The Sea Shore

by William S. Furneaux

The next division (Teleostomi) contains all the bony fishes, which may be distinguished generally from the cartilaginous group by the following features:—The skeleton is more or less hardened by the deposit of calcareous matter, and the tail is generally not of the heterocercal type. The paired fins are fan-like, and the pectoral girdle is attached to the hinder part of the skull. These fishes generally have an air-bladder, and the gills lie close together in a cavity covered by an operculum. The eggs, too, are generally very small and numerous, and massed together.

Of these we will take first the family Salmonidæ, of which the Salmon (Salmo salar), and the Smelt (Osmerus eperlanus) are well-known examples. Several species of the family are remarkable for their periodical migrations from fresh to salt water or vice versa, and we cannot do better than briefly relate the interesting life-history of the salmon as a striking instance of these peculiar wanderings. This fish quits the sea at the close of the summer, and ascends the rivers for the purpose of depositing its spawn, the colder water of the rivers being necessary for the development of the young. Its upward journey is beset with many difficulties, for it has to shoot the various rapids and leap the cascades, the latter often demanding the most prodigious efforts on the part of the fish, which frequently leaps several feet out of the water, and even then has sometimes to renew its attempts over and over again before it finally succeeds. Indeed, the difficulties to be overcome are so numerous that the fish often reaches the goal in such an exhausted condition that it would hardly be recognised as the salmon by those who have only seen it in the prime condition in which it is captured during its return to the sea in the following spring or summer. The male, at this period called the kipper, is of a dull red colour, irregularly blotched with yellow and light brown, and its skin is covered with a slimy secretion. Its body is lean, and the head, now large and out of all proportion, is rendered still more unsightly by the protrusion of the lower jaw, which at this season, when the males are particularly pugnacious, becomes a formidable weapon of offence. The condition of the female, now called the baggit, is equally poor, and the skin has changed its bright silvery colour for dark and dingy shades.

The female digs a nest in the form of a deep trench by wriggling her body in the gravel of the bed of the stream, and there deposits her eggs, many thousands in number, small quantities at a time. As each batch is deposited the eggs are fecundated by the kipper, and then covered over lightly with gravel by the baggit; and this work having been accomplished, both male and female rest and feed, with the result that their condition is rapidly improved.

After about eighteen weeks the eggs begin to hatch, and the fry wriggle out of the nest and seek shelter under stones in the immediate neighbourhood. They are now peculiar little creatures, as much like tadpoles as fishes, with big heads and narrow bodies, and a bag of albuminous yolk-matter attached to the ventral side. The young subsist on this store of food for from twelve to twenty days, during the whole of which time they remain under shelter, having, of course, no need to expose themselves to the numerous enemies with which they are surrounded, and they then leave their hiding-place in search of food, being now about an inch in length. They feed on aquatic and other insects, which are now becoming plentiful on the approach of the warm weather; and, growing rapidly, reach a length of four inches in a month or two. They are now called parr, and are distinguished by the dark bars that cross their bodies transversely—a feature that persists for a year or more from this time.

Towards the end of May the parr migrate seawards, accompanied by the adult salmon, but as their enemies include the voracious fishes, wading birds, and even the adults of their own species, it is probable that only a small proportion of the original number ever enter salt water.

In the sea they feed on crustaceans, molluscs, and small fishes, the young still growing rapidly, and attaining a weight of about five pounds in the following autumn, when both young (now called grilse) and old again ascend the rivers to spend the colder half of the year; the former will have reached a weight of ten pounds or more on their return to the sea in the following year.

The Smelt may be seen in thousands in our estuaries during the spring, for at that time they come up to spawn in the brackish water. In the summer they swim about in shoals along the coast, and are caught largely in nets for the market. In some parts they are taken in large shallow circular nets suspended on a line. This is lowered into the water, and hauled up when the fish are seen swimming above it. Many amateurs secure numbers of smelt by means of rod and line, fishing from piers, jetties, &c. They bite freely at almost any kind of bait, and will snap at an almost bare hook, with the tiniest fragment of the bait at its point.

The Herring family (Clupeidæ) contains some well-known food-fishes to which we need only casually refer. They are mostly littoral species, none inhabiting deep water, and none straying into the open ocean. Their bodies are covered with silvery scales, and are laterally compressed, so much so on the ventral side that there is a moderately sharp ridge along the middle line. The principal fishes of the family are the Herring (Clupea harengus), the Sprat (C. sprattus), and the Pilchard (C. pilchardus).

These fishes are particularly interesting on account of their gregarious habits and the enormous size of the shoals they form, a single shoal often containing millions of individuals; and they are often captured in such quantities that large numbers are sold to farmers as manure to enrich the soil. The shoals are followed closely by many larger carnivorous species that devour them in great numbers, as well as by flocks of sea birds that prey on them, and yet their numbers are not appreciably reduced by such ravages. They spawn in shallow waters near the coast, and feed principally on the crustaceans and worms of the littoral zone.

Sprats were once considered to be the young of the Herring, but it is now universally acknowledged that they are a distinct species, and quite a number of characteristics have been given as a means of distinguishing between the two. The young of the herring are, however, used largely as food, for that miscellaneous mixture of fry and small species known as Whitebait consists largely of these and the young of the sprat.