lii 



is carried on by persons from the banks throughout the year, and a number 

 of breeding fish must be victimised in this way. However, the mis- 

 chievous practices of poisoning the waters and trapping the fish appear to 

 be unknown. The smallest distance between the knots of the meshes 

 of the nets, it is considered, should be half an inch ; the public sale of the 

 fry does not appear to be known, they being consumed by their takers, or, 

 should there be a surplus, being privately disposed of. The Assistant Col- 

 lector remarked of his district, that in addition to fishing by means of nets 

 and trapping, nallas, rivers, and tanks are in the hot weather dammed up 

 with bunds, and poisonous drugs are thrown into the water, so that the fish 

 either die, or, becoming stupefied, float on the surface, and are easily caught. 

 Angling is occasionally resorted to, but only, as a rule, where the water 

 is too deep to admit of a bund being erected. The practice of 

 jooisoning fish has, to a certain extent, been stopped in the Gokah Talooka, 

 owing to the rules of the Forest Department, under which is prohibited 

 the cutting the small twigs and leaves from which the stupefying drugs are 

 made. The size of the mesh of the nets does not seem to vary very 

 much in the different talookas, the smallest being from one-sixth to one 

 quarter of an inch between the knots. In Belgaum, however, and 

 the neighbourhood, a net with even smaller meshes is used for the purpose 

 of catching prawns and a small fish called " moree." Nets with minute 

 meshes are used, as a rule, during the rains, and with larger meshes during 

 the cold season and hot weather, but this is not strictly observed. No 

 difficulty is considered to exist, in organising a scheme to prevent the 

 present wholesale destruction of fish, by regulating the size of the small- 

 est mesh of the nets that will be permitted, by determining at what 

 seasons nets with different sized meshes may be employed, by pro- 

 hibiting the sale of the fry of fishes in the bazars, and forbidding the 

 capture of fish at any rate during the first two months of the breeding 

 season. 



107. The Acting Collector of Dharwar (March 29th, 1870) propos- 

 ed selling the fisheries by auction, either 

 Opinions of the European early or f or a perio( i o£ three or four years 

 ofhunils ot the Dharwar Collec- J , , J .> . , r . ,, -, •• 



torate. a t a time, in order to give the lessee time to 



improve them. He observed that a former 

 Collector on several occasions had done so at Seerburdghee in Bankipur 

 Talooka ; selling that in one tank for 200 rupees, for others as much 

 as 80 to 100 rupees have been given. There are, taking the district 

 all round, upwards of two hundred tanks in which the right to net 

 fish might be sold. There should be strict rides as to the size of cer- 

 tain fish that should not be allowed to be removed, but beyond fixing a 

 minimum of mesh, and protecting the young of certain descriptions, other 

 restrictions are not advocated. The money collected from this source 

 would, in this Collectorate, probably yield about 16,000 rupees per 

 annum, and should be credited to local funds, to be expended on the 

 tanks which afford fishing. In many cases, steps might be taken to 

 provide an inner and deeper tank into which the fish might be driven on 

 the water becoming veiy low. Thus, not only the tanks would be im- 

 proved, but the amount of fish might be augmented, adding to the 

 food and comfort of the poorer classes, whose interests in this particular point 

 have been hitherto neglected. Subsequently (November 29th, 1871), the 



