166 



MUSEUM OF ANIMATED NATURE. 



[Sprat. 



Te«eb are fitted out at a coat of about 1000/. each. 

 Each of them is fumuhed with from one hundred 

 and eighty to two hundred nets, which cost 

 between 300/. and 400/. ; and with six ropes, each 

 one hundred and twenty fathoms in length, 

 weighing separately from four to four and a 

 hah luindredweight, and of the total value of 

 50/. or GO/. These nets and ropes retjuire to be 

 renewed nearly every fourth year, owmg to the 

 destructive eti'ects of the sea and the ravages of 

 dog-Bsh, which, in preying upon the herrings when 

 they are inclosed within the nets, injure tne nets 

 themselves. 



A» illustrations of the above account, we refer 

 to the following figures : Fig. 24G0. the Beach at 

 Yarmouth: fishermen going out : Fig. 2467, the 

 Yarmouth Jetty; herring-boats returned: Fig. 2468, 

 Yarmouth Beach-cart for carrying the produce of the 

 fishins-boats to the town. Extensive fisheries are 

 carried on along the coast of Scotland. 



We may here observe that a second species of 

 herring (Leach's herring, Clupea Leachii, Yarrell) 

 visits our coast in autumn : it is of superior quality. 

 This species deposits its spawn in February, and is 

 perhaps the first of the three kinds said to visit the 

 Baltic ; these are the strombling or small spring 

 herring, which spawns when the ice begins to melt, 

 a larger summer herring, and lastly the autumn 

 herring, which makes its appearance towards the 

 middle of September. The length of Leach's 

 herring is only seven and a half inches, it is how- 

 ever deeper than the common herring in proportion 

 to its length. 



Fig. 2469, Cornish Fisherwomen from the neigh- 

 bourhood of Mount's Bay. 



These women wait the return of vessels engaged 

 m the fishery of herrings, pilchards, mackerel, &c. ; 

 with these they fill their willow ' cauwals ' or deep 

 baskets, which they carry on their backs to different 

 towns near the coast, in order to dispose of the 

 contents. 



2470.— The Spbat 



(Clupea Sprattus). Garvie Herring in Scotland. 



For a long period this fish was regarded by 

 naturalists as the young of the herring or the 

 pilchard, but the specific difference is now well 

 established, and a momentary glance is sufficient to 

 enable the observer to detect the sprat among the 

 young of the pilchard or herring of its own dimen- 

 sions. In the sprat the line or ridge of the abdomen 

 is strongly serrated, so that by the feel alone the dis- 

 tinction may be appreciated. 



Like the herring, the sprat moves in vast shoals, 

 which in summer frequent the deep water, advanc- 

 ing towards the close of autumn towards the shore ; 

 they then enter bays, and advance up rivers, in 

 numbers incalculable. Early in the month of 

 November the fishing season commences, and con- 

 tinues during the winter; and not only are the 

 London and other markets supplied by bushels, but 

 tons are used as manure, for the wheat lands and 

 hop-grounds of our south-western counties ; and if 

 judicious regulations were adopted, the demand for 

 this purpose might benefit the fishermen without a 

 decrease of the quantity sent into the markets for 

 consumption. 



In Sir Humphry Davy's ' Elements of Agricultural 

 Chemistry,' a work with which it is to be regretted 

 farmers are so seldom acquainted, the following 

 account is given of the use of fish as a manure : — 

 "Fish," observes this eminent chemist, "forms a 

 powerful manure, in whatever state it is applied ; 

 but it cannot be ploughed in too fresh, though the 

 quantity should be limited. Mr. Young records an 

 experiment, in which herrings spread over a field, 

 and ploughed in for wheat, produced so rank a crop 

 that it was entirely laid before harvest. The refuse 

 pilchards in Cornwall are used throughout the 

 county as a manure with excellent effects. They 

 arc usually mixed with sand or soil, and sometimes 

 with sea-weed, to prevent them from raising too 

 luxuriant a crop. The effects are perceived for several 

 years. In the fens of Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire, 

 and Norfolk, the little fish called sticklebacks are 

 caught in the shallow waters in such quantities, that 

 they form a great article of manure in the land 

 bordering on the fens. It is easv to explain the 

 operation of fish as a manure. The skin is princi- 

 pally gelatine, which, from its slight state of cohesion, 

 IS readily soluble in water ; fat or oil is always found 

 in fishes, either under the skin or in some of the 

 viscera, and their fibrous matter contains all the 

 essential elements of vegetable substances. Amongst 

 oily substances blubber has been employed as 

 manure. It is most useful when mixed with clay, 

 sand, or any common soil, so as to expose a large 

 surface to the air, the oxygen of which produces 

 soluble matter from it. Lord Somerville used 

 blubber with great success at his farm in Surrey. 

 It was made into a heap with soil, and retained its 

 power of fertilizing for several successive years. 

 The carbon and hydrogen abounding in oily sub- 



stances fully account for their effects, and their 

 durability is easily explained from the gradual 

 manner in which they change by the action of air 

 and water."' The quantity of sprats used as manure 

 now amounts, it is believed, to many thousand tons 

 each year. The price varies from tcnpence to 

 one shilling and three pence, and sometimes has 

 been as high as one shilling and sixpence per 

 bushel : in 1829 large quantities were purchased at 

 sixpence per bushel. About forty bushels per acre 

 is the quantity usually applied. Barge loads, con- 

 taining one thousand five hundred bushels, were sent 

 up the Med way to Maidstone in 1829, and the hop- 

 grounds were abundantly manured; and so near 

 London as Dartfoi-d the farmers enrich the land 

 with this species of manure. 



The fishing season commences, as we have said, in 

 November, and the foggy and gloomy nights which 

 prevail at that period are considered most favourable 

 to the fishermen. The finest fish are caught in the 

 same manner as mackerel; but the largest quantities 

 are taken by the stow-boats, manned with five or six 

 men. Mr. Yarrell (p. 123, vol. ii. ' British Fishes ') 

 gives the following description of this mode : — "The 

 stow-boat net goes with two horizontal beams : the 

 lower one, twenty-two feet long, is suspended a fathom 

 above the ground ; the upper one, a foot shorter in 

 length, is suspended about six fathoms above the 

 lower one. "To these two beams, or 'balks,' as 

 they are called, a large bag-net is fixed, towards the 

 end of which, called the hose, the mesh is fine 

 enough to stop very small fry. The mouth of the 

 net, twenty-two feet wide and thirty-six feet high, 

 is kept square by hanging it to a cable and heavy 

 anchor at the four ends of the beams. The net is 

 set under the boat's bottom : and a rope from each 

 end of the upper beam brought up under each bow 

 of the boat, raises and sustains the beam, and keeps 

 the mouth of the net always open, and so moored 

 that the tide carries everything into it. A strong 

 rope, which runs through an iron ring at the middle 

 of the upper beam, and is made fast to the middle 

 of the lower beam, brings both beams together 

 parallel, thus closing the mouth of the net when it 

 IS required to be raised." The meshes of the net 

 are so small, that a pen could scarcely be inserted in 

 them, and nothing but water will pass through. 

 Hence the destruction of small fry is immense, and 

 it is alleged that the scarcity of turbots, brills, soles, 

 and other fish in those parts of the coast where they 

 were once abundant is occasioned by the stow-boats. 

 Some of the fishermen state that about twenty 

 years ago large quantities of soles and a few tur- 

 bots were caught off the coast of Kent without 

 difficulty, but that these fish have now become 

 scarce, and the fishermen are not in consequence 

 so well off. 



A committee of the House of Commons on (he 

 British Channel Fisheries, which sat in 1833, made 

 the following observations on this point, and re- 

 commended some interference: — "'This branch of 

 fishing (it is observed in the Report) has greatly 

 increased, and there are at present from lour hun- 

 dred to five hundred boats engaged in stow-boating 

 on the Kentish coast only, which remain upon the 

 fishing-grounds frequently for a week together, not 

 for the purpose of catching sprats, or any other fish 

 to be sold as food in the market, but until they have 

 obtained full cargoes of dead fish for the purpose of 

 manuring the land. Now from the veiy destructive 

 nature of this fishery, its being of modern introduc- 

 tion, and considering also the almost boundless ex- 

 tent to which a demand for its produce may be car- 

 lied, if the system be permitted to continue without 

 restriction, your committee have been incUned to 

 question whether its further prosecution ought not 

 to be entirely prevented ; but upon the best consi- 

 deration which they have been able to give to the 

 subject, they recommend that at least it should not 

 be permitted to be carried on with ground or drag 

 nets, between the 1st of April and the last day of 

 November in every year ; nor with drift or floating 

 nets in the bay during the breeding season, namely, 

 from the 1st day of May to the last day of August, 

 within a league of the low-water mark, or in less than 

 ten fathoms' water ; nor at any other time with nets 

 of so small a mesh as is now generally used." None 

 of these recommendations have yet been adopted. 



The sprat is most abundant on the coasts of Nor- 

 folk, Suffolk, Essex, and Kent ; but like the herring 

 this fish is capricious in its movements. About 

 fifty years since vast shoals made their appearance 

 off the coast of Devon, which is now regularly vi- 

 sited. In Scotland the sprat is comparatively rare, 

 and is sold in Edinburgh market by the dozen. In 

 Cornwall, the true sprat is seldom seen, but the name 

 is appropriated to the fry of the herring and pilchard ; 

 and per contra on the eastern coast of England, 

 where the true pilchard is rare, the term pilchard 

 is given to the fry of the shad, and the half-grown 

 herring. 



The sprat is occasionally taken on the coasts of 

 Cork, Dublin, and Belfast. 



Those who Jive in or near London, and those who 

 have passed a winter in London, well know the 

 abundance of the sprat in the markets. Bushels 

 are seen from day to day in the fishmongers' shops, 

 and bushels are cried about the streets; London and 

 its suburbs are deluged with sprats, sold, not by the 

 dozen, but by rough measurement, at a cheap rate. 

 Nor is their consumption confined to the humbler 

 classes ; though rich and oily, the sprat is an exeel- 

 lent fish, and a dish, hot from the gridiron, finds'fai 

 vour even with the wealthy. 



From its small size, a full-grown sprat measuring 

 only about six inches, this fish is never cured like 

 the herring, and is alwavs sold fresh. 



The upper parts of the back are of a dark blue 

 with green rene](ions, passing into silvery white on 

 the sides. 



Fig. 2471 represents a Sprat-boat fishing off Pur- 

 fleet in the Thames. 



2472.— Thb TwAm Shad 



(Alosajinia). In the genus Alosa there is a deep 

 notch in the centre of the upper jaw. 



Two species ,pf shad inhabit our seas, the Allice 

 shad (Alosa communis), and the present, both sea 

 fishes which enter high up our rivers to deposit 

 their spawn ; the latter being abundant in the Severn, 

 but little known elsewhere. 



The twaite shad, which is the Clupea Alosa of Lin- 

 naeus, differs from the allice shad, with which many 

 have confounded it, in being of much smaller size, 

 averaging from twelve to sixteen inches in length, 

 in having a lateral row of spots, in possessing teeth 

 while the allice shad is toothless, and in the last fin 

 below being comparatively smaller. The twaite 

 shad moreover is much more widely distributed. 

 It is common in the Thames, where it advances as 

 high as Greenwich, but formerly it was abundant in 

 the Thames at Millbank above Putney Bridge. It 

 visits the Severn, and is occasionally taken off the 

 coast of Norfolk. Northwards its range is very ex- 

 tensive ; Professors Nilsson and Reinhaidt enume- 

 rate it among the fishes of Scandinavia. 



It is in the month of May that this fish works its 

 way up our rivers, and those of the adjacent conti- 

 nent, in order to deposit its spawn, which accom- 

 plished, it returns to the sea towards the end of 

 July. In the Thames it is caught in considerable 

 abundance, but the fishing is not allowed after the 

 30th of June, in order that the survivors may not be 

 interrupted in the great purpose for which they 

 visit the river. The flesh, however, of the twaite 

 shad is very inferior to that of the allice, being dry 

 and full of bones. 



The young both of the twaite and allice appear 

 to grow very slowly. With respect to the former, 

 Mr. Y^arrell says, " I have obtained the young only 

 two inches and a half long in October ; " and he adds 

 that in the following spring he found them only four 

 inches long, and the young of the larger allice shad 

 (which when adult )s from two to three feet in 

 length) only six inches. 



The food of the shad consists of small fishes and 

 various kinds of Crustacea, as shrimps, &c. 



The twaite shad has the line of the abdomen 

 strongly serrated ; the top of the head and back is 

 dusky blue with brown and green reflexions; the 

 sides are silvery white, with a coppery tinge, and a 

 row of six or more dark spots from the edge of the 

 gill-orifice to the tail. The mucous vessels on the 

 surface of the gill-covers are beautifully arbores- 

 cent. 



2473. — The Anchovy 



(Engraulis encrasicolus). Clupea encrasicolus, 

 Linn. ; Engraulis vulgaris, Cuv. 



In the ^enus Engraulis, the head is pointed, 

 the upper jaw the longest; the mouth deeply di- 

 vided, the gape extending backwards beyond the 

 line of the eyes. Branchial apertures large, the 

 ventral fins somewhat anterior to the line of the 

 commencement of the dorsal. Abdomen smooth. 

 Branchiostegous rays twelve. 



From the earliest times, the anchovy has been 

 celebrated, and a sauce or condiment prepared 

 from it, called garum or yai>ov, was in high cslima- 

 tion among the Greeks and Romans. 



The anchovy is abundant in the Mediterranean, 

 and along the coasts of Spain, Portugal, and France,> 

 and extends thence northwards, being occasionally 

 found in the Baltic. It occurs also on various parts 

 of our coast, as Hampshire, Cornwall, W'ales, &c. ; 

 and is said to be frequently sold in the Liverpool 

 market. 



In general the anchovy measures from four to 

 five inches in length, but occasionally it is found 

 much larger. Mr. Yarrell quotes a statement of 

 Mr. Couch, who says, " I have seen it in the Cornish 

 seas of the length of seven inches and a half; and I 

 have met with specimens from autumn through 

 winter to the middle of March ; it is therefore pro- 

 bable that a fishery might be established with good 

 prospect of success, for though the nets employed 



