14 



about 8 miles off Dalby, reamy bottom, depths 20 to 40 

 fathoms, where I had in former seasons found spawning 

 Soles, Turbot and Brill. Here we were very successful, 

 and obtained spawning Plaice, Witch, Lemon Sole, and 

 grey Gurnard. These batches of eggs were fertilized in 

 pails on board ship and were conveyed to the laboratory. 

 The plaice spawn met with an accident, but the other 

 three samples were safely transferred one to each of the 

 three tanks prepared for their reception, where they were 

 kept under observation daring the following two weeks. 



Although the early history of such fish has been followed 

 elsewhere, we think it will be of interest to the Connnittee 

 to see figures of the first food fishes which have been 

 artificially fertilised and hatched in our district. Plates 

 II. to IV., drawn by Mr. Andrew Scott, show diagram- 

 matically the various embryonic stages of the three kinds 

 of fish during their development. 



The first batch of Witch embryos fertilised on the 22nd 

 began to hatch out on the 29th, the seventh day, the 

 majority of them died on the following day. 



The second batch of Witches, fertilised on April 24th, 

 and the Lemon Soles of the same date began to hatch on 

 Saturday, May 2nd, and by Sunday afternoon nearly all 

 of them had left their egg membranes. A few of them 

 died on Monday, and more on the following day. 



The Gurnards were later, and many of them died or 

 became abnormal before hatching. 



When the "John Fell" left Port Erin on the evening 

 of the 24th, Mr. Scott went with her to try to obtain some 

 more spawn on other grounds. The neighbourhood of 

 the Bahama and King William banks were tried without 

 success, and then on the Monday morning, by the kind 

 permission of Mr. Knox of Douglas, the owner of the 

 " Kose-Ann," Mr. Scott was permitted to join that trawler 



