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FISHERY BULLETIN OF THE FISH AND "WILDLIFE SERVICE 



summer, although it is long lived. The two sexes 

 grow about equally fast. 



Nilsson's studies 21 point to a slightly slower 

 rate of growth for the North European mackerel. 

 But American mackerel have been found to vary 

 so widely in this respect that the reported differ- 

 ence may have been only an accident of obser- 

 vation. 



A few fish of both sexes may mature sexually 

 in their second year; about % of the males and % 

 of the females spawn in the third year; and prac- 

 tically all of them do so in their fourth year, i. e., 

 when three full years old. 22 This coincides with 

 the transition from fast growth to slow, as might 

 be expected, the ripening of the sexual products 

 being so great a strain that the adult fish do 

 little more than recover before winter. Once 

 a mackerel has matured sexually, it no doubt 

 spawns yearly throughout life, as most other sea 

 fishes do. 



Proportions of the sexes. — In American waters 

 males have been described as predominating 

 largely over females. 23 But more recent obser- 

 vations have shown that there are about as many 

 of the one sex as of the other, as there are in 

 Sweden also. 24 



General range. — Both sides of the North Atlantic ; 

 Norway to Spain off the European coast 25 ; from 

 the northern side of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and 

 Strait of Belle Isle 26 to Cape Lookout, N. C. 27 off 

 the American coast. 



Migrations, and occurrence in the Gulf of 

 Maine. — The occurrence of the mackerel in the 

 Gulf of Maine is closely bound up with the sea- 

 sonal movements of the species as a whole, for 

 this is a migratory fish wherever it occurs, appear- 

 ing at the surface and near our coasts in spring, 

 to vanish thence late in the autumn. The di- 

 rections and extent of the journeys which it carries 

 out have been the subject of much discussion ever 



« Publ. de Circ, No. 69, Cons. Perm. Internat. Explor. Mer, 1914. 



" Sette, Fish. Bull. U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, vol. 50, Bull. 38, 1943, 

 p. 156. 



» Smith, Report U. S. Comm. Fish (1900) 1901, p. 128. 



»« Nllsson, Pub. de Circ. No. 69, Cons. Perm. Internat. Explor. Mer, 1914. 



» There Is a fairly constant racial difference between American and British 

 mackerel (Garstang, Jour. Mar. Biol. Assoc. United Kingdon, New Sor., 

 vol. 5, No. 3, 1898, pp. 235-295) , the latter showing a larger number of trans- 

 verse bars, being more often spotted between them, and more often having 

 6 dorsal flnlets instead of 5. 



» Jeffers (Contr. Canad. Biol., N. Set'., vol. 7, No. 16 [ser. A, General No. 

 13], p. 207) reports that several mackerel were caught in 1929 at Raleigh, on 

 the Newfoundland coast of the Strait of Belle Isle, where none had been seen 

 In recent years. 



1 Coles, Copeia, No. 151, February 1926, pp. 105-106 records a three-quarter 

 pound mackerel taken at Cape Lookout In February 1925. 



since the fishery first assumed importance, because 

 of their intrinsic interest, because of then bearing 

 on the prosecution of the fishery, and because this 

 fish has been the subject of much international 

 dispute. The point chiefly at issue has been 

 whether the main bodies of mackerel merely sink 

 when they leave the coast in autumn and move 

 directly out to the nearest deep water, or whether 

 they combine their offshore and onshore journeys 

 with the extensive north and south migrations in 

 which most fishermen have long believed. 28 



The great majority of the mackerel have with- 

 drawn from the coast by the end of December, 

 not only from the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but from 

 the entire inshore belt as a whole, not to be seen 

 there again until the following spring or early 

 summer, and it is not yet known definitely where 

 the bulk of them go, though the subject has been 

 widely discussed. Mackerel, it is true, have been 

 caught, and have been found in the stomachs 

 of cod and pollock in January, February, and 

 early March at various localities on and around 

 the outer Nova Scotian banks westward from Sable 

 Island Bank; on the southern and northwestern 

 parts of Georges Bank; in the deeper water be- 

 tween the latter and Nantucket Shoals; on Nan- 

 tucket Shoals; and along the middle and outer 

 parts of the continental shelf off southern New 

 England, off New York, off New Jersey, off Dela- 

 ware Bay, off Virginia, and off northern North 

 Carolina. Most of these winter records have been 

 along the 30-70 fathom contour zone, but some- 

 times as shoal as 4-5 fathoms off Nova Scotia, 

 and as shoal as about 10-20 fathoms (near Am- 

 brose Lightship) off New York, 29 as deep as 90 

 fathoms off Chesapeake Bay. 30 



Most of these winter records have been based 

 on odd fish only, i. e., not enough to suggest the 

 presence of any great concentration of mackerel. 31 

 But there were enough of them off New York in 

 January, February, and March of 1949 for com- 

 mercial fisheries to bring in what Gordon 32 has 



'» The literature dealing with this subject is very extensive. See especially 

 Goode, Collins, Earll, and Clark (Rept. U. S. Comm. Fish. [1881] 1884, p. 91); 

 Tracy (37th Annual Report, Rhode Island Commissioners of Inland Fish- 

 eries, 1907, p. 43); and Sette (Fishery Bull. U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 

 vol. 51, Bull. 49, 1950, pp. 268-313) for the American mackerel. 



» Gordon, Marine Life, Occ. Pap., vol. 1, No. 8, March, 1950, p. 39. 



» Sette (Fish. Bull. U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, vol. 50, Bull. 49, 1950, 

 pp. 260-261, table 1) lists several such Instances besides those cited previously 

 by Blgelow and Welsh (Bull. U. S. Bur. Fish. vol. 40, Pt. 1, 1925, p. 196). 



•i Three hundred pounds seems to be the largest winter catch definitely 

 reported up to 1951. 



•i Marine Life, vol. 1, No. 8, 1950, p. 39. 



