Investigations of the Herring of Passamaquoddy and Adjacent Regions

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Abstract
The young herring ("sardine") fishery is seen as partly dependent on extremely local conditions. The fish first appear in the catches when about 12 months old in August. They are generally segregated into shoals of similar length (within an age-group). Certain areas tend to have herring of particular sizes. The "sardine" region is poorly supplied with herring fry rather than well supplied. Turbidity of the water is the only physical factor found possibly rendering the region specially attractive to herring. Euphausiids at the surface are one of the striking features of the heart of the "sardine" region. The principal species of plankton animals (Thysanoessa, Calanus, Sagitta) behave in a manner best explained by diurnal quiescence and nocturnal activity. Large landings of "sardines" in the "sardine" region as compared with other places is partly to be explained as due to especial ease of capture in that region, but it is uncertain whether there is a larger population of fish. It is clear that the proposed dams across the mouths of Passamaquoddy and Cobscook bays would make considerable havoc of the exceptionally rich fishery in their neighbourhood. The fishery inside the dams would almost certainly be reduced to negligible proportions, since it seems dependent on immigration. It cannot be foretold whether the total effect on capture immediately outside the dams would be deleterious or not. There appears little possibility of a wide-spread effect, for example along the coast of Maine, or even seriously at Grand Manan.

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