SOME FISH-NOTES FROM GREAT YARMOUTH. 19 



sandbanks left dry at low water, and, doubtless, many young 

 ones are produced there annually." 



According to Mr. Donnison's calculations, the Seal practi- 

 cally doubles its numbers in two or three years ; to quote from 

 the 1912 (September) Report : — " It was estimated that over 

 2000 Seals were in the estuary. . . . It was estimated that 

 there would be 100 young Seals in this [Knock Sand] group 

 of about 300." 



In 1911 the numbers were put down at 1000, so that 3000 

 were expected "to rank " in 1913 ; of these, he tells us, £45 has 

 been paid for " noses," at the rate of ten shillings each. Ninety 

 Seals would seem a goodly number recovered ; but when it is 

 known how difficult wounded Seals are to bag, and that a dead 

 Seal almost invariably sinks if slain in the water, the death-rate 

 must have been considerably higher. 



The Report is this year the more interesting, if disappointing, 

 when "opinions" as to their predilections for certain fish, and 

 the destruction they are capable of performing, are given by 

 various fishermen, not one of whom had by dissection examined the 

 contents of their stomachs. Like a perverted Mark Tapley, the 

 average fisherman is only happy when he has something to 

 grumble at; a number of them condemned the Seal as keenest 

 upon prime marketable fish, Soles in particular. My own 

 experience with several Seals I have kept in confinement was 

 that .Flounders (local " Butts ") are their favourite prey ; probably 

 they are easiest to capture ; and when Eels were to be had these 

 were as eagerly devoured, bent double, rounded part foremost. 



Mr. Donnison is rightly making an earnest endeavour to 

 come to a just conclusion upon the Seal's reputed destructive- 

 ness and injury to the fisheries of the Wash, so that we may 

 have further information on the subject. It would be a great 

 pity if this interesting colony should eventually be extirpated ; 

 and a certain amount of cruelty which must follow on the 

 methods used to accomplish at least a reduction in numbers is 

 unpleasant to contemplate. The Eastern Fisheries Committee, 

 I sincerely hope, will not " condemn unheard," but do the right 

 thing between fisherman and beast. A vice-president of the 

 Selborne Society writes me that the matter may be taken into 

 consideration by the Society ; he says : — " I am told that many 



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