Distribution of Plaice Eggs — Moray Firth. 27 



area. Thus, in contrast to 1908, plaice had not begun to spawn at 

 Burghead in January of 1910, and eveo in February of that year newly 

 spawned plaice eggs were very sparingly represented in the plankton 

 nets. 



On the other hand, the results obtained on 11th March 1907 agree 

 very closely with those obtained on 21st March 1906, in regard to the 

 stage of development of the eggs, although the vertical distribution 

 varied considerably. The following are the percentages at the different 

 stages of development : — 



21st March 1906 . 32-8 6-8 27-3 3-2 

 11th March 1907 . 34-8 5-2 15-8 44-2 



The conditions at this locality are apparently very complex and 

 variable from year to year. It is probable that the observations have 

 not been made with sufficient regularity in this area to enable us to give 

 a satisfactory explanation of the complexities of the problem. 



(d) Stations VIII. and IX., Moraij Firth. 



These are two of the " Goldseeker " trawling stations which lie 

 in the intermediate zone between the two lines of stations just con- 

 sidered. The records of this area are therefore of value in helping to 

 link up the results from these two lines of stations. 



The north-west end of Station VIII. lies 12 miles E.S.E. from Tarbet 

 Ness, and the trawling station extends S.E. for 3| miles from this 

 point to within 9 miles of Lossiemouth. Station IX. runs parallel to 

 Station VIII. three miles to the east. These two stations are there- 

 fore situated over an area which lies in the triangle made by Station 29, 

 Burghead and Lossiemouth, and have a depth of about 30 fathoms. 



There is only one record from this intermediate locality in the month 

 of January. Observations were made at the S.E. end of Station VIII. , 

 Moray Firth, on 23rd January 1908, and 4 eggs in the " a " stage were 

 taken in a surface haul. A total of 22 eggs was, however, obtained from 

 the different water layers, and only 8 of these were newly spawned. 

 It has ah'eady been stated that in January 1908 very large numbers of 

 newly spawned eggs were obtained in the Dornoch Firth and at Burghead 

 Bay. At Station 30, also, a later spawning area than the Dornoch 

 Firth, 26 of the 28 eggs captured were in the " a " stage of development 

 in this month. Spawning plaice were very scarce in January 1908 on 

 this area from ten to twelve miles off Lossiemouth. But whence came 

 the relatively high proportion of eggs in the later stages of development? 

 Eggs in the later stages of development were not found so far east as 

 Station 32 in this month. It has already been proved that plaice were 

 spawning earlier this season towards the Dornoch Firth and at Biu-ghead 

 Bay. 



Station VIII., Moray Firth, was again visited in March 1908. The 

 absolute number of eggs in the later stages of development had increased 

 considerably, but so, too, had the number of newly spawned eggs, and 

 relative to the numbers at other stages these were much more numerous. 

 This area is therefore a spawning area which is later than either the 

 Dornoch Firth or Bmghead Bay. 



Plaice were also spawning close to Lossiemouth in March 1908, 

 probably in slightly greater numbers than at Station VIII. The 

 relative proportions of eggs in the different stages of development are 



