6 INLAND FISHERIES. 



ever saw. Captain Coa^o, with three others, took 1,000 pounds of 

 fish in four hours while anchored at a point a half mile sonth of 

 the lig-htship recently. 



The fish are of smaller size than usual, but are more abundant 

 than ever they were before. They average about five pounds in 

 Aveight, which is just about half their usual size. A fish weighing 

 fifteen pounds, this season, is almost a curiosity, while one weigh- 

 ing fifty pounds, such as has been caught in former years, is now 

 of very rare occurrence. The fish are so plentiful, an exchange 

 says, " that wagons have been loaded from the rocks on the shore 

 at Beaver Tail by the farmers of Jamestown." 



The favorite bait is a small herring about five inches long, and 

 large clams and quahogs. The former, however, is preferable by 

 reason of it being less susceptible to the attacks of other fish. 



The fish are now working westward, the season in the vicinity 

 of Beaver Tail lasting usually from November 10th to the 1st of 

 December. After December 1st they will be found in the deeper 

 waters off Point Judith, and later, in the still deeper waters off 

 Block Island. 



THE FISHING SEASON. 



The fishing fleet still lingers in these waters and those of Block 

 Island, but the number of craft is very small compared with the 

 big mackerel fleet. The superabundance of fish of all kinds this 

 season has stopped all the talk that the local fishermen once had 

 about the dumping of the local house offal off the lightship. To 

 this was ascribed the scarcity of fish at one time. The swill is 

 still dumped off the lightship, but the fish were probably never 

 before so plentiful off Newport and Block Island, and hauls have 

 been made with hand lines and seines that put the glowing stories 

 of old time fishermen far in the shade. The menhaden fishermen 

 have also had a good season, one firm reporting the catch of 

 37,000 barrels. The price, however, of both fish oil and guano is 

 so low that very little profit is made on the season's work, which 

 is now over. 



CODFISH IN PLENTY. 



Codfish have succeeded mackerel in the waters about Newport 

 and Block Island, and their number is legion. Last night fishing 

 schooner Dauntless brought in fifty -seven barrels of school cod 

 from the trap near Narragansett Pier, and to-day brought over 



