LOCAL FISHERY COMMITTEES 69 



chosen by the local councils, and one-half by the 

 central authority. The necessary money is raised by 

 a local rate. A committee may draft byelaws ; but 

 these only become operative if confirmed by the 

 Board. These byelaws differ, according to conditions, 

 in different parts of England. They deal largely with 

 restrictions on trawling. No steam-trawler is allowed 

 to trawl within the three-mile limit around the coast 

 of England ; even the sailing trawler is forbidden. 

 The byelaws also deal with the sizes of the meshes of 

 nets, shrimping, crabbing, etc. 



Neither the central authorities, whose chief function 

 is to administer the law and collect statistics, nor the 

 local committees, whose expenditure is limited to the 

 ' shell-fisheries ' — and, stretch the Act to the breaking 

 point, you still cannot make a flat-fish into a shell- 

 fish — have either the time or the money for scientific 

 experiment. This has to a large extent been left to 

 local or private enterprise, and is mainly confined to 

 three centres — the Northumberland coast, the Lanca- 

 shire and western district, and the Channel and North 

 Sea. The first-named area has recently been supplied 

 by a private benefactor with funds for an efficient 

 laboratory at Cullercoats, from which much useful 

 work may be expected. 



It is difficult to disentangle the Lancashire and 

 Western Sea-fishery Committee from Liverpool Uni- 

 versity on the one hand, and from the Liverpool 

 Marine Biological Committee or Society on the other. 

 The Committee owns a handsome marine station at 

 Port Erin, on the Isle of Man ; here and at the fish- 

 hatchery at Peel, in Cumberland, the largest fish- 

 breeding experiments in England are carried out. 

 In 1904, 5,000,000 young plaice were reared and put 

 into the sea from Port Erin alone. The Committee 

 publishes annual reports and a series of ' Memoirs.' 

 It is probably to this Committee that the University 



