Excerpt from Statistics of the Halibut Fishery in the Pacific: Their Bearing on the Biology of the Species and the Condition of the Banks; A Note on a Sporozoan Parasite of the Halibut; The Problem of the Halibut

Among the facts presented in the following pages. The one which stands forth most con apicuoualy is the great effect which the operations of the fishermen have bad on the character of the halibut populations of the various hanks. Not only have they been very extensively depleted. But the proportions of mature and immature. Of large and small ilsb have been radi cally changed. The presence of the greatest numbers of immature fish on those banks which have been exploited for the longest time and most intensely would be extremely misleading cairn the clicct of orertishlng were discounted. It is impossible in this connection to refrain from observing the striking parallelism between this condition and that prevailing in the North Sea in the case of the plaice. There. Although it is known that the Bight of Heiigoiand and the Dutch Coast are regions most intensely fished. The presence of great numbers of immature fish and the absence of mature has been urged in support of theories of migration from these nurseries to the deeper water spawningbanka. However this may be in regard to the plaice. It is evident that migration in the halibut must be shown by other means. It is not intended by this to deny the occurrence of migration. But simply to call attention to the obvious importance of the history of a bank in the consideration of its biological problems. It is a corollary of this that the distribution of large and small ilsb is not a criterion of fast and slow growth unless the depletion of the banks is taken into account. Throughout the attempt to correlate the average also of the fish on a bank and Its geographical position. The use of the terms fast and slow growing as synonyms of large and small has been avoided.

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