EDIBLE riSHES OE NEW SOUTH WALES. 121 



sheltered bays, creeks, and backwaters which fringe the margins of our 

 estuaries and salt water lagunes, it is marvelous that so great and profitable 

 a trade, one which in the nature of things must be ever increasing in its 

 scope, and which year by year would necessarily absorb more and more 

 labor, has not hitherto commended itself to either the public or the private 

 financiers of the Colony. 



Their hardiness, their adaptability to various conditions of life, their 

 indifi"erence to the density of the element which they inhabit, the fact which, 

 has been proved that they breed and thrive equally well in enclosed fresh- 

 water ponds as under normal conditions, the ease with which they may be 

 brought to perfection at a minimum of cost, since no artificial method of 

 supplying food would be required, all point to our Gray Mullet as the 

 pioneer of a fishing industry, which is capable of becoming a not unworthy 

 rival of the Salmon-canning industry of the Western States of America, did 

 our Australian capitalists possess but a tithe of the indomitable energy and 

 perseverance of our transpacific cousins. 



A steady supply of fish, regulated to meet all local requiremeiits, would 

 then be daily available for delivery in the market in such a condition that 

 the most hypercritical could find no ground for cavilling ; and so far as this 

 fish is concerned, would make us practically independent of the forces of 

 nature — such, for instance, as the terrible floods which have recently devas- 

 tated Eastern Australia — and the constitutional indolence of the colonial 

 fishermen. 



But little capital would be requisite to inaugurate a fish farm on the lines 

 here advocated, the initial expense being merely the enclosure of a suitable 

 sheet of water — preferably one having a stream of fresh water emptying 

 into it — so thoroughly as to admit of no incursion of the larger predaceous 

 fishes, such as the Kingfish and Tailor, while at the same time allowing free 

 entry to the Mullet fry, and permitting no outlet to the marketable fish. 



This primitive method having been proved to be a profitable speculation it 

 would need but little commercial enterprise to advance and enlarge the 

 industry by enclosing suitable localities by a boundary wall, leaving a few 

 well protected gates to admit of the ingress and egress of the tides, and being 

 as copiously as circumstances would allow supplied with fresh water. The 

 enclosed space should of course be of considerable extent, and the bed 

 should consist of sand and mud, in order to satisfy the requirements of the 

 contained Mullet as to nutrition and reproduction. To farms, such as are 

 briefly sketched out here, the fry, when roaming in schools along the fore- 

 shores, as is their habit, might with ease be transt'ered in almost illimitable 

 numbers, and being there freed, so far as is possible, from their natural 

 enemies, being supplied without cost with an abundance of their natural 

 food, and being practically undisturbed by any disquieting influences, their 

 growth would be materially accelerated, and their condition proportionately 

 improved. With a few such establishments in working order in the Port 

 Jackson District, and with the unlimited range of choice, which even the 

 close neighborhood of Sydney affords, dozens of such establishments might 

 with ease be formed, and a great and profitable canning industry might with 

 but little effort be built up in our midst ; nor should we ever again hear 

 of the " boat loads of the finest fish thrown away, because they were not 

 worth the trouble of conveying to market " as mentioned by Macleay ; in 

 addition to this would be the advantages that the local market or individual 

 dealers could be supplied from the farms with so many fish as would be 

 requisite for the day's consumption and no more, and that these would be 

 delivered to the customer in a fresh and cleanly state ; furthermore the 



