SCIENTIFIC WORK IN THE SEA-FISHERIES. 255 



Heincke states, and the time too short for reliable observations ; 

 and the same may be said of Dr. Fulton's notion that the Plaice 

 go against the current to compensate for the drift of their eggs. 

 On the whole, it is doubtful if more can be proved than that the 

 very young Plaice seek the tidal margin, and, as growth advances, 

 gradually pass to deeper water, and that in this, as in other flat- 

 fishes, considerable distances may be traversed. Their vigour 

 and vitality, in any case, would enable them to sustain a long 

 journey (e.g. to Australia). 



The second head — viz. the rate of growth — has long been 

 studied, and the additional information gained in these investi- 

 gations bears, as in Johansen's observations, more on the pro- 

 portional rate of growth in connection with locality. It was 

 found, for instance, that small Plaice taken from the Horn-reef 

 and liberated on the Dogger-shoal grew about five inches in seven 

 months, the transplanted Plaice thus showing an increase of four 

 times in length and six times in weight over those left on the reef. 

 A. C. Johansen's figures are — young Plaice on beach grew 2-3 cm., 

 those on Horn-reef 4-5 cm. ; those on the Skagerak, 10 cm. The 

 latter is thus even more favourable than the Dogger- shoal. 



It is accordingly suggested by Dr. Garstang that small Plaice 

 should be transplanted from the crowded inshore to the offshore 

 grounds, such as the Dogger. The Danes, indeed, have done so 

 for some years in the Lim Fjord, a sandy, land-locked lagoon 

 formed by the breaking in of the sea about one hundred years 

 ago, the young Plaice thus finding an entrance, growing in the 

 lagoon, and forming a fishery. Their numbers can readily be 

 augmented by artificial transplantation (for the fishermen do so at 

 the rate of about two for a farthing), whilst they are tolerably 

 safe from escape to the sea, which is forty miles distant. This, 

 however, as an acute critic* has already pointed out, is a diffe- 

 rent condition from an open seaboard like our own, where the 

 Plaice are free to pass outwards as they grow older, and best 

 know where to find suitable feeding-grounds. In this connection 

 no difficulty was experienced twelve or thirteen years ago in trans- 

 planting hundreds of Soles from Scarborough to St. Andrews 

 Bay ; but this would be a somewhat expensive method of in- 

 creasing the yield of the sea, even were it necessary. The life- 



* ' Fish Trades Gazette.' 



