Fishery Board for Scotland. 



XXV 



if allowed to continue, would still further diminish the inshore Scientific 

 herring fishing. The Board having taken the matter into con- Inv ^tigations. 

 sideration, appointed a Committee, consisting of Mr Thorns and 

 Professor Cossar Ewart, to institute inquiries. The Committee 

 found that a similar inquiry had been made in 1861 by Dr Lyon 

 Playfair, C.B., and Vice- Admiral Henry Dundas (members of the Result of 

 former Board), who reported that 'the sprat is specifically distinct ^ iTy of 

 ' from the herring, and generally keeps in shoals by itself ; but 

 1 heavy tides frequently cause a mixture of sprats and young herrings. 

 1 The proportion of herrings to sprats is at present only 1 per cent. ; 

 ' but sometimes the mixture is so great that there may be an equal 

 ' proportion of the two species.' 



But finding that many fishermen and fish-dealers still insisted that 

 sprats were young herring, and that it was generally believed that 

 enormous numbers of immature herring were being destroyed, they 

 decided to make investigations in order to finally settle the relation 

 of the sprat to the herring, and to discover what the so-called 

 destruction of immature herring amounted to. Professor Ewart 

 having obtained samples of the takes from the Firths of Forth and Large number 

 Tay, and from the Inverness Firth, and finding, that while the j^k^witl 

 percentage of young herring taken in the Firth of Forth and the Sprats in Firth 

 Inverness Firth was, in most instances, little higher than in 1861, ofTa y- 

 the percentage of herring to sprats in the Firth of Tay varied 

 from 30 to 70 per cent., it was thought desirable to visit the 

 Tay, and study the matter on the spot. Accordingly, Professor 

 Ewart joined the ' Vigilant/ on the 23rd November last, and spent 

 the early morning of the 24th, visiting, and carrying away samples 

 of the takes from, the various £ bag-net ' fishing boats, and he after- 

 wards made inquiries at Dundee as to the amount of sprats which 

 had been forwarded to the manure works at Montrose. The result 

 of the inquiries showed — 



(1) That practically all the fish, from 1 inch in length to the size Result of 

 of a large cod or salmon, which entered the bag-net were captured, ^Jto/J 

 and that the net (some 140 feet in length) was large enough to 11 1 ° ay ' 

 secure over two tons of fish at a single haul. 



(2) That 35 per cent, of the fish taken during the morning of the 

 24th were under 2\ inches in length, and that 65 per cent, of the 

 fish over 3 inches in length were young herring. 



(3) That about 100 tons of fish caught by bag-net fishermen had 

 been forwarded between the 10th and 16th November to the 

 manure factory at Montrose, and that previous to the 24th of 

 November somewhere about 44,000,000 young herring had been 

 destroyed, — the 44,000,000 only bringing in about £150, while 

 the same number of full herring would be worth when captured 

 over £100,000. 



Mr Duncan Matthews was requested to continue the investigation, Mr Matthews 

 and the Board has received from him a valuable report (see Appendix ^Jjested to 



-n -VT ttt \ i ■ i it- •• Ti continue m- 



No. 111.), which, m addition to giving an excellent account of vestigation. 

 the structure of the sprat, and showing how it essentially differs 

 from the herring, shows that while there is, in the mean time, 

 little or no call for interference in either the Firth of Forth or in 

 the Inverness Firth, the Board should have the power of prevent- 

 ing, when necessary, the fishing for sprats. 



