﻿and • that they must be supposed to be far from spawning-time. The 

 14 columns are arranged geographically from the Skaw, into the seas, 

 as far as the Baltic (Rytzebsek and Stevns). In column 2 — 4 only fish 

 larger than the statutory size limit (8 Danish inches to the base of the 

 caudal fin, or e. 9 3 /i inches to the tip of the caudal fin) have been ex- 

 amined; in column 7 almost exclusively fish below this limit. . 

 The .table shows: 



1) That »ripe«, i. e. spawning, fish are found everywhere, but only 

 in very small numbers at the Skaw. — Nor were they very common 

 in La3S0-Rende, but at Anholt, Grenaa, the Lesser Belt (Dyreborg, Mtb, 

 and Skjoldnses) as also south of Sealand they were frequently met with. 

 These latter places are all situated on rather open shores and near 

 deep water, none of them in fjords or low archipelagoes. (Comp. for 



. instance the Chart of the Depths in »'Hauchs' Togter. Atlas «). 



2) The smallest ripe spawner is 7 inches long, the largest ripe spawner 

 nay indeed, the largest plaice in the table, is 22% inches. The 

 smallest ripe milter is also 7 inches, but the largest ripe milter, 

 and on the whole the largest milter, is only 18% inches. To know 

 these extremities is however not of so great interest, as it is to know 

 the average size of the plaice the first time they become ripe and, on 

 the whole, the average size in the various seas of the mature (grown-up) 

 fishes, i. e. those more than three 3 r ears old*). 



Also on these matters the table gives some information. I should wish this 

 to be somewhat more complete, but so much is sure, that the mature (grown- 

 up) plaice in the Baltic seems to have an average size of about 10 inches 

 (not regarding the fact that the milters, on an average, are a little smaller 

 than the spawners), in the Lesser Belt about 11 inches, and in the Cattegat, 

 especially in the eastern part, 12 — 13 inches at least. On an average, then, 

 they are larger in the northern and eastern parts of the Cattegat than in 

 the Belts, and here again larger than in the eastern Baltic Sea. That the 

 maximum sizes in the latter seas never reach those of the Cattegat is easily 

 seen in the table; it is also evident that small, ripe fish, under 

 11 inches, are far more rare in the eastern Cattegat than in the Baltic; 

 both these circumstances support the above observation on the average size 

 — as, indeed, they ought to do. As to this matter I shall here say, that 

 it is possible, certainly, through a sufficient number of observations to get a 

 somewhat correct idea of the average size, but this is far more difficult to 



*) Marked 3 in the table. 



