THE HABITS OF THE SALMON. ii 



be necessary to identify them in the tideways 

 and estuaries year after year, by catching and 

 marking them in considerable numbers ; but the 

 mere capture of one or two fish in that way would 

 not be sufficient to show that the general habit of 

 early ascending salmon is to return to the salt water 

 unspawned. Where there is such a large body of 

 water as flows in the Tay, it is not an uncommon 

 occurrence for the fish that have taken up their 

 quarters in shallow pools, or in places where they could 

 not live when the water is high, to be carried down 

 stream in a flood to more suitable quarters below. 

 Not many years ago a big flood swept away a great 

 number of fish from the middle waters of the Tay to 

 the deep and comparatively still haunts below Delvine, 

 and several hundred of them were caught at one 

 station in that locality, and none below it, although 

 the nets were at work all the way down to the tide- 

 way. Were it not for these circumstances the cap- 

 ture in question might be considered as showing that 

 the fish were on their downward journey to the 

 sea ; but that would be an incorrect view of the case. 



