14 



FISHERY BULLETIN OF THE FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE 



General range. — Atlantic coasts of Europe and of 

 North America; from the west coast of Greenland 

 to Florida in the western side of the Atlantic ; from 

 northern Norway to the Mediterranean in the 

 eastern; 21 running up fresh rivers to breed, and 

 landlocked in certain American lakes. 



Occurrence in the Gulf of Maine. — No doubt the 

 sea lamprey occurs along the whole coast line of the 

 Gulf of Maine, for it is recorded in or at the mouths 

 of numerous rivers and streams in Nova Scotia, 

 New Brunswick, Maine, and Massachusetts; spe- 

 cifically in the St John, Annapolis, Petit Codiac, and 

 Shubenacadie Kivers and from the St. Andrews 

 region in salt water in the Bay of Fundy; from 

 Eastport, Bucksport, Casco Bay, and the Pre- 

 sumpscott, Kennebec, and Penobscot Rivers in 

 Maine; from the Merrimac River system; from the 

 Exeter and Lamprey Rivers, tributaries of Great 

 Bay, New Hampshire; and from the Parker River 

 in northern Alassachusetts. 



Since lampreys never take the hook or are cap- 

 tured in nets except on rare occasions they are sel- 

 dom seen in salt water; only when running up our 

 rivers are they familiar objects. But they have 

 been taken as far offshore as the seaward slopes of 

 Banquereau, Sable Island, and LaHave Banks off 

 Nova Scotia; on Browns Bank; in the deep gully 

 between the latter and Georges Bank, and over the 

 continental slope off Nantucket and off Marthas 

 Vineyard. 



Lampreys have long been known to run up New 

 England rivers a little earlier in the spring than 

 shad, perhaps beginning to work upstream as early 

 as the beginning of April or even the end of March. 

 In the rivers tributary to the Gulf of Maine the 

 runs are at then peak during May and early June, 

 with few, if any, entering later than that. The 

 larvae have been reported by Doctor Huntsman 

 as plentiful in the Shubenacadie (emptying into 

 the Bay of Fundy) and no doubt they are to be 

 found in the Merrimac system, in the Exeter River, 

 and in other Gulf of Maine streams. 



Abundance. — The construction of impassible 

 dams has sadly reduced the numbers of lampreys 



" Also reported from "West Africa" by Gunther, Cat. Fishes British Mu- 

 seum, vol. 8, 1870, p. 502. 



in the larger rivers of New England. In the Mer- 

 rimac, for example, once a famous lamprey river, 22 

 so few now succeed in surmounting the succession 

 of dams that a recent survey yielded no evidence 

 of any now having access to the upper reaches. 

 Some lampreys, however, are said to breed in the 

 river below the Lowell dam; 23 we have seen what 

 resembled their "nests" in the Squannacook, a 

 branch of the Nashua tributary to the Middle Mer- 

 rimac, and they still continue numerous in some 

 Gulf of Maine streams where they can reach suit- 

 able spawning grounds without too great difficulty. 

 We may quote catches of up to 119 recently in the 

 Shubenacadie, where larvae also have recently 

 been reported in abundance, 24 and of more than 

 100 each on several occasions in the Exeter 

 River, 25 where they are familiar spectacles, as they 

 gather at the falls at Exeter, N. H. But we ought 

 perhaps to caution the reader that while lampreys, 

 like other anadromous fishes, may seem plentiful 

 when condensed between the narrow bounds of a 

 river's banks, their numbers as a whole do not rival 

 those of the more abundant of the salt-water fishes. 

 Importance. — Lampreys were esteemed a great 

 delicacy in Europe during the middle ages (histo- 

 rians tell us Henry I of England died of a surfeit of 

 them) and considerable numbers were captured of 

 old in the rivers of New England for human food, 

 particularly in the Connecticut and Merrimac 

 Rivers. But the lamprey fishery has been scarcely 

 more than a memory for 40 years past except lo- 

 cally and in a small way for home consumption, or 

 to supply the needs of biological laboratories. In 

 the salt water of the Gulf of Maine the lamprey has 

 never been of any commercial importance; the 

 average fisherman might not see one in a lifetime, 

 nor is there any sale for the few that are picked up 

 by chance. But larvae are taken in considerable 

 numbers for bait in the Susquehanna River, and 

 perhaps elsewhere along the middle Atlantic coast. 



" For an account of the lamprey fishery in New England during the first 

 half of the 19th century, see Goode, Fish, and Fishery Ind. U. S., Sect. 1, 1884, 

 p. 680. 



« Bailey, Biol. Survey Merrimack Watershed, New Hampshire Fish and 

 Game Dept., 1938, p. 155. 



« Information gathered for us by Dr. A. O. Huntsman. 



» Collected for the Biological Laboratory, Harvard University. 



