Identifier: historyoffisheso04couch (find matches)
Title: A history of the fishes of the British Islands
Year: 1862 (1860s)
Authors: Couch, Jonathan, 1789-1870 Lydon, A. F
Subjects: Fishes
Publisher: London, Groombridge and Sons
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Smithsonian Libraries

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s been observedwhere one abounds the other becomes scarce; and if from anycause, except indeed from that which is too common in someparts of England, the presence of mineral water, or the refuseof poisonous manufactures in the river, the Salmon is drivento forsake it, this fish presently resorts to it in increasingnumbers; but they for the most part quit it again if Salmonagain become abundant. When speaking of the Salmon it was remarked that theplace of resort of this tribe of fishes when at sea is scarcelyknoAvn; but less uncertainty exists as regards the wnnderingsof the Peal, since so early in the spring as March or April,and still more frequently in May it is often caught, but usuallyas single individuals, in the drift-nets shot for Mackarel atabout the middle of the entrance of the British Channel; whereit is in the course of migration towards the land, and nearerto which it approaches as the season advances. As these netsare made to float at but a small depth where the water is
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PEAL. 201 above fifty fathoms, we conclude that this fish swims near thesurface on such occasions; as it does also in summer near theland, when drawing near the accustomed river; in Avhichsituation it is fished for with a moored and floating net. Notunfrequently also it takes a bait far out at sea, when the lineis kept in motion, as in whiffing for Pollacks; and it evenseems to be then eager for prey, which the Sea Trout neveris, and the Salmon rarely. An example caught at a considerable distance from land inthe same net with Mackarel, had its stomach filled with verysmall fishes, on which also the latter had been gorging them-selves. There is reason to believe, however, that in the Peal,as in most of the Salmon tribe, digestion is quickly performed,so that the stomach is usually found empty. When this fishhas reached the coast it soon passes into the river, and insome cases they enter in considerable numbers, bearing withthem the same kind of parasitic animal as the Salmon, butwhich

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