38 



Fortieth Annual Report 



Liverpool. Prices paid for herring offal were very low, usually 

 about 3d. or 4d. per barrel when collected by the factories. The 

 process of extracting the oil by means of benzine, instead of expressing 

 it mechanically, was further extended during the year. 



The working up of white fish offal, including unsaleable — usually 

 small — white fish and livers, is largely centralised at Aberdeen. Oil 

 from the livers is the most valuable product, as it includes a pro- 

 portion of prime quality for medicinal purposes and a second quality 

 for stock feeding, although the greater part, like the herring oil, is 

 used in industrial processes, such as soap and paint manufacture, 

 leather making, and the tempering of steel. The other bye-products 

 from white fish are fish meal, used for stock feeding, manure and 

 fish glue. The demand for fish meal and manure fell off very much 

 during the summer, and for a time subsequent to the resumption of 

 work after the coal dispute no payment was made for offal collected. 

 Thereafter the demand improved, and 5s. per ton was being paid 

 against £1 per ton at the beginning of the year. The export trade 

 in fish meal to Germany, which was the best market before the war, 

 has not so far been re-established, and practically the whole output 

 was disposed of in the south of Scotland, in England and in Ireland. 



The total quantity of raw material used during the year was 

 34,000 tons, or rather more than half that used in the previous year. 

 The products totalled 2400 tons or about 600,000 gallons of oil, 

 valued at over £50,000, 2700 tons of meal valued at £40,000, and 

 2600 tons of manure valued at £26,000. 



2. Prevention of Damage by Trawlers to Submarine Cables. 



The inspection of trawl gear at the principal trawling ports 

 — Aberdeen, Granton, Dundee — was carried out during the year by 

 the Board's officers, and as hitherto the officers were given every 

 facility in their, rounds of inspection. The defects discovered, which 

 were all remedied before the vessels left for sea, were relativelv few 

 in number, and consisted mostly of broken and loose otter board 

 keels. 



During the year 146 new sets of trawl boards were bought to 

 replace those unfit for use and considered dangerous to submarine 

 telegraph cables. No case of damage to a cable attributable to 

 Scottish trawlers came under notice. 



The following return shows the number of inspections of the 

 trawl gear of Scottish and English trawlers during 1921. No gear of 

 foreign trawlers was inspected. 



Port. 



No. of Inspections. 



Cases in which gear 

 found defective. 



Scottish. 



English. 



Scottish. 



English. 



Aberdeen - 



4,135 



59 



271 





Granton - 



839 



1 



5 





Dundee 



84 





7 





