148 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [22] 
lighter color, whilst those of the former spring herring had a more 
brownish hue. Finally, it is sometimes said that the present spring 
herring have smaller scales* and that they adhere more firmly to the 
body of the fish. 
Most of these features are actually of very little significance, and, in 
distinguishing one kind of herring from the other, they have no scien- 
tific value whatever. But as they are mentioned so frequently, I shall 
refer to them at greater length. 
The smaller size of the eggs means, as will be seen at a glance, noth- 
ing more nor less than that they are not yet fully developed; in other 
words, that the present spring herring do not arrive on our coasts in 
as advanced a stage of maturity as the former ones. Quite frequently 
it is positively asserted that even the eggs of the mature herring, 
which arrive later, in February, have not the same size as those of the 
old spring herring. But this is simply a mistake. In comparing the 
eggs of old spring herring—preserved in spirits of wine—with those of 
the present spring herring, I have been unable to discover the slight- 
est difference in size. In his well-known work, Om Silden og Sildefis- 
kerierne, Boeck says that the fully matured eggs of the spring herring 
measure 1.50 millimeters m diameter; and this is found, if observed 
with the naked eye, to be the exact measure of the eggs of the present 
spring herring. In small specimens of the present spring herring, 
measuring only 28 centimeters in length, I have found the diameter of 
the eggs to vary from 1.31 to 1.48 millimeters. When eggs, however, 
measure only 1.31 millimeters in diameter, the difference is so small 
that it can hardly be observed without a manifying glass, and, there- 
fore, by no means agrees with the statements of the fishermen. 
The greater quantity of fat in the present herring of course depends 
to a great extent, or almost exclusively, on the fact that these fish are 
not yet ready for spawning; and the fatness again explains in a most 
natural manner the circumstance that in the present herring the bones 
are thinner than in the old ones. In a fat herring the bones are not so 
distinctly felt as in a lean one, when cut with a knife, and they conse- 
quently appear to be thinner and finer. That there is much chance for 
making mistakes through this very cause is shown by the fact that the 
fatness of the great herring gave rise to the assertion that they did 
not have a certain rowof fine bones along the sides, the so-called ‘side- 
ribs,” and that thereby they were distinguished pot the spring her- 
rings. (Boeck’s report, 1873.) 
The fine quality of the meat in our present spring herring must like- 
wise be ascribed to the circumstance that these fish are not yet ready 
to spawn, and that, as is always the case prior to the spawning period, 
the meat is firm and solid. During and after the spawning period the 
meat becomes looser and of an inferior quality. 
*See the reports on the old Bohus-ldn herrings (A. LIUNGMAN: Preliminer Berdttelse 
for 1873-1874). 
