2 6 AMERICAN FISHES. 



next haul we caught 13,000 pounds more, or 50,000 pounds altogether 

 within six hours. This was at the Black Walnut Point fishery. At my 

 Avoca Beach fishery a haul was made in 1844, which was supposed to 

 amount to 100,000 pounds, but this was not accurately counted. Many 

 of the individual fish weighed 95 pounds." A Hessian officer, stationed at 

 New York during the Revolutionary war, recorded that great quantities 

 were at that time sold in the markets. In the year ending March, 1879, 

 over 800,000 pounds of bass were sold in New York, the greatest number 

 being recorded for Novemoer. 



The Baltimore Gazette, in May, 1834 had this item: "Some fishermen 

 at Carpenters Point took a single haul, upwards of 800 rock fish of the 

 largest size we ever saw. Some of them weighed upwards of 100 pounds, 

 and the most of them averaged from 50 to 100 pounds." 



The annual consumption of this fish in the United States is estimated at 

 not less than 200,000 pounds. 



I have found no very reliable evidence to show that the species is de- 

 creasing in numbers. They are not taken by unfair means, nor captured 

 by wholesale upon the spawning beds or in narrow waters. The citizens 

 of New York a century and a quarter ago were apparently more concerned 

 about it than at present, for in 1758 they passed a law prohibiting their 

 sale during the winter months, on account of the "great decrease of that 

 kind offish." An offender was to be fined forty shillings and forfeit his fish, 

 and if he were a negro, mulatto or Indian slave, to be punished at the 

 whipping post, unless his fine were paid by his master or mistress. 



The European Bass is probably quite as abundant on the west coast of 

 Spain and Portugal as anywhere within its range. 



Like other representatives of the perch family not exclusively marine 

 in habit, the Striped Bass are resident in our waters throughout the year. 

 They appear to avoid a temperature higher than 65° or 70°, and are not 

 sensitive to cold, but their movements are not related to the changes of 

 the seasons, and there is no evidence that they seek to avoid the approach 

 of winter by southward migration like bluefish and Spanish mackerel, or 

 by moving out into the temperate strata of mid-ocean, like shad, salmon, 

 menhaden, and mackerel. Nor is it probable that they voluntarily enter 

 upon a state of torpidity in winter, as some writers have supposed. Sev- 

 eral authorities state that they go into fresh water streams in winter for shel- 

 ter, and De Kay's opinion was that, entering bays and ponds, they embed 

 themselves in the mud. We know, however, that hibernation of this kind 

 is rarely voluntary; as a rule, fish retreat, with a falling temperature, into 



