134 BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF FISHERIES 



but for some unknown reasou it appears that so few fish return to fresh water along 

 the coast of Maine until older that in past times when there was still a good run of 

 salmon not more than 3 or 4 grilse to 70 adults were taken in the St. Croix, and not 

 more than 1 to 500 in the Dennys and Penobscot Rivers. 



Salmon, like most other northern sea fish, make most of their growth during 

 the summer. In summers when they spawn they hardly grow at all, but unlike 

 the herrings, cod, etc., all mature salmon do not spawn. Hence the size of a 

 salmon depends more on the number of times it has spawned than on its age. 

 Some males, as just remarked, spawn after one year at sea; most of them, and 

 many females, after two; while other fish stay at sea for three, four, or even five 

 years without spawning, meanwhile growing to a great size, and it is probable 

 that all the exceptionally large fish are maidens entering fresh water for the first 

 time. On the other hand salmon that commence spawning at an early age and 

 spawn every year never grow large, for the yearly growth is hardly more than enough 

 to make up for the loss during the sojourn in the river. Salmon rarely live more 

 than eight or nine years or spawn more than three or four times. Many (particu- 

 larly the very large fish) spawn but once, others annually, and others at intervals 

 of two or three years. It follows from this that large salmon are to be found in 

 the sea throughout the year, though fewer of them in summer when the spawning 

 fish are absent about their reproductive duties than in winter when the whole 

 stock, except for the parr and a few spent fish to be mentioned later, is assembled 

 there. 



Food. — The salmon is purely carnivorous and very voracious, feeding alto- 

 gether on five bait, chiefly on fish and crustaceans. Among the former launce, 

 herring, capelin, smelt, small mackerel, small sculpins, and even flatfish have been 

 described as entering into its diet, with the first three its favorites. 45 Comeau, 46 for 

 example, speaks of launce and capelin as having been the chief diet of thousands 

 of salmon that he opened on the north shore of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. In the 

 Baltic a hook and line fishery is carried on for salmon with herring as bait, and 

 occasionally they have been taken on herring-baited cod trawls off the Maine 

 coast, while herring up to 5 inches in length have been found in salmon stomachs 

 about Eastport. Sand fleas (Gammarus) rank with launce and herring in impor- 

 tance as salmon food in the North and Baltic Seas, while fish entering the Penobscot 

 have been found full of "shrimp" (probably euphausiids). Salmon are also 

 credited with eating crabs. 



Most of the large salmon, like the smolts, disappear from the immediate 

 neighborhood of the coast in winter, but probably the main body does not go far 

 to sea, for they are regularly caught near land in the Baltic in winter by the hook 

 and line fishery just mentioned, nor is it unusual for a few salmon to be picked up 

 about Massachusetts Bay at that season, evidence strengthened by the fact that 

 salmon appear about the river mouths so soon after the ice goes out in spring that 

 they can not have come from any great distance. With odd fish entering the rivei 



45 Eichelbaum (Ccnseil Permanent International pour l'Exploration de la Mer, Rapports et Proces-Verbaus, Vol. XXI 

 1916, p. 84) examined the contents of the stomachs of many salmon from the Baltic and North Seas. 

 * 6 Life and Sport on the North Shore, by Napoleon A. Comeau. 440 pp., illus., 1909. Quebec. 



