94 



FISHERY BULLETIN OF THE FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE 



Figtjre 44. — Catches of herring for the year 1919. Each dot represents 400,000 pounds. After Needier. 



from Penobscot Bay; and 13 times as great as for 

 the coast of Massachusetts, 40 for the years 1919, 

 1928, 1929, and 1930. 41 



Present day landings of upwards of 30 million 

 pounds of sardines alone, for Charlotte County, 

 New Brunswick, even in poor years, up to some- 

 thing like 100 million pounds in good years, plus 

 some 9-14 million pounds of larger herring, con- 

 trasted with a maximum of only about 17 to 18 

 million pounds reported for 1947 for any sector of 

 the Maine coast of comparable length, 42 show that 

 the Passamaquoddy-Grand Manan region has not 

 lost its preeminence as a herring center. The 

 abundance of little herring there is, in fact, the 

 outstanding feature of the distribution of fishes in 



*• Omitting the landings for Suffolk County, Mass., since these represent 

 flsh discharged at Boston by the vessel fisheries from offshore. 



« Graham, Jour. Biol. Board Canada, vol. 2, No. 2, 1936, p. 129, table 2. 



« Scattergood has given an interesting analysis, regional and seasonal, of 

 the 1947 catch of herring for the coast of Maine. 



the Gulf of Maine. A catch of about 2,400,000 

 pounds for Massachusetts in 1947, contrasted 

 with some 11,300,000 pounds for the Penobscot 

 Bay region alone in that year, illustrates how much 

 less rich in herring the southwestern side coast line 

 of the Gulf is than the sector that happens to be 

 the least productive part of the northern coast 

 line of the Gulf. 



Fishermen tell us, too, that herring are much 

 more regular in their occurrence from year to year 

 in the Passamaquoddy-Grand Manan region than 

 they are either off western Nova Scotia in the one 

 direction, or along the coast of Maine in the other. 

 And this is borne out by such statistics as are con- 

 veniently available. Thus only one-fourth to one- 

 fifth as many pounds of herring were caught in the 

 Penobscot Bay region 43 in 1947 as either eastward 



» Scattergood's statistical areas 11-14. 



