SIR,--As I believe that Salmo Salar is quite as desirous of
increasing the breed of Salmon as myself, the controversy between
us may be reduced to very narrow limits. He believes that Trout
eat very few of the Salmon ova, and therefore cannot do much harm.
I will just mention a few facts which make me think otherwise.
When Ramsbottom was in Galway he caught in one night twenty-five
Trout on the spawning ground, which had on the average not less
than five hundred ova in each of their stomachs; from one of their
throats he squeezed a thousand. As the net would not take a fish
of less than two pounds, how many had passed through it? When he
was at Knowlmere, in sweeping the river for spawning fish he
caught nine Par, two Trouts, and a Sprod on the spawning bed, all
of which were gorged with Salmon spawn; when he went into the
brooks there he never found a pair of Trout spawning without also
finding a number of smaller fish behind, some of which he caught,
and in all such cases found them gorged with roe up to the throat;
the male Trout would occasionally drive them off, but as soon as
he returned to the female they were again close in the rear.
In the "Perthshire Courier" of the 22nd December is the following
statement: The men employed in taking the breeding fish secured a
Whitling on Tuesday about three-quarters of a pound, and as they
observed Salmon ova coming out of his mouth he was brought to the
office of Mr. Buist for examination; on being opened, upwards of
three hundred impregnated Salmon ova were taken from his stomach
quite undigested. It may be, therefore, fairly presumed, that this
youngster had taken this quantity for his breakfast; if he dined
and breakfasted in the same style each day during the breeding
season, it is difficult to estimate the expense of his keep. Such
is the amount of loss of impregnated roe in one morning from one
trifling fish; what must it be throughout the season from the
various enemies it has to encounter?
Salmo Salar is facetious about the destruction of the roe by
insects, and says, "because an aquatic insect will devour a
minnow's egg, which is not as large as a pin's head, we have no
right to infer that it will devour that of a Salmon, which is as
large as a pea; it would be just as reasonable to suppose that
because a wasp feasts upon a cherry, or a strawberry, therefore he
will eat a turnip or a mangold wurtzel." As he seems to have made
a slip of the pen in naming the two last _fruits_, allow me to
supply what I suppose he meant to say, which I presume was that
because a wasp eats a cherry or a strawberry, we must not
therefore infer that he will either eat a pear or a plum; if that
is his meaning, I think I can understand it. If he adheres to his
own version, I would merely observe that there is no analogy in
the two cases. But the inference does not rest upon mere
supposition; the freshwater shrimps at Knowlmere were seen
devouring the ova in the spawning-boxes. We have seen above that
Par eat ova as well as Trout. Let us suppose that the millions of
Smolts (as Par) have only one meal each of Salmon roe, and we will
stint them to twenty ova apiece. I fear that very few of the five
millions which Salmo Salar says are deposited in the Hodder will
be left to grow into Salmon. In addition to these, ducks, both
wild and tame, eat them greedily. When Ramsbottom was in Galway he
saw that the tame ducks frequented the spawning ford, and the
superintendent bought one, and found its crop quite full of Salmon
roe. If this had been buried eighteen inches in the gravel (as
Salmo Salar suggests), the duck would have had some difficulty in
extracting it; but so far as my experience goes, it is not usually
one-half that depth, although this varies in different rivers.
Then, if one Salmon is able to plough up gravel which is cemented
together by sand and long continuance in one place, why should not
another be able to do the same when the gravel is loose and easily
removed? But there is another enemy whom Salmo Salar has not
mentioned, who does more harm than all the rest: that is the
poacher, and I fear that many of the Salmon which Salmo Salar saw
spawning in the Hodder and its tributaries have since then made a
journey overland. At all events, I am credibly informed that in
one season a gang of poachers took seventy Salmon in the Hodder.
Is he sure they have taken none this season? Salmo Salar seems to
think that one pair of Salmon will not spawn on the same ground,
which has been previously occupied by another pair; but he has
only to watch the same ridd for a week or two to be convinced he
is mistaken. As to fish refusing to spawn on new gravel, I may
state that when Mr. Fawkes was making his experiments at Farnley
he put some new gravel into his brook, and there were sixteen
pairs of Trout spawning on it the next morning. Salmo Salar says
that if he can have those simple checks which he enumerates to the
present practices, he will restore abundance of Salmon to the
Ribble; they are all very good in their way, but do not go quite
far enough, and they would do very little good without a fourth,
namely, protection from the poacher for the fish on the spawning
beds. Until this can be given more efficiently than it is at
present, all the rest will be unavailing; and until the upper
proprietors can have a greater interest in the preservation of
Salmon than they now have, they cannot be expected to give
themselves much trouble on the subject.
My readers would not be much edified by strong assertion and
counter-assertion of what Trout do, and what they cannot do; nor
is it probable that where we differ we should convince each other;
neither do I see any occasion for personality, when both parties
are actuated by the same motives--a desire to see the Salmon
fisheries restored to a state of great prosperity. I therefore
avoid noticing some of Salmo Salar's remarks, which seem to me a
little tinged with this spirit, and hope we shall be able to act
in concert for the attainment of that desirable result. Salmo
Salar will find that the number of Smolts is not always determined
by the quantity of ova deposited: if he will examine the bed of
the Hodder the next low water, he will find many of the ridds
disturbed by the ice floods of yesterday; and if he doubts this, I
shall be happy to examine them along with him, if he will give me
previous notice of his intention.
Since the above was written I have seen Ramsbottom, who tells me
that the stream in the Tay, where he caught the whole of the fish
from which he obtained 300,000 to 400,000 ova, was on one side of
it one continuous ridd, and that the fish could not avoid
ploughing up the gravel which previous fish had spawned in, and at
Oughterard, where 300 pairs of fish spawned in the same number of
yards, it was the same; and they found thousands of ova buried so
deep that they were rotting in great quantities.
With regard to what Salmo Salar says about the infrequency of a
veritable spawning bed being washed away by floods, I refer him to
what I have said previously; but Ramsbottom tells me the game-
keeper at Harden (Haworth) will be able to give him sufficient
proof that in the Langden Brook this has occurred, as he found the
ova on the dry land by thousands, which had been left there by the
flood.
When Ramsbottom was at Perth he found on one of the fords, a space
of twenty yards long and fourteen yards wide, filled with ridds,
which was entirely left dry. What would become of all the spawn
deposited there?
Salmo Salar seems to think nature is quite sufficient to take care
of her own interests without our interference, and that without
some counter-acting influence to keep the breed of fish in check,
the river would not hold all that would be bred. I quite agree
with him in this, provided nature had fair play; but she has not,
and occasionally needs a little help: else why do we employ game-
keepers to trap cats, foxes, and weasels, to shoot hawks, carrion
crows, and magpies, and to breed pheasants, as well as to prevent
poaching? If these precautions are unnecessary, why go to such
expense? and if they are necessary for hares and birds, may they
not be also for fish?
I hope Salmo Salar will investigate what I said about walling in
of the Smolts in Langden Brook. I fancy he may have seen these
enclosures himself; at all events, I have, and although I cannot
prove they were erected for that purpose, I do not doubt the
accuracy of my information.
I am, Sir,
Yours very truly,
THOMAS GARNETT.
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