The United States Fisheries

Abstract

IN your review of the report of the United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries, you say you are of opinion there is almost no difference between Salmo salar and Salmo quinnat. My friend Prof. Baird sent me his report some time since, and also forwarded several thousand eggs of Salmo quinnat for experiment in the hatching tanks of the Southport Aquarium. The eggs hatched out remarkably well, a very small percentage only being lost, and have proved much more hardy and tenacious of life than any Salmo salar I ever had to do with, and very much easier to feed. Salmo salar have never done well except when fed on the minute red worms found on the mud in the beds of some rivers and streams (our supply was obtained from the Thames). Salmo quinnat, however, live well, and grow faster on the roe of fish (refuse from the fish market), such as whiting, than S. salar will on anything. From what I have seen of them I quite agree with Prof. Baird in his admiration of this member of the salmon family, and I share his surprise that it has attracted so little attention among English fish-culturists. I would certainly be a most valuable addition to our food-fishes, stronger, and apparently of more rapid growth than our native species. On the continent, and in New Zealand and other countries, it is most greedily sought after, and each season for several years past an agent has carried from America to France, Germany, and other countries, large consignments of the ova. In England, so far, it appears to have been quite neglected.