480 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



at Rich's Ford, ho killed four trout with minnow, weighing respectively 

 121bs., lOlbs., 31bs., and lib., and the other day, up at Hunter's, he got nine 

 trout from 21bs. to 7lbs. in weight. But as regards the Water of Leith the 

 case is very different, for year after year the fishing has fallen off, and so 

 have the weight and numbers of trout taken during the fishing or summer 

 season. Running as it does through the city of Dunedin, and fished every 

 day by dozens of anglers, so small a stream possessing such indifferent 

 cover and range of water is bound to suffer, and indeed it is hardly now 

 worth fishing in. It is only during the spawning time that the great trout 

 now appear (as I have already stated) and this winter we took out 

 of it for stripping very fine fish of all weights from 21bs. up to 

 161bs. There is not enough food even including whitebait to main- 

 tain such heavy fish, so they must frequent the tidal and salt water, 

 where the food supply is much more plentiful. That is the only expla- 

 nation I can offer to account for their great weight. Many thousands of 

 young trout are put into the Leith yearly, so the falling off in its produc- 

 tiveness I do not doubt is mainly due to excessive fishing and also poaching 

 during the spawning season, of which latter fact there is no lack of proof. 

 The Upper Taieri River I need hardly almost refer to again, as I have 

 already said that its wonderfully big trout are consequences of great range 

 of water and a fair supply of food. It is a trout stream, however, sure to 

 suffer from the depredations of shags, which are too numerous on the rocks 

 at different points on its banks. The Lee and Deep Streams not having 

 the benefit of fresh shoals of migratory smelts every season, have deterio- 

 rated so as to be very inferior as trout producers to what they were five 

 years ago. For their natural food supply being limited, while anglers and 

 shags have both fished them incessantly, the stock of trout is not equal to 

 the struggle (at present at all events), hence their disappearance to a great 

 extent. Both streams have also been much polluted at times by gold-min- 

 ing, which must destroy the ova as well as fish food. The rate of increase 

 in weight of the trout in the above waters yearly is still greater than in 

 England, but as a whole it is falling off. Mr. F. Francis says that a three- 

 year-old Thames trout will weigh one pound. This must suffice for the 

 present regarding the distribution and growth of trout in the Shag, Water 

 of Leith, Upper Taieri, Lee and Deep Streams, during the past five years 

 as compared with the preceding ten years. 



Growth in other Otago Waters, 1878 to 1883. 

 I must now proceed as shortly as possible to record similar facts about 

 other Otago waters not dealt with in my first paper, and from which we 

 will see how the trout have fared in these since 1878 down to the present 

 year. I shall take the rivers from the north end of the province down to 

 the south end in succession. 



