FISHES OF THE GULF OF MAINE 145 



Smelt are also found very generally along both the New Brunswick and the 

 Nova Scotian shores of the Bay of Fundy, but to judge from Canadian fishery 

 statistics they are far more plentiful near the mouth of the bay and on the Nova 

 Scotian side than anywhere on the New Brunswick shore 60 or farther up the bay, 

 where only a few hundred pounds are caught annually. Smelts are also plentiful 

 on the west coast of Nova Scotia, facing the open Gulf, as is reflected in a catch 

 of almost 58,000 pounds for Yarmouth County in 1916-17. 



The adult smelts return to salt water immediately after spawning, to spend 

 the summer either in the estuary into which the stream in which they spawn 

 empties or in the sea close by. On the Massachusetts coast north of Cape Cod 

 all the spent fish have left fresh water by the middle of May, in some years earlier. 

 On the Maine coast, too, a good proportion of the spent fish are in salt water by 

 the first week in May, for we have seen a bushel of large smelt taken in a weir at 

 Cutler (near the mouth of the Grand Manan Channel) as early as May 4. 61 



The summer habitat of the smelt varies off different parts of the coast of the 

 Gulf depending on the summer temperature of the water and perhaps on the food 

 supply. In the Massachusetts Bay region and along the southern coast of Maine 

 most of them desert the harbors and estuaries during the warmest season, prob- 

 ably, however, moving out only far enough to find cool water at a few fathoms 

 depth. A few may be found in harbors through the summer, however. Smelt, 

 for instance, are caught in Cohasset Harbor throughout the summer in some 

 years, but not in others; and east of Penobscot Bay, where the surface temperature 

 does not rise as high as it does off Massachusetts, smelt are to be found in the 

 harbors, bays, and river mouths all summer, when they are sometimes taken in 

 numbers in the weirs. The smelts are always confined to a very narrow zone 

 along shore, for none has ever been reported more than a mile or two from land 

 or at more than a few fathoms depth. Though confined to shoal water, the schools 

 (which are mostly composed of individuals of one size and are probably the product 

 of a single hatching) live pelagically, not on the bottom. 



Food. — The smelt is predaceous. Most authorities describe it as feeding on 

 small crustaceans, which is correct so far as it goes for shrimp (decapods) are 

 probably its favorite food and they are certainly the best smelt bait, but small 

 fish also form an important item in its diet. We have, for example, found smelts 

 taken in the Sheepscot River in May packed full of young herring, and have caught 

 many on small mummichogs (Fundulus), while at Woods Hole cunners, anchovies, 

 and alewives have been identified from smelt stomachs. 62 The Woods Hole diet 

 list also includes shellfish, squid, annelid worms (Nereis), and crabs, but even as 

 greedy a fish as the smelt ceases to feed during its spawning visits to fresh water. 



Breeding habits. — The adult smelt all gather in harbors and brackish estuaries 

 early in autumn, smelt fishing with hook and line being in full swing by October, 

 and by the time the first ice forms in December some of them have run as far as 

 the head of tide. The smelt winter between the harbor mouths and the brackish 



" The catch in 1916-17 was 115,000 pounds for Annapolis and Digby Counties, Nova Scotia, while for Charlotte County, 

 New Brunswick, it was only 7,100 pounds. 



*' Atkins (1887) gives much interesting information on the smelt in Maine. 

 " Vinal Edwards's notes. 



