321 taken beyond about 350 fathoms1), and this depth is already within reach Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/icesjms/article/6/2/321/600620 by guest on 29 September 2021 of many trawlers. The author's remedy, in fact, is actually being applied slowly and cautiously; to apply it in the drastic fashion he advocates would require, under existing conditions, little less faith and courage than that required by the Galilean fishermen, whose plaint, that they had toiled all night and had taken nothing, so fitly and finely opens this article. C. F. H.

H. LISSNER. Monatskarten zur deutschen Treibnetzfischerei 1929, Ber. d. deutsch. wissensch. Komm. f. Meeresforschung, N. F. Bd. V, Heft 3. Berlin, 1930. It was a good idea which suggested the collection of monthly records of the drift-net for herring in the , as has been achieved for the fourth time by the well-known German investigator. On a similar principle to the "Squares" used in English statistics, indicated by letters and numbers, — with this difference, however, that these squares proved much too large for the purpose in hand, so that each of them was sub- divided into nine smaller ones — each rectangle shows month by month both the number of hauls and the average catch of herring in crans ("kan- tjes") on separate charts, so that we may see at a glance, where in a par- ticular month the was most intensive and where also it proved to be most prolific. This is a most practical way of plotting the generally patchy herring shoals for further study; if indeed hydrographic conditions have any causal connection with this concentration of ripening and spawn- ing herrings, LISSNER'S charts should make it easy to bring such connection to light. Salinity and temperature conditions are, however, only investi- gated on broad lines, and it would be an advantage if fishermen themselves were generally provided with simple means of determining the hydro- graphic conditions and, as an alternative, the character of the plankton during the actual fishing time, and really did avail themselves of such aids! As long as this is not the case we have to be content with the valuable information LISSNER'S meticulously drawn charts give us. Indeed we intend to start such work in Holland also. The paper begins with statistics of a general nature about the produc- tion of the herring drift-net fisheries of countries around the North-Sea, the vessels used in these fisheries and the weekly records, during the seasons of 1929 and 1928, of the catch per and per trip. A table showing monthly fluctuations of the landings (1929 and 1928) presents the usual irregular curve, with a tendency to fall in the middle of the season and again before the great autumn near Yarmouth starts. The monthly charts above referred to, from July to November, are particularly instruc- tive and show the time-honoured shifting of fishing regions as the summer draws on. Records were obtained from 245 trips out of a total of 662. Gradually as the season advances, the characteristically scattered nature of the fishing, which is particularly apparent in the month of August in the slack season, changes to the concentration of the vessels in the

See this Journal, Vol. Ill, No. 1. 322

"deeps" off Yarmouth. The value of records like these is the demonstration Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/icesjms/article/6/2/321/600620 by guest on 29 September 2021 of occasional, comparatively big catches in such regions as are normally considered useless for the season, as, for example, the September fishing at Bressay Shoal, at a time when most concentrate towards the . The records for December are too scanty to be included in the charts. The author concludes with a reference to a prediction, made elsewhere (Fischerbote 1930, p. 180), as to the chances for the drift-net fisheries in 1930, a statement which in the meanwhile has already been partly con- firmed. J. J. T.

WILLIAM F. THOMPSON and NORMAN L. FREEMAN. History of the Pacific Halibut Fishery. Report of the International Fisheries Commission. Number 5. Vancouver, B. C, 1930. In very old days the halibut undoubtedly was already an important food for the Indians living along the coasts of the Pacific. Many of the explorers of the eighteenth century, e. g., Captain Cook in 1778, mention the great number of halibut caught by the Indians, and really their fishery had a well-developed technique and until late years they have continued to use their own large hooks. From the description of the Indian methods, it will be understood that this people, as their fishery had a high degree of efficiency, could fish in considerable depths and land fish in astonishingly great quantities. The commercial fishery of halibut began first about 1888—1892, when the final connection was made with the east by the completion of the rail- roads across the continent. White men learned the locations of the more distant fishing banks of the Indians and a good deal of the fish was pur- chased from this people. The vessels used were small sloops and schooners carrying as many as three in the waist of the vessel. The total quantity of halibut landed along the Pacific coast amounted in the year 1889 to 1,777,250 pounds. In the last years of the nineteenth century the fishery developed to a much higher degree, and the operations were prin- cipally carried on from steamers having eight to twelve dories stowed on the stern. With the adoption of dories, the use of the vessels for fishing, and the bettering of methods for handling the fish, deeper water was tried. The fishermen extended their knowledge year by year as the necessity for new banks arose. Up to the year 1909 or 1910 the fishery and the had been growing, especially since the use of power became general, but the fish in protected waters began in about 1905 to be scarcer and scarcer and some of the best fishing grounds began to show a decline, both in quantity and size. In 1910 there occured a great shift from an inshore to a truly deep-sea fishery. In the following years the building of larger vessels allowed expansion of the fishery to deeper and to more northern waters. The sta- tistics show that the ability of the fleet to reach new banks and to tap new sources of supply plays a greater part in the maintenance of the total yield than does the increasing efficiency of the fishermen and their methods. In 1910 and 1911 are to be found the first statistics as to the total landings for the entire coast, and it has therefore been possible to use this year as