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Fishery Board for Scotland. 



we dealt with the cod, the ling, and the witch ; this year let us consider 

 the hake, the saithe, the megrim, and the lemon sole. In all cases we 

 shall limit om" inquiry, more or less strictly, to the more important 

 fishing-areas — that is to say, to those where the amount of fishing is so 

 great as to fm'nish us with a practically complete statistical record, 

 month by month, dming the whole series of years since om' investi- 

 gations began. 



The Hake. 



In the following Table (Table VII.) are shown the average catches 

 of hake, per hundred hours' fishing, in seven of om- principal areas, 

 the values given being the means for the period of eleven years, 1903- 

 1913. No one of om- trawl-caught fishes shows so clearly as the 

 hake does a regular annual periodicity. On our coasts the catch of 



TABLE VII. 



Average Monthly Catch of Hake, in Cwts., per 100 Hours' Fishing, 

 Aberdeen Trawlers, 1903-13. 



hake falls almost to nothing in the months of early spring, from 

 February to April ; and in all areas it rises to a maximum in early 

 winter, about October and November. Only in the north-west of 

 Scotland (Area D) are there indications, repeated from year to year, 

 of a small temporary increase about June or July. The precise sig- 

 nificance of this latter, and minor, movement is not known, but the 

 main fact is clear, namely, that the hake, which is essentially a fish 

 of the Atlantic coasts, comes round into the North Sea by way of the 

 north of Scotland at the beginning of ^vinter. If we look closely into 

 the figm-es of Table VII. we shall see that, though the period of 

 maximal abundance is nearly identical in all the areas referred to, yet 

 it is just a little earlier in Area X. (Shetland), a little later in the two 

 areas immediately to the southward thereof (XIII., XIV.), and again, 

 in all probability, a few days later still in Area XVIII. , still farther to 

 the southward, off the mouth of the Moray Firth. The relative 

 abundance of the hake varies from area to area in a similar way, that 



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