THE MACKEREL AND ITS ALLIES. 173 



" I have many seasons been engaged in fishing for Mackerel in our bay 

 with gill-nets. I watched the Mackerel more particularly in regard to 

 their time for spawning. In 1856, owing to the fact that a measure had 

 passed the Massachusetts legislature authorizing the appointment of three 

 commissioners to make investigations with regard to the artificial propaga- 

 tion of the fish, and that I expected to be named one of the commissioners, 

 I went to the upper part of Massachusetts Bay, where it is about twenty 

 miles broad, and I found these spawning Mackerel there near the bottom. 

 This year the Mackerel came in about the middle of May ; few at first. 

 On the 20th I went out for the first time with my drifting-nets all night in 

 the bay ; I caught 2,250 Mackerel; on the following I caught 3,520. 

 When I first began to catch them I observed that the spawn had come to 

 its full size, though it was not free to run from them, not being yet fully 

 matured. On or about the 1st of June we found that some of them were 

 depositing spawn, and as I took them from the nets the spawn ran freely. 

 On the 5 th of June I took the mature eggs as they came from the fish and 

 put them in alcohol, marking the date, as I considered this time the 

 middle of the spawning season. (By the 10th of June the fish had all 

 deposited their spawn, and they then proceeded to the grounds where they 

 expected to meet with better food in order to fatten and recruit. The 

 spawning takes place at a depth of from five to fifteen fathoms.) Thirty 

 days after I went out in the bay and found any quantity of schools of little 

 Mackerel which were, I should think, about two inches long, though their 

 length might have been a little less. I took a number of specimens and 

 put them in alcohol, marking the date. Twenty-five days later I pro- 

 cured another lot of them which had grown to double that size. I don't 

 mean to imply that they were twice as long, but twice as heavy. I put 

 them also in alcohol, marking the date. The first time I subsequently 

 went to Boston I called on Prof. Agassiz and gave him the specimens. 

 Ke said that he had never before been able to ascertain these facts so 

 clearly and so well, and that he was very much pleased with them. I 

 watched the growth of these young Mackerel all along, and I saw them 

 grow considerably from month to month, so much so that the same fall, 

 in the latter part of October, I caught some of them with a very small 

 mesh net and found they had grown to a length of six and a half or seven 

 inches. I kept a small quantity of them, split, salted and packed them, 

 in accordance with the Massachusetts inspection law, as No. 4's, and since 

 Mackerel were then scarce and very high in price, I sold them for as much 

 as $6 a barrel." 



" Much yet remains to be learned in regard to the spawning season of 

 the American Mackerel," writes Prof. Baird, " and little more is known 

 of this except in regard to the European variety. It is, however, well 

 established by the researches of Sars that this fish, like the cod, and many 



