380 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



then, and rather smaller than the fish caught in August and September, 

 when we go off shore from 5 to 30 miles and get larger and fatter 

 fish. We commence about the 15th of Jane, aud fish until the loth of 

 October. 



7. High and low both. When they are up and we can see them we 

 get them, aud when down we cannot fish, so that some days there will 

 be good fishing and others none at all. On the seine-ground, cannot 

 tell how deep they swim when they are down. We usually catch them 

 here by seeing them play. Sometimes they ripple the water. 



8. From southeast to the southwest, and generally lay along the 

 coast; they are seen fi^om Cape Sable to Oape Ann, off aud on shore 

 around Cape Cod, in the season of them — that is, an outside fish and 

 an ins'ide fish. Fish in the bays and rivers are called inside, and on the 

 ocean called outside. In Maine, the fishing is done outside nearly alto- 

 gether. 



9. About the same for the last ten years. The fish go where the feed 

 is. 



10. See no difference. 



11. Has no effect here. 



12. Usually deep water. 



13. We fish in deep and shoal water. Do not know how deep they 

 swim. 



14. Tn a sunshiny day we see them most. 



15. Never saw any fish here that looked as though they came here 

 to breed; there is some difference in the size, but could not define their 

 age. The smaller fish go into the rivers, 



16. Never saw a young fish north of Cape Cod, or old fish that looked 

 like spawning. 



17. The fish start to go west from here about the middle of September, 

 and go by degrees up to the last of October. 



18. They seem to run along the coast southwesterly. 



20. It is a substance in the water which is sometimes seen ; I never 

 examined it particularly. Something like a seed or a very small lobster, 

 or rather has this appearance; it is about one-fourth of an inch long; 

 do not see as much of that here as in Narragansett Bay. 



21. From the south side of Ca^ie Cod to the Albemarle Sound, in all 

 the inland waters aud rivers, mostly in the southern waters, com- 

 mencing south about the 1st of March and in Narragansett Bay in 

 May. 



22. Think the spawning fish leave the main body aud scatter about in 

 l)airs or small schools and in shoal water. 



23. Never saw the operation, but have noticed in the smoother waters 

 in the night that the fish came close in to the shore in shoal water, and 

 the supposition was that they were spawning. I have seen a hauliug- 

 seiue haul on shore the spawns all ready to hatch. 



24. The water is rather cold in the spawning season. 



