FISHES OF THE GULF OF MAINE 



31 



visited the northeastern part of the Gulf in any 

 numbers, there being only a few records for the 

 vicinity of Eastport, Maine, and three from within 

 the Bay of Fundy. At the present time the Gulf 

 appears to harbor a sparse and fluctuating popu- 

 lation, occasional members of which are encoun- 

 tered from time to time, here or there, but whether 

 as immigrants into the Gulf from the open ocean 

 is not known. 



The list of specimens, the capture or stranding 

 of which in the Gulf has come to our attention 

 for the period 1908-1951 is as follows: 



1908. One, 18 feet long, near Provincetown, taken in a 

 fish trap; measured by J. Henry Blake. 



1909. One, about 22 feet, in Provincetown Harbor. 

 1913. One, about 29 feet, Provincetown. 



1925. One, about 29 feet, near Monhegan Island, Maine. 

 1931. Female, 12H feet long, York Harbor, Maine. 

 1934. One, 29 feet, Whale Cove, Grand Manan Island, 



and one, 28 feet, Back Bay, Bay of Fundy. 69 

 1936. Two off Portland, Maine; the first about 20 feet 



long, weighing 550 pounds dressed, about May 1; 



the second, much larger (reported as of about 40 ft.), 



August 2. 

 1939. Skeleton of one of about 25 feet, examined by us, 



found on the beach near Provincetown in January. 



One of about 25 feet, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia. One 



of 12 feet, Bay of Fundy off Digby Gut. 70 

 1947. Female, about 13 feet long, examined by us, har- 

 pooned by W. T. Reid 3rd, near Boston Lightship, 



August 5th. 

 1949. A small one (size not recorded), near Rockport, 



Mass., September; identified from a good photograph 



by Miss D. E. Snyder of the Peabody Museum, 



Salem. 

 1951. One, 12 feet, near Bar Harbor, Maine, harpooned 



July 28." 



Occasional basking sharks also visit the shores 

 of the southern coast of Massachusetts, westward 

 from Cape Cod; one, for example, 12 to 14 feet 

 long was taken at Menemsha on Marthas Vine- 

 yard, August 16, 1916; another of 20 feet 6 inches 

 at that same locality on June 24, 1920; 72 one 

 20 feet 2 inches long was stranded in Hadleys 

 Harbor, Naushon Island, July 1937; and one of 

 8 feet (among the smallest on record) was taken 

 in a fish trap near Woods Hole on June 15, 1948. 



M McKenzle, Proc. Nova Scotia Inst. Scl., vol. 20, 1939, p. 14. 



" McKenzle, Proc. Nova Scotia Inst. Scl., vol. 20, 1939, p. 14. 



71 Personal communication from J. W. Burger. 



" This specimen, mounted, In the New England Museum of Science and 

 described by Allen (Bull., Boston Soc. Nat. Hist., No. 24, March 1921, pp. 

 3-10), served as chief basis for the illustration given here of the adult basking 

 shark. 



Probably the basking shark is no more plentiful 

 near shore in our Gulf in most years than the 

 paucity of the recent records suggest, for popular 

 interest in sharks is now so keen, as represented by 

 newspaper publicity given to any unusual capture, 

 that any well-grown one is apt to be seen in these 

 frequented and hard-fished waters. We do not 

 find evidence of any considerable incursion by 

 them into coastal waters farther west since 1878, 

 when 20, at least, were found dead in the fish traps 

 near Woods Hole during the summer. And the 

 only report that might be based on the basking 

 shark on the offshore fishing banks that we have 

 received from fishermen has been of a number of 

 unusually large sharks of some sort, seen by Capt. 

 Henry Klimm on the southeast part of Georges 

 Bank during late June and early July 1947. 



Importance. — The day of any regular fishery for 

 the basking shark is long since past in New 

 England waters, probably never to return. And 

 no use is made there, nowadays, of the occasional 

 specimens that are captured. But it may be of 

 interest to point out that it was always hunted of 

 old by the sperm whalers from New Bedford, for 

 its liver oil was considered nearly or as good as 

 sperm oil for illuminating purposes. Basking 

 sharks are still the object of intermittent small 

 vessel fisheries off the coast of Iceland, around the 

 Orkneys, off western Ireland, and off southern 

 Norway; also off Ecuador and Peru in the Pacific. 

 And increasing numbers have been landed during 

 the past few years in northern California, where 

 they are considerably more plentiful than they 

 are in the Gulf of Maine, 73 for fish meal and for the 

 liver oil. The yield of oil per fish varies from 

 about 80 gallons to about 200, occasionally to 400 

 gallons, with as much as 600 gallons reported. 

 The liver of a 30-foot fish weighing 6,580 pounds, 

 taken off Monterey, Calif., had a liver weighing 

 1,800 pounds, 60 percent of which was oil. 7 * But, 

 sad to say, it is very low in vitamin A. 



The fishery, wherever carried on, is by harpoon. 

 And basking sharks are so sluggish and so un- 

 suspicious of a boat, large or small, that it usually 

 is a simple matter to harpoon one that is seen at 



"According to MacGinitie (Science, N. Ser., vol. 73, 1931, p. 496), 21 

 basking sharks were landed in Monterey, Calif., between November 22, 1930 

 and February, 1931. 



'< MacGinitie, Science, N. Ser., vol. 73, May 1931, p. 496. 



