248 FISH CULTUKE. 



Worked in such places, the small trawls destroy the 

 fry of all the fish that inhahit our coasts to an extent 

 which cannot be calculated, and, if it could, would he 

 so incredible that few would be found who would 

 believe it. But to give a slight notion of what can 

 be done, I may state that from the small poke-net of 

 a common shrimper on the Sussex coast I have seen, 

 at almost every emptying of the net, as many as from 

 ten or a dozen to forty or fifty of the fry of soles, 

 turbot, plaice, or flounders, of from an inch and a half 

 to two inches in length. There would be, perhaps, a 

 score of these nets at work within sight at the same 

 time, and at the lowest computation they would be 

 emptied two score of times a day. Some of them 

 gather their shrimps while standing in the water, and 

 allow the rubbish and fry to fall back into it ; but 

 many more empty their nets on the shore, and cast 

 the fry on the beach. 



It is not easy to compute the mischief which 

 even these fishers in a small way do. But the 

 smaU-meshed trawl-nets are wholesale destroyers, 

 and should not be allowed to be worked under a set 

 depth of water ; as they cannot save the fry, which 

 are smothered in the mass of weed which the net 

 collects, while the good fish they take are incon- 

 siderable, and the prawns, for which they are chiefly 



