5 3 8 Memoir Sears Foundation for Marine Research 



Hubbs (56: 17; 57: 258). Anyone, for that matter, who has compared them Is likely 

 to have noticed that the adults average thicker but less deep among the sea-run fon- 

 tinalis than among freshwater fish of a corresponding size {y8: 181, tab. 3, 185, 

 187). Due to their stoutness, Salters average somewhat heavier than freshwater fish 

 at a given length; Smith, for example, remarked in 1833 that while freshwater fontinalis 

 of one pound are about 14 inches long if in good condition, Salters may weigh one 

 pound when only about 11 inches long {60: 350). Correspondingly, a Newfoundland 

 Salter of 14 Inches TL (see Study Material, p. 525) weighs about 2.25 pounds after 

 preservation in formalin. Wilder, however, has shown that these differences are not 

 statistically significant for the females, and that the differences in shape of body and 

 size of head are "less than those between progeny of one pair of trout raised at different 

 temperatures, and much less than the differences found among four widely separated 

 populations of freshwater trout." The readiness, too, with which hatchery fish of 

 strictly freshwater parentage assume the sea-running habit "refutes any claims for a 

 genetic difference between anadromous and freshwater brook trout" (49: 8— 11). Thus 

 Jordan's dictum^^ of 1905, that the sez^oing fontinalis are merely sea-run brook trout, 

 has been verified conclusively. 



Numerical Abundance. The only precise evidence available as to how many Salters 

 a given stream may harbor nowadays is as follows: 1,220 taken in 1939 in one of the 

 counting traps in the Moser River, Nova Scotia, on their descent to salt water {y5)\ 

 between 500 and 1,000 smolts counted on their way downstream from late April 

 through May in the Little River Codroy, coast of western Newfoundland;'* and 200- 

 400 larger fish taken there from July through August on their return. 



The evidence at hand does not suggest that any general alteration has taken place 

 one way or the other in the abundance of Salters in Nova Scotian waters, or to the 

 north. In the Cape Cod region, however, Salters are far less numerous now than they 

 were formerly, if. Indeed, any of the undiluted native strain still exists there. A con- 

 crete example of their early abundance is that in April 1829 two anglers, in five 

 days, caught 296 (averaging about 0.5 pound) at one of the well-known fishing points 

 in Waquoit Bay (Smith, 60 : 365'*). In Mullan's opinion this decline has been due prima- 

 rily to the effects of the Cape Cod Canal, the cranberry industry along the streams, 

 the ditching of marshes for mosquito control, and rural development in general In 

 reducing the area of suitable freshwater habitat (^9: 21, 22). Catches at the mouth 

 of one privately owned brook tributary to Buzzards Bay suggest furthermore that the 

 disappearance of the eelgrass {Zostera marina) in 1932— 1933 was an additional 

 calamity for the local Salters ; for while the average number of sizeable fish taken there 

 yearly was about 116 for the period 1928-1932, the largest catch for any subsequent 

 year down to 1954 was only 45.'^ 



Results of Stocking with Hatchery Fish. The localities of recapture of 92,100 marked 



32. Information contributed by Charles F. Ritzi. 



33. Information contributed by A. R. Murray, Fisheries Research Board of Canada. 



34. Misprinted as p. 265. 35. Information from C. P. Lyman. 



