HERTFORDSHIRE NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 
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live. He was a bad sporting fish, did not rise to the fly, was an ugly creature 
with great blotches, and was not worth catching. 
Mr. F. G. Lloyd mentioned that he had had some experience of the usefulness 
of the carp in Germany, particularly in Saxony. It was brought to market by 
women, and farmers who lived at a distance bought a supply which they kept in 
receptacles in their streams and ditches, from time to time drawing upon them 
for their dinners. With regard to canals, in Hertfordshire long stretches of the 
Grand Junction Canal were stocked with fish either by private persons or 
societies, but thev gave no adequate return. The bargemen had a triangular net 
which they put down as the boat went along, and they brought it up full of fish. 
So long as such a practice was allowed, it would be useless to stock canals with fish. 
Mr. Littleboy asked whether in speaking of aquaculture as possible for farmers, 
Mr. Chambers meant that they should utilise the existing rivers or brooks, or 
form artificial reservoirs for pisciculture. Our Hertfordshire streams were 
scarcely pure enough now to admit of fish living in them. The fish that lived 
fifteen or twenty years ago in the little stream (the Gade) which flowed through 
his grounds could not live in it now, and he thought that no amount of fish- 
culture would pay for shutting up those great industries of the neighbourhood, the 
carrying-on of which polluted our rivers. 
Mr. Chambers, in reply, said that to the present day ova were conveyed across 
the seas in a corner of the ice-room or refrigerating chamber. The waters into 
which he would introduce Salmo ferox would be those in which there was a large 
amount of bottom-fishing, for though ferox would not rise to a fly, he would take 
a worm. In waters where the indigenous fish were roach, perch, and tench, a 
non-migratory trout would be appreciated by the angler, though not equal to the 
migratory fish as an article of food. With regard to the destruction of fish by 
bargemen, if the canals were well stocked with fish, and were placed under a 
Preservation Society, the law of the land would stop the netting. As to aqua¬ 
culture, the idea he wished to convey was that throughout the country there were 
many waste pieces of land, partially covered with water, and growing only reeds 
and rushes, which were utterly valueless at present, but which might be made to 
produce a large quantity of fish. He had utilised many such pieces of land, 
making them into ponds in which he had grown very fine fish. In this county 
the porous nature of the strata would not allow of such treatment of waste land. 
Mr. J. E. Littleboy then read the following note on “ Grayling in 
the Colne and Gade.” 
An attempt to introduce grayling into the Colne, which appears to have been 
partially successful, has recently been made by Mr. A. H. Hibbert, of Munden 
Park. Mr. Hibbert writes, on the 1st of September, 1883 :—“ The grayling were 
sent to me as spawn two years ago and hatched out well. I estimate their 
number at over a thousand. When about a month old I turned them into a little 
gravelly ditch which flows into the river; on the 3rd of August I dragged and 
caught four—three of them close to the little ditch, the other some distance down 
the river. They weighed from four to five ounces each, measured about seven 
inches in length, and seemed to be in a particularly healthy and bright condition. 
I turned them in as an experiment, but I expect that there are a good many of 
them left; our net has a fair-sized mesh, and the grayling being a quick-moving 
fish, probably escaped us in numbers.” 
A similar experiment has been made by Lord Essex, who kas kindly supplied the 
following particulars :—“ Some small fry were sent to me from the Dove, a stream 
in Derbyshire famous for grayling ; I put them into the Gade, at Cassio Bridge, 
in May or June, 1882. Some months afterwards, when we dragged the river, a 
few were seen entangled in the weeds. I am told that in twelve months they will 
grow to three or four inches in length.” 
Dr. Hood, who is very familiar with the habits of the grayling, does not 
believe that it will be possible permanently to naturalize this fish in the waters 
either of the Colne or Gade. The experiments now reported will go far to test 
the accuracy of this opinion. 
