104 SUNSHINE AND SPORT IN 



per cent, of those caught in 1906 exceeded that 

 weight, and a little over six per cent, were less than 

 the half of it. The heaviest scaled 165 Ibs., the 

 lightest, taken by myself, weighed but 18 Ibs. 



As regards the tarpon's greatest length, I 

 imagine that a fish of 7 feet is near the maximum. 

 The length does not bear a constant relation to the 

 weight, a matter probably of condition. One of my 

 own fish, weighing 1 17 Ibs., measures 6 feet 2 inches, 

 and a second, weighing 140 Ibs., is only two inches 

 longer. These two specimens represent the two 

 distinct types of tarpon met with in the Pass, a lean, 

 racy type and a deep, heavy type. I do not intend 

 to suggest by "type" that these in any way 

 correspond with those local races of herring with 

 which Heincke and other authorities have made us 

 familiar by their researches in the Baltic and North 

 Sea. 



Of the natural food of the tarpon next to nothing 

 is known. Even our Cornish Fishermen at home, 

 to many of whom hook-and-line fishing for mackerel 

 is a means of livelihood for months together, know 

 quite well that those fish take a strip of mackerel- 

 skin towed behind a sailing boat, but know 

 absolutely nothing of their natural taste for cope- 

 poda and weed-spores. Those who catch tarpon 

 for sport instead of gain are content with the same 

 ignorance. They know that the fish will take six 

 inches of mullet dangling from a hook. A few of 

 them occasionally try to substitute a garfish or 

 some other bait, but without, as a rule, much 

 success. Of the tarpon's natural food, however, 

 they know nothing and inquire nothing. It must 

 be confessed that the excitement of the sport is 



