230 DISTINCT RACES OF HERRINGS. [CHAP. vi. 



figures of the animal takes of many years, that the herring 

 .exists in distinct races, which arrive at maturity month after 

 month ; and it is well known that the herrings taken at Wick 

 in July are quite different from those caught at Dunbar in 

 August or September : indeed I would go further and say that 

 even at Wick each month has its changing shoal, and that as 

 one race ripens for capture another disappears, having fulfilled 

 its mission of procreation. It is certain that the herrings of 

 these different seasons vary considerably in size and appear- 

 ance ; and it is very well known that the herrings of different 

 localities are marked by distinctive features. Thus, the 

 well-known Lochfyne herring is essentially different in its 

 flavour from that of the Firth of Forth, and those taken in 

 the Firth of Forth differ again in many particulars from those 

 caught off Yarmouth. 



In fact, the herring never ventures far from the shore where 

 it is taken, and its condition, when it is caught, is just an 

 index of the feeding it has enjoyed in its particular locality. 

 The superiority in flavour of the herring taken in our great 

 land-locked salt-water lochs is undoubted. Whether or not it 

 results from the depth and body of water, from more plentiful 

 marine vegetation, or from the greater variety of land food 

 likely to be washed into these inland seas, has not yet been 

 determined ; but it is certain that the herrings of our western 

 sea-lochs are infinitely superior to those captured in the more 

 open sea. It is natural that the animals of one feeding locality 

 should differ from those of another : land animals, it is well 

 known, are easily affected by change of food and place ; and 

 fish, I have no doubt, are governed by the same laws. But on 

 this part of the herring question I need scarcely waste any 

 argument, as there is but one writer who still persists in the 

 old " theory" of migration. He is the same gentleman who 

 has doubts about a grilse becoming a salmon ! 



Moreover, it is now known, from the inquiries of the late 



