Fishes. 4989 



Of the 300,000 young fish about half still remain undeveloped 

 in the ponds as parrs ; in other words, and in plain language, they 

 have not as yet undergone their last metamorphosis — they have not 

 thrown off their generic characters common to them with all the Sal- 

 monida3 ; they still retain the dentition, red spots and dark spots 

 and parr-markings, which all the Salmonidae, whatever they are after- 

 wards to become, exhibit when young. Amongst these I have been 

 assured may be found the so-called male parr with the milt fully de- 

 veloped, whilst in the female the roe, as usual, is at its minimum, the 

 precise condition we find them in in the rivers themselves. Now 

 what are these fishes ? what will become of them ? will they grow into 

 salmon or remain in the ponds, retaining their generic dress — a dwarf 

 salmon, with the farther anomaly that the male acquires a full-developed 

 milt, the female remaining with an undeveloped roe ? 



In the absence of positive facts required to determine these suffi- 

 ciently important zoological and physiological questions, it may still 

 be remarked that the true age of the May smolt of the rivers has not 

 been determined ; in plain terms, experimenters, without being aware 

 of it, have been simply experimenting on the metamorphosis of the 

 salmon in confined localities ; his natural history in the river is still 

 to be made out. It is no doubt quite possible that, by a physiological 

 law peculiar, or nearly so, to the Salmonidae, a certain amount of the 

 ova of one incubation may become fully-developed smolts in one year, 

 others not until two years have elapsed, and a still larger portion may 

 never proceed beyond their generic state, and, remaining in the rivers, 

 form, together with those whose destiuy is different, that vast assem- 

 blage of small fish known by the name of parr; whilst others of the 

 more favourably disposed in respect of their development may assume 

 the character of May smolts in five or six weeks from the time they 

 leave the gravel. Thus there may exist at one and the same time in 

 a salmon-river young salmon of various ages though of one incubation, 

 together with a certain number which may cease to grow, retaining 

 their generic characters ; but this is mere speculation and must con- 

 tinue to be so until the natural history of the various kinds of salmon 

 be fully investigated. After that will come the consideration of the 

 economical view of this question, which cannot be correctly decided 

 until the natural history difficulties be solved. These difficulties 

 increase instead of diminish by the late experiments at Stormont- 

 field, for I find it asserted that none of the young salmon, in the winter 

 of the year in which they first came through the gravel, had the milt 

 developed, but that those which are now there, this being their second 



