48 TRANSPLANTATION AS A REMEDY 



He was examined as a witness in 1908 by Mr. Tennant's 

 Committee on Fishery Investigations, which printed his 

 original paper as an Appendix to its report. ^ 



Professor Garstamjs Experivients 



Scientific experiments in transplantation were reported from 

 Denmark by Petersen in 1896, and from 1904 to 1908 the Marine 

 Biological Association ^ carried through an admirable series of 

 experiments. Science had already discovered that the Dogger 

 Bank produced very few plaice below^ 12 inches in length ; and 

 that ' the absence of small plaice there was probably due, not 

 to any unsuitability of the conditions, but to the fact that this 

 region is surrounded by a barrier of deep water across which, 

 for some reason, young plaice could not move from the inshore 

 nurseries '. 



The experiments were carried out by Messrs. Garstang, 

 Borley, Atkinson, and Potter. Three transplantations were 

 made in the first year : 



(1) 441 plaice from Bridlington Bay to the Easternmost 



Shoal of the Dogger (14th April). 



(2) 362 plaice from the Horn Reef Grounds to the Tail of the 



Dogger (25th and 26th May). 



(3) 344 plaice from the Horn Reef to the Easternmost Shoal 



(25th and 26th May). 



All transplanted fish were marked with brass labels. 



Mr. Douglas had conjectured (he said in 1908) that plaice 

 thus transplanted would grow^ nearly twice as fast as on the 

 small-plaice grounds ; and that one-third of them might be 

 caught in the first year, and two-thirds left to grow. The fact 

 appears to be that the Dogger is a submerged island. Between 

 it and the eastern grounds is a belt of deep water with a muddy 

 bottom, which the little plaice, for some reason still to be 

 discovered,^ find difficulty in crossing. Transplantation is, in 

 effect, merely helping them to cross this barrier. Transplanted 

 fish of 8| inches m length put on a growth of 5| inches in the 

 first year on the Dogger, as against 2 inches on the Small Plaice 

 Grounds. In weight they increased 382 per cent, on the Dogger 

 as against 100 per cent, on the eastern grounds. 



» Cd. 4304 (1908). Price 45. Gd. 



2 Walter Garstang, Experiments in the Transplant atiov of Small Plaice to 

 the Doqqer Bank, Cd. 2670 (1905). Cf. also Borley's Memoir, Cd. 0125 

 (J9I2). 



* Probably the little fish do not find tho food tlicy want dnring the I'roqnent 

 halts which would be necessary for thera. 



