188 MARKETABLE BRITISH MARINE FISHES 



The Smelt. (Osvu'n/s Epcrlanns). 



Characters. Body elongated, cleft of mouth 

 deep, the upper jaw reaching back to the hinder edge of the eve. 

 Enlarged fang-like teeth, as well as smaller ones on the palate 

 and tongue, ordinary teeth in the jaws. Scales of moderate 

 size. The tail fin forked. Colour of a light olive-green on the 

 back, silvcn- with iridescent colours on the sides and belly. 

 Along each side there is a specially distinct broad silvery 

 band, brighter than the rest of the side. Rarely exceeds 

 12 inches in length. 



Habitat. Mouths of rivers in Northern Europe and North 

 America. I ts southern limit appears to be the Seine, where it ascends 

 as high as Rouen. It is found in the Thames and Medway, but 

 not on the south-west coast, e.g. Plymouth, where a fish belong- 

 ing to a different family is called the smelt. This is the sand 

 smelt or atherine, which has a close resemblance to the smelt in 

 external appearance. In the rivers of the east coast of England 

 the true smelt is plentiful, and regularly captured for the market. 

 It is found in the Forth and the Tay, the rivers entering the 

 Solway, the Dee, and the Mersey, but is not known to occur in 

 the rivers of Ireland. 



Food. It feeds on small fish and Crustacea. 



Breeding. It spawns in March, April, and May, ascending to 

 near the limit of the rise of the tide, where the water is fresh or 

 very nearly so. In the Forth it spawns annually just below 

 Stirling, where I have taken the eggs and fertilised them artifici- 

 ally. More recently the development of the eggs and the history 

 of the young have been carefully studied by Ehrenbaum, a 

 German naturalist, in the Elbe below Hamburg. 



The egg is heavy and adhesive, but it is attached to the stones 

 of the bottom, or to wharves and piles in the water, in a manner 

 different to that found in the case of the herring (Fig. 44, p. 93). 

 The egg membrane in the ripe egg consists of two layers, and 

 when the egg is shed by the female fish the outer layer bursts 

 at one point and separates, remaining however connected with 

 the inner layer over one circular patch, in the centre of which 

 is the minute opening by which the sperm of the milt makes its 

 entrance into the egg. The loose outer membrane is stick}- when 



