114 NATURAL HISTORY. 



males, and the young, on their first return from the sea, advance up the stream earlier than the old 

 Salmon. As time goes on they ascend bsyond the reach of the tide, and shoot up rapids and small 

 cascades, often clearing a height of eight or ten feet at a bound. In Scotland they frequently kill 

 themselves by their violent efforts to ascend streams in which there are natural obstacles. The limit 

 of their perpendicular spring is about twelve or fourteen feet ; hence ladders and staircases have been 

 invented to enable the fish to overcome difficult rapids. When the animal has at last reached the 

 upper and shallow pools of the river, and the spawn is deposited in the gravelly beds, the external 

 appearance undergoes some singular changes, for in the male the lower jaw elongates and curves 

 up over the snout, the skin thickens on the back and fins, the body acquires a golden orange 

 tinge, and orange-coloured stripes appear on the cheeks ; but the females grow darker in colour, 

 and are spoken of as black fish, just as the males are called red fish. When spawning commences, 

 a pair of fish working against the stream are said by some observers to make a furrow in the gravel 

 with their noses, while others say the furrow is made with the tail. The furrow made, the male 

 and female place themselves on each side of it. It is affirmed that they then throw themselves 

 together on their sides, and, rubbing against each other, shed their spawn simultaneously into the 

 furrow. This process is continued for about eight or twelve days, until all the spawn is laid, 

 after which the fish retire to the pools to recruit their exhausted energies. 



After the eggs are deposited they are covered with gravel. Eggs that were observed to be 

 deposited in the Tweed on the 2nd of November were found on the 23rd of March to be 

 hatching ; the fry, however, less than an inch long, were lying embedded in the gravel ; but a week 

 later, Dr. Knox found that most of the young had escaped from the gravel where the eggs had lain 

 for twenty -one weeks. Eggs laid in the autumn are generally hatched in ninety days. 



The time required to hatch the Salmon is governed chiefly by the temperature of the 

 water. The earliest experiments in hatching the fish artificially were made by Mr. Shaw, who 

 records that the young are at first nearly transparent, with a continuous fin i-ound the hinder part of 

 the body, and with the yelk-bag of a bright red colour contrasting with the pale blue or peach- 

 blossom tint of the body. His specimens measured, when hatched, five-eighths of an inch in length. 

 When the yelk-bag has been absorbed the perpendicular lateral bars on the sides of the body make 

 their appearance, and the fins have become thoroughly formed. 



The fry of the Salmon, an inch long, have the head and eyes large, and the body of a pale-brown 

 colour, with dusky grey bands across the sides. A portion of the ovum still hangs below the 

 abdomen. The young Salmon of the first year has been called a pink ; in the second year, until it 

 goes down to the sea, it is a smolt ; in the autumn of the second year it is a salmon peal or grilse. 

 The young fish live on insects. Yarrell records that pinks from the river Lune were put into a small 

 lake called Lillymere when three inches and a half long. After sixteen months they had become 

 salmon peal fourteen inches long, and weighing fourteen ounces. Nearly a year later the length had 

 increased by two inches, and the weight by nine ounces. Smolts are about six inches and a half 

 long, and have the upper half of the body blue. The fish goes to sea in its migratory dress. 



After going down to the sea the fish grow rapidly, and are always much lai-ger than those which 

 have been kept in ponds or lakes. They travel down the river in family shoals of forty, sixty, or 

 more, moving at the rate of about two miles an hour. When the young reach any rapid current they 

 at once turn their heads up the stream, till at last one or two bold ones allow themselves to be carried 

 over the rapid, when the entire flock follow one by one, and keep their heads up stream till they reach 

 comparatively still water, when the head is once more turned to the sea, and the journey continued. 

 The migration, according to Mr. John Shaw, continues during nearly the whole of a month. The 

 travelling fish were six to seven inches long, and the shoals were largest and most numerous in the 

 second week of the month. They begin to descend the rivers in March, and the descent continues 

 through April, and part of May. They at first keep towards the sides of the river, but as strength 

 is gained take to the mid stream. On meeting the tide the shoals rest for a day or two till 

 accustomed to the brackish water, and then start off suddenly to the sea. Fishes which have been 

 marked, and have gone down in April, or the beginning of May, return by the end of June, weighing 

 from two to three pounds or more, and in July and August the weight varies from two to six pounds. 

 These fish breed in the winter, though the eggs, in a grilse, are about as large as those of a full-grown 



