THE FEEDING OF SALMON 



113 



and the impulse to take them is in all likelihood the 

 same impulse which enables the salmon to nourish 

 himself at other times. In this sense the fish may 

 be said to feed, while at the same time there is 

 nothing unnatural in allowing that the wobbling of 

 an apparently half-dead dace or sprat over a salmon's 

 head may incite the poor fish's rage, or that the ex- 

 quisite colouring of what is called a fly may produce 

 a flash of keen emotion, as has been said by some. 



When the digestive tract of the salmon taken at 

 the mouth of the river is examined, it is natural to 

 suppose, since the fish is more recently from the sea 

 than is the upper water fish, that more trace of 

 feeding will be found. Grey and Tosh, in 1894 and 

 1895, examined 1694 salmon in the Tweed, 1442 of 

 the fish being taken at the mouth of the river in the 

 nets of the Berwick Salmon Fisheries Company.* 

 Of those Berwick fish 128, or 9 per cent., contained 

 food. The following table shows in a condensed 

 form the times at which the fish with food were 

 taken : 



It is noticeable at once that the greatest number 



* Fourteenth Annual Report, Fishery Board for Scotland 

 Part II. Note 2. 



H 



