Rerort on the Investigations carried on in 1893 
‘in connection with the LANCASHIRE S£EA-FISHERIES 
LaporatTory at University College, Liverpool. 
By Professor W. A. Hrerpman, D.Sc., F.R.S.; 
assisted by Mr. P. F. J. Constn. 
THE last Report besides treating of the work carried on 
in the Fisheries laboratory down to the end of 1892, gave 
an account of the establishment and fittings of the 
laboratory, and a certain amount of preliminary informa- 
tion in regard to the physical and biological features of 
our district of the Irish Sea, and the need of scientific 
investigations therein in regard to Fishery matters. 
There is therefore no need to give again any such general 
introduction, and the present report will deal merely 
with the work carried out in the laboratory and at sea 
during 1893 and the discussion of any results arising from 
it. Some of this work is merely a continuation of that 
undertaken last year, such as the investigation of the foods 
of our various edible fishes and of some inedible ones 
which frequent the same grounds and so may enter into 
competition with marketable species; while on the other 
hand some new questions have been opened up, such as 
the limits of size of the various species in this district at 
sexual maturity, the relative amount of vitality in in- 
dividuals both large and small caught by various nets, the 
position and physical conditions of the spawning grounds, 
and the further extension of the food investigations to very 
young individuals of the edible fishes. 
A few notes on faunistic investigations of the feeding 
erounds, on parasites, and on abnormalities of fish are also 
eiven; and a preliminary statement is made as to the 
