48 SALMONID^ OF BRITAIN. 



If we now almost entirely restrict ourselves to tlie recorded instances respecting 

 hybridization among tbe Salmonidss in Great Britain, we find some of our earliest 

 ichthyologists, down to those of the present day, have observed upon their occnr- 

 rence, while fish-cnlturists have conclusively shown its possibility by artificial 

 breeding, from which fertile or sterile offspring have resulted. And further on I 

 shall adduce successful instances of intercrossings, in addition to those here noted, 

 which were effected by Sir James Maitland, at Howietoun, between the salmon 

 and trout, trout and char, and how the offspring were prolific* 



the California trout, Salmo irideus. Mr. G. Berney, writing from Morton Hall, Norfolk, on 

 April 28, 1883, to the committee of the Great International Fisheries Exhibition, remarked as 

 follows: "Baron Clock informed me that he had a few fish, a cross between the golden tench, 

 Tinea vulgaris, var.,andthe common carp, Ci/pi'Mis coiyio. He clearly did not wish to give me any 

 of them, and I had no desire to introduce a mongrel fish." Pennant, in the last century, alluded 

 to hybrids between the carp and tench, and also to having heard of some between the carp and 

 the bream. They have also been observed between the roach, Leuciscus nUilus, and the bream, 

 Abramis brama : between the rudd, X. cn/fArop/rt/iaJmiis, and the bream : and between the chub, 

 L. ceplialus, and the bleak, Albumus lucidiis; while Pritchard remarked that " Defay mentioned 

 a hybrid between a barbel (Barbtis) and a carp (Garpio)." 



Crosses have likewise been obtained from between turbot and brill, plaice and flounders, but 

 it is among the carps that probably the most hybrids, bred in a wild state, have been observed. 

 Hessel stated that he placed a female of the common carp with a male crucian carp, Carassius 

 vulgaris, also a female crucian carp with a male of the common carp, and a female Cyprinus 

 kollarii (a cross between the common and crucian carps) with a male of the common carp. In 

 the two first instances the young became identical with G. kollarii, some approaching more 

 towards one parent and some towards the other, while in the last experiment the offspring was 

 with difficulty to be distinguished from the genuine carp. The roach has been observed inter- 

 breeding with rudd, and also with the chub. 



* WOloughby (1686) remarked that he was persuaded that the salmon and the various forms 

 of trout interbreed : and many authors in this country have erroneously asserted that par were 

 hybrids, until the question was set at rest by the fish-culturists. Mr. Shaw, on April 26, 1841, 

 informed Mr. Scope that his " experiments with the ova of the common trout and salmon had 

 been quite successful, and that the hybrids had hatched, and were in good health. Again, in October, 

 he observed that they were aU in a very healthy state, the cross not having in the sUghtest degree 

 affected their constitutions. Those produced between the salmon and the salmon trout appeared 

 to partake more of the external markings, silvery coating, and elegance of form of the par than 

 any of the others. Those produced between the salmon and the common trout, and between the 

 common trout and the salmon trout, had in every respect more the appearance of the common 

 trout than the former." " In the Dunrobin Museum is a large series of stretched skins of trout 

 collected by the late Mr. Young of Invershin, which are called crosses between sea and river fish 

 as labels on the fish or notes respecting them do not exist." (J. Harvie Brown, MSS.) These 

 probably refer to Mr. Young's preparations of the skins of the salmon he alluded to in his work 

 as remarked upon by Ephemera, in Bell's Life of December 11th, 1853. 



Edmund Thomas Ashworth (Propagation of the Salmon, 1853, page 19), observed that " the ova 

 of trout fecundated by the milt of the salmon, by the care of MM. Berthot and Detzem, and 

 forwarded from the banks of the Ehine, were hatched in their laboratory. Also ova of salmon 

 fecundated by the milt of trout gave the same results. Davy (1858) remarked that " it had been 

 ascertained that the ova of the salmon can be impregnated with the milt of the common trout," 

 and, subsequently, that " Mr. Beynolds mixed together the roe of the lake trout and the fluid 

 milt of the char, which he placed in his breeding boxes in November. In seventy days some of 

 the ova were hatched ; the young fish had a hybrid character, the fish themselves having much 

 the appearance of the char of the same age." I received from Howietoun (January, 1885), three 

 figures of hybrid Salmonidte taken in colours from fish in spirit in the " College of France " at 

 Paris. The label asserts "these were from Professor Coste's fish-house, 1866-67. The water 

 became bad when they were about eighteen'months old and killed them. They had milt and roe." 

 They seem to be of two sorts — trout and salmon, and American char and trout. 



Dr. Gunther (1866), while he admitted that from the time of Willoughby till now the existence 

 of hybrid Salmonida had been believed in, continued, " yet no instance had been clearly made 

 out until we were enabled, through the liberality of the Eev. Augustus Morgan, to convince 

 ourselves of the existence of a hybrid between the sewin, Salmo cambricus, and the river trout, 

 S. fario." In 1872 he observed, " I am not quite sure but that milt and ova might be found in a 

 hybrid ; it has been found in pars, and my theory is that where this is so the fish is the produce 

 of a hen salmon and a male river trout. This hybrid would come to maturity sooner than a 

 pure-bred salmon, and thus give the appearance of roe or milt being found in a par." Professor 

 Easch in 1867 instituted experiments in order to practically test the question of hybrids among 

 the Salmonidse ; he found that the ova of the sea and river trout were developed regularly, which- 

 ever form were the parent one, and that the offspring were fertile. That of the ova of the char, 

 fertilized by the milt of the trout, 30 to 40 per cent, were developed, but many young fish 

 perished after being hatched. Trout ova, fertilized by the milt of the char, only gave 10 per cent, 

 of young, many of which were miB-shapen. Salmon ova, fertilized with trout milt, yielded 



