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THE HERRING AND ITS ALLIES. 389 
in Milford, Conn., captured in 1870, 8,800,000; in 1871, 8,000,000; in 
1872, 10,000,000 ; in 1873, 12,000,000. In 1877 three sloops from New 
London seined 13,000,000, In 1877, anunprofitable year, the Pemaquid Oil 
Company took 20,000,000, and the town of Booth Bay alone 50,000,000. 
There is no evidence whatever of any decrease in their numbers, though 
there can be in the nature of the case absolutely no data for comparison 
of theirabundance in successive years. Since spawning Menhaden are 
never taken in the nets, no one can reasonably predict a decrease in the 
future. 
The nature of their food has been closely investigated. Hundreds of 
specimens have been dissected, and every stomach examined by me has 
been found full of dark greenish or brownish mud or silt, such as occurs 
near the mouths of rivers and on the bottoms of still bays and estuaries. 
When this mud is allowed to stand for a time in clear water, this becomes 
slightly tinged with green, indicating the presence of chlorophyl, perhaps 
derived from the algee, so common on muddy bottoms. In addition to 
particles of fine mud the microscope reveals a few common forms of 
diatoms. 
There are no teeth in the mouth of the Menhaden, their place being 
supplied by about fifteen hundred thread-like bristles, from one-third to 
three-quarters of an inch long, which are attached to the gill-arches, and 
may be so adjusted as to form a very effective strainer. The stomach is 
globular, pear-shaped, with thick, muscular walls, resembling the gizzard 
of a fowl, while the length of the coiled intestine is five or six times that 
of the body of the fish. The plain inference from these facts, taken in 
connection with what is known of the habits of the Menhaden, seems to 
be that their food consists in large part of the sediment, containing much 
organic matter, which gathers upon the bottoms of still, protected bays, 
and also of the vegetation that grows in such localities. They also, as 
was demonstrated by Mr. Rathbun in 1880, feed very extensively upon the 
minute crustaceans, Copepoda, &c., which are found in great quantities 
swimming near the surface in the summer months all along our coast. 
Their rapid increase in size and fatness, which commences as soon as 
they approach our shores, indicates that they find an abundant supply of 
some kind of food. The oil manufacturers report that in the spring a bar- 
rel of fish often yields less than three quarts of oil, while late in the fall 
it is not uncommon to obtain five or six gallons. 
