6-7 EDWARD VII. 



SESSIONAL PAPER No. 22a 



A. 1907 



PEEFATOKY NOTE. 

 By the Director. 



Since tlie issue of the last series of scientific papers from the Marine Biological 

 Station of Canada, (under the title ^ Contributions to 'Canadian Biology, 1901 ') re- 

 searches of a varied and important nature have been continued by the staff of scien- 

 tific investigators who, from season to season, have worked at the station. It is pleas- 

 ing for me to be able to report that many of the ablest Canadian biologists, as well as 

 University assistants, demonstrators, and students qualified to conduct original re- 

 searches, have taken advantage of the facilities provided by the Dominion government ; 

 and the investigations, begun in 1899 at St. Andrews, New Brunswick, have been con- 

 tinued at Canso, N.S. (1901-1902), Malpeque, P.E.I. (1903-1904), and Gaspe, P.Q. 

 (1905). The stay in each locality has been limited to two years, and biennially the 

 station has been towed upon its scow to a new site, thus permitting of the fisheries in 

 an extensive series of areas coming, in succession, under the purview of the scientific 

 staff. Indeed, during the comparatively short career of the institution up to the pre- 

 sent date, all the maritime provinces have been visited, and vital fishery questions in 

 each have been looked into, and important facts ascertained. In each locality where 

 the station has been placed the fish and fisheries characteristic of the district adjacent, 

 have occupied the attention of the staff, but faunistic, botanical, chemical and other 

 studies have been carried on assiduously. A thorough understanding of the conditions 

 essential to the prosperity of any fishing industry is only possible when the various 

 biological and physical features of the coast and the waters concerned have been ascer- 

 tained. The study of the ' environment ' of fish and fisheries is as necessary as the 

 study of the fish themselves and their habits, or of the practical methods of exploiting 

 fishery resources. Hence the completion of exhaustive reports upon fisheries in all their 

 aspects, practical, commercial and scientific, is possibly only after continued work for 

 many years. Hasty publication often implies immature results, and doubtful conclu- 

 sions and recommendations. • 



A glance at the table of contents will show that the thirteen reports, now presented 

 as ^ Further Contributions,' deal with practical and technical matters bearing upon the 

 fisheries, and the important and complex problems which they involve. 



The ' Plankton ' investigations of which Professor R. Ramsay Wright furnishes 

 the first instalment, indicate the kind and abundance of food, in the area examined, 

 upon which the schools of young food-fishes subsist. In the absence or scarcity of such 

 food these young fish would perish, and it would, of course, be vain to expect a plenitude 

 of adult fish in future years. The abundance of marketable fish depends upon the 

 abtindance of young fry hatched out in the nurseries ' or breeding areas in the sea, 

 and the young fish can only be plentiful when the minute floating food or ' Plankton ' 

 is locally rich, varied, and plenteous. It would be superfluous to dwell upon the great 

 value of such researches as those carried on for some years by Professor A. P. Knight 



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