BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. IT 



Vol. V, Ho. 2. Washington, D. C. Jan. 19, 1885, 



according to quality as seen by examination of the barrels by the inspec- 

 tion officer. 



Herring. — The herring, of which there are two if not three species, 

 appear in the waters along the coast of Labrador, if it be an open sea- 

 son, late in April or at any rate early in May. The inhabitants begin 

 ro fish for them with nets and seines as soon as the ice in the bays has 

 broken sufficiently to allow, while they continue the operation till some- 

 time in June, usually a little earlier than the middle of the month, whea 

 the fish, having deposited their spawn in shallow water, return to the 

 deep water again. These fish are called " spring herring." They are 

 poor and thin, and, caught in the very middle of the spawning season, 

 cannot but affect future fishing in these same waters. These fish are of 

 a very poor quality and are generally salted down for the dogs to eat in 

 the winter months, when a suitable provision must be made for them 

 or they will starve. In the fall, however, the fishing is of a much dif- 

 ferent quality. The "fall herring" appear on the coast about the 

 middle of August and remain about six weeks. They are in excellent 

 condition, and very fat, and equal even to Scotch herring of the best 

 quality. These fish appear in vast bodies and cover the water often for 

 miles. 



They occur all along the coast from Blanc Sablon almost as far as 

 Northwest Eiver. Sometimes the fish remain into October; when they 

 do, these later fish are generally unusually fine, and Pierre Fortin, in 

 his report of the fisheries in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, states that they 

 are nearly always taken with a seine, and that he has himself seen " a 

 seiue set by Nova Scotia fishermen, after having been five days in the 

 water, drawn out with 800 barrels of herring." 



The largest fish are caught within the above named district, while 

 the "spring herring" are uow rarely taken except in some localities in 

 Newfoundland. It cannot be stated positively but it is generally sup- 

 posed that these spring fish, after depositing their spawn on the New- 

 foundland coast, are the same which afterward appear fat and large on 

 the Labrador coast. Although the migrations of the herring are not 

 perfectly understood, it is supposed that local and atmospheric changes 

 enter largely into the causes for which the fish will leave a part of the 

 coast suddenly and only appear again after the lapse of years as sud- 

 denly as they disappeared. 



Although herring are captured with nets and seines, much as other 

 fish are, yet there is a process known as "weir-fishing," which differs 

 essentially. Weir-fishing is conducted as follows: Young fir trees are 

 driven into the soft mud or sand at ebb tide so thickly that their 

 branches interlace each other. When full tide sets in and brings the 

 P.ull. U. S. F. C, 85 2 



