16 INLAND FISHERIES. 



and the anterior part allowed to float away or sink. It is even main- 

 tained, with great earnestness that such is the gluttony of the fish, that 

 when the stomach becomes full the contents are disgorged and then 

 a<yaiu filled. It is certain that it kills many more fish than it requires 

 for its own support. 



" The youngest fish equally with the older, perform this function of 

 destruction, and although they occasionally devour crabs, worms, etc., 

 the bulk of their sustenance throughout the greater part of the year is 

 derived from other fish. Nothing is more common than to find a small 

 blue-fish of six or eight inches in length under a school of minnows 

 making continual dashes and captures among them. The stomachs of 

 the blue-fish of all sizes, with rare exceptions, are found loaded with 

 the other fish, sometimes to the number of thirty or forty, either entire 

 or in fragments. 



*' As already referred to, it must also be borne in mind that it is not 

 merely the small fry that are thus devoured, and which it is expected 

 w411 fall a prey to other animals, but that the food of the blue-fish con- 

 sists very largely of individuals which have already passed a large per- 

 centage of the chances against their attaining maturity, many of them, 

 indeed, having arrived at the period of spawning. To make the case 

 more clear, let us realize for a moment the number of blue-fish that 

 exist on our coast in the summer season. As far as I can ascertain by 

 the statistics obtained at the fishing stations on the New England coast, 

 as also from the records of the New York markets, kindly furnished 

 by Middleton & Carman, of the Fulton Market, the capture of blue- 

 fish, from New Jersey to Monomoy, during the season, amounts to not 

 less than one million individuals, averaging five or six pounds each. 

 Those, however, who have seen the blue-fish in his native waters, and 

 realized the immense number there existing, will be quite willing to 

 admit that probably not one fish in a thousand is ever taken by man. 

 If, therefore, we have an actual capture of one million, we may allow 

 one thousand million as occurring in the extent of our coasts referred 

 to. even neglecting the smaller ones, which, perhaps, should also be 

 taken into the account. 



