FISHES OF THE GULF OF MAINE 



207 



Plymouth (p. 192). Some ripe haddock are caught 

 on the shelving-sandy bottom along Cape Cod as 

 far south as Nauset; spawning fish, too, are caught 

 off southern New England every winter. Nearly 

 800 baby haddock less than 1 year old were taken 

 off Fire Island Inlet, Long Island, and 10 miles off 

 Ambrose Lightship, in November 1948."* But 

 their presence there does not necessarily mean that 

 they were spawned so far west, as Dr. Howard A. 

 Shuck of the Fish and Wildlife Service has pointed 

 out to us. Haddock may at times deposit their 

 eggs within a couple of fathoms of the surface in 

 our Gulf, as, for instance, in Boothbay Harbor on 

 the occasion just noted (p. 206). But this is most 

 unusual, 15 to 20 fathoms being the upper limit to 

 regular spawning with the depths of the more pro- 

 ductive Gulf of Maine spawning grounds as fol- 

 lows: Browns Bank, 30 to 50 fathoms and prob- 

 ably deeper; Georges Bank, from about 30 fathoms; 

 Cape Cod grounds, about 40 to 70 fathoms; Stell- 

 wagen ground, 20 to 40 fathoms; grounds between 

 Cape Ann and Cape Elizabeth, 20 to 65 fathoms. 



The presence of newly spawned eggs out to the 

 100-fathom contour on the southeastern slope of 

 Georges Bank at the height of the breeding season 

 (late March 1931) 66 is evidence that the fish were 

 spawning down nearly or to that depth. But 

 about 100 fathoms appears to be the lower limit to 

 any regular spawning. When eggs are found over 

 greater depths they have drifted from shallower 

 regions, as Walford has emphasized. The few 

 eggs, for example, that we found over the deep 

 basin of the Gulf, and in the Eastern Channel, in 

 April 1920, were flotsam from the neighboring 

 slopes or banks. 



The haddock spawn rather shoaler in the Gulf 

 of Maine on the whole than they do in the North 

 Sea region, where the maximum production of eggs 

 takes place at 50 to 100 fathoms. Consequently, 

 there is less difference in this respect between had- 

 dock and cod in the western North Atlantic than 

 in the eastern. Neither do haddock confine their 

 spawning so definitely to smooth bottom in Amer- 

 ican seas as they do in European waters. Welsh 

 found ripe fish chiefly on broken ground "wherever 

 sand, gravel, mud and rocks alternate — if any- 

 thing, more are taken on the mud in such local- 

 ities," between Cape Ann and Cape Elizabeth. 



The Gulf of Maine haddock spawn chiefly from 

 late February until May and the following record, 

 supplied by C. G. Corliss, former superintendent 

 of the local hatchery, illustrates how brief the peak 

 period of reproduction is near Cape Ann: 



It appears from the hatchery records, cor- 

 roborated by Welsh's experience in 1913, that the 

 commencement of spawning varies considerably 

 in date from year to year, with the fish breeding 

 freely as early as the end of January in early 

 seasons, but not until the end of March or even 

 until the first part of April in late. But most 

 of them are spawned out invariably by the middle 

 or end of May at the latest. 



In normal years the spawning season is about 

 the same on Georges Bank as it is near Cape Ann. 

 In 1920, for example, we found cod-haddock eggs 

 in moderate numbers across its western end late 

 in February; great numbers of them (and took 

 ripe haddock in the trawl) on the eastern end of 

 the Bank on March 11 and 12; and they were still 

 plentiful there on April 16 and 17, but we found 

 none on the western part of the bank on May 17. 

 Similarly, Douthart, of the Bureau of Fisheries, 

 towed haddock eggs over the north-central portion 

 of the bank on April 14 and again on the 26 and 

 27th in 1913, while Walford found that spawning 

 commenced in February, was at its peak in March 

 and April, and had about come to an end by late 

 May in 1931. Spawning is likewise at its height 

 in mid-April on Browns Bank (large egg catches 

 were observed in our tow-nets April 16, 1920). 



Occasional haddock, however, may spawn long 

 after the majority are spawned out. Thus we 

 have towed eggs off Petit Passage, Nova Scotia, on 

 June 10, and have caught a ripe female and a ripe 

 male on Nantucket shoals on June 13 (in 1927). 

 Ripe haddock have even been taken as late as the 

 first part of July near Gloucester, 66 but this is 

 exceptional. 



The spawning season continues well into the 

 summer in the colder water along the outer shores 



•« As reported by Arnold, Copeia, 1949, p. 239. 



" Walford, Bull. U. S. Bur. Fish., vol. 49, Bull. 29, 



8, p. 16, flg. 7. 



« Earll, Rept. U. S. Coram. Fish., (1878) 1880, p. 730. 



