60 KEMEDIES FOR THE DEPLETION OF 



The English representatives proposed that before action was 

 taken certain questions required to be settled, viz. : 



1 . What proportion of the stock is caught ? What is the 

 density of fishing ? To answer these questions they proposed 

 an experiment with 1,000 marked fish. 



2. Do fish transplanted to the Dogger now grow as quickly 

 as they did before the war ? 



3. What would be the loss of catch to English vessels if the 

 area inside the 10-fathom line from the Skagerrak to Grisnez 

 were closed ? To answer this a naturalist should study the 

 catch month by month. 



4. What will be the actual effect of any size limit ? To obtain 

 an answer an accurate record should be kept of the plaice caught 

 on all the principal North Sea grounds. 



5. What is the average size of plaice landed at ' the smaller 

 inshore ports ', especially on the south and west coasts ? And 

 what would be the effect on their catch (about 1,200 tons) of 

 (say) a 9J-inch limit ? To answer this question, it was sug- 

 gested, a special staff of fish measurers might well be employed 

 at selected minor ports — a suggestion which is not likely to 

 appeal to many students of fishery economics. 



The Council of 1920 definitely decided that the proposals of 

 their predecessors in 1913 needed to be reconsidered in view of 

 the war. With this decision no one can quarrel. Before 1914 

 no one could have foreseen that the main problem — the effect of 

 stopping men from catching plaice in particular areas — would 

 ever pass from the region of conjecture to the region of fact. 

 But by the war the grounds have actually been closed. On the 

 assumption that the conditions before the war were fairly well 

 known — as they were — it is obvious that it is possible to dis- 

 cover the conditions which now exist, and to assess the extent 

 to which any change in conditions is due to the four years* 

 closure. Never has Marine Science had such an opportunity. 

 This the Council has recognized. It is quite correctly insisting 

 that the effect of the war — i. e. the effect of the closure — on the 

 stock of plaice should be ascertained. 



It has decided that the old contention of the trawling industry 

 is supported by the evidence available. That it is, in fact, 

 desirable, whether directly or indirectly, to close the small- 

 plaice grounds. It differs from the pre-war opinion of trawler 

 owners and skippers in one respect. It has committed itself 

 to the reservation that closures should probably be operative 

 only as against steam trawlers and high-power motor vessels. 

 On this point — if ' Science ' maintains its position — the natural- 

 ist is hkely to come into somewhat violent collision with the 



