FISH-NOTES FROM GREAT YARMOUTH. 3 



unequalled in the memory of the oldest men. . . . Now comes 

 a strange feature : Have you ever known two seasons in 

 succession where so few females are carrying eggs ? . . . I have 

 no doubt the enormous number of small Whitings, and, worse 

 still, Whiting Pouts [Bibs] , have had a great effect. With 

 regard to Whiting Pout (Gadus luscus), they have abounded to 

 an extent never before known here. They have come up the 

 Colne into shallow brackish water, and I think they have been 

 the greatest cannibals as regards Shrimps." 



Inspector Donnison in his ' Eeport ' characterized the catch 

 of Brown Shrimps (Crangon vulgaris) as a failure : "At Harwich 

 the season was the worst on record." The Inspector says : "At 

 Lowestoft and Yarmouth the men were at sea day after day, and 

 got practically nothing." The same applied to the Wash fishery. 

 His opinion was that the enormous numbers of Whitings, and 

 to a less extent small Codlings, which for months " infested " 

 the inshore grounds, were mainly responsible. 



When chatting with some shrimper friends on this subject, 

 they anathematized the hordes of young Whitings (that ran from 

 three to four inches early in the season) " which ate up all the 

 young Shrimps." One man in April, dredging from the Jetty 

 to the Britannia Pier, off Yarmouth (less than half a mile), filled 

 no less than two " maunds " (bushel-sized baskets) with these 

 annoying, because useless, fish. When off Winterton early in 

 June, he dropped his net and towed it for fifty yards ; on hauling 

 it in he found a mere handful of Common Shrimps, and two 

 pecks of Whitings, five inches in length ! 



The men have altogether been hard hit, for when conditions 

 were becoming somewhat more favourable and visitors (their 

 best customers) were; beginning to troop into the town, the devil 

 of pride and avarice entered into the Kaiser, and war broke out, 

 an immediate stampede depleted the lodging-houses, and the 

 " season " came to an abrupt end. 



On January 23rd I was discussing some Periwinkles, when I 

 discovered one with a white pearly line following the whorls of 

 the shell round and round. 



By the merest accident I observed, on January 26th, on a 

 fish-slab upon a heap of others, what I, at the moment, thought 

 was a Flounder. A second glance assured me that the fish, its 



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