The fisheries of the British Islands form one of our most important industries, providing regular or occasional employment for nearly 100,000 men and boys in the catching of the fish; for a very great number of persons engaged in secondary occupations connected with the industry, who probably far outnumber the actual fishermen; and for innumerable people of all grades engaged in distributing the eight million pounds' worth of fish brought into the ports of England and Wales each year by British ships alone. The fisheries also furnish an immense quantity of cheap and wholesome food, which, by rapid methods of transit, is available in all parts of the country.

By far the most productive of our fishing-grounds, although not as predominant as it was some years ago, is the North Sea—an area of more than 150,000 square miles, in which are taken more than half of all the British-caught fish, not including shell-fish, which are annually landed on the coasts of England and Wales. More fish are brought, every year, into Grimsby, Hull, Lowestoft, and Yarmouth than into all the other fishing-ports of England put together. It is interesting to note that, while according to the latest returns there were 1731 British steam-trawlers and drifters, exclusive of ordinary fishing-boats, engaged in the North Sea fisheries, there were only 451 similar craft belonging to the ports of Germany, Holland, Belgium, and France put together. In other words there are four British steam-trawlers in the North Sea to every foreigner. Much fishing is also done by English trawlers off the shores of Iceland, Norway, and the FaroËs, and the boats now go as far even as the White Sea and the coast of Morocco.

About half the fish are taken by trawling, which consists in dragging a beam of wood, with a net attached to it, along the bottom of the sea, in comparatively shallow water. Very many different species are caught in this way, but haddock, plaice, and cod are by far the most numerous, and make up between them nearly half the total amount of all the fish landed in England and Wales in a year. Much fishing is also done with seine nets, or with drift nets, both of which are long nets, attached to floats of cork or to air-bladders and let down into the sea without regard to the depth, and sometimes at a considerable distance from the shore. Stake nets, fastened to poles fixed in shallow water near the land, are also much used. Herrings are the chief fish caught in drift nets and seines, and more of them are landed than of any other kind of fish. The latest return gives the total quantity of herrings annually brought into English ports as rather more than 200,000 tons, of cod as about 100,000 tons, and of plaice as about 50,000 tons. Pilchards, which are full-grown sardines, and much resemble herrings in appearance, are caught in large quantities—which, however, seem trifling in comparison with those of the three fish named above—in seine nets off the coasts of Cornwall and Devon, and nowhere else in the British Isles. Many fish, especially halibut, cod, and ling are taken with hook and line, sometimes at great depths. Crabs and lobsters are caught in wicker traps or baskets called pots, and oysters are usually taken by dredging.

Fish Market at Brixham

In spite of its two long stretches of seaboard, the fisheries of Devonshire are not equal in productiveness to those of Cornwall, and are insignificant in comparison with those of the east coast; and the total value of the fish landed at all its ports taken together amounted, according to the latest return, to no more than £150,000, or one-nineteenth of what is landed at Grimsby alone. It was far exceeded at five other east-coast fishing stations.

The fish of the English Channel differ considerably from those of the North Sea. Haddock, the most abundant species on the east coast, is very rare in the south, and practically none are caught at any of the Devonshire fishing stations. The cod, again, is a northern species, and is almost entirely absent from both the Bristol and the English Channels. Whiting is one of the most abundant of English Channel fish; and in this species, as well as in soles and turbot, the south coast is of all the British fishing-grounds second only in productiveness to the east coast. More conger-eels are caught in the English Channel than anywhere else off our islands, and there is also a great abundance of gurnards, skates, and dogfish.

The Devonshire fishermen catch great quantities of whiting, herring, mackerel, sprats, and pilchards, together with considerable numbers of soles, turbot, plaice, pollack, skates, congers, crabs, lobsters, and prawns. Herrings were formerly very abundant off Lynmouth. The last great shoals appeared in 1823. A skate caught off the south coast of Devonshire measured nine feet by six and a half feet, and weighed 560 pounds. The quantity of sprats annually caught in Devonshire waters is very great, but, as in other districts, varies very much in different years. Thus the amount brought into Torquay in 1905 was more than 500 tons, or more than were landed at any other port in the kingdom; but in 1906 the quantity was only 100 tons. Pilchards, as has been already observed, are confined to Cornwall and to the south coast of Devon; but by far the greater quantity are taken at the fishing stations of the former county. Almost all the pilchards caught in Devonshire waters are landed at Plymouth. None are taken further east than Dawlish. These fish, which are particularly oily, are mostly salted and exported to the Mediterranean. Dogfish, which are very abundant and formerly thrown away as worthless, are finding an increasing market, especially in London, where they are filleted and sold as "flake."

Brixham Trawlers

The most important fishing stations are Plymouth, Brixham, and Torquay, the annual value of whose fisheries according to the latest return is about £66,000, £60,000 and £8,000 respectively. There is also a good deal of fishing off Exmouth, Teignmouth, Dartmouth, Torcross, and Budleigh Salterton, where the annual values vary from £4000 to £750 a year. It is interesting to compare these figures with the annual value of the fish brought into Grimsby, which, by the last return, amounted to nearly three millions sterling.

There are valuable salmon fisheries at Exmouth, Teignmouth, and Babbacombe; and most of the Devonshire streams abound with trout, although the fish as a rule run small. Thirteen Devonshire fisheries are named in Domesday Book. The most valuable was that at Dartington, for which two fishermen paid a yearly rent of eighty salmon.