SALMON— BREEDING WITHOUT GOING TO TUE SEA. JOl 



intended at Howlotoun to rc-ojicn the investigation aftci* an interval of forty-five 

 years. But as it was not iini)n)babIo that objections Avouhl bo raised were younj^ 

 fish captured in the rivers used for this purpose, it was determined to rear tho 

 par frona the eggs and ascertain whether the smolts and grilse thus raised would 

 or would not breed in fresh water. 



In such investigations as those which I am about to detail I need scarcely 

 dilate upon the necessity of first being absolutely certain respecting the species 

 upon which these experiments are made; secondly, on thex'o being most ab.solute 

 segregation of the eggs and young from those of all other foi-nis. That 

 segregation is complete at Howietoun I need hardly remark upon to those who 

 have visited the establishment. 



dinner. He reported that it was not unpalatable. The other smelt grew into a bull-trout and 

 lived for seven years. It died during a very severe winter when, on account of the water being 

 frozen, it could not be fed." — Extract from Report of Experimental Committee to the Tweed 

 Commissioners. 



Dr. Giinther {Introduction, Study of Fish. 1880, p. G39) considered that "the question of 

 whether any of the migratory species of Salinonidce can be retained in fresh water, and finally 

 accommodate themselves to a permanent sojourn therein, must be negatived for the present." 

 Up to 1880 he doubted the instances of successful experiments which had been brought forward, 

 as he was not convinced that the young fish introduced into ponds were really migratory 

 Salmo)iid<c and not hybrids. He had previously recorded {Fisherman'' s Magazine, i, 18G4, p. 157) 

 how to test the truth of whether migratory Salmonida perish if prevented from going to the sea 

 at the proper season, the Bev. Augustus Morgan experimented during several years with full- 

 grown sea trout, half-grown sewin, and with salmon, but all the specimens died, although 

 there was plenty of food in the pond ; the fresh-water trouts remained perfectly healthy. The 

 dead specimens presented a remarkable appearance, the body being as lean and elongated as 

 in a lake : all the internal parts were much inflamed. 



il/r. Douglas Ogilhie in 1881 took about 100 sea trout and salmon smolts, which he turned into 

 Lough Ash, Co. Tyrone, which has no access to the sea. April 30, 1883, he captured a smolt 

 or grilse 14^ in. long in this lake, where salmon had not previously been seen. Its abdomen 

 was so distended that he considered it would have spawned very shortly, more especially as it was 

 taken at the mouth of the only stream that enters this lough. The specimen is in the Natural 

 History Museum at South Kensington, and is evidently a true Salmo salar, and as such I 

 described it in the Proceedings Zool. Soc. 1884, p. 584, while the eggs in spirit were each 0-25 of 

 an inch in diameter. Provided there had been a ripe male in the vicinity, there seems no reason 

 why this fish should not have deposited her eggs, and such might have given rise to a land- 

 locked race. 



* Shaw remarked that solitary instances have occurred of large female pars having been 

 found in salmon rivers with the roe considerably developed, and he ascertained that by detaining 

 the female smolt in fresh water until the end of the third winter individuals are found in this com- 

 paratively mature condition. Davy {Trans. lioyal Soc. Edin. 1854, xxi, p. 253) observed that he had 

 examined hundreds of pars, and had frequently found the males with milt, but never a female 

 with roe correspondingly developed. On the contrary, the females, without exception, had the 

 ovaries so small that without they had been carefully sought for they would have escaped notice. 

 Kussell denied that female pars ever had the roe developed. 



Yarrell {Brit. Fish. 1836) recorded that Mr. Heysham had sent him an example 7 in. long 

 having both lobes in a forward state, as well as notice of a female taken in March with large 

 ova : Mr. Couch also informed him of a similar case in the Dart in March. 



Brown {Stormontficlds Experiments, 1862, p. 89) considered that no female par had yet been 

 discovered with the roe developed, possibly meaning no young salmon in the par livery had been 

 Been with the ova fully developed ; for, as I shall endeavour to show, smolts with par bands have 

 given eggs at Howietoun. Brown reared the young from eggs to the smolt stage and obtained 

 at Stonehaven a salt-water pond for their reception into which the sea ebbed and flowed, but 

 poachers destroyed the exi^eriment. 



March 4th, 1859, M. Julius Cloquet read a paper before the French SociCti d' Acclimation on 

 the breeding of salmon in a pond without descending to the sea (vol. vi, 1859, p. 255). The small 

 pond which was the scene of this experiment was situated in the hollow of a wooded valley, which 

 was not more than a hectare in superficial extent. Its depth was from six metres towards the end 

 where the bound was erected, while in the remainder of its extent its richly herbivorous bottom 

 sloped towards the edges like those of a basin. Some trout were first introduced, and in April 

 and May, 1857, many thousand salmon, which at twenty-two months had an average weif,dit of 

 120 grammes and from twenty-five to thirty centimetres in length. Females were found full of 

 eggs ; these were artificially fecundated, and got so far as to be close upon hatching. 



Dr. Giinther, after remarking how conclusively Shaw has demonstrated that par arc the young 

 of salmon, and that they may contain milt, continued, " No par has ever been found with mature 

 ova" (Introduction to the Study of Fishes, 1880, p. C39). Mr. Gosden observed that in the Exe par- 

 marked fish, graveling or smolt," so-called, have been taken with ova actually exuding from the 

 fish on being handled for the purpose of removing the hook. 



