252 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



take great care of the undersized shell-fish, because after 

 all these are the hope for the future. The small cockles 

 for instance that pass through the riddle ought not to be 

 left in heaps to shift for themselves. They ought tc be 

 spread out a little and lightly forced back into the sand. 

 If the heaps are simply left untouched they are exposed to 

 the attacks of the gulls, the frost of winter, or the warm 

 sun of the summer, and none of these influences are good 

 for the welfare of a cockle bed. A female cockle begins 

 to produce spat when it is between two and three years of 

 age and it is at this period that it becomes marketable. It 

 therefore follows that if large quantities of cockles which 

 just fail to pass through the legal riddle are taken away 

 between the autumn of one year and the spring of the next, 

 the repopulation of a bed by a fresh supply of young will 

 be greatly retarded. 



The present condition of the cockle industry at Flook- 

 burgh i? unsatisfactory and young cockles are very scarce. 

 One bag of marketable cockles per man each tide is all 

 that is being obtained. The suggestions given by Dr. 

 Jenkins in his Quarterly Reports ending December, 1904 

 and 1905, afford the best solutions to counteract the present 

 decrease in the population of the Flookburgh beds. They 

 are (a) Advice to the fishermen not to sell on commission ; 

 (h) The exemption of gulls from the provision of " The 

 Wild Birds Protection Act." ; (c) Restriction of the use 

 of the " Jumbo " to" a minimum, or even its total abolition. 

 A reduction in the number of gulls could easily be brought 

 about by destroying the eggs in the nesting season. I do 

 not think the total abolition of the " Jumbo " would be 

 regarded as a hardship by the fishermen as some of them 

 that I met at Flookburgh voluntarily suggested it, stating 

 that many cockles brought up to the surface by its use are 

 not marketable. Care should also be taken to spread the 



