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SOME ODD NOTES ON YAEMOUTH FISHES. 

 By Arthur H. Patterson. 



During the past thirty years the fishes of this district have 

 afforded me much interest — in adding species hitherto un- 

 recorded as local, and in noting the changes which have taken 

 place as to numbers and movements. Some that were marked 

 as rare on the Pagets' list (' Sketch of the Natural History of 

 Yarmouth,' 1834) I have found to be exceedingly common, and 

 others that were numerous in the earlier half of last century 

 have become otherwise. I have been led to believe that most 

 species are migratorial in habit — that some are fairly regular in 

 coming and going, in their proper season, and that, like birds, 

 which under certain conditions are spasmodic in their move- 

 ments, many fishes fluctuate in numbers from year to year : 

 they may be scarce one year, abundant another, or may come 

 regularly for a time, and then absent themselves for long periods. 

 What accounts for such capricious movements is not always 

 discoverable, and it is certainly less easy to suggest reasons, as 

 one may do sometimes in cases of bird fluctuations. 



In our own immediate neighbourhood the Mackerel presents 

 a striking instance. When I was a lad the Mackerel fishery 

 was, and had been for years, an institution ; May and June saw 

 remunerative catches landed on the beach, the then market for 

 their landing and dispersal. Then for years the spring fishery 

 was practically a failure ; and still later on they appeared in 

 the autumn in company with the Herrings, so much so on 

 occasion as to tempt owners to change the Herring-nets for the 

 larger meshed Mackerel-nets. In recent years they have come 

 again in some numbers in spring. No reason, so far as I can 

 gather, is assigned for this, save mere caprice, which must 

 certainly be a most unsatisfactory one ; personally, I believe the 

 movements of Herring-syle have to do with this phenomenon. 



During the past fifty years considerable changes have taken 

 place on Breydon ; parts of it that, when I was a lad, were under 

 water at low tide are now bare at half-ebb — indeed, for hours 

 at a time the flats are dry : where the Zostera was flourishing, 

 the mud is now hard, and those on the lowest level — bare of 



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