CHAPTER XI 



SIZE LIMITS AND OTHEE EEMEDIES FOE THE 

 DEPLETION OF YOUNG MAEKETABLE FISH 



To deal with the mmority view first. If Garstang is correct ; 

 if the catching of fewer snicill plaice is to result only in over- 

 crowding and shortage of food and degeneration, then, it is 

 claimed, restrictions on catching fish will not improve the 

 stock. The process would be less fish in the nets, more fish on 

 the ground, less food to go round, more deaths from starvation. 

 In that case the remedy for a depleted stock would be easy. 

 The nations — or the premier fishing nation — would proceed with 

 transplantation on a big scale, and all idea of international ' re- 

 strictions ' would be scrapped. As restrictions involve intrigues, 

 delays, shuffles, ill-feeling, evasions, and very great expense, 

 the nations may well hope that Garstang will prove his case. 



Most people, however, have beheved hitherto that it was not 

 desirable to kill too many young fish on the nursery grounds ; 

 and Atkinson, one of the most practical of our naturaHsts, has 

 suggested that it could be prevented by making it illegal to land 

 plaice ' ungutted ', for no one will go to the trouble of gutting 

 very small fish. As late as 1908 the trawler owners who gave 

 evidence before Mr. Tennant's Committee suggested the 

 advisabihty of closing the young plaice grounds to all trawl- 

 fishing during the time when the young fish predominated 

 there. Messrs. 0. Hellyer, Vivian, Bloomfield, Ward, Donnison, 

 and Alward wished to effect this purpose by forbidding the 

 landing or sale of plaice below 8 inches in length. They insisted, 

 as did Sir G. Doughty, that to be of the least use this limit must 

 apply to fish landed l3y all classes of vessels landing in Great 

 Britain during the whole of the year. If exceptions were made, 

 they said, the law would be nnpossible to enforce ashorC; 

 because it would be impossible to prove the previous history 

 of under-sized fish offered for sale. Sir George Doughty told the 

 Committee how he had helped to kill Lord Onslow's Bill in 

 1904, because it exempted sailing craft from the operation of 

 the size hmit, and thus practically ' nulhfied itself '. What the 

 industry asked for was a size limit which should make it un- 

 profitable to trawl the ' small-plaice grounds ' during the four 

 months of the year when fish below 8 inches predominated in 



