DEGENERATION OF OUR DEEP SEA FISHERIES. 



45 



while it lasts, but the mischief which it does indirectly is even 

 more formidable. 



While some of the crustaceans live at the bottom, and are food 

 for ground fish, others, such as the sessile - eyed, and some of the 

 stalk -eyed crustaceans, come to the surface during a certain 

 stage of their development, and, if spared, return again to the 

 bottom to complete their growth. Whilst at the surface, however, 

 they constitute the food of the migratory fish which periodically 

 visit our coasts in search of them ; and the more abundant this 

 class of food, the greater are the numbers in which their pursuers 

 assemble to feast on them. The produce, then, of our mackerel, 

 pilchard, and herring fisheries, is at the mercy of the trawl ; for if 

 these creatures are destroyed at the bottom of the sea before they 

 are hatched, they are prevented from appearing at the surface in 

 quantities sufiicient to attract large shoals of the migratory fish, 

 which consequently desert our waters for more prolific localities. 



The following table, kindly furnished to the lecturer by Mr. 

 Prank Buckland, and selected expressly for the present paper from 

 an immense number of similar results collected by him with great 

 care and assiduity, will serve to show the enormous loss occasioned 

 by the destruction of ova as they lie deposited in the sand. 



Results of Mu. Fkank 



Buckland's Observations on 



THE Number 



OF 



Eggs in various 



Fish. 





Name of Fish. 



Weight of Fish. 



Weight of Roe. 



No. of Eggs. 



Salmon 



1211)S. 





10,000 



Trout 



lib. 





1,008 



Carp 



14 i lbs. 





633,350 



Perch 



3 lbs. 2 oz. 



8^ oz. 



155,620 



... 



lib. 



20,592 



Jack 



28 lbs. 





292,320 



... 



4i lbs. 





42,840 



Roach 



lib. 





480,480 



Conger eel . 



28 lbs. 



23 oz. 



15,191,040 



Cod 





7 lbs. 



6,867,840 



Cod 



20 ibs. 





4,872,000 



Smelt 



2oz. 





36,652 



Lump-fish 



2 lbs. 





116,640 



Brill 



4 lbs. 





239,775 



Solo _ ... 



1 lb. 





134,466 



TI erring 



^Ib. 





19,840 



Mackerel 



lib. 





86,120 



Turbot 



8 n)s. 





386,200 



,, ... 



23 lbs. 



5 lbs. 9 oz. 



14,311,200 



Lamprey 



2i lbs. 





136,800 



Plaice 



4 lbs. 15 oz. 





144,600 



