568 Memoir Sears Foundation for Marine Research 



Scotia and northern New England wherever local surroundings are favorable, and they 

 are widespread along the shores of southern New England, as well as New York, 

 where the stream mouths of Long Island formerly were centers of abundance (p. 565). 

 Their range also includes northern New Jersey — the Raritan River in particular; and 

 there is a reliable old record of them in the lower reaches of streams and rivers of 

 Delaware and Pennsylvania, at the head of Delaware Bay (Schuylkill River and Brandy- 

 wine Creek in particular), and as far up the Delaware River as the swift water at Trenton, 

 New Jersey (jo\ 94); but it is questionable whether there are any survivors today 

 of this southernmost population. We have found no reliable basis for the repeated 

 statements that they range southward to Virginia. ^^ 



They differ widely in numbers from place to place, even within short distances, 

 depending on how well the local surroundings meet their rather exacting requirements. 

 Thus Great Bay, New Hampshire, is a center of abundance, perhaps second only — 

 considering its size — to the much more extensive shoal bays on the north shore of New 

 Brunswick. But the inner part of the Bay of Fundy on the New Brunswick side is a 

 region of great scarcity." 



There are progressively fewer American Smelts southward along the coast as a 

 whole. This gradation may be illustrated for recent years by average landings that 

 were about 25—40 times greater for the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore of New Brunswick 

 than for the longer Maine shoreline. For 1899, when the status of American Smelts 

 represented natural conditions more nearly than their present status, the catch for 

 Maine was 1,055,000 pounds, but only 154,000 pounds thence southward along the 

 coast of New England. Westward and southward from Connecticut the commercial 

 catches are negligible, and seemingly always have been. 



Occurrence in Fresh Water. It has long been a matter of common knowledge that 

 some American Smelts are also landlocked. In eastern North America there were in- 

 digenous populations in Long Lake, near Plymouth, Massachusetts (whence the Mu- 

 seum of Comparative Zoology received 10 specimens in 1875).'' They occur in some 

 lakes in New Hampshire (Squam, Winnisquam, and Winnipesaukee) and in many 

 of the coastal lakes and ponds of all the principal river basins in Maine.'* There 

 are native Smelt in: many of the Nova Scotian {61: 29) and New Brunswick lakes; 

 Lake Memphremagog (partly in Vermont and partly in Quebec); Lake Champlain 

 (in abundance); Lake St. John, eastern Quebec; Lac des Isles, Green Lake, and 

 Lac Brule in western Quebec northwest of Montreal; and in Muskrat and Dore lakes 

 of Ontario, which are tributary to the upper Ottawa River, at an altitude of about 

 3,000 feet above sea level (doubtless as a "relic of the time following the retreat of the 

 last ice sheet, when an arm of the sea extended up the Ottawa Valley to the head of 

 Lake Timiskaming" ; Dymond, 2j: 59). No doubt there are native Smelts in various 



16. Based seemingly on Jordan and Gilbert (5J: 293). 



17. For discussion, see Jefters, 46 (1932): 27. 



18. Perhaps elsewhere on Cape Cod (locality not specified), to judge from an article in Forest and Stream for April 18, 

 1889. 



19. For the Smelt lakes of Maine, see Kendall, 56: 273-278. 



