100 BULLETIN OP THE BUREAU OF FISHERIES 



have made few hauls in the coastal waters of their nativity, we have taken very 

 few smaller than 20 mm. long in our tow nets. The largest catch was in Gloucester 

 Harbor where larv£e of only 9 to 11 mm. (spawned but a few weeks previous) 

 swarmed on October 24, 1916. Huntsman, however, has been able to follow the 

 migrations of September-spawned herring off Grand Manan,"^ his general and we 

 believe justifiable conclusion being that for a short time the larva are carried passively 

 in the water, resulting in a drift to the southwest, with the set out of the Bay of 

 Fundy, at a rate of about 2 miles per day, but that they turn back and make head- 

 way against the current (technically become "contranatant") when no more than 

 18 mm. long.'"' 



Probably the young herring sink down into the water a few fathoms deep 

 during their fii'st winter to escape the extreme chilling of the surface stratum, while 

 our tow nettings afford evidence that before the following spring they become very 

 widely dispersed over the Gulf, for during March and April of 1920 we took odd 

 specimens at localities as generally distributed as the neighborhood of Cashes 

 Ledge, the northern and eastern parts of Georges Bank, the north Channel, off 

 Seal Island and Yarmouth (Nova Scotia), off Lurcher Shoal, off Machias, Me., 

 both near land and out over the deep basin, near Boothbay, and near the Isles of 

 Shoals. It is probable, however, that the majority of any particular body of fry 

 hatched together remain near their birthplace, for not only may little herring be taken 

 just outside the Bay of Fundy in winter (though they desert its estuaries then), 

 but they reappear, grown to a length of 2 to 3 inches, along our entire shore 

 line in myraids with the advent of spring. This reappearance takes place about 

 the middle of April — sometimes as early as the last of March — in Massachusetts 

 Bay; in April and May along the eastern coast of Maine, in the Bay of Fundy, and 

 on the west coast of Nova Scotia. East of Penobscot Bay generally, and particu- 

 larly about the mouth of the Bay of Fundy, "sardine" size herring from 3 to 

 8 inches long, including 1 and 2 year olds, maybe expected in abundance all summer, 

 though the schools wander and are so local in their appearances and disappearances 

 that they may swarm in one bay while sought in vain a few miles away. In the 

 southwestern part of the Gulf, however, as exemplified by Massachusetts Bay, 

 it is probable (though not yet proven) that yearlings do not appear until several 

 months later than the fish of 2 to 3 inches hatched the preceding autumn, for while 

 these are reported as more or less abundant throughout the spring," especially in 

 such partially inclosed waters as Provincetown Harbor and Plymouth and Duxbury 

 Bays, they apparently move out again during the early part of summer, being far 

 less plentiful in June than in April and May, and it is not until late July or August 

 that "sperhng" of 5 to 7 inches (fish in then- second summer) appear in numbers 

 off the Massachusetts coast. 



Even in a region as small as Massachusetts Bay wide local variation obtains 

 in the abundance and time of appearance of the "sperling." At Provincetown. for 

 example, they may be expected in schools plentiful enough to be worth "torching" 



w Doctor Huntsman allows us to quote from unpublished notes. 

 ■ » This requires confirmation, as Doctor Huntsman remarks in his notes. 

 •' Being too small for bait, and there being no sardine factories on Massachusetts Bay, no attention is paid to the smallest 

 herring there, and consequently little is known about them during their first spring and summer. 



