xxii 



Second Annual Report of the 



Scientific 

 Investigations. 



Introduction 

 of Wattles for 

 Mussel 

 culture. 



at present not only a great hardship to those immediately con- 

 cerned, but also a great loss to the country. An important step 

 in assisting in the development of mussel culture would be the 

 introduction into this country of the use of wattles; but an 

 experiment of this kind, like the other scientific work of the 

 Board, will be impossible unless a special grant is obtained. 



Some observations were made as to the food of the herring, and 

 a number of experiments were made with a view of deter- 

 mining the best means of hatching large numbers of artificially 

 fertilised eggs. These observations will be referred to in the next 

 Report. 



Perhaps the most important result of the autumn's work is 

 that the Board has come to feel keenly — (1) that almost everything 



Board recog- 

 nises great 



continuing 0 and has still to be learned regarding the habits and life history of our 



extending 

 investigations. 



Lamentable 

 ignorance of 

 habits, &c. of 

 fish. 



food fishes ; (2) that if provided with even limited funds, the Board, 

 with the assistance of the officers already in its service, will be able 

 to remove not a little of this ignorance; (3) that the fishermen, fish- 

 curers, and the country generally, are profoundly interested in the 

 scientific, as well as in the practical side of the fishery industry, and 

 prepared to do their utmost to secure for the Board whatever may be 

 necessary for its successful prosecution; and (4) that on the Board the 

 responsibility in great part falls of reversing the following verdict, 

 passed on Britain at the recent London Great International Fishery 

 Exhibition, viz. : — ' It is a very striking fact that the one point on 

 ' which all speakers at the conferences held during the past summer 

 ' at the Exhibition were agreed was this — that our knowledge of 

 ' the habits, time, and place of spawning, food peculiarities of the 

 ' young, migrations, &c, of the fish which form the basis of British 

 ' fisheries is lamentably deficient, and that without further know- 

 ' ledge any legislation or attempts to improve our fisheries by better 

 ' modes of fishing, or by protection or culture, must be dangerous, 

 * and indeed unreasonable.' 



It is a matter of great importance that the Board has been led 

 to appreciate more fully the fact, that it has in its service a large 

 number of intelligent officers, not only familiar with all practical 

 aspects of the fishery industry, but in addition, extremely interested 

 in the work of investigation; and that it has been led to recognise that, 

 owing to the want of scientific impulse, splendid opportunities have 

 been lost in the past for investigating the habits and life history 

 of our food fishes. It is a source of regret that the suggestion made 

 by the Boyal Commission, which reported in 1863, was not acted 

 upon. This Commission pointed out that results, important both to 

 science and practice, might be otained by making the fishery officers 

 keep ' natural history registers on a systematic plan.' 



Having recognised the responsibility of its position, and 

 feeling convinced that the country was not only alive to the 

 necessity of making observations, but extremely anxious that the 

 inquiry instituted in the autumn should be continued and extended, 

 the Board took steps to utilise to the utmost all the means at its 

 disposal for carrying on the work. Accordingly, in the early winter, 

 instructions instructions were sent to the various officers stationed around 

 Officers Fislieryt h e coast, requesting them to direct their attention during the 

 winter more especially to the sprat and herring fisheries, to forward 



Board has 

 large staff of 

 officers 

 capable of 

 assisting in 

 scientific work 



