CHAR 8 1 



the actual time of spawning varying greatly in 

 different lakes, presumably being affected by the 

 temperature of the water and other circumstances. 

 The Char spawn on beds of gravel in shallow or 

 moderately deep water, either in the lakes or in 

 tributary streams, forming redds like Salmon and 

 Trout. In some places, for example Loch Killin 

 and Loch Grannoch, they suddenly come on to the 

 shallows, and within a few days all have spawned 

 and gone back into the deep water, and they exhibit 

 in this an extraordinary regularity, appearing year 

 after year at the same time almost to a day. The 

 habits of the Char in Windermere are markedly 

 different, for their spawning time is protracted, ex- 

 tending from November to February or even March. 

 Char have certainly died out in several lakes 

 during the last hundred years, but the causes which 

 have led to their extinction are not well ascertained. 

 Mr. F. B. Henn tells me that since the introduction 

 of Trout into Lough Gortyglass the Char are less 

 abundant than formerly, and this leads one to 

 suspect that the stocking of Hellyal Lake in the 

 Orkneys with Trout may have had something to 

 do with the disappearance of the Char. For 

 although Char and Trout may get on perfectly 

 well together in a lake which they have inhabited 

 for thousands of years, it does not follow that Char 

 used to having a lake to themselves will be able to 

 compete successfully with a suddenly introduced 

 stock of Trout. In Lough Neagh overfishing, in 

 Lochleven the reduction of the area of the lake, 

 in Ullswater pollution of the river in which they 

 used to spawn, have been assigned as possible 

 causes of the extinction of Char. However this 



