48 SPAWNING GROUNDS. 



with a stick might kill them with the greatest ease ; 

 and yet, when disturbed in their operations of spawn- 

 ing, they can only be driven away for a few minutes 

 when they will return to the same gravel bed to com- 

 plete their work. It may be readily conceived to be 

 of the utmost importance that these fish should not 

 be disturbed, chased away, or killed, as the ova de- 

 posed by them in SHALLOW streams we find to be 

 the most productive, and the young fish the best pro- 

 tected from the depredations of other larger ones until 

 they are about six months old. 



Any one who has ever seen an annual migration 

 of thousands of smolts to the sea, and who then con- 

 siders how comparatively few of these ever return as 

 full-grown salmon, must riot be surprised at this when 

 we know that they become the food of other fish at 

 every stage of their existence, both in the sea and 

 river. 



Constantly pursuing a perilous, vagabond life, an- 

 nually travelling from the sea to the sources of river* 

 elevated hundreds of feet, in order to get to their 

 natural breeding-ground, they come in contact with 

 every imaginable enemy, difficulty, and obstruction, 

 of which I shall speak hereafter. 



Facts have proved that the largest fish are caught 

 in the largest rivers, yet salmon resort to very small 

 ones the Furbagh river, in Galway, is only a few 

 feet in width, and has a Queen's gap of three feet 

 wide through its weir, yet with a lake near to the 

 river's source, it is frequented by salmon. 



The larger the volume of water, the larger are the 

 pools and the shelter and sustenance to large fish, and 

 they therefore probably live to a greater age than they 

 otherwise would in a smaller stream. There are ex- 

 ceptions however to this rule. I am acquainted with 

 a river, from thirty to forty miles in length, in which 

 the fish do not average more than 6 Ibs. in weight, 



