38 NOKTII SEA INVESTIGATIONS. 



Amrum Light, i.e., to the north of Heligoland, and was struck with the 

 very large number of small brill and turbot in her "voyage." I found, 

 by actual count, that she had 64G small brill and 150 small turbot. 

 Many of these brill were under 12 in. and many of the turbot. There 

 were also 2G larger brill, and 10 larger turbot, the largest of the former 

 being 20 in. long, of the latter, 28 in. The rest of the catch included 

 Gl boxes of medium plaice, 100 boxes of small and 7 boxes of soles. 

 The last were by no means undersized. On this same vessel I went 

 to sea the next day, to make observations during her fishing. 



We steered E. \ S. from the Newsand Lightship. The trawl was 

 first shot a little before twelve (midnight), on June 5th. The position 

 was about IS or 20 miles west of the Sylt; the depth 13 to 14 

 fathoms. 



First haul, G a.m., June Gth. The marketable fish were : 5 baskets of 

 kit haddock, 2 baskets of plaice, none small, 4 cod, rather small, 2 coal 

 fish, 6 turbot. Three of the turbot were females, 2 of them 29^, 31| in. 

 ripe, 1, 21i in., 2 others were mature males loi in. to 20 in. The 

 largest turbot yielded ripe eggs freely, and was nearly spent after I had 

 squeezed it : this shows that the turbot, like the plaice, sheds a large 

 number of eggs at once, especially towards the end of the spawning 

 process. The refuse thrown overboard consisted of small haddocks, 

 dabs, gurnards and whiting. There were also half a basketful of 

 common whelks; Cancer pa/ju7'us,Taianj; whelk spawn, quantities; Asterias 

 ruhens, many; Solaster 2'>cipposus, many; Alcyoniuin digitatum, quantities. 



Second haul, 11.30 a.m. At the beginning of this shot we towed 

 S.E. i E., depth 12 J fathoms. Just before hauling we got 11 fathoms. 

 When the fish were on the deck I saw that we were now on the small 

 plaice grounds. The plaice kept for market were sorted by the crew 

 into two classes, according to their size, and the smallest were thrown 

 overboard. I found that the smallest saved was 11 in. long, the smallest 

 in the whole catch was Gi in. long. After the valuable fish had been 

 picked up the rest were left for me to examine : I found there were 

 about two baskets of plaice, the largest being 10 in. long ; all these 

 were shovelled overboard, with a few small haddocks and numbers of 

 small dabs. The fish kept were : — 



1| baskets large or medium plaice. 

 1| „ small plaice. 



2 „ haddock, 

 i „ dabs. 



18 pair of soles, none under Sin. 



1 coal fish, 1 Trir/la hirunclo. 



5 turbot, 11 J, in., l."Iin., 14 in., 14 in., lOMn. 



3 brill, 11 in., 13 in., 13 in. 



