of the Fishery Board for Scotland. 



235 



In this Table it will be noticed, especially in the columns in which the 

 various collections in each month are summed up, that these small 

 gurnards were got only in certain months, viz., August, September, 

 October, November, December, February, and May. None under 5cm. 

 were got in November, and none under 4-5cm. in December, 

 while in February the smallest was 6'7cm., and in May 7*9cm. They do 

 not appear in the collections before August, and the Table shows that 

 their growth at this stage is fairly rapid. 



In my former paper I gave a Table of all the small gurnards under 3 

 inches which were obtained by the fine-meshed trawl-nets of the " Gar- 

 land," arranged according to months, and it may be summarised here. 

 None under 3 inches (7'6cm) were caught between May and September — 

 a fact also borne out by the above Table — and the greater number were 

 obtained in October and September. The absence of 'the small gurnards 

 was not due to hauls of the net not having been made in the intervening 

 m >nths, since 27 were made in June, July, and August. The number 

 caught in each month in which hauls with the fine net were 'made, and 

 the average number of gurnards under 3 inches taken per haul are given 

 in the following Table : — 





Jan. 



Apr. 



May. 



June. 



July. 



Aug. 



Sept. 



Oct. 



Nov. 



Number of Hauls, 



12 



41 



34 



10 



6 



11 



23 



25 



13 



Number of Gurnards 

 under 3 in. {7 '6cm.), 



1 



3 



8 









2 



30 



24 



Average per Haul, 



0-08 



0-07 



0-23 



o-o 



o-o 



o-o 



0-09 



1-2 



1-8 



The conclusion drawn from the facts was that those taken in January, 

 April, and May belonged to the previous year, and that the absence of 

 gurnards under 3 inches in June, July, and August was due to the 

 growth in summer taking them above that size. 



It was also concluded that the gurnards ranging about 6 inches (15cm.) 

 hi length in the spring were from 18 months to 2 years old; that the 

 gurnard did not reach maturity until the third year ; and that there 

 appeared to be annual groups differing in length by about two inches from 

 each other — the measurements having been in inches and fractions of an 

 inch. 



In the collections referred to in the present paper, the early groups are 

 sometimes distinctly marked off from one another, and little difficulty has 

 been experienced in determining the rate of growth of this fish. 



It may be mentioned that the difficulty in regard to the prolonged 

 spawning period, and the summer or winter season for the early and late 

 larvae to which reference has been made, is counteracted by a rather slow 

 rate of growth on the part of this fish, and possibly by the growth 

 in the winter not being retarded to the extent that is usual 

 amongst other young fishes. In this respect the young gurnard 

 offers a striking contrast to the young plaice or dab, which may be even 

 shorter in early spring after passing through the cold winter months than 

 they were at the onset of winter. In the latter case the habitat is in the 

 shallow water, exposed to the changes in the air temperature and varying 

 with it, whereas the gurnard is pre-eminently a migratory fish at all 

 stages, and leaves the inshore waters for deeper water, where the tempera - 

 ture is higher, in autumn. 



