FISHES OF THE GULF OF MAINE 



477 



good years, along the rocky shores and around and 

 over ledges, that no amount of fishing seems to 

 have any effect on their numbers. Generally 

 speaking, they are less numerous east of Casco 

 Bay, and our experience has been that they are 

 progressively less and less so eastward along the 

 shore from Penobscot Bay toward the Bay of 

 Fundy, but average larger. On the outer coast of 

 Mount Desert, for example, it is unusual to catch 

 one in the enclosed harbors (precisely the localities 

 they frequent farther west and south) , and most of 

 those caught outside are very large. Thus we 

 took many of 12 to 13 inches, averaging about \ l A 

 pounds, near Baker's Island, off Northeast Harbor, 

 in August 1922, and no small ones. But young 

 fish in plenty, as well as adults, have been reported 

 from Bluehill Bay, nearby, 80 where the water is 

 warmer in summer. 



Cunners are also taken, here and there, along the 

 coast, eastward to the Grand Manan Channel, 

 sometimes in numbers as in 1928, when so many 

 were caught "about the rocks and in the coves to 

 the south of West Quoddy," that they were 

 reported in the press. 81 But they are so scarce 

 ordinarily around Grand Manan and within 

 Passamaquoddy Bay that only half a dozen large 

 specimens had been taken there from the founding 

 of the Biological Station at St. Andrews in 1906 

 down to the early 1920's. 82 And while the cunner 

 is reported from Black River east of St. John, 

 New Brunswick, it seems to be unknown farther in 

 along the New Brunswick shore of the Bay of 

 Fundy or in Chignecto Bay and Minas Basin at 

 the head. But Annapolis Basin on the Nova 

 Scotian side of the bay, harbors a few, while cun- 

 ners of all sizes are so numerous in St. Mary Bay 

 that this must be an important centre of reproduc- 

 tion and the source of the few large (i.e., old) ones 

 that are caught farther up the Bay of Fundy. 

 And they are reported along the western shore of 

 Nova Scotia, as at Pubnico for example. 



There are large cunners in small numbers on the 

 offshore fishing grounds in our Gulf also, Stell- 

 wagen at the mouth of Massachusetts Bay, 

 Cashes Ledge, and Georges and Browns Banks, 

 as mentioned above (p. 475) in depths down to 50 

 fathoms or so. But it is not likely that they ever 

 descend into the deep basins of the Gulf. Cer- 



*> Reported to us by Rear Adm. S. E. Morrison, U. S. Navy. 



'■ Boston Transcript for August 29, 1928. 



" Johansen, Contrib. Canadian Biol. N. Ser., vol. 2, No. 17, 1925, p. 5 [427]. 



tainly our experimental trawlings have not yielded 

 any there, 42 fathoms being the greatest depth at 

 which we have known of a cunner taken anywhere 

 in the inner parts of the Gulf. 83 



Extending our survey farther east and north, 

 we find cunners reported as numerous all along the 

 outer coast of Nova Scotia, including the many 

 bays and inlets, also in the southern side of the 

 Gulf of St. Lawrence from Cape Breton to the 

 Gaspe Peninsula, including the shallow bays of 

 Prince Edward Island and the shores of the 

 Magdalen Islands, also up the west coast of New- 

 foundland as far as Bay of Islands. And they are 

 to be expected at the heads of the bays along the 

 south coast of Newfoundland for they have been 

 taken in Conception Bay on the east coast. But 

 this last is their most northerly known outpost on 

 the Atlantic coast, and they have never been 

 reported either from the estuary of the St. Law- 

 rence or anywhere along the north shore of the 

 Gulf of St. Lawrence. 84 



Cunners near Newport, Rhode Island, com- 

 mence spawning by mid-May and June sees the 

 chief production of eggs there and near Woods 

 Hole, where most of the fish are spent after the 

 first days of July, though eggs have been taken in 

 abundance there until July 15, a few as late as 

 August 15. 85 Probably spawning does not com- 

 mence until June in the colder waters of our 

 Gulf, but continues there through the later 

 summer, for our towings have yielded many eggs, 

 apparently of the cunner, in July and August. 

 And the chief spawning season is about the same 

 as this in the southern side of the Gulf of St. 

 Lawrence, according to Johansen 8S and to Reid. 87 

 Cunner eggs have been taken at our tow net 

 stations along outer Cape Cod; near Race Point 

 at the tip of the Cape; in Massachusetts Bay 

 (where we have often towed them in great numbers 

 in the tideways between the offlying ledges) ; and 

 at the mouth of Penobscot Bay, as well as in 

 sundry harbors. Blue Hill Bay inland from 

 Mount Desert may be a breeding center, for small 

 fry are reported there. 88 And eggs taken off 



81 One was trawled at this depth at the mouth of Massachusetts Bay (lat. 

 42°28' N., long. 70°13' W.) by the Albatross II, July 28, 1931. 



>< See Johansen, Contrib. Canadian Biol., N. Ser. 2, vol. 2, No. 17, 1925, pp. 

 5-6 [427-428] for an account of the status of the cunner in the Gulf of St. 

 Lawrence, and around Newfoundland. 



« Agassiz and Whitman, Mem. Mus. Comp. Zool., vol. 14, No. 1, 1885, 

 p. 18, Kuntz and Radcllffe, Bull. U. S. Bur. Fish., vol. 35, 1918, p. 99. 



» Contrib. Canadian Biol., N. Ser., vol. 2, No. 17, 1925, p. 17 [439]. 



» Contrib. Canadian Biol, and Fish., N. Ser., vol. 4, No. 27, 1929. 



» ByRearAdmiral S.E.Morrlson.U. S.N. 



