340 
On the Natural History the Salmon ^ 
the year round p. 114. In the spring months^ few fish enter rivers ; they ra- 
pidly increase in numbers as the summer advances, and in autumn again they 
begin to decrease, leaving the winter months, as to the ascending migration, 
to constitute a dead season. 
The condition of rivers in the spring influences the movements of the sal- 
mon. J. Proudfoot states, that, “ in the spring of the year the fish always 
occupy the north side of the Tay {i, e. the sunny side of the river). The 
north side fishing kills far more fish than the south side p. 28. Mr Little 
states, that in “ the river Shannon the salmon fishery is nearly over by 
the middle of May,” p. 114. ; and that he does “ not get many fish in the 
Foyle of any kind till the end of May p. 112. When the great differences 
existing between different rivers, in the quantity, temperature, and contents 
of their waters, are duly considered, we need not wonder at the influence these 
circumstances may exert on the motions of salmon ; but if we make a diffe- 
rence in the close season between one river and another^ we must, with equal 
propriety, establish a similar distinction between the south side and the north 
side of every river. 
In rivers, during the early spring months, the fisheries are seldom pro- 
ductive : even Lord Gray’s fishings on the sunny side of the Tay, according 
to J. GiUies, “ taking the average from the 10th December till the end of 
January, will not, one season with another, pay the expences or little more. 
There are some very good fishings in the month of February ; perhaps in the 
month of February there will be ten days of those fishings, and scarcely take 
one fish.” The same witness adds, in reference to the kind of fish taken at 
those periods in the Tay, “ You will get ten foul fish till the middle of Feb- 
ruary for one.clean one ;” p. 139. As the season advances, the salmon appear on 
the shores, in the estuaries, and enter rivers in greater numbers. The stake- 
nets, in such places, according to Mr Halliday, “ are seldom productive but in 
May, June and July p. 68. ‘‘The fishings fall materially off about the 
middle of August, and to the end of it ;” p. 69. & 84. “ In September they 
catch almost nothing ;” p. 84. These conditions vary much with the sea- 
son. The salmon are most abundant in dry seasons on the shore, and in 
estuaries. In . rivers, they abound most in wet seasons. Mr Halliday on 
this subject offers some very pertinent remarks : “ Because the stake-nets 
take the salmon at that season of the year when they would not go into the 
rivers ; the rivers are not in a state to receive them, they become so heated ; 
the rivers likewise become so yerj small, and the water gets so hot at that sea- 
son of the year, when salmon is most plentiful on the coasts of Scotland, that 
they will not enter the rivers, the rivers being then not in a fit state to re- 
ceive them ; it is by the stake-nets that the fish at that season of the year can 
be taken in the greatest quantity ; it is at that time too that they are in the 
greatest perfection ; very few would be taken except by the stake-nets ; and if 
they were not so taken, they would generally be lost altogether ; a great part 
of these fish that the stake-nets do take, are taken going out to sea : even in 
the friths and estuaries, the fish do not go far up in the warm months. In the 
course of my practice in the Tay, I have carefully observed the upper stake- 
nets in comparison Avith the lower : when the seasons Avere dry, the upper 
stake-nets took very few fish in comparison at a particular time of the year ; 
in one season, when the season was very dry and Avarm, the fish in the neap- 
