34 THE LIFE OF THE SALMON 
is, I believe, March 6, 1905, when a 24 Ib. grilse 
was caught at the mouth of the Dee. Willis Bund 
mentions (“Salmon Problems,” p. 87) that on rare 
Occasions grilse appear in the Severn in February. 
Such occurrences are, however, altogether exceptional, 
and fishermen do not look for a regular run of grilse 
till May, while the greatest run is usually con- 
siderably later. The special point of interest seems 
to me to be that the grilse appear, as it were, all at 
once on the coast, so that within, it may be, two 
or three days such a market as Aberdeen may be 
flooded with them, where only very few were before 
to be found. 
The year 1902 was a remarkably good one for 
grilse, and having been favoured with a return of 
the numbers of salmon, grilse, and sea trout caught 
during the season by the Aberdeen Harbour Com- 
missioners, I constructed charts showing graphically 
the relative captures.* From the fixed net fishery 
on the coast north of the mouth of the river Dee the 
first records of grilse were on April 15, but com- 
paratively few were taken between this and the end 
of May and beginning of June. Signs of a great 
run of grilse appear in the chart in the second week 
of June, and on the 28rd of the month there is an 
enormous catch. Good takes last well through July, 
and at the end of July and again from August 10 
to 13 there are two other marked rises in the curve 
representing grilse. These last rises are also notice- 
able because simultaneously occur rises in the salmon 
* Twenty-first Annual Report, Fishery Board for Scotland, 
Part II. Appendix IT. 
