200 BRITISH FRESH-WATER FISHES 



Izaak Walton, albeit he knew little or nothing at first hand 

 about the salmon, had been told what modern research has con- 

 firmed, namely, that " his growth is very sudden ; it is said 

 that, after he is got into the sea, he becomes, from a samlet not 

 so big as a gudgeon, to be a salmon in as short a time as a 

 gosling becomes a goose. Much of this has been observed by 

 tying a riband, or some known tape or thread, in the tail of 

 some young salmon which have been taken in weirs as they 

 have swimmed towards the salt water ; and then by taking a 

 part of them again, with the known mark, at the said place, at 

 Rate of their return from the sea, which is usually about six 

 growth of months after." But it is only of late years that 



migratory -' •' 



Saimonoids. trustworthy data have been accumulated whereon any 

 sound estimate could be based as to the rate of growth 

 in salmon and their kin after their first descent to the 

 ocean. These data have been collected and tabulated by Mr. 

 W. L. Calderwood, and published in the Report of the Fishery 

 Board for Scotland, Part II., for 1901, forming a most valuable 

 source of information for all persons interested in the question. 

 Space can be found here only for a brief reference to this paper. 

 The following are a few out of a large number of fish captured 

 as kelts and recaptured as clean fish, recorded — ist, by Mr. 

 Young, of Invershin, in the years 1841-2 ; 2nd, by the late 

 Duke of Atholl, in the Tay, 1854-9 ; 3rd, by the Tweed 

 Commissioners, 1854-70; 4th, by Mr. Walter Archer, 

 Inspector of Salmon-Fisheries in Scotland, under the system 

 initiated by him in 1896, and continued by his successor in 

 office, Mr. Calderwood, from 1898 to the present time ; 5th, 

 by a gentleman on the Hampshire Avon, who has communi- 

 cated his observations to the Field newspaper. 



Mr. Calderwood reports that, at the close of 1901, out 

 of 2,976 fish recently marked in ten Scottish rivers, 190 

 had been retaken and the particulars thereof recorded. 



