, it is expedient to 
seek the causes that have led tothem. In the first place, it must be re- 
membered that M. Coste could not do everything. He had charge, 
simultaneously, of the attempts at oyster culture in the ocean and the 
restocking of our fresh-water streams; he was organizing a model fish- 
cultural establishment at Huningue, at the same time that he was pursu- 
ing in his laboratory at the College of France scientific researches, which 
he afterwards made known in his lectures; finally, he was engaged in the 
preparation of interesting reports. He was thus unable to observe with 
all the necessary assiduity the different phases of the experiment, to 
watch its progress, and to modify it in case of need. Notwithstanding 


91G REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


‘the zeal and activity displayed by the persons to whom he had given his 
instructions, were they competent to fill the place of the master? Sec- 
ondly, would it not have been preferable to choose as reproducers oysters 
from the Mediterranean, instead of the English oyster, whose fine quality 
and powers of rapid growth and fattening were incontestable, or the 
“¢ gravette” of Arcachon, with its fine shape and exquisite flavor? These 
oysters being accustomed to the waters of the ocean, which differ greatly 
both as regards saltness and temperature from those of the Mediterra- 
nean, it could not be expected that they would become acclimated with- 
out difficulty, and that the regularity with which reproduction took place 
in their native water would not be interrupted. The proof that these 
oysters were not suited to this place is the fact that no trace of them 
now remains there, while the indigenous kind, although few in numbers 
it is true, has survived. It has been objected that the varieties may 
have become confounded in one type, or, that those planted at Toulon 
may have become transformed and have acquired the character of the 
native oysters. 

The first objection is very easily refuted. It is probable that the for- 
eign variety may have undergone some modification, but this could not 
have been great enough to have deceived the experienced eye of a 
naturalist. 

From these facts it must not be inferred that the acclimation of foreign 
oysters is neither possible noredvantageous. Thereare precedents which 
demonstrate the contrary, and it will be sufficient to remind the reader 
that the American oyster (Ostrea virginiana) has prospered well in the 
basin of Arcachon; that the Portuguese oyster (Ostrea angulata) now 
reproduces naturally in the lower Gironde, just as it does at Arcachon, 
and that it does not suffer from its forced residence in the parks of Saint 
Vaast-la-Hougue, where the water is.very considerably colder than it is 
at the mouth of the Tage, of which this oyster is a native. In the third 
place, some indispensable precautions had been neglected. Thus, when 
the oysters were immersed, instead of being distributed and separated 
from one another, they were piled up in thick layers in the parks. It is 
known that the accumulation of too many individuals at one point is 
disastrous, unless the conditions for aerating the water are exceptionally 
favorable. The spawning oysters were also exposed to many other dan- 
gers. First, their habitation was soon invaded by mussels. This is by 
no means of rare occurrence; it takes place whenever the oyster and 
mussel are brought too near together. In the next place, on account of 
the ditficulty of keeping the place of experiment perfectly clean, owing 
to the absence of tides in the Mediterranean, the mud and sand, con- 
stantly kept in motion by the currents, accumulated by turns, and the 
reproducing oysters which suffered at the outset, as shown by the small 
development which they acquired in their parks, finally perished. It is 
the opinion that this experiment should not be considered as decisive 
of what can be done in oyster culture upon our southern shores. I think 


Pet] OYSTER-CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. JG, 


that ifit were tried again with the more certain methods now employed 
the results would doubtless be encouraging. It is private enterprise, 
however, that should take the initiative, for to that in large part is due 
the great progress realized in the ocean, and the creation of oyster 
culture in Trance. 

As I have before remarked, two varieties of oysters live naturally in 
the roadstead of Toulon.* Tirst, there is the Ostrea plicatula, which 
also occurs at Genoa, Naples, and on the coast of Africa; and, second, 
the common Mediterranean oyster found at Narbonne, Port-de-Bouc, 
Aigues-Mortes, in the inclosures of Leucate, as well as at Tarente, and 
in the Adriatic at Brindisi and Venice. The first is a small oyster, which 
lives isolated or in groups attached to the rocks. It never forms, how- 
ever, what is known as an oyster-bed; at least none are known on the 
coasts of France and Italy. The shell is small, rough, and irregular, sel- 
dom exceeding a large walnut in size. Its interior is pearly and of a 
slightly greenish tint, and the lower valve is very deep. This oyster is 
of an exceptionally fine flavor, which causes it to be much sought for. 
Itis quite uncommon at Toulon. The second, if it were carefully parked 
and cared for, would not, as regards fineness and quality, be inferior to the 
best on our ocean coasts, and might compare favorably with the oysters 
of any region. The oysters of the pond of Leucate, the very rare ones 
taken at Narbonne and in the vicinity of the islands of Hyeres, with 
those of the roadstead of Toulon, are the finest and ‘best furnished by 
the Mediterranean. When properly cared for in a park they attain a 
size of from 10 to 12 centimeters (4 to 43 inches). The shell becomes 
light, translucent, hard, and well enameled on the inside; it emits a 
sound like crystal upon being struck. The lines of growth are indicated 
on the exterior by slight and delicate tubular folds. The oyster is well 
shaped, without being too large or too fat, and its exquisite flavor has 
earned for it a great reputation among the people of the south, a reputa- © 
tion which would not be merely local if oyster culture was in favor in the 
Mediterranean. Finally, I will add that between the Quimper oyster, 
which is excellent and of high repute, and the oyster of Toulon or Lenu- 
cate, there exists the greatest analogy. 


“PENINSULA OF GIENS. 
ESTABLISHMENT OF MESSRS. GASQUET. 


Messrs. Gasquet were the first to seriously attempt putting into execu- 
tion the happy idea of cultivating other shell-fish than the oyster and 
mussel, and the experiments which they have been making, with the 
most painstaking and laudable efforts, since the beginning of the year 
1877, on the north coast of the peninsula of Giens, deserve to be made 


*It is pretty generally admitted that the oyster called the ‘‘ Pied de cheval” does 
not constitute a distinctspecies. It is supposed to be a common oyster that has grown 
old and large. 


918 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] © 


known. The oyster and the mussel are also among the mollusks raised 
at Giens. This marine establishment has been founded on the banks of 
a concession, measuring not less than 10 hectares (25 acres). The shores 
slope gently, and the sea-weed, with which they are almost everywhere 
covered, converts them, as it were, into marine meadows, similar to the 
‘Serassats” of Arcachon, which are known at Toulon by the name of 
“mates.” The soil is formed of a mixture of clay, sand, and calcareous 
deposits. The proximity of aquatic plants for the raising of shell-fish and 
other fish offers undeniable advantages, particularly in the Mediterranean. 
In the ocean the breeding parks are, at times, almost entirely uncovered, 
and the tide furnishes them with well wrated water. The tide also 
brings to the shell-fish confined there abundant and fresh food from all 
directions. The case is different in the Mediterranean. At less than 
50 meters (160 feet) from the shore, except during storms, the bottom 
is never brought into contact with the outer air, and the animals which 
have not the power of locomotion are forced to feed on little else than 
what grows upon the bottom within a very restricted area. But in the 
present case aquatic plants tend to render less noticeable the effects 
resulting from the absence of tides. They always set free a small quan- 
tity of oxygen and produce multitudes of microscopic insects, which fur- 
nish food to other animals. These were not the only considerations 
which induced the Messrs. Gasquet to establish themselves on the pe- 
ninsula of Giens. The numerous kinds of shell-fish which took refuge 
in the gulf and the fine oysters occasionally found there were indications 
of the possibility of success. 

In connection with the experiments of acclimation which the Messrs. 
Gasquet have made on the shell-fish brought from Cette, experiments 
which have given the most favorable results, I have thought it would 
be interesting to make known the chemical composition of the waters of 

ethe breeding-parks. The following is an analysis made in the labora- 
tory of M. Schutzenberger, a professor in the College of France: 


Sodiam and! potassium 2.22 25230 Sch sk sec le Jee ee ee eee nee 1T02 
Chlorine andibromine)....225 2 seen ose mc ose oe ee ee eee 21.61 
Maonesiahsn S226 2 ce itecen loots scp. ccsbs o oboe weet eee ee eee 3.03 
Sulphuric Berd) n.) c Sak 2 occ bse: ck eisisiers see Siac oe Be ee bale 

40.78 
Residuum for 1 liter (about 1 quart—61 cubic inches) .......-..-..----.-------- 41. 23 


With some slight differences, the water at Cette resembles that at 
Giens. This fact must be borne in mind, for it shows that the acclima- 
tion of foreign species can only be obtained without difficulty, when the 
medium whence those species are taken closely resembles that in which 
they are to be placed. The water of the roadstead has a density of 3° 
by the hydrometer; its temperature is very variable; it attains, and even 
exceeds, 24°. This is not, however, an unfavorable condition. Under 
the action of the heat and the beneficial influence of the rain-water, the 
Shell-fish rapidly develop. 


[13] OYSTER-CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 919 


The industry of Messrs. Gasquet consists in the breeding and rearing 
of the following species: the oyster, the common mussel and the red 
mussel, the “double praire” ( Venus verrucosa), the “simple praire” (Car- 
dita sulcata), the “ clovisse” of Toulon (Tapes decussata), and the “ clovisse” 
of Cette (apes texturata), the edible sea-urchin (Toxopneustes lividus), and 
the “violet” (Ascidia cynthia). The products of the seaare generally much 
relished by the inhabitants along the Mediterranean coasts. All marine 
animals that serve as food and cannot be classified as fish are called by 
them “fruits of the sea.” The people of Toulon have a marked predilec- 
tion for the praire, and esteem it as highly as they do the oyster. The 
average-sized double praire sells at Toulon at from 1 france to 1 frane 25 
centimes (20 to25 cents) per dozen; if of large size, it brings as high as 2 
francs (40 cents) ; the simple praire is worth a little less. The red mussel 
has a delicate flavor, and, like the praire, is eaten raw. The clovisse is, 
perhaps, less appreciated by epicures, but is universally eaten through- 
out the south. “One year, at Marseilles, the clovisse disappeared from 
the port, and desolation was general among the inhabitants. The magis- 
trates took a generous initiative and had large quantities of the best 
quality brought from a distance. These were thrown by the basketful 
into the place which since that time has been known as the ‘ Reserve.’”* 

The sea-urchin (Toxopneustes lividus) is sought after by many of the 
natives of Provengaux. The violet also has its partisans. Many of the 
southern people like it because of its somewhat high flavor. It sells at 
Toulon from 5 to 25 centimes (4 to 14 cents) apiece. 

As we see, the industry which the Messrs. Gasquet are attempting to 
create has an economic bearing, for it supplies a demand. The parks 
on the peninsula of Giens are all surrounded by stakes driven into the 
bottom, and to these hurdles are attached. This kind of inclosure serves 
the double purpose of presenting an obstacle to the waves, which beat 
on the coast, and of acting as a collector or place of refuge for the spat 
of the shell-fish. Within the parks have been placed other collectors, 
consisting of stones and tiles covered with a coating of hydraulic cement, 
which renders it possible, when the time has arrived, to remove the oys- 
ters from the place of attachment; this may be accomplished without 
the slightest difficulty. 

The oysters which Messrs. Gasquet have introduced into their conces- 
sion came from Arcachon; the largest, on their arrival, measured about 
4 centimeters (14 inches) in diameter; the others were still attached to the 
collectors. They were imported and parked in the spring of last year, 
and at once rapidly grew to be one centimeter in size. But since the 
manifestation of this first growth, until the month of September, at which 
time I visited the establishment at Giens, they had remained stationary, 
and moreover had given no signs of reproducing. There is nothing 
strange in this, for it must be considered that these oysters, which were 


* Note sur la praire double (Venus verrucosa) par M. Charles Bretagne. Extract from 
the Bull. de la Soc. d@’acclim., 1863. 


920 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


still rather young for spawning, had, besides, undergone the fatigue of a 
long journey; the time they have taken to recover themselves coincides 
precisely with that of their growth and spawning. It is also necessary 
to add that a drier year than that of 1877 has been rarely seen. During 
more than four months the water of the roadstead of Giens, naturally 
salt, has not received the slightest addition of rain-water. In spite of this 
fact very few oysters have perished. This is important and promises 
well for the future. 

Messrs. Gasquet, like practical men, do not propose to limit their ex- 
periments to the oyster of Arcachon; this year they are going to obtain 
a supply of Portuguese oysters and of oysters native to the ponds of Cor- 
sica. They have taken advantage of the winter season to make impor- 
tant improvements in their parks. Having learned of the excellent re. 
sults obtained by distributing shells and sand over the bottom of the 
parks, they have, like Messrs. Mauduit and Solminihac, at Belon, ear- 
ried caleareous sand mixed with clay to that part of their establishment 
where the young oysters are to be quartered. Boxes, such as are agree- 
able to the fry, ingeniously arranged, have been constructed to receive 
the young oysters and other valuable shell-fish, whose small size would 
expose them to the attacks of their enemies. If in the experiments 
made at Giens nothing conclusive has been decided as regards the oys- 
ter, mussels have succeeded perfectly. They have grown very large 
during the past year, and have multiplied in a large proportion. Their 
spat was so abundant that it was found attached in quantity to a net 
several hundred meters (a meter is 34 feet) from the breeding beds. 
The hurdles surrounding the park and the slates which served as collec- 
tors were also well covered with them. 

In order to further extend this branch of their new industry, Messrs. 
Gasquet propose soon to establish bowchots made on the model of those 
used in the cove of Aiguillon. It is also desirable to mention the suc- 
cess obtained with the double praire, both as regards propagation and 
growth. The praire is a bivalve of nearly oval shape, with deep, hard 
valves which are concentrically ribbed. It may attain a maximum size 
of from 7 to 74 centimeters (23 to 3 inches). The animal is plump and 
of a whitish color; it fills its shell so completely that a praire of average 
size is at least equal to a good-sized oyster. It is found in the ocean 
and in the Mediterranean; the Mediterranean form is preferable as re- 
gards flavor, and its reputation would have spread beyond the limits of 
Provence, were it not for its tendency to disappear from the southern 
shores. It usually lives in water ranging from 1 to 4 meters (3 to 13 feet) 
in depth; it is fond of a sandy bottom and sometimes penetrates from 
8 to 12 centimeters (3 to 5 inches) into the sand. Like many other mol- 
lusks, it seeks the vicinity of fresh water. In the month of April, 1877, 
praires of all ages and sizes from the roadstead of Toulon were placed 
in the parks of Giens. The place chosen for this deposit was a sandy 
and somewhat clayey bottom, where a few tufts of marine seaweed grow. 


[15] OYSTER-CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 921 


Their growth was apparent during the whole of last year, and it was 
_ also observed with satisfaction that they had propagated. I, myself, 
found some very young ones on the cords of tunny-nets. It is thought 
that the spat of this mollusk floats freely in the water, until it is stopped 
by some obstacle, to which, however, it does not adhere; it remains free 
in the interstices which have received it. As soon as it becomes more 
developed, it leaves its place of refuge, where it found neither the food 
necessary to its growth nor the protection it needed against its enemies, 
and settles in the sand or among the vegetation. The namesimple praire 
has been improperly given to the Cardita sulcata, for it is neither the 
parent nor the congener of the double praire, but belongs to a distinct 
species. The simple praire does not exceed in size the cockle (Cardium 
edule), which, as regards its shell, it strongly resembles; its flesh, how- 
ever, is of a reddish color and has a rich flavor. When placed in the 
same parks as the double praires, they have gone on reproducing their 
kind from the first year of their introduction. By digging in the sand 
on the shore, and as far out as the ropes of the tunny-net (madragque), 
we found some that measured from 5 to 7 millimeters (4 inch) in diam- 
eter, as early as the’month of September. The fishermen say they had 
never previously found this mollusk on this part of the shore of Giens, 
The acclimation of the simple praire is now an accomplished fact, and 
shell-fish culture cannot but be benefited thereby. 

The clovisse of Toulon and Cette have also increased much in size 
during the pastsummer. Indications of their spawning have been found 
near where they are located, and still more abundantly on the ropes 
supporting the nets of the madrague. In autumn the new generation 
had attained a size of from 10 to 12 millimeters (about 4 inch). 

The clovisse of Toulon, which has a dark and hard shell, lives in limpid 
waters and on a sandy bottom. The clovisse of Cette, whose shell is 
thinner, more tender, and lighter in color, lives in less pure water and 
‘on more earthy bottom. I will relate, simply for the sake of recording 
the fact, an observation made at Giens, which it is difficult to explain, 
regarding the manner of reproduction of the shell-fish in question and 
their well-defined characteristics. It would appear that the clovisse 
imported from Cette has a tendency to resemble the clovisse of Toulon; 
that is to say, to borrow from it something as regards shape and color. 
Although the possibility of a crossing may be contested, it must be ad- 
mitted that the bottom on which the clovisse from Cette now lives, and the 
quality and nature of the food which they find there, may have caused the 
modifications to which Ihave justreferred. Atallevents, it is proved that 
after a very short sojourn in the parks at Giens, they have acquired the 
flavor peculiar to the native variety. There is another fact to which it 
seems proper to call attention. It was observed that the spat had par- 
ticularly sought out the ropes of the tunny-net (madrague) at consider- 
able distances from the concession. In the beginning of winter, when 
the madrague was taken up from the water, some of the ropes were so 


922 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


covered with these little shell-fish that Messrs. Gasquet thought best to 
immerse them in the park in order to allow the young ones time to grow. 

Is not this indication calculated to put shell-fish culturists in the way 
of an improvement in the processes and methods to be employed in col- 
lecting spat? It is not right to attribute to chance alone, or to the mere 
influence of the currents, the preferences which these young animals 
seem to have for this sort of collector rather than for the hurdles by 
which they are surrounded, or the aquatic plants of the shore. Have 
not the fishermen of Tarente, who have carried on their industry for a 
long period of time, always used, and do they not use still, horizontal 
ropes as collectors? At all events, the observation is worthy of note. 

The edible sea-urchin is common on the coast of the Mediterranean. 
At Marseilles, Toulon, &c., it is largely consumed. It is also found in 
the ocean, but a very serious difficulty stands in the way of its artificial 
propagation there. It spawns below low-water mark, so that its prog- 
eny may not be exposed from a lack of water at low tide. In the Med- 
iterranean it propagates on the spot where it is found, which renders its 
culture possible in such places. The sea-urchins preserved in the park 
of Messrs. Gasquet propagated last summer, and in September I saw 
some ten or twelve young ones, of the size of hazel-nuts, collected round 
a couple of adults, which had been isolated for observation and had evi- 
dently given them birth. 

The violet (Ascidia cynthia) is not considered edible by all the inhab- 
itants of the sea-coast. Nevertheless, those found in certain localities 
on the Mediterranean possess remarkably fine qualities. The ancients 
were very fond of these ascidians, and ate them prepared in vinegar, with 
green or raw mint seasoned with vinegar.* Before the fishermen had de- 
vastated our shores with their drag-nets ascidians were not uncommon in 
the roadstead of Giens. They are now almost unknown, and Messrs. Gas- 
quet are right in seeking to bring about their increase. It appears from 
the observations made by these experimenters that this ascidian is fond ° 
of rather deep places, those, for instance, ranging in depth from 14 to 2 
meters (5 to 63 feet); it seeks localities where there are seaweeds to 
furnish it with food, and there it establishes itself permanently. In 
default of aquatic plants it attaches itself to any stable body. It does 
not dislike water but little salt or even slightly muddy. Like the sea- 
urchin, the ascidian has thrived at Giens, and will now, no doubt, con- 
tinue to exist there, as it has a tendency to grow and multiply in the 
parks where it has been planted. ® 

Such is the result of the fortunate experiments made by Messrs. 
Gasquet in their marine establishment at Giens. If, as it is to be hoped, 
shell fish culture comes to take its place among the new industries, to 
them will be due the honor of having taken the initiative and of having 
marked out the path to be followed. 


*Docteur Ozenne, Essai sur les mollusques. 


[17] OYSTER-CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN, 923 


BERRE, CARONTE, THAU, LEUCATE, AND AGAY. 


In view of the large extent (20,000 hectares (50,000 acres) ) of water 
known as Lake Berre, it is astonishing that human industry has not 
yet taken possession of this little sea, which, in many respects, is to 
the Mediterranean what the basin of Arcachon is to the ocean. By its 
situation and close proximity to large centers, which would afford a 
market for its productions, and by the richness of its marine fauna, 
Lake Berre would seem destined to occupy an important place in fish 
culture. The astonishment which I express is shared by a large num- 
ber of persons, and it is asked what are the reasons that have retarded 
the use of this lake for the cultivation of marine animals. One of the 
principal reasons, to which I cannot call attention too strongly, for it is 
essential that it should be correctly viewed, is the lack of success which 
has attended a majority of the attempts at shell-fish culture made in the 
Mediterranean, which lack of suecess has given rise to doubt and dis- 
couragement in the minds of those who are disposed to undertake the 
cultivation of marine animals. There is another matter which cannot 
be considered too seriously, viz.: that at the time the experiments were 
commenced, our knowledge of fish culture was still in a rudimentary 
state, and yet the results obtained, as is apparent from what I have said 
concerning Toulon and shall have to say further on in speaking of Lake 
Thau, were not of a nature to wholly justify these discouragements. 

In the ocean it has not been without uncertain groping; without the 
efforts of individual enterprise; and above all, without sacrifices on the 
part of the administration of the marine, that the prosperous state has 
been reached, which I am sure will manifest itself at the Universal Ex- 
position. The solicitude of the minister of marine and of M. Coste has 
been extended with equal favor both to the Mediterranean and the ocean, 
but private industry has been less persevering on the southern coast 
than on the western. 

Lake Berre presents the best conditions for the breeding of edible 
shell-fish and other fish. The clovisse, the praire, &c., live there natur- 
ally; mussels of an excellent quality are sufficiently abundant to make 
it profitable for forty boats to spend a large part of their time in fishing 
for them. Nor is the oyster a total stranger to this locality, for some 
were formerly found there, and in the neighborhood, near Port-de-Boue, 
very fine ones still exist. The shores are formed of shell sand, very rich 
in lime, and in many places are covered with marine plants common to 
the most fertile oyster-cultural stations of the ocean, such as Marennes, 
Tremblade, the island of Oléron, &c. The lake receives several streams 
and rivers, and numerous pure and fresh springs are found on its banks. 
Its water, which is neither too salt nor too fresh, never attains an ex- 
cessive temperature so as to endanger the life of the aquatic animals 
which industry might confide to it. Its density is very variable; in the 


924 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


month of October, 1877, towards the center of the lake it ranged from 
2°.8 to 3°, and on the banks it was about 2°.5 to 29.6. 

Lake Berre would not, however, in all its parts serve for the culture 
of shell-fish or for the establishment of fish-cultural reserves ; in the first 
place those localities must be excepted which are too deep, or at too great 
a distance from the shore, and those in which such violent currents pre- 
vail as to render it impossible, as shown by experience, to maintain 
there pieces of apparatus, and, finally, the localities which are most 
exposed to the northwest winds. But there are to the west some sec- 
tions of coast where violent winds and currents rarely prevail, and it is 
on one of these that the commissioner of maritime registry at Martigues 
has established a park, by way of experiment, to attempt the acclimation, 
breeding, and raising of oysters. The experiments are still in their in- 
fancy, but they promise a successful issue. The oysters that have been 
used were taken in the vicinity of Port-de-Bouc. They were first placed 
in baskets submerged at a suitable depth, quickly attained great vigor, 
and soon lost the salty and somewhat muddy taste which they had on 
leaving the sea; but still more important, not a single loss occurred, 
The experiment was made only with reference to the oyster, but an in- 
cident occurred which leaves no doubt as to the possibility of artificially 
cultivating the mussel in the lake of Berre. The baskets in which the 
oysters had been imprisoned, when placed in the water, at spawning 
time were covered in a few days with small mussels. 

Let us seek to discover then, (for it cannot require a great deal of time 
or money), the apparatus to be used in Lake Berre in order to collect 
and preserve the spat of this mollusk: let the system of ropes which 
is used at Tarente and Fusaro with so much success again be tried, if, 
in this case, the crawls and the rafts do not succeed, and when the proper 
apparatus shall have been found there is a strong probability, not to 
say certainty (as is proved by what I have said above, especially if the 
rational rules which have been pointed out by science and practice be 
observed, and if suitable localities be chosen), that mussel culture will be 
established there, and attain all the prosperity which has been attained 
by the sister industry, oyster culture, at Arcachon and in the sea of Mor- 
bihan. 

Below Lake Berre is Lake Caronte, as rich in shell-fish and other fish 
as the first named, and finally Port-de-Bouc, where oyster-cultural ex- 
periments were made by M. Viand; but a dry summer coming, the oys- 
ters all perished. Since Caronte and Port-de-Bouce were placed in more 
perfect communication with Lake Berre, however, the fishermen have 
remarked that certain kinds of edible shell-fish which had become very 
scarce have reappeared in large numbers. 

Of the section reaching from the gulf of Fos to Lake Thau there is 
nothing to be said. In the latter, in 1865 and in 1866, M. Coste caused 
oysters to be placed at points chosen by himself. He wished to restore 
to these fine sheets of water the oysters which had disappeared from 


[19] OYSTER-CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 925 


them, and to make Lake Thau an adjunct of the basin of Arcachon. M. 
Coste had analyzed the water and found its composition to be favorable. 
The first result did not deceive his expectation. The oysters soon at- 
tained a large size and acquired strength and flavor. They propagated 
perfectly, and the spat attached itself to the fagots arranged for that 
purpose and to a central rock, which became covered with them. I 
will remark in passing that the breeding of the clovisse has been very 
successful there. It is, therefore, an established fact that the oyster is 
capable of living and multiplying its kind in Lake Thau. How does it 
happen, then, that private industry has not been induced to come there 
also by the success of this first attempt, and that it should have for- 
saken a work so full of promise? It would, in the future, receive com- 
pensation for its labors there. 

Among the other maritime stations where it would seem oyster cul- 
ture might be profitably carried on, I will mention Lake Leucate, which 
has already been pointed out by Messrs. Coste and Gerbe as likely to 
become an oyster-cultural center, and where, not long ago, there were 
well-stocked oyster-beds, producing splendid oysters of rare beauty and 
delicacy of flavor, the finest, perhaps, to be found in the Mediterranean. 

The waters of this lake, a large portion of which is sheltered from 
the winds, is mixed to a suitable extent with fresh water. The soil is 
rich in lime, and shell-fish of all kinds abound. But the level of Lake 
Leucate is not always constant; according as there is a drought or 
freshet its extent varies from six to eight thousand hectares (15,000 and 
20,000 acres). It would, therefore, be necessary to take every precaution 
to prevent the inconveniences that would result to the oyster culturists 
from the changes in level. 

Retracing my steps I will pass abruptly from the shore of Languedoc 
to that of the farther Provence, I will mention, as.a reminder merely, 
the gulf of Saint-Tropez, where M. Coste made unsuccessful attempts, 
which may be tried again some day. Then I will stop ata little sta- 
tion which I particularly noticed in the course of my mission, and 
which seemed to me to unite all the natural conditions desirable for 
new and decisive experiments in oyster culture in the Mediterranean, 
namely, the bay of Agay. It is not surprising that it had escaped 
the attention of M. Coste in his explorations, for at that time it was far 
removed from all lines of communication, and frequented only by the 
fishermen of that section, or visited by barks in distress. Now it is on 
the line of the railway that connects Marseilles with Genoa. The water 
of the bay of Agay extends into a locality where it is protected from the 
northwest and north winds. As it communicates with the sea through 
a narrow entrance it is likewise protected on that side from the south 
winds, which are so terrible in autumn. A stream brings into ita tribute 
of fresh water, thus increasing the chances of success. An experiment 
made at a given point in the bay of Agay, with selected oysters, suited 
to the nature of the water, a park well arranged, well kept, and well 


926 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERES. [20] 


watched, an experienced man to follow up with attention and persever- 
ance the various phases of this experiment, would show definitely, I 
think, what might be obtained by oyster culture on our southern coasts. 
If the experiment was successful, as there is every reason to suppose 
it would be, it would form a starting point of information, calculated to 
establish oyster-cultural industry in the Mediterranean. 


CONCLUSIONS. 


Last year I stated with legitimate satisfaction that the industry of 
oyster culture in the ocean, although in its infancy, was in a flourishing 
condition and secured the existence on our shores of a maritime popula- 
tion of 200,000 souls. What a different spectacle is presented between 
Port Vendres and Marseilles. At the former place it is the picture of a 
commercial life asserting itself—the dawn of prosperity. I have seen an 
entire fishing population engaged with indefatigable activity in all the 
labors demanded by the culture of the mollusks, certain of finding there 
the reward of their efforts. At the latter one sees barren lakes, a de- 
serted beach, and an impoverished sea. 

The causes of the decadence of our southern shores are extremely nu- 
merous and varied, and it is not for me to examine them all. The principal 
causes are doubtless geological ones. The alluvium transported by the 
rivers flowing into the gulf of Lyons, the total volume of which exceeds 
20,000,000 cubic meters (705,600,000 cubic feet) per annum, has caused 
a displacement of the shore line, the formation of lagoons, their pro- 
gressive filling up, and their transformation into marshes which have 
become hotbeds of dangerous fevers. The fish, whose spawning grounds 
were constantly buried beneath the mud, sought a more stable shore, 
and man finally was obliged to flee from its pestilential atmosphere. 
Now the general situation is daily improving. The direction and the 
place of deposit of the alluvium is known, the portions of the shore which 
must be abandoned to the geological phenomena have been circum- 
scribed, and engineers are successfully resisting the filling up of the 
lagoons. Many marshes, moreover, have disappeared through the 
action of time, and man has dried several. The influence of the marshes 
has diminished in intensity since then ; and the laws of hygiene now bet- 
ter understood renders it possible to combat more effectually the palu- 
dal poisoning. Thus the reclaimed lands are beginning to be peopled 
again, but the population is exclusively agricultural. Itis useful, doubt- 
less, to bring these shores, which have been reclaimed from the water, 
under cultivation, with a view to rendering them healthy, and rescuing 
them from sterility. But why not open a yet larger field to the activity 
of the people, who never fail to improve every new source of making a 
fortune, and give them these aquatic fields, which, like the land, can re- 
ceive seed and yield a harvest? Does not the sea support multitudes 
of creatures which man may utilize as an important part of his food, 
provided he knows how to apply them to his use, not only by maintain- 


[21] OYSTER-CULTURE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 927 


ing them under his hand, but, also, by encouraging their growth and 
multiplication according to well-known laws? 

Reasons of the greatest importance, especially in view of their rela- 
tion to the public maintenance, impose upon us daily more and more the 
necessity of placing under a regular system of cultivation the domain of 
the fluvial and maritime waters. As regards the rivers and streams, 
this necessity was long ago made. known, and the art of cultivating fish 
is not unknown to us; whereas maritime fish culture, properly so called, 
has as yet received no attention. I desire, therefore, to call public 
attention to the subject of restocking the lagoons by fish culture, as well 
as to the necessity of restocking our rivers. 

Oyster culture in the Mediterranean does not seem to me to promise 
so brilliant a future as on the Atlantic coast, although some stations 
seem to offer all the conditions recognized as indispensable to success. 
Mussel culture, however, might be profitably carried on there. So many 
places along the coasts resemble Tarente and the cove of Aiguillon. 
The mussel furnishes nutritious food, and is, by reason of its cheapness, 
accessible to the majority of the people. Neither the south nor the 
west can produce enough to meet the demands of consumers. One- 
half of the mussels eaten at Paris are sent there from Belgium.* <An- 
other branch of fish culture, the breeding of small shell-fish ( praires, 
clovisses, &c.), would probably be profitable. The people of the south 
are very fond of these sea fruits, as the Italians call them, and would pay 
a good price for them. : 

I hasten to pass on to maritime fish culture, which seems to me to be 
the true industry suitable to these regions, and their natural conditions. 
Geographers have pointed out the striking resemblance existing between 
the delta of the Rhone and that of the Po; the alluvium tends in the same 
easterly direction, there are the same lagoons and the same marshes 
produced by the deposits of the river. The lagoons of Ferrare, Comac- 
chio, and Venice may be compared to Leucate, Thau, and those of 
Aigues-Mortes.. The inhabitants of the shore, however, have derived 
great benefit from these salt lakes, and in this no parallel can be drawn 
between the two. Whilst on the French side nothing but solitude and 
neglect} is seen, the Italians have not allowed to be lost the teachings 
im the art of cultivating the sea which were transmitted to them by the 
ancients. If, in the south, they practice oyster culture as in the last 
days of the Roman republic, along the Adriatic and in the Sardinias 
they have applied themselves to the breeding and preservation of sea 
fish. 

At Comacchio fish culture has from time immemorial furnished ma- 


“Maxime Du Camp, “ Paris, ses organes, ses fonctions et sa vie.” 

+ The average annual yield of the fisheries in Lake Thau amounts to 300,000 franes 
($60,000). This is an indication of a certain activity. (Lenthéric, Villes mortes du 
Golfe de Lyon. ) 


co 


928 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


terial for a large export trade, and fisheries are numerous in all the 
lagoons of the coast. 

This is the example to be followed—a profitable business, in which 
one can engage without doubt of success. The soil, the climate, the 
water being the same in the Gulf of Venice as in the Gulf of Lyons, the 
processes need not be sought for anew. The Italians succeeded with 
them: why not apply them upon our Mediterranean shores? They 
might be speedily tested at little expense, and if found imperfect in any 
way they could be quickly improved, just as were the oyster-cultural pro- 
cesses brought from Fusaro by M. Coste. 

Let it not be forgotten that the number of fish brought to our market 
is constantly diminishing. A part of the north of France is dependent 
upon foreign countries for its fishery supplies; in the south, fish of fine 
quality would be unknown if the coasts of Corsica and Sardinia, which 
are still prosperous, did not furnish their quota. The native fishery is 
insufficient to satisfy the demands of a market which increases day by 
day, in proportion as railroad communication becomes more extended. 
It can with great difficulty furnish Paris with a little more than half 
the fish consumed there, and still fresh sea-fish are considered the 
favorite article of food; a gale of wind is sufficient to deprive Paris of 
its supply.* It is apprehended on all sides that the time will arrive 
when fish, other than preserved fish, will be a luxury which the rich 
alone can afford. This situation demands a prompt remedy. It has 
seemed to be my duty to point out where it might be found. 


' *Maxime Du Camp, loc. cit. 


Page 
Agay, bay of, oyster breeding in........-. 19 
Aiguillon, bouchots at....-...--.-:....... 14 
Analysis by Mr. Schutzenberger......-..- 12 
BAR CICA CVU MTA oa iale ernie alee wainis wlsselsieter cis 13, 16 
Belon; oyster-parks'at: -..52 22.2... scnee 14 
Bouchon-Brandely on oyster-culture ...-. 1 
SOU CHOUS meet eetsieaie atcfalalale alatamiateleiniclareialaie 4 
establishment of............-.-. 14 
Bretagne, notes sur la praire double, cited. 13 
Wanrdicans tll Cabal -)sjoe's\se/esnatallalniso)ejease 18, 15 
Cette, .clovisse from...) 5. — 25-522 .-is- ee a6 15 
Clowisse, breeding Off. <2cjae% o-- ete ce's sodG yd, 1D) LY, 
Comacchio, fish culture at...............- 21 
Coste, M., oyster culture ...... 1, 2, 9, 17, 18, 19, 22 
laborstoftasso2 se: qsscee eeesees 9,19 
researches in oyster culture.... 1 
Orassalseepeerscsaeetececces seisccea nese 12 
Destruction of oysters in lake of Fusaro.. 2,4 
Fascines ‘at Tarente....-- ..:-.-..-...--0-- 6 
Fish culture in the Mediterranean. ....... 21 
Gasquet, Messrs., oyster establishment -. pbk 
Giens, oyster parks at .-.... Stsocauscosor 14, 15, 16 
Italians cultivate oysters................- i 
AKO RD COLTON. eo eaene clete nia=/aietsinjawsa\njaialaiaroieicls 17 
MOMUSKSWMY seer ceiensmcsteieseccele ye 17 
oyster cultureiin .-2. 2.2.5.5 -ccs5c 18 
Wake Caronte wows acciectwevcewicnasiocine scios 18 
Lake of Fusare, oyster culture in........ 1, 2, 22 
destruction of oysters in. 2,4 
MakedsenCatelcs-csasicseccceserewns=cscicciss 19 
Moats oy ae asere late imeloie wieiniaieln’s nle'slere clelaiaiom 19, 21 
Little Sea of Tarente.......---........-.- 3,4 
oyster and mussel parks 4 
Marennes, oyster-cultural station ........ 17 
Mates Pesmnc(-cemerna asec antecsm cic siesieise 12 
Mauduit & Solminihac, oyster breeding. . 14 
Mediterranean oyster .--.........-.---.-.. 11 
MModiolaibarlatarcscs accesses -S-iscees 5 
Mollusks; breeding of--< 25 - ssc ec ots 13, 14, 15 
Mussel, breeding, by Messrs. Gasquet. .- 13 
SPAWMINGOk pace ca ceaclens esa e= = 5 
CollectingiOlceccssccccs-cacecie sees 5 
in Little Sea of Tarente.......... 5 
GuUlinne se see sna ole io oatcte oes aie 4 
in the Mediterranean.... 21 
Ab Warentel jose ates osiste ww tsieiciei 3 
parks in Little Sea of Tarente. --. 4,5 
Norway, oyster culture in........-....... i 
Oléron, island of, oystercultural station - - 17 
Orata, Sergius, established oyster culture. 1 
Ostrea angulata, reproduction of ......... 10 
CCULIS a Sa ceeiete cincistee sai cla icicic\ceta = 2 

[23] 


S. Mis. 29-——59 


Page. 
Ostrea plicatulay-ss.eeseee ee seeee ee eeee 11 
found! atiNaplesjs22--csscere sess 2 
virginiana in bay of Arcachon.... 10 
Oysters, at Gulf of Genoa................ iabl 
atiNaples ite. 4a2 ce aaseeeee ee 2,11 
Brindisi asec yi necee eee arene eee 2,11 
WenlCel. cota sesneenos eee ces 2,11 
spawning at Tarente.-.......... 6 
destructiontof--2---.--.26 sac QUANT 
collectin got at isqa-ete see eeie anes 6 
quantities taken from parks at 
RATENbOte cee Metis cea cee clone 7 
Ameri canitesqjy-ss-14 ssie souls tac 10 
Portuguese ...... echode sechcsadac 10 
Mediterranean s<-.2..sectencosce 11 
at Saint Vaast-la-Hougue ........ 10 
ab Doulontie.covecscnes sestoeenee 9,11 
ateNarbonnevee cesses ee ce emacs. 11 
at2Port:de Bouc-cs.-<s-- 5-5. e0- e 11 
at Aigues-Mortes................ ll 
at Beucate ecco. seace sence sees 1 
at Tarenne............ ees eireste 11 
ETOW UN OLs2 ores eee seere eee mris ih} 
planted at Giens......2.......... 14 
Oyster beds'at;Ponlon= 2: \2.7-5222- eee sees 9 
Oyster culture in the Mediterranean, re- 
port on by G. Bonchon- 
Brandely. © (Title.) ..... 1 
SmeTtaly se. she. dose ee canoe 1 
by the Romans........... 1 
in Lake Fusaro........... 2103 
at Tarente, Italy ......... 1,3, 4 
researches by M. Coste... 1 
In Parkstos--scceses nee - 5 
in\NOrwayinc-sess- 2 2oe es. i 
abeLowlonee: eecteaceecnes 9 
failures in...... 10 
of Messrs. Gasquet.-.... 11 et seq. 
at Peninsula of Giens.-.-..11 et seq. 
of Manduit & Solminihac. 14 
AUPDOLNOS s ncsicececcenn sae 18 
at) Canontes--.-5.<6-5--cis0 17 
SteDhane wae ce cieeecioceece 17 
abiseucate ss. 25-50-26 17 
BUPA CR Yeccccem crises mete 17 
in hake) Berre)- 2.65.2. 18 
at Port-de-Bouc .......... 18 
in) Lake Than ..:2..-<..<. 19 
in Gulf Saint-Tropez..... 19 
in Bay of Agay......--..- 19 
flourishing condition of... 20 
causes of decadence-.-..... 2 
929 


930 


Page. 

Oyster culture in the Mediterranean .... - 21 
Oyster parks at Belon........-....-.-...- 14 
DUG CNS se wee see caitceecn! 14, 15, 16 

in Little Sea of Tarente.... 4,5, 6,7 

at Saint Vaast-la-Hougue. .. 10 

Ozenne, Dr., Essai sur les mollusques...-- 16 
Praire, breeding of.-.--....-... Geel 13, 14, 15, 17 
Port-de-Bouc, oyster culture at....---.--- 18 
Quimperoysters~s e+. =~ esc === <\em ieee cet 11 
Romans cultivated oysters .--------------- 1 
Saint Tropez, oyster breeding in .......-. 19 
Saint Vaast-la-Hougue, oyster parks at... 10 
Schutzenberger, M., analysis by.-..--.-- 12 
Sea-urchin, breeding of....-..-..----.---- 13, 16 
Shell fish, raising of .......-.--..--------- 11 
analiysisiof--cecscccossaijact poten 12 

from) Cette. 2: \ccsecccesscisce: 12 
Spawning of oysters at Taronte......---- 6 
Tapes decussata...-......---.cce0e a earatate 13 


Tapes texturata........ccc.seeece senescence 13 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


Tarente, Italy: 
oyster culture at..-.......-..-.. 


Iittle Sea oncc. ac toceeece eae 
mussel culture at-.-...-..-.. Hebe 
spawning time of oyster.--....-- 
fascines at loo o2 2202s c ee eer 
oyster parks at............-.-.-. 


destruction of oysters at..-...-. 
Toulon, France: 

oyster culture at.......:-....--.- 

exhaustion of beds at......-...-. 

restocking of oyster beds at.-.... 

failure of oyster beds at.....-... 

clovissestromm a essa cee eee sees 
Toxopneustes lividus; 22Hs-jsona sel ceie sae 
Tremblade, oyster cultural station..-..-... 
MenuUS/Verrucosasct et sce seecen ce ac seese 
Viand, M., oyster culture experiments by. 
Wergeland on oyster culture in Norway. 


XXXII.—AN ACCOUNT OF THE PORTUGUESE AND FRENCH 
OYSTERS CULTIVATED IN THE BAY OF ARCACHON. 


By J. RENAvUD.”* 


A—AN ACCOUNT OF THE PORTUGUESE AND FRENCH 
OYSTERS. 


The oyster (Ostrea edulis) isa mollusk belonging to the class of Lamel- 
libranchiates. To form an adequate idea of its admirable conformation, 
‘it is necessary to study it with the microscope. 

The oyster is widely distributed in nature, each marine province 
counting one or more species in its fauna. Usually grouped in places 
most favorable to their development, they form considerable aceumula- 
tions, known under the name of Banks. The immense consumption of 
this mollusk, principally in Europe and “America, may give some idea 
of its fecundity, for its abundance does not seem to diminish in spite 
of the large quantities taken from the sea. 

The oyster which we now call the Portuguese was known to, and 
esteemed by, the ancients; the citizens of Athens regarded it as a dainty, 
and used its shell to write their votes upon. Subsequently, among 
the Romans, we find Pliny congratulating one of his friends on being at 
Marseilles, where he could have fresh oysters. 

The shell of the oyster is especially recognized by its irregularity ; 
living attached to sub-marine bodies it takes the imprint of them, and 
individuals of the same species are infinitely modified in consequence of 
the numberless accidents of position which they assume on the bodies 
to which they are attached. It is, therefore, necessary to examine a 
large number of individuals in order to recognize a species and learn 
its distinctive characteristics. One characteristic of oysters is the 
inequality of their valves, the one which adheres to foreign bodies being 
always the larger. These valves have received the name of upper and 
lower, in consequence of the usual position of the oysters; the lower 
valve is the larger, the upper one is also called the operculum. Never- 
theless, in the study of this mollusk, I shall follow the rule laid down 
by zodlogists for the study of bivalve shells in general, that is to say, L 
will suppose the animal to be standing upright before me. In this posi- 
tion the large valve is on the left, the small one on the right, while the 


*Notice sur L’Huitre Portugaise et Frangaise cultivée dans la Baie d’Arcachon. 
Arcachon, Imprimerie E. Faure et V. Aumassanne, 1878. Quarto pamphlet, 33 pp. 
[1] 931 


932 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2} 


upper edge, comprising anteriorly the hinge which unites the shells, is 
extended as two somewhat conical prominences called umbos or beaks. 
The beaks in the Portuguese oyster are unequal in the two valves; the 
left one is always the larger. They are each marked by a groove, vary- 
ing in size, in which an elastic ligament, for opening and shutting the 
valves, is firmly fastened. This groove is also frequently marked with 
ridges and furrows, of greater or less width, which follow its direction 
and indicate the successive lines of growth. 

The edges of the valves in the Portuguese oyster present very con- 
siderable variations; sometimes that of the larger valve is undulated,y 
striated, or denticulated. If the oyster is an old one, the smaller valve 
partakes of the modifications undergone by the larger one, so that it often 
happens that the shells are marked by corresponding indentations. 
Their interior surface is smooth, almost always white, and often pearly 
toward the center; a little back of and above the center, however, there 
exists an oval depression. This is the point of attachment of the cen- 
tral muscle which connects the valves together. In studying the strue- 
ture of the shell of the Portuguese oyster, it is sufficient to saw or 
break the shell in two, in order to become convinced that its structure 
is foliaceous, that is, formed of successive layers. There are two reasons . 
why the specific gravity of this shell is not high. The first is, that 
rather broad spaces often inter- 
vene between the lamin of 
which the shell is formed; the 
second is, that the lamin 
themselves are to a large ex- 
tent composed of a white, po- 
rous substance whose specific 
gravity is exceedingly low. In 
the Portuguese oyster the lami- 
ne, which are irregularly dis- 
tinct, are piled upon one an- 
other like partitions. This NX $4/////, 
laminated structure arises nec- i °& z Sin" Ht stanly Me 
essarily from the organization PZ 
of the animal, and it is known 
that the interspaces contain an : 
acrid water, resulting from a Fig. 1.—The Portuguese oyster. 
depuratory secretion. This phenomenon is, moreover, common among 
the mollusks. 

Let us now carefully open the Portuguese oyster. In the first place 
we must break the solid, dark-brown ligament which, like a hinge, 
attaches the two valves together. But even now the valves do not sep- 
arate. A sharp instrument must be inserted between them, so as to 
cut the cylindrical muscle connecting them near the center.* The ani- 


[* This is not the way oysters are opened in America. The process is reversed ; the 
muscle is first cut with a knife when the hinge is broken apart.—ED. ] 


[3] OYSTERS IN BAY OF ARCACHON. 9338 


mal then appears to have nearly the form of its shell, being usually 
oval in shape, and with its anterior extremity towards the narrow part 
of the shell. If after death, it is placed in water, so as to allow its 
parts to float, one sees in the center a mass of organs, separated by the 
contractor muscle noticed above, around which are attached large stri- 
ated and whitish lamin, which may be compared te the gills of fishes. 
Finally, the entire body is covered with a thin, transparent skin, whose 
edges are blackish in color and thickened, and correspond to the edges 
of the shell during the life of the animal. This membranous envelope, 
which is called the mantle, has its edges free and detached throughout 
almost the entire circumference of the body. On the sides it adheres 
to the principal organs constituting the abdominal mass. It serves at 
the same time to cover the oyster and to secrete its shell. Its thickened 
edges are of a muscular nature, and are also provided with secretory 
glands. Its main portion is formed of two very thin membranes 
united by a vascular tissue, which, when injected, presents to view a 
beautiful network of fine ramifications. In that portion of the mantle 
which is in contact with the shell there is also to be seen an organic 
web, in which calcareous granules are secreted in great abundance. It 
is these secretions, which, becoming detached, together with the organic 
matter enveloping them, increase the thickness of the shell, forming 
one by one the laminz above described. If one tries to open the man- 
tle he can turn back its lobes as far as the central muscle, but from 
here inwards to the anterior extremity, where the mouth is, it forms a 
sort of cowl inclosing the other organs of the mollusk. 

The mouth is recognized at once by its transverse position and by the 
two thin membranous lobes accompanying it. These lobes are con- 
tinued on each side of the body into a pair of narrow, lance-shaped 
labial palps or lips, which are smooth on the outside and marked with 
oblique striations on the inside. The mouth is a simple opening, which 
the animal can contract by means of a small sub-circular muscle; it is 
followed by a very short csophagus ending in an ovoid pouch with 
membranous walls (the stomach), into which open the bile ducts from 
the liver. A more important opening near the lower extremity of 
this stomach is the entrance to the pylorus. Here begins a slender 
intestine, which descends through the thick portion of the liver, in front 
of and somewhat under the muscle connecting the valves together; then 
it ascends obliquely towards the back, passes above the stomach till on 
a level with the mouth, and finally, bending upon its course, returns, 
passing over the upper side of the muscle, at the middle of which it ter- 
minates in an anus, situated between the lobes of the mantle. The liver, 
which is the principal organ of the oyster, constitutes a considerable 
portion of the visceral mass and is easily recognized by its dark green- 
ish color. The organs of circulation and respiration can only be exam- 
ined after they are injected with mercury. The heart is easily distin- 
guished by the blackish color of its auricle, and from the fact—very rare 


®” 


934 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


among acephalous mollusks—of its being entirely independent of the 
digestive system; although placed in the ventral region, it has no con- 
nection with the intestines. The gills, or breathing organs, four in num- 
ber, are in the shape of large lamin nearly equal in size and with trans- 
verse striations; they are arranged symmetrically, two on each side of 
the body. When viewed from behind, four rows of large and perfectly 
regular quadrangular openings are seen. These openings pass through 
the gills in the form of canals, in which the fecundated eggs accumulate 
at the spawning time, in order to undergo a sort of incubation. 

The organs of reproduction consist of an ovary placed along the 
sides and upper portion of the head end of the body, and which 
finally, as it becomes developed, almost entirely covers the abdominal 
mass. The oyster is hermaphrodite, that is to say, combines the two 
sexes in one and the same individual. The organ of generation, which 
is scarcely visible during the winter, is nevertheless distinguishable in 
the form of a milky spot covering a portion of the liver. In the spring 
almost the entire upper portion of the creature has assumed a whitish 
color; the zoosperms appear; and their presence effects fecundation. The 
oyster yields from 50,000 to 60,000 eggs, more or less.* They are 
spherical and can only be seen by the aid of a microscope The embryo 
develops rapidly, is soon provided with vibrating cilia at the anterior end 
and swims round and round; finally it settles upon some solid object, 
perhaps on an oyster shell, to which it attaches itself and begins to 
grow. At this time the body of the oyster, being extremely soft and its 
shell very thin, the valves take the impress of the body upon which it 
happens to fall and fix itself, and preserves the shape so assumed ever 
after. 


B.—A NEW MIXTURE TO BE PLACED UPON COLLECTORS.— 
PRESERVATIVE BOXES. 


Without wishing to repeat whatis already known or to treat of asub- 
ject which has been handled by others, I shall in a few lines render 
homage to those intelligent and laborous workers who by the rational 
application of new methods have greatly contributed to the develop- 
ment of oyster culture. I propose to speak of the new collector or 
apparatus for collecting the “fry,” as soon asit is set free by the parent 
oysters and preserving it from destruction. 

It is but a few years since the only methods in use were the following: 
In Lake Fusaro, in the province of Naples, where the oldest artificial 
oyster banks were established, and on our coasts of Brittany, Cancale, 
Saint-Brieuc and Arcachon, the oysterculturists did nothing to collect 
the spat beyond placing bundles of whitewashed fagots in the water, 
anchoring them by means of stones. The spat lodged upon these fagots, 
after which the breeder had only to take them from the water, when as 


[*Now known to yield a much greater number.—ED. ] 


di OYSTERS IN BAY OF ARCACHON. 935 


they were shaken many of the young oysters fell off. I leave it to the 
reader to imagine what quantities must have been lost in this primitive 
and imperfect practice. Stone blocks were also used, as were tiles, slates, 
- and wooden shingles, but all these collectors were defective and insuffi- 
cient. It was almost impossible to detach young oysters adhering to a 
very hard body without breaking them, or at least doing them much 
damage; wovoden collectors present contrary disadvantages; the point 
of attachment of the oyster being too weak renders them too easy a prey 
to the crab, their most dreaded enemy, which, with its very delicate 
instinct, always attacks this mollusk in its most sensitive part. 

Mr. Michelet, an oysterculturist of Arcachon, and a thoroughly prac- 
tical man, wishing to remedy these two serious inconveniences, con- 
ceived the idea of covering the collectors with a mortar, consisting of 
lime and sand mixed with a small/amount of cement. In this mixture 
half-cylinder tiles are soaked until they are covered with one or more 
layers of it. These tiles thus prepared are dried for several days in the 
sun, and are then carried to the park, where they are placed in five or 
six rows, forming hives of from fifty to sixty tiles; these hives are sur- 
rounded by strong stakes, which are firmly fixed to prevent their being 
overturned or carried away by the rapid currents. The water passing 
through these tiles is arrested there and an eddy formed, which permits 
the young oyster to attach itself to the collectors by means of its little 
vibrating cilia. There the embryo becomes developed, increases in size, 
and attains the adult age, which isa year and a half, and not three years, 


as has been stated by certain parkers, whose opinion in the matter (as we 
know from numerous and thorough experiments) is entirely erroneous. 
Towards the close of the year women detrocate them (this term, when 
used in oyster culture, signifies detaching the oyster) by means of knives 
designed for this purpose, which they very carefully insert between the 
young mollusks and the tile to which they are attached. The young oys- 
ter, thanks to the covering of mortar, is easily loosened without suffer- 


936 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


ing much damage. When thisindustry was in its infancy, and especially 
after the first trials of these implements, before hard experience had yet 
taught its costly lessons to the imprudent, a great many producers threw 
these young oysters, improperly detached, into their basins. Either 
because the tiles were not properly covered, or because the oyster had 
been injured in detaching, a majority of the persons engaged in this indus- 
try lost almost their entire work through the ravages of the crab, the 
cormailho, the shrimp, the vive,* and the numerous other enemies of the 
oyster. 

In view of these serious disasters, numerous experiments were made 
by the various oysterculturists, but generally without success. After 
many attempts and trials, M. Michelet fortunately invented a wooden 
box, about one meter in length, by half a meter in width (34 by 
12 feet), covered at the top and bottom by a rather fine metallic net- 
ting, which permitted the water to circulate freely, and bring to the oyster 
sufficient nourishment while protecting it against the voracity of its 
numerous and dangerous enemies. In this connection we will reproduce 
a few lines taken from a work on oysterculture, printed in 1866, with 
which, on this point alone, we are entirely at variance. This passage, 
which we will quote in full, asserts that the enemies of the oyster are 
innumerable, but that they can do nothing in the face of the immense 
power of reproduction of the oyster. Many oyster breeders might reply 
to this assertion by figures, showing conclusively the serious and irrepa- 
rable losses resulting from these numerous enemies of the oyster, which 
the following lines appear to disregard, although certainly without 
reason. 

M. Davaine says, ina treatise which we have before us, page 78: ‘ Of 
mollusks, Nassa reticulata, Murex tarentinus, and probably several other 


Fic. 3.—Murex tarentinus. 
related species perforate the shells by means of their lingual teeth, in- 
troduce their proboscis and suck the oyster through this little opening ; 
the latter becoming sick or weakened partially opens its valves; the crab 
comes * * * and others with him, and all disappears. 


[* Probably Trachinus draco, Linn.—Eb. ] 


ii OYSTERS IN BAY OF ARCACHON. 937 


“Now, let us at once declare that these numerous, implacable, and 
bitter enemies are not to be feared; they neither increase nor diminish— 
they are always the same, to-morrow as to-day, as yesterday ; they will 
devour in vain, for they will be powerless to stop the prodigious multi- 
plication of the oyster. 

‘‘Their number can only be compared to the grains of sand on the 
sea-shore, yet the spat is infinitely more numerous. 

“‘ Moreover, every imaginable means that could be used against these 
enemies would be illusory and powerless. It is in vain to struggle 
against a natural law. 

‘“The evil does not exist.” 

In 1866 when the above lines were written, this theory might perhaps 
have been admissible, and it was possible for an oysterculturist to ex- 
press himself thus; but now, in 1876, the progress and extent of oyster- 
culture, the invention of the covering for collectors, and of preservative 
boxes, are the most direct refutations that we can array against the 
passage quoted. In order fully to convince the reader and to 
prove to him that we are right, we will say a few words concerning 
the boxes and their use. M. Michelet calls his boxes ambulances os- 
tréophiles, their principal object being to serve as infirmaries for the 
oysters that may have been injured by the knife of the clumsy detroca- 
trix ; and by isolating them, to permit them to repair the damage done 
to their shells. After remaining for a few days in these reparative boxes, 
the oysters are thrown into basins called claires, where they grow until 
the time for selling arrives, when, leaving their protective asylum, they 
go to enrich the tables of the epicures of Europe and America, who, 
when tasting them, little think of the amount of care and labor which 
they cost their producers before reaching the palace of the gastronomer. 


cC-2THE PORTUGUESE OYSTER FROM A COMMERCIAL 
AND OYSTERCULTURAL POINT OF VIEW. 


-§ The Portuguese oyster has already become of great importance as an 
article of food and of commerce. 

Not long ago Messrs. Garrelon, Grenier and Dasté, oysterculturists of 
the basin of Arcachon, all of whom are now known as maritime 
culturists at the head of the basin, were engaged in its cultivation on a 
large scale, and derived great profit therefrom. Several have been so 
pleased with their success in this line that they have said to me within 
a few days, “if the Portuguese Government would send us a few car- 
goes of oysters, we could, after selling them, give them a fair share of 
the profits.” These words, which are from very competent oystercul- 
turists, demonstrate sufficiently, that in spite of its detractions the Por- 
tuguese oyster is sold in large quantities and with profit, since the 
great quantity raised is insufficient to meet the demands of its numer- 
ous consumers. 


938 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


This oyster, when young, differs in taste from the French oyster, thatis 
to say, from the oysters of the basins of Cancale, Saint-Brieuc, and Arca- 
chon; but it is nevertheless highly esteemed and much sought after in 
the interior of France, and in many districts in which the culturists 
have sold and are still selling considerable quantities. We might cite, 
for instance, a culturist of Arcachon, who, a few years ago, had 
buyers at Lyons, Limoges, Marseilles, Grenoble, and at all the great 
centers, whose purchases amounted to 27,000 franes ($5,200) during the 
oyster season, that is, during a period of six months. The Arcachon 
oyster has a finer and perhaps richer flavor, but the Portuguese, accord- 
ing to the testimony of physicians, contains more compounds of iodine 
and operates upon delicate and diseased chests more speedily and more 
beneficially, especially in the case of the various physical affections. 
It may, according to epicures, be seasoned and cooked in various excel- 
lent ways. 

In oysterculture this oyster offers to breeders great advantages over 
the French oyster, as it speedily attains the adult size, and is thus 
sooner fitted for the market. In short, while the French oyster cannot 
be sold to consumers until it has reached its third year, the Portuguese 
oyster in two years attains the size and quality most favorable for its 
sale, for at that age it is always above the prescribed size of five centi- 
meters (2 inches), and having become adult its flesh then is fine and 
delicate. In addition, it results from this rapid growth that at the age 
when the French oyster has still everything to fear from its natural 
enemies, such as the crab, cormaitho, shrimp, &c., the Portuguese oyster 
has a shell of sufficient strength to protect it from the attacks of these 
animals, and there is no need of resorting to artificial means of protec- 
tion, which are always so costly. For these reasons, the Portuguese 
oyster offers to breeders at least double the advantages of the French 
oyster. ee 

Finally, allow me to pay it a tribute of gratitude in this little book. 
All oysterculturists know that during a period disastrous to our indus- 
try, the bays of Arcachon and Brittany were, from various causes, de- 
populated, oysters became scarce, and could hardly be obtained at all. 
Then France had recourse to the coasts of Portugal; we went there 
and obtained the precious mollusk in large cargoes, in order to restock 
our depleted oyster-beds. If, therefore, our parks are now so richly 
stocked, we owe it in a great measure to the Portuguese oyster, which, 
coming to the aid of the French oyster during the oystercultural season 
of that time, rendered it possible to restock our oyster-beds. 

No one is ignorant of the fact that the shell of the Portuguese oyster 
is very useful for manufacturing purposes; it furnishes mother-of-pearl 
in abundance, from which beautiful fancy articles are made; it is also 
very serviceable to agriculture as a superior fertilizer, inasmuch as it 
contains a large quantity of phosphate of lime. 


[94 OYSTERS IN BAY OF ARCACHON. 939 


D.—PROTECTION OF “CLAIRES,” OR OYSTER BASINS, BY 
MEANS OF OVERHANGING STRIPS AND WIRE 
SCREENS. 


A large number of oysterculturists lose the greater part of their 
young oysters, or find them often endangered, from the want of proper 
means of protection. When spring arrives the tére, thouy,* and many 
other rapacious fish which are fond of oysters, invade our bays, and 
create great havoc. “But,” some will say, “we have done everything, 
and our efforts have proved powerless against the numerous and vora- 
cious enemies; nothing can save us from them.” After many attempts, 
I have just devised a method of protection, which may be easily arranged, 
and which serves to shield the mollusk from the attacks of erabs and 
other oyster-eating animals. The following means are apparently the 


Fic. 4.—The crab. 


Over the walls of my claires, which are built of tiles and a very 
resisting clay, I fasten from the base to near the middle boards, about 
twenty centimeters (74 inches) in height, bound together on the inside 
by means of strong stakes driven in at a distance of a meter (34 feet) 
apart; and in this way I arrange a block of five or six clatres touching 
one another, the continuity not being interrupted either below or between 
the boards. Along the upper edge of the boards, and jutting outward 
from them, I fasten a strip of zine about eight millimeters (one-third 
inch) wide, which is firmly held in place by a small lath. The crab, 


[*I have not been able to identify these fishes from their vernacular names.—ED. } 


940 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


attracted by the young oysters in the claires, climbs along the board, 
but meeting with the little projecting band of zine on which his claws 
can get no hold, he slides off and is precipitated outside the claire; he 
exhausts himself in vain efforts to enter, and the oyster meanwhile 
flourishes, secure from his attacks. This contrivance may be made 
either of wood or of zinc, according to the desire or means of the breeder; 
but zine, although more costly, is far preferable. 

But even now, protected from the crab, the ‘oyster harvest is not yet 
sure ; for there is much to fear from the predacious fish already referred 
to. These other enemies do not crawl, but swim; and at high tide 
pass over the obstacle just described; coming in large schools, they 
devour millions of young oysters in a single night; alas! we have just 
had a sad proof of this in the Arcachon basin. In order to arrest their 
invasion, I arrange small iron hooks along the zine band at inter- 
vals of about twenty centimeters (74 inches), and also at the same dis- 
tance apart upon the two longitudinal sides of the claires, which are 
opposite to one another. The keeper of the park, bearing a large roll 
of galvanized iron wire upon his arm, attaches the extremity of the wire 
to the first hook; a second workman, unrolling the wire, carries it to a 
third upon the opposite side; the latter attaches it to the correspond- 
ing hook which is before him, and then fastens it securely to a second 
hook; the man with the wire carries it back to the keeper, who repeats 
the operation. This work is continued until all the claires are covered 
with this metallic net-work. 

Oysterculture is still in its infancy, and it is only after many fruit- 
less attempts that we have been able, by a slow course of study, to dis- 
cover, successively, the collectors, the proper coverings for the tiles, the 
preservative boxes, and the different methods of raising and breeding, 
which have served as the fundamental basis of our oyster industry ; and 
it is by pursuing the same course that we have demonstrated the immense 
advantages presented by the use of the zinc protector and metallic net- 
work for claires. In fact, the results we have just described are not the 
only ones secured by these arrangements, for they serve, not only to pre- 
vent the oyster from being devoured, but also from escaping. Many 
persons are tempted to consider this assertion as a pleasantry, yet noth- 
ing is more true. During the prevalence of extreme heat the basins are 
covered with a greenish growth, called “gouémon,” or “Arbre de mer” 
(sea tree), which becomes attached to the mollusk. This seaweed in- 
creases in size, and finally, by reason of its specific gravity floats, carry- 
ing with it the oyster to which it adheres, and transferring it from our 
basins to a neighboring park, or to the bottom of the channel outside. 
The metallic net-work prevents this escape; the gouémon, or sea tree, 
raises the oyster as it did before, but, meeting with the wires which 
cover the claire, it attaches itself there, becomes dry in the sun or air, 
at low tide, and having no longer strength to retain its prey, the 


(eet) OYSTERS IN BAY OF ARCACHON. 941 


oyster falls back into the claire, leaving it for the waves to carry off its 
ravisher at the next high tide. 

To complete the enumeration of the advantages of our system, we 
will remark that there is still another one, not less important, to which 
we would call the attention of our readers; it is, that theft is rendered 
very difficult, if not impossible; oyster thieves can no longer dredge 
the claires; in order to rob them, they must cut or saw the metallic 
wires, which operation would require much time, would make a noise, 
and give the alarm to the guard, thus enabling him to defend the 
property entrusted to his care; a robbery of this kind would, moreover, 
come under the head of burglary. We will mention, as another advan- 
tage, the protection which the seaweed, stopped by this net-work, gives 
to the oyster by shielding it from the violence of the sun during the 
extreme heat of summer; for the heat of the sun may cause the loss of 
a great number of oysters, both large and small. We therefore persist in 
saying, and our own experience has sufficiently demonstrated the fact, 
that the zine bands and the metallic net-work for claires are destined to 
become two efficient adjuncts of all the various kinds of apparatus 
which have thus far been used in oysterculture in our basin of Arca- 
chon. 


XXXIII.—OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN, 


A REPORT PREPARED IN THE NAME OF THE COMMISSION OF THE OOMPETITIVE 
EXHIBITION AT VANNES.* 


By A. E. Havsssr, 
Engineer of Roads and Bridges. 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


; Page. 
THEOGUCLION F oicce mw atc wim aye oom = jan Saree cmine sem aclemns)smcicseisenae roc. 5 [2] 

CHAPTER I. 

Breeding-parks in general. 

Time, of spawnmins extention Dh PAarks.cccc. -Sae soc c/n aoa e lec celeis wel cineia clone [5] 
Hi isuccess of breeding im: parks); the currents. -. 3.0222. -o22c- cc-mice socceu aces [8] 
The muddy deposits of the shores of the department of Morbihan...e.....---. [10] 
The general character of a shore with reference to breeding-parks ............ [13] 

CHAPTER II. 

Collectors ; liming; formation of breeding-parks. 

(Hole yoga tee obi anen Somer aos BE SeeAe ees. CS eSm or Seen Sma nm an sacri acne [15] 
Tilesiarran gedsiny< SPOUqueIS)) A naar a awe ta coo al es tececee es Nats ome [18] 
Woatane SUNG COlleClOls es <= car oem ae ae ae et uae eee ie wea eee eee [20] 
Arrangement of the collectors and of the breeding-parks ...-.....-....2--..-- [25] 
Consolidabionofi thei bouton. a= s-rer ate = = emcee cae sfatcinee Vere eas ere see [28] 


CHAPTER III. 


Removal of the young oysters from the collectors ; their preservation ; enemies of the oyster. 


Attached andiineed! Oy Sterns = cate sotce eels cisciwicins io Na ceete ian cavene meee cis see aso a[O0i] 
Clairesiand' submerged, basins: s22/so sce ees ca seers es ot emcee manisewleeee cece [36] 
Enemies of the oyster...--...--...=« QuG Hosen bHccsoiocadqdie SHE ORO SeaESESSOOSE [36] 


CHAPTER IV. 
Parks for raising and fattening oysters. 


Possibility of raising and fattening oysters along the shores of Morbihan-.... [39] 
_ Choice of bottom; character of the water..---- rieoer a Rae eraele Se ere Ee ie ete aid aie [41] 
PreparatloneoLr the: boo Mecano siice etoleaaiccrieeeineceies Saciewie ec ance een [42] 
BS AST S cpa ee see lash ae oe ots Sain pect eteetetrenactaete sia ns fealnt = ejncrince lanes [44] 
Care to be taken in raising and fattening oysters..--....--------.------»----- [44] 
Resultsobtameds wurnino Creenee cece aecsesaiccesiec os ote sacices)semisc ce nnsys [45] 


*L’Industrie Huitriére dans le Morbihan. Rapport dressé au nom de la Commission 
du Concours de Vannes par A. E. Hausser, Ingénieur des Ponts et Chaussées. Publié 
sous les auspices de M. le vicomte de Rorthays, préfet du département, par le Conseil 
général du Morbihan. Avec vignettes et 5 planches. Paris; Dunod, éditeur.. Quai 
des Augustins, 49. 1676. 12mo. 152 pp. 


[1] 943 


944 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


CHAPTER V. 
Measures required to insure the prosperity of oyster culture. 
Principal cause ofthe failure of Coste. 4700 oan sae eee eerie een ne ee eee [46} 
Necessity of establishing parks for raising and fattening oysters..........---. [47] 
TAGING aao4 Sass bocden eS odso pono oab sade dacb asSsisesoedadas 6568 deoSoeneodes Sanus [50] 
Concessions fora long Geri ce oe oon a wine eee petiole a ele olatal erent aia ntetetat ole etatate ae (50) 
TReformesrObede tate sete ners 2am tata ate ae tate eae el rete [52] 
POC TTC Ne St SSR SEO RE AREEOE COs rio SoCo SIr SSeon eHSace see Oo Md asen Semnns Joe [53] 


ENE OrD Ue" kr LOIN: 


The oyster, whose edible qualities are so remarkable, formerly abounded 
upon our coast, and has always been in great demand. Successful 
attempts at its cultivation date back to remote times, and Coste has 
given an exceedingly interesting description of the ancient industry of 
Lake Lucrin. Inthe days of the greatness of ancient Rome, the proconsul, 
C. Sergius Orata, attained such success in the cultivation and improve- 
ment of the oyster, that a liking for the pleasures of the table, no less 
than for the attractions of picturesque country life, drew every year 
numerous patrician families to the environs of Lake Lucrin, upon the 
pleasant shores of the bay of Naples. 

Among the débris discovered about certain Roman camps, oyster- 
shells occur abundantly, and history proves that everywhere among the 
many productions serving as food for man, shell-fish in general, and 
oysters in particular predominate. This has resulted from the remark- 
able hygienic properties possessed by this class of animals, and to judge 
from the prescriptions of American physicians, one might be led to 
believe that the flesh of the oyster bore the character of an universal 
panacea. 

We do not intend to plead here the cause of the oyster, or argue in 
favor of its increased use. The consumption has already attained such 
proportions as to form in itself the strongest argument in its behalf. 
When we consider that in America nearly ten thousand millions are 
eaten yearly, that in the city of New York alone the annual sales 
amount to from seven to eight millions of dollars, and that, according to 
M. de Broca, more money is expended there for oysters than for meat, 
some idea may be obtained of the consumption in that country, and of 
the important position occupied by this mollusk in the public welfare. 
Taking into account the valuable nutritive properties of this product, 
and the importance of making it a common article of food, one can un- 
derstand our regret at seeing it disappear from some of the most impor- 
tant of the French beds. We do not need to seek the cause of its disap- 
pearance from the French coast; the fact is evident, and it is the fact 
that we should bear in mind. Coste, whose name will ever be remem- 
bered in connection with the great attempts of the past fifty years, in 
advancing fish culture and the cultivation of marine products, has, with 


[3] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 945 


the characteristic glance of a man of genius, embraced the entire ques- 
‘tion, in all its bearings. 

It is indispensable that we should, in this connection, review the plan 
of work of this learned man, together with his principal ideas. When- 
ever oyster-cultural enterprises are to be undertaken, it is Coste, and 
Coste alone, who should be consulted, and whoever desires to make 
oyster culture practical must reflect upon the failures of Coste and 
deeply ponder their causes. 

We give here, in a few words, the course pursued by the master. M.de 
Quatrefages has contended that the artificial fecundation of the oyster 
is possible; Coste has shown that the oyster is hermaphrodite, that the 
eggs and spermatozoa originate in the tissues of the same organ, and 
that the mantle of the parent forms the only favorable medium for the 
process of hatching. In 1860, he wrote the following words, which are 
full of truth: ‘In the case of oysters, the natural processes are the only 
practicable ones to be followed in connection with the industry.”* This 
discovery, therefore, totally precluded the artificial fecundation resorted 
to in fish culture, rendered the crossing of species impossible, and led to 
a study of the natural development of the functions of the oyster, with- 
out the hope of controlling it. The fecundity of the oyster is very great. 
Each individual is capable of producing from 1,000,000 to 2,000,000 eggs. 
between the months of Juneand September. Hatching is accomplished, 
as already stated, in the mantle of the parent. The eggs, which are 
white at first, change in color, and when they have assumed a bluish or 
slaty gray tint, it is an indication that the embryos have arrived at ma- 
turity, and they are then expelled. 

Impressed by what he had observed at Lake Fusaro, convinced, after 
his trip to the little bay of Seudra, that cultivation might improve the 
oyster and giveit valuable qualities, persuaded, by the results of the mus- 
sel industry in the bay of Aiguillon, that man might exert a powerful in- 
fluence in increasing the abundance of these mollusks, Coste conceived 
a comprehensive plan. He asserted that breeding was possible in 
basins or claires; he made a study of the spat-collectors, sought to 
collect ali the spawn produced by the parent oysters, and affirmed that 
nearly all our shores might be planted and transformed into fertile 
regions of production. He insisted upon the duties of the department 
of marine, in connection with the enterprise. ‘The administration,” 
he said, “will see, as if by magic, the isolated banks of the entire har- 
bor of Brest and of the bays of Brittany, with the mouths of the affluent 
rivers, enlarged and united, by the formation of new ones, into vast 
areas of production. The depleted beds of Cancale and of Granville 
will be renewed, and will spread out towards very many localities, 
where the depths are such as to readily favor the attempts made to 
enrich them. The basin of Arcachon, all that section of la Manche, ex- 
tending from Dieppe to Havre, from Havre to Cherbourg, and from 

* Voyage d’exploration, Industrie du lac Fusaro. 


S. Mis. 29. 60 


946 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


Cherbourg to Granville, will become covered with oysters, and the ex- 
tinct beds of the districts of Rochelle, Oléron, Rochefort, and Marennes 
will be brought back to their former prosperous condition.”* 

Such enthusiasm in a man of science, who based his propositions upon 
indisputable observations and upon the very judicious application of 
the principles of embryology, would naturally be communicated to others 
and create numerous adherents. 

The first attempt at oyster culture on a large scale was made at Saint- 
Brieue. Over the spawning oysters deposited upon the bottom, fascines 
were arranged and held in place by means of weights. The spat attached 
itself abundantly, and at the end ofa few months, the first lot of branches, 
covered with young, were carried triumphantly to the palace of the 
Tuileries. ‘I consider it my duty,” said Coste, “to propose to your 
Majesty that you order the immediate restocking of our entire coasts, 
including that of the Mediterranean as well as those of Algiers and Cor- 
sica, and not excepting the salt lakes of Southern France. * * * In 
this age, in which, by the eflicacious application of the laws of physics, 
an invisible force carries thought along the conducting wires, with 
which the genius of man has encircled the globe, physiology shall ex- 
ert its power upon organic matter, by an application of the laws of life.” t 

Coste did not doubt the result; failure seemed to him impossible ; he 
foresaw the complete transformation of the sea-coast, and exclaimed, in 
his letter of March 20, 1861, to the Emperor: “I thank your Majesty for 
having placed me in the front ranks of the greatest enterprise of the 
age, in connection with animate nature.” Attempts were multiplied, 
but progress and success seemed more and more retarded and lessened 
in the course of time. The bay of Saint-Brieuc was swept by a tempest. 
At Arcachon discouragement seized upon those who, in the beginning, 
were most enthusiastic; for little or no spawn was collected. Coste 
heard the name of charlatan sounded in his ears; his work was ridi- 
culed even by those whom, in the expectation of success, he had loaded 
with favors, and our modern Athenians were lavish in criticisms, in 
which neither sarcasm nor bitterness was spared. Enfeebled by his 
labors and deprived of sight, Coste struggled on. He hoped against all 
hope, and maintained that the application of his principles would even 
change the social conditions of the sea-coast communities.{ His views 
were met only by incredulity. He died at his post, despondent, greatly 
discouraged, and to the last hour misunderstood by that multitude, who 
_ treat with contempt all great ideas which do not meet with immediate 
success. While others were occupied in criticising, a few men labored 
faithfully, and in a few years, between 1868 and 1875, the production 
and cultivation of oysters made remarkable progress on the shores of 
Morbihan. 


* Rapport & ’empereur du 5 février, 1858. 
+Rapport 4 ’empereur du 12 janvier, 1859. 
tSee the preface to the work of M. de la Blanchére, Culture des plages maritimes. : 


[5] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 9AT 


In 1875, a local fair was held at Vannes, in one of the departments of 
France. Those who visited the section of practical oyster culture were 
convinced that the enterprise was not only practicable, but had even 
grown tothe rank ofanindustry. Fifty-four oyster-culturists responded 
to the invitation of the prefect of the department, and displayed speci- 
mens of their productions, in a tank prepared for the purpose. In addi- 
tion, they thought it appropriate to exhibit their materials and tools, and 
the methods of using them. A first glance sufficed to show that this 
branch of industry had its principles, its methods, and its utensils, elabo- 
rated and adapted by study and experience. 

Two grand prizes, in addition to the ordinary awards, were specially 
offered for oyster culture. The first was to the culturist who, by his 
perseverance and success, had contributed most to the development of 
this special branch. The second was to the author of the best memoir 
on the general subject. The second prize was not given, but the first 
was doubled and divided between M. Chaumel and M. le Baron de 
Wolbock. Through the efforts of the prefect of the department, a spec- 
ial commission was organized, under the honorary presidency of the pre- 
fect of marine. The labors of this commission, consisting of the study 
of the memoirs presented by the competitors, the examination of the 
parks, and the discussion of the processes in use at Morbihan, excited a 
lively interest. Furthermore, it was decided that, in a general report, 
the commission should set forth the condition of oyster culture at Mor- 
bihan, in 1875, its progress, its prospects, and its demands. This was 
the consummation of its labors. 

Appointed to edit this report, we have attempted to perform this deli- 
cate and arduous task to the best ofour ability. If this memoir contains 
any valuable ideas, their merits should be attributed to the oyster-cul- 
turists of Morbihan. Weassume the responsibility of the imperfections 
that may be found, and invoke the indulgence which we hope will not be 
refused to good intentions. 

A. E. HAUSSER. 

LORIENT, July 25, 1875. 


CHAP TE RK I; 


BREEDING PARKS IN GENERAL. 


Time of spawning; extent of the parks.—The determination of the exact 
time when the oyster becomes milky and its ovaries become charged 
with millions of eggs, is of such importance that we must devote some 
lines to the subject. 

When the parent oyster, by a series of contractions, throws out about 
it that whitish cloud, so rich in life, it leaves to the forces of nature and 

_ to the instincts of its progeny the entire care of providing for the fixa- 


, 


948 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


tion and development of the embryo. The works of M. Coste and his 
followers, among others M. Fraiche and M. de la Blanchére, illustrate 
the structure of the young oyster, with its embryo shell and promi- 
nence armed with cillia, which, remaining in a state of perpetual vibra- 
tion, constitute a temporary swimming apparatus. The young oyster, 
by this latter means, sustains itself in the water, until it finds a suitable 
object for its attachment. Then, the temporary swimming organ disap- 
pears, and soon afterward a little shell may be distinguished, about the 
size of a lentil, firmly attached to the side of the collector. 

It has been noticed that mud is not suited to the newly-hatched oys- 
ters, which require a hard and clean surface for their attachment. But 
it was not known when to place such objects in the water, when to offer 
the embryos a suitable surface upon which they could live, for a short 
time at least. é 

Many culturists, observing that the oysters became milky in April and 
May, thought to prepare their collecting apparatus at that time. They 
were entirely deceived, and, in an industrial point of view, unsuccess- 
ful. It was this failure, experienced by Coste himself, which discouraged 
the first attempts. 

M. Chaumel, in an interesting memoir, has given to the commission 
the series of experiences by which he succeeded in meeting the diffi- 
culty. “The situation in 1862~63,” said he, ‘“‘was very trying. M. 
Coste, in discouraging letters, did not disguise from me the fact that he 
was on the eve of seeing his functions as inspector-general suppressed, 
and urged me on to a success which I already began to foresee, and for 
which I tried to make him hope. 

“T was, in fact, convinced that the principle was good, but that he did 
not yet know how to apply it, and it was towards this end that all my 
efforts were now directed. , 

‘““T, as well as the greater number of oyster-culturists, had already 
noticed that the young oyster never attached itself to any but the 
cleaner portions of the collectors, and also that apparatus Which had 
been even fifteen days in the water was already salt. 

‘“‘ Tt, therefore, became absolutely necessary for me to ascertain the 
exact time of spawning, which would, consequently, be the proper time 
for placing the collectors. Upon this success depended. I made many 
attempts to arrive at this desirable result; but what turned out the most 
successful were the most simple. 

“At Pénerf and Auray, I arranged new collectors at every high tide 
after the month of April, and at the same time I opened a few oysters, 
to ascertain the condition of the ovaries. I noticed that the spawn, at 
first white in the ovary, deepened in color as it passed through the 
gills, becoming yellow and violet in turn, as the time of incubation 
approached, and finally assumed a bluish slate-color. When this hue 
appeared, I discovered several young oysters upon the last collectors 
put in place. 


[7] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 949 


“The conclusion was easily deduced; the blue tint announced that 
the spawning time was at hand, and that we should hasten to arrange 
the apparatus. I announced to M. Coste the happy result I had obtained, 
and predicted a complete triumph.” 

This result, which to-day may seem of slight importance, had consid- 
erable weight at the time of its publication, ten years ago, When it 
became known that about the 1st of July, the time when the milky hue 
changes to the bluish color, was the commencement of the spawning 
season, then it was evident that one might with certainty, and without 
danger of interference from sediment, make ready the collectors to re- 
ceive the young oysters. 

From the time when this matter was determined, the problem of the 
arrangement of the collectors was solved. 

In this way, moreover, judicious observations conduced to progress, 
and divers experiments were made. Attempts were made to collect the 
young oysters by keeping the spawning oysters shut up in basins fur- 
nished with sluices, and also by simply placing the collectors in the water. 
This last method produced magnificent results. 

It was now well understood that the spawning season dated from 
about the 1st of July, and it was also known that the best results had 
been obtained in the deeper water; but it had not yet been ascertained 
that there was a classification to be made, and a judicious method to be 
followed. 

To Dr. Gressy, of Carnac, is due the following observations: “The | 
collectors should be placed in the shallower areas from June 15 to July 
10, and in the deeper areas from July 10 to August 1. 

“Tf, during the first-named period, the collectors are set in the deeper 
areas, polyps will grow over them, and they will receive only an insuffi- 
cient number of embryo oysters. Polyps are never observed on the 
collectors in the shallow areas, because the young are unable to resist 
the heat, when exposed at low tide, but they are most abundant upon 
those which are seldom uncovered, or only at the spring-tides. Nothing 
can be more easily proved in the breeding parks. The deeper down we 
go, the more numerous and more luxuriant will we find the polyp growths, 
suspended over the collectors. 

‘‘By the 10th of July, the polyps have about finished spawning, while 
the oyster spawn is still very abundant; hence, after this time, the young 
oysters may attach themselves to the collectors, without fear of being 
smothered by the growing polyps. This physiological law, which I have 
observed in my parks, has not hitherto been made known.” 

It will, therefore, be seen that, before placing the apparatus intenced 
for the attachment of the embryo oyster, it is necessary, not only to 
await the month of July, so as to escape the deposit of sediment, but 
also to follow a methodical order, and work in the shallower areas from 
the middle of June to the middle of July, and in the deeper ones from the 
middle of July to the first part of August. 


950 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


Ill-success of breeding in parks; the currents.—The idea, at first, was 
not to collect the embryos at the mouths of rivers or along the shores. 
Aware of the extraordinary fecundity of the oyster, and knowing its 
period of spawning, it was supposed that all that was necessary was to 
transfer the adult oysters to basins, arrange collectors near them, and 
leave the rest to nature. 

This method, which led many culturists to employ clusters (ruches) 
of tiles, where the spawning oysters were fastened upon shells or other 
collectors, was recommended by Coste. If one adult oyster produces 
2,000,000 embryos, thousands of such oysters would yield the thousands 
of millions, required to satisfy the public demands, and that too within 
a very restricted area. Such was the reasoning employed, which ap- 
peared as striking as it was logical. 

The method of proceeding is described in all of Coste’s letters, regard- 
ing the industry at Marennes. ‘ Each establishment,” he says, “thus 
transformed into an actual factory, where man controls the influencing 
conditions and varies them at will, performs the double function of an 
artificial oyster bank, supplying spawn, and of a perfect collector for the 
attachment of the spat; in this manner, those oysters which have become 
adult and marketable will be replaced each year by their own progeny, 
carefully brought together and bred in the place of their birth; thus, by 
this indefinite rotation, a constant renewal is produced.” 

The attempts made to carry out this process at Morbihan resulted in 
completely upsetting this plausible theory. 

Breeding in basins was found to be unprofitable. Such was the con- 
clusion then arrived at, and this conclusion is to-day considered indis- 
putable. What is the cause of it? The question is one which it would 
be quite useful for us to solve; for, in order to progress in so delicate a 
matter as the breeding of oysters, it is necessary to study all the phe- 
nomena, and even those which, at first sight, appear to be of secondary 
importance. We have said above that the young oyster, with its em- 
bryo shell, when first set free by the parent, is furnished with a tempo- 
rary swimming apparatus, which enables it to move about and remain 
suspended in the water. Ina closed basin, the young oysters, when they 
issue forth, fall to the bottom, and whether there be any mud or slime 
there or not, or anything beyond the proper bodies arranged to receive 
them, but a very small proportion attach themselves. Certain culturists, 
among them M. Charles, who own important breeding establishments 
near Lorient, attribute the ill-success to the saltness of the water in the 
basins, and its temperature. Besides, according to the latter, the oysters 
when they are placed in the basins are notin a healthy condition; being 
transported, handled, and moved about, during the period of fecunda- 
tion, conception takes place under unfortunate circumstances, and the 
issue is but an abortion, producing still-born offspring. According to 
others, and Coste foresaw this difficulty, it is impossible to have a basin 
without some mud and ooze, in which the young oysters perish. While 


[9] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 951 


granting to these several causes effects more or less important and de- 
cisive, we must seek others, and arrive at one of the most important 
subjects in oyster culture, the action of currents. We are convinced, 
and our opinion is founded upon the statements of the principal oyster- 
culturists of the department of Morbihan, such as MM. Chaumel, Gressy, 
and De Wolbock, that a current is indispensable to the life and welfare 
of the embryo. 

On the sea-coast, the tides vary in their movements according to the 
location. Near the shore, in the coves and mouths of rivers, the undula- 
tions, due to the tides, produce currents, which are called tidal currents. 
The rivers also have their currents, which on the flood tide carry the sea- 
waters towards the interior, and on the ebb come back laden with sedi- 
ment. 

There is something peculiar about these currents, which is that they 
are unequally distributed, and often, when there is an inward or flood 
current at the surface, the water is flowing outward below, and vice 
versa. It is now known that the parent oyster does not give out its 
spawn, excepting at the beginning of the flood tide. ‘‘ How admirable!” 
exclaims M. Chaumel. ‘ Never does the parent oyster, doubtless from 
the fear of having its young left upon dry land to perish, give them 
forth at the last of the ebb; all of the emissions which I have witnessed 
have taken place at the first of the flood, when the oysters begin to be 
well covered by the rising water, but never, never when the sea was 
about to leave them dry.” 

We can readily admit the instinct of the mother oyster, especially as 
we shall have later to speak of the instinct of the embryo; but we must 
also take into account the fact that the water is less pure and vivifying 
on the ebb than on the flood tide, and thus, in the former case, the 
conditions are much less favorable for the oysters. After remaining 
some length of time under the influence of the ebbing waters, they feel 
the contact of the incoming tide, under the revivifying action of which 
they throw out their spawn, for some distance around. 

Whether we take into consideration solely the action of the tides in 
connection with the spawning of oysters, or study their effects upon 
development in general, the result is always the same, as determined by 
careful observations, that the tides are necessary for the oyster and in- 
dispensable to its normal existence. If the oyster becomes fat and of a 
greenish color, it is an indication that it has been living under abnormal 
conditions, and it is well known that all animals confined in parks 
or basins, where they fatten, are not favorably situated for reproduc- 
ing. Thus, in locations where the current is wanting, the oyster, even 
though performing its natural functions, reproduces very imperfectly. 
But, however important the tidal current may be for the mother oyster, 
it is still more necessary to the embryo, which has not the power of 
transporting itself to any distance, by means of its temporary swimming 
organs. The area which it can traverse of its own free will, so to speak, 


952 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


is very limited. In a single drop of water its vibratile cilia cause it to 
move freely about in all directions, but it has not the power to stem a 
current, nor to swim far in a perfectly quiet sea. It is the current alone 
that transports it, preserves it, and places within its reach everything 
essential to its growth and existence, and it is the current alone that 
enables it to become readily attached to the collectors. “I feel certain,” 
says M. Chaumel “ that the organs of locomotion serve, at the same time, 
as organs of respiration, sight, and hearing, by means of which the em- 
bryo is able. to find a suitable place for its attachment.” 

It is evident, therefore, that, if the idea of breeding oysters in a closed 
area must be abandoned, it is because the parent oyster, from the Jack 
of a current, gives issue to imperfect offspring. The embryo, also with- 
out the means of moving about, is exhausted from the time of its 
birth, and generally falls to the bottom, where it perishes within sight 
of the collectors. These conclusions only apply to inclosures of medium 
size, having a superficial area ranging from 1 to 2 hectares (24 to 5 acres). 
In more extensive basins, of 15 to 20 hectares (37 to 50 acres) each, 
special phenomena come into play, producing changes both at the bot- 
tom and at the surface, in the former case by the renewal of the water, 
and in the latter by the action of the wind, permitting to a certain ex- 
tent more favorable results. 

Taking everything into consideration, however, it is now admitted, at 
Morbihan, to be preferable to entirely renounce both the small and large 
inclosures, and depend upon the natural movements of the water, in the 
channels, coves, and rivers. This plan is the most economical one and 
the results are more certain. 

We cannot do better than quote, in this connection, the remarks of M. 
Chaumel, who is one of the best authorities on the subject. “TI regret,” 
he says, in speaking of the works established in the river Trinité, to 
see such extensive reservoirs, built at so great an expense, in which it is 
expected breeding can be successfully carried on. I know full well that it 
has been found possible in some places to collect embryo oysters in arti- 
ficial basins, and an example is cited where shells, thrown upon the bot- 
tom, have become covered over with young oysters. I am, therefore, con- 
vinced that I was mistaken in what I had all along held to be the case, 
that the shells were really covered with the young, without its being 
noticed, before they were placed in the basins. The temperature of the 
water in these narrow basins, under the action of the sun’s rays, attains 
that of a warm bath, and must, at least, present a serious obstacle to the 
operation of breeding. _ Reservoirs for the breeding of the young and 
walled parks are fundimentally wrong in principle. It is necessary to 
avoid placing any obstructions in the way of the currents, which are 
very essential to success.” 

The muddy deposits of the shores of the Department of Morbihan.—The 
currents, So important and so necessary to the life of the oysters, carry 
along with them, what is considered by many culturists a very destruc- 


[11] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 953 


tive element, one of the most deadly enemies of the oyster; this element 
ismud. ‘“ Mud is a deadly poison to the oyster, whether large or small. 

* * #* What then is essential to the prosperity of the oyster? 
Very little, indeed; a solid object, and water, devoid of mud.”* We 
might multiply these citations from Coste, Fraiche, and others; upon 
this point all seem to be in accord. It may, therefore, appear paradox- 
ical when we state that, upon the coast of Morbihan, the oyster thrives 
only where. there is mud; the fact is incontestible; reproduction suc- 
ceeds only in the muddy estuaries, and good parks exist only in the 
sheltered places, almost covered over by slime. This assertion would 
appear improbable did it not admit of an explanation. 

With these preliminary remarks, we will proceed to a consideration of 
the conditions required of a shore in Morbiban, in order that it may 
answer for the general cultivation of the oyster. 

The sea bottom consists, for the most part, of mud, as is evidenced 
by the many soundings that have been made, and by the results of 
various explorations. It is also known that, in many of our rivers, as at 
Auray and in the Scorff and the Blavet, there are sloping shores, which, 
when the tide goes out, appear above the water as immense areas of a 
black or brown color, and into which one can easily sink up to his neck. 
Whence comes this fine flocculent mud, which has seemed, at times, to 
threaten the port of Saint-Nazaire, and whose action has been so diffi- 
cult to resist. Does it come from the rivers, or is it produced by the 
constant disintegration of the rocks and shores? Why does it invade 
the mouths of all our rivers and all our bays and creeks? Some good 
may arise from our pointing out general causes, at least, if not by the 
determination of all the questions, and this is all our subject demands. 

The constant wearing of the rocks, as in ages past, by the action of 
the sea upon the headlands, gives rise to three principal kinds of material : 
gravel, sand, and mud. These materials are carried along by the action 
of the waves. Gravel is moved only in times of heavy storms, when, 
lifted by the force of the waves, it is moved gradually along, until it 
finds a region of comparative shelter, where it remains buried. Sand 
is more frequently moved than gravel, but the strength of the waves is 
required to raise it and carry it along, and it needs a greater calm than 
the gravel, in order to fall to the bottom again. Mud, on the contrary, 
being fine and light, acts more as though it were in solution in the water, 
and remains suspended in it for a long time; carried along by the cur- 
rents, which have no power over sand and gravel, it penetrates into 
coves, estuaries, and rivers, where it is deposited in the eddies, con- 
stantly raising the level of the shores. With regard to the movement 
of the sea alluvium, we are able to make the following deductions: 
Whenever we desire to determine whether a bay or estuary is a region 
of actual calm, we have only to examine the character of the bottom. 
If the bottom is muddy, the region is a quiet one; if sandy, it must be 


* De la Blanchére, Culture des plage maritimes, 


954 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [12] 


subject to more or less disturbance; and if gravelly, it is certain to be 
the scene of much commotion in stormy weather. 

The first condition to be sought for, as favorable to oyster culture upon 
a coast, is one of rest. However rich the bottom of a region may be in 
the elements essential to the oyster, it cannot serve for the breeding of 
oysters if it is not a quiet one. Consequently, to mark out on a chart 
of Morbihan the regions covered with mud, would be to indicate the 
bottoms where oysters can be cultivated, and, without visiting the re- 
gion, one is able to affirm, by reference to the chart contained in this 
volume, that oyster culture is only possible in the Scorff, the Blavet 
the bay of Gavres, the river Saint-Philibert, the river Auray in the gulf 
of Morbihan, the estuary of Pénerf, and the entrance to the Vilaine. 
It is precisely at these places that the oyster-culturists have located. 
Oyster culture cannot be carried on at the entrance to the river Etel, 
about the peninsula of Quiberon, and in the many bays possessed by the 
islands Groix, Belle-Ile, Houat, and Heedick. 

It may be objected, with reference to our own statements above, that 
if the mud collects in sheltered situations it will cause an elevation of 
the bottom, against which the culturist of Morbihan will have to con- 
tend. An equilibrium is, however, finally established, and this fact is 
ot so much importance to culturists as to warrant mention here. It ap- 
pears as though, during the geological changes which resulted in our 
present coast line, the mouths of our rivers were given a size, quite ont 
of proportion to the importance of the rivers. The Scorff and the Bla- 
vet, both humble rivers, unite majestically in the roadstead of Lorient, 
whose great depth caused it to be chesen as the great central station of 
the India Company, and more recently as a naval station. Ten kilo- 
meters from their mouths, these rivers lose their importance, from their 
small size, and farther up, the Scorff especially, dashes through narrow 
granitic valleys and becomes the haunt of trout. These two streams 
play no part in the role of rivers, so to speak, while at their mouths all 
the conditions are strictly marine. The valleys through which they flow, 
in the interior, give rise to no alluvium for them to carry down, and the 
only phenomena observable are those produced by the sea. 

As we have stated before, the water enters the broad mouths of rivers, 
charged with mud, and, if it encounters perfect stillness there, the mud 
sinks and the bottom is gradually built up; but this elevation of the 
bottom has a limit. An equilibrium has already been established be- 
tween the tendency tobuild up the bottom and the wearing action of the 
tidal currents, and at present both the landward and the seaward cur- 
rents go, charged with mud, without producing any change in the level 
of the bottom. Two equal and opposing currents are thus represented 
as annulling each others actions. 

We insist upon this point, because of its important bearing upon oys- 
ter culture, and the breeding of oysters in particular. A state of equi- 
librium having been established with regard to the beds of our rivers, 


[13] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 955 


it follows that, whenever this equilibrium is disturbed, one or other of 
the forces we have described must come into play. If the rivers are 
dug out, the depth being increased, mud will be rapidly deposited un- 
til an equilibrium is again established between the actions of the two 
contending forces, one bringing in the alluvium, the other sweeping it 
out to sea. Then the deposition of mud will cease. If, on the other 
hand, liquid mud should be poured into the channel, causing a tempo- 
rary elevation of the bottom, the currents would naturally clear it out 
again, and in a short time the mud accidentally deposited there would 
be carried away, and the bottom cleaned. Finally, if fixed obstacles are 
placed in the river, eddies will be produced, and, consequently, a depo- 
sition of mud, of which it is easier to affirm the existence than determine 
the intensity and scope. From the very beginning of oyster culture in 
Morbihan, we have, therefore, encountered these two elements, the cur- 
rents and the deposit of mud, the actions of which are controlled by nat- 
ural laws, and to which the culturists have been obliged to submit. It 
is not without some hesitation and many experiments that these results 
have been attained. 

The difficulties met with and the failures and losses at the beginning, 
sometimes considerable, which have been sustained, all go to prove that 
one cannot, with impunity, oppose the action of natural phenomena. 

Whenever nature’s laws are violated, she knows how to avenge her- 
self, and it is, therefore, much better to submit to them and avert the 
danger. 

Dr. Henri Leroux, an excellent and intelligent observer, remarks as 
follows: ‘‘We reckon ourselves among the active partisans of science, 
but ask of it only the application of practical discoveries. We should 
consult science in order to ascertain the greatest advantages to be de- 
rived from our field of labor, but it is very dangerous to struggle against 
nature.” ’ 

Science and work, study and observation are required of all the cul- 
turists of the department of Morbihan. Now, that the importance of 
the currents and of the deposits of mud. are understood, we can appre- 
ciate the entire worth of our culturists, who have labored under great 
disadvantages from more than one point of view; but success has finally 
been attained, thanks to the persistent energy so characteristic of the 


Britons. 
AL Ze Labor omnia vincit 


_ The general character of a shore, with reference to breeding parks.—For 

the purposes of breeding, therefore, the culturists of Morbihan do not 
hesitate to establish themselves upon the muddy shores of the rivers 
Trinité or Auray. They know that, by the processes we are going to 
describe, they can collect a goodly number of young oysters. They seek 
to group themselves, as nearly as possible, in the neighborhood of nat- 
ural oyster banks, over which the marine authorities watch with a solici- 
tude, worthy of all praise. 


956 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


The site being chosen, they endeavor to locate between ordinary low- 
tide level and the level of low water during the spring-tides. Collectors 
placed in these situations are only exposed during spring-tides, and 


remain almost entirely covered at ordinary low water. There isa great. 


advantage in keeping as near.as possible to the channels, and to the 
natural oyster banks, for there are to be found fewer eddies, more cur- 
rents, and a greater number of embryo oysters. 

M. Henri Leroux, to whom we have already had occasion to refer, 
sums up in the following just and brief manner, concerning the condi- 
tions which ashore should possess, in order to fit it for breeding purposes: 

“Up to 1867, it was supposed that breeding could be carried on most 
successfully in those portions of the river where the water was most 
tranquil, but quite the reverse is true. Nowhere do the collectors be- 
come more fully covered with the young, than in the currents produced 
by the ebb and flood tides, and above all at the level of low water. 
Parks situated in a region of eddies are poorly located. In 1867, it was 
still conceded that the embryo oysters, leading as they do a wandering life 
for several days, must scatter themselves more or less equally through- 
out all parts of the rivers, where natural oyster beds exist. At present 
we are given to understand that, at a distance of 500 meters from an 
oyster bank, in the direction of the mouth of the river, no embryos are 
to be encountered; whereas very many oysters will attach themselves 
‘to the collectors arranged in the bottom of the river, above the oyster 
bed, these being carried up by the flood tide. 

“The parturition of the oyster seems to take place rather at low water 
than at high water. It is essential, therefore, that the breeding parks 
be established in as close proximity to the oyster beds as possible, and 
also in the course of the tidal currents; at any rate, they will have no 
chance of success, if exposed to the violent action of the sea.” 

These ideas present to us an example of the foresight of private 
industry, which is more powerful in its results than the wisest rules. 
One cannot always locate close by a natural bed, and again natural 
beds may die out, as experience has unfortunately taught us. Hence 
the culturists are always careful, when not breeding, to retain about their 
breeding parks a strong reserve of adult oysters. M. Alphonse Mar- 
tin, who has such a well-managed establishment at Kergurioné, keeps 
30,000 oysters in reserve, and the Baron de Wolbock has 50,000 at Kér- 
iollet. Thus, when they fear a scarcity of young, from the exhaustion 
of the beds, this reserve series becomes of the utmost importance. 
MM. Leroux:and Leroy have a supply of 800,000 oysters, whence their 
supply of young is derived. So perfect a system cannot fail to produce 
good results. 

Natural oyster beds, bordering the parks where oysters are kept in 
reserve, increase the richness of the results. The quantity of young 
produced will be augmented, and, in consequence of this prolific inter- 
change, the richness of the oyster beds will be insured for the future. 


[15] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 957 


CHAPTER TT: 
COLLECTORS—LIMING—FORMATION OF BREEDING PARKS. 


Collectors.—After the selection of a site comes the choice of col- 
lectors—that is to say, of the apparatus for the attachment of the em- 
bryo oysters. 

The word park conveys to the minds of many persons the idea clita an 
inclosure; but breeding parks are never inclosed. It is, therefore, im- 
portant a define the terms in use in oyster culture, in order to prenen 
confusion. 

A park is any bank or shore, where spat collectors are used in connec- 
tion with the spawning oysters; a claire is an inclosure surrounded by 
low walls and covered by the water at high tide, and serves as a depot 
for collectors, and for raising; and, finally, a basin is an inclosed area, 
protected from the influence of the tides, in which, by means of hy- 
draulic apparatus, water-gates, or sluices, the height of the water may 
be regulated at will. Coste’s attention was first directed to the subject 
of collectors, which, from the beginning, have been made the object of 
much study. 

Most authors who have written upon oyster culture have contented 
themselves with reproducing Coste’s note, which occurs in the supple- 
ment to his Voyage of Exploration. We will call attention, simply as a 
matter of interest, to what have, until to-day, been considered as the best 
collectors. Wood and tiles are the most important materials for the 
construction of collectors. Wood is used either as fascines, submerged 
and held in place by means of weights, or else as platforms; tiles are 
utilized in the greatest variety of ways. Coste recommended— 

1. The simple roof collector. 

2. The double-roof collector. 

3d. The roof collector with oblique rows. 

4. The roof collector with opposed rows. 

As a more complicated apparatus, he advised the “ hive” collector, a 
large wooden box, open at the bottom and containing movable frames. 
On the latter, the spawning oysters and cockle-shells are disposed in 
layers—the one supplies the spawn and the other the means for its attach- 
ment. Finally, he suggested the use of stone, although, at the same time, 
he acknowledged the difficulty of removing the young oysters from it. 

Study and experience in breeding have failed to discover any other 
substance suitable for collectors, but the method of using collectors has 
been greatly perfected. 

Stone, which sinks so easily in the mud, cannot produce good results. 
M. Liazard, one of the culturists of Morbihan, who, since 1861, has not 


958 © REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


hesitated to continue his labors in the difficult branch of oyster culture, 
has given numerous details of the failures in the use of stone. It would 
be needless to enter here into a long argument upon this subject; this 
kind of collector does not seem likely to come into general use. At 
Pénerf, however, limestone has been employed with some good results. 

With wood there is not the same difficulty, and it is even now used, 
either in small rectangular pieces about the size of a tile, and half an 
inch thick, or made into platforms, such as are in use especially in the 
river Auray. 

Fascines have been experimented with, especially by M. Chaumel, 
and, as they may answer for some sections, it may be useful to give some 
idea of their construction. The following account is by M. Chaumel: 

“Kor the construction of good fascines, it is necessary to procure 
branches of some hard wood, with the bark as soft and smooth as pos- 
sible; cherry, for example, answers perfectly. It is a great error to 
suppose that the embryo oyster attaches itself more readily to rough 
surfaces than to smooth ones, for precisely the contrary is true. 

‘‘ After the wood has been prepared, the branches are arranged alter- 
nately, with the large end of one branch next to the smaller end of the 
adjoining one, so as to prevent their lying too close together and 
leave interspaces between them; then at each extremity, under the cord 
which binds them together, a large wedge is introduced, the object of 
which is to prevent compression when the bindings are tightened. In 
this manner, the fascines have plenty of light and water about them, and 
the embryos have ready access and may attach themselves to any part 
of the branches. It now simply remains to attach the fascines to a small 
chain, at intervals of about two yards, by means of pieces of wire, like 
those used in binding the extremities, care being taken, however, to 
fasten the wire around not more than one or two branches, in order not 
to draw them together. 

‘‘Fascines are the best collectors I know of for use at the bottom, and 
the oysters may be detached from them, to some extent, even with the 
fingers, especially after the lapse of a year. By this method not a single 
oyster is lost; they may perhaps be a little defective in form, but to so 
slight an extent as not to affect their sale. It is a singular fact that 
fascines which become uncovered give but poor results.” 

We do not believe that, along the shores of Morbihan, fascines are des- 
tined to play an important part as collectors. Planks will also become 
less and less used; made into platforms they have been employed in 
the river Auray, and M. Liazard gives the following description of those 
in use by him: 

‘My platforms are constructed of four, five, or six thin boards, accord- 
ing to their widths; they are joined together by three bars, about three 
inches high. Those which I shall construct this year will consist of only 
four.thin boards, as I wish to leave a space of about an inch and a half 


[17] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. | 959 


between each two boards, so that the mud, deposited upon them, will run 
off at each side and not collect upon the top.” 

Tiles, however, are the apparatus par excellence for collectors, and they 
are now generally employed. Dr. Henri Leroux sums up as follows, 
regarding the efforts made to employ tiles successfully and in the most 
effective way: 

‘The tile,” said he, “ has the right of priority, but this is not its sole 
merit. Its cost is moderate, it is easily handled, and its weight tends 
to keep it in position in the water. 

‘The sea, however, is subject to 80 many unexpected movements, and 
the oyster bottoms are so covered with shifting mud, that the culturists 
had to struggle against great difficulties for many years. 

“The tiles were first arranged in piles, ia a manner pleasing to the 
eye, and it was hoped that the heavy stones, placed as a weight upon 
each pile, would give the requisite stability to these structures; but at 
the first high tide, a portion of them were overthrown and the work had 
to be done again. 

‘Upon a solid bottom, two tiles are placed upright, and upon the tops 
of these a third is laid crosswise, to separate those which are to follow. 
A considerable number of rows may be arranged and held in place by 
means of flat stones, laid in front of, above, and behind them. In this 
manner the tiles are sufficiently well secured, and may readily become 
covered with young oysters. A hard bottom is not often found, how- 
ever, and generally occurs near the shore, where, at low tide during the 
summer, the sun destroys a large share of the young, the remainder 
finally succumbing to the cold dry winds of September and October. 
If, on the other hand, the tiles are placed upon level bottom, 
the obstacle they present to the action of the sea soon leads 
to a deposit of mud or sand, which may cover them, either 
entirely or in part. 

‘¢ In 1868, in order to preserve the tiles from contact with 
} the bottom, we had a number of boxes made, capable of 
holding about four hundred tiles each. The desired object 
was attained, but the young oysters did not develop except 
upon those tiles which received air and light. These groups 
of tiles served as haunts for star-fishes, crabs, and other 
marine animals, which found there an abundance of proven- 
der. In fact, the construction and maintenance of the boxes 
led to an expense, out of proportion to the results of the - 
harvest. 

“The best method of arranging the tiles is unquestionably 


Fic. 1.— Bou- ; : 2 4 
quet cel by means of stakes. The tiles, pierced with a hole at each 


oe extremity, are united in little piles of twelve or fourteen, 


by means of wires, firmly fastened to the head of the stake, which is from 
three to five feet long, and implanted in the bottom in such a way that 


- 960 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


the lower tile is about six inches above it. Each of these clusters of 
tiles bears the name of ‘bouquet’ or ‘mushroom.’” 

Tiles arranged in, ‘‘ bouquets.”.—In the principal breeding parks of the 
river Trinité, they have settled upon the use of tiles arranged in “ bou- 
quets,” as represented in our design. At Morbihan this is also con- 
sidered a very rational system. It has this great advantage, that the 
apparatus can be entirely prepared on land and so arranged that the 
setting up will consume but a very short space of time. 

This is an excellent idea, as will be understood from what has already 
been said, and the details we have given concerning the deposition of 
sediment will indicate its bearings. 

Whenever, in a river, subject to depositions of sediment, the nature of 
the bottom is modified, if: only by a wooden stake, a deposit of mud is 
induced, which elevates the level of the bottom. One will gain some 
idea of the rapidity with which the deposit of sediment is formed, on 
learning that, in the military port of Lorient, after the alterations which 
modified the bottom, the deposition reached a depth of from twenty to 


Fia. 2. Fie. 3. 


Frames for supporting ‘‘Bouquet’’ collectors on a hard bottom. 


twenty-eight inches a year, the average being twelve inches. In the 
commercial port the case is identical, and several spells of bad weather, 
accompanied by a southwest wind, are sufficient to produce the muddy 
deposit. Culturists should not forget that the water is not charged with 
sediment, excepting when itis agitated. At such times, the waves wash- 
ing upon the muddy shores become charged with mud, which is de- 
posited at those points where the equilibrium of the bed has been modi- 
fied, in one way or another. 

The cluster of tiles fastened to a stake, if arranged above the muddy 
bed of a river in July, has been placed at the proper season, and from 


ese OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 961 


then until the month of September causes but a slight deposit of mud. 
Whatever may be the extent of the deposit produced, at the moment 
when the stake is withdrawn, in order to secure the oysters attached to 
the tiles, the current resumes its normal action, sweeps away the accu 
mulated mud, and restores the bed to its original condition. 

We repeat, that, after having carefully examined the action of the cur- 
rent upon these bouquet collectors, we must assert that the greatest 
progress made in oyster culture, in Morbihan, consists in the discovery 
and reducing to pratice of this system. The honor of this progress be- 
longs to M. Eugene Leroux, one of the most indefatigable and perse- 
vering culturists of Morbihan. It is very interesting to note by what 
a succession of attempts Mr. Leroux arrived at the important result we 
mention. 

“On May 31,” said he, ‘‘I began to arrange the tiles in my parks. “I 
constructed a wooden framework, and upon wires attached to the top of 
it I placed two tiles, followed by two others placed crosswise upon the 
first, this operation being continued until a dozen tiles were thus dis- 
posed of. When this arrangement had been completed, I saw that my 
tiles would not remain in place, since the currents tended to continually 
displace them. I, therefore, thought to retain them, by passing a wire 
around my little scaffolding, which made everything very secure. 

‘“‘T did not finish the placing of my five thousand tiles in the parks 
until towards the end of June. It was a lengthy undertaking, as we 
could work only at low tide, and I will add that it was both laborious 
and expensive. q 

“Thad read in the works of M. Coste that after every high tide it 
was necessary to remove from the tiles the sediment which formed there, 
from one tide to another, so I scrupulously set to work to wash mine, 
one by one ; we were obliged to stand in the water up to our knees, and 
when the tide left us to continue our work with buckets of water, and 
then to carefully replace all the tiles. 

“This troublesome operation continued until September; I considered 
it the work of a Roman, and saw the impossibility of undertaking it on 
a large scale. 

‘As soon as I discovered that my tiles had embryo oysters upon them, 
I discontinued the washing; I contented myself with rearranging the 
the collectors that became displaced, and thus passed the winter. 

“T determined todevelop my undertaking ona larger scale. I order- 
ed from Nantes 30,000 tiles, which were received in the month of May, 
1867, and then I set myself to work distributing them in the parks. This 
necessitated a new arrangement. Planks were first placed flat upon the 
mud, and on these I arranged the tiles, four in width and ten in length, 
making forty tiles placed side by side in one layer. Upon this layer 
five other layers were arranged, making six in all, the last layer being 
covered with boards, holding stones heavy enough to act as weights, 

S, Mis. 29-—61 


ft 


962 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


to keep the entire structure in place, and prevent the movement of the 
water from causing the tiles to fall into the mud. 

‘The results in 1867 were fair, but did not equal those of the first 
year. 

““T observed that tiles placed upon the bottom did not remain as clean 
as when placed above it. Here, therefore, was another point to be con- 
sidered. 

“In the month of November, 1867, I bored a hole at each end of my 
tiles. But, before doing this, I measured off the points where the holes 
should be, in order that they might correspond exactly in all the tiles, and 
permit of the tiles being joined in pairs opposite to one another. The 
wires, with which the tiles were strung together, measured each about 
46 inches. Two tiles were first strung together, by means of a wire pass- 
ing underneath and through the two extremities. Two more were then 
arranged in the same manner, but opposed to the first, and the series 
continued up to twelve. This work being finished, I passed a stake, 
about fifty-three inches long, through the middle of the bundle of tiles, 
and wound the four ends of the wires firmly around the top of it, which 
projected about five or six inches above the uppermost of the tiles. In 
this manner they were firmly fastened to it. 

“T proved that my new invention was entirely successful and would 
resist the action of the sea. These collectors also had this additional 
advantage, that they could be placed in the water without the necessity 
of wading through the mud; from the boat in which they were carried 
we could set them up in the parks. This system has been so highly ap- 
preciated that all the culturists have adopted my invention, and it is the 
only one in use to-day.” 

Being as practical as it is reasonable and as judicious as economical, 
this system has given excellent results. The mode of arrangement varies 
but little in the different parks. M. de Wolbock perfected the system, 
by slipping very thin pieces of board between the tiles; but this addi- 
tion, which is an excellent one, does not in any way alter the principle 
upon which the apparatus is constructed. 

Coating the collectors.—If bare collectors had always been used, the 
greatest difficulty would have been experienced, when it came to the deli- 

vate operation of removing the young oysters from them. Coste, himself, 
when he rejected stone, simply followed the idea that the oyster, when it 
adheres too strongly to the surface of the collector, is wounded by the 
operation of removal. When breeding was first attempted at Arcachon, 
as well as at the He de Ré, and along the coast of Morbihan, numerous 
trials were made, and finally, after many drawbacks, the only rational 
system was arrived at, by applying unconsciously, perhaps, a principle 
which, had it been proclaimed in the beginning, would probably have 
averted many a failure. The science, to which M. Gressy and M. Henri 
Leroux appealed, plays an important part in oyster culture, and must 


[21] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. J63 


always be taken into account, whenever it is desired to arrive at practi- 
cal results. 

In giving some details concerning the coating of collectors, a method 
now in universal use, we desire to have it understood that, in oyster cul- 
ture, this subject involves a principle, fully as important as those which 
relate to the action of the current and the deposition. of sediment. 

About 1858, a mason of the He de Ré, named Hyacinthe Bouf, pre- 
pared a park with great care, and inclosed it with walls. After having 
filled up the bottom with various materials, and among others straw, he 
was surprised to find that the young oyster, instead of adhering to the 
bottom, preferred the calcareous stones of the inclosure. So he took his 
wall to pieces, stone by stone, and thus obtained a more or less abundant 
harvest. 

At this time, no one investigated the reason why the oysters had shown 
such a preference; the fact was noticed, but nothing further was done. 

Many observers remarked that, upon submarine walls of masonry, con- 
structed with hydraulic cement, even in basins and in places distant 
from oyster banks, there were always found a considerable number of 
oysters, persistently seeking the joints of the masonry. The thing was 
considered as accidental, exceptional, and still, at the same time, nu- 
merous attempts were being made to facilitate the removal of the oysters 
from the tiles, by dipping the collectors in a material, soft enough to 
permit of the oyster being easily removed, and hard enough to offer 
an adhesive surface to the young. 

Dr. Kemmerer, of the Ie de Ré, the veteran oyster culturist, whom Dr. 
Henri Leroux calls the savant, who studies with feet and hands in 
water, was the first to find a remedy for the too persistent adhesion of 
the young oyster to the tile. He began by soaking his tiles in the fol- 
lowing composition: Hydraulic cement, 1 part; water, 4 parts ; defibri- 
nated blood, 1 part. 

The results obtained by the use of this composition were excellent, 
as compared with those resulting from the old misunderstanding. 

Defibrinated blood is not much used, and for those establishments 
scattered along the coast, far from great centers, it is very, difficult to 
obtain. Icfforts were made to dispense with it, and Dr. Kemmerer him- 
self succeeded in making a mixture with lime as a basis. 

In the report which he sent to the fair at Vannes, he expresses him- 
self thus: . 

“« The oyster attaches itself to all natural bodies, but nature cannot 
equal industry. Nature created the oyster beds, and as soon as the de- 
mand for oysters became more pressing, from the increased facility for 
transportation, afforded by our modern means of communication, the 
beds disappeared. 

“The oyster culture of Coste does not, therefore, present the appara- 
tus necessary for the purpose, since it cannot produce the oyster seed. 

‘7 designate as seed the young oysters which, having remained from 


964 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


seven to nine months upon the collectors, are ready for removal and 
planting in beds, where they may grow and develop. The first princi- 
ple of the industry had been discovered, but the means of producing 
this seed were still wanting. 

“Then it was that [invented the cement for collectors, the formula 
of which I have given. 

“ Between the collector and the oyster there should be interposed a 
caleareous substance, hard enough to withstand the action of the sea, 
and soft enough to permit of the easy removal of the oyster at any 
time. I had proved that cleanliness was the first necessity of a good 
collector, and soon I added that the collector cement alone had the power 
of renewing that cleanliness, at the will of the oyster culturist. From 
that day oyster culture was an established fact.” 

The success attained by coating the tiles, that is to say, by dipping 
them in lime or cement, has been complete and very characteristic. 
Several culturists, wishing to observe what the difference might be, have 
placed a certain number of tiles, some coated and others not, under the 
same conditions as regards cleanliness. The former had about three 
times as many young oysters upon them as the latter. The trial was 
therefore decisive. 

In 1866, when M. de la Blanchére was seeking the principle in the 
case, he wrote: 

“A principle should govern the employment of all collecting appara- 
tus, not only as regards the time for setting the collectors, with refer- 
ence to the spawn, but also as to the special state of cleanliness of the 
apparatus itself.” 

With Dr. Kemmerer, the principle was an easy removal of the oysters 
from the tiles; with M. de la Blanchére, it was cleanliness. 

Without wishing to enter into the domain of the critic, we venture to 
say, however, that the principle had not yet been found. 

While seeking a means of easily detaching the oysters from the tiles, 
and almost without being aware of it, there was discovered the attract- 
ive element, indispensable to a good harvest, the bait, so to speak, of the 
oyster—that is, lime in an easily assimilated state. 

Such is the‘principle; we will proceed to explain it: 

When the young: oyster passes from the mantle folds of the parent, 
out into the sea, what does it instinctively seek? A place to which it 
ean easily attach itself, and where it can readily defend itself against 
its enemies. It could readily attach itself to any substance, but in order 
to defend itself, it must be able to develop its shell, which serves as a 
protective armor. As lime is the predominant element of the shell, the 
preferable collector must have a basis of lime. 

The young oyster seeks calcareous substances by instinct. Nature 
is certainly very provident. If calcareous material is wanting in the 
collector, that extremely perfect laboratory, contained within the infi- 
nitely small body, constituting the embryo oyster, will withdraw it from 


oO 


[23] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 965 


the surrounding waters; but there is a question of instinctive preference, 
which must not be forgotten. This is the reason why Hyacinthe Beeut 
found young oysters upon his walls, and not within his pen; this is the 
reason why we find oysters upon the joints of the masonry of the quays 
and other structures, in our ports. Wherever a calcareous solution has 
pexuded, and then hardened upon the outside, there it ismost readily dis- 
-s ved and assimilated. Nevertheless, to Dr. Kemmerer is due the honor 
of waving first introduced the process of liming intooyster culture. It will 
be said of him, perhaps, that he carried a torch by which he himself was 
no’ lighted. We may consider that he was looking for India and dis- 
covered America. He deserves the gratitude of all oyster culturists. 

What is most remarkable concerning liming is the fact that both quick- 
lime and hydraulic cement are decomposed by sea-water. Hydraulic 
cement hardens in fresh water; but salt water, although it permits of a 
first hardening, in the course of time produces complete decomposition. 

This change is favorable to the removal of the young oyster, and to 
the assimilation of lime by the young. 

By combining these two substances, hydraulic cement and quick-line, 
the oyster culturists of Morbihan, in all cases, attain the desired results, 
so far as this particular point is concerned. 

If some of our culturists still seem to ignore the existence of a prin- 
ciple in the use of lime, as necessary for the attachment of young oysters, 
there are others who, without strongly insisting upon. it, still affirm 
this truth. We may cite a few instances: ‘ Quick-lime,” says M. Al- 
phonse Martin, ‘always retains a little moisture, thus placing at the dis- 
posal of the oyster all the materials which it needs.” 

“A coating of lime,” says M. Gressy, ‘‘not only permits of the easy 
removal of the oyster, but also constitutes a substance eminently favor- 
able for collecting the young. This fact is so well known, that no one 
to-day would place a collector in the sea, without having first dipped it 
in lime.” 

Finally, Dr. Henri Leroux writes as follows: “We will not now in- 
sist upon the necessity of coating the tiles, in order to obtain a good 
supply of oysters, as experience has sufficiently proved this fact. The 
tiles, covered with lime, will give three times as many oysters as those 
without it.” e 

This principle being admitted, the liming is done in two very different 
ways, at Morbihan, according to whether it is intended to entirely free 
the oysters from the tile, or to allow a portion of the tile to remain at- 
tached to each shell. 

When we come to speak of the removal of the oysters from the col- 
lectors, we will make some remarks concerning the matter of leaving a 
portion of the tile attached tothe young. For the present, we will merely 
state that, under that system, the tile is cut, leaving a portion adhering 
to each oyster, forming a sort of heel. 

Some of our culturists, such as M. Gressy and M. Henri Leroux, 


966 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [24] 


who breed oysters in this manner, cover their tiles with a slight coating 
of hydraulie cement. The young oyster attaches itself to the cement, 
but the coating, being very thin, is soon worn away, leaving the oyster 
quite firmly fixed to the tile. 

Others, on the contrary, who, six months after the collectors have 
been set, prefer to separate the oysters entirely from the tile, with the 
blade of a knife, generally cover the tile with two layers, and proc’ “i 
in a different manner. We cannot do better than to give their method 
of procedure in their own language: 

M. Eugtne Leroux says: “TI proeured some quicklime, which was 
slacked just as it was to be used, and was put, while still in a state of 
ebullition, into a large vat, where two-thirds the same quantity of sand 
had been placed. My men stirred the mixture, until it had attained the 
consistency of clear broth. The collectors had been made ready, and, 
held by the lower end, were dipped into the vat. One immersion suf- 
ficed, after which the women took them in hand-barrows and exposed 
them to the air to dry, before setting them up. ‘This excellent coating 
Should be prepared with fresh water only; sea-water prevents its ad- 
hering for any length of time to the tiles, and if it comes off the labor is, 
of course, lost.” 

M. Liazard states: “It was necessary to find a substance which, placed 
between the outer coating and the tile, would decompose, after remain- 
ing long in the water, and thus leave the coating almost free. I tried 
different pastes, all of which gave good results, but it was necessary to 
select the most economical. I was satisfied with a mixture made of flour 
and a small quantity of the scrapings of potatoes, boiled in a sufficient 
quantity of water to produce a thin paste. The tiles were dipped in 
this, and after they were dry they were passed through a bath of hy- 
draulic cement. Ihave always succeeded with thismixture; itis quickly 
made and costs but little. Every time I have neglected to use it I have 
regretted it.” 

M. Alphonse Martin says: “T first plunge each tile into a milk of 
quicklime, and when this coating is quite dry, I again dip the tile into a 
bath of hydraulic cement.” 

M. de Wolbock generally uses two layers of hydraulic cement. 

It seems to us rational that, when not intending to leave the oyster 
attached to the tile, we should resort to two layers, the first of quick- 
lime, which will not adhere very firmly, and the second of hydraulic ce- 
ment. The first facilitates the removal of the oyster and the second, the 
adherence of the young. 

Pursuing this idea, Dr. Kemmerer, in his report, makes the following 
proposition: 

“In oyster culture, not a single oyster should be lost. Ianticipate this 
result from the removable cement for collectors. Saturate your tile with 
water, cover the concave portion with wet paper, leaving the edges bare, 
then spread on the layer of cement, which must cover both the paper 


[25] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBITHAN. 967 


and the edges, so that when the edges are scraped off, the entire concave 
surface can be removed, without damage to the adhering oysters. 

“Tf the paper is not spoiled, it can be used a second time, or it may be 
replaced by the large leaves of some plant. 

“The collector with a removable coating, applied to the industry at 
Areachon, will offer the following advantages: it will prevent a loss of 
20 per cent. and much labor may be dispensed with. The cement, 
bearing the young, may be transferred directly to the claires, without 
passing through the boxes. The oysters will grow and the cement may 
be easily broken into pieces, even with the hand.” 

It is useless to insist further upon the practice of liming; we have 
stated the principle and supported it by several illustrations. 

At Morbihan, it is easy, in all cases, to settle whatever difficulties may 
arise. The question has been studied, and the path to be followed 
clearly pointed out. 

Arrangement of the collectors and of the breeding parks.—We have 
reviewed the system of collectors and of coating the tiles; it is now in 
order to say something about the arrangement of the collectors and of 
breeding parks in general. 

One principle also governs this question, and imposes itself upon each 
culturist. It is the transportation of mud in rivers, which are influ- 
enced by the tides. The culturists of Morbihan study the eurrents and 
the deposition of mud; they arrange their collectors along the shore in 
such a manner as to prevent their being covered up with mud, during 
the period when they remain in place. The principle being understood, 
the question of application is determined in each case by observation, it 
being impossible to formulate any general rule. 

We will state, however, that the majority of culturists arrange their 
collectors in rows, at right angles to the shore. This system, which pro- 
duces a sort of dam opposed to the current, must be modified in a cer- 
tain measure, so as not to offer too much resistance to the general cur- 
rent. It might, perhaps, be preferable to arrange the collectors in rows 
parallel to the channel; this is an experiment yet to be tried. We 
repeat that the culturists of Morbihan pay considerable attention to the 
action of those natural forces, which produce the currents and the depo- 
sition of mud. In proof of this, we have only to refer to the judicious 
observations of Dr. Gressy. 

“The ‘bouquet’ collectors, whether of tiles or of thin boards, when 
placed near together, will cause a deposit of mud in the parks, by rea- 
son of the obstacles which they oppose to the current. 

‘To obviate this inconvenience, I was the first to originate the idea 
of grouping the bouquet collectors in series of three rows each, placed 
in juxtaposition. Between each series I left a space of from five to six 
feet, so as to permit the current to flow freely, and by the force of the 
rising and ebbing sea to sweep out the deposit of mud, which might ac- 
cumulate among the collectors in calm water. This system is univer- 
sally followed in our river. 


968 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [26] 


“The number of collectors to be arranged within a given area varies, 
and no absolute rule can be laid down regarding this point. The force 
of the current and the degree of impurity of the water should guide 
each culturist, in determining the number of collectors he may be able 
to accommodate in his concession. Whenever mud begins to accumu- 
late at the base of the collectors, the culturist finds an experimental 
proof that there is not sufficient space between them, and that, conse- 
quently, he should decrease their number. 

“The first [ have upheld, and even to-day, against the general opin- 
ion, I still maintain that the concessions are overloaded with collectors. 
My own concessions contain, in proportion to their extent, many less 
collectors than those of my neighbors. 

“T consider it very necessary to prevent the deposition of mud. I 
cannot forget that, on the He de Ré, oyster culture had to be abandoned, 
because the concessions became filled up, after having succeeded adini- 
rably for several years. 

“The space to be left between each group of the bouquet collectors 
varies also, according to the length of time which they are to remain in 
place. 

“Tt is evident that the culturist, who leaves his collectors in the water ° 
eighteen months, should separate them more inorder to prevent the depo- 
sition of mud than he who removes them in November of the same year 
in which they are placed, that is to say, after an interval of only four 
months. 

“Tn this latter case, the mud has not sufficient time to form a deposit, 
and the current, after the collectors have been removed, sweeps every- 
thing away, during the winter season.” 

The method deseribed by Dr. Gressy is practiced by all his associates 
in oyster culture, with various modifications. 

For instance, in the parks of the Baron de Wolbock we find groups of 
from twenty to twenty-four “bouquet” collectors, separated by inter- 
spaces of about six anda half feet; they are arranged in rows both par- 
allel with, and at right angles to, the channel. MM. Gressy and Ku- 
gene Leroux have their collectors arranged in series, running at right 
angles to the channel, and formed of rows of ‘ bouquets,” each row con- 
taining three “bouquets.” The series are separated from one another 
by a passage-way, about six and a half feet wide. 

We have already had occasion to state that the principal advantage to 
be gained by the use of the “bouquet” collectors is that everything can 
be prepared on land, and the collectors set up in the parks almost on a 
fixed day, by merely sinking the stakes in the mud. 

One can judge of the truth of this by the following statement of M. 
Eugene Leroux : 

“In 1871, I had the use of a large barge, which was very flat and drew 
very little water; it was about thirty-two feet long and nearly ten feet wide. 
I could load it with a large number of collectors, and it also had other 


[27] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 969 


advantages. When this loaded boat reached the parks, where the water 
was only about three feet deep, my men could set up the collectors in 


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the mud from the boat, and were no longer obliged to stand in the water, 
sometimes at the risk of their health. Moreover, this method was much 
more expeditious, for I could place twelve thousand tiles in one day.” 


970 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERTES. [28] 


The stake has this great advantage, that it dispenses with all compli- 
cated apparatus and is both easily and rapidly set up. Those culturists 
who do not employ the stakes encounter many difficulties in the matter 
of setting up their apparatus. 

“When I arrange my collectors,” says M. Liazard, “TI begin by plac- 
ing three small horses of rough wood upon a sort of wooden frame, 
composed of three strips 1,4, inches thick by two inches wide, which, 
including the laths, furnishes a framework, to build upon, of twenty-six 
inches. The horses rise from six to ten inches above the bottom, thus 
permitting the water to circulate freely under the collectors and pre- 
venting the accumulation of mud. In certain very muddy localities, I 
have been obliged to make the horses from twelve to sixteen inches high. 
I first place a row of tiles, which are fastened through the middle. The 
frame will hold twenty-eight tiles, and, therefore, a second row, com- 
posed of the same number of tiles, is arranged transverse to the first, 
and this operation is continued until there are eight rows in all. My 
clusters thus contain two hundred and twenty-four tiles. Above the 
tiles I place a platform, which binds everything together, and on the 
‘platform enough stones are laid to prevent the movement of the water 
from displacing anything. 

‘‘When panels are used, they are ordinarily arranged in the same man- 
ner as the tiles, to the number of eight, upon a framework, resting upoa 
three trestles, and are covered with mats loaded down with stones.” 

“One of the greatest difficulties arising, when many collectors are to be 
placed, is in the matter of properly accomplishing the work at the two 
low tides of the Syzgies. At that time, as many workmen as possible 
should be engaged, and the work proceed with great haste. Itis some- 
times badly done, and often nothing is accomplished.” 

As we have said, it is mainly in the river Auray that“ hives ” are used, 
either constructed of tiles or of wood. The system followed is analogous 
to that described by M. Liazard; however, the “bouquet” has been 
judiciously applied there by M. Thevenard. 

Parks arranged with “hives” are much more subject to a deposition 
of mud then those set with “bouquets.” The débris from frames and 
platforms, which sometimes remain upon the bottom, may lead to a seri- 
ous elevation of its level, and, consequently, a firm bottom is much more 
suitable for “hives” thanan unstableone. This distinetion must be taken 
into account in considering the reason why the “hive” is sometimes pre- 
ferred to the “ bouquet.” 

Consolidation of the bottom.—However much care may be taken to 
avoid muddy shores as much as possible, still, it is sometimes necessary 
to work upon them, and as we have already said, in some places a man 
would sink into the mud up to his neck. A means of visiting the parks 
without sinking into the mud was, therefore, sought. It was a difficult 
problem, and all the culturists declare, that, if there had been long to 
wait for the simple and economical solution which has been found, 
oyster-cultural attempts at Morbihan would have ended in failures. 


[29] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 971 


To lay small strips of wood in the passage-ways through the parks, 
would have been expensive in the beginning and useless in the end. 
Fixed obstacles would have created eddies, and the eddies would have 
induced a deposition of mud. The desire to examine the oysters would, 
consequently, have resulted in their being destroyed by the mud. 

Then arose the ingenious idea of covering the parks with coarse gravel, 
such as the shores afford. This gravel partakes of the well known 
property of sand, in distributing pressure over a large area. Slightly 
compressed mud is elastic, and vibrations are carried through it in 
great undulations. These two properties of distributing pressure and of 
elasticity have been judiciously utilized. 

Dr. Gressy was the first to employ this mode of consolidating the mud. 

“The first attempt at macadamizing,” says he, ‘‘were made in my 
parks. It is effected by spreading over the mud, to be hardened, a layer 
of sand, varying in thickness according to the softness of the mud. The 
sand becomes incorporated with the mud and thus transforms it into 
firm ground. I thus converted into excellent oyster bottom some soft 
mud, upon which the workmen had refused to work. 

“The macadamizing of mud by means of sand is, in my opinion, a 
discovery of great importance for the future. I call the attention of 
the commission in a special manner to this question, of which the oyster 
culturists have not yet understood the importance.” 

The Baron de Wolbock, who encountered the same difficulty, ex- 
presses himself thus: 

‘‘ Before utilizing the basins, it was sometimes necessary to excavate 
the rocks, and sometimes to harden the shifting mud, especially in the 
great basin of Keriolet. This was considered an impossible undertak- 
ing; nevertheless this result has been completely attained, by the use of 
sea gravel, spread upon the surface to be hardened. Put on in layers, 
from four and a half to six inches thick, this sand or gravel mixes with 
the mud, which it hardens, forming a sort of mortar, and this without 
changing the original level of the bottom. After this operation one can 
move about, and even place heavy loads upon the bottom, where pre- 
viously both men and apparatus would have disappeared, swallowed up 
in a short time.” 

Reverting to the properties of mud and sand already indicated, it will 
be seen that the consolidation with gravel has the great advantage of 
‘causing no modification in the section of the bed, which assumes greater 
consistency without change of level. The other means employed for 
the same purpose, such as fascines, which we have examined at the Span- 
ish fort, in the river Auray, are inferior both in effect and result. It is 
true that the particularly unstable nature of the bottom there may 
justify the use of fascines, but gravel and sand have such remarkable 
properties that, when judiciously employed, they are of a nature to bring 
about the most excellent results in almost all cases. 


972 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [30] 


CHAPTER III. 


REMOVAL OF THE YOUNG OYSTERS FROM THE COLLECTORS—THETR 
PRESERVATION—ENEMIES OF THE OYSTER. 


Attached and freed oysters.—In well arranged breeding parks, where 
care has been taken to employ the means previously mentioned, both 
= as regards the choice of ¢ 
collectors and their ar- 
rangement, about the 
month of August, small 
yellow spots will be no- Fic. 6.—Pincers for cutting the tiles in preparing 

the attached oysters. One-tenth the ordinary 
ticed. These are none © size. 
other than the newly hatched oysters, which attach them- 
selves to the tiles and develop there. In the earlier experi- 
ments it was decided to wait two or three years, before re- 
moving the oysters from the tiles. But oysters left to grow 
upon the collectors assume imperfect shapes. Upon stone 
or wood they grow very flat, and upon tiles they become 
distorted and a portion of the young are stifled. Further- 
more, when oysters remain for several years upon the col- 
lectors, it is impossible to regulate, according to necessity, 
the care which they demand. 

Where there are good raising parks, it would be well to 
remove the oysters at an early date, so as to allow them to 
grow under better conditions; but the best course to pursue 
in the matter of raising oysters has not yet been determined 
upon, at Morbihan, as the different methods in use will deci- 
sively show. 

When a young oyster is removed from the collector, the 
valve by which it adhered is exceedingly delicate, and, not- 
withstanding the existence of a calcareous appendage, result- 
ing from the calcareous covering of the tile, still the surface 
of attachment presents a very weak point. 

By attacking it from this side, its enemies are able to de- 
stroy it, and, therefore, all the proceedings during the first 
stage of raising are directed toward protecting the recently 
detached oyster from its foes, while at the same time its 
growth is going on. 


Fic. 5.—Knif Wee 7 
re deimenine Two principal systems are followed at Morbihan. 
the young oys- ese ; See i 
ters reduced The first consists in cutting up the tile, so as to leave each 
t half tl 
ordinary size. OYSter with a fragment of tile adhering to its shell. By so 


doing, there is no weak surface exposed, to be attacked by an enemy. 


[31] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 973 


The second consists in shutting the young oyster up in cases, the sides 
and top of which, being made of wire gauze, permit the action of the air, 
light, and current, while they present an insurmountable obstacle to the 
entrance of such enemies as the crabs and shrimps. 

These two systems are criticised and defended with equal vigor, and 
both tend to favor industrial results. 

In order to throw light upon the subject, without attempting to com- 
pletely elucidate it, we should, necessarily, make known the different 
opinions of the various culturists. 

‘Some desire to preserve their tiles,” says Dr. Henri Leroux, “and so 
cover them with a thick coating of lime, which they remove every year 
with the young oysters; others spread only a thin coating of lime over 
their tiles, which the young oysters soon absorb to their own gain, and 
thus fix themselves firmly on the tile itself. 

“Tn the first instance, the labor of removal will be much easier and 
less expensive, and the plastered tiles will be as good as new for the 
next year. These advantages are very tempting; but at the age of six or 
eight months the young oyster, separated from the surface upon which 
it had fixed itself, is flattened, and the valves become very delicate, 
especially the lower one, which is transparent. 

“Tn this condition, the oyster is without protection, and is exposed to 
the voracity of its enemies. A lot of forty thousand, exposed in this 
way, disappeared in the course of two weeks. This has twice been our 
experience. 

“Tf, in order to avoid such a disaster, the culturist puts his oysters in 
basins, he exposes himself to the same dangers; we have seen quite re- 
cently, in a basin measuring something like two thousand square yards, 
more than a million oysters disappear, stifled under the sand, stirred up 
by crabs and black worms. 

‘““We must, therefore, have recourse to boxes, covered with wire gauze, 
in order to save the oysters; but should we not consider the expense of 
this, when there are several millions of oysters to be preserved ? 

“Tf, on the other hand, the tiles are kept in the water until the second 
year, when the oysters will have attained sufficient strength, they will be 
badly shaped, and the economy in the matter of tiles will become a source 
of vexation and deception. On the contrary, tiles covered with a calea- 
reous coating appear to us to present much greater security. The pre- 
liminary labor is more difficult and more prolonged than in the case of 
the tile with the thick coating; but the young oyster, adhering firmly to 
the tile, still remains fixed upon it, even when, with a pair of pincers of 
ourinvention, the tile has been easily cut away, into pieces about the size 
of the young mollusks. Thus placed free from one another in the raising 
parks, they are in a condition to defend themselves against their greatest 
enemies (crabs and oyster-devouring fishes), by the weight and strength 
of the hard tile covering.” 

To this opinion, which appears to be based upon reasonable and logi- 


974. REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [32] 


cal conclusions, we will oppose that of M. Solminihae and M. Mauduy, 
who have a very important breeding park at the Spanish fort, in the 
river Auray, which supplies their famous establishment at Bélon. 

Speaking of the first attempts, when the oysters were left to grow 
upon the collectors, these gentlemen express themselves thus: 

‘In the months of March and April, the oysters being then two years 
old, we thought them strong enough to be transplanted, and we removed 
them. This method gave us results which, if not satisfactory, were at 
least assuring. Considerable expense and some inconvenience were 
encountered. The great number of tiles required for the proper growth 
of the oysters demanded a great deal of space. Our possession, which 
we had been obliged to crowd, suffered great mortality, and also a large 
number of young oysters, having been completely deprived of light, 
scarcely grew at all. 

‘We tried removing them earlier, that is, in May and June, and then 
placing them in our parks or floating basins, where the water was re- 
newed every day. The oysters placed in the parks disappeared com- 
pletely; those in the basins succeeded better, but their development 
was so insignificant that we thought it best to put them into the parks 
in the month of August. We preserved about one-third of them. We 
tried at the same time some boxes of thin wood, which gave but poor 
results. At this time, M. Coste induced us to try wire cages, such as 
were used at Arcachon. Of these we had three hundred made, after the 
model sent us. In these cages, arranged in different parts of the river, 
and in close proximity to the current, we placed four million young 
oysters, taken from our stock of 1873, at the Spanish fort. 

“These cages, set at different periods of the spring and summer, gave 
us magnificent results, in spite of the great number of oysters placed in 
eachone. ‘The mortality was very insignificant. Weobtained from them 
more than half a million oysters, measuring from two to two and a half 
inches; the remainder measured from an inch and a quarter to an inch 
and three-quarters. These oysters were put into the market in very 
good condition. 

‘For us, at the present time, the problem of the collection and raising 
of young oysters has been solved, and, profiting by the experience re- 
sulting from prolonged and arduous efforts, we are convinced that the 
crop of 1874, at which we are going to work next spring, will give us 
results superior even to those of last year. Satisfied of the importance 
of this method of operation, we are having five hundred new boxes 
made with wire gauze.” 

_ As indicated by these statements, the conclusions arrived at are quite 
opposed to one another, and this difference occurs everywhere in neigh- 
boring parks; M. de Wolbock abandons the method of leaving the shell 
attached to the tile, while M. Gressy retains it. If we wished to solve 
the difficulty, we would have to take into consideration the location of 
each park; for it should be remembered that in the industry now being 


[33] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. — 975 


discussed there is no universal method of procedure, and from this arises 
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one side of the Pyrenees is false on the other,” finds serious application 
here, and progress is hindered with this very diversity of methods. 


976 | REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [34] 


But, in a general way, it must be acknowledged that the cage is indis- 
pensable to the culturist, whether he possesses greater or less numbers 
of them. They are necessary to his work, if only to be used as “‘ambu- 
lances.” We have several times examined oysters, the shells of which 
had been completely broken, even to the loss of some portions, and 
which placed in cages with wire coverings, and thus protected against 
enemies, but at the same time subjected to the vivifying action of light 
and of currents of fresh water, grew surprisingly. The shell healed, 
and, what is a remarkable phenomenon, new calcareous scales formed 
most rapidly over the wounded portion, as if to cover it quickly and 
afford complete protection to the mollusk inside, with the least possible 
delay. 

The MM. Martin on the one side, and Solminihac and Mauduy on 
the other, have several times utilized, with good results, the numberless . 
bits of lime and cement, chipped off by the removal of the oysters from 
the tile, and formerly rejected, by placing them in the wire cages. It 
suffices to place all these chippings in cages, the meshes of which are 
quite fine, and, at the end of a few months, there will appear upon this 
calcareous waste fine little oysters of good growth. From a stock of 
from three to five million of young oysters, they were quite surprised to 
find about four hundred thousand saved in this way. 

In general, all oysters placed in cages, whether they be newly hatched, 
the young, small seed, or oysters of three years’ growth, improve remark- 
ably, and better than under any other system. 

Experience upon this point is conclusive; theoretically the oyster cage 
is excellent, but practically, should it always be employed? This ques- 
tion, to be answered in each separate case, would require a consideration 
of the location of each park. We will only mention that there is, first 
and above all, a question of expense to be considered. 

Everything depends upon the increased value given to the oysters, by 
allowing them to remain in the cage. A cage costs from four to five 
dollars; is generally six feet and a half long, thirty-nine inches wide, and 
six and a half inches deep; it needs to be kept in good repair, is de- 
stroyed by the rusting of the wire, in three or four years, and, conse- 
quently, is subject to continued renewal. Each culturist should make 
his own calculation, and if he has any certain method of proceeding, 
with sufficient profit, without the use of the cage, there is no reason 
why he should employ it. But we repeat that, generally, such is not the 
case, and the wire cage renders a great service. It furnishes a solution 
to the question of raising oysters in the first stage. 

M. Gressy acknowledges it himself, but maintains that the raising 
of young oysters in cages is possible only in basins, where the surf has 
no action. He adds, that the newly hatched oyster, left to itself, will do 
well enough without the cages, by attaching itself to a well-selected 
place. 

‘The location best adapted to the young oyster, not attached to the 


[35] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. i 


tile, is the highest zone of the park, a short distance below low-water 
mark; higher up they would die from the effects of the sun’s rays in sum- 
mer, and from the cold in winter. Fish and crabs, especially the former, 
venture less to this height; they frequent, by preference, the deeper re- 
gion of the park, which is seldom uncovered. It is evident to me that, by 
placing the young unattached oyster at the height which I have indi- 
cated, they are preserved, whereas when placed lower down they may 
be considered as lost.” ; 

The conclusion seems rational to us, in a general way, that at the time 
of the removal of the young oyster, if it is detached from the tile, it 
should be placed in a cage. They may be scattered through the upper 
parts of the park, after they have acquired some size and strength, and 
may be placed near the lower current, in the lower part of the park, 
when they are able to offer greater resistance to attacks upon them. 

This principle being acknowledged, what is the proper time of removal 
from the collectors? The oyster culturists of Morbihan admit, as a gen- 
eral rule, that it should be done early, and in this they are right. To 
leave the collectors in place for one or two years would be to provoke a 
dangerous deposit of mud, which would have the disadvantage of 
stifling a part of the crop. The usual practice is to begin the work of 
removal in Mareh and April; a tlexible knife is passed under the coat- 
ing of the tile, and thus is obtained rapidly, and without harming the 
oyster, that particular product termed oyster seed by Dr. Kemmerer. 
In Mareh and April, the growing season begins; oysters grow in the 
summer and fatten in the winter. 

Also, if oysters should be injured during removal, in the beginning of 


Front elevation. Side elevation. 
Fig. 8.—Cage for holding the day’s work. 
spring, they are then in the best condition for healing. Still, there is 
one very intelligent culturist, M. Alphonse Martin, who begins detach- 
ing his oysters in the month of November. 
“T have three hundred and fifty cages,” says he, ‘and, therefore, pos- 
sess the means of placing all my young in them for the winter, thus to pro- 


0,24 tect these unfortunate mol- 


lusks, within a restricted 
area, and save them from 
Fig. 9.—Scoop. erabs and fishes, the aceum- 

wation of mud, and the force of the current, which would carry them 
S. Mis. 2 


9) 
— 


978 [36] 


away. By this method there is also obtained a finely shaped oyster, 
which does not carry with it a disagreeable impression of mortar, and 
which is not flat like those left for fifteen months upon the tiles. 

The conditions of sale and the facility of raising are the only things 
which can determine whether the oysters, hatched in July, should be re- 
moved from the collectors in October, or not until the following April. 

Claires and submerged basins.-—Whatever may be the time of detach- 
ment of the oyster, it is recognized, at Morbihan, as indispensable to 
have at one’s disposition claires or basins, in which the collectors may be 
placed during the winter season. At that period of the year, great cold 
is often caused by northerly and easterly winds. During these winds, the 
sea falls more than when the wind is southwest, often to such an extent 
that it might leave all the collectors of a park uncovered for several 
hours. This would suffice to ruin everything. The winter of 1870 was 
severe in this respect. M. Kugéne Leroux declares that: he then lost 
fifteen thousand dollars worth of oysters in one day, and others suffered 
in like manner. 

M. Gressy has wisely distributed claires and basins around his parks, 
at Cuhan, and warmly recommends all culturists to put 
their stock under shelter during the winter. 

The fine basins of M. de Wolbock are well known, 
and M. Eugéne Leroux has just been having some made. 
Our oyster culturists cannot be too much encouraged on 
this point. 

Enemies of the oyster.—From the time of the removal 
of the oyster from the collector to the period of its normal 
development, it is exposed to numerous enemies. 

We have often had to speak of them, without giving 
their names. It is now time to enter into some details, 
an easy task, since we have only to reproduce the spirited 
description of M. Chaumel. 

‘From the spring time, when they put in an appear- 
ance, until cold weather, when they leave us, we see 
these miserable crabs roaming about, searching and 
ferreting out the young oysters, often to crush them, 
merely for the pleasure of killing them, for I have often 
seen them going from one to another, crushing them in 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


their claws, and never stopping until I had seized them 
and crushed them in turn. With oysters which they 
cannot break they resort to strategy; stopping near 


Fig. 10.—Ga 


teway for 
reservoirs. 


them they watch, without noise or motion, until the valves of the oyster 
are opened, then they thrust in the elbow of one of their claws, and with 
the fine extremity of another tear out the oyster, which, in this case, they 


devour. 


If the crab misses its stroke, and gets in only the extremity of its 
claw, upon which the oyster shuts down firmly, the latter is still a cap- 


[37] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. I79 


tive, for the crab drags it about as a galley-slave does his ball, and it is 
a damaged oyster for the culturist. But, fortunately for itself and for 
us, the oyster is not quite so foolish as it seems to be, and is not often, 
taken. J have almost always seen the crab pay the penalty. When they 
cannot do injury in this manner, they have recourse to another method, 
which is as follows: 

‘““Whole groups of crabs unite together and dig holes, as large some- 
times as a hand-basin, first using their claws, and then, when the holes 
become too deep to work in in this way, loading the mud or muddy sand 
upon their bodies and discharging it beyond the hole, thus burying all 
the oysters in the vicinity. By the action of the waves, oysters are often 
thrown into these holes and buried in them; this we tried to prevent 
by means of long-handled rakes. I neglected to state that the basins 
or holes dug by these sea-moles, the crabs, serve as a shelter for their 
progeny. 

‘¢Since I have spoken of the crabs, I will pass in review the other ene- 
mies of the oyster, which are the more to be feared; this is a matter of 
great interest to all. 

“ Murex tarentinus is furnished with a small apparatus, in the form of 
a rasp, armed with very sharp points, harder than diamond, with which 
it pierces and kills the oyster. This is a parasite of the most dangerous 
sort. I placed someof them upon collectors covered with young oysters, 
and saw the adults pierce the oysters, one after another. They did not 
leave the collector until they had killed the last one. Ordinarily it is 
the young Murex that attacks the young oysters, which they can pierce 
when they are scarcely the size of a pin. ‘The older ones attack the 
larger oysters, and thus each has his field of destruction. To get rid of 
these dangerous parasites, they must be driven off at all times, but espe- 
cially at the spring-tides of April and May. 

“A mostactive search should then be made of the lower levels of the park, 
where all the stones, tiles, and wood-work should be moved, overturned, 
and inspected. Even the oysters themselves #Ad the dead shells should 
be subjected to this examination. In the inspection made at this season, 
they are always to be found in groups of fifteen or twenty, and search- 
ing more closely about these groups, their eggs are often to be found. 
The eggs alone may even be discovered after the spawning season is 
over. These eggs look something like large grains of wheat; they are 
placed in an upright position, very firmly fastened at the base to the 
solid body upon which they have been deposited. The number of eggs 
in each cluster often amounts to several hundreds, and each egg contains 
at least thirty-three embryos. There is no need of my demonstrating 
further the importance of destroying both the Murex and their eggs. 
After hatching, the cluster of eggs continues to present the same appear- 
ance for a long time, and it is only by a close examination that an 
_almost imperceptible opening on the top of the egg can be discovered ; 
then it is too late to destroy them. 


980 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [38] 


‘¢ Many persons mention the Nassa reticulata as a dangerous variety of 
periwinkle, quite as harmful as the preceding. My own observations 
and researches do not lead me to share this opinion. 

‘¢T must also speak of the Thére, a fish belonging to the family of Rays, 
and another formidable enemy of the oyster, which it devours after. 
having crushed it in its powerful jaws. When this fish enters a park a 
veritable devastation follows. The havoe they produce must be seen to 
be appreciated. During my first year here, I had to suffer from their 
depredations ; but [immediately putin practice the means which I had so 
fortunately employed at Arcachon, and which consists in increasing the 
number of pickets in such a manner as to hinder their advance. They 
always move in an oblique direction, when they sink to the bottom. Can 
my getting rid of them be ascribed to this contrivance? It is possible 
that, injuring themselves against the pickets a first time, they are not 
willing to run the risk again; or do these obstacles inspire them with 
fear? Weare tempted to believe so, when we consider the pusillanimity 
of the There. 

‘“‘ Hinally, more as a matter of curiosity than otherwise, I am going to 
mention a singular enemy of the young oyster, and this is the shrimp. 
But, as this animal requires a certain amount of space for its movements, 
it is difficult for it to commit great depredations about the collectors; it 
does some damage, however, in the following manner: 

‘‘ Tn order to break off the young oyster, the shrimp proceeds after the 
manner of a battering-ram. It poises itself some distance off from the 
point to be struck, and then pounces down upon it with all the speed it 
can acquire, directing its spur, which is powerful compared with the rest 
of its body, upon the shell, which it thus penetrates. This attack is re- 
newed, until it only remains for the shrimp to settle down upon its victim 
and devour it.” 

The star-fish, which the English oystermen dread so much upon their 
oyster banks, is little to be feared along the coast of the department of 
Morbihan. However, at@he county fair of Vannes, Dr. Gressy exhibited 
a Star-fish holding, entangled in its arms an oyster, the edges of which 
seemed to have been worn away by the file-like surface upon the under 
side of the rays of the star-fish. It is probable that, whether upon the 
banks or in the parks, the star-fishes feed upon oysters by seizing and 
holding them tightly, and filing away the edges, until the mollusk is 
sufficiently uncovered to be devoured by suction. 

Besides these enemies, which may be said to act directly, there are 
others which cause ravages none the less sensible, because produced in- 
directly. Thus the sea worm excavates cavities into which the oysters 
sink, become swallowed up in the mud, and die. The only preventive 
against them is to macadamize the muddy or clayey soil with gravel or 
broken shells. 

In speaking of the different zones of the parks, we have had occasion 
to mention the polyps, which attach themselves to the collectors, like 


™ 


[39] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBITAN. 984 


so many little blisters; without being exactly enemies, they act like the 
mussels, which also sometimes assume the place of the oyster and de- 
velop upon the shell of the young or of the adult. MM. Solminihaec 
and Mauduy had occasion to observe at Bélon regular invasions of mus- 
sels, which, in a certain measure, prevented the growth of the oysters. 

The means of preventing this has not yet been discovered, but the 
disastrous action of the mussels may be, in a great measure, hindered, 
by keeping the oysters in a state of great cleanliness. In this respect 
the young in cages may be easily subjected to washings, either by means 
of the Dutch shovel or with a suction pump. Cleanliness, in general, 
is the best guarantee against enemies of this kind. 

Upon the whole, the enemy most dreaded by our culturists is the erab. 
Inorder to get rid of them, many devices have been suggested. M. 
Liazard’s invention has been especially noticed. It is a prism, covered 
with wire cloth, closed at the bottom, and with an opening at the top. 
The interior is partly filled with stones, as ballast, and bits of fish, as 
bait. When the crab once enters at the top he becomes imprisoned. A 
considerable number are sometimes caught in this way. 


CREATE eRe V. 
PARKS FOR RAISING AND FATTENING OYSTERS. 


Possibility of raising and fattening oysters along the shores of Morbihan.— 
Following the details already given, it will be seen that, in Morbihan, 
if not all the breeding parks, at least the best among them, consist, 
first, of the shore, along which the collectors are placed; second, of 
claires, or places where the stock can be protected during the winter; 
and, third, of cages or other appliances for protecting the oyster recently 
detached from the collector against their enemies, in cases where a por- 
tion of the tile has not been allowed to remain attached to the shell. 
These parks should be completed by the addition of special places, 
called raising parks, in which the oysters collected might be allowed to 
grow. 

Unfortunately, raising and fattening parks are not of general occur- 
rence in Morbihan, or, at least, are insufficient for the convenience of the 
entire stock collected. The efforts of those who understand the im- 
portance of the work we are now discussing should, in the future, 
be directed to this branch of oyster culture. The question of breeding is 
already understood, but that of raising and fattening is yet to be per. 
fected. As regards the breeding of oysters, we have encountered cer- 
tain well established practices and principles; but as to raising and fat- 
tening there exists an uncertainty, which will be remedied in the future. 

Here we again find that the nature of the bottom upon which the oyster 
grows is all-important in jts influences, This mollusk has more the ex- 


982 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [40] 


ternal qualities of a vegetable than an animal. Almost incapable of 
moving from place to place, it feels to the fullest extent the influence of 
the soil which serves as its bed. We have seen what difficulties had to 
be overcome, in order to carry on breeding successfully in the midst of 
our mud; what will it then be as to raising and fattening? Some per- 
sons, influenced by a feeling of timidity, mingled with incredulity, ask 
themselves whether raising and fattening’is possible along our coast. 
When such questions have been proposed to us we have always answered 
affirmatively, and it will be useful to make known the reasons upon 
which our hopes are based. 

There exists in the world a privileged country, where the oyster indus- 
try occupies a prominent stand; that country is the United States. 
There, immense fortunes have been made in this industry, the capital 
of one American oyster dealer having been computed as high as ten 
millions. Now, if it be true that the character of the coast and the 
nature of the bottom exercise a preponderating influence, what are the 
particular features of this coast and what constitutes so favorable a 
bottom ? 

From the St. Lawrence to Florida, the American coast is deeply in- 
dented. Magnificent bays, like those of Boston and New York, are 
succeeded by the steep banks of the Delaware, which waters Philadel- 
phia, and of the Chesapeake, whose tributaries pass by Washington and 
Baltimore, Richmond and Fredericksburg. Farther to the south, along 
the coast of South Carolina, we find the interior seas, called Albemarle 
and Pamlico Sounds, which seem like great basins, protected from the 
high waves by immense breakwaters. 

All along the coast, from North to South, the soundings indicate sand, 
sandy mud, and rich, shelly bottoms. Inthe coves, mud is found; and 
the bays, whether large or small, receive an abundance of fresh water, 
from many streams and smallrivers. Sometimes this mixture is effected 
by small tributaries, as in Delaware Bay, and again by large rivers, 
which, near their mouths, are quite majestic in character; such are the 
Potomac and the Rappahannock.’ When these numerous indentures, 
these rapid currents, and these seas, which penetrate even into the inte- 
rior, are studied and examined, one is struck with their similarity to 
eee of the coast of Brittany. 

We also have a great gulf, deeply indented and dotted about with 
islands; we also have large rivers, with brackish water and rapid cur- 
rents, and shores tranquilly washed by the waters of the sea. If the 
Americans, thanks to their favorable coast, have a profusion of oysters 
and cultivate them with care, we may also, since the problem of breeding 
has been solved, endeavor to raise fair crops, as Providence has fur- 
nished suitable iicalites for so doing within reach of our culturists. 
To such as have said to us ‘Breeding is our field, let others attend to 
the raising,” I have always replied, we must not neglect the raising of 


[41] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 983 


oysters, but make a division of labor so as not to neglect fine resources 
and lose great riches, 

The oyster must be raised and fattened upon its own ground, and then 
it will be unrivalled. This must be insisted upon, and this is the reply 
to be made to all who bring forward as obstacles to success the mud, the 
changeable bottom, the sacrifices to be made, and the struggle to be 
maintained. 

Choice of bottom ; character of the water.—After what has been said, it 
will be understood that it is not possible to state principles as positively, 
with regard to the raising and fattening of oysters, as has been done in 
the case of breeding. 

However, it would appear that the foundation of this special branch 
of oyster culture is to be sought in the natural action of the bottom and of 
the currents. M. Charles, one of the oldest oyster culturists in the coun- 
try, declares that, for the purpose of raising and fattening, nothing is 
as valuable as the natural bottom, well prepared. The only suitable 
preparation consists in giving it a little solidity, by incorporating cal- 
careous ingredients with it, when possible. In this manner, a bottom is 
obtained, analogous to that which exists along the coast of America. 

M. de Broca has informed us that the American oyster thrives on a 
bottom of muddy sand, rich in animal life and sufficiently sheltered 
against heavy seas; and, he adds, “that the brackish water, occurring 
at the mouths of certain rivers, constitutes one of the best elements for 
the success of this industry.” 

Moreover, so true is this, that only in the last extremity should re- 
course be had to artificial means. Americans, in order to raise and 
fatten their oysters, content themselves with planting them in creeks, 
where the action of the currents is felt, but where they are, at the same 
time, completely sheltered and where the depth of water varies from 
three to nine feet, above low-water mark. 

M. de Broca, who furnishes this information, adds the following judi- 
cious observation: 

‘In America, parks, as we understand them in France, are unknown. 
American oyster culture, more simple in its details, consists in planting, 
the mollusks along the shores of the sea-coast. Where there is only 
sand, they grow but little and do not fatten; where mud alone exists, 
they contract a bad flavor and are in danger of being stifled; but where 
the sand is mixed with a moderate quantity of mud, they develop won- 
derfully, especially if the water be moderately salt.” 

The choice of bottom is always a delicate subject, because it has so 
important an influence upon the raising and fattening. 

Dr. Henri Leroux states that “the low price of oysters now depends 
entirely upon the greater or less area given over by the State to oyster- 
culture.” 

The great difficulty is that the bottom must be selected and appro- 
priated, At first sight, it would appear that the gulf of Morbihan and 


984 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [42] 


certain portions of our river banks, between low and high tide marks, 
might be utilized with success. This is an experiment which -many of 
the culturists of Morbihan are disposed to hazard. 

Upon this subject we have heard manifested a desire to see in the 
waters of a raising or fattening park the animal matter, upon which the 
oysters might feed. This idea should be set aside from the beginning, 
nothing being required but a firm bottom and tidal action. 

As we have said before, the oyster is a remarkable laboratory, where 
transformations are effected naturally; very little is necessary for the 
development of this mollusk, and the best is that which is most easily 
assimilated and which readily escapes our notice. 

It is remarkable that the same idea should have prevailed in all coun- 
tries, where the raising and fattening of oysters has been undertaken. 

M.de Broca says: “ A belief, which has gained some credit in England 
and America, is to the effect that oysters may be fattened by scattering 
a little flour (corn-meal being commonly employed) in the water which 
covers them. Some oyster-planters in New Jersey,” he says, “have 
tried this, but it is probable that the use of meal has little or no effect 
upon the oyster, whose stomach is so delicate as to appear incapable of 
digesting such nourishment.” 

Preparation of the bottom.—Setting aside the possibility of raising 
oysters artificially, the first thing to be sought for is a firm bottom, and 
if this cannot be found it must be made. M. Chaumel has accomplished 
this result in the gulf of Morbihan, and his example may be easily fol- 
lowed. It has been necessary to do the same thing in the river Bélon, 
which answers for fattening, as the river Trinité does for breeding. 
MM. Solminihac & Mauduy, who have built a remarkable establish- 
ment at Bélon, have had great difficulties to overcome. ‘The bottom 
of the river,” they say, ‘is not everywhere favorable to the existence of 
the oyster. In most places the borders of the channel, which are the 
only suitable localities, presented slopes of mud in which the oysters 
disappeared almost as soon as placed there. We had, therefore, to adapt 
the bottom to our purposes; we removed from eight inches to two feet 
of mud, macadamized the surface, and thus constructed a bed suitable 
for the oyster. Our efforts were crowned with success, for the oysters 
placed upon this artificial bottom in the early spring (as far as possible 
during the month of March), became completely transformed as to the 
nature of the shell, and increased very considerably in size, at the same 
time that the edible portion fattened greatly.” 

But this formation of bottom is not always possible in the streams 
and along the shores of Morbihan. In a little river which flows into 
the bay of Lorient, a culturist has been led into an ingenious system, 
to which future success would appear to be secured. M. Turlure, to 
whom a park had been conceded in the river Ter, had for some time 
contented himself with simply planting oysters along the channel, 
Where they improved greatly and soon became edible, Anxious to 


[43] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 985 


extend his field of operations, he found himself unable to utilize the 
muddy portions, as the work of consolidating the bottom there would 
have been very great and expensive. He decided, therefore, to make 
use of the cups of M. Michel, superintendent of the hydraulic works, 
in the port of Lorient. These cups, constructed of a kind of cement, 
are about nine inches square, and are capable of containing about four 
and a half inches of water. 

At first two kinds of these cups were utilized, the one being pierced 
through the bottom, and the other solid on all sides. The first com- 
bined with the second might serve as “ambulances.” It would appear 
that the non-perforated cup is really of practical importance, and des- 
tined to become of great service in certain cases. 

M. Turlure has now 52,000 of them placed in his park, in elevated 
places, where raising would have been impossible under any other 
system. They contain fourteen millions of oysters. The net cost price 
of this work of solidifying the bottom amounts to about $1.62 a square 
yard. 

It is impossible, at the present time, to pronounce upon the value of 
this system, but it deserves to be studied with scrupulous care. From 
a theoretical point of view, however, it presents the advantage of afford- 
ing oysters, both large and small, an exclusively calcareous bottom, 
over which may be spread a fine mud of a good brown color, and which, 
not containing animal or decomposed vegetable matter, exercises no 
harmful influence upon the oyster. 

The fact must not be lost sight of that, so long as the mud does not 
become black from the liberation of sulphurous matters, it is, if not 
favorable, at least inoffensive. After turning black it acts as a poison 
upon the oyster. 

Joste made known the mortality which overtook the oysters in Lake 
Fusaro, about the year 1820, on account of the appearance of sulphur- 
ous fumes, due to volcanic eruptions, and the fatal influence of mud 
containing sulphur is to-day well known to all the culturists of Morbihan. 

In case a deposit of the black mud should form upon the basins in the 
Michel system, the action of the atmosphere and light would rapidly 
transform it. It would become brown by the absorption of oxygen, 
which changes sulphurets into sulphates. 

What is most remarkable in connection with the breeding and raising 
parks of Morbihan is the great diversity in the methods of work, and the 
attachment of each culturist to his own system. This, on the whole, is 
praiseworthy, because, with such a multiplicity of trials, the true road 
to suecess is more likely to be discovered. 

At the mouth of the river Ter, we find the parks of M. Charles, where 
the method of proceeding is totally different from that of M. Turlure, 
whose parks are about three hundred yards further up on the same 
river; and yet the success of M, Charles is assured, and the reputation 
of his oysters already made, 


986 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [44] 


He has selling parks upon the emergent portions of the banks, a 
large shipping basin, and in the cove of Kérolé, an excellent basin with 
a bottom of clayey sand, where the growth is remarkable, even though 
there is no current. The oyster develops rapidly, and in six months in- 
creases in size from a quarter of an inch to an inch and a quarter. 

But in the ease of M. Charles, as in that of M. Turlure, in Bélon, as 
well as in Morbihan, it is always necessary to commence by removing the 
mud, and forming artificially a hard bottom, in order to secure a good 
increase and insure the fattening of the oyster. All these conditions seem 
admirably united in the parks of M. Pozzy, at Ludré-en-Sarzeau. 

The fine flour-mill of Ludré, situated upon a point projecting into the 
sea, and which appears like an establishment where human industry has 
endeavored to seize from nature an important motor power, has an im- 
mense reservoir of nearly one hundred acres in extent; on one side, there 
are walled parks, intended to receive the cars, and on the other, raising ba- 
sins with a surface of over seven acres. By the action of the waves, a cer- 
tain current is produced in the parks, and the large reservoir, acting like a 
storehouse, makes it possible at almost any moment to concentrate upon 
any of the parks a continuous and steady flow. A careful examination 
of the functions of the different parts of that most judiciously arranged 
establishment of M. Pozzy, shows that he possesses, in the parks of 
Ludré, the means of varying, at will, the action of those natural forces, 
which are so favorable to the growth of the young oyster. The clayey 
bottom of the carefully cemented basins can be readily adapted to rais- 
ing, and the possibility of placing the cars, containing the young oysters, 
under the vivifying action of the currents, admits of early growth, diffi- 
cult to obtain in ordinary parks. 

Upon the whole, and despite the almost embryonic state of this branch 
of raising and fattening, we can predict, in a short time, very successful 
results in parks so favorably situated and so judiciously arranged as 
those of M. Pozzy, at Ludré. 

Basins.—It is indispensable that several fattening parks and shipping 
basins should be added to all raising parks; this is a necessity to which 
our culturists of Lorient, in the gulf of Morbihan, and at Bélon, have 
been obliged to conform. Where they are wanting, much is left unpro- 
vided for, to the great loss of the industry. 

Care to be taken in raising and fattening oysters.—Having described the 
arrangement of the parks, it is interesting to point out the care which 
should be taken to insure growth and fattening. TFirst of all, the oys- 
ters should not be piled upon one another. Coste said the proportion to 
be followed in distributing them should be a million of oysters to two 
acres. This is the proportion used at Marennes. In America they are 
disposed under the same conditions, and all culturists have stated the 
proportion to be one hundred oysters to the square yard. This point 
seems to have been settled beyond dispute. 


[45] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 987 


As to the special attentions to be observed, MM. Mauduy and Sol- 
minihac have briefly summed them up, in the following terms: 

‘We take great care of our parked oysters, because experience has 
shown that the more attention given them, the more satisfactory are the 
results. These cares consist mainly in removing all foreign matters, 
which the tides may deposit in the parks, in turning the oysters, in re- 
arranging those that are badly placed, and in repairing defects in the bot- 
tom, after which the oysters may be replaced upon it. These operations 
require the employment of a considerable number of workmen, all the 
year round.” 

The duration of the term of parking for an oyster of salable size, varies 
from six months to one year. There is nothing which more requires the 
eye of the master, and constant and active watchfulness. 

Results obtained ; turning green.—The results obtained are in propor- 
tion to the efforts Alien ed. The well-parked oyster upon our shores 
will assume a closed shell; while before parking it consisted of a chamber 
containing foetid water, which spreads throughout the interior when the 
knife is employed. This defect it' loses and assumes a solid and resist- 
ing surface. The oyster grows, its flesh loses its brown color and be- 
comes quite white. Everything indicates a Seale? for the better, as 
pleasing to the palate as to the eye. 

One quality, long considered as peculiar to the oysters of Marennes, 
a greenish coloration, is easily produced in the parks of Morbihan. 
This singular phenomenon consists in the appearance of a very decided 
greenish color, affecting especially the breathing organs, that is to say, 
the four branchial leaves. 

Coste had observed this fact at Marennes, and had also noticed that 
the green oysters always became white at spawning time. ‘ Those,” 
said he, “ which previously presented this appearance, became paler, little 
by little, as fecundation took place and finished by losing the color en- 
tirely, at the time of spawning. On the other hand, those which were 
white when placed in the parks remained so. It is only after the month 
of August, that they recover from this temporary loss of color, which 
does not affect the trade, since the color reappears immediately after 
spawning.” 

It is now proved that the process of turning green in the parks of 
Morbihan, is connected with the entrance of fresh water into the parks, 
and the development of vegetation upon the bottom. It is effected in 
a few days and has no relation to fattening. What causes the trans- 
formation? Some of our culturists attribute it to a disease of the liver, 
others exclusively to the influence of the bottom. 

Berthelot, who carefully analyzed the green oysters, thinks he can 
ascribe the green color to a metallic oxide, doubtless the oxide of iron, 

The blue marl of the Seudre contains analogous elements. This alone 
indicates that the bed, on which the oysters are placed, exercises so de- 


988 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERTES. [46] 


cisive an influence upon them, that to improve the bed may be said to 
improve the oysters. 

The presence of oxide of iron in Morbihan is scarcely admissible, 
hence it must be the green vegetation that produces the color of the 
oyster. M. Charles has observed that vegetation tends to disappear 
around the oysters which become green; but he rightly admits that the 
process of turning is only possible because of particular dispositions of 
the animal, either illness or otherwise, which disappear at the period of 
spawning. 

However this may be, the fact remains that in the parks of Morbihan 
the green tinge, so much demanded by lovers of oysters in the south, 
may be obtained with great facility, and also that the color has nothing 
to do with fattening, nor with the special qualities of the oyster. 


CHAPTER V. 


MEASURES REQUIRED TO INSURE THE PROSPERITY OF OYSTER 
CULTURE. 


On the preceding pages, we have endeavored to point out the state of 
oyster culture in Morbihan. It is important to draw from these details 
some conclusions, to show what future is in reserve for this industry, and 
by what measures such a future may be assured. 

Principal cause of the failure of Coste.—It is evident to all that, in 
spite of the scientific knowledge, the zeal, and the labors of Coste, his 
attempts, so far as regards commercial results, were radically fruitless. 
Nevertheless, he had at his disposition apparatus, boats, auxiliaries as 
intelligent as devoted, and also, to a certain extent, the resources of 
the public treasury. Still the reason is very simple. That impersonal 
being, called the state, is incapable of creating any industry. It suf- 
ficed to relinquish oyster culture to the culturists, who, although intelli- 
gent and well informed, are, in the majority of cases, neither savants 
nor academicians, to insure success, where only failure had been pre- 
dicted. 

This is because the state lacks that powerful lever called individual 
interest. An occupation is not possible unless an assured profit may 
be realized from it. The merchant alone can be certain of this, from a 
study of the markets ane the demands of consumers. The poorest 
merchant in France is the state. The state has quite another part to 
play. Charged with the protection of all, it cannot descend from this 
elevated sphere of general usefulness into the arena, where opposing 
interests are contending—an arena which it always leaves defeated and 
often injured. To abandon its reserve and endeavor, by taxation, to 
create a national industry is an act of socialism, generous, perhaps, but 
from which others will derive the benefits, 


[47] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 989 


Napoleon ILI, in his youth, had a passion for studying these ques- 
tions, and sometimes lent an attentive ear to these grand socialistic 
theories; this was why Coste obtained so much support from the Em- 
peror. Led away by his own ardor, he did not notice that he was gliding 
down a fatal slope, and that he would fall at last,in spite of all his 
efforts. If, instead of going to the Tuileries, he had addressed himself 
to an association of capitalists, or to the trade, who could have par- 
ticipated in his confidences, then oyster culture, disengaged from the 
shackles of the state, would, from the beginning, have taken a higher 
stand and progressed with surer steps. 

We do not wish to underrate the importance of the part played by 
the state, for we are going to appeal to its aid in another matter; but 
we think it should be well understood that the two domains, of industry 
and of government, are totally distinct. By confounding them, power- 
lessness replaces fertile effort, and the most important work is crowned 
only with failure. 

We do not wish, in any way, to diminish the gratitude due to those, 
whether functionaries of state or others, who have labored for the cre- 
ation and development of this industry; but we feel the necessity of 
proclaiming, in a certain measure, the omnipotence and vigilance of in- 
dividual interest. We believe that, imbued with this thought, the public 
administration would desire, even more in the future than in the past, to 
free from fetters and obstacles the pathway along which this: industry 
must move, in order to attain a high degree of prosperity. 

Necessity of establishing parks for raising and fattening oysters.—The 
prosperity of oyster culture will be secured when, in addition to breeding, 
«a matter already of certainty, there is established a methodical system 
of raising and fattening. 

‘The oyster,” says Dr. Kemmerer, “ which is now rather a luxury, would 
become an article of general consumption. In Paris, in the month of 
January, 1875, more than 185,635,000 French oysters were consumed, a 
flattering result for oyster culture. The oyster culturists of Marennes 
acknowledge that, out of seven millions of oysters, they lose six in their 
fattening parks, which is a shameful acknowledgment for the industry.” 

We have no influence over these figures, but. we are going to endeavor 
to roughly sketch out the oyster statistics of the present and of the 
future, in this interesting department of Morbihan. 

According to the statements furnished us by the commissioners of 
maritime inscription, there are, within the approximate limits of Morbi- 
han, 535 oyster parks, occupying an area of about 1,065 acres. It is diffi- 
cult to make a division between the breeding parks and the parks for 
aising and fattening. A careful examination, however, leads to the 
following classification: 100 acres are used for breeding, and 965 for rais- 
ing and fattening. It will be prudent to reduce the last figure to 750, 
because several parks are but little used, and many are almost aban. 
doned, 


990 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [48] 


Since it takes three years to raise an oyster, and since, during the 
growing and fattening period, about one square yard is required for a 
hundred individuals, it follows that it would require about 74 acres of 
bottom to raise and fatten one million young oysters. This is the num- 
ber theoretically, but practically some portions of the concessions are 
found to be much more favorable than others, and some portions are 
even unsuitable for raising and fattening. Taking this into account, 
and,adding the space lost in enirance ways, &c., we must double the 
area, and call it fifteen acres. In the 100 acres set aside for breeding 
purposes, what does the number of young produced a year amount to? 
It is difficult to answer this question, and the methods of enumeration 
vary. Some persons count the tiles, and thus obtain a mean of the 
number; others try to count the oysters actually produced; the latter 
approach nearest to the truth. 

Deducting for losses, the production really varies from two hundred 
to a thousand oysters, to a square yard of the area of a breeding park. 
In some parks there is a square yard of collecting surface to a square 
yard of the park; others have only a foot or a foot and a half. 

Breeding, therefore, along our coast, varies every year in the produe- 
tion of from eighty millions to four hundred millions of oysters, but we 
believe it is not prudent to accept any figure higher than eighty millions. 
Dredged oysters are not included in this sum. 

If we accept the figure of fifteem acres of raising and fattening parks, 
for the annual production of a million oysters, it results that a surface 
of 1,200 acres is required to raise wha. is produced; the figures given 
above show that there are only about 750. 

Consequently, if the production continues to increase, and if the prac- 
tice of raising remains ata stand-still, the supply exceeding the demand, 
prices will be lowered, speculation will interfere, and we shall arrive at 
& Crisis. 

Do not accuse us of pessimism. The industry of canning sardines is 
now passing through an unfortunate phase, on account of an excess of 
production. It is asked, What will be the effect upon the maritime 
inscription, if this fishery is given up, if our coasts become deserted? 
What is there to offset this result?) The future does not look bright. 

It is to be hoped that no such crisis is in store for the industry with 
which we are concerned, for oyster culture could not oppose it; once 
fallen, it would be difficult to raise it; then it would be useless to court 
inquiry, to make scrupulous examinations, and to ask oyster culturists 
what ought to have been done. , Now is the time to attend to the needs 
of oyster culture in Morbihan; the way must be prepared immediately, 
and sufficient space accorded this industry to extend its labors. What 
is necessary to attain this result? Attend to the raising and fattening, 
which means, that a great deal more space is required. 

For the actual production of 80 millions of oysters, 1,200 acres in parks 
are required; for the future production of two hundred millions, we 


[49 ] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 991 


must have 3,000 acres. Where will they be found upon the coast of 
Morbihan? The shores are muddy; the attempt to utilize them would 
be to change the order of things; to modify the equilibrium in the beds 
of rivers, and induce a deposit of mud. On the other hand, if a high 
rent, which would be justified by a well-established occupation, be im- 
posed upon our culturists, a budding industry will be stifled. The in- 
fluence of the state should come in between the culturists, who desire 
to develop their establishments, and the obstacles, opposed to such de- 
velopment. It is incontestable that, to prevent the deposition of mud 
and the modification of the bed of our rivers, the creation of parks might 
be combined with a judicious system of damming. But this operation 
necessitates a connected study of the courses of our rivers, which could 
not be undertaken by our culturists, who have not the means necessary 
to bring it to a successful issue. 

The state alone, by means of the help employed by the minister of 
public works, might set on foot the requisite studies to determine at 
once: first, the surfaces which can be transformed; second, the technical 
conditions under which this transformation is possible, without injury 
to the general welfare. This labor accomplished, the result should be 
brought to the knowledge of culturists, who could then take into con- 
sideration the chances of gain or loss, success or failure, which the labor 
of raising and fattening might offer them. 

Would it not be desirable to know to what extent this industry might 
be developed upon the coast of Morbihan, if this programme could be 
realized, and these numerous parks established ? 

At present 80 millions of young oysters a year represent a value of from 
$60,000 to $80,000. Ifthe process of fattening were made practicable, 
the increased production would place 40 millions of edible oysters at 
the disposition of consumers, and then the results of the industry might 
be reckoned at about $1,200,000, calculating the price to be about $16 a 
thousand. The 80 millions of young oysters require 160,000 days’ labor, 
of both men and women; if raising were undertaken, 600,000 days’ labor 
would be necessary. Let it not be asserted ‘in opposition to this that, 
after all, the fattening of oysters is attended to in other places, and 
though Morbihan may suffer by not undertaking it, still the general in- 
terest would not be the loser. This is an error, because the bottom 
can be adapted to fattening, and therefore not to utilize it is to neglect 
a source of wealth. 

It is the duty of the authorities of the department of Morbihan to ex- 
amine the situation well. The preserving of sardines along our coast 
already realizes about $2,000,000 annually. Oysters, to the value of 
$1,200,000, might easily be put into market, and so the annual amount 
of the industries of our coast would amount to $3,200,000. This is a 
considerable sum, and large enough to warrant the attention of those 
who believe, that the public wealth is closely allied with individual and 
local wealth. 


992 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [50] 


Rent.—In case our desires were to be carried out, and the study of 
transformable bottoms made, at what rate should the rental be fixed ? 
Every service must be paid for; this is a principle of economy which 
enters largely into all our habits. A rent must, therefore, be decided 
upon. The rate is the only point to be discussed. 

The rent, especially in the beginning, should be very small, and of a 
nature merely to secure the rights of the public domain. It would bea 
pity, to see a fiscal measure trammel upon this industry, which still 
feels its way along so timidly. It is true that in the present state of 
our public treasury, and with the debts which weigh upon our country, 
every source of revenue is eagerly sought for, but yet we must be care- 
ful not to kill the goose that lays golden eggs. As Bastia has said, there 
are two sides to this question, one seen, and one not seen; what is seen 
is the rent, which may enrich the public treasury; what is not seen, is 
the fact that by putting an obstacle, even a slight one, in the way of 
the early efforts of culturists, the progress of an industry might be 
stopped, the result of which would be a certain reaction upon the pub- 
lic welfare. From this point of view, there is a great service to be ren- 
dered to oyster culture. The state, by accepting the proposition, would 
be playing precisely the part it should, and its intervention could never 
have more beneficial results. 

Concessions for a long term.—This question leads naturally to a con- 
sideration of the method of granting concessions, now in vogue in already 
existing parks, and that to be followed in the future. 

At present, as is well known, every culturist is entirely dependent 
upon the administration; the concessions are nominative and revokable; 
what a minister has given with a stroke of his pen he can likewise take 
away. We have heard it said that administrative favor might cause 
trouble to this industry, by arbitrariness or favoritism, but we do not 
fear this, for we believe that the principles of equity, integrity, and jus- 
tice, which are the patrimony of the adininistration, will ever be held in 
honor. But from another point of view this question deserves to be at- 
tentively studied. 

A culturist is authorized to found an establishnent by a permit which 
is entirely revokable. He expends a considerable sum of money upon 
his establishment, but he entirely ignores what the future may have in 
reserve for him. In case of death, what will become of his industry ? 
Into whose hands will his concession pass? Will his descendents, di- 
rect or indirect, have the right of pre-emption? 'The administration, 
with a high standard of impartiality, may know how to conciliate all 
parties; but for most parties this is a simple hope. A hope does not 
afford that certainty which belongs’ to an arrangement, known to every 
one and determined upon beforehand. Besides, how can one calculate | 
the redemption of capital? There can be no stated period of possession ; 
all is absolute uncertainty. An urgent reform is demanded upon two 
points: 

1st. The concession should be made for a fixed period, with the privi- 


[51] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 993 


lege of renewal by the retainer, unless the public interests demand other- 
wise. 

2d. An acknowledgment of the right of pre-emption for the descend- 
ents, or of a valuation to be placed upon the park in case of change, and, 
also, a right of pre-emption, for those who reside along a river, to that 
which faces their property. 

A concession given for a stated period will have the immense ad- 
vantage of enabling the culturist to calculate a total or partial redemp- 
tion of his capital, which will afford him some certainty for the future. 
This certainty will engender confidence, which is inseparable from pro- 
gress. 

On this point, our French oyster culturists have once more given an ex- 
ample of that peculiarity of our national character, exhibiting at times 
an exaggerated fear and again an incomparable audacity. 

It is generally stated that we are lacking in commercial spirit, that 
the English and Americans, more daring than we, know better how to 
venture in untrodden paths, and, thanks to these qualities, attain won- 
derful results in all industrial pursuits. 

It will not be rash to assert that neither English nor Americans would 
have hazarded the establishment of an industry, the existence of which 
depended upon an authorization, which was revokable from one day to 
the next. The most venturesome would have held back before such 
instability; and what proves this is, that American legislation has been 
categorical in this respect. 

Thus, in Massachusetts, where the celebrated Northern oyster is found, 
the concessions are made for twenty years, the oyster culturist and his 
heirs having the exclusive privilege of the conceded ground. In Rhode 
Island, where oysters are extensively cultivated along the banks of 
Providence River, the shortest concessions are for five years and the 
longest for ten years. In Connecticut, each authorization indicates the 
duration of the concession made. Farther still, not only is a stated 
duration of concession considered indispensable in America, but, in 
many cases, those who reside upon the banks of a river are acknowl- 
edged to have the right of cultivating oysters along the frontage of their 
own property. This is the case in New York, New Jersey, Delaware, 
Maryland, &e. 

In this manner, legislation has shown that human activity can and 
should develop itself, not only on the land, but also in the domain of 
the sea; it has comprehended that the initiative should always be left 
to those who would engage in any undertaking, both as regards the cul- 
tivation of the land and the sea bottom. Without entering into the 
realm of industry, it has removed obstacles and taken all measures not 
to hinder the advancement of oyster culture. Here we find both an 
example and a lesson; an example, for, notwithstanding the wealth 
derived from the oyster trade in the United States, legislation protects 
oyster culture, a thing which is wanting with us here in France, where 

S. Mis. 29 63 


994 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [52] 


the need of it seemed to us, a short time ago, as real as irremediable ; 
a lesson, because it is only in making of the sea-coast, not a special do- 
main, but one subject to the ordinary rights of ownership, that we can 
accustom the people to sea-coast affairs, and thus build up and perpetu- 
ate a race of seamen, like that of which America is justly proud. 

In England, where there has also been a falling off in the cultiva- 
tion of oysters, an inquiry has been instituted. The principal con- 
clusion of this inquiry is remarkable, and the duty of the government is 
marked out in the following terms: ‘Let it be provided that associations 
or persons may easily obtain a title of possession, sufficiently secure, to 
such portions of the bed of the sea as they desire to work, in order that 
they may be induced to employ the capital necessary to furnish and 
keep up their fisheries.” 

No doubt is possible upon this point. French oyster culture will never 
become an industry destined to thrive, until its future shall be assured. 
It depends upon the government alone to remedy the evil, by conceding, 
with guarantees as to duration of lease and facilities of transmission, 
parks sufficiently extensive for the double purpose of breeding and 
raising. 

What is it they oppose to us? Is it that public interest might neces- 
sitate labors which would lead to a dispossession, in the case of conces- 
sions for a certified time with acquired rights? That navigation or some 
other maritime interest might require freedom of the coast, understand- 
ing by freedom its remaining entirely in the hands of the state? The 
answers are readily made, and upon this basis of discussion oyster cul- 
ture is impregnable. Where there is a willthereisa way. It is acknowl- 
edged that, so far as concerns the public welfare, the recruiting of our 
sailors, our marine power and our marine industries should be sustained, 
at any cost. This is the main point, the end to be attained, and all 
that is secondary to it should be disregarded. By hesitating, on account 
of objections in the matter of details, which may, perhaps, have some 
value, we are led astray, and soon lose sight of the greatness of the 
object. The state must be constantly reminded of this object; it must 
be convinced that here is a work which the government alone can under- 
take, and which we confidently hope it will perform. 

Reforms of detail.—Besides these reforms and innovations, which we 
so earnestly desire, there is still a good deal of progress to be realized in 
detail. 

We have shown the importance of the current for reproduction and 
raising; now, these currents being found in the deeper portions, it must 
systematically be permitted oyster culture to approach the channels. 
We have shown how powerful the current is in sweeping away the 
mud, accidentally deposited in the deeper places, and consequently all 
facilities for the cleansing of the parks should be fearlessly afforded. 

We have shown how great was the solicitude of our culturists for 
the restocking of our oyster beds; let them be permitted to approach 
the banks, which will become, for those interested in them, objects of 


[53] OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 995 


active watchfulness and attentive care. In fine, we will add that maraud- 
ing should be severely repressed. 

In America, where centralization is little known, and where almost 
every one protects himself, we have a remarkable example. 

In Rhode Island, oyster thefts are punished by fines, varying from 
$24 to $120, accompanied by imprisonment, sometimes for a year. 

In Connecticut the fine amounts to $72, with imprisonment for six 
months, and in the other States the laws are also severe. 


CONCLUSION. 


In a word, to study and reclaim transformable surfaces; to give con- 
cessions for a long term, with acquired rights for the retainers; to ex- 
tend the liberty of culturists, and to enact severe police measures; such 
is the conclusion of our studies upon the part to be undertaken by the 
state in the matter of oyster culture. 

The culturists will do the rest; in this respect, the past guarantees 
the future; their courage and energy will place oyster culture foremost 
among French industries. 

In conclusion, may we be allowed to state how happy we have been 
to find all our culturists rendering to Coste the honor which is due him; 
all confer on him the glory of being the founder of oyster culture. 

“Tet us proclaim it aloud,” says Dr. Kemmerer, “because it is true: 
the academician, Coste, was the founder of this new science.” 

“JT know that certain minds, filled with jealousy, dispute with his 
searcely cold ashes these first scientific attempts; but his writings, as 
well as those of all the oyster culturists of the time, exist to cast ridicule 
upon these posthumous inventors.” 

To this ery of indignation, we add the touching words of M. Chaumel: 

“Tn coneluding, may I be allowed a souvenir of affection and gratitude 
to M. Coste, the learned professor of embryology, to whom oyster culture 
owes everything; for, without him, of that which occupies us here there 
would be absolutely nothing. 

“After having trodden for many years a path bestrewn with thorns, 
leaning upon my arm, his failing eyes often caught a glimpse of the 
laurels of the promised land, though he died in sorrow. If, more for- 
tunate than my dear master, it pleases God that I have the honor to 
gather them, it will be both sweet and pleasing for me to lay them upon 
his tomb.” 

We have been pleased to hear this touching unanimity, which should 
be noted, for our age has given birth to critics, whose sight is easily 
dazed by glory. It would seem as if they tried to measure everything 
by their own proportions. But our culturists of Brittany have escaped 
this contagion. As, for what is solid and true, they have ever had an 
unvarying devotion, and a fidelity, which is the eternal honor of their 
race, they have proclaimed their admiration for Coste, gloried in humbly 
acknowledging themselves to be the disciples of the master, feeling that, 
if gratitude be a duty, it is also a noble quality. 


eis ANP LOE heey S 


aro , A 


i ING Exe: 


Page. 

American oyster, water needed for.....-.. 41 
America, oyster culture in .......--.....- 41 
Analysis of the green oyster..-...-.-.... 45 
Ancient oyster culture in Lake Lucrin... 2 
Artificial fecundation of the oyster. .-.... 3 
Auray, collectors used in river ....-...-.. 28 
oyster/culture ati... ---o-cene5e5 6, 12 

Basins indispensable in oyster culture. -.. 45 
Bay of GAvres, oyster culture at.--...--. 12 
Berthelot, analysis of the green oyster ..- 45 
Blanchére on collecting apparatus ..--.... 22 
structure of the young oyster. 6 

Blavet, oyster culture at...........-----. 12 
Beuf, Hyacinthe, experiment of ......-... 21 
Bouquet collectors - ...------ ..-. 17, 18, 25, 26, 28 
Breeding of oyster, Dr. Leroux, remarks. 14 
of oysters in parks.-....-.-- 2 -5,'8, 9).10 

parks, general character of shore 13 

to be abandoned..-......- 10 

Broca, artificial fattening of oysters ..... 2 
consumption of oysters in N. Y.... 2 
oyster culture in America........-. 41 


cages for the reception of young.. 33, 34,35 
Charles, M., cause of ill-success in breed- 


inginiparks=-ss-<c-- Siena 8 
color of oysters ..-.-...-... . 46 
method of raising oysters... 43 
preparation of fattening 
WALK Sloeeeeeiesescccetessaes 41 
Chaumel, M., experiments at oyster-breed- 
INP Sccsceseenana-Cesccasn 6 et seq. 
memoir on oyster breeding.. 6 
on enemies of oyster.....-- z 36 
on fascine collectors........ 16 
preparation of bottom for 
fattening park............ 42 
received oyster-culture prize 
at fair at Vannes ........- 5 
spawning of oyster..-....--. 9 
tribute to M. Coste....,-.... 53 
Claire, definition of... ..-..----.- 2... eae 15 
PULPOSCOL +2 < cose sec ce seo oanasean= 36 
Coating the collectors, materials employed .20 et seq. 
Collectors, arrangement of ...-.------- 25, 26, 27, 28 
houguebiecscsssss--=--—= 17, 18, 25, 26, 28 
coating of... ..--- 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 31 
de Wolbock's system.......-.. 20 
fascines -.-......00.----------- 16 
Leroux’s process.....------17, 18, 19, 20 
M. Chaumel’s description of.. 16 
M. Lazard’s description of .... 28 
of embroyo oysters...-..----- 4 15 
PIAN Keeeeccecceecc site cce BCGIOS 17 


[55] 


Page 
Collectors, recommended by Coste........ 15 
removalof young oysters from. 30 
file woo same ccewnie sms caivaca seco 17,18 
used at Morbihan ............. 18,19 
used in oyster breeding ....... 6 
used in the river Auray......- 28 
Corn meal used in fattening oysters -..... 42 
Coste, account of ancient oyster industry 
in| Make Tncrin.-cs-----sssesl-- 2 
collectors recommended by --.-..-.- 15 
experiments in oyster culture...... 2, 3,4 
failureOf se sscecse- ce seesecieene cee 4 
On‘ COlOLjOL OY Stern! =2 246.2 =e ae 45 
principal cause of the failure of .... 46 
rapport 4 l’empéreur, cited .......- 4 
structure of the young oyster ..... 6 
tributes't0 <2... <)522-<s-sc0-cecnsess 53 
voyage d’exploration, industrie du 
lac. Dusaro) Cited 2. .-escce cess <> 3 
Crabs inimical to oysters ..-............-. 36, 37 
Currents of water, effects of ...-.....-... 9, 12, 14 
Disintegration of coast rocks, results of . 11 
Embryo oysters, apparatus for collecting. 15 
collecting of............. 10 
Embryo, development of ................- 6 
Enemies of the oyster : 
(Ong becad ea cdoccunocobcEcoscoseooean 36, 37 
Murex tarentinus =< s-s-s.2ecceeseo- 37 
Nassa reticulata) <-.5.<..5-.2.-cc--e 38 
Thére ..... BORLA AH CBSECODS HO BOCERSROEE 38 
DHTMPoacsesaseescccaseees Bee oees 38 
Star-fish....-..- Salesa cesses enese eee — 38 
Failures in oyster breeding, cause of ..... lu 
Hascine collectors; +. . 2... .---<cceceuscoene 16 
Fattening oysters, care to be taken....... 45 
parkstesccoeac ao d-caccsecotee 39 
choice of bottom ......-.. 41 
character of water .-..---. 41 
preparation of bottom ... 42 
DASINS weeaseccscceec owas ccna 44 
Fecundation of the oyster, artificial....... 3 
Fraiche, M., structure of the young oyster 6 
GAvres, bay of, oyster culture at.-......-- 12 
Gressy, Dr., exhibited a star-fish holding 
SN OVBLOL=~ .-cecosnescese== 38 
method of detaching young 
OYSUCES\-coccemoanccsaseasor 32 
on bouquet collectors.--..... 25, 26 
on coating of lime........... 23, 24 
on consolidating the mud.-.-.. 29 
on spawning of oyster...---. 7 
provided for claires.......... 36 
raising young oysters in cages 34 
997 


998 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


Page. 
Hausser, A. E., report on oyster culture in 
Morbihan sess secencee sae sonesccaeasee ae 1 
Hive collectors in river Auray..-.-..----. 28 
Implements in use in detaching oysters -. 30 
Kemmerer, Dr., coating of collectors.-..-.. 21 
introduced the use of lime 
in oyster culture....-... 23 
on coating of tiles....- aa 24 
on oyster gonsumption.. . 47 
on oyster seed ........... 35 
removal of oysters from 
the tiles) 22222 ee eee see 22 
tribute to M. Coste....... 53 
Keérolé, oyster parks at...-....-.-..------ 44 
Lake Fusaro, cause of failure of oyster 
culture in ........ Spas cease as eesets 43 
Lake Lucrin, ancient oyster culture in. ... 2 
Leroux and Leroy, MM., breeding estab- 
lishment Of24520-ss%s ses ccoesscsese snes 14 
Weroux, Dr; Henrils:<22- c.csaseces sess ces 13 
on coating of tiles....-.- 23, 24 
on detaching oysters... 31 
on oyster breeding. ---- 14 
on tile collectors. ---17, 18, 19, 20 
price of oyster......-.- 41 
Leroux, employs bouquet collectors ....-.- 26 
loss of oysters ..-..--..-....---- 36 
provided claires for oysters. ..--- 36 
setting up of bouquet collector... 26, 27 
Liazard, M., arrangement of collectors. ... 28 
description of collectors. -.... 28 
failures of stone collectors... 15,16 
on coating of tiles ....-...... 24 
Lime, use of, in oyster culture ......----.. 22, 23 
Lucrin, lake of, ancient oyster culture in-. 2 
Ludré, oyster parks of.......-----...-.--- 45 
Macadamizing the mad in oyster parks -. 29 
Martin, detaching oysters from collectors. 35 
on ase of lime in oyster culture.. 23, 24 
oyster-breeding establishment. .. 14 
Taising young oysters in cages. .- 34 
Materials used for coating collectors .--..20 et seq. 
Morbihan, collectors in use at...........- 18,19 
lime used in oyster culture at. 23, 25 
method of detaching oysters. . 30 
muddy deposits of the shores . 10 
oyster breeding in parks -.-..-.-. 8 
oyster culture in -...-.--.-.... 1 
oyster establishments at .-.... 39 
oyster parks within its limits- 47 
preparation of bottom for 
breeding parks. ............- 42 
removal of oysters from collect- 
Ol Seeceeeaee men esece sere ace) Bs) 
Mud, a deadly enemy of the oyster....... ll 
Mcrex tarentinus, inimical to oysters .-.. 37 
Nassa reticulata, inimical to oysters ..-... 38 
Ocean currents, effeet on oyster breeding. 9, 12,14 
Orata, C. Sergius, cultivated oysters..... 2 
Oyster, American, water needed for....-. 41 
artificial fecundation of the .-...-. 3 
attached and free ---........-.--. 30 
10 


Oyster breeding, cause of failure in.-.-.-. 
Dr. Leroux’s remarks -- 


[56] 


Page. 
Oyster breeding in parks, ill-success of.. 8, 9,10 
j M. Chaumel’s memoir on 6 

success in, depends on 
condition of bottom --- 12 
Oysters, color 0f2s55-s-- sone ae eeeese 45, 46 
Consumption Ofsesses sae cenaesoee 2 

Oyster culture: 

ancient, in Lake Lucrin..-.--.--....... 2 
basins are indispensable..........-... 45 
invA MeTICASa ce Le see ese see oes eee sae 41 

Morbihan. By A. E. Hausser. 

(Litle) Peter ees st ee 1 
measures to insure prosperity of ....46 et seq. 
prizes for, at Vannes fair .......-..-- 5 
reforms and innovations desired ..... 52 
where possible ...............-..-----4 1 

Oysters, damaged, healing of...-.....--.. 34 
development of..--..-..---..-.--. 6 
enemies/of; the)-- = 3-22 .a ence ae 36 

Oyster failure in Lake Fusaro, cause of... 43 

Oysters, fattening of, care to be taken in-. 45 

fattening with corn-meal........ 42 

industry in the United States-.- 40 

newly-hatched, abundance of..-. 6, 10 

Oystoriparks)ses--ccreeset secon sees eee 5 

at Ké6rol6zs eco ssseeeansecie 44 

at mouth of river Ter.... 43 

breeding/iny << == ss se0 s-csene 8 
classification of ..........--. 47 

concessions to be granted... 50, 51 
consolidating the bottom of.. 29 
OxtentiOlerancosccsesscecse cl 5 

breeding to be abandoned .. - 10 

of udré: 2.225520. cercacces 45 

OL MGB OZZY ence a csisetac/ a= 45 

necessity for establishing. . - 47, 48, 49 

rental for seces sccecees eee 50 

within limits of Morbihan. -. 47 

Oyster raising, M. Charles, method...---. 43 
M. Turlure’s method...-.. 42, 43 

results obtained...-...--- 45 

Oysters, removal from the collector ...-.-. 30, 35 
Oyster seed, how obtained ........-..---- 35 
spawns with the flood tide........ 9, 14 
structure of, works on.-.---...---- 6 

thett punishable in America....-. 53 

time of spawning.....---.-2..-.-.. 5 et seq. 

Park, definition Of2--2 <2. \.c0-~c-s0 ss eas 15 

Parks atex6rolé). see eeeet a oececeeeceeee 44 

breeding of oystersin, ill-successof. 8, 9, 10 
consolidation of the bottom. -.---- 28 
for breeding oysters abandoned... 10 
for raising and fattening oysters... 39 
OfelUdn6essoeee ete steers ee saniat= 45 
Of MEP OZ7Yiececeesisat ann = som nna 45 

Parturition of the oyster.-......---.----. 14 

Pénerf, oyster breeding at-.---..-.----.--- 6, 12 

P0zZy, (Ma, Parks Obei cet aacinn~ saan se nn 44 

Quatrefages, artificial fecundation .....-. 3 

Quicklime, use of, in oyster culture....... 20 

Saint Philibert, oyster culture at ........ 12 

Scorff, oyster cultare at........--.--...--- 12 

Shrimp, inimical to oyster. .....-...------ 338 

Solminihac and Maudny : 

care expended by ...--...-.--.------- 45 


[57] 


Solminihac and Mauduy—Continued. 
method of detaching young oysters... 32 


Page. 


on invasion of mussels..-.. SAipae sie's'e 39 
preparation of bottom for fattening 
Darke oss secaccne-'= SOSSBOS easans 42 
raising young oysters in cages.....-.. 34 
Spawning of oyster........--.-.... sasaes OCU. 8CQ. 
Spawning of oyster at flood tide ....... Boe tpl 
Starfish, inimicalte oyster.....-......... 38 
Ter, river, oyster parks at month of...-... 43 
Thére, inimical to oyster..-....... Svescee 38 
Thevenard, M., bouquet collectors.....-. 28 
Tides, connection with spawning of oyster 9 
Mid ercollectorseac- == cele -siececcas=cies poco alyfaks} 


Turlure, M., method of raising oysters... 42, 43 


OYSTER CULTURE IN MORBIHAN. 


Page. 
United States, oyster industries in....... 40 
Vannes, fair at, practical oyster culture.. 5 
Wire cages for the reception of the young 
OYStLETS..2-2- ----- == eee e ne sce enceee 33, 34, 35 
Wolbock, breeding establishment of ..... 14 
collectors used by ....----.-..- 20 - 
employs bouquet collectors -.-. 26 
method of detaching young oys- 
LOLS ree ieeenaniner acs cate sins 82 
on coating of tiles .........-.-- 24 
consolidating the bottom of 
PATHS ee ee enmasecasieaeee= <n 29 
provided claires for wintering. . 36 
received oyster-culture prize at 
at fair at Vannes ........--.. 5 


XXXIV.—RESULTS OF THE INVESTIGATIONS RELATIVE TO THE 
OYSTER AND ITS CULTIVATION AT THE END OF THE FIRST 
YEAR OF THESE INVESTIGATIONS.* 


[Appendix to the Sixth Annual Report of the Zoological Station of the Netherlands 
Zoological Association. ] t 


LEIDEN, 1881. 


The review (catalogue raisonné) of the literature of the oyster, referred 
to in our report, was completed during the month of June. It is in- 
tended to form the first part of the final report on the investigations 
relative to the oyster, but on account of its size (104 pp. 8vo, close 
print) it has been thought best not to embody it in this appendix. 
The table of contents of this review, which has not been given to the 
book-trade, is as follows: 

Introduction. 
The *“* Ancients” on the oyster. 
Conrad Gesner (1516-1565) on the oyster. 

A. Works of a purely scientific character : 

I. Systematic study of the oyster, and its geographical distribu- 
tion. 
If. General anatomy and physiology of the oyster. 
Iii. Anatomy and physiology of the generative organs of the oyster, 
IV. History of the growth and development of the oyster. 
B. Works relating to the general natural history, fishing, cultivation, &e., 
of the oyster: 
I. Works which donot exclusively relate to onecountry or locality. 
II. Works relating to the oyster-fisheries and the cultivation of 
the oyster in the Netherlands. 
Ill. Works relating to the oyster-fisheries and the cultivation of 
the oyster in Belgium. 
IV. Works relating to the oyster-fisheries and the cultivation of 
the oyster in France. 
V. Works relating to the oyster-fisheries and the cultivation of 
the oyster in Great Britain and Ireland. 
VI. Works relating to the oyster-fisheries and the cultivation of 
the oyster on the German coasts of the North Sea. 


*“ Overzicht van den stand van het onderzock de oester en haar cultuur betreffende aan het 


einde van het eerste onderzoekingsjaar.”—Translated from Dutch by HERMAN JACOBSON, 

t Zesde Jaarverslag | omtrent het | zodlogisch station | der | Nederlandsche | Dierkundige 
Vereeniging, | uitgebracht door de Commissie voor het zodlogisch station, | op de Vergadering 
van 10 December, 1881. | 


[1] 1001 


1002 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. © [2] 


VII. Works relating to the oyster-fisheries and the cultivation of 
the oyster on the coasts of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. 
VIII. Works relating to the attempts to establish oyster-beds on the 
coasts of the Baltic. 
IX. Works relating to the oyster-fisheries and the cultivation of 
the oyster on the coasts of the Mediterranean and Adriatic. 
X. Works relating to the oyster-fisheries and the cultivation of 
the oyster on the east coast of North America. 
XI. Works relating to the oyster-fisheries and the cultivation of 
the oyster on the coast of China. 


Alphabetical index. 


The investigations relative to the ANATOMY OF THE OYSTER were in 
charge of Messrs. Hock, Vosmaer and Waalewijn. 

Dr. Hoek writes that, as far as the generative organs are concerned, 
the more important questions are those relating to physiology, at least 
in viewing the matter from the point of view of an oyster cultivator. 
These questions—to mention some of them—are as follows: At what 
age does the oyster begin to propagate? What percentage of the oysters on 
a bed take part in the propagating process? Does the propagating oyster 
exercise the functions of one sex or of both sexes? Does one and the same 
oyster propagate once or more than once a year? &c. All former investi- 
gators, who have occupied themselves with this subject, have attempted 
to answer these and other similar questions. The reason why they did 
not succeed—for even the investigations made by the most prominent 
among thein (Davaine, Lacaze-Duthiers, Mobius, &e.), have not led to 
any certain results, but only to more or less doubtful suppositions—must 
be found in the circumstance, that an attempt was made to answer these 
questions, without any satisfactory knowledge of the anatomical (both 
macroscopic and microscopic) construction of the oyster. 

What is the construction of the generative organs? Where are they 
located? How are the generative products emitted? These three ques- 
tions seem so simple that it is difficult to imagine that they could not 
be satisfactorily answered by the aid of the experience of former inves- 
tigators. The oyster is not such a rare shell-fish, nor can it be classed 
among those animals which, on account of their small size, are difficult 
to examine. The fact that its anatomy is particularly little known is 
doubtless owing to the circumstance that the oyster—more than other 
mollusks—presents great difficulties to the use of the dissecting needle, 
scalpel, and magnifying glass, to such a degree as to make such experi- 
ments appear futile and bring them to an abrupt close. Our more mod- 
ern methods of investigation cannot yet be said to be entirely suited to 
the nature of the oyster; it will nevertheless be to these methods that 
we will have to look for a speedy and deeper insight into the construc- 
tion of the generative organs. 

These methods consist principally in hardening the oyster and in ob- 


[3] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1003 


taining their sections for microscopic observations. Oysters can be 
hardened by means of different liquids; as far as our experience goes, 
we are inclined to give preference to pure alcohol or combinations of 
chromium. 

The results which have so far been reached, and which, from their 
nature, must be considered as preliminary, are given below. Although 
it would perhaps be preferable not to publish some of these supposed 
results, as yet, we shall give them, so that they may serve as guides in 
future investigations : 

(1.) The generative organ of the oyster is not, as in other lamellibran- 
chiates, a strictly localized organ, but extends equally on both sides of 
the body. The organ on the right side is connected with that on the 
left, both on the abdomen and on the back, and besides this by a por- 
tion which bounds the pericardial cavity in front. It is therefore a con- 
tinuous organ which does not extend into the mantle. 

(2.) The generative organ is located near the surface of the body, but 
is separated from the skin by a thin layer of tissue. 

(3.) The generative organ consists of a system of vessels which, 
throughout, have an anastomotic character, and which run parallel with 
the surface of the oyster, and from their internal sides or faces there 
arise blind tubular prolongations which extend inwards into the tissue 
of the body. In these tubes the generative products are developed. 

(4.) The generative products are developed from the epithelial cells, 
which cover the inner sides of these blind tubes or follicles. During this 
process both male and female generative products are developed close 
to each other in one and the same follicle, and can gradually be distin- 
guished from each other by their structure and the manner in which 
they color. 

(5.) It must be considered as a rule, that one of the two generative 
products in one and the same oyster will, in its development, by far ex- 
ceed the other. Those generative organs which furnish principally 
male products, contain but few eggs, and these in a very backward 
state; whilst in those organs which furnish principally female products, 
the male products appear to be still less developed than the female pro- 
ducts in the first mentioned case. 

(6.) The generative organs of an oyster, having young spat in its gills, 
appear in sections as large vacant spaces. Whilst in such oysters nearly 
all the eggs had disappeared from the follicles, the male products were 
much more developed than had been observed in some principally female 
oysters, during the period that the eggs were still in the follicles. This 
observation seems to favor the opinion that the same follicles develop 
first eggs and then spermatozoa. This, however, does not prove that 
the reverse cannot also be the case. 

(7.) The opinion advanced by Lacaze-Duthiers, that all the blind tubn- 
lar acini or follicles of the generative organ, on both sides of the body, 
pour their contents into a main channel, having an opening on each side 


1004 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [4] 


near the surface of the body, located under the mantle on the ventral 
side of the large muscle, rests on a mistake. 

(8.) Rolleston’s and Robertson’s opinion, that lymphatic vessels occur 
in Lamellibranchiates, deserves to be carefully examined. There are, 
in the oyster, vessels, the inside of which is coated with a layer of cells 
with small cilia. These may be observed especially in both sides of the 
pericardial cavity. Occasionally specimens are obtained in which they 
can only be distinguished from the anastomosing vessels, on the internal 
aspect of which the generative follicles are found, by the greater length 
of the hairs. In some specimens such a supposed lymphatic vessel, ac- 
cording to the view of Rolleston and Robertson, may be observed, one 
side of which is coated with young eggs. 

(9.) It is improbable that the organ of Bojanus has anything to do 
with the emission of the generative products. Nothing is known eon- 
cerning such an organ in the oyster; but everything which relates to 
the determination of the anatomy of the generative organs of the oyster, 
should be carefully observed. It is found on the ventral side of the 
pericardial cavity and communicates with it through a narrow slit, al- 
most a distinct papilla. In sections of this organ cecal tubes may be 
observed, the yellow and peculiarly formed cells of which are highly 
characteristic. 

(10.) It may be considered as absolutely certain that the eggs are im- 
pregnated by spermatozoids from another oyster; but it cannot as yet 
be said with certainty whether these spermatozoids reach the eggs at 
the very moment they are emitted, or whether this takes place in the 
generative follicles or in some of the vessels. Whenever an oyster has 
eggs between her gills, all that can be said with absolute certainty is 
this, that these eggs have been produced by that oyster. 

Dr. Vasmaer offered the following report of his observations relative 
to the natural history of the oyster: 

Owing to the nature of the case the following observations can only 
be regarded as implied by their title, as a report of my activity. It would 
be unjust to look at present for important results. 

After having microscopically examined a number of large oysters, in 
order to get a general idea, I soon became convinced that success could . 
only be looked for from microscopic observations. The method now 
so much in vogue of making a series of sections or slices, in order to 
obtain a clearer insight into the structure of the animal, will doubtless 
throw light on many dark points. Although I am sorry to say that I 
am not yet able to state where the generative vessels empty, I feel con- 
vinced that a series of sections will lead to some certainty in this mat- 
ter. It is certain, however, that the opinions of Lacaze-Duthiers and 
those who have followed him are not correct. 

Firmly convinced that the method referred to is preferable to all 
others, I have not only made numerous sections of small oysters, which, 
therefore, in their entirety, could be subjected to microscopic observa- 


[5] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1005 


tions, but also of large oysters, cutting thick slices in different direc- 
tions; and by sketches which I have made of all these cuts, I have 
been enabled to compare these observations with those made in other 
specimens and in the usual way. In the first place, as regards the 
shape and location of the gut, or rather of the entire digestive canal, I 
found that it is not nearly as uniform as is generally supposed. I, for 
my part at least, have not seen mention made, in any work, of a differ- 
ent location of this duct. It also seems to me an important circum- 
stance that, as a general rule, the anus is located on the side and not 
at the end of the duct. A small bag is, therefore, formed at the end of 
the duct which, in one case observed by me, showed a sort of worm-like 
appendage. ‘ 

A series of sections is extremely well suited to give some idea of the 
relation between the generative organ and the liver. Whilst the gen- 
erative organ appears to thin out round the liver dorsally, it gradually 
increases in thickness towards the bottom ventral side; the liver, how- 
ever, runs, though much narrower, through to the place where the great 
cavity begins, which contains the heart and the so-called organ of Boja- 
nus. [The liver does not extend to the pericardiac space; this is the 
case in Ostrea Virginiana as well as in O. edulis, as may be shown in 
longitudinal sections.—J. A. Ryder. ] 

More than once I have had to make injections of the heart and the 
vessels originating in it, but I cannot say that these attempts have been 
particularly successful. Of larger blood vessels I could, on the large 
cuts, only distinguish one (probably the aorta). In view of the fact 
that there are still strange and conflicting opinions as to the course of 
the blood vessels, further experiments with injections cannot be too 
highly recommended. Important conclusions may possibly be drawn 
from the contraction of the heart, which continues for a long time after 
the oyster has been opened; at least various questions are thereby sug- 
gested, such as whether the motion of the so-called Bojanus organ is 
voluntary or involuntary? I think I have noticed that the diastole and 
systole did not take place simultaneously in both portions of the heart, 
but alternately. I must repeat, however, what I said above, that all 
these observations bear more or less the character of suppositions, which 
stand in need of further proof. 

As regards the method of making preparations, several of those com- 
monly in use have been tried. The hardening by means of Miiller’s 
liquid, which in the beginning seemed to promise well, cannot be recom- 
mended for fine microscopic cuts. 

It will be best to use alcohol of 70 per cent. or of 90 per cent., or pure 
alcohol, and then to embed the hardened oyster in paraffine in the well- 
known way; or also picric acid, which takes the lime out of the shell. 
In this manner small, one-year old (and younger) oysters can be pre- 
served whole. 

I need hardly say that it is very important to examine oysters of 


1006 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [6] 


various ages. Special attention should, however, be paid to young oys- 
ters, and to the development of the generative organs in these. <As far 
as ny observations go, exclusively male or exclusively female oysters 
do not occur. In full-grown, healthy oysters an oval lump of sperma- 
tozoa may be observed, surrounded by free eggs placed radially and with 
great regularity. In comparing perpendicular and other cuts, these 
eggs appear in close elliptically-shaped groups or lumps, each in a tissue 
pouch, or several together in one and the same pouch. The eggs are 
generally attached by a wide base; are granular, and provided with a 
large, round nucleus and nucleoli. In specimens stained with fine picro- 
carmine the difference between the nucleus, with its appurtenances— 
sit venia verbo—and the egg-cell itself can be very distinctly observed. 
The egg-cell has a brownish-yellow color, and is granular, whilst the 
nucleus is reddish, and appears to be a homogeneous body. In oysters 
which have already lost some of their young spat, the empty pouches 
or hulls may be seen in considerable number. As far as my observa- 
tions go, I am inclined to think that eggs and spermatozoa do not mature 
simultaneously. It seems that new generative products may at a later 
period be developed in the empty pouches. It would be worth the 
trouble to examine into this matter carefully. 

My preliminary observations have convinced me that it is absolutely 
indispensable to the success of these investigations to make a series of 
sections of oysters of different ages and examine these carefally~ If 
during the coming year I am privileged to continue my investigations, 
I shall principally follow this method. 

The investigations relative to the history of the development of the oyster 
are perhaps farther advanced than any other portion of our investiga- 
tions. They were in charge of Dr. Horst and Professor Hoffmann. Mr. 
Horst made use of the booth of the zoological station at Wemeldinge, 
described in the first part of our report; and his observations were so 
successful that he was enabled to prepare a brief review of the embry- 
ology of the oyster, accompanied by the necessary illustrations. This 
review is too extensive, however, to be embodied in this report, as a 
whole, and we shall therefore give its principal features in brief outline. 

It is particularly difficult to obtain the necessary facts relative to the 
first stages of the development of the oyster; and it is hoped that next 
year’s observations will supplement those of the present year. The 
principal difficulty lies in the circumstance that, as a general rule, more 
female (mother) oysters are found with old than with quite young brood. 
There is no doubt that, in their general features, the first stages of the 
development of the oyster-egg resemble those of other bivalves. The 
result of the first stage in the process of development is, that the lower 
(vegetative) pole of the egg is formed of a large granular cell from which 
the entoderm* (and mesoderm ?) develop, whilst on the upper (animal) pole 
numerous smaller cells may be observed which furnish the material for 


*T have retained two terms, which are not found either in Webster's Dictionary or 
in Dunglison’s Medical Dictionary, and which—not being Dutch, but Greek—will be 


oo 


[7] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1007 


the ectoderm. The last-mentioned cells gradually grow all round the 
vegetative cell or sphere without however inclosing it entirely. After- 
wards these cells also begin to segment, and a layer of cylindrical cells 
is formed, which is slightly invaginated or pushed inward at one point 
and which forms the entoderm. 

About the same time a crescent-shaped groove is formed at the other 
pole of the egg by an invagination or pushing inwards of the entodermal 
cells (erroneously called the gastrula mouth by former investigators), 
from whieh the shell-gland is developed. Soon after this we see the 
formation of the primary intestinal channel by a farther invagination 
of the entodermal surface. Back of the opening of the mouth 2 few large 
cells make their appearance, which must probably be considered as the 
first mesodermal cells. The shell-gland has now assumed the shape of 
a deep little bag, the wall of which is composed of large cylindrical cells. 
The portion of the ventral side located below the mouth projects con- 
siderably during the succeeding stage, so as to form a sort of foot, as in 
the embryo of the snail. 

Daring the further growth of the embryo the entoderm develops into 
@ Spacious stomach cavity, with a sac-like appendage, which later forms 
the end of the intestine, but which is still closed; the gastrula mouth 
becomes the permanent mouth. The ectoderm is now lifted up from 
close contact with the entoderm and in this way the body cavity is 
developed. The invagination of the shell-gland has meanwhile disap- 
peared almost entirely by an inflection of its margin. Its place is now 
occupied by a thickening of the ectoderm, consisting of long conical cells. 
These cells develop a thin membrane, which is the first trace of the 
shell, from which it appears that the bivalvular shell does not originally 
appear as such, but that the shell begins to form as one piece. Above 
the mouth a cirelet of vibratory filaments begins to make its appear- 
ance, which later forms the relum, the organ of motion of the larva. 

During the succeeding stage the shell rapidly increases in size, and 
almost entirely envelops the larva; the velum becomes more clearly de- 
fined, and in the center of the velar area, encircled by its ciliary ring or 
crown, a thickening of the ectoderm (velar plate) begins to make its ap- 
pearance. A funnel-shaped gullet forms the entrance to the pear-shaped 
stomach, whilst the hinder portion of the intestine develops an opening 
communicating with the outside. 

By the appearance of pigment at different points of the body of the 
larva (velar plale, gullet, stomach) the whktte spat assumes a dark gray 
color and becomes black spat. On both sides of the intestine muscles 
begin to develop, running downward from the hinge, by means of which 
the head part, which protrudes from the shell, can be drawnin; and like 
the abductor muscle, which connects the left and the right valves of the 
shell and closes them, the former are also developed from mesodermal 


- easier understood, if given in the original, than if a translation had been attempted: 
“‘entoderm,” ““mesoderm.” The similar term “‘¢cfoderm” is found in Webster, but not 
in Dunglison.—TRANSLATOR. 


1008 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 


cells. The velum now appears as a double row of long threads, which 
surround a vaulted surface, and in the center of which lies the velar 
plate or thickening, which projects outwardly, and consists of several 
layers of cells ; from this the pharynx* (mouth) arises at a later period. 
The intestinal channel has meanwhile increased considerably both in 
length and width; the stomach has been divided by a constriction into 
a lower and upper portion, and the intestine arises from the line of junc- 
tion of thetwo. The anterior portion of the stomach develops on the up- 
per side a large round sac, the rudiment of the liver; the whole intesti- 
nal channel is coated internally with fine ciliary filaments, with the ex- 
ception probably of the hepatic protuberance. On the ventral side of 
the larva, in nearly the same place where formerly the so-called “foot” 
was located, a knob-shaped enlargement of the ectoderm begins to make 
its appearance, which is probably the rudiment of the pedal (parieto- 
splanchnic) ganglion. 

Older stages than those on which the above observations were made 
have not been examined. In order to recognize very young oysters 
which have just adhered to an object, a glazed tile covered with pure 
lime has been successfully substituted for the usual collector (stone tiles 
covered with a mixture of lime and sand); on such a collector an oyster 
measuring only 0.57 millimeter could be distinctly recognized with the 
naked eye. 

In conclusion Dr. Horst gives some information relative to a presumed 
enemy of the oyster spat. He says that in his aquarium, which con- 
tained a female (mother) oyster, which every now and then emitted large 
quantities of spat, there were also a number of actinia (Sea-anemones), 
The quantity of oyster spat decreased visibly without his being able to 
discover the cause, until one day he saw bluish-gray pellets, measuring 
but a few millimeters, come out of the mouth of an actinia. These pel- 
lets appeared to consist exclusively of empty oyster shells of the most 
diminutive size, and therefore showed that the actinia had been feeding 
on oyster spat. 

Professor Hoffmann makes the following report on his investigations: 
During the second halfof July he occupied himself with some investiga- 
tions relative to the development of the oyster. The great heat during 
July, by which the temperature in the wooden shed rose to 94°, made 
it impossible to steadily continue the observations. 

The first stages of segmentation were not observed, whilst full obser- 
vations, both on optic and actual sections, were taken during the gastrula 
stage. The gastrulat does not belong to the hollow, but rather to the 


*The Dutch word ‘‘bovenslokdarmknoop” is not found in any Dutch dictionary. Mr. 
Ryder has rendered it as the rudiment of the mouth or pharynx.—TRANSLATOR. 

t This word is not found in Webster’s English nor Dunglison’s Medical Dictionary. 
The words coelogastrula and sterrogastrula are translated hollow and solid type by Mr. 
Ryder. These are words of little consequence, except as descriptive of different con- 
ditions of development of the body cavity. All mollusca nova appear to pass at first 
through a sterrogastrula stage, followed by a coelogastrula condition.—TRANSLATOR. 


[9] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1009 


solid type. The cells of the mesoderm, whose origin I cannot state with 
absolute certainty, but which appeared to me to be a product of the en- 
toderm, do not form a continuous sheet or leaf, but begin to be differen- 
tiated at a very early period into embryonic muscle and connective 
tissue. The preconchial invagination begins to make its appearance 
at a very early stage, the cells of the ectoderm being distinguished by 
their high cylinder-shaped appearance; the shell therefore belongs to 
very early embryonic formation; in young oysters the post-larval shel! 
of which has already formed, the embryonic shell can still be very dis- 
tinetly observed. [Full information as to the results of my observations. 
of oyster embryos, made principally on cross-section, are at the disposa, 
of the Commission, in case they should desire it for their final report. 

As regards the investigations relative to the young oyster, after it has 
settled, Dr. Hubrecht writes: “The time which I spent at the station in 
June was almost wholly devoted to the regulation of the physico-me- 
teorological observations, the prelimary results of which will be pub- 
lished in full at some future time. Onmy return in August, we made a 
distribution of the work assigned to us, and I was commissioned to oe- 
eupy myself with the oyster larve and their settling on the tiles, but 
was much delayed in my work by the long-continued unfavorable and 
. cold weather. Regular observations were out of the question during 
this month, the season of the settling of the oyster spat having been 
brought on prematurely by the hot weatherin July. I was therefore 
obliged to abandon the task which I had set myself for this year, and 
devoted all the time I could spare from the physico-meteorological ob- 
servations, to the study of the anatomy of the oyster, more especially 
of those points on which the opinions of scientists differ very much, and 
where there are still important gaps in our knowledge, viz, the heart 
with the pericardium, the organ of Bojanus, and the channels through 
which the generative products are emitted. I made numerous micro- 
scopic sections of one to three year old oysters; but these results of these 
observations I shall reserve for our final report, because it will require 
the uninterrupted observations of another summer, to bring this inves- 
tigation to a satisfactory close.” 

Dr. Van Rees writes regarding his observations on the radius of dis- 
tribution of the oyster spat and the conditions under which they settle, 
as follows: “ Whilst at the zoological station during the second half of 
June I noticed the forerunners of the oyster spat. To my great regret 
I was not able to be in Bergen op Zoom during July and continue my ob- 
servations at that place. When Ireturned during the last days of July, 
T noticed that a great deal of spat had settled. By fishing in different 
places I found, however, numerous oyster larvee swimming about in the 

rater, which could be kept alive for several days in sea-water contained 

in wide, open glass jars. In fishing I used the tow net in the manner in 

which Thad seen Professor Weismann use it in the Lake of Constance. 

The tinned iron hoop of the net is furnished with a long, free bag of very 
S: Mis: 2964 


—_ 


1010 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [10] 


fine gauze, weighted with a stone ora piece of lead, the net is let down 
te a limited depth, and left under water a shorter or longer time—say 5 
to 10 minutes—according to the force of the current and the swiftness 
of the boat. Even ata moderate rate of speed the net tightens, and 
everything which fioats into it is retained by the fine meshes. A piece 
of wire-grating closes the opening of the net to larger objects. Draw- 
ing it carefully out of the water it is turned inside out into a wide glass 
jar with fresh sea-water. Aiter having, by microscopic observations, 
obtained a general idea of the various animal forms contained in the 
water, it is not difficult to distinguish them from each other, with the 
naked eye or with a magnifying glass, particularly by their different 
motions. 

“During my first experiments with the above described net I found it 
to be extremely well suited to my purpose. ‘This was, in the first place, 
to find the proportion of oyster larve floating near the surface, in deeper 
water, and immediately above the bottom, at different times, and in 
as many places as possible. It seemed important to me to get an idea 
of this proportion, especially in connection with the following consid- 
erations. 

“The swiftness with which the oyster larva moves about by means of 
the thread-like apparatus, is very insignificant as compared with the 
swiftness of the current of the tide when coming in or going out. As 
regards the radius of distribution of the oyster spat, it is entirely 
dependent on the varying swiftness of the current. Inthe river Scheldt, 
where natural and artificial oyster beds are scattered all over the river, 
oyster spat is probably floating about everywhere as soon as the time 
has arrived for the spat to become detached from the mother oyster. 
Whether oyster spat will settle more freely in one place than in another 
will, therefore, depend not so much on the radius of distribution of the 
oyster larvee of this or that oyster bed as on the peculiar conditions of 
the current. It is, therefore, in the first place, necessary to learn to 
know the swiftness and direction of the currents in the principal por- 
tions of the river Scheldt, and it is consequently a matter for which we 
are very thankful that the minister of public works has given his sup- 
port so freely to this part of our observations. A thorough knowledge 
of the currents, combined with practical experience, will give us a better 
insight into the reason why certain localities are better adapted to the 
settling of the oyster spat than others. In studying this subject, spe- 
cial attention should be paid to the manner in which the oyster larvee are 
distributed over the different depths of water, as unfortunately but 
little is known at present concerning this important matter. Although 
their organs of motion do not enable them to go any great distance— 
which, moreover, is not essential to their distribution—these organs, 
nevertheless, furnish them with an entirely satisfactory power of rising 
and sinking, and of keeping themselves afloat in the water when it is 
not violently agitated. In connection with the conditions of current 


eos OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1011 


and temperature, the distribution of the larve in the water is a question 
of primary importance. 

“Tt was a grievous disappointment to me that I had to let the greater 
portion of the month of July go by without making any observations 
in this direction; and as the weather during August was exceptionally 
unfavorable, I could not make up for time lostin July. Spat fell during 
all of this month, but regular observations at favorable points had be- 
come absolutely impossible. During the coming summer I hope to be 
able to devote my undivided attention to the distribution of the oyster 
larvee.” : 

On the PHYS[CO-METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS in the Eastern 
Scheldt during 1831, the following report was offered by Mr. Hubrecht, 
who had been assisted in his work by Mr. van Kervel: 

As soon as possible after the Commission of the Zoological Station had, 
at their meeting of March 10, resolved that the observations of the 
oyster cultivation (and subjects connected therewith) in the Eastern 
Scheldt, should also be extended to the condition of the water, its tem- 
perature and density, as well as the nature of the currents in the Scheldt, 
which might exercise an influence on oyster cultivation, the commission’ 
opened negotiations with Prof. C. H. D. Buys Ballot, of Utrecht, Director 
of the Meteorological Institute. To his kind aidand the friendly assist- 
ance of Dr. Maurits Snellen we owe the knowledge of various impor- 
tant facts as to the best manner and time of taking observations, and 
of a peculiarly arranged areometer, which was manufactured under the 
supervision of Dr. Maurits Snellen, and which deserves the preference 
over other areometers which we tried. To these gentlemen we herewith 
express our best thanks. 

From the very beginning we felt convinced that, on entering a field 
in which none of our number felt at home, we ran great risk of making 
mistakes and of drawing erroneous conclusions, if we did not eall in the 
aid of competent persons at the right time. It soon became evident 
that the observations on the current would not only require theoretical 
knowledge and technical experience which we did not possess, but 
would also involve considerable expense, which our treasury was not 
able to bear. These difficulties, however, would only deter us from 
making the desired observations if if should appear that we could not 
have the help of competent persons. Our hope that the minister of 
public works would allow the expenses of these observations to be borne 
by his department was not put to shame, and by a letter from him, 
under date of August 26, 1881, we were authorized to enter into. an 
arrangement with the chief engineer of Zealand. Thanks to the kind 
assistance of this officer and of the district engineers stationed at Goes 
and Zierikzee, we had a preliminary conference on the subject, where we 
kad an opportunity to state the ideas which led us to the supposition 
that there must be some connection between the settling of the oyster 


1012 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [TI2] 


spat in certain localities and the local currents in such places, and to 
submit them to the greater experience of these gentlemen who were 
better acquainted with the Eastern Scheldt. After we had consulted 
with these gentlemen as to the best way of making the desired observa- 
tions, and had visited various points on the Eastern Scheldt, on the 16th 
of August, with them, we felt that we must-no longer trespass on their 
time, when (as mentioned above) we were gladdened by the letter from 
the minister, during the latter part of August. We intend to embody 
the results of these investigations in our final report as soon as they 
have been communicated to us. It is hardly necessary to say that, as 
long as we are not in possession of these results (we hope to receive 
them during the first months of the year 1882), no connection can be 
traced between them and the facts mentioned in this report, and that 
we cannot attempt to draw up a plan for the observations to be taken 
on the oyster beds during the following years, but that nevertheless we 
may entertain the hope that we may come to know some of those gen- 
eral laws which govern the distribution of the oyster in this and other 
localities. 

We have still to report our observations on the temperature and den- 
sity of the sea water. Prof. Buys Ballot, Director of the Meteorologi- 
cal Institute, told us that, if such observations taken at different points 
of the Scheldt were to be really valuable, they must be taken three 
times a day, at high water, low water, and at 2 p. m., by the sun-dial, 
when the heat of the sun is supposed to have exercised its most power- 
ful influence. In reporting such observations it should also be men- 
tioned what the state of the weather was at the time, as rain and wind 
may have a considerable influence on the temperature and density of 
the sea-water. 

As regards the areometer above referred to, and manufactured at 
Utrecht by Mr. Olland, Prof. Buys Ballot advised us to get in addition 
one of the large areometers which are used by the German ‘‘ Commis- 
sion for the investigation of the German waters” in the German Ocean, 
and which are fully described and highly praised in their official report. 
The relative value of these different instruments could, however, only 
be ascertained by practically testing them in the observations which we 
had before us. Mr. Steger, of Kiel (Germany), furnished us this instrument 
as well as a set of areometers, which had also been recommended by 
the German commission. In using these instruments it has been found 
desirable to make some slight modifications, which were made by the 
engineer of the torpedo service No. I. 

Prof. Buys Ballot also advised us to use the maximum and minimum 
thermometers according to the Negrettt and Zambra system. As the 
water in the Eastern Scheldt is, comparatively speaking, not very deep, 
he thought it would be sufficient to observe the temperature of the water 
in the areometer, provided it is sufficiently thick and is drawn up quick 


4 


[13] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1013 


enough not to allow any considerable quantity of sea water from higher 
layers to flow into it. 

In conclusion, we must mention that through Mr. W. Leemans, engi- 
neer, we obtained from the ministry of public works the loan of an iron 
areometer, which was subjected to a comparison with the above-men- 
tioned instrume ts, and which was used in the observations made at 
Tholeu, of which we shall speak later. 

We also employed a number of thermometers and areometers from 
the firm of Kipp, at Delft, likewise with the view of obtaining a knowl- 
edge of the instruments most suitable for our purpose. 

This will suffice to give an idea of the instruments with which we oper- 
ated, and we will only briefly refer to the method pursued in our opera- 
tions during the past summer. 

Thanks to the friendly assistance of the minister of marine, we got 
the promise of co-operating with us from Mr. J. F. van Kervel, retired 
lieutenant, Ist class, Netherlands Navy, and during the course of the 
summer we had ample opportunity to experience the great value of his 
services. From his former occupation, more familiar than any of our 
number with the use of physical and meteorological instruments, he was 
ever ready not only to give his advice regarding the most profitable way 
of making observations and the conclusions which might be drawn from 
such observations, but also to give his personal aid whenever he thought 
that his presence at any of our stations of observation might be of use 
in furthering our object. Also in August, when, through the kindness 
of the minister of war, we obtained the use of one of the steamers of 
the torpedo service at Brielle for two weeks for the purpose of making 
observations on the Hastern Scheldt (see the private report on the sub- 
ject), it was Mr. van Kervel who, in spite of the extremely unfavorable 
weather, gave his personal aid and attention to these observations. We 
herewith express to him our warmest thanks, and the hope that in the 
future we may count on his co-operation, without which our progress on 
this (to us) strange field would be considerably delayed, if not entirely 
stopped. 

The method and object of the last-mentioned observations were as 
follows: 

(1.) To ascertain to what modifications the temperature and saltness 
of the sea water in the Eastern Scheldt is subject: 

a. At different times. 
b. At different depths. 

(2.) To ascertain if these modifications are everywhere apparent to 
the same degree, and also if there is a noticeable difference in this re- 
spect between banks which are deep under the water and those which 
are occasionally dry. 

(3.) To ascertain whether there is any connection between these modi- 
fications and the phenomena of the current, as far as they have been 
observed by the engineers of the Department of Public Works. 


1014 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [14] 


(4.) To find whether there is any connection between the settling of a 
greater and smaller quantity of oyster spat and the following: 
a. The nature of the bottom. 
b. Phenomena of the current. 
ce. Changes in the temperature of the water; and, 
d. Changes in the density of the water. 

These four points, which are here given in the order in which the diffi- 
culty of their explanation increases, give an outline of the problem, the 
solution of which we are seeking. The fourth point at the same time 
indicates what results long-continued and carefully made comparative 
observations may possibly lead to. These results, however, will, in our 
opinion, not be reached in the near future, although we feel convinced 
that any positive results in this direction will not only be of importance 
to oyster culture in its present state, but will also serve as a guide in 
exploring other localities, where in former years profitable oyster fish- 
eries were carried on, which at present have entirely disappeared. 

From the causes already referred to we are stillless able to return an 
answer to the question mentioned under No. 3. Our observations of the 
temperature and density of the water are as yet not numerous enough, 
and in some respects not reliable enough, to justify us in basing upon 
them comparisons such as are there indicated. The observations with 
which we have been occupied during the past sumraer are principally 
those mentioned under Nos. land 2. As has been said before, we were 
obliged not only to determine the respective value of our different in- 
struments, but also to endeavor to arrive at some definite result as to 
the manner in which long-continued observations of this kind should be 
regulated—who should take such observations, and how they should 
betaken. Knowing that we could only spend a few short summer months 
in the localities where the observations must be taken, and fully aware 
of the great importance of obtaining full data also from other seasons 
of the year (especially autumn and spring), we made inquiries of a num- 
ber of oyster cultivators, whether among their employés suitable per- 
sons could be found who would permanently take charge of these obser- 
vations, and thus furnish us with the desired data. From different 
parties we obtained highly valuable aid in this respect. In the first 
place we must here mention Mr. Wagtho, of Tholen, who took observa- 
tions during the whole summer, and still continues to do so; further- 
more Messrs. ’. Leo de Leeuw, of Wemeldinge, C. L. de Meulemeester, of 
Bergen op Zoom, and the watchmen of the firms of Hagan & Brand and 
Bolier & de Groot. All of their observations, taken during the past 
year, have been tabulated, and will be appended to our first report in 
that shape. We shall, as a matter of course, in continuing these obser- 
vations, have to rely on the active co-operation of the oyster cultivators. 
‘The importance of their aid cannot be overestimated, and the results of 
such observations will undoubtedly gain in value, if based on a broad 
basis of facts, carefully and patiently gathered during a long period of 


[15] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1015 


time. We hardly need say, that the establishment of such stations of 
observation goes beyond the financial means of the Zoological Station. 
Private enterprise should therefore share this burden with us. 

The daily observations, which, as has been mentioned, are taken three 
times a day, are transmitted to us, and entered on specially-prepared 
forms. From these forms it will appear that the observations were not 
only taken at certain regular hours, but also at a uniform depth, which, 
at low water, was still 3 meters under the surface of the water. We 
thought that thereby we should increase the value of these observa- 
tions for drawing comparisons. 

Besides this series of observations, which were in part at least en- 
trusted to subordinates, Mr. van Kervel, during August, took a number 
of observations, with a view to obtaining the greatest possible degree of 
accuracy, by thus controling the observations taken at Tholen, Wemel- 
dinge, &c. These observations were unfortunately somewhat limited by 
the exceedingly unfavorable condition of the weather. We deem itim- 
portant to give the results of these observations in their entirety, as, in 
our opinion, furnishing important hints as to the method to be followed 
in future observations on the Hastern Scheldt.* 

Mr. van Kervel adds the following remarks to this table: 

“Tt is somewhat surprising that out of more than 30 careful observa- 
tions from which the table has been prepared, the difference of tem- 
perature between the bottom and surface water is so small, compared 
with the difference, observable in this respect, in the observations taken 
at Tholen and Wemeldinge.” 

We shall have to ascertain, by further observations, whether these 
differences are caused partly by the presence of a larger quantity of 
marsh water, and partly by the main current of the Hastern Scheldt 
which at Wemeldinge flows close to the bank. 

The figures given in said table furnish ample food for thought; they 
prove that, at the time when these observations were taken by means 
of excellent instruments and with the greatest care, the differences of 
temperature at various points of the Eastern Scheldt, between the bot- 
tom and the surface, were very small and in some cases hardly notice- 
able. 

The water in the deep places and that in the shallow places does not show 
any considerable difference of temperature, whilst there was a great differ- 
ence in the depth at which the observations were taken, this difference rang- 
ing from 2 to 21 meters. 

This important result will, during the coming year, be made the sub- 
ject of new and careful observations, taken as frequently and in as many 
places as possible. If this preliminary result seems to be confirmed, this 
will prove that there is no need of so many stations of observation on 
the Scheldt as we had imagined in the beginning, and that, if, only a 
good point of observation has once been selected, additional observa- 


*See table at the end of this paper. 


1016° REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [16] 


tions of the bottom temperature may not be necded for drawing up an 
exact table of the changes of temperature to which the water on the oys- 
ter beds is subject. 

The observations relative to the saltness of the water will, during the 
coming year, be brought into a more definite relation to the results of 
the observations on the current taken by the engineers. 

The two series of observations, both those on the temperature and 
those on the saltness of the water, should go on simultaneously with 
investigations as to the quantity of oyster spat, not which settles on 
this or that oyster bed, but which is found in given portions of the water 
of the Scheldt. We do not conceal from ourselves the great difficulty 
of investigating this latter point, but we feel convinced that this will 
be the most certain way of obtaining really reliable results. During 
the course of the winter we propose to study out a method by which 
such investigations could be made. The experiments in that direction 
made in 1881 have not yet led to results definite enough in their charae- 
ter to enable us to make a final decision as to the best method of carry- 
ing on these observations. Simultaneously with these investigations 
careful observations should be taken of the quantity of oyster spat 
found on the different beds during the year, not only on the so-called 
“tile beds” (where tiles are employed as collectors), but also in different 
parts of the eastern Scheldt. 

We have been informed by many persons of experience in these mat- 
ters that circumstances of a local character (still water near the main 
eurrent, the emptying of two currents, as at the Hendracht, deep 
holes in the bottom, &c.) are considered to have great influence on the 
settling of the spat; and this also formed the starting point of some of 
our consultations with the engineers in regard to observations on the cur- 
rent. We shall refer to this matter more fully in our final report; here 
we will only mention what has been communicated to Mr. van Kervel 
relative to the settling of spat on those portions of oyster beds where 
his observations were taken. (See the table.) 

(1.) The portion of lot 324, near the pit or hole, is considered to be 
very favorable to the settling of oyster spat, especially near the edge 
(more particularly the northern edge), and also along the upper portion 
of the steep walls of the hole. 

In the deep portion of the hole very few oysters are found. (See 
table, column of observations, relative to the nature of the bottom). 
On the portion of lot 324, referred to, no oysters are planted. 

(2.) Oyster spat settles very freely south of the ‘‘ Laagte.” 

(3.) Oyster spat settles in considerable quantities in the northeastern 
portion of lot 267, and seems to flourish better there than in the north- 
western portion of lot 266. 

(4.) Also in lot 231 and in its vicinity oyster spat is said to settle very 
freely. 

(5.) It is well known that large quantities of oyster spat settle in the 


[17] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1017 


“ Hendracht,” from some distance north of the Vosmeer Ferry to the so- 
ealled ‘ Nachtegaal”; this applies especially to the whole of lot 38 in the 
“‘ Nachtegaal.” : 

In the above we have endeavored to give a brief sketch of our past . 
and our future activity; and the reader will thereby get an idea of the 
slow progress of our investigations, chiefly owing to the circumstance 
that so far no definite way whatever has been marked out for us. An 
investigation like the present requires time and patience, especially in 
the beginning; it is certain, however, that as we begin more and more 
to reach the firm basis of reliable observations we shall be able to report 
more rapid progress. Once more, briefly put, the questions which we 
must have steadily in view are these: What influence do the tempera- 
ture and saltness of the water have during the period when the larva 
are passed from the mother oyster? Which way does the spat travel 
when passed from the mother oyster, and in what manner is this way 
determined by circumstances directly connected with current, temper- 
ature, and saltness, and how can it be controlled by means of these 
data? What influence do these same circumstances exercise on the full- 
grown oyster. 

As regards the study of those animals which live on the same beds as 
the oysters, as their enemies, parasites, friends, or messmates, we have 
to present the following reports: 


I. InFusortA.—(Report by Dr. J. van Rees.) 


With regard to those infusoria ciliata, which I observed near the 
oysters, I shall for the present confine myself to the following short 
notice. The fauna of the brackish water of the Scheldt, in general, differs 
but little from the fauna of the North Sea, as far as I have learned to 
know it at the Helder, Flushing, and Nieuwediep. 

Besides some few forms described by Claparéde, Lachmann and Stein, 
a few of those varieties were found which Cohn has observed in the 
water of the Baltic, and a description of which he has published ;* but 
his description is far from systematic, and leaves much to be desired, 
especially as regards the illustrations. 

Among the forms of infusoria which I observed, there were the fol- 
lowing: 

Of the group of the HALOTRICH&: a fewsmall varieties of Lacrymaria, 
Amphileptus and Leionotus ; (Amphileptus meleagris Cl. Lachm., which I 
had found in the Helder as a parasite on Carchesium polipinum, did not 
occur here) also Glaucoma scintillans, Cyclidium glaucoma, and Cyclidium 
elongatum Cl. Lachm., erroneously called by Cohn with a new name, 
Limbus velifer. Concerning this last-mentioned kind I must say that 
they do not have one but two pseudo-membranes consisting of very fine 
cilia, which extend from the front part of the animal to the outer side of 
the little oval mouth. 


s ss “ Zeitschrift fiir Wissenschaftliche Zoologie,” Vol. XVI, 1866. 


\ 
1018 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [18] 


Of Hypotrricu# I found Chilodon cucullulus a few varieties of Hrvilia 
and Dysteria (not quite the same forms which I observed on the coast). 
Related to these there is another form, also new in our fauna, and which 
js principally distinguished by dark grains of pigment scattered irregu- 
larly all through the body, and found in unusually large masses in a 
certain place close under the surface, and only covered with a strongly 
convex somewhat broad elevation of the ectosarc* entirely free from 
grains, which doubtless answers the purpose of a lens. This variety is 
moreover distinguished by an unusually wide and perfectly straight 
esophagus. 

Among the few ASPIpISsc.z I noticed Aspidisca limbifera which I had 
also observed in the Helder, and which is distinguished by a fine wavy 
hem running along the right side and round the edge of the back part. 

Of the EupLoTES I found here, as well as near the coast, a variety 
closely related to Stéin’s Huplotes harpa (from the Baltic), and distin- 
guished from this one principally by a more regular inner edge of the 
peristome (‘ Stirnrand” of Stein). Just as in the coast-waters I again 
found two sizes of this variety closely resembling each other, and but 
few intermediary stages. Of Huplotes longipes Cl. Lachm., recently de- 
seribed by me in an article, “ Zur Kenntniss der-Bewimperung der Hypo- 
trichen Infusorién,” 1 found large numbers. I likewise found Stein’s 
Uronychia transfuga resembling the Campylopus paradoxus of Claparéde 
and Lachmann. On account of its restlessness this variety presents 
unusual difficulties to the observer. It is my opinion, however, that all 
three varieties belong to the same genus (Uronychia). 

Of the genus STYLOPLOTES, which is related to the HUPLOTES and 
URONYCHLA, I found, besides Styloplotes grandis mihi (also described in 
the above-mentioned article), and a small variety which I had noticed 
in Niewwediep, a third kind, but only in small numbers. 

Besides some small OXY TRICHIN& I also found the beautiful Oxytricha 
saltans (Actinotricha saltans, Cohn), which immediately strikes the eye by 
its four strong adoral ciliary plates. I also noticed some varieties of 
the group STICHOTRICHA and UROLEPTUS, amongst the rest the Oxy- 
tricha auricularis Cl. Lachm., but, as on the coast, in very small number. 
Cohiwvs Oxytricha flava, which does not belong to that group, but rather 
to that of UROSTYLA, of a beautiful orange, red, or brown color, was 
also found here, but not in as large numbers as in the sea. Cohn, in 
his Ulustrations, does not show the proper distribution of color on this 
animal; the color is exclusively found in small but very distinct little 
balls or bags, which refract the light, and are arranged in rows. The 
very rapid changes of form to which this animal is subject, make it 
very difficult to make accurate observations of it. 

Of the group of PERITRICHA I found only a few forms, a few varie- 
ties of the genus Vorticella and Zodthamnium, the same as on the coast. 


* Cf. foot-note on p. 6. The same remark applies here as to entoderm and mesoderm.— 
TRANSLATOR. 


wy 


[19] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1019 


Vaginicola crystallina Ehbr., and Cothurnia nodosa Cl. Lachm., besides a 
large number of intermediate forms, were also very common. Besides 
these I noticed a Strombidium and the elegant Halteria pulex Cl. Lachm. 
(without any good reason called Acarella siro by Cohn). 

Of HETEROTRICHZ no trace could be discovered. 

As my knowledge of a number of important varieties is still very de- 
fective, I hope that another prolonged visit to the Scheldt will enable 
me to fill many gaps. 


If. SPONGES.—(Report by Dr. G. C. J. Vosmaer.) 


In the beginning of Juiy, when I had not yet begun my work at the 
station, Dr. A. Horst wrote me, that at Yerseke he had found on the so- 
called collectors a large number of calcareous sponges. Thanks to his 
forethought I am now in possession of a large number of them. When 
later in the season I searched for sponges at Bergen op Zoom, I found in 
Mr. de Meulemeester’s pits the same kind which I recognized as Sycandra 
ciliata (trans. var. coronata), according to Haeckel’s terminology. In ex- 
amining a large number of specimens, among them some very large 
ones (up to 80 millimeters) I became doubtful whether Sycandra ciliata H. 
and coronata H. can be considered as two different species, and whether 
they should not, as in former times, be looked upon as two varieties 
of one and the same species. The circumstance that I had to class all 
the specimens which I examined, under the “transitory variety,” seems 
to speak strongly in favor of the last-mentioned opinion. I hope to con- 
tinue my observations with the view of forming a definite opinion on 
this subject. To whatever kind these sponges may belong, the fact 
that calcareous sponges occur on our coast is entirely new. It is also 
peculiar that all such objects are found on the lower side of the collec- 
tors, and that they therefore hang with their oscule downward. 

Another important discovery was that of another sponge belonging 
to the family of the Chalinea, which is probably identical with.Chalinula 
Jertilis, Kell., 1880. This sponge, which is likewise new in our fauna, 
appears as a light brownish-red crust on the oyster shells, especially on 
the large oysters called “ paardepooten” =“ horse-feet.”. Most of them 
seemed to come from Lot 250, near Yerseke, and some were aiso found 
by me in the “‘ Hendracht” (Lot 18) near Tholen. I hope that I shall be 
able at some future time to give a fuller account of these sponges. 

A kind of sponge, found in many places on our coast, and called by 
Johnston Halichondria panicea—a name which is no longer employed— 
is also found amongst oysters. 

In how far either of these kinds of sponges is healthful or hurtful to 
the oyster, cannot be determined at the present time. 


It. Worms.—(Report by Dr. R. Horst.) 


The varieties of worms mentioned below were found on the oyster- 
beds during the past summer. This list does not, however, pretend to 


1020 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [20] 


give all the species of Annelida living on the oyster-beds; for no one 
had specially oceupied himself in gathering specimens of this group. 
The most frequent kind was Nereis pelagica L., which is very common 
on our coasts; some specimens wore their remarkable wedding gar- 
ment (Hpithoken). But few specimens were found of Nereis longissima 
Johnst., and Nereis Dumerilii Aud. & Edw.; two of the latter kind were 
found in one oyster. The Phyllodoce family was represented by Phyllo- 
doce maculata Jolinst. and KHulalia virides Oersted, also found in other 
portions of our waters. Of the Polynoé family I found Lepidonotus 
squamatus L. almost as frequently as Nereis pelagica, also Polynoé impar 
Johnst. (Hvarne impar Malmegr.) less frequent than the preceding, and 
Polynoé cirrata Aud. & Edw. (Harmothoé imbricata Malmgr.) I also 
found a number of very small specimens (only measuring 3 millimeters) 
of Pholoé minuta Oersted, also belonging to this group. Capitella capi-° 
tata, van Ben. repeatedly observed on our coasts, was also found here. 


IV. ARTIOULATES.—(Report by Dr. P. P. C. Hoek.) 


The number of articulates which have been observed is very small, 
and it is certain that it is only a small portion of those which occur 
here. We will mention the following: 

(1.) Cirripeds. 
Balanus crenatus Brug., very common on oyster shells. 
Sacculina carcint Thomps. Only found on the lower portion of 
Carcinus moenas L. 
(2.) Arthrostracans. 
a. Lemodipods : 

Caprella linearis Lin. A few specimens of the small va. 

riety were found near Kattendijke and in the Hendracht. 
b. Amphipods: 

Microdeuteropus Spec.—Probably a new variety; chiefly 
remarkable on account of its being generally found in 
the slits of the folds of the oyster shell, between the 
beard of the oyster, &e. 

Gammarus marinus, Leach. Very common near Bergen op 
Zoom found on different kinds of fucus, &c.* 

Allorchestes imbricatus sp., Bate. Found near Wieren, to- 
gether with Gammarus marinus. 
Talitrus locusta Latr. Everywhere between and under the 
stones in the oyster pits. 
ce. Isopods: 
Ligia oceanica Lin. Very common with Zalitrus along the 


stones. 
¥ 
*Prof. W. F. R. Suringar, of Leiden, was kind enough to determine for me three kinds 
of fucus which are very common near Bergen op Zoom, viz, Fucus vesiculosus, L., Fucus 
platycarpus, Thuret, and Ozothallia vulgaris, Dene (Fucus nodosus, L.). 


[21] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1021 


3. Thoracostracans. 
a. Macrourans: 
Homarus vulgaris Bel. One specimen was found on the 
Yersche oyster bed. 
Crangon vulgaris Fabr. Below Wemeldinge, in the Eastern 
Scheldt. 
b. Anomurans: 
Pagurus bernhardus Lin. Found here and there in the East- 
ern Scheldt. 
¢. Brachyurans: 
Carcinus menas lL. Very common on the oyster grounds. 
Hyas coarctatus Leach, var. A dark-red variety with a 
peculiarly felt-like body was found once. 


APPENDIX: Pycnogonida. 


Pycnogonum litorale, Strom. Some specimens were found near Kat- 
tendijke, below Wemeldinge, and in some other places. 


V.—MOLLUSKS. 


As has already been said at the end of our private report, only the 
most common kinds of mollusks are observed here. As relating to 
this part of our investigation, we give below a letter from the secre- 
tary of the commission, dated November 9, 1881, and addressed to the 
superintendent of the Scheldt and Zeeuww-stream fisheries: 


LEIDEN, November 9, 1881. 
To the Superintendent of Fisheries in the Scheldt and the Zeeww-stream, at 

Tholen: 

In reply to your letter No. 6402, of June 7, 1881, and the one further 
explaining it, of 12th July, 1881, No. 6482, the Commission of the Zoo- 
logical Station has the honor to report as follows: : 

The inquiry addressed by you to the Commission relates to the oceur- 
rence of the “ Drill”* on oysters imported from Arcachon and planted- 
on Herkingsche Banks. As youareof opinion that the “ Drill” has not 
been found in our waters till now, you have requested us to make an 
investigation of the subject, with the view to ascertain whether this 
animal has been introduced with the oysters referred to, and if so, has 
of course remained alive during the transportation. 

On the 14th July, 1831, I personally visited the Herkingsche Banks, in 
company with one of your officers. Thanks to the kind aid of Messrs. 
van den Berg, who rent several lots on these banks, we were enabled to 
examine on some of these lots everything which, by means of a scraper, 
had been brought up from the bottom in our presence. I examined on 


*The French word ‘‘Perceur” is given in the original, no Dutch translation of it 
having been attempted. Mr. Ryder translates it by this word “ Drill.’—TRANSLATOR, 


{022 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 


this occasion a very large number of oysters, and on none of them did 
I find the peculiarly-shaped egg-shells of the “« Drill”; neither did I find 
either young or old, living or dead specimens of the animal itself. 

We did not continue this investigation, principally because we felt 
that it would be fruitless. Considering that, even in the most unfa- 
vorable case, the quantity of “ Drills” is very small, we doubt whether a 
continuation of this investigation would be of any use. The chance 
was very slender that by dredging we would find either the animal 
itself or its young; and, on the other hand, as long as a single oyster 
and asingle foot of ground remained unexamined the circumstance of 
our not finding any “ Drills” would not justify us in drawing any con- 
clusions as to their non-occurrence in these waters. 

Such theoretical considerations would, however, not have prevented 
us from seeking greater certainty on this point by a second investi- 
gation, if it had not been for the fact that an accurate investigation of 
the entire mollusk fauna of our country might involve questions which 
should be approached with the utmost caution. Supposing we had ob- 
tained the absolute certainty that a ‘ Drill” was living or had lived 
among the oysters planted on the Herkingsche Banks, this would by no 
means prove incontrovertibly that this ‘‘Drill” had been recently intro- 
duced from the coast of France among Arcachon oysters. 

The “ Drill” which is referred to in the above is the Murex erinaceus, 
L. The Murex tarentinus, Lamark, is, according to some writers, a 
variety of the same genus, found in more southern seas, the Mediterra- 
nean, &e., whilst according to others (among them Gwyn Jeffreys, an 
authority of the first rank), Murex tarentinus is nothing more nor less 
than a full-grown Murex erinaceus. This animal is quite common on the 
coast of France, from the south as far as Boulogne; on the coast of 
Great Britain it is found on rocky bottoms, from the tide line as far as 
the region of the Laminarians, both on the southern and western coasts 
of England and Scotland, and on the coasts of Ireland and Wales. This 
animal has also been repeatedly observed on the eastern coast of Eng- 
land and Scotland, in the mouth of the Thames, near Yarmouth, 
Searborough, Northumberland, Durham, in the Bay of Berwick, near 
Aberdeen, and in the Moray Virth (Gwyn Jeffreys). It is also found 
near Ostend and Blankenberg, on the coast of Belgium, although not 
as frequently. (1. de Malsine observed a live specimen on aray near 
Ostend.) As far as the coast of the Netherlands is concerned, Herklots 
says this animal belongs to its fauna, without telling us, unfortunately, 
where he has observed it. The museumof the Zeeuw Association, at Mid- 
dleburg, possesses a specimen which came from the North Sea. I must 
also mention, in conclusion, that, according to Lovén, this animal is found 
in the Kattegat, but not farther north, either on the coast of Scandinavia 
or in the open North Sea. The fact of its having been found near Yar- 
mouth is only given on the authority of the ‘‘ Commission zur Unter- 
suchung der deutschen Meere”—Comumnission for investigating the German 
Seas. 


. [23] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1023 


As this animal is found in all these different localities, it will not 
astonish us that it occasionally occurs on the coast of the Netherlands, 
and, in fact, it is rather surprising that this animal is so rare in our coast 
fauna. We shall find an explanation of this circumstance by examin- 
ing the nature of the bottom; the Murex erinaceus does not live ona 
sandy or clay bottom, but shows a decided preference for rocky bot- 
toms. That our oyster grounds have so far been free from this animal, 
which is so hurtful to the oyster, must in the first place be ascribed to 
the bottom, and in the second place to their shallowness. We are all 
the more inclined to embrace this opinion when we remember that the 
Zeeuw oyster grounds for more than a century (Job Baster) have 
been stocked not only with oysters imported from Arcachon (as the 
oyster cultivators at Brwinisse assured me they have worked with Arca- 
chon oysters for several years), but also with young oysters from Great 
Britain, and that the “ Drill” could easily have been introduced from the 
last-mentioned country. The scattered cases where the Murex referred 
to have been observed on the coast of the Netherlands may possibly have 
been caused by its having been introduced with other shell fish; if 
this could be ascertained beyond a doubt, we would possess a proof (al- 
though only a negative one) of the correctness of our supposition that 
the non-occurrence or rare occurrence of the “ Drill” must principally be 
ascribed to conditions existing on our oyster-grounds which are not 
favorable to the development of this animal. 

If we are to have a more thorough examination of the oysters im- 
ported from Arcachon (and other points on the coasts of France and 
Great Britain), and planted on the Zeeuw oyster grounds, with the 
view to ascertain whether or not the “Drill” is found there, we deem it 
necessary to answer the following question: “Must the Murex erinaceus 
L., even now be considered as a representative—though a very scarce 
one at that—of the fauna of the Eastern Scheldt and the neighboring 
waters ?” Both for this investigation and for an accurate determination 
of the localities where natural oyster and muscle grounds are found, an 
exhaustive examination, from a zoological point of view, of the East- 
ern Scheldt seems absolutely necessary. The matter of undertaking 
such an investigation will form the subject of serious consideration by 
the commission. 

Very respectfully, 
Dr. P. Pi€; HORK, 
Secretary of the Commission of the Zoological Station.” 


The above appendix will, in the opinion of the commission, give an 
idea of the present condition of the investigation. In said appendix it 
‘has been mentioned repeatedly that in our final report, which will be 
published when the entire investigation has been brought to a close, 
all the results will be given in full, if necessary, accompanied by illus- 
trations and maps. ' 


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1024 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


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1025 


NETHERLANDS. 


[25] 


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[26] 


REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 


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XXXV.—OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 


By Dr. P. P. C. HogK.* 


{From Cireular No. 2, 1879, of the Deutsche Vischerei- Verein. 


In his interesting work, Die Austern und die Austernwirthschaft, Ber- 
lin, 1877 (Oysters and Oyster Cultivation), Professor Mobius returns 
a negative answer to the question, whether the artificial cultivation of 
the oyster, according to the French system, can be carried on in Ger- 
man coast-waters; and assigns as the principal reasons for his conelu- 
sions the unfavorable conditions of tide and temperature. 

Many a German reader will, therefore, be astonished to learn that 
oyster cultivation is very successfully carried on on the coast of the 
Netherlands. I have recently published a treatise, in the Dutch lan- 
guage on oyster cultivation in the Netherlands, as compared with such 
cultivation in France, and the unsuccessful attempts in that direction 
made in England and on the German coasts, and at the request of Pro- 
zessor Mobius, I shall here reproduce, in German translation, that por- 
tion of my treatise which relates to oyster cultivation in the Nether- 
lands. 

The rise in the price of oysters had produced on the coast of the 
Netherlands, asin other countries, a system of fishing, which might well 
be termed plundering or robbing, and the number of oysters decreased 
very perceptibly in consequence. The Tevel oyster-beds have been al- 
most exhausted, although a few years ago they enjoyed the reputation 
of possessing a great wealth of oysters. Thus a whole ship-load of young 
Texel oysters was sold in 1835 at mark 3.25 to mark 4 (77-95 cents). In 
1836, Texel fishermen brought large oysters to Hamburg and Bremen 
and sold them at mark 1.90 to mark 2.60 (45 to 60 cents); besides these 
they sold 2,000,000 oysters to Amsterdam merchants at about 80 pfennig 
(20 cents) a ivi ee These oysters were sold in the Amsterdam oyster- 
saloons at 2 mark (47 cents) a hundred. For a hundred oysters of the 
same kind 7 mark ($1.66) were paid in 1870, and ten mark ($2.38) in 
1875. 

When the Dutch Government, in 1870, began to give attention to the 
subject, the number of oysters had greatly decreased, not only on the 
Texel oyster -beds, but also on those of the coast of Groningen, Friesland, 


“*Dr. P. P. C. Hoek; in jee Ginn aubibrncuckt in en Niederlanden.—Translated 


by HERMAN JACOBSON, 
[1} 1029 


1080 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


and Zeeland. After some hesitation the government resolved in the year 
1870 to prohibit general fishing on the large Yerseke oyster-bed in Zeeland 
and on the large oyster-beds in the Lauwer Sea, and to rent out these 
beds in small portions. This measure was both warmly defended and 
bitterly assailed. It is natural that a person owning oyster-beds—even 
if it should only be temporarily—will take much greater care to keep up 
the value of his oyster-beds, and if possible to increase their value, than 
fishermen who take oysters wherever they please. These latter will of 
course endeaver to obtain in the shortest possible time the greatest pos- 
sible number of oysters, because they feel convinced that every oyster 
which they leave on the beds will increase the wealth, not of the oyster- 
bed, but that of the fisherman who comes after them. Many persons, 
however, viewed the subject from a philanthropic point of view, and 
maintained that it would be very hard for the “ poor” fishermen, who 
live on the daily result of their fisheries, if general fishing on the oyster- 
beds were prohibited, because it would require some capital, if ever so 
small, to rent a portion of an oyster-bed. But regard to the interests 
of the entire population gained the victory, and at the present time, 
when hardly ten years have elapsed since the introduction of that 
measure, every one feels thankful for it. In the beginning the rents 
were not too high even for fishermen of moderate means, especially if 
they went shares with some neighbors or friends. ‘Thus as early as 1870 
some fishermen of Tholen rented portions of an oyster-bed, and did a 
good business. 

But only the Zeeland oyster-beds have recovered from their conditions 
of decadence, and have attained to a formerly unknown degree of pros- 
perity. Oysters are occasionally fished on the Texel oyster-beds, but 
they are so few in number that itis hardly worth the trouble. The 
Groningen and Friesland beds in the Lauwer Sea have of late years 
been entirely abandoned, although they afforded good fishing in former 
times; principally because by the closing of the Reit Diep, a canal which 
communicated with the Lauwer sea, the Zoutkamp beds in the neigh- 
borhood of Vostmahan and in the Dokkuwerdiep have become entirely 
worthless. 

Besides the oyster-beds which are rented out, there are still in Zee- 
land some public oyster-beds which do not seem to have undergone 
any material change during the last few years. The yield of these 
beds is not the same every year, but in 1875 it was very good. 

During the summer months access to the oyster-beds is, at least ofti- 
cially, prohibited. But the police supervision leaves much to be de- 
sired, and in 1875 large numbers of young oysters were taken from 
these beds during the period of prohibition, and were sold to the les- 
sees of portions of oyster-beds for the purpose of restocking their beds. 

The rented oyster-beds, however, are the ones which deserve our 
special attention. This combination of oyster-beds forms the so-called 
Yerseke Bank in the eastern Schelde, between the coasts of South Beve- 


[3] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1081 


land and Tholen, and has a surface area of 2,000 hectares (4,942 acres), 
but only a portion of this area is well adapted to the cultivation of 
oysters; the remaining portion, the so-called “flat bank” (platte bank) 
has natural oyster-beds, and fishing is there carried on with drag-nets. 
On this. bank experiments in oyster cultivation were made as early as 
1870. On the whole, the method introduced into France by Coste is 
followed ; and consequently there is no exclusively artificial oyster cul- 
tivation. 

The method referred to consists, as is well known, in catching young 
oysters and placing them in other portions of the bank where they are 
not exposed to so many dangers, and where consequently they have a 
better chance of growing and developing. Only in rare cases do these 
oysters reach the age of sexual maturity; for the following years re- 
course must therefore be had to the original oyster-beds. I will, in 
this connection, briefly describe how young oysters are taken and to 
what further treatment they are subjected. 

In places where oysters are found and which are not too deep, dif- 
ferent objects are thrown here and there into the water in the begin- 
ning of summer, with the view of offering to the young oysters a suit- 
able surface to which they may cling. The places most favorable ta 
this purpose are those in which, when the tide is out, enough water re- 
mains to allow the objects to which the oysters adhere to remain under 
water at all times. In the beginning a great variety of articles was 
used for this purpose: dishes covered with cement, milk-pans, sugar- 

‘bowls, and during the very first year 20,000 tiles covered with cement. 
It soon appeared that these tiles were best adapted to the purpose in 
view, but in the beginning the attempts to loosen the oysters proved 
unsuccessful in many cases, as many of the tender shells broke during 
the process. With the view of remedying this evil the tiles are at 
present covered with a crust of cement several millimeters in thick- 
ness, which can easily be removed, leaving a small piece of cement 
adhering to every oyster when loosened from the tile. As soon as the 
winter is past the collectors are removed from the bank and the young 
oysters are taken off. 

The number of young oysters adhering to one collector (e. g., a tile) 
differs of course very much. In 1875 the average number per tile 
was 25; this, however, was an exceptionally large number, for on an 
average there are not more than ten oysters to a tile. After the 
young oysters have been loosened from the tiles, they must be scat- 
tered in suitable places so that later they may easily be found again. 
In this way a portion at least of the young oysters are treated, viz, 
those which have attained a certain degree of hardiness ;, tue remainder 
are placed in specially prepared boxes, some of which are placed on 
the banks, and others in the parks. These boxes rest on piles, and 
their top and bottom are covered with a wire grating; inside there is 
a partition likewise formed by wire grating. In these boxes the young 


1032 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. | [4] 


oysters are protected from crabs and other enemies, whilst the water 
has free access and supplies all the food required. 

The oyster parks or ponds are specially intended to protect the young 
oysters from the cold of winter, which is very hurtful to young oysters, 
especially when they are in shallow water. In his work (referred to 
above) Professor Mébius enters very fully into this question, and it is 
therefore not necessary for me to dwell on it any more. 

Oysters which have been treated in the manner above described are 
ready for the market in the second year. It is but natural that only 
a portion of the young oysters which have been scattered should grow up 
and become fit for the market. The firm of Meulemuster & Co., in Ber- 
gen op Zoom, which owns one of the largest establishments for oyster 
cultivation on the Yerzeke Bank, forwarded between 2 to 3 millions of 
oysters to the market in 1875. This number was the result of 123 mil- 
lions young oysters placed on the bank during the season 1873-774. 
About 70 per cent., therefore, had perished,* partly through the low 
temperature, but partly also by the numerous enemies of the oyster, 
prominent among which is the star-fish. In 1876 the same firm sold 
2 millions oysters, which in the beginning of the season brought 80 marks 
($19.04) a thousand, and somewhat later 100 marks ($23.80). These fig- 
ures will convey an idea of the extent of the oyster business done by this 
firm. The total number of oysters which came into the market from 
these rented oyster-beds in 1875 was about 30 millions. From the offi- 
cial reports of the Netherlands Commission of Sea-fisheries (from which 
the above figures are taken), we are enabled to get the exact number 
of oysters which, in 1876, were furnished by the natural and artificial 
oyster-beds in the Zeeland waters (viz, 36 millions), but it is impossible 
to ascertain how many were furnished alone by the artificial beds. In 
1877 the yield was not quite 10 millions, whilst in 1878 it was much 
larger. The market price in 1877 was, in the beginning of the season, 
135 marks ($32.13), and somewhat later 160 marks ($38.08) a thousand. 
Good and bad years alternate, as in most other branches of industry. 
The peculiar feature of the oyster cultivation, as carried on in the Neth- 
erlands, is this, that two years ahead it can be ascertained with a toler- 
able degree of probability whether the oyster harvest will be a success 
ora failure. In 1877 a large number of young oysters were placed on 
the banks, and the winter 4877~78 was a mild one, so that in all prob- 
ability 1879 will be a good oyster year. The demand for Dutch oysters, 


*Ttissaid that in France about 80 percent of the young oysters become fit for market. 
This seems to be owing to the circumstance that in the French oyster establishments 
the oysters, which have adhered to different objects in autumn, «are not taken off 
in spring, but are allowed to cling to the collectors for a whole year. In em- 
ploying this method twice the number of tiles is required, therefore a larger working 
capital. Last year (1878) attempts were made in the Zeeland oyster establishments 
to introduce the French method in the eastern Scheldt, and, as it seems, with good 
results. 


[5] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1033 


especially in Germany and England, is so unlimited, that even in the 
most favorable years a good price can be obtained. 

The above will, at any rate, furnish sufficient proof that oyster culti- 
vation, according to the methods described, can be carried on very 
successfully in the Zeeland waters. It is very difficult, however, to 
answer satisfactorily the question, Why the same methods which on the 
Duteh coast have been productive of such good results have proved 
entire failures on the German and English coasts? As far as I can see, 
there are three causes which contribute to this result: (1) the happy 
idea of our government to rent out the Zeeland oyster-beds in small 
portions; (2) the fine business qualities of the men who engaged in this 
enterprise with genuine Dutch perseverance, simplicity, and zeal; and 
(3) the quality of the bottom, and the exceedingly favorable conditions 
of temperature and tide. The three last-mentioned causes are the ones 
to which these favorable results are mainly owing, and I therefore 
regret it all the more that I am not able to give further information on 
this subject. 

In this short article it was only my purpose to direct the attention 
of other nations to oyster cultivation as carried on in the Netherlands. 
As regards statistical data and exhaustive descriptions of the methods 
employed, I refer the reader to the respective reports. 


CIRCULAR OF THE NETHERLANDS ZOOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION. 


e HONORED Sir: The Commission of the Zoological Station intends 
during the coming summer months to inaugurate a series of investiga- 
tions, on as extensive a scale as possible, relative to the anatomy, prop- 
agation, development, mode of life, &c., of the oyster. From the second 
half of April opportunity will be offered both at the principal station 
at Bergen op Zoom and at the branch station at Wemeldinge in South 
Beveland, to make such investigation. 

A number of persons having already declared themselves willing to 
take part in these investigations, the commission is of opinion that a 
division of labor would greatly increase the chances of a favorable re- 
sult, and I have therefore been directed to request that you will take 
an active part in these investigations. The commission will supply 
you with all the aids necessary for such an investigation, excepting opti- 
cal instruments; and I would ask you, in case you should be inclined 
to comply with this request, to inform me as soon as possible. 

The only condition imposed upon you by the commission in asking 
you to share in this undertaking is that you will consent to furnish us, 
after the investigations have been brought to a close, with as full a re- 
port as possible, accompanied by the necessary illustrations, We., and 
in shape for publication. It is impossible for the commission to state 
at the present time in what shape the results of your investigation will 


1054 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES [6] 


be published. The commission, nevertheless, does not hesitate to make 
itself responsible (1) that the results of your investigations, if suitable, 
shall really be published, and (2) that whatever you furnish us shall 
be published under your name. 

In order to give you an idea of the extent of the investigations which 
the commission have in view, I give below an outline of our programme, 
and at the same time inform you for what portions of it we have already 
received offers. 

(L.) To prepare as complete a list as possible of all the works relating 
to the oyster, accompanied by short references, and to publish this list 
at an early date. The commission will take charge of this matter, and 
hopes to have the work ready in time so that it can be used during the 
coming summer. 

2.) To subject to an exhaustive investigation the anatomy of the 
oyster, and more especially that of its generative organs. Dr. Hoek and 
Dr. Vosmaer have this subject in charge. 

(3.) To examine the contents of the stomach of the oyster, with the 
view of attaining absolute certainty as to its food. 
 (4.) To trace the development of the oyster : 

(a.) The egg, from the time it has become impregnated till the 
young oyster leaves it. Dr. Horst and 

(b.) The young oyster at the surface of the water until it 
goes toward the bottom, Prof. Hoffmann and 

(c.) The young oyster after it has adhered to an object, Dr. 
Hubrecht and ——— 

(d.) To determine the limits of the migration of the young, 
oyster, Dr. Van Rees and 

(5.) ‘To find the physical and meteorological conditions under which 
the young oyster leaves the egg and adheres to various objects, and to 
trace the normal course of life of an oyster, Dr. Hubrecht and 

(6.) To study the life and habits of those animals which share the 
bank with the oysters, either as enemies, parasites, friends, or compan- 
ions. 


Protozoans tee ss tee ee meee Dr. Van Rees. 
Sponges, echinoderms, &e.......-- Dr. Vosmaer. 
VViOTRINS 8 eee eet ees ue kee Dr. Flrst. 
ATtiCulates’ = cee See sites eet oe Dr. Hoek. 
MOIMSKS). 3. SS Seno tne eeperee nena : 
ASV ga Pmt = 2 Rare See ON ee eR Dr. Hubrecht. 


(7.) To answer practical questions relative to the industry of oyster 
cultivation not given under any of the six preceding heads. 

The commission hopes that sooner or later at least two persons will 
be engaged in the investigation of each of the above subjects, and 
would state here that even as regards those subjects for which one or 
two persons have been mentioned, nothing definite has been settled, so 


[7] OYSTER CULTIVATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. 1035 


that, if any of these subjects should offer special attractions to you, you 


will very probably be assigned to it. 
As soon as all answers have been received, I shall address a more 


definite letter to you, so that we may arrive at some positive under- 
standing with you. 


Very respectfully, yours, 
Dre Ba bs C..HORK 


Secretary of the Commission of the Zoological Station. 


LEIDEN, March 16, 1881. 


PPE a We 
en a 
Art sOAc) 


Ee ehnaitt 
Rank Aa 
Hed oo 


Wee 
nie 


XXXVI.—ON THE REASON FOR AN EXTRAORDINARILY RICH 
PRODUCTION OF OYSTERS IN A NATURAL BASIN.* 


By Prof. H. H. Rascu. 


After repeated requests from many persons living in the counties of 
Stavanger, North and South Bergenhus and Romsdal, who, because of 
the great diminution of the oyster fisheries, had in the space of the last 
year invested considerable sums to re-establish them by the method em- 
ployed on the west coast of France, but always with unfortunate result, 
in the summer of 1878 I undertook a journey along the coasts of the 
above-mentioned districts. The object of my journey was made known 
through the newspapers. Shortly after my arrival at Stavanger, H. 
Gundersen, a custom-house officer in Egersund, told me that he knew 
a little lake (tarn), rich in oysters, which lies a few feet higher than the 
open sea close outside of it, which could convey salt water into the 
lake only during severe southwest storms combined with spring tides; 
the lake receives through a brook the surplus fresh water from two 
lakes situated higher. In the lake mentioned, which, because of its 
wealth of oysters, had from time immemorial received its name, Oyster 
Lake, is found, according to the informant’s statement, the same abund- 
ance of oysters fastened on the perpendicular banks descending into 
the lake and on the bowlders which have fallen down from them. 
The truthfulness of the informant was established by the large num- 
per of living oysters which he brought with him. Most of them had 
grown together in clusters or clumps a foot long, but they were easily 
separated from one another. Specimens of such oysters were to be 
seen among the individuals exhibited by me in Berlin, which ought to 
eall attention to the development of oysters in Oyster Lake. 

That I should, as quickly as possible, devote myself to this much- 
tavored lake is a matter of course, and, after I had a boat brought into 
it, I was able, with the help of a water telescope brought along, to sat- 
isfy myself that Gundersen’s report was not exaggerated. Because of a 
continued drought which had prevailed for a long time previous to my 
arrival, the quantity of water in the two higher lakes had diminished, 
the brook flowing therefrom was entirely dried up, while at the same 
time the great evaporation from the surface of Oyster Lake itself had 


* Translated from Nordisk Tidsskritt for Fiskeri, 1880, pp. 49-58, by Tarleton H. Bean, 
[1] 1037 


1038 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 


caused it to fall about 6 inches lower than its outlet to the sea. The 
fresh-water layer was therefore evaporated so that the surface water 
had a salt taste. This condition was favorable in the respect that it 
had given the young oysters swarming about an opportunity to come up 
into the uppermost layer of water, where they had found points of con- 
tact on the branches of our common dog rose, Rosa canina L., which, 
being cut off, were accidentally thrown into the water. This was for 
me a hint as to how the gathering of young oysters in this basin ought 
to be managed. 

The lake is surrounded on three sides by steep walls of rock 300 to 
400 feet high, and only on the western side facing toward the open sea 
does the middle portion of the mountain slope on both sides down to the 
level of thelake. Through the southeastern depression, when the basin 
is full, fresh water flows out into the sea, while on the contrary during 
westerly storms sea-water presses in more easily through the north- 
western depression, the bottom of which, however, lies nearly one-half 
foot higher than the southeastern. 

A couple of fathoms from the shores the lake has nearly everywhere 
a depth of 6 meters, and slopes therefrom uniformly down towards the 
middle, where the depth is nearly 12 meters. In summer great masses 
of floating conferve are found crowded together both on the surface 
and in the deeper strata of water. This conferva, the only aquatic 
plant in the lake, according to the determination of our algologist, N. 
Willes, is Cladophora crispata (Roth) Kuts. 

In spring, when it begins to sprout, it is bright green, and develops, 
by the influence of the sun, a quantity of oxygen in the form of small 
bladders, w hich collect in masses in the closely entangled web which 
results from the extraordinary branching of this species. Through this 
quantity of air-bladders the cohering mass becomes so much lighter 
than the water that it frees itself from the bottom and rises toward the 
surface, where, little by little, it becomes darker—brownish—and at last 
quite black, whereupon it breaks up into minute fragments which fall 
to the bottom in the form of the finest dust, and communicate to it a 
jet black color. What part this black bottom-color plays in the singu- 
lar thermal conditions of this lake I will attempt to show farther on. 

Upon and in these masses of conferve live two species of gastropods 
both belonging to the genus Rissoa and three or four Acephale of which 
especially a dwar fish form of Cardiwm edule is exceedingly numerous. 
The shells of these three species are black because of the fine conferve 
dust mentioned, but by, being transferred to sea-water, which is free 
from this black powder, they become gradually lighter and finally 
altogether white. At the same time, however, the black color has so 
penetrated into the shelis that they cannot be made much lighter by 
rubbing. The young oysters of from one to two inches diameter always 
have black-striped shells, which can hardly be explained in any other 
way than that the black particles of conferve have been taken up with 


[3] PRODUCTION OF OYSTERS IN A NATURAL BASIN. 1039 


their food and afterwards secreted in connection with the calcareous 
matter of which the shells are formed. 

Besides the part which the conferva plays with regard to the tempera: 
ture and oxygenation of the water, it probably furnishes the chief food 
of the oyster in the enormous masses of spores which it gives off. A 
similar but less important role as a means of nourishment is taken by 
the young of Medusa aurita, which occurs in the lake in enormous quanti- 
ties and of all sizes. The young of the species of mollusks mentioned 
and of the crustacea living in the lake are less important in this respect. 
A little Gammarid, probably a variety of G. pulex, and the common 
shrimp, Palemon squilla L., notably the last named, are exceedingly 
numerous. 

The peculiarities above communicated with regard to the plant and 
animal life of this remarkable basin I did not of course discover dur- 
ing my first short visit, but the existence of a greater quantity of oysters 
than I had heretofore seen collected in one place, combined with the 
discovery of the branches of the dog rose covered with young oysters and 
the peculiar situation of the lake, were sufficient facts to warrant me, 
after my return to Stavanger, in advising my acquaintances living there 
to form a joint stock company, as soon as they could agree with the three 
owners of the lake as to the terms of the lease, to carry on oyster culture 
with combined forces, and I promised to support such an association in 
this matter by word and deed. A sufficient number of share-holders in 
such a company was quickly found, and they intrusted to the well-known 
customs-officer H. Gundersen the task of negotiating with the owners 
of the lake and agreeing with them about the terms of the lease. When 
this business was settled fourteen experimental collectors were set out by 
Gunéersen on the 31st of July. These experimental collectors consisted 
partly of willow twigs fastened with nails to a wooden frame of laths, 
and partly of boards covered with cement. By means of stones fastened 
with ropes to the lower ends of the collectors these were held under the 
surface of the water in a vertical position. On the 17th of October, 
these were examined by some members of the company, among them the 
young pharmacist Buch, curator of the Stavanger Museum, and school 
principal A. Olsen, both of whom had been my companions in the examina- 
tion of Oyster Lake. Mr. Buch communicated to me the result of this 
preliminary trial, which was certainly surprising because of the rapid 
growth of the oysters deposited—to particularize, some examples in the 
course of two months and seventeen days had reached a diameter of 35 
millimeters—and because, also, of the unexpected fact that swarms of 
young had been emitted, since they found a great quantity of attached 
young so small that they could hardly be seen by the eye alone, and so 
could not have been more than a couple of days old. 

On taking up the collectors Gundersen observed that the stones which 
were fastened to them to hold them under the water were quite warm 
to the touch, which was so much the more remarkable because cold 


1040 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES [4] 


weather had set in. Later in the autumn a thermometer was sent to 
the superintendent (one of the owners of the lake), who was requested to 
observe here and there in the course of the winter the temperature of 
the water at the bottom. The winter cold, which set in early in Novem- 
ber, before he had received a thermometer, was unusually severe up to the 
end of March, so that a layer of ice a foot thick was formed over the 
lake. In the beginning of April he reported that the temperature at the 
bottom, in a depth of 23 feet, was 10° R. (54.5° F’.), though the water was 
not yet free from ice. They betieved in Stavanger that he had read 
incorrectly, but repeated examinations gave the same result. When 
Gundersen visited the lake in May, to place new collectors and examine 
the old, he found the temperature of the water 14° R. (63.5° F.), at a 
depth of 33 feet. This seemed incomprehensible to the members of 
the company, and gave occasion for many guesses as to the cause which 
coyld possibly produce the high temperature of the bottom water. The 
flowing out of warm springs in the bottom of the lake was regarded by 
some as the most probable, while others attributed it to the heat de- 
veloped by the putrefaction (fermentation) of the masses of contervee. 

When they asked my opinion as to the explanation of this curious 
circumstance, I reserved it until, by a longer stay in the place, I had 
carefully examined the conditions which probably in connection with 
one another would give a better basis of explanation for the unques- 
tionable fact than those propounded above, both of which seemed to me 
inadmissible. Last summer and fall I remained twice for a long time 
at the lake, and after my return to Christiania, I stated at one of the 
meetings of the scientific society my explanation of the causes of the 
exceptionally high temperature of this basin, both in summer and win- 
ter, a temperature which makes this lake, scarcely two hectares in area, 
with an average depth of 26 feet, a tropical water oasis in our cold north, 
and thereby a forcing-house for oysters. I hope that my explanation 
will be satisfactory to the scientific public since it has been sanctioned 
by our well-known hydrologist, Protessor Mohn. 

I suppose the causes to be the following: 

1. Its situation, protected from all cold winds ; because only the milder 
westerly winds coming from the sea can affect the surface of the lake, 
and that but slightly. Through the valley, which leads up to the lake 
from the north, from which originates the brook spoken of, a portion of 
Oyster Lake, it is true, can be affected by cold northerly wind, but the 
cooling effect of this wind, taken altogether, is comparatively slight, 
and when the lake becomes ice-bound and afterwards snow-covered, the 
cooling off will be reduced to a minimum. 

2. The black color of the bottom is, according to my opinion, compared 
with the remaining reasons, the chief cause of the high temperature of 
the lake water; to this also the dark color of the mountain sides men- 
tioned contributes in no small degree, in that, being illumined by the 
sun, they radiate a heat, which in the stratum of air saturated with 


[5] PRODUCTION OF OYSTERS IN A NATURAL BASIN. = 1041 


vapor, which rests over the lower portion of the mountain base, becomes 
very oppressive and sudorific, under a temperature which during my 
stay in Skyggen sometimes rose to 27° R. (92.759 F.). Ata height of a 
little over 150 feet above the surface of the lake, this strong and oppres- 
sive heat diminished more rapidly than it had done during the ascent, 
notwithstanding the fact that one had not reached the edge of the 
depression which is found in the mountain wall which surrounds the 
lake upon the north and east, and through which the newly constructed 
road leads down to North Fjord. 

3. The cooling off of the surface water produced by the radiation in 
clear nights counteracts in part the formation of the fog which origi- 
nates by the shifting of the layer of vapor resting over the mountain 
base, when this is cooled after sunset. This is, however, the case only 
jn perfectly calm weather; for when a brisk wind blew over the mount- 
ain surrounding the lake, I did not observe the formation of any fog. 
Thus, radiation deprived the water of far less heat than it had received 
during the day through the influence of the sun’s rays. 

There is no doubt that the black color of the bottom of the lake is the 
chief cause of the high temperature of the water; for when the sun’s 
rays through the crystal clear water meet the black bottom, this absorbs 
the light rays, whereby the heat rays combined with these are set free 
in the same way as in the air, and every one has felt sensibly enough 
how strong this can be when he wears black clothing on a clear, sun- 
shiny day. The heat given off from the sun-illumined bottom diffuses 
itself in accordance with physical law quickly upward to the overlying 
water stratum and communicates its temperature to the whole mass of 
water. When a body of water 26 feet deep and 2 hectares in area is 
heated up to 20° R. (77° I’.) it certainly takes a long time before this will 
cool to 10° R. (54.5° F.), especially when half the water mass—the lower- 
most—is at perfect rest, which is the case here; for the current which is 
caused by the issue of the brook into the lake certainly does -not reach 
very deep, all the more as this water is fresh and lighter than salt water, 
and consequently remains at the surface. 

In the deepest part of the lake—12 meters, or 40 feet—the saltness of 
the water is greater than in the North Sea at a depth of 4 feet. On the 
17th of October, 1878, Candidate Buch examined the saltness of the 
water in depths from 2 to 27 feet. In the latter the saltness was 3.90 
per cent., and in the former 0.20. 

In sinking the collectors at different depths they have been convinced 
that the depositing of the young does not take place below a depth of 
18 or 19 feet, and that the size and number of the young diminish in 
from 14 to 18 or 19 feet. As to the cause of this I will not venture to 
express an opinion, but the fact is fully established. 

The stratum of water in which oysters thrive best is between 3 and 14 
or 15 feet, and I have called this stratum the oyster belt of Oyster Lake. 
In this belt the swarms of young appear to congregate in at least nine 

S. Mis. 29-66 


1042 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES, [6] 


months of the year. The shoaling young retain their swimming power 
far longer than is stated by the authors who have attempted an expla- 
nation of this question. Gundersen and Prof. G. O. Sars have kept them 
living as long as eleven days, while the authors known to me state the 
duration of their swimming power to be four days at the most. 

That all the conditions for a vigorous oyster growth are present in the 
above-described basin to an extent hitherto unknown is best shown by 
the rapid growth of the oysters living therein, their fatness, and the quick 
development of their reproductive function; to give details, individuals 
of eleven months old had already emitted broods of young. With refer- 
ence to the question of the fertility of the oyster I will venture to remark 
that according to my opinion this is placed too low by many late writers 
when they estimate the number of young which an adult oyster will emit 
as only 1,000,000 or even fewer; for | am convinced that Leuwenheck 
is correct in putting the number at many millions, yes, so far as I recol- 
lect, at 9,000,000. 

From an oyster eleven months old taken from one of the collectors, 
which probably had scarcely begun to emit young, since many oi the 
embryos had not yet broken through the egg-membrane, I preserved by 
estimate half of the number of young, and I am greatly at fault if this 
number does not considerably exceed 1,000,000. 

The plan of suspending receptacles for ae young, made of birch wood, 
on telegraph wires stretched in many directions across the lake and fast- 
ened to iron bolts which are fixed in holes made just at the margin of 
the water, was carried out this year. Last year only a couple of re- 
ceptacles were placed; these were rather heavy collectors, consisting 
partly of old crab-traps and baskets filled with sticks, broken crockery, 
shells of blue mussels, Mytilus edulis L. and modiolus, were suspended on 
heavy, well-tarred ropes. Many of these ropes, however, became so 
rotten in the tepid fresh water that they parted and the collectors some- 
times sunk in water so deep that they could not be found; but the col- 
lectors which were hung up and fell down in a less depth of water were 
found to be thickly covered with vigorous young oysters. The recep- 
tacles built by Groom, the merchant, of pieces of boards joined together 
in the form of book-cases showed themselves to be next best to those 
made of birch. They were, however, covered with young only on the 
under side of the pieces. On the same area the birch collectors yielded 
a much larger result, and the young on them could be easily gathered 
without injury. The young, which are intended for shipment or to be 
placed in the fattening grounds leased by the stock company, are taken 
from the lake down to North Fjord, where they are put into boxes with 
holes bored in them until they are sent away. In the latter part of July 
65,000 young oysters averaging 24 inches in size, packed in 43 boxes, were 
transported 10 miles and deposited in a fattening-place 14 miles from 
Stavanger. Of this number less than 100 were found dead when de- 


[7] PRODUCTION OF OYSTERS IN A NATURAL BASIN. 1043 


posited, and those that were dead had been greatly injured in removing 
them from the collectors. 

When they have placed many hundred receptacles tor the young in 
Oyster Lake they will without doubt be able to harvest an extraordinary 
number of such young oysters. 

From the description here given by me it is to be hoped that people . 
will adinit that the discovery of Oyster Lake may become a matter of 
great importance for oyster culture in Norway; regarding it both as a 
nursery for this highly esteemed mollusk wherefroin many of the oyster 
beds which were formeriy rich may again be supplied with parent oys- 
ters, and as a school for the study of oyster culture. 


APPENDIX J. 


MISCELLANEOUS. 


1045 


ue 
Pid i Dy 

O Pramer at ba 

UO esau 

Pata ot 


oar 


oy, 
re vy 


a #0 ak a9 
We 


aN he 4 


dian Noa Tas i y Sy AH! 
a ey Ania Mok prtaiaemon Reape : 


‘ 
=D, 


tT 
ah 
fla 


RU an 


XXXVII.—LIST OF PATENTS ISSUED IN THE UNITED STATES, 
DURING THE YEARS 1879 AND 1880, RELATING TO FISH 
A a PRODUCTS, AND APPLICATIONS OF THE 


By RoBert G. DYRENFORTH, 
Examiner-in-Chief, United States Patent Office. 


FISH-HOOKS. 


PIMGNGHME ST Hall. « eet eg toe NA el eee February 4, 1879. 
DO SLOT VW En NACHO et nea aps 2 om seuote he ce uiries December 30, 1879. 
PSSA DSe As Wa KAIM AM 2h os 2 slates aches els sete eye August 5, 1879. 
Dos miM Maa TAY: eee te acetate seen eee Bret cet June 8, 1880. 
Zolder sens. 35. FR es Sane EL September 7, 1880. 
Pobre Gr OTOP OLY fers) ence hive oe site. oe ere September 28, 1880. 


2IS(ata Wicd IRCNGGLSON, 2.2.36: sss eee ees 2 August 19, 1879. 

DO SO4S> By Wu. OWCLA OI. Rene terete tle wie) 2/ 4 oe oie Sa June 15, 1880. 

230743. B. FW. Chase.<...:.-- Dee Eset se AU INCE sae ae August 3, 1880. 

DRO OIGE) Li MUOMCIC bees eterna elas cine Se ste win fee ats September 21, 1880. 

FISHWAYS. 
2TS299" MeMeDonalaea es. 2 vee eget Pr isicie cans August 5, 1879. 
DISOBGO Wir Hi RODCLSL 2 Stale nie siejete om sie sep ett June 15, 1880. 
HARPOONS AND SPEARS. 

DASHA O: MeO KNOWLES. none =o). eal oe io its oe August 12, 1879. 
NETS AND SEINES. 

2tDOS TH. WEDD). 12.2 - =-+7 SESE aS ae ey May 6, 1879. 
OYSTER CULTURE. 

DIP SSO MANUS ioe cia ave svete tee 6 mic eee eres gir February 18, 1879. 

PIAS lawn SteWalte.c © nage eeree ee oe on oe UL ne, LOD. 

Dole eon oluamerall Scored 2 Pane estonia November 4, 1879. 

232740. 1. MeCosker-2-cme- sss = eee ete ise September 28, 1880. 

. [1] 1047 


1048 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [2] 
OYSTER RAKES AND TONGS. 
22015, IW ala PMECSSIC anes usa pots ee oe ease ee eae March 2, 1880. 
REELS 

2144952 PED ADICKSON 4/< Ae eegae eee nea: April 22, 1879. 

DNGZE2 sO ANEEAIS WV OSS ai ey ate ates oc ecer oie ees rel ere June 3, 1879. 

PAGS 28.~ B.C. OU ELOLG Ain. Sie ences ce stctsieeisioher= c/a September 2, 1879. 

2201 TG Sa We Wala welln yt tetera sot ouster eres October 21, 1879. 

2271 000 G., Hancock: saest Lette e ERLE etter ener April 27, 1880. 

ZSD0LG. EU AP richard es 2s. Set tn See Sr November 30, 1880. 

OO is Milos UOOMIIB Ks jeter = eiaie severe pie crenata tes December 7, 1880. 

Zaooii oh. Ee Chubb: seta: sys e teenie area December 14, 1880. 

2o0DE2, 0 EL Chmbp\..entclecite: Bees ches tateecen December 14, 1880. 

Doo loo: da Chubb aees Seem tle tele oe ees Se Pore December 14, 1880. 

RODS 

DO9GSi= Wa Marlene shane os. lee eS Rr teagan December 16, 1879. 

Aa0GDOs xine NISWAMGER aya aaciette ail ela siete are August 3, 1880. 

Zor: HS Richardson 2/2. 2.2 cease shes ye. ears November 23, 1880. 

SINKERS. 
ZepolOe Ee WUD DAtox se eee, stele aca trai ce December 14, 1880. 
Zoe TM OOLE ss oes nse ae tall aera tsa August 24, 1880. 
ICHTHYOCOLLA. 

PASC TAKE sO. ANSI 92 te) fac iets, he are Sree ctest eich ate ote September 16, 1879. 

2009 TO NV COV. SOLIS NAM oc 2c a eee ee ook eet els November 2, 1880. 
9226. J. 'S. ROgers(TeIssue) 2. 22) 4. 32). 22 25 June 1, 1880. 
9296.50). 5. ROGers (LEISSUG) Pace. cme = cleave July 13, 1880. 

PRESERVING FISH. 

ALO 28: NK Wa POW recs ecto ose reese es Cer eee May 20, 1879. 

223682. Sellman, Martin & Balkam..-...-...-.... January 20, 1880. 

2ODODSeeC Mars... oa see ees Sc eae eee ..---March 30, 1880. 

226390 DEW... Davis’. -otnetine< plicit neo cte eoaes April 13, 1880. 

PP AL)S\ CoP) egy Us 62 11) Gm MRE ng ARN Se Oecd a Begs im ges RL June 29, 1880. 

Poiiilloy Glen I CS JN Opera HAR eek dodo Sorc December 7, 1880. 

ZoOtO ge An ua ATNOL - <i Segid oct. pies) aera es eee December 14, 1880. 


foNT TD hx. 


Norr.—This index contains general references to the entire volume. 


More detailed 


indexes to eleven papers will be found at the pages indicated, 


Page. 
AE WALOD MV Oe RepontiOn Dish as HOOGs . seer em- ese ences nee -\pe i eeeeee 269 
Bony Medes keport on Oyster Culture=: 2-22.22 as.0 2-22 cco acelin - tee eenie 905 
Bouchon-Brandely, G., Oyster Culture in the Mediterranean ........---------- 929 
Clark, Frank N., Whitefish propagation at Northville -.........----- eee 595 
Coste, M., Report on Oyster and Mussel Industries ...-..-.....-.-.. ----.---- 883 
Harllih. Edward, Lhe Spanish Mackerel 2-2 -t22.5-.< 5-222 2cco-2es-0cssece | AQ 
Fraiche, Félix, Guide to Oyster Calture.......--.------- Sree ee eae eee 823 
Goode, G. Brown, History of the Sword-fishés- —-. 5. .0--ic20 s-ecssce sven oecce BOF 
Hanusser, Api. Oyster Culture in¢Morbihane. .- ccc- sec celeste 997 
Mobius; Karls The Oysterand)| Oyster Culture =---- s-2-- 2-24 -22- 2-1 -seweenene (AO 
Scudder, N. P., The Halibut Fishery.—Davis’ Straits ...........-...,.----.---- 227 
A. Page. Page 
Acclimatization of fish............ oi2"| Anomurans. -22 226-22 5--55---s4+54 LOE 
Accounts, instructions for making Apparatus, dredging.-.--......--- 65 
OTR Tl ya Ril Ge a ape ek Cr 28 in halibut fishery -.... 209 
Acephalw ..---------------------- 1038 | Arcachon, Bay of, fish ponds in. ..517, 531 
Actinia......-..---.-------------- 1008 oyster breeding 
Adhesive eggs, fecundation of- ---- 493 ING ee eee ene 931-941 
Alabama fish commission...-..---- A479 WA Ghrostacans)s-c<ee- == eee ea 1020 
Albemarle Sound, shad hatchingin. 653 | Articulates ........--.. -.-....--. 1020 
Albrecht, Archduke of Austria.--- 533 | Artificial food for trout in ponds.. 619 
Albuminoids. ..---...---.-------- 262 propagation of fish.416, 491-516 
Alewife and alewife fisheries. ----- AQ’) Ascaris incurva..<.c-t-c<-2.22ec-- 343 
nutritive value of ...-... 233, 257 | Ascidia cynthia ...--....------.-919, 922 
259, 264 | Ashby, Benjamin -.......--.------ 291 
Alge®..---.---------- 22-2 2e eee ee: OSES AGpidiscus e202 ee eee 1018 
Alosa sapidissima .----. ---------- 653 | Atkins, Chas. G...45, 57, 237, 238, 481, 633 
Alpena hatchery..--..------------ 568°] Atlantic salmon... 252 ssec-- 484, 623 
Ambulances ostréophiles..---..--. 937 | Atwater, W. O...-.-. ------------ 231 
American fish-cul uristsassociation 479 | Austria, fish culture in ...--.---- 533, 544 
AID pOUS ascetic = ieee 1020 
Analysis of fish, methods of. ..---- 242 B. 
of invertebrates, methods 
 Saeee op San, Sheree, 950 lBaitd #Oalioss soe us tose Seee eee ee 485 
Anatomy of the oyster.--.--- 691,693, 932)" |, Baird, S. EF .-..-. 4, 54, 62, 189, 233, 291 
- 934, 1001, 1002, 1004 306, 316, 333, 414 
IAT ersOls AseAte ser ace asiieee es 630 416, 479, 556, 576, 597, 742 
INDO GRIGG IDL S es danepenbsoosec 605, 648 | Bait used in sardine tishing---. ---- 163 
Animal food, nutritive value of dif- trout ishing >= -)-se. <. 620 
ferentikiNdSiOb. sees ane eee 263 | Banks, fishing --.-.-...--. 189, 192, 193, 206 
J wiht ies Ua ca55 oseoeo eco acac GUST BALbeL, iWisteliss sms ee een eee =rere 648 


1050 INDEX. 

Page. Page. 
Barometric observations -......-.. 204 | California, shipment of eggs to.... 582 
Bass Islands, spawning operations. 565 trout) food Of je ssees- 618 
Beamer wMiles oes e- one ese sie 232, 249 | Canned oysters, flavor of......-... 738 
Beamytrawilee. cesses sone seen ee 65,66 | Capelin fisheries of Finmark..--.- 167,175 
Bean, Tarleton Hf ........-.- 60, 575, 1037 natural history of ........ 172 

Behr shlerrivion caste sees aacteoe: 606, 673 | Captains who have gone to Green- 
Belgium, works relating to oyster- landfor halibut. 2. .< 22 dene. 190 
Culture ane paki a aaa 1001 | Car for transporting fish .......--. 657 
Berlin fishery exposition...-...... 477 Carbohydrates —)22.2-2-5-- cece. 262 
Bibliography of the oyster... .... 1001"|"Cardita sulcata 2: 22-0 cents 919 
Bill-fish, geograpical range of... --. 319" }Cardiumeduley. 72.252. e ee eae ee 1038 
Bioceenose, influence of tempera- Carp, characteristics of the best..535, 536 

cure uponsa ese. 2=-- 725 introduction of, into En- 


of oyster banks.-..- - 721, 723 

means of maintaining 

_the condition of a... 727 
Biology of Rhine salmon -....--. 427, 475 


Black bass, nutritive value of... 240,257, 
259, 264 
Blackfish, nutritive value of. .... 238, 257, 
259, 264 
Blackford, E.G..---. 57, 233, 249, 291, 306, 
319, 323, 347, 363, 366, 369, 648 
Bluefish, nutritive value of... -.-. 234, 257, 
259, 264, 266 
BOG CKMPALS 2 ieee tea eee aie 127 
Bohus-liin,care for sick on coast of, 
during) fisheries 2242. oe kee PTO 
Bohus-liin sea-fisheries ...--. --- ve (6999 
Bojanus, organ of =.-..--.---+- 1004, L005 
Borne; Max vonwdem 2 a54-.) csc 517, 673 
Bothriocephalus xiphie.-....-..--- 345 
Bottemann, Cr See 22 sete oat 606 
Bouchon-Brandely,G ............-. 907 
Bower, Seymour. ..-.--..-560, 564, 571, 590 
Brachiella ramosa)o--5-------5--4- 346 
Brachyurans=, sepa se 1021 
Brackett, E. A.-... -.-.628, 629, 630, 649 
Braintood fish) asi sseesee seee cae 266 
BrOcas Paul ’d6.i tik oat octet 742 
BROOKS eWieKe 221% joo pao cae beer see 762 
BLOOKALLOMt aes. =~ 2 ope eee eee 555 
nutritive value of 287.259, 264 
BUCK MAG Hees tootsie cee Sees 625 
Bucksport hatchery. -.---.22--<- 481, 623 
IBUWSS6 SpE eee apo Saiys 82 gts wae 606 
PS Until e rep A ay beers oer pe eee oan cose ee 605 
C. 
California fish commission --....-. 472 
Ssalimoneeeee aes 484, 555, 598 
in Lake Ontario... 611 


nutritive value 
Of ee nO 3H Os 


land Sr. 2 amas sdb 512 
nutritive value of -...-.-.-- 733 
stocking open waters with.. 675 

Carp ponds at Washington.-..-..-- 62 
on the Kanio6w estate, 

Austria: 622 52s eoscee 533 
Carp-raising, advantages and meth- 

Gds ‘Of/ 5.2 eee 673 

wOrks) On) =o ses seer 673 

Carpenter, "lise. 28 528) see eee 70 

Cary ® SETS eee fee eee ere ere 648 
Casella-Miller deep-sea thermeme- 

WOT cieige lil). isk acl eee Some 58 
Census of 1880, co-operation with- - 60 
Cephalopodseessse ee ee cee see ose 760 
Cestoda eee yee eee ee et eA 
Cheetodipterus faber...........--. 420 
Chalinea secs sibs. eee ieseees == LOIS 
Chase hatching-jar ...-:.---- 556, 558, 573 
Check-stop 25535 2 Sasecale saceclee sere 71 
Chemical composition of edible fish 

and invertebrates! 2255-5 ----se- 231 


Chester; JAS Cao s25 oe een eee ee 69,73 
China, works relating to oyster 


culture anyseoeer ounce cence 1002 
Chondracanthus xiphiez ..----.---- 346 
Christie; (PR. ote eee se eect pce oe 648 
Girripedse 70.28 eee a eeieeer. 1020 
Cladophora crispata _.-.--..-.----- 1038 
Claires; scsi. bas eons eee seeks 937 


protection of oysters in....939, 940 
Clams, long,nutritive value of 261, 264, 266 
round, nutritive value of. .261, 264 


266 

Clark: Az Howards.) 0 Sees 189, 415 
Frank N - -586, 587, 616, 657, 666, 670 

I stan enti cw a ceed ay Cc 553 
hatching box js see = se 553, 554 

CONbbaRy OUD HCN See ee he Be 479 
Codi eee mee 31, 191, 208, 211, 219 
and'icod=fisheriesas ssa cesses 31, 209 


INDEX. 1051 
Page. Page. 
264, 266 Density of water, influence of, in 
Cod, boned, nutritive value of. . ..236, 258 oyster culture ....-.-... 1014 
fisheries, importance of capelin Deutsche Fischerei-Verein ..-.-..-- 62, 673 
WMeeeievsce ce cem er se 169-187 | Development of fish-eggs ..---.--- 507 
of Hinmarky::- = 22 <- IGZ—1S7 | Dinkins Jewble-sss = see so aeels cele 628, 629 
of Iceland .-.-'- jae ae 78 | Distoma dendriticum ...-..--.-.+-- 344 
nutritive value of... .233, 234, 256, 257 WEMULICOSAl a2 ste oe ee oie 344 
258, 259, 264, 266 | Distribution of eggs from McCloud 
MOE OLaOr Dailiiie- so se sees see 164 River trout ponds.. ‘616 
salt, nutritive value of ..237, 238, 264, of Atlantic salmon 
266 CP OsWee ase sates 624, 628 
Colorhynchussas-20 secs ssa 2- = 311 of California salmon 
College of France, hatching appara- OL TS eee wecseese 605 
HUSHUISCCUDeseetase herp se ose sees 501 of Jand-locked salmon 
CollmayAgoess-e stees Saatae wae 479 OPPS - -5.2 255.2. 630) 648 
DOSEPLY Wisesencencss 189, 316, 353 of young salmon from 
Comacchio, fish-ponds of..---. ---- 518 “Northville  hatch- 
Comfonveerer nse eee ee ate aoe Bacice « 1038 erye2 Pe ee oe 608 
Connechicutins:-..-e=-ss<cee--an-—5 . 483 of young shad... ---- 653, 672 
fish commission ------ 478 of young whitefish 
Copepod anes saree ee en seeeee 345, 346 from the Northville 
Coregonusialbus v.25 cs ss. == see 553 hatchery. ss-2-s0 4 585 
Coste, P.494, 499, 513, 517, 698, 754, 773, 825 | Dowers, A. H.-..../-...---------- 630 
Counties, list of seaboard ...-.---- 48 | Drag-nets for herring ....-...---. 101, 191 
Grail eee oe ee cee ee Meio, ol od DWLed Pempecle ss sa iserine eee eee 65 
destructive to oysters. . 935, 936, 939 Oysters =25 2c. 25 .- eee sees 689, 777 
@radllesslevie sss sos se cea == <= 65, 71 oyster, injurious effects of, 
Cray tisha eee! sae oe ose eee a 770, 771 upon oyster beds -.----- 776-778 
nutritive value of... -251, 261, 264 Take! eet ee eee ee eee 65, 68 
Grevieling elk: tease eames ane 655, 669 | Dredging and trawling stations... . 55 
Crittenden At Riess. aces. = eee 233 Z apparatus used in ...-..- 65 
Crustaceans, characteristicsiom-e2)) 6709) (Mri fie eo. s —o oseeee = oa eeee saa OL 
culture Of .o-2.- ---- 753-824 | Dry method of fecundating fish- 
Currents, connection of, with water- CP ORb ee Cesiss sea actee se eee reeee 481 
temperature 2-------- “0135 Ducastel; Monsieur.22-.2- 225-2... a fol? 
influence of, in oyster cul- Duly, Panes!) -ce Je este cee as 648 
UG eee eee 1014 | Dyrenforth, Robert G....-...--..- 1047 
Wyiummeabalia soe ee cees. 47 398 ‘ 
mia CUlagWMs cei. seleaae 395, 397 E. 
regale...--.-.------------ 398 | Rarll, R. Edward -...57, 189, 328, 348, 356, 
Cyprinus auratus....-...---. ----- ole 362, 366, 367 
HelkardtssRieneceee ne cce sso) rece 677 
D. Economie values of edible fish and 
Danish fisheries -.....---..--..--. qe qrivertebrates . oes 2 2 e.-e os 231 
Davaine, Monsieur ..-.-- = .--.---. 936 shidswards*avanal Nie acc. coco tema 56, 57 
Davenport, GG ..- s2-------'----- 670 | Eels, nutritive value of ..233, 257, 258, 264 
Davis Strait, fishery in .-.--.----. 189) Hees ot halibut_-2--. -2...------4- 218 
Deep-sea research, Appendix B.-.. 68-74 of McCloud River trout..--.- 617 
Denmark, works relating to oyster | Ellis, J. Frank....--...---.------ 669, 670 
Guibunewin 824s ateas teas eons OOZS |Cage Ss s5 ea Oe eee 249 
Dennen OA tess 8-26 GOSN62ONGSON Phim bry olor yy. =e eee ees mat eee 507 
Density of sea-water in Netherlands, Of capeline =.=. 2-2-6 173 
observations on ..---.-. ROS pliner honed, decce emi oe ee 73 
1014, 1024 | Enemies of fish-eggs..--....------- 505 


1052 INDEX. 
Page. P Page. 
Enemies of the oyster .-..-..---- 935, 936, | Food of Spanish mackerel..-.-.-.. 403 
939, 940, 1017, 1021, 1032 Of BWOrd lish s eee eee ae eee 329 
England, oyster culture in... ---- TAL of young white-fish .....--.. 586 
Buplotesmenesmee see seemec!saeine see 1018 | Food-fishes of North America, list 
ORSORS ee sea pata 11 
. a propagation of ....-... 551 
Fairbanks, N. K -.... 616, 625, 628, 629, 648 | Forbes, 8. A...--....-------------- 576 
Pata chee ie! aan Wee elit h ae 262 | Fort Washington, Fish Commission 
Fattening of young fish ........--. 521 work at ../.......-.------ ------ 656 
Robiner ohn CH .-naeece tat eee 653 | France, common species of fish in-521, 529 
Feeding-ponds for young fish.----. 509 oyster culture in - - .. 698, 709, 738, 
Fenstermaker, Mrs. H. C .-.------- 576 739, 740, 753-822, 834 
HoentonssH. ,.22282)-s22e 628, 629, 630, 648 oyster culture in, works re- 
Ferguson hatching apparatus. ----- 655 lating to -..--.--.------ 100 
Ferguson, 1. Bil. 22.232 59, 422, 605, 616, oyster production in Can- 
629, 655, 668 Cale Bay sa. sooo eee LO aco 
Finmark capelin fisheries -.... ---- 167 | Franklin, Benjamin, supposed fish- 
Fish Commissioner, appointment of - 53 cultural work of ..-.....-------- 512 
Fish Hawk, steamer ......-------- 62 | Free eggs, artificial fecundation of. 493 
Fish-cultural association, American 55,61 | Freezing of eggs in transportation, 
establishment, ex- ReSUL Ol eee asa ese eee 579 
pense of maintain- Freezing point of sea-water -...--- 706 
Mga sess tenes Old)! MMroghishs 2. - se ee eee eee eames 45 
uishscultureeceseee] oso- AVii A Vtech Pres) || Inovlleiey On Bo aeeseoose Sacecs soos 291, 370 
Fish-eggs, retarding development Fusaro Lake, oyster culture in... 781-783, 
Ol pada Gaonhe cacpeacuodedeaEsesae 575 825-830, 907, 908 
Kisheries .tecseessqeecces abe cece 189 
of Icelandieos2- 5-22 sees Tia Gadus MOrmhuaicwe jose csc cee eee 31 
of the United States .... - 22 | Gammarus pulex 2... --22 222 -2-2 ) 1089 
of the United States, his- Garlick) Theodatms -2-+2 +--+ sees 478 
tory and condition of. - 3 Gaseh, Adolf -:apee5 face see eenes 533, 673 
sword-fishy.2sees see -ee odd GasteropOdshemee sees eerieee a eeee 760 
ishermenesessee ese See 220, 223, 224 | Generative organs of the oyster... 1002 
Fishes, edible, of North America. - 11 | German Fishery Association... .--.62, 673 
injurious effects of retting Germany,white-fisheggsshippedto. 577 
WUbOL Wp ONets ar ar aiaaclees= 545 works relating to oyster 
Mishine banks) =--- 22 o-2- 189, 192, 198, 206 Culture in sseeeeeeeeee 1001 
Fishing for rainbow trout ----.-..--- 619" |\Gerrish) Bs Hiss eeeee oo eee ee 629 
Fishing vessels, plan for obtaining Gesner Conrad 22 eee e aoe 1001 
SUAVISULCS Olas omee eoee es eae ene 30 | Gill-nets, methods of setding - ------ 408 
Fish-ponds, answer to objections fish’ injoredcinG ys .s-es.2— 568 
aCaimste nee ees cee 526)|\Gleason; Mic! sase2 2 oe oe oer 669 
on Kaniéw estate ....533-544 | Gold carp, origin of...--.----..--- 512 
plants; forse) oe see == 523; 0500 Goldenvorteseesess cee seeeense nace 59 
transformation of salt Goldfish, origin) ofe 22-245 o-c= 4 = ee 512 
marshes into..----. 517 | Goode, G. Brown -.4, 289, 369, 371, 398, 401 
MISH WAYS soccee tate csec ssc ace econ 1047) .Gowemon: 32 seceses Seneices oo oses 940 
Hhitchin'oshalibiutiss cee css cece 227 \eGrandabanikss seme sees es ee ee week 
Floating hatching apparatus ------ 654 | Grand Lake stream hatchery ---- - 481, 633 
Flounder, nutritive value of. .233, 235, 256, | Grayling ....-...---...--..- ------ 555 
257, 259, 264,266 | Great Britain and Ireland, works 
Hoods, nutrients) of. -2-2-. 22-. ->-- 262 relating to oyster culture in----- 1001 
Pood for young fish<=-2- 22--.- 522. 510 | Great Britain, oyster breeding in-. 702 


of McCloud River trout... .- 618, 619 


Greentijoren sss se- aoe eee 


INDEX. 1053 
Page. Page. 
Greeny Myroniesatecsses fae ease OUT OLLI) MElTSt1o phonies. nes cates See ee 296 
Sethi: sess eee eras AS Ao WOle Ola eas hlOMMOLUsisss-2e% eons come cle sees 296 
Greenland halibut fishery --..-....- 189 | Histiophorus americanus---...--. 304, 309 
Griftit hs Wines eras eee a2 OON Ode nOod ancipitirostris -.---.- 310 
Guebueu brasiliensibus ...--. 293, 305, 380 fossil forms of ...-..- 311 
Gundersen) Hesse: o-- 1-2 1037, 1039, 1042 gladius\ 2... 2-222 0098319 
fe gracilirostris --.---... 310 
Haddock, nutritive value of ..235, 257, 259, Pees ee cecy ieed 
O64. 266 orlentalisiesce) 2-0 309 
: ; puichelluses.---2-2. = 310 
Haime, Jules --.--. --. EP fees 478 | Hoek, P. P. C..-1002, 1020, 1028, 1029, 1035 
Halibut fishery in Davis Se te, ee Hofiaan Prot lo: see eee 1034 
nutritive value Ce ee Hooks bite as eee tae 
s, 258, 264 Horak-sWienzeliz cere ces cee aa 673 
smoked, nu na) val . 6 ; MOtgt, Resto \co- nce ence a ee ee LOLONT0S4 
a fe Pee 1 T aiats ee gtshcadch gon ERUDTeChitn teeta ee ee eee 1034. 
Halifax Fishery Commission... 0+ it Hughilett, Mhomas: == -. 2 osee seek 605, 648 
Elalounichze)~—— a =- 2 22s === == =-=- ms 1017 ELUM 6s sy J fl os Sees eee eee 605 
ELEN ae Cie) ee ares ols oe Hiiningen hatchery... ...-----..- 515 
Hanscom, Ellis -...-......~----.-- ee Flonlbext att: Elva. shee ae: ee 291 
TIRIGUORE 5c opie oe sesa ote Sharan a tell iinsicon(: di: ee ae tn een ee 669 
Hatcheries ---.-.-...---- 478, 481,576,597 | topridization of fish...-..-.------ 498 
Hatching apparatus..---...--.-- 499-504 Hydrant water used in shad-hateh- 
Chase. . 556, 558, 573 rig Cea beeing ane ae 655 
Clark .---...558, 554 iV GrozOaseeiciwee ts elements oe 194 
Coste -- -499, 500, 502 Hy potrich csp ce. steseacrseeoeeee 1018 
Gehin and Re- 
MY Sos 499, 502 I. 
Ferguson. .... 655 | Iceland fisheries ........---- ae: 77-88 
floating -....- CoA Slothy.ocullae seem oe ee een 1048 
Jacobi...-.--- 409) | Vdus melanotuss.. 22. 242s 59 
Rueff. ..-....- S028 pintosOria So. eet ee 1017 
Scharnhouse - 502 | Ingersoll, Ernest ............----- 57 
Williamson... 487 | Invertebrates .............------- 1017 
Hatching fisheggs, instructionsfor- 504 | Towa, shipments of fish-eggs to... 577 
trout eggs .------+------ OIG isopods: es a2 te ci he ar ee 1020 
Hatching stations in 1880.......-- 653 | Italy, fish culture in........------ 927 
Hausser, A. E .....--------------- 943 oyster and mussel culture in 
Haven, J. M..--..-.-----.---.---- 648 825-830, 907-913 
Havre de Grace, shad hatching sta- 
HON bees ances 653 J. 
record of . shad- Jacobson, Herman, translations by — 77, 
hatching at.-.. 662 89, 99, 163, 167, 427, 477, 491, 517, 533, 545, 
temperature ob- 1001, 1029 
servations) at-., (662! || Jacobson; OF-- 52- ec-cn-- -5- seas 733 
ISAO 2 Beane neue uaseSe cocaacae 163 I;dellutes George) ss fos so ss nes 649 
fisheries of Bohus-liin-....89-126 | Jenkins, jr., W. H....-.----.- 630, 668, 670 
Tcelan d= Fost O4= 86" |p emsen Or Nae asses ce tise or earee ae 127 
Norway ..---- 197-161) |, Johnston; ©. eA vs 52 eee = Odd 
movements of, ..----- IPSiet Seq." |) OLGA WV) . El 2252. ccet tence cose 232 
: nutritive value of. ...--- 240, 257 a 
preparation of -.....-.--- 95,114 K, 
smoked, nutritive value Kentucky, shipments of fish-eggs to 580 
Obs se 2345 2O5; 209, CAON ZOOM | MlObz twos aaeeee ee ecee sone ese 616 
aOR WDE Ooasecons csacopedbUade 630,648 | Kumlien, Ludwig .............-.- 57 


1054 INDEX. 
Page. | Page. 
L. Meteorological observations -198, 201, 212, 
: : 1011 
-Duth Félix J. H. de -1002, 1003 é 
aceze, Dav btorsat a ego Methods in halibut fishery .:...... 211 
hemodipods(.sesce eee eee oss 1020 : 
2 o/h Michatrx,<C apt. fl wee. ocleomeeee Neo 
Wakewroubeern cco one nese oe eee 555 ; f 
Se : Michelet, Monsieur, oyster-collector 
Lamellibranchiates, presence of : 
lymphatic vessels in ...--..----. 1004 ee Pe eee a agian 935, 937 
Microgadus tomcodus......-.-----. 45 


Land-locked salmon, nutritive value 


of .... .238, 257, 259 


propagation of 633 

Manesh lyse ceesjcce ccc sie eee 249 
Law, hichard Lio. <2. wccessee- 2 ae 653 
Legislation, fishery .....-...----..- 60, 653 
Hep pelmian li see eee sete 648 
ivingston, Rohe os esses esseee- OUD 
Ljungman, Axel Vilhelm -.----..- 89, 99 
Lobster, canned, nutritive value of 264 
cultures j-ceececoee 780, 818-822 

fishing, close season for... 779 

y natural history of... .-..771-774 
nutritive value of ...... 251, 261, 

264, 266 

protection of ...... --...779, 780 
reproduction of -.....---- 779 


rock, natural history of -.771-773 


Money DB ee cee ceecs sete wee 605, 648 
Long clams, nutritive value of --.. 251 
Iookout, steamer... se0). 2! 655, 661 
utkens Chrisie owe Sele 306, 375 
M. 

McCloud river, California, opera- 
tions at trout-ponds on--...-...-- 615 
river hatchery- ....481, 597, 621 
trOombe ee esee 555, 617, 618 
McDonald, Marshall -...403, 415, 416, 417, 
422, 423, 448 
Mackerel and mackerel fisheries. - - 36 


nutritive value of -234, 236, 238, 


239, 256, 257, 258, 259, 264, 266 | 


Mackinaw trout, nutritive value of. 235 | 
Macrourans cacses cece steee cts 1021 
Mining aeemimccerios: secre ne ceneceee 483 
fish commission ............ 479 
shipments of fish-eggs to.... 577 
Makaira nigricans -..-...--...-... 310 
Marcgrave, Herr.........--..-e+- 380 
Martin, George H..-.-.....--.. 291, 353, 361 
Maryland fishery law ....---...... 653 
Massachusettstacee. secs occ ce ee one 483 
Massachusetts fish commission .... 478 


Mather, Fred. - - - 57, 415, 479, 488) 576, 648 


NMedusarauritaicas ose ceo sete ee 1039 
MerrillG.cPo. eee sect as ook. 232 
Metcalf M co s.cie oe Sojotrtsen 616, 648 


Microscopy, importance of, in the 


study of anatomy of the oyster.. 1002 
Miescher-huseh hye senses see sea oG 
Maller. He Bis. sot aoe aoe cee 606, 648 
Malners Si Wiese se ose see 57, 58, 59, 481, 559 
Minnesota, shipments of fish-eggs 

LO sere st eeetaniee Soon ee eee 579 
Mobius, Karl -....---.---.1002, 1029, 1032 
Molluses?ioj2tc.4-2 sot aos ae emo 

characteristics and subdi- 
VasionslOfieesesce asses 760 
Moon-fish, artificial propagation of. 420 
Morbihan, oyster culture in ..-.--. 943 
Morrison;) Thomas):-----4-4= seen -- 649 
Mother of pearl from Portuguese 

Um agacms os scscmbosoutesc soos 938 
Mowry lls Wise et ose eee 648 
Miuirexct ces ioe ana See seeste fate 22, 1022 
Murex: tarentinuses25 32 S22 2> ee 936 


Muskallonge, nutritive value of. .239, 257, 
259 

Mussel and oyster breeding com- 
INE dye wee oe Wie eee oS 
Mussel culture ..-...758, 810, 818, 825-883 
culture.in Dtaly:.--.-22--% 910, 911 
natural history of .-......767-769 


Miytilusiedmllise ote ess sees 1042 
modiolusss2 32. cosesseee 1042 
Ne 
Napoleon pits tee eneessaeeee 698, 755, 857 
Nassa reticulata. 2-22. .- 2-3. -- 5 -2- 936 
Natural history, Appendix E...-... 287 
of halibut ......-. 217 
Navy-yard station -..-.-.-.---.--- 653, 655 
Navy-yard station, record of tem- 
perature observations-.....----. 660 
Navy-yard station, shad-hatching 
operations) ab oes - eee aaraeaae eee 666 
Negretti and Zambra deep-sea ther- 
MOmMeteL s-— saceee ee eno =2--L295160 
Nematoda 2. .-so---s-eneeest aa 343 
Netherlands, oyster culture in the. 1029 
oyster culture in the, 
WOLKSONe=s asec ese 1001 
zoological association. 1033 
INGtS 5. Jee eee Saree ee cee cee 1047 


INDEX. 1055 
Page. Page. 
Nets. towing x-ee tee cee oe. 71 | Oyster, ancient cultivation of..... 781 
Nevada, shipments of fish-eggs to... 583 and mussel breeding com- 
Newfoundland cod-fisheries - - - - --- 169 itted ee sschmes Cease 823 
New Hampshire fish commission... 478 animals found in connection 
New Jersey fish commission - -.---.- 479 Withee eo eee 721, 744, 1017 
ING WASPCClIeS eee. cect ss oe sae 57, 480 Appendix Heese ec see. oe 681 
New York fish commission .-.--..-- 479 artificial fattening of the.. 725 
Niclas Karl oepiet en ces cle saa. feiss 673 bibliography of the... --- 713, 1001 
North America, food-fishes of. -- --- 11 cause of absence of, from 
oyster production Baltic: Seas. - ses 710 
IMs fe, ser cine cet 888 chemical constituents of... 732 
works relating to Classesiofee se o6)- ceo see el= 715 
oyster culture -- 1002 common European, descrip- 
Northville hatchery, distribution of tloniOfee #4 e eee 761 
eges from... 576 comparative flavor of the 
distribution of male and female...-.-..- 734 
fry from.... 586 conditions influencing the 
operations at, settling of spat of...--.- 1016 


1880-81 .. 553, 564 


Norway, herring fisheries of- --.---- 127 
latitude of fishing-sta- 
LIONS ebC.yuMe sass sae 159 
oyster culture in.....-. 913,914 
oyster culture in, works 
Telatimeabowm ssc cess 1002 
Norwegian fishery association... . - 85 
Nive, jr) Willard. 4. 2.22422. ~<.. 291, 373 
O. 
Ohio fish commission ..-......----- 479 
Olsen mAs <6 Pe eae sete sees 1039 
Ontario, California salmon in..-.-. 611 
Osborn yH Wwset= sees oe eee ees OOS 20 
Osmerus arcticus 22 —- 4--- 22-2 =... ~ 168 
WAITICESCONBe= eee ec oe 44 
Ostrea anculata- <5: co --- ssc 932 
edulis) Soo eeeee sce oeee es a--ne L005 
description of....--... 761 
hermaphrodite:- =. 222) +762 
Ving inianaes ees. see LOOS' 
propagation of... 762 
unisexuality of.. 762 
Ofter-trawl-oss2e~.o- sero eta s ee nt Oop Om 
Ovarian development of Rhine sal- 

MOMs — setae cisierse ses cialis oases 431 
Over-fishing, effects of. ..----- 718, 719, 726 
Oxytrichinwess..s- 1s cscs ceecse 1018 
Oyster, affected by nature of sea- 

obiome cess eee eee 697 
American, in France. --. -<- 916 
propagation of. 762 


transplanting of, 
to Europe.... 1 
unisexuality of. 762 


conditions necessary for ex- 
istence of .....697, 710, 712, 724 


danger of freezing the .... 705 
Danish works on ..--...-.- 715 
decreased abundance of, in 
INOEWAYi io= series secee. LOST 
duration of pelagic condi- 
HlOnV OR sana eaepeee eee 1042 
enemies of...---. 700, 935, 936, 939, 
940, 1032 
nglishyess sce eeeoecys sss 737 


fecundity of....694, 713,717, 1042 
fisheries in Norway, dim- 


THUbLOnt O fee see ee 1037 
flavor of, canned.--..----. 738 
formerly in Baltic Sea -... 712 


Greening OL... Ya. sane. 765, 766, 834 


free-swimming embryo of: 763 
history of the development 

Of theses oo: setts ease 1005 
influence of saltness of wa- 

ter UPON jf io. ee ae 696 
in Oyster Lake, Norway, 

remarkable facts concern- 

inp hes = eect seas 1038, 1042 
investigation of -....-. 1033, 1034 
method of dredging---.-.-.- 690 


nutritive value of. ..249, 255, 260 


264, 266, 733, 734 

PLICOR Ole seach e eee eee 730 

production in America.... 888 
production in Schleswig- 

Holsteinsesectecscse lesen 716 

provectionvOl S- os eee = 743 

rate of growth of.....--.. 763, 764 


reproduction of... ..-...692, 762 


1056 INDEX. 
Page. ; Page. 
Oyster, result of investigations rel- Oyster culture—Continued. 
ativelto. vec. cok eee OO of France and Italy.......... 825, 883 
Spawoin@iotet 8 seen 889 result of investigations relative 
spawning-season of .-....- 912 UO e222. penne eee eee 22 eee 1001 
stages of development of Scandinavian, bibliography of. 718 
YOUNG ae oe Be 2,5 tee G95, | Oyster dnedgee acs 2s saree 689 
statistics of production of. 719 description of ....-. a7 
storage-ponds for... .-...736,737 injurious effects of 776-778 
supply and demand.....-- 729 | Oyster dredging, close season for... 778 
transportation ofthe young 843 | Oyster family, genera included in 
unexpected survival of.... 842 the .. -------+++++++------ F326 761 
view of, in cross-section... 693 | Oyster pares, cost of ..--......-..- 902 


Oyster-ambulances..-.---- 
Oyster-beds: 
cause of the depletion of, in 


rane) sc cceeepestiec tesa sm 774-777 
good effect upon, of judicious 

ishing ete as ayes ee ie 746 
in France, former condition of. 857, 858 
in France, Government ..-...---. 859 
inhabitants Obesssseoscesceee. 721, 744 
preservation Ofesseeeee ences 720 
natural, possibility of enlarg- 

ANOS Soares sero siec leer are 707 
natural, possibility of forming 

NOW ses aseises ceeesee ws etse es 707 
of Cancale, productiveness of. 719 
preparation of ground for. --.. 297-802 
PLOvectroniOfe seek se sae ee 902 


Oyster claires, method of construct- 
ing. 802-806, 834, 835, 842 


methodsof working. 807— 

810, 837, 839 

construction of. -..897, 898 

protection of -.---- 939, 940 

Oyster culture... -..683-751, 753-824, 1047 

Oyster culture: 
French and Dutch methods 
Ofy ae A ees ee OSL OSON 

in BayJof Arcachon=.=----- cece | Gol 

ey Dive Pyles Be see Badd = occ 702, 741 

influences affecting ....-.-...- 1014 


in France... .698, 709, 738, 739, 740, 783, 


822, 834, 860-876, 885-906, 

910, 914-927 

in France, beginning of ...-..- 755 

in France, centers of ......---- 766 

in France, success of ....----- 843, 844 
in NorthvAmencaes. -oocss-.5 = 742 | 

IN NOL Wa Vim ere eissient= Ost ties 913, 914 

in the Mediterranean.....--..- 907 
North American, works on..-. 742 | 

ObjecChiOh-sessoeeeeeec eee sa iecee 738 


OTIPINIOf 2 oe ace se eels ets ose. 825, 887 


- -- -896-898, 937 


Oyster Lake, Norway: 
high temperature of....-...1039, 1041 
remarkable production of oys- 


LOLGAM Asc hacisee sae eases 1037 
BaltMeESss'! Of ios oc, seas cae vee ce 1087, 1041 
Oyster wakes) 2 52- esas joe ee 1048 


Oyster spawn collectors. .876, 880, 895,896, 
898-902, 912 


fixed eas 793, 797 

movable ..784, 793 

Oyster tongss. toe sesee ese ere 1048 

124 

Race wl Mercer. scselvseeee saeeee 628, 629 
Palemon squillaise 22-3. 2-2 eee 1039 
Parasites of fish-eggs .-.--..-.--. 905, 506 
OYSUCIS seca nis ee eee 1017 

Parker, (eG 2.5. et eees soe Oa 
Patents relating to fish...--....... 1047 
Pearl-oysteree:- s--sese seer ena 766, 767 


Pearls found in common oysters. . 732,733 


Pennell a eeecseess sess. sees 346 
Pennsylvania fish commission. --- - 478 
shipments of — fish- 
CYNE UOaccoksasess Geb! 
Penobscot salmon, report on propa- 
gation Of ee: cesta coceeee eee 623 
Peritricha) .52..5- sess seces sosls== 1018 
Pestel; idlerr vonee:.- 2-2 -a-2sse eee 606 
Philichthys xiphiw-..-...-.------+ 346 
Phillips; Bammetiesenece cess see 291 
Pisciculture, condition of, in United 
NUabeS ce eree ee saice 477 
introduction of, into 
the United States.. 478 
Plan of inquiry regarding fisheries. 3 
Planting of young fish, methods of. 657 
Plants for fish=pondss2—- 2: -ses 523 
PoeywHelipe ss ceree ese eee 380 
Poisonous effect of retting water-. 545 
Pomolobus pseudoharengus -.-.--- 40 
Pond-cultivation in Austria -..--.533-544 


Ponds for carp, construction of - ..674, 677 


INDEX. 1057 
Page. 2 Page. 
Ponds, raising crops in drained ..540,542 | Rhine salmon—Continued. 
Porgy, nutritive value of.. ..234, 236, 256, relative proportion of sexes 
257, 259, 264 AMONG ..---------- +--+ ----- 452 
Portman IC) en ae es 616, 648 SIVAN) Ser Sera ee es ee See 456 
Portuguese oyster : Rhode Island fish commission. -... 479 
anatomy of .......2...--.---.932, 934 | Rhombochius osteochir ........... 347 
commercial importance of. .... 937 4) Rice, Hi Jeo a2 os ' 59, 683, 753, 762, 766 
cultivation of.........-..-... 931,937 | Richardson, James A...-..-....... 597 
in theiBay,of Arcachon .. ..-.931,941 |-Rissoa-..2 2-2 25.22.52. -.02-2 seo 1038 
PapideenowiuM ol. ofe-cce 2225, , 9304) Nixey, S.1M 22 222.3222 we 669, 670 
WalwerOSHOllMOfesas so aercnee <2 938) PRobimsory-BigiMiace teh Ac eeeraee 630 
Post-offices within three miles of BOGS Sia ornate ice eee 1048 
Gideawaberis hee aera ce 49 | Roosevelt, Robert B.............. 484 
iRotbens Marsa saree sap tere ceaseless GG r | PROOUr ACW NV iNet ele tacos ese eee 559, 571 
Ponundenetio es... 409, 410, 412,568 | Round clams, nutritive value of... 251 
BowwerseAes Mick oe Se acc: 628,629/.649 | Rowe; Johm'-2¢ <4 eto ose ssuees 291 
Preparation of fishery products. ..25, 1048 | Russian method of fecundating fish- 
Products of French fish-ponds........525 OS8S ----------- eee ee eee eee 481 
Propagation of food-fishes, Appen- Ryder, John A... ...57, 422, 576, 1005, 1021 
AH Crete tate ia ke Re Soe 551 ‘ 
Protection of lobsters ......-.....- 779, 780 : sr 
OySbers. sess) oncee 778 Satlsishie sie 2 ca4 Ge eee ee 304 
Purse-seine in Sweden....-..-.-. 101, 116 geographical range of . .... 319 
Pycnogonida so-so ecceon cee ae: 1021 Marcgrave’s description of. 280 
MOVeEMEeNts OL = s--- 2425. 324 
Q. YOUNG Wayava/e ole neice siourestoeers 375 
Quatrefages, Monsieur de.-.....-. AS OOM Sealing faniom: oni: 8 oes ee 494 
Quinn, H. E.............--..---- 668, 670 fontinialis’+..-2 2,20: 555, 617, 619 
R. irideds #2 --oe-ce sere OOO OL soe! 
AVA OWabLOUb sae e o-oo 3,617, 618 TAM AVCUSh sate sepa ee 555 
Riake2dtede elec somes case aloes 65, 68 UI Rit. Acree cinaje meen sso ere 484, 555 
Riascbs HP En Pavia. hows eas 1037 Salata ee eet es epee 484-623 
Rathbun; Richard.2ks-s2¢ss.ch~ = 56,60 | Salmon, Atlantic, cultivation of .. 484 
Raveret-Wattel, C...........-.2. 477, 606 California, cultivation of. 484,617 
VOC Cath. MME tars stegstsicray- reise ein esses 617 canned, nutritive value of. 236, 
Redding, Bo Bese eae= cece. =< cis 1510040 . 257, 258, 264, 266 
Red-snapper, nutritive value of. .235, 236, land-locked 2-1 3262 .5_-- 633. 
257, 259,264, 266 nutritive value of...... 234, 237, 
Reels ....----.------------------- 1048 256, 257, 258, 259, 264, 266 
Rees, J. van ..-..-----.--------1017, 1034 Rhine, biology of ......... 427 
GIG NATO teeieecrtac at oecrereaioaiee eas OAO seining operations at Mc- 
Remoropsis brachyptera .......-.- 346 Cloud River hatchery .. 602 
REM AaNG dis a Sets = sae Siaerniee * aisle 931 spent, weight and meas- 
Reproduction of sword-fish........ 330 UEOMONTS OLS ca2 cafe ee 237 
Retarding development of fish-eggs 575 | Salmon trout, nutritive value of... 235 
Retting water, injurious effects of, 257, 264 
On fish! ..es-cere 545 | Salt marshes, transformation of, 
kind and quantity into Ash-ponds~.55- <2 w.tjssee eee 517 
of gases in ...... 550 | Salting halibut, manner of ....... 213 
Rhine salmon: Saltness of water, influence of, upon 
DEGLOG yO hie wes woe fain aniae ee | AS OYSUOES assess cess anhae son cee 696 
change of weight in.........- 439 | Sardines, French, mode of packing 163 
ferocity of, inspawning-season 473 | Sars,G.O-..........-....... 128, 167, 1042 
MMPTHGLONSIOR. « lo 65 «ssn )n = we 454 | Sauerhoff, W. P....-. 606, 661, 666, 668, 670 
ovarian development of....... 431 | Saunders, John S.. ..653, 659, 665, 668, 670 


S. Mis. 29 67 


1058 INDEX. 
Page. Page. 
Scallops, nutritive value of...-..201, 255, | Spanish mackerel..--.....--.---- 395-424 
264, 266 | Spanish mackerel: ; 
Schleswig-Holstein : abundance Of:c2 22.2 5..2.0 Se. 400 
early history of oyster-beds of... 714 artificial propagation of... --.- 416 
map of sea-flats of ...--....--- 686 common name of...-......-.-- 395 
oyster production in......----- 716 description Of 2-2 .22s.02a2e=0 397 
the oyster in.. --.4...--------- 685, 69 disposition of catch of .....--. 414 
Schoodic salmon, propagation of .. 633 Opes Ofc. cenetoot cee eee 405 
Schuermann, Carl W.....---- 666, 663, 670 fishing-season for..........---- 413 
Shuster,\Catlate- 2). 22. eer(to- n 606 HISHOV Yao Seen s Mtoe eee eele 406, 415 
Scientific departments of the Gov- fOOW OL. 22 cse/stecuceoese eee es 403 
OIMIMeNies ea) cesses eres = - 53 geographical distribution of... 398 
Scomber scombrus ...------------- 34 hatching station for....--.---- 423 
Scudder, Newton P........------- 56, 189 movements) Of2222 4. ¢520e nee 399 
Sea- anemones devouring oyster spat 1008 nutritive value of........--- 239, 257, 
Sea-fisheries, Appendix C..---..--- 75 258, 264, 266 
Sea-urchin, propagation of ....-..-- 919 reproduction Of 252-4 -2-s cee. 403 
Season for halibut-fishing.-..----- 208 | Spawning-places, artificial ........ 497 
Sea-water, freezing point of..-.--. 706 | Spawning-season...-....-.--. 432, 494, 495 
relation of temperature of California sal- 
and density of ...--- 705, 706 Mone assesses 598, 602 
Sea-weed, oysters carried away by- 940 of rainbow-trout. 615 
Sections for microscopic study, use- of whitefish...... 565 
fulness of, in oyster study....--. 1002 | Spawn-taking, instructions for ..493, 494, 
Sections of oysters for microscopic : 560, 561 
study, preparation of ....-..---- 1005 method of, at McCloud 
Set-lines used for trout-fishing --.. 621 River hatchery... 615 
used at McCloud River Spear-fish, descriptive noteson.... 299 
{rout-ponds< 22. s-.-2-— 619 geographical range of.. 319 
Shad, nutritive value of.....---- 232, 233, Mediterranean Sea. .... 319 
234, PV ip 256, 257, 259, 264, 266 movements of PTE (AD eg 323 
propagation and distribution pugnacity of. -.e---26 337 
GE Ree sieea Maree salatatereins 653, 672 | Spears, patents for ...--.--..----- 1047 
Shaw Dabiecs os i--test-- sae 576, 616, 648 | Spicer, William E ..............-. 374 
Sheepshead, nutritive value of. ..240, 207, | Sponges....---..----.------------ 1019 
259, 264 | Spotted brook-trout, the nutritive 
Shell-fish, propagation of .--.----- 919 Value Obs hie nate Sea 236 
Shipment of eggs from Northville Starbuck, Alexander.--/-..:.--.-.: 58, 291 
hatching station .-..------------ OvGi State Hatcheries s2o.:.cseease eae 478 
Shipment of eggs, methods of.... - 577, | Statistics of Finmark capelin (cod) 
578, 634 Psheriesy sess ee pee eee 170 
Shrimp ss sce soi wc. a2)! sn me alni L039 Stearns Stlaseer acca scene sake eee 57, 415 
destructive to oysters. ....935, 936 | Steedman, J. G. M.......--..----- 616 
Simmons, Newton...........------ 668 | Stettiner Hoff, carp-raising in the.673, 676 
Sinlers ae veer ck. 2... See aoe 1048 | Stilwell, E. M.......576, 628, 629, 649, 655 
Gist, PWietli ete onto > Seeecwinen mys 648 | Stone, Livingston. ...57, 479, 484, 486, 597, 
Siecle eb eee chee) ae A791) a 611, 615 
Mis cd El ee enn = ons n= -628, 629 | Striped bass, nutritive value of. .232, 233, 
Slept Wem ta Mee ok 571 234, 235, 236, 257, 259, 264, 266 
Smelt and smelt fisheries..--..---- 44> «Styloplotesiz.2 -oasteecisneee a caer 1018 
nutritive value of. .235, 257, 259,264 | Sunday, observance by fishermen 
Siniley, Chas. Weesseceasesacincct 415 Ob. Loe sije ausieeges ae eee 224 
Sanrithy Cae eee rarely sie sao 628, 629,630 | Sweden, works relating to oyster 
dete ee oGbabosen noed Cecnae 73 cultureyini2 So. esos 1002 


INDEX. 1059 
Page. Page. 
Sweden, fisheries of ......-....-.- g9 | Temperature of water, influence of, 
Sweeny, R. O....576, 605, 616, 628, 629, 648 in oyster culture... 1014 
Swordetish tac sos eee. eee! 289, 394 influence of, upon a 
Sword-fish : bioceenose .....-...- 725 
abundance of. .ss44ac2.<% 26: 328 influence of, on the 
bibliographyiof-22-- 2-2. «c.2-- 292 movements of sword- 
descriptive notes on.---..--.-- 297 fishy 22 35 i556 < 321 
early allusion to the-..------ Sidsol3 |) PCNCD. . cerca elesalenc 2. ote 59 
Economic msesiOfsss eo nsene see 363) |p belrapturuss. cecseiacconceeein see 296 
ENnemilesiOtees see oe eee cee ee 342 BlbIAUS 225,262 42 299, 303, 380 
fSheriesitOLssee ee eee eee eee 347 allbrusyeeseceeeatsees = , 308 
products Of. -25255..0. 361 amplus -<2..--5- 303, 308, 380 
TOOCRO Le en oe eee eek ee a 329 belone.2.2.2 2 cess 319 
geographical distribution of....311, brevirostris.........-. 308 
: 314, 315, 317 fossil forms of.....-.- 311 
habitsiotuers crs. see ge 25, fe 323 SOOT NT ee rae see eee 308 
influence of temperature on the hexschelit 2 gece feces 307 
movements Of: «2-2 -2e'-b = 22 321 IMIPCT ALOR ese espe rae 306 
internal parasites of........--. 342 INGiCUS Soe =eeete =e 307, 319 
popular names of -...-......-. 291 LESSON saa eo 308 
periodical movements of ...-.-- 329 Tetrarhynchus attenuatus ....-... 345 
probable winter habitat of .... 322 | Thermometers ...--...----.--- 58, 129, 160 
pugnacity Of eee NS SBIEREY/ Thompson, John eco ceceia 291, 371 
Leproduction, Of..4--52ic.-s 52 3904) Phoracostracans)-=---c2.<s1a55-- 1021 
size and rate of growth of---.-- 324 | Thymallus tricolor...--..----.---. 555 
vessels for taking Ct Dea as, OE = 354 | Tides in Davis’ Strait..----.----. - 206 
FOUN MOL seats ee et tees 57 aN Ca VU ATIS) olla ee clelat se nate sero 59 
zoological names of ....--.--.- 992 | Tom-cod ..-.--...-. ----.----- ---- 45 
Sword-fish : MO WANS -NetStea= at eee eee alse 71 
foi liye ee os Ne ache 293 | Townships within three miles of 
family, description of -.....--. 294 tide-water, number of ...--....- 49 
geographical range of. 318 | Toxopneustes lividus ...--.-..---- 919 
enumeration of species Trachinus draco ..--..------------ 6 
Tig ee teehee 0s 306 | Trammel-fishing .-....-...-....-.. 524 
Transportation : 
T. Of Carpren sees ce oeseeee 677 
WRADLO*SIEVOe cece ses Secon sic cect 65, 72 of fish, experiments regarding. 656 
Mao one isis coe eee o hataeinia cis aie wa 624 of fish and eggs, directions con- 
Man oles\22 35 eer cee) sats sis 65, 69 GELDING 2.22 fees siejeicinee ste aes 512 
Damn ers Zia stores aire ee erates 422 of rainbow trout-...-........620, 621 
Tapes) texburabacn. elo o-6 seco e 919 OL VOUNL OY StCLS flo 2e 2, <sicloaey HELO 
Tarente, oyster-culture at. --909, 910, 911- Cantor Spawil cece cise seo ease OOS 
OPS 4) Ara pss sats cae ice Ginter nee Seeesecee 1047 
Telephone used at McCloud River Mrawi,, WeaM a sactotjoneetece eee 65, 66 
bTOUL-PONGS see ee se eso eo ee 617 halibut, description of--..- 209 
‘Temperature observations. -196, 207, 1012, manner of setting. 210 
1014, 1024, 1039, 1040 GubOIs Ho Soenss ocle coats 65, 67 
Temperature observations: Trematodai- sass. soc eee Seer 344 
at McCloud hatchery -..--..-.... 600 | Tristoma coccineum ....--......-. 344 
at navy-yard station....-..--- 660 papillosum):s sss 345 
at Northville, Mich-....# --.- HOON MErolle yw Chee es eee e ee 77 
at Spesutie Narrows .--...----- 658 | Trout, common European .-...---- 494 
on coast of Norway ....------- 160 mackinaw, nutritive value 
Temperature and density of sea- (0) ee ee Sec 235 
water, relation Of: .2. 2.2 ie... 705, 706 nutritive value of.....-.--- 733 


1060 INDEX. 
Page. Page. 
Trout, Caimi Owes a3 eee 615, 616 | White-fish, nutritive value of .235, 257, 259 
salmon, nutritive value of.. 235 264, 266 
Mire shred erichkaWeectcstee sete = 343, 358 propagation of-.-.....- 553 
Tunicatay ose eee eae LOE VATLOLICS Ob emer aerae 569 
Turbot, nutritive value of -.-257, 259,264 | White perch, nutritive value of. .239, 256, 
257, 259, 264 
ue Wilkins; Georges 22525 anes see 656 
United States Fish Commission .65, 53-62 | Williamson hatching apparatus... 487 
Qa AT Onl Walling Oba Satelite nets 606, 613 
United States, list of typical fish- Wisconsin fish commission...--... 479 
eriesiohsec-ssese 222s WViOOd DULY, pVELe es. te ee eee 618 
plan of inquiry re- Wioods CDE ae oscars 232, 249 
garding fisheries Woodson, Silas ss) cess eee 605, 649 - 
Ofna ois ahem mele 3 Worth, Ss .Ga oo eee 605, 628, 629, 649, 653 
V. Wright, Ao Bissecc eee een 576 
WienlsiVeLruCQsaas --oesae eae OLS x. 
Vermont fish commission..-.-.-... EAS Roi 1 Ut ema WO ape MES Re 995 
Vierrill Ay Mott wets cosas Seam. 56, 65 Peis Lire Lied ela ae wget box ‘ 
Vessels, fishing, plan for obtaining a Iablioere phe Otee a: 
statistics of............. 29, 30 descriptive notes 
Va H St) oho Pr ee ae a 190 | , OM eat hag lao: 297 
sword-fish......-...------ 34 distribution of, in 
\Wolsiitrrl Cri 9.4 dl 2-235 ees Gaocce 1019 the eastern At- 
W. lentHO Bas Sonisese 314 
geographical range of .-.. 318 
Wralicer,Hraners/ Ae. 2 ese =o 31-5) 4 S10) RT phd ace ae eee eee 294, 295 
WET CIMSE SO Shs ctealss sonia terme arate 6380)| Kiplin 52 aao.b oes hes oe ee ee 
WiebberiiS' wise seisiiec 2B stz Sopa ceais 616 
Weeks, Seth ....576, 616, 628, 629, 630, 648 % 
WielshermiWrrAteeecn mass issie tare 616;,630 | SYiarrow EC). see eee cones 57 
Whale-fisheries......-..-- 167, 168, 177-187 | Yellow pike-perch, nutritive value 
Whales driving herring landward. 154 Ofe Joie ceases teenie 240, 257, 259, 264 
WAatIE (CRISIS BA ogaa pepe Age ce soos 616 | Young fish, instructions for raising. 508 
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