water in the neighbourhood of and beyond the Atlantic Slope to the west of Iceland — 

 Faeroes and West Europe out to about 5000 meters. 



Whilst it is a considerable advantage on the one hand, that the Investigations have 

 been made always by the same vessel, in the same manner and with the same apparatus 

 over the whole region, it must on the other hand be admitted, that every part of the 

 region with the species occurring therein have by no means been equally thoroughly and 

 regularly investigated. That this has not been the case is due firstly to the great extent 

 of the region; from north to south alone it extends ca. 1500 miles. Other considerations 

 also had to be reckoned with. Thus, the "Thor" had numerous other demands upon 

 its services in addition to the investigations on the pelagic fry of the gadoids. It was 

 therefore only within relatively short periods that these investigations were permitted to be 

 the main research; often they had to be discontinued for a shorter or longer time on ac- 

 count of other investigations, for which definite routes were laid down, and the collections 

 have therefore in many cases a somewhat casual appearance as if taken at haphazard. 

 The waters best investigated were those round Iceland, especially in the year 1904, when 

 3 — 4 voyages were made round the island at the time of year when the young pelagic stages 

 of the gadoids occur. The waters round the Faeroes may likewise be said to have been 

 rather well investigated. Further to the south, that is west of the British Isles and in the 

 Bay of Biscay the investigations except in the deeper waters were much more fragmentary, 

 as the main research there was for the larvae of the eels fLeptocephali) which 

 occur in deep water beyond the 1000-meter line, whereas the pelagic fry of most of 

 the gadoids belong to shallower waters. In these southern regions we had relatively far 

 more hauls in deep water than at Iceland or the Faeroes, whilst but few investigations 

 were made in shallow water. One exception was however the region to the north 

 of Scotland, which we often passed through on the way to Iceland and thus had good 

 opportunities to investigate; another was the district round the south-west corner of 

 Ireland where numerous observations were also made, mainly as a result of the bad 

 weather in May and June 1906 which prevented the "Thor" from continuing its search 

 for the eel larvae in the deep water S. W. of Ireland. We then had a long involuntary 

 stay at Valencia Harbour in Dingle Bay, which was for the most part utilized to make a 

 thorough investigation of the coastal waters. We were also greatly favoured there by the 

 authorities granting us permission to use our fishing apparatus for young fishes within the 

 territorial limits, and our careful investigation of the conditions at that place was very 

 successful, which indeed had no small importance for the whole of this work. A third 

 region where we had the opportunity to make careful investigations in shallow water in 

 these southern parts was the Channel. Numerous hauls were made there, especially in 

 April 1906 when the "Thor" was passing through the Channel, and these have given a 

 good picture of the conditions there as regards the pelagic fry of the gadoids. Further, 

 the director of the Marine Laboratory at Plymouth, Dr. E. J. Allen, has on various 

 occasions sent me for examination small collections of gadoids both pelagic and bottom 

 stages, so that the results for the Channel have been rather successful. 



The "Thor" has not been in the Irish Sea and but little in the coastal waters on the 

 south of Ireland. Some few samples from these waters, taken by the Irish research-steamer 

 "Helga", have however been kindly sent me for examination by the director of the Irish 

 investigations, Mr. E. W. L. Holt. 



