68 EEPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



(5.) It explains better tban the other tlieories the appearance of the 

 fish at the time of their arrival in the spring. 



The menhaden appear to be bottom feeders. If they migrated coast- 

 wise to the south, they would there find feeding-grounds; if they sank 

 to the bottom, they would there find food if they had sufiQcient vitality 

 to resurrect themselves in the spring; if they passed the winter in the 

 mid-ocean strata, they could obtain no food and would naturally become 

 emaciated, the accumulated fat of the preceding summer being absorbed. 



BimhaucVs classification criticised and a neic one proposed. 



91. Eimbaud's classification, which is a modification of one recognized 

 in the markets of South France, is very suggestive, but it does not 

 appear to me to be entirely applicable to the fishes of our coast, at least 

 not in the way in which it has usually been adopted. 



Rimbaud makes four divisions, viz : 



I. Wandering fishes {Poisson nomade). • 



II. White fishes {Poisson blanc). 



III. Bottom fishes {Poisson de roclie or Poisson de fond). 



IV. Alien or outside fishes {Poisson for ain). 



The distinction between Classes I and IV does not appear to be very 

 clearly marked. In the Western Atlantic, some of the fishes making up 

 Class IV belong to each of the other classes. 



A more natural classification would be in three divisions, which might 

 readily be correlated with the three kinds of migration mentioned in 

 the jireceding i3ara»Taph. 



The first group would include the wandering fishes, the Poisson 

 nomade of Eimbaud, whose migrations are entirely oceanic and con- 

 fined to the surface zones. The second group would include the bottom 

 fishes of restricted range, the Poisson de fond of Eimbaud, which move 

 to and from the shore or the shallows, and which do not range. The 

 third group would include the middle classes, those which take advan- 

 tage of both methods of migration, and corresponds approximately 

 to Eimbaud's second division. " White fishes" seems hardly an appropri- 

 ate name: "coast fishes" would perhaps be more expressive. 



Colonel Lyman, in his report "On the Limits of Artificial Culture, and 

 the Possible Exhaustion of Sea-fisheries"* (p. 07), speaks of the first 

 class as " the wandering or schooling fishes of the high seas." The term 

 "schooling" is liable to mislead, for the "white fishes" also school. 

 Among the wandering fishes he mentions only " the herring {ClnjJea 

 elongata), mackerel {Scomber vernalis), menhaden {Alosa menhaden), cod 

 {Gadus morrhua),''^ &c. The cod and herring most certainly are " white 

 fishes," and the menhaden and mackerel are certainly not to be ranked 

 with " those which appear on tiie coast only when ' migrating,' and then 

 in vast but uncertain troops" (p. C3). 



* Report of the Comtuiasioners of Fisheries (of Massachusetts) for the year euding 

 January 1, 1870, pp. 58-C7. 



