VALUE OF NORWEGIAN LAKES FOR FISH CULTURE. 543 



of fish has brought fish-culture to mind; aud at present aquaculture, 

 that is, the cultivation of the waters with reference to fish-proijagation, 

 is about to win its way to recognition and practice as agricuJture did 

 thousands of years ago. 



I. 



GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 



Few countries possess such a wealth of lakes and rivers of all sizes 

 as Norway. In his work, " The Kingdom of Norway ," Dr. O. J. Broch 

 gives the combined areas of these waters as 7,G00 square kilometers, or 

 2.4 per cent, of the whole area of the country. Their situation with 

 regard to elevation above the sea, in connection with the climate and 

 the' topographical relations, causes bj' far the greater portion to be 

 especially adapted as a place of residence for the kinds of fishes which 

 are univessally considered the choicest and most valuable, because they 

 contain clear and cool water, in which these fishes thrive best and 

 acquire the finest flavor. Of the waters, only a small portion, lying in the 

 lowest regions, are unsuited to these better kinds, because of their slug- 

 gishness and liigher temperature ; these are, however, well adapted to 

 other less esteemed, but at the same time valuable, species of fishes. 

 Most of these waters, in earlier times, when the population was smaller, 

 were very rich in fish, and the greater ones were therefore regarded as 

 manorial rights, which, as such, were separately liable to taxation. 

 Forty or fifty years ago the greatest portion of the waters situated in 

 the mountain regions proper, and the rivers generally, were what one 

 might call rich in fish, although the abundance, according to the state- 

 ments of the inhabitants, was even at this time considerably diminished; 

 but latterly the (juantity of fish is steadily and rapidly being diminished 

 by the constantly increasing fishery of the growing population, which 

 in this country, as everywhere in Europe, urges on the })ursuit, and 

 especially at a time when it is the most injurious to the continuance of 

 the fish supi)ly — the spawning time — because- the fish is most readily 

 caught on the spawning-gTOunds. The steadily diminishing abundance 

 only increases the demand instead of putting a check thereon. Fishing- 

 implements were gradually constructed in such manner that the smallest 

 edible fish could never escape, and brooks which were the natural haunt 

 of young fish were swept systematically from one end to the other by 

 fine-meshed nets with careful search, so that only an insignificantly 

 small number could reach the age of reproduction. This was, of course, 

 not so everywhere in like degree ; but over a large part of the country, 

 by this mode of proceeding, prosecuted more or less eagerly, has been 

 established a scarcity which in places approaches complete absence of 

 fish of the better kinds, which were the chief object of pursuit, just as 

 in many other European countries. 



The sad result brought about in this manner, which in those places 

 had reached its culmination more than thirty years ago, is natm^ally 



