572 NATURAL HISTOEY OF AQUATIC ANIMALS. 



changed through the influence of seining. The shore fishermen could obtain none for bait, and 

 vessels followed them far out to sea, capturing them in immense quantities forty miles from land. 

 The fisheries had produced no such effect south of Cape Cod, and it was quite inexplicable that 

 their habits should have been so modified in the north. In 1878, however, after ten years or more, 

 they resumetl their former habits of hugging the shores, and the Menhaden fishery of Maine was 

 carried on, for the most part, in the rivers. 



Why the schools swim at the surface so conspicuous a prey to men, birds, and other fishes is 

 not known. It does not appear to be for the purpose of feeding; perhaps the fisherman is right 

 when he declares that they are playing. 



An old mackerel fisherman thus describes the difference in the habits of the mackerel and 

 Menhaden: "Fogies school differently from mackerel; the Pogy slaps with his tail, and in 

 moderate weather you can hear the sound of a school of them, as first one and then another 

 strikes the water. The mackerel go along 'gilliug,' that is, putting the sides of their heads out 

 of the water as they swim. The Fogies make a flapping sound; the mackerel a rushing sound. 

 Sometimes in calm and foggy weather you can hear a school of mackerel miles away." They do 

 not attract small birds as do the schools of predaceous fish. The fish-hawk often hovers above 

 them, and some of the larger gulls occasionally follow them in quest of a meal. About Cape Cod 

 one of the gulls, perhaps Larua argentatus, is called "Fogy Gull." 



On warm, still, sunny days the fish may always be seen at the surface, but cold or rainy 

 weather and prevailing northerly or easterly winds quickly cause them to disappear. When it is 

 rough they are not so often seen, though schools of them frequently appear when the sea is too 

 high for fishermen to set their nets. The best days for menhaden-fishing are when the wind is 

 northwesterly in the morning, dying out in the middle of the day, and springing up again in the 

 afternoon from the southwest, with a clear sky. At the change of the wind on such a day they 

 come to the surface in large numbers. 



A comparison of the eflect of the weather upon the Menhaden and the Herring yields some 

 curious results. The latter is a cokl-water species. With the advance of summer it seeks the. 

 north, returning to our waters with the approach of cold. The Menhaden prefers the temperature 

 of 60 F. or more; the Herring, 55 F. and less. When the Menhaden desert the Gulf of Maine 

 they are replaced by the Herring. Cold weather drives the former to the warmer strata, while it 

 brings the latter to the surface. The conditions most favorable on our coast for the appearance of 

 Herring on the surface, and which correspond precisely with those which have been made out for 

 the coast of Europe, are least so for the Menhaden. 



Their winter habitat, like that of the other cold-water absentees, has never been determined. 

 The most plausible hypothesis supposes that instead of migrating towards the tropics or hiber- 

 nating near the shore, as has been claimed by many, they swim out to sea until they find a 

 stratum of water corresponding to that frequented by them during their summer sojourn on the 

 coast. 



This is rendered probable by the following considerations: 1. That the number of Menhaden in 

 southern waters is not diminished in seasons of their abundance on the northern coast, nor increased 

 in those of their absence from (lie latter region. 2. That there are local varieties of the species, dis- 

 tinguished by physical characters almost ot specific value, by differences in habits, and in the case 

 of the, .southern schools by the universal presence in the mouth of a crustacean parasite, \\hich is 

 never found in the specimens caught north of Cape May. 3. That the same schools usually reap- 

 pear in the same waters in successive years. 4. That their very prompt arrival in the spring 

 suggests their presence in waters near at hand. f>. That their leanness when they first appear 



