18 



Part III. — Twenty- fifth Annual Repori 



and more stringent Act was passed against seine-net fishing for herrings,* 

 and it was enforced as far as possible in the Clyde with the assistance of 

 two gunboats and a staff of police on shore. Seining, however, still went 

 on, especially from Tarbert, and in 1861 a third Act was found to be 

 necessary, which gave power not only to seize and forfeit the seine-nets, 

 but also the boats using them and all the fish they might contain.t 

 Under this Act numerous boats and nets were seized and destroyed. In 

 June, 1861, a fisherman was shot dead by a marine of one of the gunboats 

 engaged in suppressing "trawling," and the Fishery Officer remarks, with 

 reference to this occurrence, that the "fishermen are as determined on 

 trawling as ever, and say they won't give it up, and condemning them- 

 selves martyrs, they seem inclined to court martyrdom " Later in the 

 same month he reported that the fishing was being very irregularly 

 conducted, and " although the fishermen state that they see plenty of 

 herrings, they -cannot succeed in getting them by drift-nets, and the 

 cruisers' boats harass the trawlers so much that they cannot manage with 

 all their ingenuity to get a haul." In this year very little seining took 

 place, owing to the strength and vigilance of the police force both on sea 

 and shore, and the herrings being abundant and the drifters successful, 

 the fishermen very generally equipped themselves with drift-nets and made 

 use of that method of fishing. 



In this year, also, an important Commission was appointed to enquire 

 into the operation of the Acts above referred to. It was composed of Dr. 

 Lyon Playfair, Professor Huxley, and Lieut.-Colonel Maxwell. The 

 Commission examined all the evidence placed before them by the Board 

 of Fishery, and made a personal investigation at Loch Fyne and elsewhere. 

 They found that the yield of the herring fishing in Loch Fyne had 

 increased rather than diminished, when a period of years was considered, 

 notwithstanding the use of the seine-net. "When we look back," they 

 say in their report^ " to the records of the fishing in Loch Fyne for the 

 last fifty or sixty years, we find many periods of bad fishing and gloomy 

 depression on the part of the fishermen. In such times of panic they 

 have always been ready to demand legislative protection against other 

 classes of fishermen who were supposed to be interfering with their 

 interests. Thus, in 1836, the Fishery Officer at Loch Fyne, expressing the 

 views of the fishermen there, entreats the Board to protect that loch from 

 ruin by putting down all fishing on the East Coasts of Scotland during 

 the only months when it was productive, because the West Coast fisher- 

 men are persuaded that it is the fish of the West Coast which travel to 

 the East Coast to spawn. In fact, every time that there is a panic the 

 reasons assigued for the failure of the heiring alter, but are strongly 

 pressed upon the Fishery Board as demands for immediate prohibitory 

 measures." The conclusion of the Commission was that the Acts were 

 quite unnecessary and had been injurious, and that seining, or trawling, 

 for herrings had not diminished the productiveness of the fishery in Loch 

 Fyne, which, on the contrary, had increased. They expressed the opinion 

 that if any legislation had been requisite, it should have been applied to 

 a regulation of the size of the mesh of the seines, which were frequently 

 under the legal standard, and they recommended that the Board of 

 Fisheries should have discretionary powers to prohibit seining for herrings 

 in waters which are too narrow for that method and drift-net fishing being 



* " An Act to Amend the Law relative to the Scottish Herring Fisheries," 23 

 and 24 Vict., c. 92. 



t " An Act to make further Provision for the Regulation of the British White 

 Herring Fishery," 24 and 25 Vict., c. 72. 



X Report of the Royal Commission on the Operation of the Acts relating to 

 Trawling for Herring on the Coasts of Scotland, 1863. 



