Common Atlantic Salmon 



If to 2^ in head; hyoid teeth usually present but very small 

 Size various ; clarkii 1 76 



bb. Scales moderate, 130 to 180 cross-series; no red on throat • a red- 

 dish lateral band usually present; mouth moderate, maxilhrv ■> 

 in head; hyoid teeth wanting. Size very large ;..^j/n//,m', igo 



bbb. Scales typically large, in 120 to 130 cross-series; usually no red 

 on throat; a red or yellowish lateral band; mouth small, maxil- 

 lary 2 to 2i in head; no hyoid teeth. Size moderate; 



irideiis, 198 



Common Atlantic Salmon 



Sa/iuo salar Linnaeus 



The Atlantic salmon is perhaps the best and most widely 

 known of all game fishes, and it was doubtless this fish which 

 was sought by the earliest anglers. " In Aquitania the river 

 salmon surpasseth all the fishes of the sea," wrote Pliny eighteen 

 hundred years ago. This was the salmon's christening, and 

 though more than 100 species of Salm'onidcv. have been de- 

 scribed, the salmon has always stood pre-eminent as a game- 

 fish, like a Scottish chieftain, needing no other name than that 

 of his clan. The luxurious Romans prized highly the salmon 

 streams in their Gallic and British provinces, if we may trust 

 Pliny and Ausonius, and that this fish was well known to the 

 early English is evinced by the many Saxon names, such as 

 "parr," "pearl," "smolt," "grilse," "kipper," and "baggit," 

 given it in different stages of its growth. The Normans brought 

 over the name of Latin origin, which they applied to the per- 

 fect adult fish, ready for the banquets of the conqueror. When 

 Cabot discovered Newfoundland in 1497, he found salmon in its 

 waters, but the red men had long before this learned the art of 

 killing them with torches and wooden spears. 



Salmon inhabit both coasts of the North Atlantic and all its 

 suitable affluents. How far beyond the Arctic circle they range 

 no one knows, though their occurrence in Greenland, Iceland, 

 northern Scandinavia, and middle Labrador is well established! 

 They occur in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, entering the Baltic 

 and the waters of Russia, and, according to some writers, the 

 White Sea. They abound in all the British Islands, where they 

 are protected and fostered with great success. They are, or 



163 



