54 Soles, Food and Breeding. 



numbers each of these months, more particularly during the 

 fast few mild winters. 



The above catches with the shrimpers have chiefly been 

 made in the daylight ; but it is well known that the older soles 

 are greatly night feeders, hence, those who go fish-trawling 

 often take advantage of the darkness, remaining out over 

 night on purpose. (See Fish Trawling, Sect. VI.) 



The food of the sole in our waters is not so easily identified 

 as in the case of plaice, dabs and flounders. This is, perhaps, 

 due to their being dainty feeders, at least the young ; the 

 material swallowed, as a rule, is tender and quickly digested. 

 Hence we have found often only a mass of straw-coloured or 

 brownish gelatinous substance, which under the microscope 

 showed no tissue structure, or occasionally was indefinitely 

 cellular. In other examples sandy matter was added, or 

 remnants of worms, minute crustaceans (shrimps and others), 

 but onlv rarely shelly remnants. Evidently Nereis and Sabella 

 ("Ross") and Terebella are the choice worms. Elsewhere, in 

 biggish soles, observers have met with sand and brittle stars, 

 sea anemones, razor- and other shell- fish, with sand-eels to boot. 



Mr. Robert Johnson, senr., a trustworthy observer, is inclined 



to the opinion one held by others of the Leigh fishermen that 



soles breed within the Thames Estuary itself, and likewise in 



the Crouch river upwards towards Burnham. He further 



believes that the larger-sized fish, of which mention has been 



made above, are the parents of the aforesaid brood. According 



to him, the spawning ground of the sole in the Thames proper 



I would therefore be in the neighbourhood of the Oaze Deep. He 



i thinks that in the Crouch river spawning takes place from the 



river's mouth as far up as Burnham, and even beyond. He 



; bases his reasoning on the circumstance that on many occasions 



he has found full-roed soles in the places stated, particularly 



during the months of May and June. Among his experiences, 



whereof some 20 years were spent fishing in the localities 



aboTe-mentioned, he states that ordinary sole fishing would last a 



