FOURTEENTH ANNUAL MEETING. 



93 



for the return of fish or tags taken the next spring, and twelve 

 tags were received. Nine of the fish bearing them were weighed 

 and found in every instance to have fallen away in weight since 

 marking. No fully or partially mended fish were obtained or 

 heard of that year. But in Jvme, 1882, five prime salmon were 

 recovered bearing the tags affixed in October and November, 

 1880. The following statement shows the date for each indi- 

 vidual : 



RECORD OK MARKING. 



with those of the other two, and they leave little room for doubt 

 that it is the normal habit of the Penobscot salmon to spawn 

 every second year. Had any considerable number of them re- 

 covered condition in season to return to the river for spawning 

 the year after their first capture, they would hardly have escaped 

 detection altogether ; indeed, they would have been much more 

 likely to retain their tags, since thev would have borne them 

 only six or seven months, instead of eighteen or nineteen. This 

 view is further supported by what we know of the reduced con- 

 dition in which the end of the spawning season finds the salmon, 

 the short time, only six months, that intervenes between the 

 spawning season and the time for the next " run " up the river, 

 the low temperature then prevailing in the river and bay, and 

 the fact, which is pretty well established, that a large part, per- 

 haps nearly all the salmcju, instead of proceeding at once to sea 



