FISHES OF THE GULF OF MAINE 



399 



stance, on Grand Manan Bank, on Jeffreys Ledge, and on Stellwagen Bank at the 

 entrance to Massachusetts Bay. 



They are also caught regularly by the line trawlers and in less amount by the 

 otter trawlers on all the offshore fishing grounds, but as a rule the catches brought 

 in thence are insignificant compared with those of the inshore fishery, as the follow- 

 ing figures for 1919, a fairlj^ representative year, will illustrate: 



Location Pounds 



Browns Bank ^* 157, 080 



Georges Bank and "off Chatham" 1, 059, 512 



Cashes Ledge and vicinity. 



South Channel 



Nantucket Shoals 



Jeffreys Ledge 



Platts Bank 



15, 988 

 672, 335 

 38, 467 

 92, 890 

 30, 555 



POUNDS 



L/N»[D 



l.'SOO.OOO 



1,300,000 



1,200,000 



1,100,00 



1,000.00 



900,000 



800,000 



700,000 



600,00 



9»0,0 



+00,0 



300,00 



200,0 



100,0 



Sometimes, however, larger quantities are 

 brought in from one or the other of the outer 

 fishing grounds than in the year just analyzed — 

 3,260,000 pounds from the South Channel in 

 1921, for example. In the grand total the yield 

 of pollock may be expected to average at least 

 35,000,000 to 40,000,000 pounds for the whole 

 Gulf of Maine— say 5,000,000 to 6,000,000 fish, 

 taking one year with another. 



Small pollock 4 to 10 inches long and weigh- 

 ing less than half a poimd (that is, 1 or 2 years 

 old) swarm inshore after early April, when we 

 have seen thousands taken from the traps at 

 Gloucester and Magnolia. In the southern part 

 of Massachusetts Ba}' these "harbor pollock," 

 as they are called locally, move out in June, 

 probably to avoid the rising temperature, to work back in autumn, but they remain 

 very abundant all summer and autumn in the harbors and bays and among the 

 islands all along the coast from Gloucester north and east to Nova Scotia. In 

 winter, however, most of them seek slightly deeper water, probably to avoid the cold. 



The larger fish, as is usually the case, keep farther offshore than the small 

 ones, and on the whole live deeper except when pursuing some particular feed 

 (p. 401). They are caught in more definite localities — not everywhere and any- 

 where along the coast as the little immature fish are. In the southern part of the 

 Gulf, as exemplified by Massachusetts Bay and the belt from Cape Ann to the 

 Isles of Shoals, large pollock are taken in greatest number in late autumn and early 

 winter when the gill-net fishery taps the spawning fish (fig. 202), and they often 

 appear in abundance near land during April and May. However, they so generally 

 move out and into deeper water as the surface warms up with the advance of the 



Fig. 202. — Monthly landings of fresh pollock at 

 Gloucester for the year 1921 



" These are only the landings by United States vessels. 

 Bank in various Nova Scotian ports. 



Probably Canadian vessels landed as much more from Browns 



