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The Rate of Growth of some Sea Fishes and their 

 Distribution at Different Ages. 



By 

 J. T. Cuuninghaiu, M.A. 



Dr. Wemyss Fulton has made an extensive investigation of tlie 

 distribution of immature sea fishes^ and has published his results 

 in the Eeport of the Scottish Fishery Board for the year 1889. 

 He had at his disposal a sea-going vessel specially adapted to 

 fishery investigations, and his data were obtained exclusively by 

 means of this vessel. As scientific Secretary to the Board Dr. 

 Fulton is attached to the Ofiice in Edinburgh, and the observa- 

 tions he required were made and recorded according to his direc- 

 tions by the naturalists on the Board's steamer '' Garland.'' The 

 conception and the execution of this investigation are both admii'- 

 able, and it has supplied a great deal of definite knowledge upon 

 subjects of great importance on which previously we knew little or 

 nothing. The enquiry consisted in determining firstly, from the 

 examination of a large number of specimens, the minimum and 

 maximum size of sexually ripe specimens of each species ; and 

 secondly, the relative abundance of specimens smaller than this 

 minimum size at various depths and various distance from shore. 



The enquiries described in the present paper are to some extent 

 similar to Dr. Fulton's, but in the main they are different both in 

 object and in method. My first object was as far as possible to 

 ascertain something of the rate of growth of sea-fishes of various 

 species. With this purpose, I have searched for young specimens 

 in all possible ways, and have measured and preserved all I could 

 meet with. Some have been taken with the shrimp-trawl worked 

 from our little steam-launch in Plymouth Sound and the neighbour- 

 ing bays, some in the tow-net. I have also collected specimens 

 from the deep-sea trawl of the professional trawlers, and from the 

 hauls of ground seines. During the summer of the present year, I 

 have been authorised to hire steamers in order to collect in deep 

 water at some distance from land, and have trawled at various 



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