106 The Food of the Salmon. 



Mr. Tarrell writes as follows — " That tlie salmon is a 

 voracious feeder may be safely inferred from the degree of per- 

 fection in the arrangement of the teeth, and from its known 

 habits, as well as from the well-known habits of the species 

 most closely allied to it ; yet of the many observers who have 

 examined the stomach of the salmon to ascertain the exact 

 nature of that food which must constitute their principal 

 support, few have been able to satisfy themselves. "* Faber 

 says that " the common salmon feeds on small fishes, and 

 various small marine animals." Dr. Fleming, as quoted by 

 Tarrell, remarks that their favourite food in the sea is the sand 

 eel, and Tarrell says he has himself taken the remains of sand- 

 launce from the stomach. That herrings enter largely into the 

 list of the food of the salmon while in the sea, I can state 

 from personal observation. The salmon in whose stomachs I 

 frequently found one, two, three, or even four herrings together, 

 were from the coast of Norway. Some of the herrings were 

 nine or ten inches long. I never found any other fish in their 

 stomachs, nor, indeed, any other kind of food. This, however, 

 will do no more than prove that salmon feed greedily enough 

 on herrings, and not that other fish do not form part of their 

 diet. There is an abundance of herrings off the coast of 

 Norway, and probably they were more readily captured by the 

 salmon than other fish, during the months of May, June, and 

 July, at which time I made my examinations. 



With respect to the river or fresh- water salmon, I never 

 detected the smallest trace of food of any sort either in the 

 stomach or intestines ; and Mr. Bowring, a most respect- 

 able fishmonger at Wellington, obligingly examined for me 

 a great number of stomachs. We neither of us ever found 

 any food in them, nothing but a thick white or yellow mucus 

 with the gritty particles already noticed, and some intes- 

 tinal worms, amongst which tape-worms were the most 

 common. But it is asserted by many that the idea of a 

 salmon abstaining from food the whole time the fish is an 

 occupant of fresh water, is a physiological heresy; that so 

 active a fish must eat in order to maintain itself and supply 

 muscular force ; and that the very fact that salmon are taken 

 with minnow, worm, or fly, is a convincing proof that they 

 do feed in fresh water; that the vacuous condition of the 

 stomach is readily accounted for by the well-known habit this 

 fish has, in common with many others, of emptying its 

 stomach when hooked or netted, by an instinctive act of fear, 

 or to facilitate its escape by lightening its load. That the 

 salmon does occasionally throw up the contents of its stomach 

 is probable enough, and has indeed been witnessed. " I was 



* See " British Fishes," ii. p.^52.1 



