170 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



Gisler relates tliat in the Botliuian Gulf storms do not drive the her- 

 rings from their places of sojourn far out at sea, and that the herrings, 

 when storms jjrevent them from approaching the sea-coast, are supposed 

 to spawn out at sea where there are suitable banks. 



As regards our present Bohusliin herring-fisheries, they are so insig 

 nificant, the spawning-places are all in such sheltered locations, and the 

 fisheries are carried on with so little energy, that it is very difficult to 

 obtain sufficient data on which to found any certain opinion. We have 

 been informed, however, that during the herring-fisheries near South 

 Hisingen, the herrings go farther- up towards the mouth of the river 

 during land-wind, when there is good fishing in the neighborhood of 

 Ny-Elfsborg; and when westerly and southerly winds prevail the best 

 fishing is farther out near the coast of Andal and Hiistvik. 



During that part of the last great-herring fishing-period, when large 

 numbers of herrings spawned near our coast, land-wind was generally 

 considered most favorable to fishing. 



As the most important, most profitable, and safest herring-fisheries 

 are those which are carried on during the spawning-season (as during 

 the other portions of the year the fish are not so fat and their course is 

 more uncertain), it will be clear that, although physical conditions exer- 

 cise a far greater influence on the last-mentioned fisheries, our knowledge 

 of them is much more limited. 



When the herrings come to the coast for the purpose of seeking food, 

 wind and especially storm has an entirely diflerent influence on them, 

 and the occurrence of the herrings is chiefly determined by the quantity 

 of herring-food found in a certain place. Thus the herrings often ap- 

 proach a coast with that wind which drives in large quantities of herring- 

 food, and leave the coast with that wind which drives the herring-food 

 away. This explains why during the last great Bohuslan herring-fishing 

 period the herrings did not always appear in the same numbers during one 

 and the same direction of the wind ; for during that period when the her- 

 rings spawned near the coast land-wind was more favorable than sea- 

 wind, whilst during that period when the great mass of the herrings 

 only approached the coast for another purpose, a strong sea-wind often 

 caused the herrings to enter the fiords and thus brought about the be- 

 ginning of the fisheries. 



In discussing the causes why the great-herring fisheries came to an 

 end, people made the mistake of supposing that all manner of refuse float- 

 ing in the sea and various noises kept the herrings on the outer coast 

 and hindered them from coming nearer until the storm drove them in- 

 Both from our last great-herring fishing period and from our later much 

 less important herrmg-fisheries it is well known, however, that a south- 

 easterly wind drives those herrings which have come for the purpose of 

 seeking food away from the coast, because it blows from the land in such 

 a direction that it both increases and accelerates the Skagerack current 

 on the outer coa.st and directs it farther away from the coast, carrying 

 with it the great mass of herring-food. 



