8 The Atlantic Salmon 



different climatic influences from those which 

 prevail in Great Britain. At the breeding estab- 

 lishment of Stormontfield on the Tay, where 

 intelligent observation of the habits and growth 

 of salmon have been carried on for about half a 

 century, large numbers of smolts which had been 

 marked by cutting off the adipose fin were retaken 

 as grilse after absence in the sea of somewhat over 

 two months and weighing six to nine pounds. It 

 was also discovered that while the larger propor- 

 tion of the young salmon assumed the silvery coat 

 and went to sea the second year of their lives, 

 the remainder which had been hatched from the 

 same lot of ova taken from the parent fish at the 

 same time, and had been subject to exactly 

 the same conditions, remained another year in 

 the ponds before changing to the migratory 

 coat. That this can be ascribed (and the same 

 thing has also been observed in the Severn) to 

 such conditions varying from the natural ones 

 under which the Stormontfield fish pass their 

 early lives, is improbable, and it is likely that the 

 divided migration of smolts to the sea is based on 

 some natural provision analogous to that which 

 governs the divided migration of salmon from the 

 sea to the fresh water. I have learned that on 



