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very rare occurrence since the erection of the navigation weirs, 
when the exceptional amount of wet so frequently caused the 
weirs to be out of action, that these fish were enabled to pass. 
Since 1872, I am informed that none of these fishes have been 
seen in the Severn near Shrewsbury. Randall observed that 
“shad were formerly taken in considerable numbers. by men 
who stood at the fords, watching for them as they ascended the 
river at night. Their approach was marked by a phosphor- 
escent light or ‘“‘loom” in the water. They were difficult to 
catch in the daytime, as they could either go over or under the 
net. When in proper condition they were a well-flavoured fish, 
and attained sometimes 2 lbs. or 3 lbs. in weight.”—(The 
Severn Valley, 1882, page 502.) When, as last year, the river 
rose to a considerable height, these fishes could top this con- 
struction, and perhaps some obtained access to their spawning 
grounds, so were able to continue their race: but in years when 
the water supply is low, as at present, they cannot effect this, 
and then very few young are produced. The eggs float, and 
the weirs would arrest their downward course, or that of the 
young: while the constant passage of steamers must be like- 
wise very detrimental to them. The flattened form of the shad 
and its spined abdominal edge, are unsuited for its jumping 
and pushing up a salmon pass, and until such time as these 
passes, by a series of lochs, go through the body of weirs, they 
will be useless for shad. A few may, it is true, pass through 
the pound-lochs when open, and fortunately one female gives 
an enormous number of eggs, for were this not so, the proba- 
bility is that this breed ere now would have become extinct in 
this river. 
And if this has been the effect upon the larger form it has 
been equally or more disastrous to the smaller twaite, which 
often arrives two or three weeks later than its relative. It 
passes up the Severn to the Teme, up which it ascends so far 
as the Powick weir. But it likewise is a fish that will at no 
distant date probably to almost or quite extinct in this river, 
for it is unable to obtain access to. its spawning beds, and 
these forms of shad, which formerly were of great moment to 
