Grey Mullet, Distribution ; Baas. 119 



some half-dozen small craft regularly use seines for fishing both 

 for mullet and bass. They are periodically netted at Dover 

 and neighbourhood, and thence regularly forwarded to the 

 London market. The fact is the grey mullet is ordinarily a 

 restless, impulsive fish. At times they rove in a scattered few, 

 at other times they are gregarious and very lively. They 

 frequent nearly all the Kent fishing harbours and piers seeking 

 the garbage, and then small and moderate-sized ones are taken 

 by rod and hand-line ; at Margate jetty, in 1880, an Italian even 

 speared them while devouring mussels on the piles. But the 

 big mullet seem to prefer grubbing among the muddy, weedy 

 creeks and shallows of the estuaries, where they feed on the 

 tiny Crustacea and mollusks found on the Zoster a marina, &c. 

 Thus the whitebaiters secure a few occasionally in their drag- 

 nets, while only by chance an odd one is taken in the trawl. 



The Stour (Kent), Medway, Thames and Black water are all 

 noted haunts. Near Havengore and thereabouts in the old 

 times a nice lot would now and again be got (Tyrrel). In the 

 Blackwater they often run from 10 to 11 Ib. weight one of the 

 latter was caught in the peter-net August, 1900 a 10 Ib. fish 

 taken 9th July, 1898, measured 2J ft. long (Fitch).* A similar 

 large fish was met with by whitebaiters in the Queenborough 

 Swale in the autumn of 1899, but it leaped the net and was off 

 in a trice. Small ones occasionally are hooked at Southend 

 pier, but some anglers there are apt to mistake young bass for 

 mullet. Although not a rare fish, yet few have been brought 

 to us ; extremes 5 to 10 inches. But around North Kent 

 annually many of the big ones find their way into the amateur's 

 basket. With regard to the grey mullet, rod-and-line fishers 

 admit it is most capricious in taking baited hook, and such is 

 the general experience of Kent and Essex sea-anglers. 



The Sea-Perch Family (Serranidce)^ The BASS or SEA-PERCH 



* In the Essex Nat. II. (1888), p. 'JO, Mr. Fitch states that mullet are diminishing in 

 numbers in the Blackwater. This he attributes to decrease of the Zoster a weed within 

 the last 30 years, and to the eel-trawlers disturbing their feeding haunts. 



t Laver (op. cit.), evidently following Gunther and Day, places the bass under the 

 Fam. Percidce. We prefer Boulenger's grouping of it (2nd. ed. B.M. Cat. of Fish 1. IV.I.YI 

 uuder Sea-Perch, Fam. Scrnmidic, though retaining the old generic and specific 

 names, and uot that of Mot-one labrux. See also Smitfs Scandinavian Fishes I. (1887). 



