INVESTIGATIONS IN ST ANDREWS BAY, 1892. 119 



independent of their actual condition in the area. The weather, 

 mode of working, state of the tide, time of day or other cause 

 may have intervened. Moreover, it is sufficient to note that 

 three winter months, viz., February, November and December, 

 are included. Such results as the foregoing, along with those 

 obtained in the Forth could have formed no reliable basis for 

 further closures. They therefore were probably made on other 

 grounds. 



The diminution alluded to in 1891 continued to mark the 

 captures in 1892, during which 40 hauls of the trawl were made 

 in eight months of the year, viz., February, March, April, May, 

 June, October, November and December. These hauls pro- 

 duced 2,680 saleable and 2,277 unsaleable, the average of 

 saleable fishes being 67 per haul, and of unsaleable oQ. This 

 result, therefore, falls far short of what was found at the 

 commencement of the operations in 1886, indeed, only a 

 little more than half the number of saleable fishes, and 13 

 fewer unsaleable per haul were procured. On every station 

 there was a reduction on the numbers of the previous year — 

 which was also noted for its scanty captures. Moreover, 

 on every station except one the average was less than in 

 1886, the exception being Station II. — where there were 4 

 more. 



A new Station (VI.) was established in connection with the 

 bay — in a line running obliquely in a north-easterly direction 

 — from the Carr Rock to a point a little south of the Bell 

 Rock. Four hauls of the trawl were made on this unenclosed 

 area, viz., in April, October, November and December, the 

 average catch of saleable and unsaleable fishes being 133 ; a 

 comparatively moderate number. 



In reviewing the kinds of fishes, the reporter in the Blue- 

 book for the year points out the decrease in the flat fishes, but 

 shows that the numbers of the cod and the whiting are greater 

 than in 1891, but the numbers of the cod are trifling, viz., in 

 1891 — 20 cod, and in 1892 — 45 ; if we consider that no less 

 than 44 hauls of the trawl were made, a far larger number, viz., 

 80, having been caught by a single " shot " of a fishing-boat in 

 the bay. In the same way the whitings had increased from 114 



