130 



MINUTES OF EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE THE 



17 2[arch 1904.] 



Mr. Garstang. 



[Co-?! t inued. 



Lord Tweedmouth — continued. 



"U'ay, and might lead up in the future (after this 

 complete knowledge had been acquired which I 

 liave been recommending in the first place) to a 

 real International regulation of the Avhole 

 thing. 



2305. Then would this be your idea ; That let 

 lis say a limit of 12 inches should be fixed for 

 hrill and turbot and a limit of 10 inches for soles 

 ^nd plaice, and that this limit should be imposed 

 only on fish which were to be landed in steam 

 trawlers and steam carriers ? — Although as I say 

 I was informed that evidence or particiilar size 

 limits was not required by this Committee ; yet, 

 I think I would be prepared to support a measure 

 specifying those limits, but I would restrict it a 

 little more and allow it to operate only for 

 •certain months of the year — those months of the 

 year when, as those statistics that I have handed 

 in show, the steam trawlers are fishing on the 

 Horn Reef grounds. 



2306. April, May, June, and July ? — Yes, those 

 four months; and although my impression is 

 that an 11 inch limit would be distinctly better 

 than a 10 mch limit, yet as a 10 inch limit is 

 already in force in Denmark, I think, on the 

 whole, those limits that you have mentioned 

 "would have my approval ; but I say that in a 

 few mor€( months I should have been able to 

 answer that question with far more definiteness 

 .than at the present time. 



2307. Mr. Holt propounded what to me, at 

 any rate, was a new theory, the idea that there 

 were two races of plaice in the North Sea. Have 

 you anything to say as to that ? — That is a point 

 I wanted to draw attention to, but I did not 

 come to it. The fact is that we have already a 

 ;good deal of evidence which tends to show that 

 .the plaice in the greater part of the North Sea, 

 where the steam trawlers fish, are apparently of 

 a different race from the fish in the southern 

 area. The fish in the southern area appear to 

 'be much more closely related to the fish in the 

 •Channel, and the limit appears to be from the 

 Humber over to the Dutch coast ; in fact, it is 

 just the limit south of which the smacks fish. 1 

 think, although our results are not final yet, 

 there is a good deal of evidence that this northern 

 area, where the steam trawlers fish, is inhabited 

 by a larger race of plaice maturing at a different 

 size from those in the southern area, which I 

 kkelieve is inhabited by a smaller race of plaice. 

 It so happens that the two races correspond with 

 the areas occupied by the smacks and steam 

 trawlers respectively. 



2308. Small plaice mature at 9 to 10 inches 

 and the others at 13 to 14 ? — The limits are 

 higher ; the larger plaice mature more at ] 5 to 

 16 inches, even 17 inches, and in the southern 

 area more like 11 or 12 inches. We are not pre- 

 pared at the present time to state what is the 

 ..exact average spawning size for those respective 

 groups of plaice. 



2309. ^Yould you imagine that the smaller 

 plaice of ten or eleven inches was the same age 

 us the plaice of thirteen to fifteen inches, taking 

 the two times of maturity? — I am not prepared 

 on that point to give evidence now ; we are care- 

 fully directing our attention to that point, and I 

 have a preliminary report from one of my 

 assistants upon it, but the investigations have 



Lord Tweedmouth — continued. 



not gone suflaciently far to enable us to reply 

 directly. 



2310. It would throw a good deal light on the 

 question of migration if it were shown that there 

 were two distinct races of plaice ? — Yes, and even 

 these migration returns tend to confirm the idea. 

 I have already shown that the plaice tend to 

 migrate in a circle within this southern area, and 

 that relatively very few get out of the area at all. 

 Only about three or four of these fishes out of 

 the whole thousand marked have migrated to the 

 north-west, and only one has migrated to the 

 east ; that is to say, they seem to tend to circu- 

 late within this area. 



2311. But I suppose you would be of opinion 

 that there should be but one size for all ports ? — 

 No, I cannot quite see that it is possible under 

 those circumstances to fix the same size. 



2312. I was going on to ask you, do you think 

 that ten inches would be a fair limit to put sup- 

 posing the existence of two races was established 

 to cover both races ? — I am afraid it would bear 

 very severely on the smack industry, on the 

 fisheries in this southern area. The sizes of 

 plaice in that area ate distinctly smaller than the 

 sizes of plaice in the northern grounds, and what 

 would interfere relatively little with the steam 

 trawlers would interfere very seriously with the 

 smacks. In this southern area if I take now 

 the average catches per hour of our vessel, the 

 " Huxley," over the four quarters of the year, I 

 find that on the Doggerbank we get from 

 January to March an average of from six to ten 

 or even more plaice per hour above 12 inches, 

 and a similar abundance or scarcely less from 

 April to June ; the figures are 9 per hour. Again 

 from July to September we get 15 per hour, 

 and then in the December quarter 26 per hour ; 

 so that in the northern area the abundance is 

 never or very rarely less that 10 large plaice per 

 hour, that is plaice above 12 inches. In the 

 southern area, which is fished over by the 

 Lowestoft boats, there is not a single record, if I 

 remember rightly, in which the catch per hour of 

 plaice of 12 inches and upwards exceeds eight 

 per hour. There is one record of 8 per hour in 

 the October to December quarter. The others 

 were only three and four per hour and so on ; 

 whereas the abundance of small plaice in the 

 southern area is very much greater than it is in 

 the central grounds of the northern area. 



2313. Still, apart from you as a biologist, as a 



Practical man you see a great difficulty in fixing 

 liferent sizes for different ports ? — I thought it 

 was the very idea of this particular Bill. 



2314. I am not speaking of the Bill ; I mean 

 as a question of practical politics that it would 

 be a difficult thing to say at Hull the limit 

 should be 12 inches and at Lowestoft it should 

 be 10 inches ; or say 10 inches at Hull and 8 

 inches at Lowestoft ? — My proposal was that the 

 limit should be 10 inches for plaice. 



2315. My question was whether 10 inches 

 would be fair aU round, even if you bear in view 

 the fact that there may be two races of place ? — 

 I thought the suggestion was limited to steam 

 trawlers. 



2316. No, I put it generally. Supposing that 



• any 



