PEESENT CONDITION OF THE FISHERIES. 45 



Mr. Andrews. There lias been more bait passing this island this 

 year than for a long time. 



Mr. Burgess. The menhaden come in the spring, and then again in 

 June, and pass by and go into deeper water, where it is cooler, and 

 come back in the fall. 



Mr. Fhinney. There have been more mackerel here this year than last. 

 There has been only one net for them. This was a special net, smaller than 

 the blue-fish net. There have been more schools in the bay this year 

 than last — large mackerel, that would be called large " threes." They, 

 were spawning when they went through. We never catch any small 

 mackerel in nets. Cod-fish are ardund here in the spring and fall. The}" 

 are gone now. They spawn here in the fall. We find spawn in them 

 in October and November — very full ; never, or very seldom, in the 

 spring. 



Mr. Holmes had fished for cod on the Banks, and had found spawn 

 in them in July there: sometimes got a bucketful, in latitude 45°. 

 They do not appear to have any spawn in June, and we catch only a 

 few female fish that have spawn in them. The Bank cod are a differ- 

 ent kind from the shore cod. No shore cod are found with spawn iu 

 them except in the fall. I have seen a cod that weighed one hundred 

 pounds — more than five feet long. 



Mr. Burgess. We once caught, on the Georges, 1,100 fish in one day, 

 and they made 110 quintals of dried fish. 



Mr. Andrew thought cod as plenty as they had been. The shore 

 fish bring about twice as much as those from the Banks. Take them 

 right through, and they will not weigh four pounds each. We have a 

 very large school here in the winter that will not average more than a 

 pound and a half apiece. 



Pollock are very plenty here, but they do not bring much. They come 

 from the last of April to the first of June. They have no spawn in 

 them then. 1 do not know when they spawn. 



Haddock spawn from the last of October to December. 



Halibut are not caught much about here. 

 . Squids are plenty ; they are not used. 



Dog-fish are caught; many use them. They are not around here 

 much at this time of the } T ear. 



Mr. Burgess. The blue-fish were later than usual this year ; I think 

 two weeks later. 



Mr. Snow. We caught the first blue-fish the 30th day of May. 



July 19. 



Samuel H. Winslow, in 1870, June 17 % went up about Tnckernuck 

 and caught 130 blue-fish ; on the 18th of June eight nets were set there ;-on 

 the 22d he went there fishing again, and got only one fish. The nets, 

 iu his opinion, had driven them away, (to the devil, he said.) He thought 

 the nets were driving the fish from the island. 



George Winslow. Ten or fifteen years ago we could catch as many 

 scup as we wanted anywhere around in our harbor. They were around 

 the wharves ; they are a salt-water fish altogether. Now we can catch 

 scarcely, any ; it would not pay to go after them. It was so with bass. 

 Ten or fifteen years ago we could go out here and load a boat with bass 

 in a short time, weighing fifteen or twenty pounds. They commenced 

 seining ; and now it is very rare to catch bass. Bass and scup are pretty 

 much used up ; and the blue-fish are going out at about the same rate ; 

 they are driving them away as fast as they can. I have caught 140 bar- 



