70 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



part of the work applies to samples of herrings obtained from 

 the summer fishery round the south end of the Isle of Man, 

 from the winter fishery in Carnarvon and Cardigan Bays, and 

 from the steam trawler fishery off " The Smalls " in St. George's 

 Channel. Over 1,000 herrings have been investigated during 

 the year. 



Mr. Scott reports on samples of sprats and whitebait sent 

 to him from Morecambe Bay and Menai Straits. A very 

 important and lucrative fishery for sprats and whitebait has 

 been in progress at Morecambe for the last two or three winters. 

 The sprats are mostly salted and are sent away in barrels, 

 apparently for the purpose of being made into sardines. The 

 smaller fish (which are both sprats and herrings) are riddled 

 out from the general catch and are packed in boxes and sold 

 as whitebait. The fish are caught both by seine-nets and in 

 the " baulks." There is no sprat fishery of any consequence 

 in the Menai Straits and the whitebait there are taken in the 

 weirs. Sprats also come into the Mersey Estuary in the 

 winter, and a large proportion of them are sexually mature 

 fish. 



Dr. Johnstone has examined all the samples of herring 

 sent to the laboratory, with the object of estimating the 

 variation in the amount of fat contained in the flesh. This 

 rises to over 33 per cent, in the case of the Manx summer- 

 caught fish and sinks to about 5 per cent, in the case of the 

 Welsh winter-caught herrings. The fish that contain most fat 

 are those that have their ovaries or testes ripened just at the 

 time of maximum sea-temperature. The proportion of fat 

 falls off very suddenly just about the time that the fish are 

 spawning. It is well known that fish which are just spent are 

 in the worst condition as regards human food. 



Spawning Period of the Shrimp. 



Mr. T. Monaghan has examined two large samples of 

 shrimps during each month of the year 1914. These shrimps 

 were caught in the Estuary of the Mersey by the New Brighton 



