32 THE PLAICE QUESTION 



English catch. These ports were, working from north to 

 south : 



Hull , 



Grimsby 



Boston . 



Lowestoft 



London 



Rams2:ate 



catching 6,234 tons of plaice 

 14,966 

 1,134 

 5,549 



2,073 1 „ 

 1.252 



Total, six east coast ports, 31,208 tons, of which 80 per cent, 

 was caught by steam trawlers. 



The remaining fishing ports of England landed between them 

 6,564 tons, and not one of them as much as a thousand tons 

 in the year. 



Of the English catch, steam trawlers landed, in round numbers, 

 26,300 tons, or 75 per cent. ; big deep-sea saihng smacks 

 7,300 tons, or 21 per cent. ; and inshore fishermen 1,200 tons, 

 or 4 per cent. Quite 70 per cent, of the fish came out of the 

 North Sea, and of this Grimsby probably landed 45 to 50 

 per cent. 



Something like the same proportion holds good of Scotland. 

 The steam trawlers of Leith, Montrose, Aberdeen, and other 

 districts caught 1,540 out of 2,300 tons, or 67 per cent, of the 

 Scottish catch ; and the plaice fisheries outside the North Sea 

 are of altogether minor importance. 



It is fair to say, therefore, that the Englishman owes the fact 

 that he can obtain plaice all the year round mainly to the 

 exploitation of the North Sea — and especially the southern - 

 portions of that sea — by British steam trawlers based on the 

 east coast. 



If all other vessels ceased catching plaice there would be 

 rather fewer fish, and they would cost rather more, but the 

 inconvenience to the public would not be serious, and the 

 fishermen would -not be faced with anything like a disaster, 

 though their losses would be quite considerable. 



The plaice problem then is, in the main, an English problem, 

 a North Sea problem, and a steam-trawler problem. Before 

 the conversion of the main fishing-fleet into fleets of steam 

 trawlers (between 1893 and 1900) there were, according to 

 Bertram,^ at least three times as many soles eaten in London 

 as there were plaice. The British catch of plaice was in 1913 

 more than ten times as great as that of soles. The latter was, 

 in round numbers, 3,400 tons (worth £480,200), as against 

 37,800 tons (worth £1,095,300) of plaice. 



' Mostly in Hull vessels - Sec below, p. 33. 



3 Harvest of theSea, p. 07. 



