A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE
byssus. Sometimes this muddy deposit becomes so unresistant as to be washed away by the tides, and then the mussel bed is for a time destroyed. Mussel beds of greater or less extent are to be found all along the Lancashire coast, but the most extensive accumulations are at Morecambe and Heysham. Here there are literally miles of mussel beds, and in some years over 2,000 tons of this animal may be sent away from Morecambe alone. The mussel thrives best in localities where it is not uncovered by the tide for a very long interval, and where some considerable proportion of fresh water finds its way into the sea. Unhappily it must be added that it finds a certain admixture of sewage matters a reason for self-congratulation.
Although these two animals, the cockle and mussel, form perhaps the most abundant element of the Lancashire marine inshore fauna, the shrimp, prawn, and 'fluke' are not far behind them. The shrimp (Crangon vulgaris) is found all along the Lancashire coast a mile or two from low-water marks, but it is particularly abundant about the banks off the estuaries of the Mersey and Ribble, and in Morecambe Bay, and hundreds of boats are almost continually fishing for it there. The value of this little crustacean to the Lancashire fishermen, and to the shrimp potters of Southport and Morecambe, cannot be less than about £50,000 annually. The prawn, 'red shrimp,' or 'sprawn' (not the true prawn, but Pandalus montagui) is found also in all parts of Lancashire waters, but it is particularly abundant in the inshore waters near Fleetwood (hence the term Fleetwood prawn). It inhabits rough stony ground, while the shrimp prefers sand or sand and mud, and it is caught in trawl nets fitted with extra stout foot-ropes so as not to catch on the stones among which the prawn lives.
Then in addition to this characteristic 'shellfish' fauna, consisting of the cockle, mussel, shrimp, and prawn, we find that the Lancashire inshore seas contain enormous numbers of young fishes of comparatively few species. This indeed is the most striking feature of the inshore marine fauna. Nowhere round the British Islands (nor indeed on the north European coasts, so far as I am aware) do we find so abundant a piscine fauna. The whole of the inshore waters, but particularly those off the Mersey, off Blackpool, and in Morecambe Bay, are a vast 'nursery' for young pleuronectid fishes, particularly dabs, plaice, and soles. With these are associated shrimps, 'sprawns,' and a host of invertebrates belonging to comparatively few species. I will illustrate the general character of the fauna of these nursery grounds by quoting the results of a haul with a shrimp trawl witnessed by myself in August, 1899. The shrimp trawl was dragged for about an hour over two miles of sand and mud in the vicinity of the Deposit Buoy off Burbo Bank at the mouth of the Mersey. There were caught: 896 dabs (Pleuronectes limanda), 285 whiting (Gadus merlangus), 265 plaice (Pleuronectes platessa), 257 soles (Solea vulgaris), and 18 ray (Raia clavata). All these are of course edible fishes.
But in addition to such hauls of these common fishes, of which the above figures may be regarded as fairly representative, others are always found, whiting (Gadus æglefinus), cod (G. morrhua), herring (Clupea harenga), sprats (C. spratta), and gurnards (Trigla spp.) being most common. Inedible fishes such as the solenette (Solea lutea), butterfish (Centronotus), the bullhead (Cottus scorpio), the sand eels (Ammodytes tobianus and lanceolatus), the toad
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