210 INVESTIGATIONS IN MORAY FRITH, 1897. 



Nothing in the foregoing facts is inconsistent with a sound 

 condition of the area of the Moray Frith (closed and open) as 

 regards food-fishes. The}^ are in unison with what has been 

 found in the other areas, and if they demonstrate anything 

 more than another it is that the interference of man, specially 

 by closure, is powerless to increase the food-fishes of the sea, or 

 by eager fishing to reduce them to vanishing point. 



A careful consideration of the returns both of liners and 

 trawlers in connection with the Moray Frith shows that there 

 are no satisfactory grounds for the closure of " spawning areas," 

 any more than for the closure of the inshore limit of three 

 miles, for the purpose of increasing the fish-supply of the 

 country. For eleven years closure of part of the area, and for 

 five years closure of the entire area, has been in force, with the 

 result that, allowing for the usual variations, the fishes in the 

 area and its neighbourhood as a whole, are very much what 

 they were at the beginning. Scientific evidence as to the 

 serious diminution of any species is wanting. On the contrary, 

 there is proof of the abundance of all the important forms over 

 a wide area, including not only the closed region, but the 

 waters beyond. Temporary reduction, local or otherwise, has 

 always occurred, but, sooner or later, the nomad food-fishes 

 again assert themselves, and continue from generation to 

 generation of men a never-failing supply. 



It cannot be said, however, that complete satisfaction has 

 been felt with the work as carried out by the " Garland," and if 

 other means for observation had not been constantly at hand, 

 the same confidence would not have been felt in coming to a 

 decision on a question so important. The investigations of 

 1884, those of the commercial ships before the closure of the 

 Frith, those during its closure, and those made in April, 1898, 

 outside the Frith, together with the work of the " Garland " and 

 other observations, give a body of facts which are reliable. 



