250 



FISHERY BULLETIN OF THE FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE 



fish in question was taken in June 1917, by Capt. 

 A. S. Ree, about 50 miles eastnortheast of Cape 

 Ann, and since it weighed 615 pounds, eviscerated 

 with the head still attached, when brought in to 

 the Boston fish pier, it must have been as heavy 

 as 700 pounds while alive. 22 Another halibut of 

 602 pounds is said to have been taken near Isle au 

 Haut in 1902, but we cannot vouch for this one. 



Halibut of 500 to 600 pounds are rumored al- 

 most every year, but the next largest of which we 

 have definite knowledge was one of about 450 

 pounds caught on a hand line in the deep water 

 between Browns and Georges Banks in 1908 by 

 W. F. Clapp. Goode 23 likewise had records of a 

 dozen fish of 350 to 400 pounds caught off the 

 New England coast; the heaviest was one of 401 

 pounds taken near Race Point, Cape Cod, in July 

 1849. But a 410-pound halibut that was brought 

 in to the Boston fish pier by the Dawn, March 27, 

 1941, 2i was spoken of as the largest that had been 

 landed there in a "score of years," and it seems 

 that halibut heavier than 300 pounds always were 

 rarities anywhere in the North Atlantic. 



Full-grown females average about 100 to 150 

 pounds. Males run smaller, and most of the 

 "large" fish landed in New England ports weigh 

 from 50 to 200 pounds. The largest we have 

 caught, taken on Browns Bank, weighed exactly 

 100 pounds and was 5 feet long. Halibut be- 

 tween 7 and 8 feet long usually weigh 300 to 350 

 pounds, and the following table based on Ice- 

 landic fish measured by Jesperson, 25 and others 

 from the Gulf of Maine, give the relationship of 

 length to weight for the smaller sizes. 



' This flsh weighed 98 pounds dressed, the intestines accounting for 15 

 pounds and the ovaries (with immature eggs) for 7 pounds. 



Habits. — The halibut, like all the flatfish tribe, 

 is normally a ground fish, once the young fry have 

 taken to bottom. But it comes to the surface on 

 occasion (p. 257), and it is a very powerful fish, 

 when hooked. Halibut caught in shallow water 

 are very active, usually starting off at great 

 speed when they are hauled up from the bottom, 

 often spinning the dory around in then- attempts 

 to escape. 26 They are usually found on sand, 

 gravel, or clay, not on soft mud or on rock bottom; 

 400-500 fathoms may be set as the lower boundary 

 to their existence in any numbers, 27 but their 

 absolute depth limit is not known. 



The young halibut, like the young of so many 

 other ground fishes, drift helplessly with the cur- 

 rent for some months after hatching (just how long 

 is not known) ; not at the surface, how T ever, but in 

 the mid-depths (p. 253). During this period they 

 tend both to rise in the water as they grow, and to 

 be carried inshore, so that when they finally take 

 to the bottom they do so in quite shallow water 

 (p. 254). But the fry as a whole tend to work 

 offshore again thereafter, and deeper, so that 

 halibut caught in deep water are larger than those 

 caught in shallow water. This fact was noticed 

 early on Georges Bank, where most of the fish 

 taken on the bank in depths of 30 to 40 fathoms 

 or less ran from 125 to 180 pounds, whereas much 

 larger ones were caught on the deeper slope to the 

 southeast. Fishermen have also reported catching 

 smaller fish on the inner ends of long lines set from 

 shoal water out into deep, and larger fish on the 

 outer ends. i8 And this rule holds equally for the 

 other side of the Atlantic. 



The halibut is a boreal, not an arctic fish, in its 

 relationship to temperature. Thus, large catches 

 are (and were) made only at times and places 

 where the water is at least as warm as 36°-38° F. 

 (about 3° C). In the Grand Banks region, for 

 instance, halibut are mostly caught either far 

 enough down the slope to be below the icy touch of 

 the Labrador Current, or at times and places 

 where the latter does not reach bottom, if the fish 

 are on the bank. But the lower limit to the 

 temperature range of the halibut is not sharp-cut. 

 We do, in fact, find record of at least one halibut 



" An account of this flsh was published In the Boston Globe, June 12» 

 1917. It was bought by the Shore Fish Co. 

 » Fish. Ind. U. S., Sect. 1, 1884, p. 194. 

 « Reported In the Boston Herald, March 28, 1941. 

 « Meddelel. Kommls. Havunderstfgelser, Ser-Flskerl, vol. 5, No. 5, 1917. 



» Goode and Collins (Fish. Ind. U. S., Sect. 5, vol. 1, 1887, p. 17) give a 

 readable account. 



" Capt. Baldersheim (Rapp. Cons. Intemat. Explor. Mer, vol. 56, 1929, 

 p. 25) reports good catches at that depth In Davis Strait off west Greenland. 



» Goode, Fish. Ind. TJ. S., Sect. 1, 1884, p. 195. 



