102 Mr Shaw's Experiments and Observations on the Parr, 



precisely the same appearance as the salmon-fry. They measure 

 about 6^ inches in length, of a beautiful blue colour on the 

 back ; the sides bright and silvery ; the dorsal and pectoral 

 fins and tail tipt with black ; the belly, ventral, and anal fins 

 white ; and on the most minute comparison with those at the 

 time descending the river, not the slightest difference could be 

 perceived, which proves what I have above stated, that the 

 parr remains in the river two years before it assume the silvery 

 appearance of the young salmon or smolt. 



This active little fish, which has, as I have shewn, turned out 

 to be the parr of a few weeks old, is nowhere to be found but 

 in the streams in which the old salmon had deposited their 

 spawn the previous winter, or in the immediate neighbourhood 

 of these streams. Early in April 1835, I found them in the 

 same stream as above stated, but so young and weak, from their 

 having but recently emerged from the bed in which the egg had 

 originally been deposited, as to be unable to struggle against 

 the stream, where there was any considerable current. They 

 therefore generally betook themselves into some small eddy, fre- 

 quently where the horses, in passing the ford, had left the im- 

 pression of their feet in the loose shingle of the stream, and in 

 this shelter, where there was a slight current, a few inches deep, 

 they continued to remain, with their little tails in constant ac- 

 tion, till my approach was perceived, when they immediately 

 darted under the stones and disappeared. At their first appear- 

 ance, they are only to be found under the loose shingly stones 

 two or three inches deep in water, with a very small current, 

 and close to the edge of their parent streams, or on the gravelly 

 bank sometimes called a scour or rack, which generally runs in 

 an obhque direction across the river, and adapts the stream so 

 admirably to the purposes of the breeding salmon, that there are 

 few instances of such scours occurring in the river without their 

 being much resorted to by the salmon during the breeding sea- 

 son. These httle fishes, as above stated, are to be found in 

 such situations during April, May, and even June ; but as they 

 increase in size and strength, they scatter themselves all over 

 the shallower parts of the river, especially where the bottom is 

 composed of fine gravel. The parrs of one year old, or summer 

 jwrrs, are now to be found in every considerable little current, 

 especially where the clear and shingly stream purls over the 



