TRANSACTIONS 



OF THE 



Art. 1. On the Food Fishes of jSTova Scotia. By J 

 Bernard Gilpin, A.B., M.D.., M.E.C.S. 



No. III. 

 {Read November Gth, 1865.) 

 The Mackerel. 

 Scomber — Scomber — (Gimther, Catalogue B. Museum.^ 

 Scomber — Vernalis — (Dekay, Storer.) 

 Scomber — Grex — (Mitchell.) 



Dr. Guntlier, from actual comparison of English and American specimens, 

 considers tliem identical. The American authorities consider them different. Dr. 

 Gill, Smithsonian Institute, 1865, gives as typical "finlets, 5 — 6." This is not 

 true as regards any Scomber I have identified in Nova Scotia as Vernalis or Grex, 

 and must refer to some southern species. 



In my two former papers, I liave endeavoured to give to the 

 Society all the facts I could collect, relating to the common Herring 

 and to the Gaspereaux, and their habits. I shall this evening, still 

 following up the subject, read a paper upon the Mackerel. Thus 

 in time we shall have the natural history of all what I may term the 

 Food Fish of Nova Scotia. A true knowledge of the nature, 

 habits, food, spawning time, and localities of our fish, has been a 

 long desideratum in our Province, as the success of our fisheries must 

 be based upon it. 



The description of a fresh Mackerel, bought in the Halifax fish 



market on the 2Tth October, 1865, is as follows : — 



Length 17 inches; girth in front first dorsal 7^ inches, head one- 

 fourth of body to root of tail, diameter of eye five-eighths of an inch, 

 about two diameters from tip of nose. As the fish lies dead, a membrane 

 from the posterior part of the orbit half closes the eye. The lines of the 

 opercle and preopercle are nearly at right angles with the line of body 

 the margins of sub and interopercle like a V, Avith its apex pointing for- 



