REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 155 
SPECIAL OBSERVATIONS AND EXPERIMENTS. 
The Cod (Gadus morrhua). 
Tn the last annual report an account was given of the efforts that 
had been made to increase the supply of cod on the southern New Eng- 
land coast and of the success with which this experiment had been 
attended. The evidence since obtained in regard to this matter is even 
more gratifying, and the expediency of continuing the propagation of 
this species upon as large a scale as possible can no longer be denied. 
In fact, the observations which are being made from year to year upon 
the habits of marine fishes tend to prove that they are nearly all much 
more susceptible to human influences than has generally been supposed, 
and we feel justified in predicting for this branch of fish-culture a more 
brilliant future than has usually been accorded to it. 
The number of cod fry planted in the Vineyard Sound region prior to 
July 1, 1889, was about 38,000,000, to which may now be added 5,500,000 
for the season of 1889-90, and 36,200,000 for the season of 1890-91, mak- 
ing a total of over 80,000,000 down to the close of the last fiscal year. 
For the details of the hatching work reference should be made to the 
fish-cultural report of the Woods Holl Station, but it is interesting to 
note in this connection that the 36,200,000 embryos deposited in 1890-91 
were obtained from the eggs of 587 fish, caught chiefly on Nantucket 
Shoals, although a few were taken off Marthas Vineyard and No Mans 
Land. The season during which ripe eggs were secured lasted from 
November 17, 1890, to February 7, 1891, each fish yielding from 11,000 to 
238,000 eggs at a stripping, but some of the fish were handled more than 
once. The period of incubation ranged from 216 to 762 hours, according 
to the temperature of the water, which varied from 32° to 49° F. 
The observations of Mr. V. N. Edwards during the past two years have 
shown not only that the young cod have continued to be abundant at 
the proper seasons, but also that the larger fish enter the inner waters 
in considerable numbers. In the autumn of 1889 cod of two sizes were 
plentiful; the smaller, measuring 12 to 154 inches long, were consid- 
ered to be yearlings, while the others, from 18 to 22 inches long, were 
supposed to be 2-year-olds. Fish 14 years old, captured in the spring, 
measured 15 inches. The 2-year-old cod were abundant all along the 
Massachusetts coast south of Cape Cod, and off Block Island, during 
the fall of 1889, and over 1,000 individuals of this age were secured by 
the schooner Grace during one day’s fishing. They were also taken by 
the tautog fishermen in Vineyard Sound and Buzzards Bay, and 16 
were captured in a fyke net which had been set in the Great Harbor of 
Woods Holl for twenty years, the first time that any of this size have 
been known to occur in these waters. 
