66 



estuary of the Dee, but these are not included in the 

 Lancashire Sea-Fisheries district. 



I estimate the area covered by cockle beds at 69 square 

 miles in the Northern Division, 19 square miles in the 

 Central Division, and 17 square miles in the Southern 

 Division. Altogether there are not less than 105 square 

 miles of cockle bearing sands in the whole district. 



It must not be supposed that each of the coloured areas 

 on the map represents a bank, or portion of a bank, over 

 the whole of which cockles are abundant, and are con- 

 tinually being fished for. At any one time the fishing 

 is practically restricted to one or more comparatively small 

 portions of the bank, and as this becomes exhausted, or as 

 the cockles become so small as to be under the legal size, 

 the fishing shifts to some other part. The whole of a 

 bank may become exhausted temporarily ; this was the 

 case in 1899 for the Formby Bank, though in 1897 it was a 

 very profitable cockle fishing ground, as much as 180 cwts. 

 being removed daily during the winter and spring. At 

 present (1899) the cockles on this bank are, as a rule, under 

 legal size ; they are, however, exceedingly numerous, and 

 a season similar to that of 1897 may be expected in 1900. 

 Each coloured area on the map represents, in fact, a tract 

 over which cockle beds are distributed. The precise posi- 

 tion of the beds is continually shifting to some extent, old 

 beds being exhausted by fishing, or being sanded up with 

 the shifting of the sand banks. New beds are being 

 formed, the position and extent of these being dependent 

 on the deposition of the spat. The newly-hatched cockle 

 leads, for a time, a free-swimming life, and with the 

 acquirement of its shell, settles down for the remainder of 

 its life in the sand. Obviously the conditions which 

 determine the place on which the spat ultimately settles, 

 and the consequent formation of a bed, are complex. 



