t
about and including Eastport and Lubec, where about 30 of the 59
factories and 16 of the 43 operating firms are located; so that, while
the herring catches of recent years have fallen much short of their
former proportions, they still show imposing figures.

In the past much of the catch was taken in St. Andrews (Passamaquoddy)
Bay and along the north shore of the Bay of Fundy to Lepreau Bay and
Point. Lepreau. Of late years virtually no herring have been taken in
these waters, in which the herring schools that arrive in October were
accustomed to remain until spring. Of past fishing in this locality
Capt. Sumner Stuart, of Lubec, says:

"The herring left St. Andrews Bay and the North Shore about 1885. There
is no summer netting there now. Those waters and Lepreau Bay were
formerly very productive fishing grounds, it being not unusual to take
5,000 (count) big herrings (food fish) in a single haul. These were
mainly spring and winter fishing grounds for large herring. The fish
seem to have disappeared from all these grounds at about the same
time.[10]

"In past years (25 to 30 years ago) small herring were driven ashore in
such quantities by their enemies--squid, silver hake and dogfish--that
it sometimes became necessary for the authorities at St. John to use a
snowplow to cover them where they lay decaying on the beach."

From the statistics of the sardine and smoked-herring industry for the
year 1924 (a year, be it noted, in which the sardine industry almost
reached low--level mark for the pack) the waters of the Bay of Fundy
furnished to American purchasers alone a total of herring for smoking
and canning purposes amounting to 76,756,250 pounds valued to the
fishermen at $957,665. This showing, poor as it is when compared with
the figures of other years, by no means represents the herring fishery
as an unimportant industry. There still remains to be accounted for the
catch of herring of Grand Manan and the neighboring Canadian Provinces.

A new source of profit to the fishermen in this industry has been
developed in the purchase of herring scales by firms engaged in the
manufacture of artificial pearls. For this purpose there were collected
at Eastport and Lubec 700,000 pounds of herring scales, valued at
$39,000; and a further amount was taken at Grand Manan of 140,000
pounds, valued at $7,000. With other entrants already in the field, this
branch of the industry bids fair to grow to still greater importance