FIFTH ANNUAL REPORT. 



TO THE MOST HONOURABLE 



THE MARQUIS OF LOTHIAN, K.T, 



Her Majesty's Secretary for Scotland. 



Fishery Board for Scotland, 

 Edinburgh, 2nd May 1887. 



My Lord Marquis, 



We, the Members of the Fishery Board for Scotland, 

 appointed under the Fishery Board (Scotland) Act, 1882, have the 

 honour to submit our Fifth Annual Keport, in terms of the fifth 

 section of that Act, and of the fifth section of the Secretary for 

 Scotland Act, 1885. 



THE SEA AND SALMON FISHERIES OF SCOTLAND. 



The Fisheries of Scotland continue to be very productive. Fisheries very 

 Nothing, however, is more striking in connection with them than productive, 

 the great and increasing yield of the herring fishery. Previous to Great and in- 

 the constitution of the present Board, no account was kept of the of e ggJ^ il f ield 

 takes of herrings which were captured and consumed fresh ; and Fishery, 

 it is therefore not possible to form anything like a correct estimate 

 of the quantity which, year by year, has been landed and thus 

 used. Statistics, however, have been annually collected, beginning statistics 

 with 1809, up to the present time, of the quantity which has been showing this, 

 caught and cured; and the returns show that, with yearly 

 fluctuations, it has gone on increasing in an extraordinary 

 degree. In the year 1 809, the quantity of herrings cured was 90,185^ 

 barrels; in 1829. or twenty years thereafter, it had increased to 

 355,979J; in 1849, or in other twenty years, it was 644,368£; 

 while last year, it had still further increased to 1,312,223J barrels, 

 the value of which was £1,377,834, 8s. 3d. 



Notwithstanding, however, such a large progressive increase in Proved great 

 the produce of this fishery, and which, from the low prices at which Jj^J 0 Com " 

 herrings have been sold, has proved a great boon to the com- mum y ' 



