IMPOVERISHMENT OF THE GROUNDS 267 



the classification, and the fishing capacity of fishing 

 vessels, and of the total quantities of fish landed, 

 are so imperfect that all deductions made from 

 them are more or less uncertain. Then the area 

 over which fishing is carried on has changed so 

 much that this introduces a further element of 

 uncertainty.^ It may be said, too, that it is an 

 imaginary vessel which makes the decreasing 

 average catch. But Garstang ^ gives also the actual 

 catches made by four Grimsby trawling smacks 

 from 1875 to 1892, and in each of these cases the 

 annual catch has decreased, with but few fluctuations, 

 during the period under consideration. 



It has been contended, however, by the Inspec- 

 tors of Fisheries ^ that the above treatment of the 

 problem involves a fallacy. " A knowledge merely 

 of the total quantity of fish landed is not sufficient 

 to enable us to arrive at any trustworthy conclusion 

 regarding the condition of the fisheries. On the 

 other hand, care must be taken to avoid the 

 opposite error of thinking that the fisheries are 

 becoming depleted if the increase in the quantity 

 of fish landed does not keep pace with the powers 

 of capture ; . . . for unless the supply of fish in the 



^ If the area widens it is an indication, however, of impoverishment, 

 for it means that the older fishing area is becoming unprofitable ; 

 else trawlers would not expend time and stores in going farther to 



catch fish. 



2 Journ. Mar. Biol. Association, vol. vi. No. i, p. 65, 1900. 



^ Fifteenth Annual Report, Inspectors of Fisheries (England and 

 Wales), for 1900, p. 5. 



