artificial fly as bait. Its near relative, the shad, will also give very excellent sport when fished for with the fly. The king of the herring is the tarpon, which frequents the Gulf of Mexico and the coast of Florida. They vary in weight, but often exceed 150 pounds. They are caught on rod and line, as also are the leaping tunas of the Pacific Coast, gigantic mackerel, equaling in size and weight the tarpon. Blackfish weighing from two to nine or ten pounds, and caught by a bait of soft clams, or bits of lobster, with either hand lines or rods, may be found between South Carolina and Massachusetts Bay. In some parts it is known as the tautog (q.v.). Its favorite running places are near sunken wrecks, deserted docks, or where the coast is of rocky formation. The fish above mentioned are the ones which may legitimately be classed as game fish; most of the others, usually deep salt-water fish, as cod, haddock, whiting, and halibut, being caught principally for the market and as a means of livelihood. (See Fisheries.) Sharking (q.v.) is occasionally indulged in off the eastern coast, and sometimes near Nantucket Island. Every State in the Union has its separate fish laws, which, however, are constantly changing in a matter of detail, although their general principles remain the same. Some fish are protected by law from capture by netting, spearing, or any other method except hook and line; and then only during certain months, known as the ‘open season.’ In some States it is unlawful to take fish under a regulation size or weight, and fines and imprisonments are penalties imposed for the transgression of such laws. In brief, the general trend of the law throughout the United States is to prevent the employment of any method which will destroy the supply. The reader is further referred to Angling; Bait-Fishing; Fly-Casting; Game Laws; Graining; Salmon-Fishing; Sharking; Sword-Fishing; Tarpon-Fishing; Trolling; Trout-Fishing.
FISHING BIRDS. Birds subsisting by catching fish, and adapted in structure to their capture and digestion. They do not constitute a scientific group, many widely dissimilar forms having taken up and become adapted to this mode of life, not to include such out-of-the-way species as the kingfishers, and certain fish-eating birds of prey. The fishing birds proper include the larger sea-birds, such as the loons, penguins, auks, puffins, tropic-birds, frigate-birds, cormorants, and gannets; and certain fresh-water families of higher organization, such as the pelicans, darters, most herons, and some ducks. All are either powerful swimmers and divers, or else are skillful in lying in wait and snatching or piercing any fish that comes sufficiently close to their motionless forms. The instrument (except in the Raptores, which use their talons) is the beak, which is long, straight, sharply pointed, and sharp-edged, so that a firm grip may be had of the slippery bodies of their prey. A large part of the prehistoric birds were fish-catchers. Many of these birds have a special provision for bringing home a part of their catch to their young, either by swallowing it as far as the crop, whence it may be disgorged, or by storing it in a bag formed by the distensible membrane between the lower mandibles (e.g. pelicans). Certain more powerful birds (as the jäger gulls) profit by the labors of the fishing birds, compelling them to give up their prey; and men have trained the cormorant to exercise its skill for their benefit. See Cormorant; Gannet; and other birds of this group; and Plate of Fishing Birds.
FISHING BOUNTIES. It was the policy of the English Government to encourage the fisheries, as schools for seamanship, in order that the navy might be readily manned in times of emergency. In the reign of Edward VI. we find statutes compelling people to keep the fast days of the old Church, although Protestantism had already been introduced. This was to keep up the demand for fish. A statute of Elizabeth went further, and removed all import and export duties from fish, and another statute of the same reign encouraged by similar exemption the Iceland trade in herring and cod. In the eighteenth century this legislation had its desired effect of excluding the Dutch from the fishing trade in England, except in the case of the whale fisheries. To meet the latter difficulty, bounties were offered in 1733 and again in 1740 and 1749 to the owners of vessels engaged in the whale fisheries. These bounties were considerable, amounting in 1755 to £55,000, but they did not have the desired effect of increasing the industry.
Following these precedents and others of Colonial times, the American Congress offered bounties to promote the fishing industry. In 1789 bounties were given for the export of dried, salted, and pickled fish; these were increased in 1797 and 1799. An act of 1792 offered extensive bounties to vessels engaged in the cod fisheries of Newfoundland. They varied from $1.50 to $2.50 on the ton, according to the size of the vessel, three-eighths of which went to the owner and the rest to the fishermen. These bounties were finally abolished in 1854. Consult: Statutes of the Realm, 2 and 3 Edward VI., c. 19, 5 Elizabeth, c. 5; Cunningham, Growth of English Industry and Commerce (Cambridge, 1892), i. 443-444; ii. 21-22, 115-116, 282-284. For American legislation, consult United States Statutes at Large, i. 229 sq., 260, 533, 692.
FISHING CAT. A species of wild cat (Felis viverrina), common in eastern India and through Burma and the Malayan Peninsula. It is 30 to 32 inches in length of body, to which must be added 9 to 12 inches of tapering tail. The general color is dark gray, sometimes reddish, striped on the head and neck and spotted elsewhere with dark brown; the throat and breast are white, and the tail barred with chestnut. The peculiarity of this cat is that it subsists mainly upon fish and mollusks of its own catching; but it is said also to he exceedingly fierce, and to carry off children. Consult Mivart, The Cat (New York, 1892).
FISHING CREEK, Battle of. See Mill Springs, Battle of.
FISHING EAGLE. A large eagle (Polioaëtus ichthyaëtus) of India and eastward, which lives by catching fish, having habits and a conformation of claws very similar to those of the osprey.
FISHING FROG. See Angler.
FISHING LAWS. Laws regulating the killing or taking of fish. These are divisible into
