— 32 — 



The Moray Firth line-fishing stations show us a maximum of Small Haddock in 

 autumn, and the accompanying curve (fig. 40) indicates that that maximum is attained a 

 little earlier at Cromarty than on the deeper waters of the Banff" fishing grounds. In the 

 Moray Firth the catch of Small Haddock increased in a marked degree between the years 

 of 1904 and 1906. 



We may briefly summarise the evidence of our statistics for Small Haddock by 

 saying that they are especially abundant off the East Coast of Scotland in autumn, and 

 from autumn to early winter in Shetland and on the north-western grounds. In the 

 deeper waters of the North Sea they are most abundant in mid-winter in the regions 

 between our East Coast and the Fisher Bank, while in the more northern regions their 

 maximum abundance occurs in the months of spring (see Chart, PI. II). 



1901 



1902 



190^ 



1905 



Fig. 41. Small Haddock. Percentages. Area XXIII 



Area XXIX 



At Faeroe we have evidence of a double maximum in spring and autumn. 



Fig. 41 is a curve of a different kind, showing the Percentage of Small Haddock to 

 the total catch of all sizes of that fish at various seasons in areas XXIII and XXIX. It 

 will be seen that the small fish are proportionately most numerous in spring, and least 

 so in autumn, the latter season corresponding with the influx of the shoal of Large Had-' 

 dock. Towards the end of 1904, while Small Haddock were not abnormally scarce, the 

 large fish were unusually numerous. The chief interest of these diagrams lies in the close 

 correspondence between the curves for the two large areas off the East Coast of Scot- 

 land, indicating a great uniformity in the distribution of the various sizes of the fish. 



In Table IV are shown the average annual catches of Haddock in the various 

 Scottish fishery districts during the twenty years from 1886 to 1905, the ports of 

 Aberdeen, Montrose and Leith being the only ones where the trawling catch forms an 



