BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 469 



Gloucester and Provincetown. I am not specially interested in the 

 mackerel fishery, but I am largely in the menhaden. 



There were an enormous body of herring on the coast about the first 

 week of September. Great schools of them were seen in Ipswich Bay, 

 and from Cape Ann to Portland. I had no information about them to 

 the westward of Cape Cod. 



New Bedford, October 13, 1882. 



121.-WH1T THE CATCJIBNO OF MENIIAHEN WITH SEINES, ETC. 



SHOVED BE RESTRICTED. 



By DAVID F. VAIL. 



TFroni a letter to Prof. S. F. Baird.] 



I have observed that the fish come in the spring at about the same 

 time regardless of weather, and that there are large schools of spawn- 

 ing fish. They come for *that purpose and ought to be protected if pos- 

 sible. If there is not some law passed to prohibit the catching of these 

 fish on this coast with purse nets, pounds, and other traps, during the 

 months of April and May, it will be only a few years before the men- 

 haden will be annihilated as completely as they have been on the coast 



of Maine. 



I know a good many of my brother manufacturers will not agree 

 with me; but the reason is that they have steamers that can go down 

 the coast during the months of April and May and catch up these 

 spawning fish before they get to their spawning grounds. It is my 

 belief that if the fish could be left until the spawning season is over, 

 they would catch just as many fish and .leave the spawn to grow up and 

 make fishing good for years to come. I am the oldest person in the 

 business, except one, that I know of. I have been engaged in it the 

 last 20 years, and have watched it from year to year. 



Eiverhead, N. Y., February 20, 1SS3. 



122 OCCURRENCE OF BAEISTES CAPRISCITS GMELI1V (EFATHER- 



JACKET OR FIEE-F1SH) AT NEW BEDFORD, MASS. 



BY THOMAS R. LUCE. 



[From a letter to Prof. S. F. Baird.] 



The fish which I send by express was caught to-day in the waters 

 of this place near Pound Hills. 1 was fishing in about 2 fathoms of 

 water, with lobster bait, for tautog, and succeeded in catching three of 

 these, much about the same time. I therefore think they must have 

 run in schools. Please inform me of its name. 



No. 127 Cedar Street, New Bedford, Mass., 



September 25, 1883. 



