IS 
Part III. — Tenth Annual Report 
there is no doubt that if it were possible to extend them to the 
great offshore fishing grounds, from which the bulk of the fish 
supply is obtained, their value would be greatly increased. 
The Food of Fishes. 
The inquiries into the nature of the food of the edible fishes have 
now been carried on for four years, in connection with other investi- 
gations, and in the present Eeport an account is given by Mr W. 
Kamsay Smith, M.B., CM., B.Sc, of the results obtained in 1891— 
and also an analysis of the whole of the information collected 
since the inquiries were begun. The species of food upon which 
the various kinds of round-fish and flat-fish subsist has been 
determined with great care by Mr Thomas Scott, F.L.S., the 
naturalist on board the ' Garland,' who ha3 kept the records of the 
contents of the stomachs of all the fishes examined — a number 
now amounting to about twenty thousand. Mr Ramsay Smith 
gives in his Report full details of the food of each species of fish, 
and shows that mere lists of the various kinds of organisms upon 
which fishes prey convey but little information as to the food 
material upon which they really subsist. Thus it appears that 
while a species may prey upon a very large number of organisms, 
it3 existence depends upon two or three, which constitute the great 
bulk of its food ; the others being only captured occasionally. 
The determination of this fact is of much importance. It is also 
found that there is much less competition for the same organisms 
between the various species of fish than had been supposed. 
Additions to the Fauna of the Firth of Forth. 
In connection with the inquiries on the distribution of the 
organisms which form the food of fishes, Mr Thomas Scott, F.L.S., 
has, for a series of years, made special investigations of the fauna of 
the Firth of Forth, and gives in the present Report his fourth con- 
tribution on this subject. Previous to 1887, about 120 species of 
Crustacea had been recorded for the Firth of Forth ; but, as a result 
of Mr Scott's painstaking labours, this number has now been 
increased to over 400. In his present Report, he describes over 
thirty species of Crustacea chiefly belonging to the Copepoda, upon 
which the herring and mackerel largely subsist. Fifteen of these 
are new to science, and the rest have not been previously found on 
the East Coast of Scotland. A large number of the new forms 
were obtained at the well-known fishing ground — the 'Traith'or 
' Fluke Hole,' off the coast of Fife. Mr Scott's paper is illustrated 
by seven plates. 
The Reproduction, Maturity, and Sexual Relations of the 
Food-Fishes., 
In previous reports papers have appeared on the investigations 
as to the spawning and propagation of the food-fishes. In the present 
Report, Dr T. Wemyss Fulton deals with the collective results of 
