88 SALMGNID^ OF BRITAIN. 



Wales and the soutli, in -wliicli tlie finger maj-ks are distinct along their upper edge 

 from the colours of the back into which they do not run as is mostly the case. 

 At Stormontfields, a suggestion which had been advanced that the anomaly of 



as marked it may be reckoned thus :— Left the pond in 1855, 130,000 ; in 1856, 100,000 ; total, 

 230,000." Although many grilse were reported to the superintendent as captured, having this 

 year's mark, not one having the ring was among those taken. The grilse in 1850 were very 

 numerous, but marked ones were not detected. A few of the fry that left the pond in May or 

 June, 1855, were reported as having been caught this season as salmon. 



Dr. J. Davy, Plnjsioloffical Eesearchcs, 1863, p. 221 concluded "that a par — a distinct 

 species — is a creature of the imagination, and that the idea^of such a species ought to be opposed, 

 both as founded in error, and as affording a pretence to allow of the wasteful, mischievous capture 

 of the salmon and sea-trout fry." 



EuEsel, The Salmon, 1864, p. 33, observed that the chief questions are, or have been: — 

 1st. Is the par tlie young of the salmon in earliest infancy ? 2nd. At what age does the smolt 

 emigrate to saltwater? 3rd. After what length of absence does the emigrant return to fresh 

 water? 4th. In what state does he return, "grilse or salmon?" Continuing, "that the par is 

 the infant young of the salmon was a fact so clear, or a conclusion so inevitable, before the 

 experiments (Shaw'.s) were made, that it would not be hard to conceive how it could ever have been 

 in doubt. Were it not that, even after the experiments have furnished the most ample demon- 

 stration, there arc still to be found a considerable number of people who, instead of having been 

 convinced, have only been enraged." "Every schoolboy on the banks of the Tweed (where almost 

 alone the S. salar and S. eriox arc found together in jileuty) knows at a glance the difference 

 between the smolt of the salmon and of the bull trout — the black-fin and the orange-fin." 



Couch, British Fishes, iv, 1865, p. 245, observed, " The question at present, therefore, is 

 not whether the young of the salmon — and, we may add, of some others of the same family — 

 may not remain in fresh water for more than a year, during which they may bear on the sides a 

 series of dusky marks at this time, denominated Par-bands, but whether there be not also a 

 distinct species which bears those marks, and which, by something like arrested development, is 

 never deprived of them." " Mr. Shaw's conclusions, in some particulars, appear to be far from 

 satisfactory : and, as regards the true nature of a fish he terms the par, the question appears to 

 be exactly where he found it." 



Bertram, The Harvest of the Sea, 1865, p. 105, remarked : " Indeed, the experiments 

 conducted at the Stormontfiefd ponds have conclusively settled the long-fought battle of the par, 

 and proved indisputably that the par is the young of the salmon, that it becomes transformed to 

 a smolt, grows into a grilse, and ultimately attains the honour of full-grown salmonhood. The 

 anomaly in the growth of the par was also attempted to be solved at Stormontfield, but without 

 success. In November and December, 1857, provision was made for hatching in separate com- 

 partments the artificially impregnated ova of — (1) par and salmon ; (2) grilse and salmon : 

 (3) grilse pure ; (4) salmon pure. It was found, when the young of the different matches came 

 to be examined early in April, 1859, that the sizes of each kind varied a little. Mr. Buist, the 

 superintendent of fisheries, informing us that — (1st) the produce of the salmon with salmon are 

 four inches in length ; (2nd) grilse with salmon, 3^ inches; (3rd) grilse with grilse, 3J inches; 

 (Ith) par with grilse, three inches ; (5th) smolt from large pond, five inches. These results, 

 of a varied manipulation, never got a fair chance of being of use as a proof in the disputation ; 

 for owing to the limited extent of the ponds at the time, the experiments had to be matured in 

 such small boxes or ponds as evidently tended to stunt the growth of the fish." 



Another theory at this period obtained some notice respecting why merely half of the par 

 descended as smolts one year, for this, it was asserted, must be in consequence of the first batch 

 being the progeny of pure salmon and the second the offspring of grilse — a theory which on 

 investigation proved to have no foundation. 



Dr. Giinther, Catalogue of the FiKltes of the British Museum,vi, 1866, pp. 11-34, placed the Salmnliis 

 of Willoughby as the young of a variety of sea trout, which he termed S. camhricus ; while the 

 Saliinilus of Eay he considered an immature salmon, observing in a note that " under these names the 

 young not only of the salmon, but also of other salmonoids, have been described." Ray's description 

 was almost verballyidenticalwiththat of Willoughby; and in the Introduction to the Study of Fishes, 

 by Dr. Giinther, 1880, it was observed that " the Historia Piscium, which bears Willoughby's name 

 on the title-page, and was edited by Eay, is clearly their joint jiroduction." He also said : " Shaw has 

 demonstrated in the most conclusive manner that those small Salmonoids, generally called Far, 

 are the offspring of the salmon, and that many males from seven to eight inches long, have the 

 sexual organs fully developed, and that their milt has all the impregnating properties of the seminal 

 fluidof amuch older and larger fish. That this par is not a distinct species — as has lately been again 

 maintained by Couch — is further proved by the circumstance that these sexually mature pars are 

 absolutely identical in their zoological characters with the immature pars, which are undoubtedly 

 young salmon, and that no par has ever been found with mature ova. But whether these par produce 

 normal salmon, impregnating the ova of female salmon, or mingle with the river trout, or whether 

 they continue to grow and propagate their species as true salmon, are questions which remain to be 

 answered." 



In 1869 commenced the case of theTay Fishery Board versus Miller, who was accused " m so 

 far as, upon Saturday, the 10th June, 1869, or about that time, the said Robert Miller had in 

 Iris possession nine smolts or salmon fry." This was first decided against the Fishery Board, 



