FISH AND FISHING IN AMERICA. 



I'.V WM. C. HARRIS. 



(Continued from page 340.) 



The herrings, Clnptidce^ are estimated 

 to be more numerous in individuals than 

 any other family of fishes. They con- 

 sist of thirty genera and one hundred 

 and fifty species which are spread over 

 the waters of the temperate and tropical 

 zones. Commercially they are the most 

 important of the food-fishes and in the 

 economy of nature seem to have been 

 created for one purpose only — to be 

 eaten. They supply the tables of the 

 rich and poor in nearly every quarter 

 of the globe, and millions of millions of 

 them serve as food for countless shoals 

 of marauding- bluefish, cod, pollock, 

 striped bass and weakfish, their savage 

 foes, but more valued as table - fish. 

 Thus we see a compensatory distribu- 

 tion by natural laws, ceaseless in opera- 

 tion, of which man receives the benefit. 

 Remove the herring from the waters of 

 the earth and our choice table-fish would 

 disappear from the market-stalls. 



The pursuit of no other fish gives so 

 great employment to labor or yields so 

 bounteous a harvest. Billions of her- 

 ring are caught annually by the net- 

 fishermen of the North Sea and the At- 

 lantic, and about fifty millions of pounds 

 are taken annuall}^, in favorable years, 

 on the eastern coast of the United States. 

 Extravagant as these estimates seem to 

 be, they can readily be believed when 

 we consider that two or three millions 

 of herrings are contained in one shoal 

 covering six square miles, and much 

 larger schools are on record. 



Of all migratory fishes the herrings 

 seem to be most erratic or capricious in 

 their movements. Professor Spencer F. 

 Baird wrote of them : 



" They sometimes frequent a portion 

 of the European coast for many succes- 

 sive years, and then abandon it gradually 

 or suddenly, presenting themselves usu- 

 ally at the same season in some far-re- 

 mote locality. Sometimes a wind blow- 

 ing on-shore will favor their inward mi- 

 gration ; at other times it appears to 

 have a directly opposite eft'ect. Even 

 when they reach the portion of the coast 

 for which they are bound, the facilities 

 of their capture depend upon meteoro- 

 logical conditions." 



Pursued as the herring are, inces- 

 santly, by their ferocious hostiles, among 

 which, exclusive of those above-named, 

 are the fin-whales, the sharks and the 

 dolphins, as well as those of the air, the 

 gannets, fish-hawks and the larger gulls, 

 the sudden appearance of their enemies 

 in numbers or a persistent pursuit by 

 them so long as their victims remain to 

 be devoured, would seem to explain, in 

 a measure, at least, not only the sudden 

 disappearance of the herring, but their 

 entire abandonment of a predetermined 

 line of migration, in-shore or outward, 

 also their sudden departure from waters 

 where every facility existed to net them. 

 Experienced salt-water anglers, without 

 exception, have frequently observed an- 

 alogous instances of the instantaneous 

 disappearance of the weakfish and other 

 species without apparent cause, and have 

 for hours fished fruitlessly in a tide that 

 yielded bounteously during the early 

 part of their outings ; they could not 

 account for change of luck, iintil a big 

 dogfish chanced to be boated or the 

 dorsal fin of a shark was seen cutting 

 the surface of the water near the boat. 



